My Little Pianist

Since this is the season, I want to mention something else that I am thankful for. 

Even if being in the States has been hard and an adjustment, I want to share how thankful I am for being here. God has done so many wonders while being in the US. There are so many things I can mention but today is a special day and I want to be thankful for Benedetta and the possibility to let her play the piano.

I know it may seem not so spiritual but it is. Growing up I have always wanted to play an instrument but my family could not afford it. I think music is just one of those things that helps espress yourself, if you are going through some difficult times or if you are rejoicing because of the great things the Lord is doing in your life. 

When we were in Italy I had looked and looked for piano lessons for the girls but they were just insanely expensive.

Once here in the States, we met this young lady at our Bible study. After a few meetings we overheard this conversation about a pedagogy class at the College and the need of some kids so the college students could practice teaching on the kids. There were only two spots left and one of them was almost taken. So basically only one was available.

We prayed and prayed and if we would have known what we knew a few months later (our support dropped) we would have probably not signed her in. But the Lord made everything possible so we were encouraged to sign Benedetta up into this program. The Lord provided financially for the first and second semester, He even provided for an incredibly old, used clavinova electric piano. 

We have been so blessed to see our little talented girl play for fun, play for us and compose her own music and songs.

Today she had her fall recital and it was just amazing being there and seeing those little hands moving around the piano keys, and those eyes concentrated on her music sheet. 

Benedetta played "Italy My Home," I don't know if it is the true title of the song, but I love it and Benedetta plays it often for me to remind me of the beauty of my homeland.

So one of the MANY blessings of being here is being able to get Benedetta to take lessons. On the other side their school provides a good music program and Hannah gets to play the flute. 

When you look at it from a human prospective, it doesn't seem that big of a deal. But when you look at it with the eyes of faith you can see that the Lord takes care of us in every little details and gives us things that are unexpected, from the big ones to the small ones. He gives gifts that sometime we wouldn't even be able to imagine!

I will give thanks to the Lord with my whole heart

"I will give thanks to the Lord with my whole heart;

I will recount all of your wonderful deeds.

I will be glad and exult in you;

I will sing praises to your name, O Most High."

Psalm 9:1-2

Today at 6.30 a.m. I got a message from my husband saying that he had been in a car accident on his way to seminary. The news came as a shock, Josh is an excellent driver, but sometimes that is not enough on California's highways.

Josh was fine but for the rest of the morning I was just thanking God for protecting him and not allowing anything bad to happen to him. 

November is the month of thankfulness and today from the moment I opened my eyes I have been thankful that the Lord has granted this wonderful man to be ok in the midst of a bad situation. This could have been a day of tears, but I am thankful for God's goodness. 

When Josh and I met, we didn't know how the Lord was going to transform our lives and on what adventurous paths He was going to bring us. It has been an amazing adventure living my life with Josh.

Josh is an amazing man that loves me as Christ loves the Church.

He is an amazing father, who loves and cares for his three little ladies. He loves them with a compassionate and graceful heart! 

Josh is a wonderful man who has a great passion to serve the Lord and follow Him. 

I am glad I married Josh 11 years ago, I am glad the Lord took two different lives from two different worlds and put us together. 

I am thankful for this man in my life and I am thankful today for God's protection over Him.

I will thank the Lord with all my heart, and I will recount all of His deeds. Our God is an amazing and good God.

What are you thankful for?  

Let your doctrine dictate to your heart!

David’s response to difficult times

I know many missionaries in Italy, one of them is my hero. One time in talking with his wife about the difficulties in life, we talked about the time her husband was depressed. The news came to me as a shock, thinking that certain things don’t happen to believers, much more to missionaries.

Have you ever faced something like depression?

So my question for today is, how are we to react if we ever face depression or know somebody that is affected by it?

What is depression.

It is a mix of negative feelings that effect our life to the point that we are unable to do the things that we used to do. It makes us passive and apathetic!

The thing is that those feelings are related to things that happen in life, can you think of some examples?

- loss of job

- loss of a child or a loved one

- having a serious illness

- hormone change

- post partum

In Psalms 3 David was going through some difficult times, what was his response in a time of crisis?

When David was writing this Psalm, his son Absalom was trying to take his kingdom and because of this plot, David is forced to leave his palace and run away for his life was in danger.

v1. Many were those who were against David and that supported Absalom. Many who used to be David’s friends betrayed him, turned their back on David. His own son acted evil against him.

v2. Those who were supporting Absalom probably thought that there was no more hope for David. From a human prospective, Absalom had many people that supported David's friends and enemies had every reason to think that David was done!

David had very right to be depressed, His own son, his friends betrayed him, he was forced to leave.

v3. David, however, knew some important truths: God was his shield - what does a shield do? Protects. David knew God was his protection.

God was the lifter of his head - when I think of this sentence an image comes to mind, the one of a child who is sad, discouraged. As a parent what do you do? You lift his chin up to encourage him. God is the One who lifts our chin up when we are down. God was his encourager.

v4. David cried as he prayed and God answered. What was the answer?

v5. “I lay down and slept” - how many times when we are troubled we loose sleep? We start thinking about the whys, and how's to solve the problems and it feels like a storm in our brain.

“I awoke for the Lord sustains me” - often when things go bad and we feel depressed, one of the major tendency is to want to sleep, almost to say "I don’t want to get up and deal with the problem” or “there is no hope, why do I even bother?” Well, David slept well and He also woke up knowing that the Lord sustained Him. David knew that God was his sustainer, He gave him peace at night and strength to face the day.

6. God took his fear- David was not afraid of what lied ahead, now he was able to fight them because he knew God was the only one who can save Him. One of the first things that we learned from David's life was that as a shepherd he faced so many wild animals. He was confident in God’s help, that is why he wanted to face Goliath, he knew even if he wasn’t as strong as the giant, God was on his side. Sometimes we forget how God has helped us in the past.

7. David’s prayer was the one for God’s urgent intervention.

8. The Lord saves and blesses 

The Psalm never states what the end result was in the battle. We aren't given insights into the battle strategies or whether or not David won or lost. David’s positive reaction was not based on the situations. God in fact had not changed the situation yet. David’s reaction was based on what he knew about God.

- God was his protection

- God was His encouragement

- God was his sustainer (peace at night and strength to face the day )

- God takes his fears

- God saves

Most of David’s strength in this difficult time was in his head, he defeated his feelings by speaking to his mind about God.

How many times do we face difficulties? What is our reaction? I think we know all these truths but for them to be effective we need to live them and be driven by them especially in the difficult time.

Let your doctrine dictate to your heart what it should think and feel!

Two Wolves

An old Cherokee chief was teaching his grandson about life.

“A fight is going on inside me,” he told the young boy, “a terrible fight between two wolves.  One is evil, full of anger, sorrow, regret, greed, self-pity and false pride.  The other is good, full of joy, peace, love, humility, kindness and faith.”

“This same fight is going on inside of you, grandson…and inside of every other person on this earth.”

The grandson ponders this for a moment and then asks, “Grandfather, which wolf will win?”

The old man smiled and simply said,

“the one you feed.”

"But I say, walk by the Spirit and you will not gratify the desire of the flesh. for the desire of the flesh are against the spirit, and the desire of the spirit are against the flesh, for these are opposed to each other, to keep you from doing the things you want to do." 

Galatians 5:16

How can we walk by the Spirit? By living a life based on the word of God, knowing what he wants from us will help us have a renewed mind and so to live a transformed life, a life where we will be encouraged to live for God.

A colorful month!

October, such a colorful month! This year even if we are very busy, we decided to go to a pumpkin patch, it was our first time!

It was an hectic morning because I had a brunch with seminary wives and our Bible study leader. We had a great time there. It was so amazing to share our story and how God brought us all here at seminary, to hear of the many plans He uses into our lives.  There were not only Americans but also wives from other country and  we just learn how to bond in each other, even in our weaknesses. Some of us don't like to speak up, others are afraid to speak in English for fear to make mistakes and look ridiculous. It was good to practice compassion and grace as we listened to each other. Not to mentioned the food! everything was so delicious and our hostess very kind.

As soon as that was done my family and I headed to the pumpkin patch farm. We got to see many pumpkins and obviously the kids loved all the tractors, animals, aye pyramids. For the very first time my girls tried corn on the cob. I had tried it before but being that we have not lived in America for many years, my kids have never had it and amazingly they loved it, except for Ruhamah that kept on having a funny face every time she would take a bite.

It was a good family time, as I said our life have been pretty busy and we really miss being able to have one day or even half a day just to hang out as a family, do something fun or funny or just being together and relax and enjoy each other (even though if we are home the kids end up fighting most f the time!!!)

I just wanted to give you a glimpse into our lives. I feel blessed by those cute smiles that surround me. And I am sure God as blessed you too with many cute smiles around you. Can you think of some?

I am blessed too, by learning from other seminary wives, how we all face difficulties, how we handle them and how God gives us strength in different ways. God is good :)

Strange Fire

If you have time,
and you want to listen to something good,

 check the Strange Fire Conference at 

http://www.tmstrangefire.org

Italy

The other day I was at the Italian Bible Study here at Grace Community Church. It was good to hear songs in Italian, to fellowship with people that speak Italian or have something in common with Italy. We had a good time in listening to the message, had good conversations and AMAZING food!!!

I love talking about my homeland, and sharing how big is the need on the other side of the ocean. Today I want to do something that my husband usually does, I want to share some facts about this little country that has the shape of a boot.

• Italy has a population of 60 million inhabitants. 
• 95% of the population is Catholic.
• of that 95%, only 5% are practicing catholics.
• 0.6% of the population is evangelical;
• The rest are Jehovah witnesses, muslims and so on...

What does it mean to be a catholic? For many Italians being Catholic is like being Italian. It is part of who you are, it doesn't matter if you read the Scripture or not, if you know what the Catholic Church teaches or not, if you believe in it or not. Being Catholic is part of your ethnicity and if someone were to change that, it would be shameful.

"Aren't they Christian?" That is the question that gets asked very often.

This happened a few years ago in Acireale, right under our balcony. The carriage is carrying the statue of saint Sebastian, and has steal wheels. It may not look like it but the carriage is so heavy that leave indents in the asfalt. Saint Sebastian is the patron saint of the city and prior to this day, at every corner of the city, people were collecting money so that they could celebrate the saint with fireworks and adorn the city. Sebastian, we know from history, may have been a true believer who never would have imagined that people would elevate him so much!

People walk barefoot, hurt themselves for the saint in order that they may gain a greater GRACE!

When I was a kid I remember listening about stories of kids living in tribal areas. How they would kill their children for the gods they believed in, offer them sacrifices. I see so many correlations between those tribal rituals and the catholic church of today.

This is not christianity, it started like it but it went away from it a long time ago.

Italians are lost as much as other people in the world, but because they named themselves christian they think they are, and sometimes we, in america, think that too. 

When I look at my nation I see a great need. I see sheep lost without a shepherd. They are caught in a religion that will not teach them how to have peace with God, but that will encourage them to live by doing, to live in fear. They are caught by a religion that seems good and seems like it is bringing them to God but in reality it is making them sink even more into their own sins. On top of that it is telling them that they are ok! 

When you think about Italy, and you think about the food, the fun that the people have and the fellowship that they have, remember they that are lonely because they are missing the only person that can change their life and give true meaning. Remember to pray for them and pray for those who work there, that they may be a strong witness for the Almighty!