As friends sprinkle back to base after summers traveling to the States or adventuring around Europe, the question is asked, "So how was your summer?"  "What did you all do?"  Sean has a pretty tight schedule, so our travel was limited to the holiday weekends and having local fun boating, dining, and touring.  The kids had fun swimming, playing for several hours each day with our quad kids, trying out new sports like volleyball and dodgeball (go ahead..."If you can dodge a wrench, you can dodge a ball!"), taking swim lessons and working on math and writing here and there.  But, for me this summer was different than any other summer I've ever had.  Aside from the fact that we live in Italy and toured bits of Germany and Venice, I spent the majority of my summer getting to know God a little more through various avenues.  But here's a little Germany and Venice first... San Marco A Florian treat with a live orchestra! The famous lions of San Marco Ahhh Germany! Neuschwanstein Castle The Gorgeclose to Garmisch  

My most involved was the 1 Thessalonians Precept study with 4-5 days each week of an hour long study.  You know when someone sees something in you that you don't quite see in yourself, well that is what happened here.  I'll get to that though.  So, Precept, then I had my monthly InTouch publication and daily devotional that did not disappoint, as usual, and I still went to PWOC and had fellowship and discussion with the ladies that inadvertently helped me battle through the rough roads of this transition last fall.  For this post, I want to focus on Precept though.  

I had really no idea what I was getting into with this, but from the encouragement of our fearless instructor (she knew it was right up my alley), I said yes.  Precept is a ministry that "exists to establish people in God's Word."  It is an inductive Bible study that uses "the Bible as it's main source of study to learn about God's word and what the Bible teaches."  Words directly from the precept website, here:  Precept.  But the best part...how do we apply that to our daily lives...that's what counts right?  How we relate to brothers and sisters, those who believe and those who don't, those who see things maybe slightly differently that I do...how do I move forward in love, patience, kindness, joy and not fleshly irritation and pride and...well there's so many I could list.  

I tell you what, it was just what I needed this summer.  We are studying in 1 Thessalonians, five chapters...11 weeks, three weeks left.  Precept gets you deep into God's Word.  We may have been in 1 Thessalonians, but we walked all through the Bible seeking Truth through cross-references and pointed questions.  Our first meeting, I was a little concerned when our instructor handed out a package of colored pencils.  As a means to highlight keywords, the pencils became a wonderful tool.

1 Thessalonians 4I thought it was my most colorful page, I think I found my keyword groove!

We read through this incredible book of the Bible written by my personal favorite apostle, Paul, and God showed me so much more about myself than I thought was possible in just the first six weeks.  God showed me how much my pride tore me down each day, showed me that it's OK to ask him pointed questions when we don't understand something and to be READY for the answer because usually He's going to do some refining, showed me that I have something to offer but don't get proud about it, showed me that the day I die is the first day I will ever be perfect....and all of this is OK.  I just have to accept it all and "excel still more."       

Paul's callThese three words may only be seen twice in the text, but their theme runs rampant throughout the whole book.

If you're ever asked to dive into a Precept study, I would strongly encourage you to at least try...it's fun, eye-opening, a little tough, but soooo worth it!  Oh yeah, and I would also encourage you to start with a short book of the Bible....then COMMIT TO IT.

Grazie mille amici!

Mackenzie