Joel 2:13
"Rend your heart and not your garments. Return to the Lord your God, for He is gracious and compassionate, slow to anger and abounding in love, and he relents from sending calamity."
One of my greatest struggles in this crazy busy life is time management. The days just don't seem to have enough hours in them... especially for sleep. This world gets faster and faster. I don't remember life ever being like this when I was a kid. Everything is instant.. instant message.. emails.. phone calls... texting... instant oatmeal for crying out loud... although all of these things are convenient.. it can begin to feel suffocating. When you are doing all you can to serve... be a good parent and spouse... friend... sister.. it begins to feel like that gnat that wont leave you alone. The other day ... I had my hands full... Halle was fussing... the t.v. was blaring and I was trying to buckle Elijah in the car seat and of course my cell phone starts blowing up... Elijah looked at me and said "Mommy do you want to throw your phone in the river?" lol I said "Yes sir I do" Something tells me he has heard me say that a time or two... Maybe I'm the only one who feels this way...
Today I was talking to the Lord about how my mind was so clouded with thoughts of all the stuff I had coming up... trying not to forget anything... and I couldn't focus on my time with Him... He led me to Joel 2:13... This was after Israel had turned away from God... The Lord says "return to me with all of your heart, with fasting and weeping and mourning." (Joel 2:12) Then He goes on to say "Rend your heart and not your garments" . In that day Israelites would tear their clothes as an outside expression of pain and sorrow...I could go on and on about this reference and how it applies to the text and to us today but the bottom line is this... He is more interested in their inside than the outside... if the inside is right ... the outside will follow.
More than sacrifice... more than service.. more than anything God wants our hearts. How amazing is that... In a work work work world... God says "I want your heart" .. Our time can be packed full of "good stuff" but if we neglect to give our hearts to Him daily we have missed the point. What a wonderful God.
Tuesday, April 26, 2011
Monday, April 11, 2011
another facet of grace
The Word says that it's not by the work of man but by grace we are saved. (Ephesians 2:8) It is a gift that cannot be earned. This is something that God has revealed to me in the past but in the recent days, He has enlightened me to a whole new facet of this truth.
I am a stay at home mommy of two precious gifts of God. I am living my dream. This is what I have always wanted to be and I am so greatly appreciative that God has allowed me to be home with these kiddos. That being said, being a mom is quite exhausting and time consuming. You are in high-demand. Halle has been such a light to our lives. She is hilarious and precious and I already see that the Lord has answered my prayers and has blessed us with such a special mother-daughter relationship and bond. Her strong attachment to me has been so extremely demanding. This is not a complaint because as I said, this is an answered prayer, but this has left me in a struggle, over the past year, to get in a solid routine to spend time studying the Word and in prayer. I am a scheduled person. I like routine. Well Halle doesn't lol. I used to do it every day, at the same time, when Elijah napped. Well I tried that with Halle... she would throw a fit. I tried getting up at 5 am. This worked for a couple of weeks until she started waking up with me. Ha! Its like she can sense when I am awake!
I finally just went before the Lord with my frustration. In the past, I would condemn myself if I missed a day of my study time. I would feel distant from God... like He was mad at me or something. He showed me it is not about what I DO. He freed me from the sick cycle of the spiritual highs and lows caused by self-condemnation and showed me how to rest in Him and who I am in Christ. Since then my life and walk has changed dramatically. He unravelled a condemning message of works and "earn your salvation" that I had been fed all my life... but I wont go into that.. another day... another sermon lol.
Well over the past few weeks I have been so extremely busy.. there have been a few days where I said "Wow God, thank you so much... You allowed me to get all this stuff done in one day.. where my hours didn't match my accomplishments..." I have been grabbing time in the Word whenever I get a quiet second.. this may be 5 minutes or 20 minutes... or maybe no reading at all... but I have started my day mindful of Him.. asking Him to live through me.. truly dieing to myself and asking the Spirit to live through me for the day... acknowledging that I cant be the wife, mom, friend that I desire to be unless He does.
This is what I have found... despite how crazy my schedule is... I have remained so close and steadfast in Him. I am so extremely in love and captivated my Jesus. Its become less about scheduling and more about remaining in Christ... the revelations of God and the blessings of communion with Him is just that a blessing... a gift.. which we have because of who we are in Christ! Not because of what I do (with the exception of unconfessed sin)... which leads me to this... once again I find another ritualistic check box that I have been a slave to.. Its not how much I "study" its about remaining in Him. In no way am I down playing the utmost importance of saturating yourself in the Word ... I am just saying that doesn't save you.. beware of the boxes you check! This is a passage that the Lord has continuously led me to over the past few weeks and I didn't really understand why until now... I have committed myself to memorize this and more importantly LIVE IT!
John 15: 1-5
I am the true vine, and my Father is the gardener. He cuts off every branch in me that bears no fruit, while every branch that does bear fruit, He prunes so that it will be even more fruitful. You are already clean because of the word I have spoke to you. Remain in me, as I also remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself, it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me. "I am the vine, you are the branches. If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing."
I am a stay at home mommy of two precious gifts of God. I am living my dream. This is what I have always wanted to be and I am so greatly appreciative that God has allowed me to be home with these kiddos. That being said, being a mom is quite exhausting and time consuming. You are in high-demand. Halle has been such a light to our lives. She is hilarious and precious and I already see that the Lord has answered my prayers and has blessed us with such a special mother-daughter relationship and bond. Her strong attachment to me has been so extremely demanding. This is not a complaint because as I said, this is an answered prayer, but this has left me in a struggle, over the past year, to get in a solid routine to spend time studying the Word and in prayer. I am a scheduled person. I like routine. Well Halle doesn't lol. I used to do it every day, at the same time, when Elijah napped. Well I tried that with Halle... she would throw a fit. I tried getting up at 5 am. This worked for a couple of weeks until she started waking up with me. Ha! Its like she can sense when I am awake!
I finally just went before the Lord with my frustration. In the past, I would condemn myself if I missed a day of my study time. I would feel distant from God... like He was mad at me or something. He showed me it is not about what I DO. He freed me from the sick cycle of the spiritual highs and lows caused by self-condemnation and showed me how to rest in Him and who I am in Christ. Since then my life and walk has changed dramatically. He unravelled a condemning message of works and "earn your salvation" that I had been fed all my life... but I wont go into that.. another day... another sermon lol.
Well over the past few weeks I have been so extremely busy.. there have been a few days where I said "Wow God, thank you so much... You allowed me to get all this stuff done in one day.. where my hours didn't match my accomplishments..." I have been grabbing time in the Word whenever I get a quiet second.. this may be 5 minutes or 20 minutes... or maybe no reading at all... but I have started my day mindful of Him.. asking Him to live through me.. truly dieing to myself and asking the Spirit to live through me for the day... acknowledging that I cant be the wife, mom, friend that I desire to be unless He does.
This is what I have found... despite how crazy my schedule is... I have remained so close and steadfast in Him. I am so extremely in love and captivated my Jesus. Its become less about scheduling and more about remaining in Christ... the revelations of God and the blessings of communion with Him is just that a blessing... a gift.. which we have because of who we are in Christ! Not because of what I do (with the exception of unconfessed sin)... which leads me to this... once again I find another ritualistic check box that I have been a slave to.. Its not how much I "study" its about remaining in Him. In no way am I down playing the utmost importance of saturating yourself in the Word ... I am just saying that doesn't save you.. beware of the boxes you check! This is a passage that the Lord has continuously led me to over the past few weeks and I didn't really understand why until now... I have committed myself to memorize this and more importantly LIVE IT!
John 15: 1-5
I am the true vine, and my Father is the gardener. He cuts off every branch in me that bears no fruit, while every branch that does bear fruit, He prunes so that it will be even more fruitful. You are already clean because of the word I have spoke to you. Remain in me, as I also remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself, it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me. "I am the vine, you are the branches. If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing."
Thursday, April 7, 2011
yet ANOTHER testimony of God's faithfulness
My last post was an exclamation of God's goodness... well He is STILL good! Here is the story of yet another time that God has revealed His faithfulness to me... this is the "more to come"..
A few months ago we were informed by our tax guy that we owed the IRS quite a bit of money. Needless to say we were not expecting this. Every year we have got money back but we were in a different tax bracket this year as well as the move and other things, we ended up owing money. After building and moving into our house it took a pretty big chunk out of our savings so what we owed we didnt have in our account. Well of course our immediate thought was "oh man"...
Allow me stop here and explain that Luke has always been very anxious and OCD about our finances.. everything had to be perfect... lets just say he was extremely OVER responsible... to the point of anxiety over nothing... recently in the past couple of years God has done an amazing work in his heart teaching him that it is from God and by God that all things are provided... He has placed a deep desire to focus on investing in His kingdom instead of our 401K... to completely trust and overcome the anxieties that often come by being the head of the household... I am so proud to be that man's bride.
Normally this situation would have probably cause Luke's head to spontaneously combust... but I stood there in the parking lot of our childrens pediatricians office... right after we got the phone call... and I saw first hand the change that God had performed in my husbands heart. I looked at him and said "What in the world are we going to do?" and he calmly and peacefully said "Hunny, it will be fine... we honor God with what He gives us... He will take care of it." What a change! I thank God for healing Him of those anxieties!!! I was the one kinda scrambling! I then said "I will be fine as soon as I talk to the Lord about this..." So I went home and put the kids down for a nap and fell on my face before God. I immediately began to cry and ask Him to forgive me for being fearful for one second! I said "Lord You are FAITHFUL I have seen it and I trust You above all else! I dont care what our circumstances say... I TRUST YOU! You are my Father and You take care of Your kids! Whatever your will is... I trust You. Lord You have taken care of us... our treasure is not in the material things in this world... it is in You and You alone... so You just work this out how you see fit... I trust You" The very second I fell on my face... so did my fear... I know who God is and I believe Him..
A few days later we found out that we had some stock that had matured that we could sell .. but it still wouldnt cover all of the taxes. So the plan was to just save as much as we could ... pray and trust God.. then in the midst of the stock market falling our stocks increased quite a bit.. enough for that coupled with what we had in savings to cover it! We are so thankful!!! God had provided!!!! Our treasure and worth is not in the numbers that our next to our name at our bank... it is in God alone!!!! But the story doesnt end there...
The day we had sold the stock and were making transfers to send the check to the IRS we were left with $300 in our account... we were just praising God for providing and His faithfulness.. and how good He is... we hung up the phone and Halle and I were in Ross's looking at kitchen stuff and my phone rings... its Luke.. he had just talked to our mortgage company and we had over paid on our escrow and we would be getting a pretty hefty chunk of change back! We were gonna have more than we had to start with! This is more that we can give back to Him! Thank you God... He goes WAY PAST OUR WAY PAST! We walk through this life free from the burdens of this world because we belong to the King... He is our Daddy and Daddy's got this :) Our treasure is not in the stupid fleeting things of this world saturated with materialism... it is in Christ alone! He is our treasure!!! Whatever He gives to us our desire is to turn around and give it right back to Him... our time, money, home, cars... whatever... its all His and for His glory! God is FAITHFUL! I am so thankful to be called His daughter!
A few months ago we were informed by our tax guy that we owed the IRS quite a bit of money. Needless to say we were not expecting this. Every year we have got money back but we were in a different tax bracket this year as well as the move and other things, we ended up owing money. After building and moving into our house it took a pretty big chunk out of our savings so what we owed we didnt have in our account. Well of course our immediate thought was "oh man"...
Allow me stop here and explain that Luke has always been very anxious and OCD about our finances.. everything had to be perfect... lets just say he was extremely OVER responsible... to the point of anxiety over nothing... recently in the past couple of years God has done an amazing work in his heart teaching him that it is from God and by God that all things are provided... He has placed a deep desire to focus on investing in His kingdom instead of our 401K... to completely trust and overcome the anxieties that often come by being the head of the household... I am so proud to be that man's bride.
Normally this situation would have probably cause Luke's head to spontaneously combust... but I stood there in the parking lot of our childrens pediatricians office... right after we got the phone call... and I saw first hand the change that God had performed in my husbands heart. I looked at him and said "What in the world are we going to do?" and he calmly and peacefully said "Hunny, it will be fine... we honor God with what He gives us... He will take care of it." What a change! I thank God for healing Him of those anxieties!!! I was the one kinda scrambling! I then said "I will be fine as soon as I talk to the Lord about this..." So I went home and put the kids down for a nap and fell on my face before God. I immediately began to cry and ask Him to forgive me for being fearful for one second! I said "Lord You are FAITHFUL I have seen it and I trust You above all else! I dont care what our circumstances say... I TRUST YOU! You are my Father and You take care of Your kids! Whatever your will is... I trust You. Lord You have taken care of us... our treasure is not in the material things in this world... it is in You and You alone... so You just work this out how you see fit... I trust You" The very second I fell on my face... so did my fear... I know who God is and I believe Him..
A few days later we found out that we had some stock that had matured that we could sell .. but it still wouldnt cover all of the taxes. So the plan was to just save as much as we could ... pray and trust God.. then in the midst of the stock market falling our stocks increased quite a bit.. enough for that coupled with what we had in savings to cover it! We are so thankful!!! God had provided!!!! Our treasure and worth is not in the numbers that our next to our name at our bank... it is in God alone!!!! But the story doesnt end there...
The day we had sold the stock and were making transfers to send the check to the IRS we were left with $300 in our account... we were just praising God for providing and His faithfulness.. and how good He is... we hung up the phone and Halle and I were in Ross's looking at kitchen stuff and my phone rings... its Luke.. he had just talked to our mortgage company and we had over paid on our escrow and we would be getting a pretty hefty chunk of change back! We were gonna have more than we had to start with! This is more that we can give back to Him! Thank you God... He goes WAY PAST OUR WAY PAST! We walk through this life free from the burdens of this world because we belong to the King... He is our Daddy and Daddy's got this :) Our treasure is not in the stupid fleeting things of this world saturated with materialism... it is in Christ alone! He is our treasure!!! Whatever He gives to us our desire is to turn around and give it right back to Him... our time, money, home, cars... whatever... its all His and for His glory! God is FAITHFUL! I am so thankful to be called His daughter!
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