it's a good day....

Last night I went to bed with feelings only the great deceiver can give.  Feelings of helplessness, feelings of unworthiness and feelings of doubt.  Feelings of not giving my kids a big American Christmas and how they will be disappointed for years to come I'm sure because of the expectations our society sets.

My husband...oh, my dear amazing, God-fearing husband took my hands last night before we closed our eyes and he said, "let's go to God". He said he felt like "spaghetti brain" that night while he prayed and I said, "it was perfect".  Together we gave it to God and we closed our eyes with peace. 

I woke up to this...

"No one can serve two masters. Either you will hate the one and love the other, or you will be devoted to one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money."

~Matthew 6: 23-25~

Then I woke up to a dear friends post about motherhood...the expectations and how not to let them weigh you down...

and another one covering the same heart and feelings.

Then there was this ... the second advent week video by Ann Voskamp at www.aholyexperience.com.

All blogs, thoughts, feelings, bare exposed hearts on the fears I went to bed with. God...answering our prayers above and beyond. Comforting words from a friend about my ability to homeschool my kids...words of encouragement to press on. 

I find myself often in a spot like Jacob was.  In Genesis 28:10-16 Jacob wakes from a dream and says, "Surely the Lord is in this place, and I wasn't even aware of it!"

I find myself wondering if God really is hearing me.  With all of the struggles and hurting in the world.  With the poverty and poor, the dying and sick...does he hear my fears about money and homeschooling? But then there are answered prayers...experiencing God that cannot be denied. 

I can climb and climb and climb this ladder of life...this ladder of fear...this ladder of expectations set by the world but the real amazing thing is...there really are no ladders for me to climb up, because Christ came down one to get me!

"I tell you the truth, you will see heaven open and the angels of God going up and down on the Son of Man, the one who is the stairway between heaven and earth" (John 1:51, emphasis added).

"Jesus doesn't show you the steps to get to heaven - Jesus is the steps to heaven.  Jesus doesn't merely come down to show you the way up - Jesus comes to make Himself into the WAY to carry you up. He comes to us not in spite of our failings - but precisely because of them.  Ours is the God who is drawn to those who feel down.  Ours is the God who is attracted to those who feel abandoned.  Ours is the God who is bound to those who feel broken".  

It's been heavy on my heart this Christmas, this Advent season, this waiting and preparing and sharing the coming of our Saviour...to make it slow. 

"Make space in the pace for Peace...for Jesus"

"Slow for more joy in Jesus...simplify Christmas by celebrating Christ"

in the middle of the mess of an American Christmas we are making space for the Messiah...finding Him in the mess of this life...slowing....

This week I have no commitments and I am grateful for it...because today I got to be with my kids...and God is faithful through my obedience to slow down. I cried....I cried like a baby as my oldest son lit the dining room table candles opened his bible and invited me to have a bible study with him.  He found in his bible the story of Jesus Christs Birth.  He knows my heart and he knows this is the true story of Christmas.  He knows I find the miracle fascinating and I cry at the fact that the God of the Universe, so big the heavens couldn't contain him came down, soft, slow and small to save us! If I would have been in a hurry, busy with life...I would have missed that moment.  I shed tears as I watch my 8 year old hover over his bible, reading it and asking questions...together we are finding Christ this Christmas.

Thank you Jesus!

Day 5 of Advent

"The Lord had said to Abram, "Leave your native country, your relatives, and your father's family, and go to the land that I will show you.  I will make you into a great nation.  I will bless you...and you will be a blessing to others.  I will bless those who bless you and curse those who treat you with contempt.  All the families on earth will be blessed through you."

Genesis 12

"I will bless you" ... "He will not burden you.  He will not break you.  He will bless you!

Here are a few quotes from my devotional tonight...

"You must feel the fullness of your own pitcher before you trust the pouring out of yourself."

"It is no use for you to attempt to sow out of an empty basket, for that would be sowing nothing but wind"

Spurgeon

"So slow down to feel the wind.  Listen to the carols just a little bit longer.  Linger in the quiet and taste the grace of now, and know that He is good and He is God.  Name them in this moment - gift upon gift upon gift - and listen for the echo in everything: I will bless you"

"D.L. Moody once wrote, 'Faith is the gift of God.  So is the air, but you have to breathe it; so is bread, but you have to eat it; so is water, but you have to drink it.  Breathe it, eat it, drink it - leave the blur of Ur and slow to taste and see the promised land of Advent, of Christmas, of His coming - the blessing of gift upon gift.  Only when you first unwrap the gifts of blessings to you can you be wrapped up as a gift of blessing to others.  Only when you are overwhelmed with the goodness of God can you overflow with the goodness of God to others."

"There is no need for more: the heart is full of gifts that is full of Christ".

****sigh****

ahhhhh....advent.  That season where I cry....I cry at the wonder of our God.  At the amazing gift we have been given through Christ...so undeserving of it.  Last night we lit our Jesse Tree Candles.  25 devotions, 25 ornaments and 25 candles (the boys are loving it).

We sat down as a family last night and watched The Nativity Story.  I felt incredibly blessed as William asked question after question wondering what everything meant.  I think I cried most at this part...on Mary and Joseph's way to Bethlehem they met the Shephard and he says, "we have all been given a gift".  When asked what his gift was he replied, "nothing...nothing but the hope of waiting for one". 

YES! That is advent.  The hope of waiting for the Messiah! How one can hear the story of Christ coming down and not fall to their knees in thanksgiving...it is beyond me.

God Almighty, God whom the Heaven's cannot contain,God whose heart breaks with ours...come down in flesh!  I am overwhelmed this morning at his great love...

"His heart was filled with pain" (Genesis 6:6, NIV)

"God has a heart and it hurts.  It hurts with what hurts us.  His heart hurts not just with a few drops of ache, not just with a slow drip of sadness - the whole expanse of His heart fills, swells, weighs dark with this storm of pain.  And God whispers close to us in a hurting world.  A mother whose heart is bound to her child's? That doesn't compare to how your FAther's heart is bound to you (Isaiah 49:15)

God, who hung the stars - He has taken a thread of His heart and tied it to yours.  And HE DIDN'T NEED TO, but God tied His heart to yours so when you feel pain, He fills with pain."

~Ann Voskamp~

God looked on his creation...the creation he created to give back Glory to Himself and he was disgusted and hurt with their evil.  His heart broke and God who created the heavens and the earth was SORRY he had ever made mankind.  He was to destroy it all...all humans, all living creatures big and small...gone...but, Noah found favor....Genesis 3:6-9

Week 1 of Advent

December is an important month to me....no, not because of all of the Christmas planning to come and things to do but because of the coming of Christmas...the coming of Christ.

All year long I desire and yearn for the slow...still pace I set for myself in December.  I take time off work to be with family, friends and Christ.  It amazes me how the reality of Christ changes for me.  Because when I am slow and still, I cry at the realness of Christ.  It's when I hurry and rush and do, do, do that his realness diminishes.  The month of December comes and I anticipate all year long...anticipate the nights with my family, serving family and friends, decorating our house with Jesus Christmas decorations, I anticipate the snow and the beauty of it and I cry..........because this Christ loves me...someone so incredibly shallow and small.

For me Christmas doesn't start with Black Friday shopping or the hustle and bustle, for me Christmas begins with the coming of Christ.  Listen to this...

"Christ, who is there in the beginning, the voice calling out of darkness, an echo in cosmic emptiness, speaks it by the commanding word of His mouth: Let there be....

Let there be light and land and living beasts...

But you? You alone were formed by a huddle of hearts: Let us make human beings.

The authority of God made all creation.  But it was the affection of God that made all His Children.  The three persons of the Trinity - Father God, Jesus Christ and Holy Spirit - gathered close together to imagine you.  

No matter your story before, this is your beginning now: you were formed by Love...for love.

John Calvin, he wrote it like a reviving breath - that every human being is 'formed to be a spectator of the created world and given eyes that he might be led to its author...first [to] cast our eyes upon the very beautiful fabric of the world in which [God] wishes to be seen by us....As soon as we acknowledge God to be the supreme architect, who has erected the beauteous fabric of the universe, our minds must necessarily be ravished with wonder at His infinite goodness, wisdom and power.'

Ravished with wonder.

Be still and know and watch love come down...be awed at the God-struck wonder of this world."

Advent....the coming of Christ.  To people who are weak, small and hopeless.  "Out of the last and forgotten son of Jesse comes forth one tender branch that will grow into a crown of thorns...a rugged cross...your ladder back to God.  Jesus will go to impossible lengths to rescue you.  Out of a stump...comes a twig, a twig that sprouts and will be the scepter that defeats your sin...and lets you grow again.  Christ.  He comes small for the small, he comes in a micro-macro miracle and he whispers, Seek Me.  The small Babe of Bethlehem, the dismissed Son of God, the stripped and beaten Messiah hanging exposed on the Tree - He begs us to spend the attention of Advent on the little, the least, the lonely, the lost.  Because in the rush, in the hurry, in our addiction to speed - it might just be a bit like stepping on the shoot that sprouts from the stump.  Advent, it is made of the moments. 

This slow unfurling of grace."

~Ann Voskamp~

He came for the small...the weak...the lonely and lost....respond...now.

Thanks be to God....this is just what I needed

I have a few addictions....here they are starting from most serious to least serious..

1. Coffee

2. Coffee Mugs

3.  Books

4.  Christmas Decorations

Some might say (those who have no addictions) that these are horrible things...I know it's a "mind" thing but there is something incredibly relaxing to me...even freeing a little to sit at night with a hot steaming cup of coffee and a good book.

A while ago I saw a friend post to her sisters wall on facebook (also a friend) something about trying out the book Love and Respect in the Family by Dr. Emerson Eggerichs.  So naturally while I was out with my brother I picked it up and placed it on my way too full "unread" shelf on my bookshelf.  Three times I went to read it and had no desire to be told how I wasn't handing my family right. Last night after another bad night for bedtime...I took a bath and grabbed the book (because it was there right in front of my eyes).  

A few weeks ago I posted about how I had had enough.  I felt like a horrible mother for having the urge to put the kids in bed, tuck them in with kisses and getting in my van and driving...away...forever.  

God knew I needed to read this book because one of the stories by the wife of the author talks about how she had these same feelings.  Like the story was identical about her wanting to hop on a motorcycle and drive far away.  

I highly recommend this book.  In the first 30 pages I underlined almost 30 times.  This isn't a self help book...it's a book backed with Scripture and life experiences to back up that Scripture to give you insight from parents who have been there and their kids who are there now...wisdom in loving your children and the respect we should get in return.  

Love it already! 

Thanks Sadie for posting on your sisters wall so that I was encouraged to grab the book myself. 

Advent....it's almost here....

Advent means...."coming".  Celebrating Advent means we are celebrating the coming of Jesus.  We celebrate the fact that Christ came as the Savior of the World.  

God is ridiculed as a cruel, unloving, unjust God yet how do he present his Son? as a baby.  The Son of God whom the heavens could not contain was born of a virgin and he came slow and soft...like the still snow.  He could have come triumphantly and loud but our God chose to come in love...through a miracle of the virgin birth.  

Christmas is a magical time for me.  Not because of some fake person that my parents told me about or that always showed up at Christmas parties, but because of the still, small child called WONDERFUL, COUNSELOR, ALMIGHTY ONE  who was born for one purpose and one purpose only...to save me from my sins.  My heart breaks for those who don't believe in this.  Who celebrate to give a performance, show off money, make a kid happy with one more pointless and needless toy.  Big and glossy, fast and hurry is how the world turns.  There's never enough time in the day...hurry, go, fast....hurt. That is how we run.  But God, "when He comes - He shows up in this fetal ball.  He who carved the edges of the cosmos curved Himself into a fetal ball in the dark, tethered Himself to the uterine wall of a virgin, and lets His cells divide, light splitting all white.  HE GAVE UP THE HEAVENS THAT WERE NOT EVEN LARGE ENOUGH TO CONTAIN HIM AND LETS HIMSELF BE HELD IN A HAND."

 advent wreath for 25 days of remembering our Savior Coming...candle for each night

our Jesse Tree....

"The mystery so large becomes the Baby so small, and infinite God becomes infant.  The Giver becomes the Gift, this quiet offering."

We celebrate Advent every year and each year I become more anxious to get there....anticipating re-learning and re-living the Christmas Story.  Reading scripture every night with the kids from The Greatest Gift

hanging ornaments on our Jesse Tree.  Counting the 25 Days of Christmas together to spend slow, quiet, still time with my family.  Intentionally putting Christ back in Christmas because over time it has been taken away. 

It's late November and it's not too late.  Ann Voskamps book The Greatest Gift is at any local book store.  Liz Curtis Higgs book The Women of Christmas is also there and is a great devotional for you...mother of the family, sister in Christ, daughter of a King. Ann's free Jesse Tree ornaments are free and printable.

I hung 25 days of Christmas on our tree as decorations this year....ranging from baking cookies for our neighbors, making a shoebox nativity, lighting Advent Candles, Read Scripture, making ornaments, family nights and so on.  

The purpose of this Christmas is to bend low, be slow and write this story on your heart.

Advent is coming.... I'm so overwhelmed with Joy!

Marriage Challenge #26

So many times there are things that just get in between our marriages. 

Many times we don't recognize them until they are too late.  I am incredibly grateful that I was taught boundaries in marriage early in life.  I've mentioned before the past that I've learned so much from...especially in marriage.  

"Take heed to your spirit, and let none deal treacherously with the wife of his youth.  For the Lord God of Israel says that He hates divorce, 'for it covers one's garment with violence,' says the Lord of hosts."

~Malachi 2:15,16~

Gods intention for marriage is this gorgeous, Christ exalting union that leaves others speechless at the relationship.  If a marriage is designed to be Christ exalting, will not Satan desire to attack that all the more? Is not Satan a deceiver and liar? 

Things that can get in between our marriage may not seem big to us...but we are being deceived.  You must pray protection over your marriage because that is a union that is created to Glorify God greatly.  You must evaluate constantly and look to see where you are breaking some boundaries.  You must pray daily for God to show you what is coming between your relationship with Him and your relationship with your husband.  Like Molly said in her post...if we are drowning in sin how can we hear God speak to us? We need to be right with God before we can be fully right in our marriages.  

Some of the boundaries we have set up are as follows:

I share no emotional feelings or deep personal feelings with men and Brian does the same with women.

We make sure at gatherings that we are never alone with that of the opposite sex.

We do not intimately hug the opposite sex (Yes a friendly side hug is okay but we honestly don't hug the opposite sex at all...we stay clear and do a hand shake, wave, fist pump ;) ). 

We do not study the bible alone with the opposite sex

We do not talk about our marriages with the opposite sex

We pray, we talk and we desire God to protect our marriage. 

The reason we never confide in the opposite sex is because it can be so dangerous.  It can lead us women especially to find emotions with another man other than our husband.  Thoughts of infidelity may rise and honestly nothing good comes from that.  Think of that and remind yourself every time that nothing good will come of it...maybe a slight adrenaline rush...that's it. 

Is there something, maybe listed above, or maybe that the list above helped you identify that might be getting in between your marriage? What about something completely different? I want you to evaluate your marriage relationship today and brainstorms ways to bring you and your husband closer.  Pray! PRAY! Pray for God to reveal it!

"Two are better than one, because they have a good reward for their labor.  For if they fall, one will lift up his companion.  But woe to him who is alone when he falls, for he has no one to help him up."

~Ecclesiastes 4:9, 10

Lord, I pray you would protect our marriage from anything that would harm or destroy it.  Shield it from our own selfishness and neglect, from the evil plans and desires of others, and from unhealthy or dangerous situations.  May there be no thoughts of divorce or infidelity in our hearts, and none in our future.  Set us free from past hurts, memories, and ties from previous relationships, and unrealistic expectations of one another.  I pray that there be no jealousy in either of us, or the low self-esteem that precede that.  Let nothing come into our hearts and habits that would threaten the marriage in any way, especially influences like alcohol, drugs, gambling, pornography, lust or obsessions.  Unite us in a bond of friendship, commitment, generosity, and understanding.   Eliminate our immaturity, hostility, or feelings of inadequacy.  Help us to make time for one another alone, to nurture and renew the marriage and remind ourselves of the reasons we were married in the first place.  I pray that my husband will be committed to You, Lord, that his commitment to me will not waiver, no matter what storms come.  I pray that our love for each other will grow stronger every day, so that we will never leave a legacy of divorce to our children.