For Memorial Day weekend, we stayed at our pastor's house as he and his family were gone to conference. What a nice change of pace to stay somewhere and not have to interrupt the lives of other people! We were so blessed to have a house all to ourselves.
This weekend, I think it hit us how much has changed in the last 3 years and how much more will be changing as this year goes on.
Jason and I are waiting on baited breath for the call from our District Superintendent to go to Ann Arbor for accreditation Once we go through that, we are ready to go where ever God calls us. I am excited, a little nervous, but over all so humbled that God has chosen our family to be a vessel he uses to specifically tell others the Good News as a paying job. I am so proud of Jason for answering the call, even though it has been a hard, painful, journey for all three of us. We would have it no other way. The struggles we have faced in this season have chipped away the walls that stood between us and the people God needed us to be. I am different, I am a new creation, I am becoming the woman God wants me to be so I can fulfill his plan for my life. His grace IS sufficient and through Him I was able to overcome the obsticals, the heartache, the anger, and the fear that was holding me back from what I am today.
Jason started a new job yesterday. God was so faithful this last month providing for us. I watched my cousin's girls all month, something we had decided on months ago, and yet God had a plan and what I got paid covered what we needed each week. Jason new job would have never happened had he not been laid off and looking for jobs AND by being off he was able to go through all the interviews and tests.
It is all worth it. Jason and I are reading a book called "The Land Between" by Jeff Manion. He was a speaker I saw at Orange. His talk had me sitting on the edge of my seat, holding back tears, the entire time. His message is that God takes us through the "land between", or the desert, or the valley, whatever you want to call it, to teach us. (Ok, duh, I know you are thinking, that is what most preachers say). His story, however, is based on how God took the Israelites out of fertile Egypt and to the land "flowing with milk and honey". He didn't tell them they would be spending years in the desert, nor did he tell them why. But there in the land between there faith was tried and tested. So is ours. We go there and our faith either flourishes or fades. Our trust in God can either increase or die, based on how we respond to what we experience in the land between.
This book has changed and ratified my life and how I look at it. It has changed my perspective on God and what he is teaching me. I can be thankful for the hard times and look to God and the future he is giving me with hope and expectation. I long for the land flowing with milk and honey and I welcome the land between so I can be molded and pressed, tried and found worthy.
Wednesday, June 1, 2011
Wednesday, May 25, 2011
Friday, May 20, 2011
Thursday, May 19, 2011
doctor jerek and doctor jolie
I have been watching my cousin's daughter a couple days a week for the last month. I had to run out yesterday, so my mom came over to help Jason (who is AGAIN laid off) watch the kids. She had the genius idea of getting out the stuffed animals and playing vet. She called me while I was in town and asked me to buy a doctor kit. This is what they did, LITERALLY, all day.
Monday, May 16, 2011
with a trumpet call
Tonight after devotions, Jerek asked when he would get to see God. I explained that there were two ways that he would get to see God. The first was when he died. We talked a little bit about some loved ones we know who have died and gone to heaven and how exciting it will be to see them someday.
I then told him that the other way is when Jesus comes back. I told him that we don't know when, but someday Jesus will come back to Earth. A loud trumpet will blast (at this I cupped my hands to my mouth and said, "doo-do-dooo!") and then everyone who believes in Jesus and loves him with all their heart and tries to live like him will, BOOM, go up in the sky with him and go to heaven and to God.
His eyes got big.
His jaw dropped.
His little face just lit up at the picture that must have formed in his head. "That is so cool, Mommy." he whispered, "I can't wait to go to heaven."
What conviction I felt. In my selfishness and fleshy sinfulness, I lack that excitement about Christ's return. There are days like today, when I am perfectly comfortable with snuggling with my little boy on the couch and reading or leaning over and kissing my wonderful husband and he wraps his arms around me in return. My sinful, limited view tells me that this is all I need in life. Life is good and I don't need to leave it.
Father forgive me. My finite mind cannot conceive the wonder of the truth of your return. Help me to have that childlike faith and amazement that my son has; that you have called all of us to have.
"For the Lord himself will come down from heaven, with a loud command, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet call of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. After that, we who are still alive and are left will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And so we will be with the Lord forever."
1 Thessalonians 4:16-17
I then told him that the other way is when Jesus comes back. I told him that we don't know when, but someday Jesus will come back to Earth. A loud trumpet will blast (at this I cupped my hands to my mouth and said, "doo-do-dooo!") and then everyone who believes in Jesus and loves him with all their heart and tries to live like him will, BOOM, go up in the sky with him and go to heaven and to God.
His eyes got big.
His jaw dropped.
His little face just lit up at the picture that must have formed in his head. "That is so cool, Mommy." he whispered, "I can't wait to go to heaven."
What conviction I felt. In my selfishness and fleshy sinfulness, I lack that excitement about Christ's return. There are days like today, when I am perfectly comfortable with snuggling with my little boy on the couch and reading or leaning over and kissing my wonderful husband and he wraps his arms around me in return. My sinful, limited view tells me that this is all I need in life. Life is good and I don't need to leave it.
Father forgive me. My finite mind cannot conceive the wonder of the truth of your return. Help me to have that childlike faith and amazement that my son has; that you have called all of us to have.
"For the Lord himself will come down from heaven, with a loud command, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet call of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. After that, we who are still alive and are left will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And so we will be with the Lord forever."
1 Thessalonians 4:16-17
Friday, May 13, 2011
Wednesday, May 4, 2011
imagine & orange
This past weekend I got home from the Orange Conference, put on by the ReThink group, in Atlanta GA. What a way to spend 6 days! 2 days in a car, through 4 states and 11 hours, with 3 other women! AND we all love Jesus. I had an amazing time.
Before we left, Jason and I took Jerek to the Imagination Station in down town Toledo. We thought it would be a great way to spend our last day together before my trip.
It was fun.
We got drenched.
It poured and poured and we refuse to pay 7 bucks for valet parking, so we walked 2 blocks, in the rain, with a broken umbrella. We pitched the umbrella in the bathroom trash can . . .
I just wanted to mention this as a disclaimer for my unruly locks. I look like a wild child! But it was fun.
So, the next day I left for Orange at like 6:30 in the morning. Orange is a huge ministry conference. I took 5 classes on Wednesday plus the first large session, 2 on Thursday and Friday with 2 main sessions both of those days as well. My brain was mush by lunch on Wednesday!
God taught me so much and I was so challenged as a Christian, a wife and mother, and a ministry worker. My heart is so excited by all I learned and by all the changes I want to make so that my 3-6 yr olds will leave my class and really be changed for Jesus. How precious is the job that I have been given. That God has entrusted me with an hour a week to speak the truth and love of His word into the hearts of tender children! They are the church and they need a solid foundation of God's word and his love so that the church will carry on in truth and true worship.
So, here are some pictures and I swiped some video from some guy on youtube because his audio is WAAAY better then mine!
Before we left, Jason and I took Jerek to the Imagination Station in down town Toledo. We thought it would be a great way to spend our last day together before my trip.
It was fun.
We got drenched.
It poured and poured and we refuse to pay 7 bucks for valet parking, so we walked 2 blocks, in the rain, with a broken umbrella. We pitched the umbrella in the bathroom trash can . . .
I just wanted to mention this as a disclaimer for my unruly locks. I look like a wild child! But it was fun.
In the wind tunnel:
Conked out!
So, the next day I left for Orange at like 6:30 in the morning. Orange is a huge ministry conference. I took 5 classes on Wednesday plus the first large session, 2 on Thursday and Friday with 2 main sessions both of those days as well. My brain was mush by lunch on Wednesday!
God taught me so much and I was so challenged as a Christian, a wife and mother, and a ministry worker. My heart is so excited by all I learned and by all the changes I want to make so that my 3-6 yr olds will leave my class and really be changed for Jesus. How precious is the job that I have been given. That God has entrusted me with an hour a week to speak the truth and love of His word into the hearts of tender children! They are the church and they need a solid foundation of God's word and his love so that the church will carry on in truth and true worship.
So, here are some pictures and I swiped some video from some guy on youtube because his audio is WAAAY better then mine!
The "Awful House" HAHA
The Conference Center and Gewinett Arena
worship
speaker guy, did the intros every day
NeedToBreathe
the band that did a concert for us Wed. night
What Orange is all about:
To the volunteers:
NeedToBreathe:
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