Galore

When I planted the seeds in my garden almost three months ago, I had no idea how successful it would be. I was just excited when little sprouts came out of the ground! But oh the thrill of seeing seeds become sprouts, which then became plants, which grew into vegetables. And now -- we're eating it!!! I love it. And I can't believe how amazing fresh-off-the-vine zucchini and yellow summer squash tastes! Not to mention the cucumbers and carrots. You can actually taste the difference! (I'm excited. Can you tell?) And I just got in from picking tomatoes and corn. Our first of the summer from the garden! Maybe we'll have them for breakfast. :)

Satisfaction And Then Some

My senior year in college, I read the book Perelandra by C.S. Lewis. It's one of the very few books I think I could read over and over again , although I have yet to do so. But I digress...

There is one scene in which the main character, the narrator, I believe, eats some fruit from a tree. And the fruit tastes better than anything he's ever tasted before. So absolutely satisfying, in fact, that he is exactly that --- satisfied. Truly satisfied. And he doesn't want anymore. The flavor is more amazing than anything he's ever experienced, yet he does not want more of it.

I remember being so struck by the idea of being so satified that the idea has stuck with me ever since. I still remember the discussion in Dr. Mark Cosgrove's class. I even wrote a paper on it. And here I am, 15 years later, blogging about the very same topic. I think it has so greatly affected me because I've always longed for such satisfaction in life. The kind that needs no more. Wants no more.

Well, lately God has been reminding me of His promise for full life. So I've taken Him up on the challenge. If Jesus really came so that I could have life, the life that is truly life, to the full, then He is even better than the things that I love to have and enjoy in my life. Things like Diet Coke, and getting a really great bargain, and Pottery Barn, and great new clothes, and chocolate! Sounds crazy or stupid, maybe. But I think He's up for the challenge. I'm starting to believe that He's as good as all these. And then some. So here's the journey to find the "and then some . . " that He's offered. I hope you'll enjoy the journey. And find some for yourself.

Spiritual Faint of Heart

I'm a little confused. I have this new challenge in my prayer life. It started the day of Corey's funeral. Spiritual numbness, maybe. Then, two days ago, Hanna woke up at 4am throwing up. By Sunday morning at 5am, I was pleading with God to please make it stop for her. So pitiful was she. And by 6am, I was claiming His own character as the basis for it, begging Him to show my children how faithful He is to answer prayer. How loving and caring He is to not want any of His children to suffer. I was sure He would listen and make her suffering stop. But 15 minutes later, while again holding the "barf bowl" I found myself to be wrong. So now, as I pray that God would spare Grace (everyone in our family, actually, but especially Grace) from this horrible stomach flu, I waiver in my faith. He said we should ask, believing that we have what we ask for. But how do I do that if He doesn't even answer the prayer that protects His reputation? For His Name's sake. I don't understand! But I know that even in that, God is sovereign. And I so badly want to believe that EVERYthing He does is good. So I guess I'll pray that He helps me in my belief.

My Own Personal Gethsemane

"Every true disciple of Jesus Christ will know their own Gethsemane." --Beth Moore, in lesson nine of her study Jesus the One and Only.

After they shared the Passover Meal and sang a hymn, "Jesus went out as usual to the Mount of Olives, and his disciples followed him (Lk. 22:39)." They followed Him. On His trek through the Kidron Valley to the personal cross He endured that very night as He submitted Himself to the perfect will of His Father. They had been following Him for three years. Learned from Him. Sought His direction. Studied under Him. Rabbi in Word. In deed. Indeed. But the true following, I think, was just about to begin on that trek through the Kidron Valley and into the Garden. Where He would lay down His life and fight the battle of all battles before He faced the battle in physical form.

There is so much about this study that challenges me. But the part I can't get over, the one that keeps repeating in my head, is the idea that if I am a true disciple of Jesus Christ, a true follower of Who He Is, then I too will face my own personal Gethsemane. A place, as Beth Moore puts it, "where serious decisions are made that will affect the rest of my walk (with Him)." And it might happen more than once in my lifetime.

Funny thing is, I think I'm there. Today, as I listened to her talk on the video, I realized the Lord's clarification of some, as of late, very persistent and personal thoughts in my head. And in my heart. Thoughts like, (okay don't lol) "Bria, put down the computer and play with your kids." And, "Bria, don't start a game of Pathwords, you know you'll get sucked in for another at least 45 minutes!" And "Bria, turn off facebook and listen to Me. I've got something better." Or even, "Bria, don't you know that what I have to offer is so much stinkin' better than any of what you could possibly be doing?!?"

And so I have to choose. It's time for me to make one of those decisions "that will affect the rest of my walk." And, I know it sounds (or looks) trite, but it's a very real struggle right now for me. Not just the time on the computer, but my "me time" as a whole. As an at-home mom, I've always been able to justify stealing whatever moments by myself that I could get, knowing that every mom needs alone time or she's just not her best. As true as that is, for me, in all pure and utter honesty, I think I've gone to the opposite extreme. No, my children are not neglected. But I must say, confess rather, that I certainly have not appreciated my opportunities with them to the best of my ability. And I most definitely have not been willing to forfeit my "me time" in order to submit in the Gethsemane way to the will of the One Whom I claim to follow.

But, you know what? That's just like Jesus. Agonizing. Hmm, cool. I guess i'm on to something. And now, to just do it....

Ahhhh....

So when I'm sick, I'm really grouchy. Self-centered. Self-pitying. Self. Self. Self. And then more self. Yuck! I'm sick and tired of this self! So Sunday morning, before my family and I left for church, instead of doing what has become the normal morning routine for me over the last two weeks (while being sick), I got up, took a shower, and decided to get back to it. Back to the real focus. Back to at least trying to regain that focus, anyway. So I journaled. And I prayed. And I didn't know what to read in my Bible until I remembered the commitment I had made last week at church to read a Proverb every day. (oops!) So I read Proverbs 15. And I prayed through it. And, although I don't believe I received any extra special revelation meant just for me, I do believe God spoke through the quiet. And He refreshed my self. And He's renewing the focus. Ahhhhh....

Sincerely

Yesterday I had the opportunity to experience for the first time a little bit of what God might feel when someone isn't loving one of His kids the way He thinks they should be loved. I know it's pretty crazy that I've never really internalized such an experience before. I mean, I have been a parent for almost seven years. I guess I'm just a little more clueless than I'd like to admit.

It all started about three weeks when our four-year-old decided to start a separation anxiety thing every time we go to church or Bible study. We were approaching the parking lot at church the first time her new phase showed its terribly tumultuous little face. Unsure of the catalyst but clear on the fact that she needed to get through it, we lovingly convinced her (or maybe just ourselves) that she would have fun at church as we left her in the very capably loving hands of the Kuddly Kittens coordinator. (That would be the wonderful lady that oversees the 4-year-old department at our church.) Well, yesterday when we made clear our intentions of going to church, those many tears returned, yet again. And yet again, we questionned her as to what it might be about church that she doesn't like. And again she answered, "We have to do so much work!" So we probed a little more and were told that there's just to much coloring involved! OK, hold the phone. This is the four-year-old who has been coloring perfectly beautiful pictures for about six months, in the lines and everything. So. . .

It occurred to me that perhaps there's just a little too much structure for my young four-year-old. After all, she will be in the four-year-old class for two years before she enters the kindergarten class. (Because of her late summer birthday, she misses the kindergarten cut-off date by one day.) So my husband and I decided to put her back into the less structured, more playing-time Busy Bees class (aka the Sunday School class for the three-year-olds). We decided to have her repeat that class instead of the Kuddly Kittens class before going on to kindergarten in two short years.

Unfortunately, I hadn't thought through the possible added stress this impromptu decision might cause some of those who work with the three-year-old class. And I was caught off guard when I saw that stress written all over one's face as she tried to calm a screaming child (not mine -- thankfully) while processing the idea of adding one more child (mine) to her already very full classroom. What an amazing servant of God this woman is. But also, to my pedestal-breaking disappointment yesterday, human.

So we sent our beloved in, after some deliberation with the powers that be, and went on to our own class, where I proceeded to start crying before walking back out. I just wanted my daughter to be loved. I knew that she was in very loving and capable hands. I just wanted her to feel the love of those hands more than the capability of them. Oh, how I long for my children to want to know Jesus! And to know His unexplainable love! I wanted their love for her to be sincere. Not forced. And it made me cry to think that she might not experience it the way I wanted her to. The way I expected her to.

In spite of all of this, she was beaming when we picked her up. She had fun. She even remembered the story! And she played with friends and had snacks. I am seriously thanking God Almighty for that! She had nary a clue about any of what had gone on in my own heart (and in the privacy of the bathroom stall where I broke down and cried until I could compose myself).

And as I debriefed myself yesterday afternoon, I realized that maybe, just maybe, that's a little bit how God feels when I don't love His children sincerely and with authentic love. When any of us doesn't genuinely love someone that He loves, I think it probably tears Him up inside. I'm guessing He doesn't need to go into the bathroom stall at church to let it out, but I am pretty sure it hurts Him just the same.

But it's hard to love the unlovely! Yep. Just like it was probably hard for that Sunday School teacher to get past the idea of adding even more possible stress to her time with the very busy Busy Bees. I mean, my daughter was having a hard time in the other class, so who was to say she wouldn't experience that kind of turmoil here too? But I still desparately wanted that teacher to love her and to want her in there.

Romans 12:9 and 10 says, "Love must be sincere...Be devoted to one another in brotherly love." Too much to ask? Maybe. But the beginning of that twelfth chapter in Romans is where we are told to "offer (our) bodies as living sacrifices." And to "be transformed by the renewing of (our) mind(s). Then (we) will be able to test and approve what God's will is." So it's His deal -- this sincere and genuine love. We let Him have His way with us. He transforms us. We love like He wants us to. Yep. Definitely too much to ask without that plan. But it's His plan I'm living for. Not mine. It's His love I'm called to give. Not mine. It's His four-year-olds I am called to tickle and serve and teach and LOVE. Not mine. Good thing. Because sometime it's hard.

Nostalgia From The Bend

I've had some pretty deep thoughts going on in my head lately. So it would have been nice to blog about them. But, obviously, I have not. And, now that I am actually sitting down and taking the time to blog, the thoughts are mostly gone, which leads me to wonder what I am actually going to write about....

There's oh so much that's gone on these last few (ok, more than just a few) months. My husband's settling into his new job in the bioenergy field, which has deepened my commitment to recycle more and more. (Here in this town that's not really a town, we have to actually drive our recyclables to a central drop-off spot and separate them into their appropriate containers. It actually is somewhat of a commitment.) It has also gotten me thinking that I'd like to start composting sometime. I am so proud of him and the job that he's doing. And I am so in wonder and awe that God picked him up out of the struggle of the automotive industry and put him into an industry that's exciting and growing. At least once a week, I find myself just thanking God for getting him out of there. Not knowing why He chose to be so kind to us, but thanking Him all the more. He is so good!!

And, in the midst of it, last week I followed my thoughts to my life as it was in South Bend. Since that day, I still haven't totally returned to the pleasure of life here. I miss my old life in a lot of ways. Don't get me wrong -- there are so many things I absolutely love about living here -- the beautiful hills and trees of Wayne and Holmes County, the awesome church we get to be a part of, the great school that Grace goes to, living in the country next to some awesome neighbors, not to mention the number one best part of living here -- being so close to our families and all of the many amazing benefits of that. But I felt like, in South Bend I was just settled into my routine (as mundane as it sometimes was) in a more wholehearted way. Mostly, I miss my friends.

"Friends are the family we choose for ourselves." I have a plaque that says that. (I think I may have written that here in a previous blog.) And that was true of our lives in South Bend. Because our families were four to five hours away, we had to choose some for ourselves. Actually, I believe God chose them. And allowed us to develop those friendships to the point of kinship. I miss them. The girls and I got to go there for about a week in August. We stayed with some of these dear and kindred friends. Oh, it was so great. And it was good to come back to my husband's hometown, too. I guess I'm just feeling sentimentally nostalgic. I love you, my friends. And miss you.