[1] Last week Tyler turned 6 months old! To celebrate we took him in the swimming pool—one of his new-favorite things to do. The last few weeks he has been getting up on all fours and rocking forward and backward—no crawling yet though! It is such a joy to see him grow and develop. He’s even teething now too! Bobby has been teaching him how to give “fives” which is fun because he wants to do it to people if they hold their hand out. I notice a big change in the last month where Tyler is much more social and it’s pretty easy to get him smiling, talking and laughing. He also likes exploring things more, it seems that he’s always looking around for something to touch and wants to see what things taste like. He has yet to try any solid foods, but I’m sure that will be coming up this month.

Things with our youth group are going well. Bobby is teaching a series called[2] “Back to School with Daniel” to get the students ready to return to school in the next few weeks. During the summer we do “Beach Day” every Wednesday and I have been blessed to have a girls small group for that each week. It takes time to get to know people and for people to feel comfortable with us shepherding this group, but I think we’re getting there.

Last Wednesday Bobby recapped his lesson from Sunday and then gave us some application-questions for small groups. The questions were from 2 Corinthians 10:3-5–

[3] As we discussed thought patterns that we need to get in order I realized how daunting this can seem. I was convicted of some thoughts I need to take into obedience and they can seem so huge, not even able to get in control. Sometimes I wonder if we don’t even bother trying because we know that we have strong habits and are too stubborn or lazy to really change. It can be overwhelming to start breaking habits and getting control of our thoughts, but it is worth the pain it may take to discipline ourselves. We know it isn’t better to live in disobedience and unfruitful for the Lord.

At our previous youth group we studied Cliff McManis’s book Christian Living Beyond Belief. In his chapter “Think!” Cliff makes it clear that it is vital that Christians know how to think properly–according to the Truth in God’s Word.