Breathing Out Gratefulness Today

I am truly breathing out gratefulness today. I have a blurry mind full of bits and pieces of images, words, and feelings, but it's all good. I'm thinking about how girls in Bible study last night said that beauty is defined to them as "inner peace in the midst of chaos", that huge smile Yemi gave me when she turned around in her stroller to look at me today, and the wonderful feeling of my soft blankets which I crashed in just a bit ago!

It crosses my mind often: I live a charmed life! It is so cool to be able to like what you have and love where you are and what you're doing. I am obviously so blessed to have 2 healthy and radiant daughters, much more energy and health than I have had in years, a wonderful and supportive extended family, my dear husband, and the list truly does go on. But it does occur to me that there have been plenty of seasons of life where I had lots of beautiful God gifts in my life but still was hoping for one thing more, one something more.

I am just breathing out gratefulness today because God has given me the grace and peace to live MY life, which means to me that I am accepting and trying to give my best to what He has clearly put in my lap. I'm not looking for more, and I am not searching for my importance by finding more to invest in. Maybe you've always been there, but little Miss Overachiever here did not always know that peace and rest in my soul. What's really neat, too, is that as knowing Jesus takes first place in what I really care about, a relaxation settles in about the other things I am called to do. It's not that those things (singing, making the CD, Sister Bridge, being a mom and wife) aren't important or that I don't care about them, it's just I realize they are not MINE. They really are God's and for His sake. When we aren't concerned about our legacy or reputation anymore, the floodgates of freedom really do open wide! Freedom to just want Him, not get "our panties in a wad" about things, even good God things, and freedom to let Him do what He wants through us as our eyes are elsewhere...

Maybe it's kind of like baseball. I never was good at hitting the ball. When people said, "Keep your eye on the ball", I really wanted to hit them instead of the ball. ARGH! I mean, what does that mean??? Anyway, supposedly if you had your eye only on the ball, you could trust that your arms and the bat and whatever must move to hit the ball would swing around and do its job naturally. But your attention needed to be solely on that ball. Not on your arms or the bat. Same with Jesus. When our goal is to seek His face and know Him better every day, everything else falls into place. I am learning to not keep track or look at what I'm "doing for the Lord". I can hardly stand to even write those words because it's just not like that anymore, thank the Lord! I get far too impressed with myself, or far too upset with myself, and God wants our attention on Him, not ourselves. I'd really like to go through life oblivious and unaware, trusting that as I continually am emptied of myself (sin, opinions, hardheaded ways) and then filled with Him in a living and genuine way, that HE will have freedom to use my life (and I don't have to know about it.)

Well, thanks for reading...More from Creative Counterpart by Linda Dillow next. It is such a good book about being the wife God is calling me to be. :)

Sister Bridge

There are several things that I really love and it is super fun and exciting when those things collide. Sister Bridge is a collision of many favorites: I love the nations and missions, I love beautiful material, purses, natural looking jewelry, and quilts, and I love sisters in Christ standing together and helping one another out!

There are such amazing ministries and devoted missionaries out there who are living among the poor, the least of these, widows, and orphans. I love sponsorship, adoption, and mission trips...but there's always need, therefore there's always more room for great ideas! And I've had the desire for a long time to be a representative or "middle-woman" you could say between these ministries/missionaries with good ideas and the people they are helping and everyone here in my small circle of friends and family. I've always wanted to be a voice, and I just had to "die" to it. All the talking, blogging, song-writing, singing, wanting to do something...God definitely wanted me to lay it down and stop worshipping the desire to be useful. And laid down it was.

When all of a sudden this summer I had the opportunities fall in my lap to start connecting with these ministries that gave a skill and an income to at-risk women in three countries, I was surprised! But the timing was right. It is such a joy to just enjoy this, and let God build the house. I want to be really clear that Sister Bridge is nothing more than an idea and I needed a quick noun to say "the people that get the inventory and organize selling it to people in the U.S., connecting women to women all around the world!" You can simply go through Sister Bridge to help these women in Cambodia, Indonesia, and Swaziland...OR you can go online yourself and purchase things! (The Cambodia one, not yet, but hopefully soon we can help them make a website/shipping availability).

As I said, all we are doing is getting the inventory here and keeping track of the money getting back to the ministries. NO ONE profits from this except for the women themselves, and these organizations reaching out to them are fantastic. If you are interested in the 3 ministries and want links to their websites, just check out Facebook.com/SisterBridge. We have items to sell especially in this time of year when people are shopping for Christmas gifts; not sure what inventory we will keep after that. We can give you everything you need to have a party or just bring to your small group, bunco, girls night out, whatever. The items are gorgeous, incredibly reasonable in price (most things are under $20), and original...not to mention the point here: partnership with women who are so much like us who simply do not have the same opportunity for their needs to be met.

I pray Sister Bridge can truly be a bridge between "us" and "them", connecting us until we really do live with equality on our minds and compassion in our hearts. This desire to make a difference, or "do something", is a journey of our own hearts and minds changing. There is no quick leap. And living how we live, surrounded by this constant slurring of our needs and wants, sometimes it feels impossible to ever cross that bridge! I don't believe in just "doing something"; His sheep must know His voice. If helping women in this tangible way is something you'd like to do this season, just contact me and we can help make it happen.

Health Stuff

It is about time to change my blog picture! No more running through the slip and slide...however, I think yesterday it would have been okay, since it was at least 80 degrees! You won't find me complaining...til January! No, I have every intention to enjoy all the seasons, even if I have the personal opinion that winter takes over too much of the year!

Anyway, just wanted to write about my pursuit of healthiness today. A long time ago, I wanted to do some nutrition info groups at my house and blog more often about the things I had learned, things that got me back into the land of the living! But honestly, January through May 2011, I felt like crud again and didn't have much passion to share anything with anybody! Then in June, I started feeling so much better, started waking up early and going running 5 mornings a week, and just all kinds of amazing differences. So, I just wanted to briefly share encouragement of how that came to be in case anyone else needs a little hope...

First of all, Jesus. Always it's going to be: First of all, Jesus. Surrendering my health and future to Him, going through the process of accepting whatever He chose for "my" life which is really His, was a huge part of my journey. Before I got better, I truly had peace that my life was just as valuable and full in bed as it is up and doing all these things, because my LIFE is hidden in Christ and cannot be touched by the things of the physical realm. Amen! Coming to this truth is a long journey that I am still on.

Secondly, I read a book "Tired of Being Tired" by Jesse Lynn Hanley and saw Shelly Roby at Nova Medicine in E-town. I began to live by the knowledge (not perfectly at all, but applying what I could) and taking special pharmaceutical grade supplements that Shelly saw through my blood work that I was depleted of. I did this for a year before I saw improvement, but now I am so glad I persevered! I know now that our food just does not have the nutrients in it that we need, so I eat incredibly well plus take these things. The cost is so much lower than meds I was taking...and I am on NO prescriptions now.

Third, I read (so randomly it seems but it was the hand of God) this tiny paragraph that said, "Sometimes patients who have underwent gall bladder surgery need to be cleansed of the toxins introduced to their bodies under anesthesia. They simply need to do a liver cleanse and take Kyolic garlic supplements in large quantities." OH MY GOSH. I thought, "How amazing would that be if it worked?" I had that surgery in Africa in 2000. I did what the book said, and that is really when I started to see improvement, in about 4 weeks. I felt so well I literally began running 5k's. I definitely still need 11 hours of sleep a night or I crash back into all the old symptoms, and I must continue in all the other therapy included in the book "Tired of Being Tired", but everything is manageable usually if I do what I know.

For anyone tired, not sleeping well, overweight, sick often...read that book! It's like $4 on Amazon! I have definitely learned how important it is to invest in my health, because I'm not sure how other people are, but I struggle emotionally, socially, spiritually, and mentally if my physical stuff is a wreck. If I haven't gotten enough sleep, I make poor food choices, I'm more likely to feel depressed, I do not have perspective with my husband and kids, and then I'm an emotional mess. It's like I can choose to live in a pit and live my life always climbing out of it...OR I can avoid the pit altogether as often as possible. Disciplines like time with God, exercise, and eating healthy don't always feel like they fit in my "I just wanna be carefree" mood...however, by doing these things, I am much more carefree!

It's definitely a passion of mine to share these tiny tidbits I have learned with women who are not getting to live up to their potential, so if you are reading this and want to talk about any part of it, I am available!! Just let me know, and we'll do this together. :)

Creative Counterpart by Linda Dillow

I have had this book Creative Counterpart by Linda Dillow on my shelf for many years, and have read it many times. If nothing comes of all of this moving stuff around, and we stay here in this house another decade, finding this book will have been worth the mess! I was -okay, am- finding myself in a difficult season of marriage. We are going on 11 years! Yay Us! But certain things in our relationship that are steady and constant are not very good things, and certain things that are good are not steady and constant. I bet you know what I mean.

So I needed a good dose of truth. A talk with a friend really helped me realize some things about myself and brought some perspective. It was hard to talk about it, because I know I am blessed and don't like to be negative and complaining. But sometimes it is just good to hear myself say certain things out loud and look at them out there in the air...I needed to remember I am responsible for myself, my reactions, my heart attitude, and that I must stay in total humility and desperation before Jesus because I do not love my husband like I should, but HE DOES! Hallelujah! And when I don't love my husband like I should it is not because of my husband, friends, it is because of me. Regardless of the details, Jesus can give me love to give, but I have to do the work to stay in that place of receiving (so that I can give).

So, this book...Yes, that's the thing I want to share. This one paragraph says so much. Chapter One excerpt:

"Yes, there are frustrated wives, just as there are frustrated engineers, airplane pilots, and karate instructors. But the frustration does not stem from the nature of the work; rather, it comes from the boredom inevitable in any job done poorly or unimaginatively. (OUCH and HELLO!!! I like this woman. She's a truth-teller.) A creative counterpart is more than just a helper. She is a woman who, having chosen (or having found herself in) the vocation of wife and mother, decides to learn and grow in all the areas of this role and to work as hard as if she were aiming for the presidency of a corporation."

The fact is, I did sign up for this. No one forced me to marry, and no one forced me to marry the specific man I married. I am so lucky to have had that choice and my daughters will have that choice as well. Maybe we chose or will choose other vocations as well, but that doesn't mean that we are not responsible for being excellent at this particular vocation of wife or mother or just woman. It's a beautiful task. Women are amazing, and I want to keep perpetuating that good image, especially in a world where men and women alike value women by their weight, looks, or accomplishments outside the home. Hey, I think weight, looks, and accomplishments outside the home are fine and dandy...but they are not the most important thing, by far! We can, by God's grace, be professionals at this. I am encouraged and challenged by this!

Secret Place: The Job of Our Lives

I am just struck tonight by a secret that I don't want to keep secret. There is a secret place, and those of us who are "in Christ" know this...we know that we could be in a living hell on earth but we have a Life hidden with God in Christ, and that life can ALWAYS be thriving, abundant, lush, full of laughter and pure joy. Our Life makes us strong and shining in our life, if we develop this Life. It's a secret place, we go there alone; it's the throne of God, the lap of God, the face of God. Friends can remind us of that place, oh thank the Lord for friends that draw us to remember or find this intimacy with our Father, but we go there alone. We look eye to eye with Him, and by faith, we dwell there. We connect, like when you lay down next to your child or spouse or dog (haha) and just have some face time. And this is where we draw our strength, perspective, focus, and LIFE.

It's like finding out you won a million bucks, going to sleep, and when you wake up, you remember you won million bucks yesterday! It wasn't a dream. YAY! That's how the secret place is. There is relief, there is always good news, there is something beyond all this, and we have it right now. WOW! Life gets so hectic and troublesome, and I mess up so very much, and I'm so tired of myself...and I want some relief. I go to the Lord and lay myself before Him in the secret place, and it's an oasis for my spirit! I go and I say, "Jesus, I don't have to feel anything, I come by faith! I want to give myself to YOU, You don't have to give anything to me!" But He does. He leads us beside still waters, He restores our soul. There really is a hiding place, an oasis...we can wake up from the sometimes bad dream of life and enter into our eternal life, anytime, any place, through intimacy and connection to His Word, praising Him, repentance, surrender, talking, listening, teaching, friends who love Him.

Keeping our life consumed with Jesus is THE job of our lives. I personally don't have room to get caught up with anything else, if I am going to make knowing Him the job of my life. I do other things, I care about other things, hopefully all that He has told me to do and care about, but those things ARE NOT the job of my life. Those things are just...obedience...they'll come and go. They're passing. I wasn't created for them. I used to think that stuff for God, stuff that was about God and His people, and knowing God personally was the same effort, the same job. Oops! It sure does take a load off when you can obey the Lord without all that burden. The job of my life is to know Him and believe Him, and while that is not heavy, it is all consuming work.

One thing I run to the Lord and hide from is myself. I just want to be so honest here. When I write a blog or talk at a concert or something, I am always honest and I am always 100% myself. But most likely when I am writing or talking or singing, I have just come from having intense and intentional times with the Lord, I am somewhat drunk in the Spirit, and if you see freedom, or confidence, or joy, or truth, you are seeing Jesus. Sometimes I am consistent with this "being intentional" with the Lord, and I am very blessed when He helps me do that. I love those steady times, such ground gets covered, oh it's just so wonderful and I'm an idiot to not continue in it! But many other times, I'm sitting in a pit, and I'm a fool. A literal, biblical fool. The good news is, despite my example, we ALL have the opportunity offered to us to have the most fantastic relationship with God EVER MADE, if we will go with Him and make it. We can go where "no man has gone before"...if we want.

I wrote a song in the past month and I don't really like it, but there's one line I love. It says: "I am ruined for anything less, I am ruined for anything less than the fullness." Yeah. May we be ruined for anything less. Unable to go back after what we have experienced in Christ. Lose our appetite for the world. Move on past baby milk, move on past old sins. Crave repentance and obedience and God's delight in us, and not have room for craving other's attention, approval, and applause. Forget that stuff ever ruled us. Amen.