I didn't tell you guys about the last time I almost died. Well, here it is:

It was a beautiful sunny saturday morning and the other women from church and myself were going to a conference in Orlando. We were going to drive there and I was in the car of lady B, along with two other ladies and The Kid. I was about seven months pregnant at the time. Lady A was to lead the group of cars and she wasn't doing a very good job about it. Let's just say that for about 45 minutes, she had us lost withing 15 miles of church. Yes, that means we were driving around in circles in the same general area. Then, once we finally made it to the 75mph minimum highway, she kept on switching lanes like it was going out of style or something; completely forgetting that there were other cars following her. We had to pull over in the middle of the highway because someone got a flat tire. After getting some confusing signals, lady B pulled out of the grassy area and went into the right lane of the highway and stopped.

Yes, she came to a complete stop in the 75mph highway waiting for lady A to pull out. Lady A didn't pull out cuz she was fixing her makeup or talking. Meanwhile, I get this funny feeling and look behind me (did I mention that I was riding in the backseat along with The Kid? Well, I was) and lo and behold there's the biggest 18 wheeler truck in our lane that we are totally stopped in and he's honking his horn, hitting his brakes, and I could see the man's terrified face as he realized that he was going to plummet into our car. Two things I did at once, yell at lady B to move your car woman git! git! git! And realize that I was probably going to die alongside foetus mccletus and The Kid since we were in the backseat and would get hit first. My life flashed before my eyes. The Kid happily munched on some cheerios and blueberries.

Thankfully lady B moved the car back into the grassy area and we survived. The truck driver's tires did not. There was so.much.smoke coming from his tires from when he was slamming on his breaks that I think they may have caught on fire, remember it was a 75+mph highway and he was going pretty fast. Little foetus mccletus did not move at all for the rest of the drive. It was pretty scarey. We made it to the conference and on the way back they had someone else be the leader of the cars. That ride was so satisfyingly boring that I almost peed my pants. Oh lets face it, I was pregnant, it didn't take much to make me pee my pants.

And that my friends, is the tale of how I almost died.

Katherine Marie said...
Are you flippin' married to a pastor?! Are you like the family in "Seventh Heaven"?! O jeeze.

I am so not like the family in "Seventh Heaven". I own my house and don't have meddling old biddies sweeping through it to make sure that the church's property is being taken care of. I am married to a pastor. One of three pastors at my church. But he doesn't really do the pastor thing, he's actually the treasurer of the church (and no katie, we don't "borrow" money from church with or without the intent of paying it back). Plus, if I had that many kids I might flush them all down the toilet. Or try. I would at least try.

**edited to add** Oh yeah, I wear pants and gasp! Makeup.

"Preach the Gospel at all times; when necessary, use words." That advice, originally given by St. Francis of Assisi, is applicable today, because how you behave tells the world what you believe. How you treat others, how you spend your money, how you maintain your house, car, and other possessions, and even how you drive all speak loudly about what you believe.

The world is hungry for something real; they're searching for answers to life. But the world's not reading the Bible; they're reading Christians. And they will recognize true Christians by their fruit, not their mouth, not their bumper sticker, not their cross earrings, but their fruit--their actions (Matthew 7:20).

Clearly, how you behave tells the world what you believe. In other words, your life is a sermon.

Therefore, it is very understandable that James instructs: Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says. Anyone who listens to the word but does not do what it says is like a man who looks at his face in a mirror and, after looking at himself, goes away and immediately forgets what he looks like (James 1:22-24).

Faith involves more than hearing and believing; faith demands action. Therefore, the best way to preach the Gospel is to live the Gospel, because how you live boldly declares what you believe

I don't think Katie realized what my point was in that post. My point wasn't so much to make fun and point and stare at what them kids was doing (although it was fun to do so). No, my point was more on the lines of the fact that the girl in question (paris hilton wannabe)is twelve years old. Not 20, not 15, not even 14. She's 12. What kind of mother allows and buys their child vagina baring skirts? Seriously, what kind of mother? I'm not trying to imply that you keep your child dressed like a pentecostal woman (I can say that because I used to be one, and am/have been friends with many of them), I just think that children should be children. This brings me back to something I saw at a family fair. A girl, couldn't have been more than two, was wearing a teeeny tiny belly baring shirt. Not the cutesey kind that just shows the belly. The womanly kind that ties and ends just beneath the breasts (with the long sleeves, gotta have the long sleeves). This girl was wearing diapers and she was dressed "sexy". Since when do children have to be sexy???@@!!! Especially in Florida, where sex offenders outnumber you two to one. Currently there are 153 of those perverts in a two mile radius from my house. And those are only the registered ones. Don't even go into all the crazies that have not been charged/found out about yet.

The point is, children in this country are at an ever growing threat of being molested/abused/touched and by sexualizing them, we ain't helping any. Whatever happened to good old children's clothing? I walk by the girls section at the local hellmart and all I see is rows upon rows of ultra minis, high heels (for toddlers nonetheless. Don't they have to learn how to walk first?) and clothing that would look sexy on someone with boobs.

I'm concerned about how these girls that are taught body image from an even earlier age than we were will end up in the future. As we can see with the paris hilton wannabe (I only say that because she may or may not be chockfull of diseases and she may or may not know how to write), she's heading down a bad path. Who, do you think told her that if you wear a cleavage revealing shirt (she does not have cleavage, that's the sad part) you shouldn't pair it with a mini. Who told her that it's not okay to ditch skool to go partying with a guy that's old enough to drink. Who, upon seeing what she was wearing, sent her back to her room to wear something decent? No one, that's who. And that is her problem. Does the blame lay on the girl for her attitude and easy ways, or on her parents for turning her into what she is? Will Teresa tell Ethan that he's the real father of Little Ethan? Will she ditch Ethan to be with Jared? Will Fancy discover who the rapist was? Will Sheridon finally stop getting in between Luis and Fancy?...

Got you with the title didn't I? It was a beautiful church service. Pastor was preaching and Translator Girl was translating... Somebody decided that they just couldn't hold off anymore and started making out with their girlfriend. Now, let me just say that maybe, just maybe this someone is my nephew and that he is 14 years old. And that maybe, just maybe this girl is 12 years old (although she is *mature* for her age). And by *mature* I mean that she has said in the middle of church that "all the girls hate her because they think she steals their boyfriends, but it ain't my fault that their boyfriends like me" and that by *their boyfriends like me* I mean that she's told ADULT women at church that they're lucky they're married because she would so totally take their husbands from them. And by husbands I mean men twice her age...

But I digress. Let's just say that maybe, just maybe the kisses were so wet, that someone had to wipe the spit off of the girl's cheeks. Now remember that this is inside the temple while the pastor is preaching. And that the parents of one of these hooligans are sitting three, maybe four seats away. And that the father said he didn't see such a thing. And did I mention that this girl wears bandeau minis so short she can't sit down? My goodness, not even when I was at my hoochiest I wore things that short. It's scandalous, it deserves a stoning of sorts. Okay, I admit it. I've been hankering for a good old fashioned stoning for a while and if there ever was a situation that warranted it, this was it.

I don't like to talk about people but, when you're seen licking the inside of someone's ear at church you're pretty much up for grabs. Now, not many people saw this happening and the pastor didn't call them out in the middle of service. They weren't told, but I'm pretty sure that if they ever try that again, someone's gonna grab the microphone and point them to the happy couple.

Ew. What kind of person liplocks in church? Even when I was all about making out with guys in different, exotic places (like under the pier in Myrtle Beach. Or the Firehouse with a fireman. Or maybe a motorcycle) I still respected churches. I mean, you don't want God to strike you down and smite you.

Now I'm curious, would you ever make out in a church? Let me know in the comments section or write in your post and let me know.

Yeah, well. I do believe that Jesus came as a baby and that he died in the cross for me. I do believe that Christ came back on the third day but I don't believe in this "christmas" thing that is celebrated at this time of year. Why? Well, first of all I believe in logic and reason and things just don't add up.

Don't be offended, please. God forbid I lose my 3.5 commenters. The thing is that there are so many things that don't add up regarding this holiday that I can't follow. No where in The Bible does it say that Jesus was born on December 25, yet people act as if it's his actual birthday. If you read The Bible closely, logic and reason show that he was actually born in the fall. Why? Because the angels announced it to the shepherds tending the sheep. It gets cold in Israel during wintertime so it rules that season out. There was a census going on at that time. In those times, eveverything rose and fell according to the harvest. That means that until all the crops were harvested no farmer wanting to live through the winter would've left his field. Yet there were so many people in Bethlehem that there was no available room. This leaves out summer and early fall. It couldn't have happened in the springtime because it's planting season, and once again the farmers wouldn't have been able to leave their land. People really lived off the land during that time for sustenance and profit. It wouldn't have been economically motivating for the Roman rulers to order something that would eventually affect the amount of money they received from the Jews.

This leaves mid to late fall as the only possible time. Now, the wise men. The Bible doesn't say how many there were nor how long it took them to get to Jesus and his mother. The Bible does say that they were come into the house. If they had found Jesus right where he was born, it would've said barn. It also says that right after they left Joseph was told to leave Israel. This is when Herod killed all young children less than two years old. "according to the time which he had diligently enquired of the wise men." He wouldn't have had a need to kill all two year olds if there had been no time passed between the birth of Jesus and the time the wise men showed up in front of Jesus. Also I know that the Catholic church first had about 20, then 2 then 3 wise men. They even named them. There are no names in The Bible for them.

I have to go back to work, but this is my little rant of the day. Don't get me wrong, I just have a problem with something that maybe started out as a good thing but has now become completely commercialized. Christmas is about satisfiying the ego. How many presents did I get? How good were they? How many did I give? Give me, give me, gimme. That's all there is to it nowadays. It's nothing more than a marketing scheme. I choose to get presents and give them if there's a secret angel thing going on at my job. I choose to pick a card off the angel tree and give presents to a needy child. I don't ban christmas music. I don't go to the company christmas party. But who wants to spend more time than necessary with the crazies at my job? I hope that you're not offended by my not wanting to celebrate this time of the year just as I'm not offended by your wanting to celebrate it.

I don't really post much about Godly things here because I don't want the controversy but this I gotta post. The women from my church were invited to another church service.

Now, just so you know. My church is pretty kewl. Women are allowed to wear pants, makeup, jewelry, shave, and even cut and color our hair if we want. I said that because most Hispanic Christian churches are what we call "rajatablas." The women of the church we went to had no makeup on, long (almost ankle lenght) skirts, (probably)unshaved legs, no earrings, and had the requisite "brillo pad" hair bun (that's where the grey hair and unkempt hair gets so bad, it literally resembles a brillo pad). And we were given looks for being cute.

Anyways, that's not the point of my story. Here's the kicker, when it came to pick up the offering the pastor of the church grabbed the mike and said the most unbelievable things. He started to talk about how they're redoing the tile in his house (house doesn't belong to the church but to pastor) and how after seven years the tile had cracked and the company had refunded them 1/2 the original price of the tiles. The refund was only "$12,000 and that's only half the cost, so you can do the math about how much more is needed."

He also said things like: "Oh? You think that YOUR house has to be better than the pastor's? Nosirre, The pastor's house has to be better than your house." He also made public the names of those men that hadn't gone there to help him as well as the name of the person in whose house he would be staying for a few days.

I only say this because:
1. It's pretty unbelievable, I can't believe that someone would say that. Basically, this pastor believes that he is more holy than the rest of his church. It's this kind of mindset that has pushed so many Hispanic people out of church.

2. I don't like it that the other Hispanic churches in our town will invite us to their activities just to fill in their seats, but they won't come to ours. Since we are only one of a handful of churches that allow such radical liberal things like leg shaving and heels, it's to be expected. But still, I don't like it.

3. Did I mention that it's unbelievable?

4. The pastor never said that the offering was for him, but he never said that the church was going to keep the money in the offering. So now I'm not sure if he dips into the offering plate. And frankly, the church could use some sprucing up to make it prettier.

* Oh yeah, we told our pastors this (they weren't able to go to the service for various reasons) and they could barely believe us. We also told our senior pastor that if he EVER tried something like that, we'd walk right out (we are friends so we can tell him things straight up).