Living life, loving god, loving people & lessons learned along the way.
|
What REALLY seems to separate the boy blogs from the MAN blogs is simply LARGER pictures. So I moved some stuff around so I could accommodate larger pictures, got rid of the boring sidebar, and am using an awesome pic for our header of Jess and I by Pranne Loffer who was in my school of photography in 2008. Here’s another pic that she took of us in Columbia South Carolina this past July. Are you guys digging the new layout? I am
JIM baker   Hey everyone, here is our Christmas Newsletter…
if you want a copy e-mailed to you so you can actually read it e-mail me requesting one jim@worshipplace.org HAPPY HOLIDAYS!!!
love the picture of you guys kissing behind the snowman & snowoman. thanks lisa! its fun being able to do your own photoshoots. Jim and I watched this video clip the other day and I thought it was definitely worth sharing. Aside from the fact that it’s an entertaining twist on the typical nativity play, it completely changed my outlook on the Christmas story as we picture it. It hit me when the angels came in… and notice the chorus keeps repeating “i’ve been waiting my whole life for this one night.” I mean, how awesome is that? I have no idea how time works in heaven, but I am of the understanding that heavenly beings are at least aware of the passage of time here, and I bet they were up in heaven watching all of humanity waste away in our own sin and just waiting for the day when we would be redeemed, and then the day came!!! And think of the Jewish believers, the shepherds and even the wise men; all these people who have been anxiously anticipating the arrival of a savior who would bring them freedom. All that time waiting, hoping, and then finally to witness his arrival!I think that sense of excitement is completely lost on us. I mean, we get jazzed about waiting a year – or more likely – about a month for Christmas morning to arrive and that’s usually just so we can eat cookies and receive that expensive toy, phone, camera or whatever we’ve been wanting for the past six months. It’s easy to miss really, because Jesus already came for us. We don’t have to wait for anything. Which is actually probably for the best, as we all have short attention spans anymore anyways. But these people were waiting for GENERATIONS… their WHOLE EXISTENCE for this one thing to happen! And when it does… can you even imagine the party in heaven?!? After all the build-up of excitement, the anticipation of joy… the celebration must have been unbelievable. I bet they danced their halos off. Literally. A completely unrestrained explosion of joy. JESS baker i’m so excited you’re blogging thanks lisa… we’ll see how it goes. i’m not very tech savvy and have never been interested in blogging. unlike my handsome husband. but this experience wasn’t too painful. this kinda gave me chills. looooved it. it gave me chills when I read it too the first time when it was still in draft. my wife’s a dang good writer.  Rick, Sandie, Zachery and Jason all decided to get in on the deal too.
Zachery
JIM baker I loved how you captured the boys glowing facial expressions. Their eyes seem to sparkle. Nice photos such a great fam. good pics, jim thanks mom and lisa! So Janie was one of the two people that took me up on my I’ll do photography for your family in exchange for support towards our Africa trip deal. The group shot went MUCH better than I had hoped, I was a little intimidated shooting a group of 14. I used a wingback chair (Stanley Leary would be so proud) I used my 580ex fired through an umbrella at about 1/2 or 1/4 power triggered via my PW Plus II’s. I was afraid I wasn’t going to be able to light the whole group of 14 with just one light, but I did. This was the biggest group portrait I’ve ever done and the family did a GREAT job.Here’s a pic of the kids.
Sidique, Jadenne, Rashad and Julie Fofana.
Mike, Lily, Meridith and Megan Rohlin.
Zachery, Rick, Sandie, and Jason Rohiln.
JIM baker These look awesome! and with just one flash for that huge group? how do you like the pocket wizard? might try to get a radio popper soon. just don’t want to burn a hole in the pocket. Great pictures!!! @ sam – thanks man, yeah, one flash, crazy huh? i bought the pocket wizards over any other of the cheaper ones because its the industry standard and I just didn’t want the hassle of having to mess with equipment that wasn’t going to work when i needed it the most. you messed with any off camera lighting? @ jane – thanks for the honor to shoot your family love the pics, jim! thanks lisa! nyarr.
Ridiculous? What would your life look like if you could stop trying to be something your not and just be yourself? Be free to be who God created you to be. YOU. JIM baker powerful statements, but I happen to be a fan of rubber duckies that dress up. haha. lol… theres a whole trend of dressed up rubber duckies, we have wedding ones in our bathroom sitting on top of the mirror. april 2008
God you’re so patient. You are the best thing, yet you never force your goodness on anyone. You never demand the respect that You deserve. Why? Is that because you just want people to recognize your goodness on their own? To come to their own conclusion? I guess respect comes in its purist form when its given freely, and not done out of obligation and duty, guilt or coercion. You were silent as they mocked you and crucified you. You even prayed forgive them father for they know not what they do. You are the king of kings and the lord of lords. You created man, and man tortured you to death. You did it because you love us. You did it to expose our ugly sin, the depravity of our humanity without you. God you loved us so much that you made a way for us to walk in relationship with you even though we messed it up. You are the initiator. Help me to know this love better, and to love with this same love. JIM baker some of our Christmas decorations on our mantle
It looks fine in this picture, but on our mantle it looks kind of sad, because the mantle is so big and the things on it are so small. It looks a lot better now that we super glued Joesph’s head back on. I said we should probably go buy green army men to protect Jesus and that would make it better but I’m not sure Jess thought that was a good idea.
While we were in MD over Thanksgiving my parents gave me our own advent calender. It was one of our family Christmas traditions growing up. To take turns each night reading scripture that told the Christmas story and then putting on one of the small ornaments on the tree. As we were doing the readings that went along with the calender I heard Jess read this statement and I got really excited. “Of the increase of His government and peace there will be no end.” I also heard Dwayne Roberts from IHOP (international house of PRAYER, not pancakes) preaching the other night and he said how sick he is of hearing how we should be “afraid” of radical Islam. He simply stated that our God is so much bigger. Yes and AMEN. So how is God choosing to increase His government in the earth right now? Through His ambassadors. Do you know who those are? You and me. JIM baker I feel honored to have been there for the gluing on of Joseph’s head. The advent calender is excellente. It’ll be a Baker tradition methinks. I’m in full support of the army men, for the record! @ sandi – your comment makes me laugh out loud, we’re glad we could share in that experience with YOU @ chachi – thanks man, a baker tradition indeed @ colleen – i misspoke my wife totally said I could get green army men… we never ended up doing it though (because of me not her) next year… next year part of my photostory assignment for School of PhotographyKailua-Kona Hawaii 2008 Dude… Christmas is in 22 days. Thats crazy. Anyway, last monday at Higher Calling I encouraged the kids to ask themselves what is the point in every area of their life. And then ask themselves if the way they were living matched up with that purpose. The room got silent when I asked that about church. The kids got real honest too. It was good for them to just think and answer their own questions. Sometimes you simply have to present a question and let them draw their own conclusion. At the beginning of the meeting we always share testimonies and two people shared how God had healed them in the past week miraculously. During worship I felt that God wanted to heal people that evening as well. So I went forward and I asked if people who had pain in their body to come forward for prayer. I prayed for one student’s back and asked him if he felt anything and he said no. I then reminded him that even Jesus had to pray twice for a blind man. (mark 8:22-26) So we prayed again and I asked him to test his back out and a grin came across his face as he was moving his back in ways that he could not before without pain. I came up to another student an laid hands on him and asked him what was wrong, lower back he said. I prayed for him and asked him what he felt. He looked at me surprised and said as I prayed he felt heat running through his whole body and felt his back pop like fifteen times and the pain left. Jess prayed for a girls ankle and felt tendons moving around as she prayed. She asked the girl if she was moving her ankle and the girl was like no, and she tested out her ankle and the pain was gone. The girl that just received that healing then prayed for another girl with a right ankle sprain that had kept her out of dance and that girl was moving around her ankle without pain and tears in her eyes surprised and grateful at what God had done. It was interesting to me that it was two lower backs and two ankles that got healed that night. That there was almost a theme for what God was doing. Christianity isn’t boring when we’re seeing God do supernatural things in our midst. JIM baker THATS AMAZING. as i was reading about the supernatural healings i had “God shivers”..such an amazing feeling. GOD IS SO GOOD. wow. i am so thankful that you and jess are now at pf and working with the youth. you are bringing God in a whole new way. not quite sure how to word that. but i love hearing about all the healing and change that God is bringing into the lives of the youth and others also. AWESOME. i would like to suggest something. andrew, ben and liz blick went to YWAM with this couple in texas and they were just married a couple of months ago. just last week they were in a terrible four wheeler accident. tanya and will both had bleeding and swelling in the brain. tanya had/has an amazing singing voice and had just released a cd. (they are both leaders of some sort) she now cannot even speak..she rarely says ONE word that makes sense. they say the bleeding has stopped but the swelling is still present. she may be mentally handicapped. they said it would take a MIRACLE for her to not be such. (clearly a miracle is possible) and will has many broken bones in his face. he has been waiting several days for reconstructive surgery. he is lucky to have complete knowledge of whats going on. he has some amnesia but it should be temporary. they are in their 20s and beautiful inside and out. such a love for God and have been living so much through him. i just ask that you pray for them and pray for a miracle. THEY NEED HEALING. A MIRACLE. hey jackie, thanks for the encouragement and we’re praying for tanya and will. keep us posted. hey man, that’s an awesome story. I love that REAL stuff is happening there and the kids are being challenged and really seeing God work thanks bro god is GOOD shot to show texture, hard lighting off camera to left SOP Project 2008
So Jess and I went yesterday to empty out one of those large water jugs that you see in offices, the typical gossip water cooler. I started filling one up with pennies in 1995, for some reason at that age I thought if I saved enough change that someday it could be something that I could cash in if I ever needed it. Well we didn’t cash it in because we needed the money we cashed it in because we needed the jug. We’re going to use the jug to collect change at our church towards the Africa trip. Anyway, after a lot of noise and having to have a bank teller come over to take change out of the machine because I filled it to capacity the Warren PA Northwest Savings bank gave me a whopping $49.95. That is 4,995 pennies. I guess I wasn’t to aggressive in my saving for the past 14 years. Anyway, thanksgiving was GREAT, we spent time in MD with my parents and got to see my sister, brother in law and niece as well. Ate a lot of Indian food, got caught up on rest, had a great prayer time with my parents. Mike, Lindsey, Jeannie, Mom, Dad, me and Jess
Put in an 11 hour work day at the office today but they did feed me lunch and dinner so I’m not complaining. I’ll update soon about some cool stuff that has been happening this week. If you think of it pray for me I’ve had a headache and body ache for about two weeks with no other symptoms. It’s on and off… not sure what it is. Excederin migraine was the only thing that touched it. JIM baker Def still praying for your head and your body ache. thanks for the prayers |
|
by Jim Baker
Beautiful layout. I love those larger photos, especially the subjects. Nice work once again. Love, G
nice layout and i love both the picture from July and the one as the title on top. you guys rock!
thanks grandma, and thanks lisa! yay for NEW!
love the lay out…how do you get your middle section to get wider? I’ve moved stuff around a lot and it doesn’t accommodate the x-large pictures, it cuts them off
you’ve got to get in there and change the html… do a google search on it and you’ll find websites that will walk you through it.
uh….i’ve been trying to figure out how to get my blog wide format like that for years. i’ve gotten it wider but i can’t figure out how to do that big and couldn’t find it on google either. why don’t you just share the love….eh?? please please please???
hannah, i’ll post a blog about how to do it today since a bunch of ppl have asked…