All posts in My Listening Year

I Am!

by admin on October 3, 2009 in My Listening Year with 1 Comment
Even when you cry I am
Even in your joy I am

I thought I was going a little nutty today. I was convinced the same song was playing over and over on the local Christian station today… every third song was the same… then I thought I would go nuts because I had listened to it so many times today while driving in my van…. so I changed the station….

I am the Spirit deep with in you
I am the Word upon your heart

Tonight I was driving across the city alone and out of habit turned the above mentioned station on again. I chuckled as I recalled that mornings irritation. I wondered if there perhaps was something in said song for me and that is why I kept hearing it, I know, I assume to much and this all sounds very much like ‘the world revolves around me’ talk… but…Sure enough the third song was THE song and so I tried to relax and just listen.

It was basics of Christianity. The song was a call to again embrace my first love.

I AM
the fount of living waters
the risen son of man
the healer of the broken
and when you cry I am
your savior and redeemer
of all the sins of man
the author and perfecter
beginning and the end
I AM

I have had many years in a row of being tired… tired in my faith… not being nearly as passionate as I once was… The song reminded me that I might have lost my luster but He is still ‘I Am’. No matter how I change as I am molded by life and my Lord he will still be ‘I Am’ and I was so thankful to hear that.

The song reminded me of all the reasons I love Him, why He is my first love… the reasons are all that HE IS, and WAS and ALWAYS WILL BE!

I LOVE YOU JESUS!

TTFN

All The Angry Noise

by admin on September 17, 2009 in My Listening Year with 4 Comments
Galatians 5

22But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, 23gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law. 24Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the sinful nature with its passions and desires. 25Since we live by the Spirit, let us keep in step with the Spirit. 26Let us not become conceited, provoking and envying each other.

So much noise around me, coming from members of The Body, and I am left feeling raw…

So many messages demanding I listen and agree…

You find fault in all that I believe…

So many perceptions and views slapping me down…

You find pleasure in making me doubt…
So many angry voices telling me who I am…

All I want to do is love Jesus and live by his Spirit…

I need to get a grip…

A few weeks ago I felt like Christ was calling me to really focus on the basics…
to work out my salvation with fear and trembling (to take it seriously)…
to quiet my mind and spirit and focus on where it all began…

The week following this call I was hit with many aggressive mixed ‘messages’!

I boiled all the crazy noise down…
and my heart went from being stormy to calm…
and all that was left was love…

A couple days later I felt him speak out of the love that remained…
out of the love grew selflessness…
a gentle spirit full of faith, mercy, peace, patience, joy, thankfulness, praise, worship and truth…
and I felt assured that no amount of noise can take that away from me.

The noise likes to make you doubt…
likes to block out your rock solid beliefs…
and try to blur truth…
muddy the waters of your faith and hope in Jesus Christ.

Is nothing sacred? Would the noise attack even LOVE? NO MATTER! My God is bigger then the noise and does not need to defend himself to the noise!

I will remember love (Jesus), TRUE LOVE (JESUS)!

TTFN

A Good Oops:)

by admin on September 15, 2009 in Bits Of My Personality, Life Keeps Changing, My Listening Year, People In My Heart with 2 Comments

We made our plans and we changed our plans and we ended up at the first after all.I feel a bit like I am struggling to really connect with the church we are attending. Everyone is so busy, including us, and so we miss out on so much. Christ has given us this group of people for a reason. Even though I am often afraid to jump into relationships, I want too with this group!

Baby boy had a fever Saturday night so we assumed we weren’t going to the church’s big ‘kick off’ picnic as planned. We took our Sunday slow because of our boy feeling off. We made pancakes and relaxed. The kids started to get antsy and so we decided a little bike ride would do no harm for every ones sake.

As we passed a local park we realized our congregation was out in the field and then remembered the picnic. We are usually not spontaneous people and our new plan meant not going to the picnic (which had already begun) but I am also a romantic and felt like there was a reason for us spotting the group. There was no reason not to swing back and join the group…After all, we where already out and about, had a fully loaded diaper bag and everyone was in a good mood!

(Big Boy enjoying his fancy balloon hat before his Daddy borrows it.)

The kids had a blast and my man and I felt like we finally made it out to something going on at this church!

(Only Dad can look serious while borrowing his son’s balloon hat!)

It felt like summer! Mid September and the weather was perfectly summer-y! These are the kind of days you have to grab a hold of and deliberately enjoy! I am hoping God changes more of our mature decisions and plans for our better real soon.

TTFN

Flirty Little Post

by admin on September 8, 2009 in My Listening Year, My Romance with 3 Comments
Pardon me while I gush about my man!(Garnet will probably have a ‘grunt’ response to my blog title today (he he he) but I am going to ignore his adorable shyness and GUSH!)

I was thinking about my last post involving my man. He seemed surprised to see a little note of affection on my blog about him… I think more of the ‘he says love’ posts are needed in the future.

I often complain that my man isn’t romantic and definitely isn’t a poetic sort but truth is I am lacking in the romance department too. We have been married for almost ten years and have four kids and our date life is pretty sad (last date was a year ago and we ran out for coffee after a parent teacher appointment and called it a date… shameful, I know). I guess I have let the fatigue that comes with being a mommy cloud my view where my man is concerned. Time to put on some rose colored glasses and really focus on the US, romantically! I dedicate myself to finding that daily romance in our lives again…

I started out this year with a clear vision about learning to LISTEN to God and I really feel he has been sending clear messages that I need to appreciate my man more DELIBERATELY and need to enjoy my marriage more (a.k.a. more romance). I felt this message hit home when I started planning our ten year anniversary party… I had always planned to have a lovely re dedication ceremony but these last few months I chickened out… I got nervous and decided to dumb down the whole party. I was afraid I would have nothing to say (again SHAME) after ten years of hard work being parents! Don’t get me wrong, I know I clearly love my man but I was starting to think love didn’t involve mush anymore… I had a good friend give me a verbal lashing and a kick in the butt when I shared this with her (thanks Anna) and she was just another hint from my God.

I WILL PLAN THAT ROMANTIC re dedication ceremony!

Watch out everyone! I am a woman dedicated to mushing and gushing about my man! It shouldn’t be too hard really, after all, he is incredible!

TTFN

Listen To Her

by admin on September 4, 2009 in Bits Of My Personality, Dem Kids Sayed WHAT?, My Listening Year with 1 Comment

You have to give kids credit, often they boil down our overly complicated and emotional problems to the root of it all and can wrap it all up with a hug and a simple solution. I was feeling afraid today. I had a moment of weakness where I was doubting God’s provision. When I caught myself I was hit with shame and sat in a puddle of selfish and confused tears on the couch. My three year old came up to me, cautiously, and put her hand on my knee. “Mama, waz dah matwer? Why you so sad?” I felt bad for worrying her and said ” Mom is just worried about all the things we need and all she has to do…” She looked at me very thoughtfully, with furrowed eyebrows and replied “But God woves you Mama, right?” RIGHT my little woman! Her simple words snapped me out of my mood and I felt my faith restored. I hugged her and thanked her for loving me and then thanked my Lord in heaven for LOVE.

TTFN

MERCY

by admin on August 20, 2009 in My Listening Year with No comments
  • compassionate or kindly forbearance shown toward an offender, an enemy, or other person in one’s power; compassion, pity, or benevolence
JAMES 2:13
For judgment is without mercy to the one who has shown no mercy.
Mercy triumphs over judgment.

Read this verse in the second chapter of James early this week and I have been chewing on it for days. So often a chapter or verse jumps out at me and then I end up having conversations about it, hearing and seeing so much that relates to it during the week following…

Judgment and mercy have been coming up a lot lately, in my daily life. There is often an unseen struggle in the heart of man that is basically TO JUDGE or to SHOW MERCY. The worlds solution to so many problems is to judge others and it is easy to do that with a heavy hand. Judgment is seen as the POWER of the two options and those who call themselves Christians are famous for their ability to judge others (are we any different from the world in this regard?).

If you think about it… it is so easy to judge that how much strength does it really take to do so? It is often far more difficult to show mercy and takes way more thought power and heart… you have to really work to empathise and get to know a person. A man I respect said to me this week ‘…after all who really has the right to judge anyone? We don’t know their story.’ The above verse makes it all very clear… takes all doubt and argument away… When I read it I said aloud ‘Whooow, that is intense.’ and the truth is mercyIS INTENSE!

A scene from ‘Schindler’s List’ kept coming to mind as I chewed on the power of mercy. The hero of the story was trying to teach the Nazi camp leader the strength in mercy… The real man is merciful… the Nazi character of course missed the point, or the heart, of mercy… but it was a moving scene and really drove home the point…

We all know the verse ‘judged not lest ye be judged’ but how often do we take that to heart in our day to day treatment of other people? Instead of focusing on judgment why don’t we just move away from that (since it is ultimately GOD’s place) and focus on mercy. After all wasn’t what Christ did for us totally undeserved, intense, PURE MERCY!?

JAMES 4:12
“There is one Lawgiver, who is able to save and to destroy, Who are you to judge another?”

I hope it goes without saying that we must living in and by the Spirit to truly know and practice the mercy that Christ showed perfectly.

BLESS YOU!

TTFN

Weary

by admin on August 12, 2009 in My Listening Year with 3 Comments
(Watching the rain fall.)
“…looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. For consider Him who endured such hostility from sinners against Himself, lest you become weary and discouraged in your souls. You have not yet resisted to bloodshed, striving against sin.” Hebrews 12:2-4

Been weary lately…
not just because I have been sick… or because it has been super hot in the house… or because the kids where going stir crazy being house bound more… or because the kitchen was a disaster and I had to keep the kids out of it during renos… I would like to blame it on all of the above and more… but…
I knew this weariness ran deeper…

The wearyness didn’t make sense…
I am content where I am… happy to be blessed with a home to settle into for a while… thankful for the bright outlook I have about this coming school year…

So why was I so weary then?
I pretty much new from the get go it had something to do with the slump in my devotion time… Not that I am religious about that but I am SPIRITUAL about it and RELATIONAL about it. Due to craziness around me, my devotions had been hurried for the last week or more… I was missing my one on one time with Jesus and feeling like I wasn’t getting the kick in the pants each morning that I needed (you know, putting on the armor, focusing on Jesus in order to live by the Spirit)…

The weariness manifest itself in the dysfunction of my schedule.
Kids and I not running like a well oiled machine… up to late, sleeping in to much… no naps, meals thrown at them… me missing meals… on and on and on… I felt like I would get glimpses of victory just before the kids would explode on one another like wild animals and then I felt pulled back under… I felt like I couldn’t stop it all long enough to get off and get clarity…

UNTIL…
Yesterday I read Hebrews 12 QUICKLY and it felt like a big present that I needed to unwrap more… but I was whisked away by family insanity and even though I thrust a copy of the new Testament in my pocket in hopes of going back to it during the day it didn’t happen. Night came and I sat down with my Bible after a long depressing day… I read the chapter again praying to see what was there for me… I felt it, I craved it… I thought I missed it…

Laying down to sleep that night I got it…
The above verses where for me…

WEARY…
Not because of my life right now (although it could use a little more schedule again)… not because of anything I listed above…
Because of thoughts…
So if this is where I loose you that is fine… I am writing this for myself to look back on.
Negative thoughts directed at myself, varying in degree aren’t new for me…
When I went to bed last night I realized I hadn’t noticed all the thoughts for what they where… building up in force and harmfulness…

A clear example came to mind…
I was driving home from a day at the park yesterday and I couldn’t stop the on slot… ‘You are a crummy mother, you are a disappointment, you don’t give enough to your friends, your kids and certainly your husband… you just can’t get it together…’ I ended up sitting in a puddle of bitter tears as I sat in my drive way… ‘Should I even bother getting out of the van?’ Flashed in my mind and then…JUST KEEP GOING… so I did…BUSY BUSY BUSY…till the day ended… trying to but never succeeding in out running the thoughts…

I am not saying I have a self image issue people… just that like most people, and mothers for sure, I let the guilt build up sometimes, of not being as good as other mothers and it blocks all the good in my life from getting to light.

My problem was I wasn’t holding these thoughts up into the light. Grabbing them as they came and exposing them for the foolishness they are so they kept building and I wasn’t noticing…

Weariness resulted and the cycle of it all just kept spinning around. You start to feel like resisting is too hard… but it hasn’t come to blood shed (verse 4) and even then MY GOD IS BIGGER! Thoughts are no match for my GOD!

Every mother assumes they are the one bad mother out there at some point and probably most wives as well but this will not keep me down because I am not a wife and mother first… I am a CHILD OF CHRIST, NEW CREATION IN CHRIST first.

I will look to Jesus and feel the weariness, dripping with nasty thoughts, fade into the irrelevant and I will remember all Christ has done for me!

My God is a consuming fire and he can burn away all these weedy thoughts that have been blocking all the good fruit in my life from getting light!

MY GOD IS A CONSUMING FIRE (also in Hebrews chapter 12).
Bless you!
TTFN

My Beautiful Gift Giver

by admin on July 30, 2009 in My Listening Year with 3 Comments

The author of the book of Hebrews is discussing how Christ is our High Priest. I am sure most of you who read this will have heard what the sacrifice was that Christ brought.

Himself…

HIMSELF!

HIS PERFECT SACRIFICE WAS HIMSELF…HIS BEAUTIFUL GIFT WAS HIMSELF!

When I read the part about gifts it reminded me that as painfully passionate as his death was, on the cross, it was not only a sacrifices but a gift.

I was thinking about how thankful I am to have a perfect high priest to intercede for me before God the Father. Just to throw another thought in here… are we the gift that he brought to God, the Church, to be more specific? He reconciles us with God and then God gives the Church back to Christ as his bride…

The concept of gifts kept ringing in my head.

GIFT

1. something given voluntarily without payment in return, as to show favor toward someone, honor an occasion, or make a gesture of assistance; present.
2. the act of giving.
3. something bestowed or acquired without any particular effort by the recipient or without its being earned: Those extra points he got in the game were a total gift.
4. a special ability or capacity; natural endowment; talent: the gift of saying the right thing at the right time.

Everyone loves to get gifts… it is a wise person who learns to love giving gifts… It is an art to give gifts in the true definition of gift giving… with no desire for a favor returned, with that person’s honor or need in mind and not your own… whether that person has earned it or not!

I hope I am a gift to him…
I hope I live my life seeking to bring gifts to him…
I hope that I accept and cherish his gifts…

Beautiful is the gift and the giver. Thank you Jesus, my gift giver!

TTFN

Letting Go Of Lakes and Loving A River

by admin on July 28, 2009 in Bits Of My Personality, Do I Call It Parenting Advice?, My Listening Year with 2 Comments

“Sometimes, if you stand on the bottom rail of a bridge and lean over to watch the river slipping slowly away beneath you, you will suddenly know everything there is to be known.” Winny The Pooh

I swam in rivers in my youth, up north, but mostly we stuck to lakes. I miss the land. Swimming and boating and LAKES are still in my blood… but I am starting to be soothed by spending time at a river… our river… throwing rocks in, digging in the mud, and even venturing close enough to dip my feet in its calm edge.I will never feel as comfortable in the city as I do beyond its borders and so each time we venture out to spend time in nature I feel relief, like I can breath deeper. Coming home is all the sweeter with a contented heart.Rivers are beautiful. They come from so far and go so far… there is a quote that even at the very source of the inland river, the river believes in the ocean. They go wild and around the corner can be eerily calm.

Our river is feared by most of the locals. There are signs posted at the start of the path we took today that say such things as ‘No swimming, this water is dangerous. Don’t be this years death in the river’ (I am not joking!)…

Truth be told I hope my kids don’t grow up fearing God’s creation but learn to understand it and use wisdom. All that Christ has created is GOOD.

TTFN

Prayer Closets and Aprons

by admin on July 25, 2009 in Better Check Out Blogs, Bits Of My Personality, My Listening Year with 2 Comments

I have tried the prayer closet and the kids think it is cute to bang on the door and stick their little fingers under it and plead to come in too… I tried going to another room and usually the kids flip out and start pounding on one another at that time…

Yesterday I was inspired by Susannah Wesley… many of you probably know her story already but here is a link to a blog I just found. She gives a quick run down of the apron over head story and I think I am going to enjoy her blog!

http://susannahsaprons.blogspot.com

Basically, the mother of many many children would put her apron over her head where ever and when ever she needed to pray and then the kids new to give her time.

I have enjoyed her story for years but never thought of trying to put it into literal practice!

Now I love my aprons… but they wouldn’t go over my head well. The red work one is tied at both sides thus wouldn’t go up. The white one is too short and the pink one to fitted. The red was made by my mother just for me. It is a double bibed (front and back) apron with a big pocket on the front. Just like the one she has used for as long as I can remember. My white apron is very pretty and the first I picked out myself for myself! The pink was handed down to me by Garnet’s great aunt and used to belong to his great grandmother!

The other morning I put my wrap over my head, the fuzzy comfy wrap I wear in the mornings, and the kids actually sat around me quietly and let me pray. I think it took them by surprise and perhaps that is why they behaved so well but either way I have began a new thing in our home. When Mama needs to pray she needs to pray!

TTFN

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