Tonight we played a rousing game of Balderdash. In this hilarious bluffing game, a word is selected form the card box and the players make up definitions trying to get the others to vote for theirs believing it is the correct one. Usually definitions are believable or just funny. Mine tend to lean toward the funny side. For example, the word “acouchy”(pronounced like ‘a-coochy) came up and I, thinking it sounded like a combination between “couch” and “squishy”, wrote “A squishy couch.” Needless to say I was in last place. Another funny word was “pixilated,” which produced results like, “The after-effect of snorting pixi sticks”; “To drown in fairy dust”; and “To be utterly confused to the bone so that your pixi sticks come out.” This actually means “eccentric and mischievious.” Ah well, my stomach muscles aching and my vocabulary enhanced…

We’ve had a wonderful weekend having my sister as well as our good friend Bradford in town. We celebrated New Year’s Eve at an all-nighter. Monica and I stayed until about 4 am around which we found it absolutely necessary to leave due to our laughter turned to uncontrollable cackling. Mostly we have been attempting to stay warm and dry by having a crakling glowing fire and a collection of old movies to watch. We worked our way through It’s a Wonderful Life, Flight of the Pheonix, Mr. Smith Goes to Washington and a mystery called The Big Sleep. One afternoon Monica and I braved the rain and went shopping. I bought a new rug for my kitchen and a tweed handbag, she found some shoes and a scented candle for mom. I’m looking foreward to having tomorrow off from work since she isn’t going home until later afternoon. Who knows what kind of pixilating things we will find to do…

I was challenged today by Bobby’s talk on a rather pressing and pertinent issue: victorious Christian Living. I find that victory is not popular among most Christians. Though it seems like a good idea it also seems like a very unrealistic way to live. People are always talking about frustrations at work, troubles in the family and ongoing struggles with sin. We quickly attribute our defeats to humanity. But victory is the essence of the everyday life of a believer. “But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.”(1 Corinthians 15:57) “God be thanked that though you were slaves to sin, yet you obeyed from the heart…and having been set free from sin, you became slaves to righteousness.”(Romans 6:17-18) We don’t have to keep struggling in our sin, or remain trapped in our troubles because Christ has set us free from this kind of life. Instead we can be about loving God, loving others and walking in obedience to the Father. One of the great areas this encompasses is temptation. The battle is between living in sin or in righteousness. The awsome reality is that this battle has been won for those who believe in Jesus as Lord. This changes how I see temptation. 1 Corinthians 10:13 says, “No temptation has overtaken you except such as is common to man; but God is faithful, who will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able, but with the temptation will also make the way of escape, that you may be able to bear it.” Sinning is my choice. Sin does not happen to me, I do not “fall” into it, I choose it. The freeing truth is that I don’t have to, I can choose righteousness. There is nothing that I am tempted in which is unique or different. God never allows me to be tempted beyond what I could handle. And there is always a way of escape. This means there is always a response that I could choose that is not sin. I like how Bobby called people who live like this overcomers. I want to be an overcomer. I know I have experienced what it is like to listen and think and take time to choose godly responses. To choose not to gossip or lie, to confront a friend out of love, being thankful rather than complaining. Walking obedient to the Lord is a freeing and peaceful way to live. “These things I have spoken to you that in Me you may have peace. In this world you will have tribulation; but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world.” (John 16:33) I can’t think of a better way to live, than as an overcomer.

Happy New Year!