Do the Homeschool Hustle

Do you do the "Homeschool Hustle"? 

You know - that end of the official school year, we've got to figure out curriculum, "we homeschool year round", go to homeschool fairs, meetings and practicums, test, portfolio review, submit paper work - review paper work and then submit it, round up the kids for 4-H - baseball - recitals - end of year projects and make one final push towards the "finish line."

Well let me invite you to stop it. - That's right - I said it!  Get off the crazy train and come on over here for a minute, you can always go back to pulling you hair out if you like.

Do you remember those old tv's?  The ones that were had a tube and a tuner?  Sometimes, usually gradually over several days, they would become staticy.  You wouldn't notice it at first - just a little fuzz once in a while, usually blamed on the weather.  But over the course of several days the picture would just get worse and worse - until it looked like a snowstorm and all you could hear was that annoying white out buzz.  
How did you fix it? Re-adjust your focus.  Tune it back into the signal. 

How do we cure, or prevent, this same white out buzz in our own lives?  Tune back in to the signal. 
Here are some verses for your tuning pleasure

Philippians 4:6-7


Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.
 
2 Peter 1:3

His divine power has given us everything we need for life and godliness through our knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness.

 

Matthew 11:28-30

"Then Jesus said, "Come to me, all of you who are weary and carry heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you. Let me teach you, because I am humble and gentle, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke fits perfectly, and the burden I give you is light."
 
John 14:27


"I am leaving you with a gift--peace of mind and heart. And the peace I give isn't like the peace the world gives. So don't be troubled or afraid."
 
Maybe it is just me, but when I get stressed out - it is usually because I have stopped relying on the Lord to work things out - and have started trying to work them out for myself.  - So my favorite homeschool verses of all.
 
Deuteronomy 11:18-2118 “So commit yourselves wholeheartedly to these words of mine. Tie them to your hands and wear them on your forehead as reminders. 19 Teach them to your children. Talk about them when you are at home and when you are on the road, when you are going to bed and when you are getting up. 20 Write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates, 21 so that as long as the sky remains above the earth, you and your children may flourish in the land the Lord swore to give your ancestors.
 
Happy Homeschooling,
Amanda
 
 

 

 

AWESOME AUCTION - Don't Miss out!

I know many of you are either in favor of the parental rights amendment, or would enjoy the items that are being auctions - there are several gift certificates and quality books and items for sale.


"Dear Champion of Parental Rights,
While many of you will not be able to attend our dinner tomorrow night, you can still take part in our fundraising efforts - and maybe find a bargain for yourself in the process!

Donors have made all kinds of items available for our Silent Auction, with proceeds going to support our efforts to secure the Parental Rights Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. These items will be available at http://www.32auctions.com/ and open for bid from 6:00 a.m. tomorrow (Tuesday, April 20) through 10 p.m. Sunday, April 25. The online auction i.d. is ParentalRights and the password is amendment.

In addition, a few items are being reserved for our dinner guests tomorrow night - but any of these that are not sold will be added to the online site on Wednesday, so be sure to check back for these additional items. Auction winners will be notified Monday, April 26.

A pdf catalog of the auction items - including those not yet available online - is available from our website http://www.parentalrights.org/

Or, you can find the current items listed on the auction site when you're ready to place your bids.

Remember, all proceeds move us closer to securing the Parental Rights Amendment, and all of these items are available with opening bids at a small fraction of their market value. Books, art items, photography and other services, lodging - a wide variety of items and services are available.

Happy bidding, and thank you for supporting the Parental Rights Amendment!

Take your Parents to Court

On April 1, the Islamic nation of Maldives proudly announced a breakthrough in long-stalled negotiations to create an international tribunal to receive complaints from individual children. For twenty years, internationalist efforts to create a new world tribunal for children to challenge the actions of their own governments have been thwarted by political division. But, after a month of negotiations led by Maldives a unanimous agreement was reached on the components for a new optional protocol to be added to the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child.


Maldives is a curious choice to lead negotiations on a human rights treaty. When Maldives signed and ratified the CRC in 1990-91, it boldly rejected any semblance of religious freedom—a central “right” in the CRC. The Maldivian reservation proclaims: “The Government of the Republic of Maldives expresses its reservation to paragraph 1 of article 14 of the said Convention on the Rights of the Child, since the Constitution and the Laws of the Republic of Maldives stipulate that all Maldivians should be Muslims.”

What will this new protocol accomplish? According to Miadhu, a Maldivian news agency, the “protocol to the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC), will create a procedure whereby children who are being abused or their representatives (such as national child protection NGOS, lawyers, and doctors) could seek assistance from international human rights protection mechanisms when domestic institutions are failing to offer protection.” [Read the rest of the article.]

Action Item

This week, we urge you to get two postcards, address one to each of your senators, and send them a brief message along these lines:

Senator {Smith},

I oppose the UN's Convention on the Rights of the Child because it will intrude on the sovereignty of my nation, my state, and my family. The proposed 3rd Optional Protocol now being written will only make matters worse. Please oppose this convention, and support the constitutional amendment (SJ Res.16) that will permanently end this threat.

Respectfully yours,
{signature, address, zip code}

To find your senators' contact information, visit parentalrights.org/States, click on your state, then click on your senators' names to visit their web pages. It will take these cards a few weeks to reach the Senate, but we are hopeful their arrival will coincide with the next stage in our efforts to defeat the CRC. (More details to come!)

Easter

Psalm 51

Have mercy on me, O God, according to your unfailing love; according to your great compassion blot out my transgressions. Wash away all my iniquity and cleanse me from my sin. For I know my transgressions, and my sin is always before me. Against you, you only, have I sinned and done what is evil in your sight, so that you are proved right when you speak and justified when you judge. Surely I was sinful at birth, sinful from the time my mother conceived me. Surely you desire truth in the inner parts; you teach me wisdom in the inmost place. Cleanse me with hyssop, and I will be clean; wash me, and I will be whiter than snow. Let me hear joy and gladness; let the bones you have crushed rejoice. Hide your face from my sins and blot out all my iniquity. Create in me a pure heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me. Do not cast me from your presence or take your Holy Spirit from me. Restore to me the joy of your salvation and grant me a willing spirit, to sustain me. Then I will teach transgressors your ways, and sinners will turn back to you. Save me from bloodguilt, O God, the God who saves me, and my tongue will sing of your righteousness. O Lord, open my lips, and my mouth will declare your praise. You do not delight in sacrifice, or I would bring it; you do not take pleasure in burnt offerings. The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise.

David asks for a lot of stuff here:
teach me
cleanse me
wash me
let me hear joy and gladness
hide your face from my sins, blot out my iniquity
create a new heart in me
renew a steadfast spirit in me
restore to me the joy of salvation
grant me a willing spirit
save me from bloodguilt
open my lips

David know his only hope is God's complete mercy and transformation.  David also knows that the only way this will happen is with a broken heartedness towards sin.

"True repentance has a distinct and constant reference to the Lord Jesus Christ. If you repent of sin without looking to Christ, away with your repentance. If you are so lamenting your sin as to forget the Savior, you have a need to begin all this work over again. Whenever we repent of sin, we must have one eye upon sin and another upon the cross; or, better still, let us have both eyes upon Christ, seeing our sin punished in him, and by no means let us look at sin except as we look at Jesus. A man may hate sin just as a murder hates the gallows but this does not prove repentance. If I hate sin because of the punishment, I have not repented of sin; I merely regret that God is just.
But if I can see sin as an offense against Jesus Christ, and loathe myself because I have wounded him, then I have a true brokenness of heart. If I see the Savior and believe that those thorns upon his head were put there by my sinful words; if I believe that those wounds in his heart were made by my heart-sins; if I believe that those wounds in his feet were made by my wandering steps, and that the wounds in his hands were made by my sinful deeds, then I repent after a right fashion. Only under the cross can you repent. Repentance elsewhere is remorse, which clings to the sin and only dreads the punishment. Let us then seek, under God, to have a hatred of sin caused by a sight of Christ's love.
When I sat on this platform on Monday night, and marked your sobs, in tears, and heard the suppressed sighs and groans of the great multitude then assembled, I could not but say. Behold! And yet it ought not to be a wonder, it ought not to be a strange thing for God’s people to be in earnest, or for sinners to feel brokenness of heart.
Psalm 51 is the photograph of a contrite spirit. Oh, let us seek after the like brokenness of heart, for however excellent our words may be, yet if the heart is not conscious of the blackness and hell-deservingness of sin, we cannot expect to find mercy with the Judge of all the earth. If the Lord will break your heart, consent to have it broken; asking that he may sanctify that brokenness of spirit to bring you in earnest to a savior, that you may yet be numbered with the righteous ones."
Charles Spurgeon

I never looked at a broken heart as a blessing - but I think that it must be, because if God will speak to me in this way it is only because He loves me and wants to restore me.

For this is what the high and lofty One says he who lives forever, whose name is holy: I live in a high and holy place, but also with him who is contrite and lowly in spirit, to revive the spirit of the lowly and to revive the heart of the contrite. — Isaiah 57:15

Happy Easter,
Amanda