Knight In Shining Armor

As young women we long to be swept off our by a knight in shining armor. We have fairy-tail dreams that are all-too-often disapointed by the guys in our lives. But tonight I want to tell you the most beautiful Valentine's story ever.

Let me start by telling you about two necklaces I own. One is a large, beautiful crystal-cut heart necklace. The other is also a heart, this one of solid metal and inscribed with the words of John 15:13, "Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends."

Like my crystal necklace, there are many ways we can strive to look beautiful on the outside and reflect a good image to the world around us, just like the facets on this necklace reflect beautiful colors and light. To look at most of us you might think that we “have it all together.” But if I take off my necklace and hold it away from light, we can see that all that beauty is just outward and that inside there is nothing there but plain glass. Sometime what we portray to the world is simply a disguise for the fragile emptiness we are feeling inside.

We all have different heartaches. Yours may be longing for someone to love or be loved by. Or trying to make your body look differently than it does in order to fill that void in you heart. At one time in my life my emptiness drove me to the point desperation and even contemplating suicide. No one could see that lonely emptiness inside, but I knew it was there. The heartache and grief consumed me every day and I felt abandoned by God because it seemed that He didn't even care.

But thankfully how I may "feel" about God doesn't dictate reality. Lamentations chapter 3 is a long book of heartache about all the things this author suffered. But hidden right in the midst of his complaints, he dramatically shifts gears for a few verses and boldly proclaims, "Yet this I call to mind and therefore I have hope: Because of the LORD's great love we are not consumed, for his compassions never fail." While I was busy feeling overlooked by Him, He had already been going out of His way to prove the opposite to me.

What is the value of something? It isn't really the cost of an item as much as it is what someone is really willing to pay. There are many things I don't buy because the price tag is higher than I feel the value to be. But God placed the ultimate value on me when He choose to pay the price of His son's life to prove His love for me! Many of us know the verse John 3:16, "For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life." God made this verse very personal to me when I realized that "God so long to call me His daughter that He allowed the death of His only biological son to pay the price of my adoption."

If you are feeling empty and fragile and wondering about God's love for you, He has proved it better than any knight in shining armor ever could. Remember the verse on my second necklace, John 15:13? "Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends." Just like this necklace is strong and solid and full of meaning, when I put my hope in God and trust Him at His word even when I don't "feel" Him there, He fills that empty place in my heart with hope.

” Yet this I call to mind
and therefore I have hope:
Because of the LORD's great love we are not consumed,
for his compassions never fail.
They are new every morning;
great is your faithfulness…
For men are not cast off
by the Lord forever.
Though he brings grief, he will show compassion,
so great is his unfailing love.“

-Lamentations3:21-23, 3:31-32 (NIV)

Teens for Safe Cosmetics

I stumbled across a fantasitc website today, Teens for Safe Cosmetics. This organization was founded and is run by young women who are passionate about using healthy beauty products that do not contain ingrediants linked to cancer, reproductive issues or other health risks. Check them out today at http://www.teensforsafecosmetics.org/

Win FREE Wii™ System!, an iPod™ Nanos, or signed copies of THE BOOK OF NAMES

I'm stepping a bit outside my usual offering with this one, but the prizes (a FREE Wii™ System!, an iPod™ Nanos, and signed copies of THE BOOK OF NAMES, by D. Barkley Briggs of http://hiddenlands.net ) are just too big to ignore. So I emailed the author and asked if his book touched on true beauty in any ways. Here's Mr. Briggs' reply, along with a short passage from his book.

"The central theme of my book is about the power of identity, and where true identity originates. While the tone is geared more towards boys, I've heard from plenty of girls about how much they love the fantasy genre (as well as from their moms and grandmas who are buying it for them)."

The following scene involves Hadyn, the older brother, being captured by the Nameless. He is being hauled away in the hold of a ship along with many other Nameless/Lost, on their way to the island of the sorceress Nemesia. They go to her to forget themselves and their pain:

"I don't know what Kyra means. I just know I don't like it. I never have."
"Why? It's very pretty."
"That is why. I am not nearly so pretty as my name."
Hadyn, taken aback, quickly realized he needed to be careful. He did not want to risk offending whatever new friend or ally he had just gained. Kyra had smooth skin and bright eyes flecked with mischief not yet lost to Nemesia. Like all the Lost, she was dirty and worn, but most anyone seeing her would have thought her attractive. Not beautiful, but cute. And feminine, with a girlish, fluttering voice.
"I don't much like being a girl," she said, as if reading his thoughts. "Always guessing what other people think about me. I grew up watching the Revlon Cirque in Portaferry. Now those are women! So beautiful and graceful, with those huge feathers in their long, twirling hair."
"I'm sorry. I don't know what that is."
"The Cirque? Are you even from here? You talk funny."
"To be honest, I don't know how to tell you where I'm from."
"Well, everyone here loves the Revlon Cirque," Kyra smirked. "They are the most marvelous carnivale in all the world. Men desire them. Women envy them. Paintings of them hang in the streets. They are rich and famous." She lowered her eyes. "I do not have their shape, their face, or their fame. I never will. When I told a friend once how I wished I could be a Revlon, she laughed at me."
Hadyn spoke gently. "Not much of a friend, I'd say."
Kyra was unmoved. She pulled out a small round mirror from the folds of her gown. It fit in the palm of her hand. She gazed into it sadly. "That is only because you do not see what I see every day in the looking glass."

- from THE BOOK OF NAMES, by D. Barkley Briggs. Used by permission from NavPress. Copyright 2008, all rights reserved. www.navpress.com


So I leave you with this simple question... What do you see every day in your looking glass?

Winners for Two Months Running!

And yet a second congratulations to the Reno Homeschool Wonderful Wacky Writers for taking first place in the Silly Books international writing contest for a second straight month! Check out their Penguin's Peanut Butter story. :)

Kid Author Congratulations!!!

Congratulations to my Eagle Homeschool Co-op Writing for Publication class, the Reno Homeschool Wonderful Wacky Writers (RHWWW), who have just won the February writing contest at SillyBooks.net! Please view their adorable story, Pirates, Popcorn and a Party that has been professionally illustrated as part of their winning package.

Looking for more resources for homeschooling writers? Check out homeschoolwriters.com for a great list of contests and writing resources!

Growing in Beauty - Guest blog with author Camy Tang!

Something many of you may not know about me is that I was raised in Japan for seven years of my childhood. So is it especially fun for me to share today's blog with Camy Tang who describes herself as "the loud Asian chick who writes loud Asian chick lit." She used to be a biologist, but now she is a staff worker for her church youth group and leads a worship team for Sunday service. She also runs the Story Sensei fiction critique service. On her blog, she gives away Christian novels every Monday and Thursday, and she ponders frivolous things like dumb dogs (namely, hers), coffee-geek husbands (no resemblance to her own...), the writing journey, Asiana, and anything else that comes to mind. Visit her website at www.camytang.com for a huge website contest going on right now, giving away five boxes of books and 25 copies of her latest release, ONLY UNI.

Welcome, Camy. Thank you for joining us to share your reflections on beauty!

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Thanks for having me here, Jenni!

I love the verse for your Inner Beauty Girlz website, 1 Peter 3: “Beauty should not come from outward adornment... Instead, it should be that of your inner self, the unfading beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is of great worth in God's sight.”

It took me a long time to understand my inner beauty and to be happy with who I am. For most of my teenage years and even my twenties, I spent too much time being embarrassed for being awkward, nervous about making a social mistake, shy to put myself forward.

I knew my self-esteem was low, but I thought it was “natural” or that I needed to exert myself more in order to raise it. I knew that my self-esteem ought to be dependent solely on Christ, but I didn’t know how to go about doing that, and couldn’t get what I knew in my head to make an impression on my heart and how I felt.

It wasn’t until I reached my late twenties that I started to understand how to let Christ determine my self-esteem. I’d been under the misapprehension that I needed perfect social graces to be acceptable to other people. That mistakes on my part would make people think of me as strange or odd, and at all costs, I didn’t want to stand out or be thought of as a weirdo.

But slowly I started to understand who I really was, who God had made me. Slowly I started being happier with exactly who God had made me—a bit awkward, with an unusual sense of humor, a bit out of the ordinary.

And that was okay.

I made an effort to stop being nervous about social mistakes I made. I learned to ignore my mistakes or laugh at them. And I discovered that while some people DID think I was odd, I started making friends with people who DIDN’T think I was odd.

God sent me friends who loved who I was—awkward, strange, a bit of a dingbat. He gave me people to be my sisters in Christ, and a husband who completes me in ways I didn’t realize I needed him.

I have found my inner beauty, and realized it was there all the time, the beautiful person God had made me to be. When I could accept who I am, and stopped trying to be who I was not, He drew people to me who also saw my beauty. He helped me see myself as His child.

And because of what He’s done for me, this is my prayer for all my readers, too—that they will co me to see themselves as God made them, and to accept who they are.

Winner of My Life, Unscripted

Plaughersquared, you are the winner of the January drawing for My Life, Unscripted by Tricia Goyer! Please email me at jennifer AT saake DOT biz (removing spaces and replacing AT and DOT with @ and .) with your mailing address by February 15, 2008, and I will be happy to drop this wonderful book in the mail to you!