Blessings in Trials

Last Friday, the two oldest kids were diagnosed with strep.

On Monday, the baby started running a fever.

On Tuesday, Sophie fell while climbing the chair and hit her head on the doorknob. After 3 hours in the ER, she came home with her eyebrow glued back together.

On Wednesday, Gideon started coughing so hard he was choking. We went to the pediatrician who said that seasonal allergies were making his asthma worse. He's now taking a low dose of steroids and 2 inhalers 4 times a day.

The house is a wreck. I have a deep chest cough that's connected to seasonal allergies and my sinus infection leaving my body. I was up with Gideon at 4 AM last night while he and I coughed.

We're still blessed.

Right now, my children are in bed. They are all napping soundly. Modern appliances are cleaning my clothes and my dishes. I have bags of chicken marinating in the fridge and freezer ready to be turned into easy meals over the next few weeks. I have the Internet to connect me to friends I rarely get to see and some that I have never met. I have a bazillion TV channels, a DVR, Netflix, library books and my Kindle to entertain me.

Thank you, Lord, for blessing me beyond measure. Thank you for reminding me of these blessings even when things look dark.

Finding My Peace

Before the throne of God above
I have a strong, a perfect plea
A great high Priest whose Name is Love
Who ever lives and pleads for me

God formed me. He knows me better than anyone else on this earth. He alone will meet all of my needs. He alone will love me perfectly. I will find peace, satisfaction and will never be lonely as long as I stay close to Him.




My name is graven on His hands
My name is written on His heart
I know that while in heaven He stands
No tongue can bid me thence depart
No tongue can bid me thence depart

Wherever I go and no matter what I do, God will love me unconditionally. He will never turn his back on me. If I feel distance from Him then it is because I have turned from Him.




When Satan tempts me to despair
And tells me of the guilt within
Upward I look and see Him there
Who made an end to all my sin

I will be bruised. I will be thrown. I will be hurt. Sometime it will be life. Some of these things will be my own fault. Whatever I have done and whatever I will do is already forgiven. Satan lies. I am still important. I am still His child. There is no reason to give up on God because He will never give up on me.

One with Himself I cannot die
My soul is purchased by His blood
My life is hid with Christ on high
With Christ my Savior and my God
With Christ my Savior and my God

My life, my soul, was paid for at an incredibly high cost. Something that I cannot even begin to fathom. It is eternal. It can never be changed. From the time I accepted that gift at 10 years old, my fate was sealed.

Behold Him there the risen Lamb
My perfect spotless righteousness
The great unchangeable I am
The King of glory and of grace

My Savior, my Father, My King is perfect. I am not and can never hope to be. Yet He still wants me. He yearns to be near me and for me to follow Him.

Because the sinless Savior died
My sinful soul is counted free
For God the Just is satisfied
To look on Him and pardon me
To look on Him and pardon me

I am ugly and covered in sin. I am human. Yet, when God looks at me, He sees nothing but the purity of the sacrifice made in my stead. It must be a choice. He can still see the real me. He created the real me. He chooses to see the sacrifice instead and pardon my sins. Then He can be free to hold me close.

How can I deny this? How can I look at humans to meet my needs when I have a perfect God who is not just able but willing and eager to love me more than I can expect?


Lyrics - Before The Throne of God by Sojourn

All a Part of the Body

God ask His people to obey in all different ways.  Some people teach and some people preach.

(I promise this whole post won't rhyme.)

He calls me to pray.  A lot.  Sometimes I'll have specific prayers and sometimes I'll wander around the house just thinking about someone until they take up all of my brain space.  Then I stand still until I understand that God wants me to pray for them for a reason that only He knows.  I really like having specifics and watching to see the Lord work.

I'm working on a new way to remember my prayers.  I'm writing them on note cards and putting them up in places where I find myself standing during the day.  There will be some over the sink in the kitchen where I wash dishes and some on my bathroom mirror.  This should also help me to always be ready to talk to the Lord at any time.

Right now I'm praying for:

• 3 beautiful ladies to be blessed with children
• 4 people to be blessed with partners
• comfort on one going through a divorce
• comfort on a family who lost a loved one
• 2 ladies fighting diseases that seem insurmountable
• 4 ones who need the Lord in their hearts
• friends going through moving stresses

This is in addition to 3 people that God has put on my heart and I have no idea why.  So I just pray that God works however He needs to.

I take requests.  I love to talk to my God.

Prayers and Lessons

I haven't really posted about any resolutions for 2012.  There are not too many things I want to do this year.  OK, that's a lie, there's a ton of stuff I want to do.  This is one of the most important things.

I want to learn a new Bible verse every month.

Now when I say "learn" I don't just mean memorize the words.  I want to write those words on my heart.  I want to dissect the verse and truly get to the bottom of what God is saying to me through that verse.

January's verses are Romans 8:38-39

"For I am convinced that neither death nor life; neither angels nor demons; neither present nor future nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation shall separate us from the love of God through Jesus Christ our Lord."

Now I'll admit that I wrote that by heart and them immediately checked You Version.  I left out the part of "nor anything else in all creation".  I'm still getting there.

The part that hooked me today is that God never mentions the past.  He states that "neither present nor future" will separate us but the past is not in there.  One could argue that the past is lumped in there with anything in all creation...but God is specific in His words.

I guess the reason this caught my attention was because there are still parts of my past that I haven't settled.  There are people that I still have to wake up and daily ask God to put forgiveness in my heart for them.  There are choices that I made that still shame me.  There are people I pray over only because God puts them on my heart and I know that I'm supposed to do what He tells me to do.  Before I pray, I ask him to search my heart for Black Spots and cleanse me.  Then I ask Him to only let me pray with a clean heart.  Sometimes it takes a long time.  He brings up people that have hurt me.  He brings up someone that I used to call my best friend until they cut me out of their life.  He brings up people whose lifestyles I don't think are Godly.

Then He always reminds me that I'm not perfect.  I still make mistake after mistake.  However, just as He promises in Romans, because of the decision I made when I was 10 then I will never again be separated from the love of God.  He reminds me that these people need these prayers.  They need to know His love.  They need His conviction.

So I pray.  First for cleansing and then for whoever God brings to my heart.

Because I am convinced.

Not Giving Up

"For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord."
Romans 8:38-39

Do you hear that?!?

It doesn't matter that Sophie still couldn't understand my instructions about potty training and had a massive meltdown.

It doesn't matter that Gideon tried to destroy everything whenever I went into the bathroom with Sophie because he was jealous of all of the attention his sister was getting.

It doesn't matter that Milly freaked out whenever I not only left her sight but went out of her reach making nap time a really difficult thing.

God was still with me all day.  He still loves me.  He still believes in my ability to mother these children.  He's going to be there as I cry tonight.

I'm still OK.

Missions

Me: "Lord, there's a lot of talk at church about missions. I don't feel like I get to participate much."

God: "Oh? I've given you a specific mission. What do you mean?"

Me: "What do I mean? What do You mean? I haven't felt any tugs to go to China or Jordan or the wilds of Borneo. What am I doing to bring Your word to those that are lost? Don't you want to use me?"

God: "Honey, get up and go back to Sophie's room."

Me: "Um...OK."

*Cue me walking back to see a wild-haired Sophie chasing after her brother squealing at the top of their lungs both of them waving harmless looking toys they have learned to weaponize.*

God: "Here is your mission field."

Me: "I guess it is similar to the wilds of Borneo."

God: "Now pick up that Noah book and give it a shot."

Me: "Hey guys! Want to hear about Noah?"

Natives: *stop dead in their tracks and drop toys* "No-No? Too-ba-too? OHKAY!"

Then we read about Noah 5 times in a row.

When You Feel satan Winning

Shout out to Jon Acuff by giving satan the middle finger with the lowercase s.

This morning started out so great. Milly let me sleep a little more than 5 hours. That's Rip Van Winkle sleep when you have a newborn. She got up at 6:30 to eat and was finished with everything by 7:00. I took her back to our room and let her wake Daddy up by being adorable right in his face. Mentally, I was fist pumping. We had time to both take showers, get everyone up, fed and dressed and still get to church without a huge hurry. Daddy got in the shower and I laid down with Milly to wait my turn.

I was just going to rest my eyes.

At 8:30, I woke up and began the mad dash. We left the house at 9:30. The kids ate cereal bars in their carseats and Milly wasn't wearing any of the cute little headbands I bought yesterday. I didn't shower. I really wanted that shower. We threw the kids into the nursery and crept into our Life Group. For the rest of the morning, I felt like satan and I just headbutted.

I'm still in a foul mood but I feel God nudging me. Unfortunately, I'm reacting like Sophie does when she's in a bad mood. I'm ignoring Him. When He does get an arm around me then I yell, throw it off of me and tell Him to go away. I don't want to be comforted. I don't want to learn anything. I don't want to work. I don't want to be loved.

Can you guys pray that He doesn't let up? Please?

Time Out

Tuesday sent me and the girls to the doctor's office for a check-up (Milly) and a few shots (Sophie). Everyone looks good. More on all that later. My mother came over to lend me her car and watch Gideon so I just had to wrangle two children. Before she came over, I got an email from my landlord.

Here's a little background on my landlord. She lives in another country. We deal mostly through email. This is a VERY old house and it hasn't been taken care of at ALL. We've had all sorts of things break over the last 2 years. The latest was the heater last week during Dallas' ice storm. The ducts looked like they had never been cleaned since installation. Usually the landlord just tells us to take any fees out of the rent and just send her the rest of the money. We're supposed to deposit the rent check into her bank. Well...Dallas ice storm...banks have been closed. She refuses to take our money directly. I've asked, begged, pleaded and negotiated to send her a check so she'll stop freaking out every time that money is not in her account by the 1st of the month. I have no control over what the bank does! I could go on but that gives you the gist.

Anyway, I got another email from her threatening eviction if she didn't get her rent check. I emailed her back and told her that we had to pay the heater guy and that the rent check was going to be deposited. I emailed Ben and we ranted a bit about how much trouble we've had with her and with the house. We are so ready to move. We are planning to move by June 1st. While driving I gleefully thought about how she would never be able to rent such a cruddy little house and how she would be so sorry to see us go. Then God started nudging me.

"So, Kelly, you're feeling pretty good about yourself?"

"God, she's just being so unreasonable! Half of the outlets don't even work in that house and we've never complained because we knew there was nothing she could do. We were just thankful to have a roof over our family's head. But to treat us like that every month? We never pay the rent bill late!"

"I know. I'm proud that you're paying your bills on time. That's a hard lesson to learn."

"It is! I mean...I know we still have a long way to go and we're still learning how to truly be good stewards of our money but we're tithing and paying our major bills on time. I mean, that EMAIL! Did you see the email?!"

"The email? Goodness, I had no idea! For you see, I have been on Mars for the last decade, in a cave, with my eyes shut and my fingers in my ears."

"Touche, God"

"Kelly Bear, watch the road but listen to Me. I love you so much. I always love you. I even love you when you fall. Sweetheart, you still fall a lot. You're falling right now."

"What do you mean? I'm in the right! I'm paying the bills! I'm doing it all right!"

"Kelly, how many times have I said to love those that don't love you back? Those that treat you badly? Even those that hurt you?"

"...a lot."

"Are you doing that? Are you loving your landlord the way I love your landlord? She is my child, too."

"No, sir."

(By this time I am in tears. I'm also in God's lap with His arms around me. This correction is always done gently which is good because it is done often.)

"Is it time to forgive your landlord?"

"I can't do that on my own. Can you help?"

"Of course."

And that's how I forgave my landlord driving to the doctor. And again this morning.