Blogging

Blogger is outdated I'm told. WordPress is the way to go. I am too stuck in my ways to change. And despite my best intentions, I rarely blog. I have ideas then POOF! they are gone with the next thought. Is this what aging is? I am not sure I like it.

A Call to be Still

As long as I have been a Christian I have imagined the peace and awe I would feel as I listened at the feet of Jesus. Today I came as close as I believe I will this side of Heaven. Mama Maggie Groban was the personification of Jesus. She was humble, strong, gentle, courageous, comforting, irresistable, and motivating. You could not listen to her and not be compelled to action. Her time to speak to us was a wake up call to all that we are gifted with here in the west and that we need to slow down and be still in order to hear God. She was not trying to get you to have her call, rather she drew you to desire your own call. To desire to sit at the feet of our Lord and simply experience His presence. To first silence your body, then to silence your tongue, after you silence your tongue then you must silence your thoughts in order to hear your heart, next to silence your heart in order to listen to your spirit, and finally to silence your spirit so that you may listen to His. If we are unable to achieve this time of quiet we will never know what God truly desires for us to do.

Mama Maggie spoke truth about so many things we all desire to achieve and be. I long to be elegant but I already am if I love. Love is giving until it hurts and forgiving. Mama reminded me that forgiveness is not between me and another person but rather it is between me and My Father. He alone knows my heart and sees the truth of my essence. We all desire somewhere inside to be a hero. But Mama says that we can each be a hero. All we have to do is what God desires us to do. When we do that we honor Him as we can in no other way. Finally, I was reminded that I did not choose where I was born or the circumstances I was born into but I alone choose whether to be a saint or a sinner. I choose. Me. God speaks but I choose. Choose to comply. Choose to ignore. Choose to act. Choose to obey even if it seems ridiculous, to fly in the face of reason. I choose to follow.

Mama Maggie created a longing in me. She was used to stir my spirit and launch a craving in me to commune with my God and find His will for me. To stop striving on my own and to simply be still. Then to go and do what I know I am to do. Be who I was created to be and do what only I was called to do.

It's All New... Again

2011. It does not seem possible that another year has slipped through my fingers. Another year of goals not met, dreams not fulfilled. I am still the same. I have not done what needs to be done to better my life and the life of my family. BUT there were victories. I went to school ON CAMPUS at DeSales. I mingled with the young 'uns and survived to tell about it. I did well, too. Dean's List with room to spare in my GPA. This is an important step in securing our family's future. And Dale has done well in school and I feel that I have done a lot to help him succeed by doing all the running with the kids, etc. But I can be a better wife and a better mother. I can be a better friend, sister, teacher, employee, etc. But first, I need to be a better child of God. I need to spend my time reacquainting myself with God and His ways. That is my focus for 2011, to become entralled with Him and His ways rather than my own. To learn to trust Him, which I have no reason not to, as He has always met our needs and surpassed every one of my expectations. Trust is my biggest issue and how can I trust anyone else before I learn to trust God? This year may be the most pivotal yet as I learn anew what it means to walk by faith and not by sight. I want to be a History Maker. I want to fulfill my destiny and achieve my purpose.


I will close with this:

History Maker
by Martin Smith

Is it true today that when people pray
Cloudless skies will break
Kings and queens will shake
Yes it's true and I believe it
I'm living for you

Is it true today that when people pray
We'll see dead men rise
And the blind set free
Yes it's true and I believe it
I'm living for you

I'm gonna be a history maker in this land
I'm gonna be a speaker of truth to all mankind
I'm gonna stand, I'm gonna run
Into your arms, into your arms again
Into your arms, into your arms again

Well it's true today that when people stand
With the fire of God, and the truth in hand
We'll see miracles, we'll see angels sing
We'll see broken hearts making history
Yes it's true and I believe it
We're living for you

I will be a History Maker. I will live for Him, in faith, worry free. My God has it in His hands.

Sick

Sick. It’s a word we all use and most likely overuse. Last week I learned what sick really meant. I had a 105 degree fever for at least two days and then was admitted to the hospital with a kidney infection that had begun to manifest in my blood stream. I was so sick that I didn’t care what they did to me. I can say with absolute honesty that I have never been that ill or that apathetic in my entire life. That is sick. My cold or sniffles is not sick. They are a mere annoyance. A speed bump in life. The road to recovery for me has been frustrating and regaining energy has been slow.
Sick is just one of many words we have neutered with overuse. Love comes to mind. We should love God and things holy. We should love our family. We should not love pizza or a TV show. Another is killing. We say that our head, or wherever our current pain is located, is killing us. Well, most likely it isn’t.
I need to be more particular in my word choices. I desire to be accurate in my descriptions and to love only that which I truly do. I need to use God, or any form of His name, in a reverent manner. I need to recognize the power of my words – the power of life and death. I need to be aware of what I speak and the spiritual consequences of my words. This is my newest goal. To be exacting in my word choice, to think before speaking and to make every word a prayer and blessing.

A Season of Struggle

I have not blogged because I don’t want to be negative. I don’t want to appear a failure. I don’t want the quality of my faith questioned. But the reality is that I am struggling. I am struggling to find where I fit. I am struggling to see what I am called to. I am struggling to love and be loved by the Father who created me. This, or course, affects all my relationships. I feel as if my entire life has been a struggle. Ok, from when I can remember. My earliest memories are of my parents fighting. And me thinking, after hearing a commercial for a divorce attorney on KYW News Radio which my mother always had on, that would NEVER happen to my family. But it did. I remember knowing it was true even when they were “hiding” it from us saying that Daddy was working late, etc. Maybe that is why I hate being treated as if I am stupid to this day. Hmmmmm

I have struggled with inadequacy for as long as I can remember. I have never felt that I measured up. My aunt, who was one year older than me and as close as a sister, was prettier and artistic. I couldn’t draw stick figures. My brother was high maintenance to say the least. I was always under improvement by my family – for my dry hair there were multiple treatments, weight to be lost (this was before I was actually over weight), I was too loud, ran too much, read too much, a nerd, etc. I struggle to remember the positive things said about me as a child. This has impacted me in ways I have denied for way too long. I KNOW in my head that I am to replace the lies with the truths that God has laid out for me in His Word and the truth of who I am in Him. But how do I translate this to my heart? How do I live this out? How do I achieve victory so I no longer have to live in this state of defeat?

There has to be more to this life than this. This feeling of despair. This feeling of rejection. This feeling of being completely alone. I want more. I want victory. I want freedom. I am sure I must choose this but what if I can’t? Does that make me less of a Christian? Does that mean I don’t believe enough?
The irony is that I know that I will get through this. That I will be a stronger person with an amazing testimony because God said so. It is the walk through this valley that is feeling momentarily as if there is no light in this darkness. But there is. It may be small, almost as if it is a figment of my imagination, but it is assuredly there. Giving hope when I don’t feel it. Strength when it feels as if there is no way I can move my feet let alone take a step. I know He will carry me, I just want to feel it too. I know He loves me, I simply want to feel it. I want the dark, lonely season I am in to fade and the light to shine again.

Personal Responsibility

Why are so many of us averse to taking responsibility for our lives? Why do we allow ourselves to live as victims rather than victors? We have victory in Jesus because He said so! He died so that we may live. Not as slaves to our worldly circumstances but rather as dead to us and alive in Him! We need to own our mistakes, recognize our failures, see ourselves as we really are, and then do what needs to be done to be realigned with the Word of God. For me, this has been quite the journey. I have had to see myself for what I was - I avoided the truth, sometimes in order to protect myself, but nonetheless this avoidance caused me to tell lies and that is a sin. People were hurt and I did that. So, I had to face it and fix it no matter how painful. Now I must face my fat. I am obese and this is not okay. This does not honor my God, my husband, my children. My life is limited and people limit me because of it. I have gifts that are unrecognized because they are veiled. I am seen, especially by Christians it seems, as unworthy and lazy. No longer! I will no longer live as a victim. I am not a slave to my fat, my appetite, my thyroid, my exhaustion, my depression, nor anything else that contributes to the reasons I have arrived here. I submitted an application to the Biggest Loser and have not heard from them. But really, I am not sure I wish to be away from my husband and children for up to 6 months. Not do I relish standing on a scale in spandex for the world to see. Nor do I wish to be touted as the heaviest contestant ever. Yet I desire to be healthy. I desire to lose this burden which holds me down though God desires me to soar. I am not the unworthy, unlovable person I was brought up to think I am. I am loved by God and He will help me overcome but I MUST DO THE WORK. I must resist temptation, fill up on His Word so I am armed and ready for battle and I must get moving. It is not a complicated equation really. But the thing is I must act. I am responsible and faith does not trump personal responsibility. If anything it should make us feel a greater sense of responsibility because we will stand before Him one day and answer for our choices. We are the servants of a just God who loves us so much He placed His son on the cross as a sacrifice so that we may live with Him forever. In the face of that, how can I not take responsibility, accept forgiveness and get on with correcting the problem? I can’t. Now is the time. This is the day.

Easter Sunday

It is Easter Sunday. The day we celebrate the culmination of the Christmas Story, for He had to be born in order to die. I so enjoyed the speaker at Lifechurch today, a former mobster who is a powerful example of the redemptive power of God’s love in a life fully surrendered. And then I think, “Am I fully surrendered?” With all that I have done wrong and all the mistakes I have made, God still loves me. He never turns His back on me. Yet I continue to hold back, even just a little and sometimes a lot. Why do I not let Him have it all? He wants it. He wants me to surrender and follow Him. He wants me to step back and allow Him to step up. I am so stubborn and pig headed. When will I stop trying to second guess God and do His job? When will I simply let go? I have lost it all, in a worldly sense. I have had no home for my family. I have been unable to pay bills, yet He provided. He has proven Himself to me over and over. It is time – time to sit down and shut up. Time to let Him lead me. Time to go where He wants me to go instead of where I want to go. Here I am Lord. Here I am.