Evil Issue

This just in:

"This is not just about me."

I have been shared a great truth, indirectly and I am so overjoyed at God's protection in our family.

My very handsome husband and I have had a very rocky marriage. In the last two years things have calmed, and in the last year we have began growing in a consistent love and appreciation for one another. As I look back on what we lived through, I am amazed at what God has accomplished and what we have endured, but I get it now.

We weren't fighting each other. We were and are fighting evil.

I have heard recently the quote, "The issue isn't the issue. The issue is control." This is it. control.
Who is in control? Evil likes it when He is in control, and He is in control when I am taking control.

It is not totally God in control, until I ask Him to take it. And even then, I have to let go of it to Him.

That's my job. To rest in Jesus, to let go of it all to Him. To listen for His desires and to follow in obedience with the peace and joy He provides.

And Satan will do all He can to keep me from trusting God. Why? Because if He can take out my peace and create in me a hot mess, it will impact my marriage, and if he can make my marriage a hot mess, it will impact my children. And if I am not trusting Jesus, my kids won't trust Jesus.

This is the reality. I am already sealed. It's not about me anymore. It's about my children...and their children...and their children. Satan thinks ahead. He is not stupid. He has a game plan every time.

This life of obedience is good for me, but it is absolutely necessary for my children. They won't believe if they can't hear. They can't hear if it's not being shared. It can't be shared if we don't have it to share.

I have to fill up! It's no longer optional. It's life or death for my family.

Jesus said He desires none should parish. Me too.

Love's Retreat

God meets me in The Shed. I can't explain it. Door open, birds chirping, the children jumping and giggling outside. He is here. It's sad to look back on the many years of my life when I would be still and feel alone, forgotten, and abandoned.
But today I am so filled with His love. Any time that I can be with Him I steal away from the world. I abandon dishes, wet clothes sitting in a wet clump, and the toys strewn from one door to another.

While the children play, I pray.

I am like a child in this game of hide and seek. Me hiding from my world and seeking Jesus. Except that today He is easily found. Sometimes I wait, but this season is ripe and His fullness of love I carry with me.

I once felt bad for taking advantage of the quiet moments to soak up the Savior's love and sit at His feet. I thought I should play with the children more, or continue in my attentiveness to them. But then He stirred in me a great joy. He shared His longing to be with me.

The Lover of my soul is jealous for me. He calls me, "Seek Me first and all these things shall be added." I feel my head relax and I grin. This is romance.

So I share with you like a schoolgirl telling her dearest friend. Seek Him while He may be found! It is  a crazy romance. Unpredictability and delight are the trademarks. He has more for me everyday, every year, every season. "Taste and see that He is good."

I feel this season's sweetness and know I am being filled for what is ahead.  I revel in the now. I don't let my imagination go anywhere. I stay here with Him. I enjoy this.

Mom's who take time to pray,
grow what is important.
It's the only way;

To nurture and care for our tender flock,
We listen and wait
we don't watch the clock.

Jesus is calling
do not delay
joy is waiting for you today.

I want to be a joy filled person, a peace filled person.

So when I am shaken I will spill good stuff.

Bitter Dam

Jesus has removed everything that hinders and blocks my relationship to Him. He came and lived and died. He proclaimed it is finished, and then He came back to life! 

I have realized that when I feel the distance in my communication with Jesus, it isn't His end of the line that is being cut off. Its mine.

When Moses led the people out of Egypt, they people often grumbled. I grumble. They were thirsty. I get thirsty. At many points in their weakness, they became greatly swayed by their discomfort. I get weak and get stuck. They openly admitted that it would have been better if they had never left Egypt. Egypt, where they were enslaved and mistreated! Moses, their chosen leader, turned to God and prayed. The flock of God's people were a burden for Him to lead. I have been chosen as a leader and I feel the burden, too.

God then provided water, but it was too bitter for the people to drink.

I think about my own circumstances. I look at the life God has provided me with the eyes of my flesh, and I think that it is not very good. My thoughts turn sour in the routine. I think that maybe this is not what God has because it isn't easy or fun most of the time. I don't see purpose, but a lot of daily menial tasks that run the corse of my day until the sun goes down. Some days turn right into night.

Then God turned Moses. The great Shepard told Moses to take a log that was within reach. God opened Moses eyes to see it, and instructed moses throw it into the water. Moses obeyed and the water was made sweet.

My marriage, my home, my community, it is the perfect training ground for my pilgrimage to Heaven. I need only to look to my Shepard to show me the tools that He has laden about me that will bring the sweetness to my life and the lives around me. To take the bitter in my life and turn it sweet. He used a tree... roots and hardwood, twigs and green leaves. hmmm....a normal, nothing exciting, nothing out of the ordinary, thing.

It is at the place where God made the water sweet for His people, that He warned them, and blessed them. 

" 'If you will diligently listen to the voice of the Lord your God, and do that which is right in His eyes, and give ear to His commandments and keep all His statutes, I will put none of the diseases on you that I put on the Egyptians, FOR I AM THE LORD YOUR HEALER. '

Then they came to Elim and their were twelve springs of water, and seventy palm trees."

Exodus 15:16-27 (emphasis mine)

The couldn't see one tree until they looked with God's blessed, wisdom filled eyes. But when they saw, they obeyed. And when they obeyed, they were blessed exponentially.

God's blessings do come through pain and uncertainty. We see who he is when we are out of options and He is all there is left. His voice and His visions are clearer when we lean in close out of desperation. When panic drives us to Jesus, He becomes the calm and canceled the crazy.

Ask Jesus to give you vision for His purpose in your circumstances. Ask him to give you God goggles to see what He has provided for you from His perspective.

I have made many wonderful friends over the years. I would meet people think, "this isn't going anywhere." Then it wold come to fruition to be a meaningful lasting friendship. Other times, people I thought I would be so close to...those relationships seemed to fizzle. I want to be a friend who trusts God. With my marriages, my homes, my children, my friends.  I have learned my job in a relationship is to always be patient and loving. Never manipulating and controlling. What freedom!

I am stepping back again today and I am looking. 

Jesus, I ask you to come and make the bitter waters of my heart sweet. Let your aroma fill my thoughts, communication, and actions. Let the debris of my discontent and lack of closeness with you be freed so that the currents of your living water can come and wash my life clean. All for your glory*