The Santa Barbara Zoo!

We are grateful for the men and women (past and present) who serve our country so that we may enjoy the freedom it allows us to have. We never take for granted the time we are ablet to spend as our little family of three, especially since that will be changing in just 3 short months.
We took full advantage of the Memorial holiday and drove up the coast to the Santa Barbara Zoo! Cade had yet to go to the zoo and Eric and I were excited to experience it with him for the first time. We packed a lunch and headed out for a fun day! It was absolutely gorgeous in Santa Barbara and the zoo wasn't very crowded, which was super nice. Cade loved the giraffes and his favorite part of the day was the koi pond. Go figure, take the kid to the zoo with lions and elephants and he likes the pond we can find anywhere!
After the zoo we decided to make a quick stop at the pier for some ice cream and then battled the holiday traffic home. To top off the evening we were treated to dinner at the Gutierrez' new home. Michelle is doing a great job turning this cute little house into a home that will no doubt bless anyone who shares a meal or a visit with their family. We are so grateful for their friendship, love and support. They mean the world to us and it is now fun to watch our boys enjoying playing together. Cade got the biggest kick out of Weston, and when Weston realized he could make Cade laugh it was endless giggles. Too fun! Can't wait for Nolan to join the bunch and for Gabe to get a little older so he can join in the fun too! Thank you Guties!
Here are a few picks from the fun filled day.
Xoxo,
MmM

Boys, Boys and Sick Boys

Well by now I hope most have you have heard that we are having another BOY! We are so excited that Cade will have a little brother to play with. They will be about 20 months a part and hopefully that means good buddies. My sis and I are 17 months a part and Eric and his brother are just under 2 years a part and we are best buds with our siblings. So fun! We have also given him a name, in fact we only had a boy's name so good thing the baby turned out to be a boy! Nolan Gregory Matthews will make his appearance in September!Auntie Laura babysat Cade while we went to our doctor appointment, so she got to be the first one to hear the fun news!

Here is a fun video of us telling my parents they were going to have another grandson! Cade was hungry and tired so he wasn't really into the whole reveal.

My pregnancy has been pretty smooth since the first trimester has passed, however my family and I have had a hard time staying healthy. One week we're sick and the next we're healthy. We're hoping for a few more healthy weeks now that the weather is staying warmer. Please pray we continue to fight off sickness and enjoy healthy days ahead. One of God's gifts while we have been sick are the sweet moments Cade and I have had together snuggling on the couch or watching Despicable Me (the current favorite of the Matthews' household). I thought I would share a few pics of my sweet sick boy and his sick daddy too.This is his new trick... climbing into the leather cube. He's pretty proud of himself for it too!
Sick boys :(, but oh so sweet!
On a brighter note, we have been doing some home improvement projects around the house and I can't wait to post pics of the finished projects!

xoxo,

MmM

What is on my heart ~

With the craziness of a new home and second child on the way I have had little time to sit down at the computer and put thought into a new blog post. I've written many in my head and thought oh, I should share this or that. I want to post some pictures of the house being (slowly) decorated and Cade's newest tricks, but that will have to wait for now.

What is on my heart is the gospel... I was recently reminded that it is not of my own strength that someone is won to Christ. I lovingly and armed with scripture pointed out someone's sin and was met with criticism and harsh words. It hurt, I cried and still it haunts me at times, however, I have a loving God who reminds me that I was faithful to His word and wanted only to glorify Him as I was sharing with this person. I am grateful God gave me the courage to speak and ever so grateful that I have a husband who was encouraging and so proud of my boldness.

This instance reminded me of a book I've been reading called "A Gospel Primer for Christians" by Milton Vincent. He was a seminary student at the Master's College and his journey is incredible. He is passionate about preaching the gospel to himself daily and writes, " The gospel is so foolish (according to my natural wisdom), so scandalous (according to my conscience), and so incredible (according to my timid heart), that it is a daily battle to believe the full scope of it as I should. There is simply no other way to compete with the forebodings of my conscience, the condemnings of my heart, and the lies of the world and the Devil than to overwhelm such things with daily rehearsings of the gospel."

He then goes on to tell us all the reasons we should rehearse the gospel, but what I continue to read over and over again is his gospel narrative, which he writes in a prose version. It's long, and I hope you'll read it because it is absolutely beautiful. It has brought so many ways for me to think about the gospel and just how undeserving I am Christ's sacrifice because of the magnitude of what he absorbed on my behalf.

A Gospel Narrative ~ Prose Version
The Glory of God
1 My God is immense beyond imagination. He measured the entire universe with merely the span of His hand.
2 He is unimaginably awesome in all of His perfections, absolutely righteous, holy, and just in all His ways.
3 He has also been unbelievably good and merciful to me as the Creator and Sustainer of my life.
4 Every breath, every heartbeat, every function of every organ in my body is a gift from Him.
5 Every legitimate pleasure I experience is a gift from His loving hand to me.
6 All that I am and all that I have I owe to Him and to His goodness.
7 My life in every way is, and will continue to be, utterly dependent upon Him in whom I live and move and have my being.
8 This wonderful God is the most supremely worthy Object of admiration, honor, and delight in all of the universe;
9 And He has created me with the intention that I might glorify Him by finding my soul's delight in Him and by living in joyful obedience to Him in all of my ways.

My Sin Against God
10 Yet I could not have failed this great God more miserably than I have.
11 Instead of giving thanks to Him and humbly submitting to His rule over my life, I have rebelled against Him and have actually sought to exalt myself above Him.
12 Going my own way and living accordingly to my own wisdom, I have broken countless times either the letter or the spirit of every one of God's Ten Commandments.
13 Thinking myself to be wise, I have shown myself to be a fool; and because of my arrogance, God has every right to damn me to the everlasting experience of His terrifying wrath in the Lake of Fire.
14 So as for myself, apart from Christ I am bound by the guilt of my sins and also bound by the power of sin enslaved to various lusts and pleasures.
15 Apart from Christ, I am also utterly deserving of and destined for eternal punishment in the Lake of Fire, completely unable to save myself or even to make one iota of a contribution to my own salvation.

God's Work on My Behalf
16 However, what I could not do, God did - and in doing it, He did it all, sending His own Son into the world to die on the cross for my sins, thereby showing me unfathomable love.
17 God loved me so much that He was willing to suffer the loss of His Son, and even more amazingly, He was willing to allow His Son to suffer the loss of Him at the cross.
18 Jesus loved me so much that He was willing to lay down His life for me. No one could ever love me more or better than Jesus.
19 On the third day after Jesus' death, God raised Him from the dead, thereby announcing that His death was completely sufficient to atone for every sin that I have or will commit throughout my lifetime.
20 God then exalted Christ to His own right hand, where Christ now reigns from on high, granting salvation and forgiveness to all who call on Him by faith.

My Salvation
21 Now when my time came and I placed my faith in Jesus, God instantly granted me a great salvation.
22 He forgave me of all my sins, past, present, and future.
23 He made me His child, adopting me into His family.
24 He gave me the gift of the Holy Spirit, who gives me God's power, who pours out God's love within my heart, and who tenderly communicates to my spirit that I am a child of God and an heir of eternal glory in heaven.
25 In saving me, God also freed me from slavery to any and all sins.
26 I no longer have to sin again, for sin's mastery over me has been broken!
27 In saving me, God also justified me, and being justified through Christ, I have a peace with God that will endure forever.
28 In justifying me, God declared me innocent of my sins and pronounced me righteous with the very righteousness of Jesus.
29 God also allowed His future and present wrath against me to be completely propitiated by Jesus, who bore it upon Himself while on the cross.
30 Consequently, God now has only love, compassion, and deepest affection for me, and this love is without any admixture of wrath whatsoever.
31 God always looks upon me and treats me with gracious favor, always working all things together for my ultimate and eternal good.
32 God's grace abounds to me even through trials.
33 Because I am a justified one, He subjugates every trial and forces it to do good unto me.
34 When I sin, God's grace abounds to me all the more as He graciously maintains my justified status as described above.
35 When I sin, God feels no wrath in His heart against me.
36 His heart is filled with nothing but love for me, and He longs for me to repent and confess my sins to Him, so that He might show me the gracious and forgiving love that has been in His heart all along.
37 God does not require my confession before He desires to forgive me.
38 In His heart He already has forgiven me; and when I come to Him to confess my sins to Him, He runs to me (as it were) and is repeatedly embracing and kissing me even before I get the words of confession out of my mouth!
39 God does see my sins, and He is grieved by my sins. His grief comes partly from the fact that in my moments of sin, I am not receiving the fullness of His love for me.
40 He even sends chastisement into my life; but He does so because He is for me, and He loves me, and He disciplines me for my ultimate good.
41 I don't deserve any of this, even on my best day; but this is my salvation, and herin I stand. Thank you Jesus.

Oh my!! 36-41 make my soul sing! I want to repeat this daily so I can fully understand the gospel as Christ meant me to. I hope you are renewed as you read this as well.