Filled to the brim

Life has been moving at a fast pace the past two weeks....for good reasons!  Visits with great friends a birthday celebration and a women's young life retreat at Lost Canyon.  All awesome.  I was undecided on the decision to go to the retreat until pretty much the last minute, but I am SO glad I did.  My husband rock star'd (a new term/verb???) it as we drove from Denver to Albuquerque, where he dropped me off to link up with some fantastic gals, then took our crew another six hours home, unloaded, unpacked and got the house back in functioning order so that I returned late last night to a CLEAN home.  :)

After having a week of wonderful visits with friends, I switched cars in Albuquerque and couldn't shake the feeling of being homesick.  But I wasn't homesick for my family (it had only been a few hours) or for our new home (though I do like our new town!)...yet I just couldn't shake the feeling of being homesick.  I asked God what I was so homesick for.....and it hit me.  I was homesick for the community, familiarity, bonds, memories, inside jokes, history and memories that come with old, tried and true friendships.  I was in a car with some beautiful ladies on a way to a retreat with the promise of new relationships, but it was a stark contrast to the weeks worth of familiarity that I had just left.  I had not been that homesick since I was a little girl.

But if there was ever a cure for homesickness, a weekend at a Young Life camp did the job for me.  If you have never been to a YL camp and come across the opportunity to go, here is my unashamed plug:  GO.  EXPERIENCE.  You will not regret it one iota.

From the minute we walked into our rooms and saw the adorable goodies waiting for us on our beds and decorations, to the amazing music crew, the hilarious program characters and the speaker who breathed life into my tired bones, it was clear that everything was done with excellence for His Name's sake.  Oh, did I mention the food???  Yep.  Just as awesome.  This ain't your average camp food.  Oh no siree!



Late during the first night, my homesickness began to fade....because I was back in a familiar place.  It wasn't because I had been to Lost Canyon before or because I was with my best friends.  It was my first few hours at Lost Canyon and I had known a couple of the ladies for only a few hours.  Instead, it was the familiarity of being with a group of folks who all wanted the same thing:  to experience and glorify God.  As we sang songs of praise, laughed hysterically at the program and heard the words of God through our speaker, it seemed to me a glimpse of what heaven could be like.  Where we sing to our Creator, laugh with joy and hear His voice.  It was all about Him and it WILL be all about Him.  

Bottom line:  for 36 hours, the retreat staff and crew poured into us.  POURED into us in every way.  These are just a few highlights that I walked away with and can't wait to share:

1) He is FOR us.  Psalm 56:9.  A gal who led the praise reminded us that though we know we are loved by God, sometimes we forget that He is FOR us. This was something I really needed to hear:  I have experienced folks who I know without a doubt love me, but weren't FOR me when I needed them to be.  I needed to hear that God is FOR me.  

2) In the story of Mary and Martha, Nick our speaker, pointed out that Martha was not told that she was doing a bad thing.  She wasn't sinning in her actions.  Jesus just merely points out that Mary had chosen the 'better thing'.  I feel overwhelmed by the many 'good' things I try to do/feel the need to do... but I am learning to discern and choose the 'better thing'.

3) Don and Renee Wooster gave a marriage seminar and it was EXCELLENT.  Their words of wisdom made me want to love my husband even better.  And they encouraged us in how to do it.  They were transparent, real and such a breath of fresh air.    

And the last thing I'll mention:  the group of ladies I had the privilege to be with.  WOW.  In the hours spent in that minivan, I saw these gals with new eyes...through the eyes of God.  Their stories are not mine to share, but my best description of their lives is 'beauty from ashes'.  I came in with the impression that they were a secure, flawless, beautiful, professional, confident group of gals that I was just a wee bit, maybe slightly intimidated by.  But their stories and scars make them real, beautiful, women that God is using for His Glory and I feel blessed to call them friends.

I can't wait to share more.......I need to pour it out because I am filled to the brim.  

The dreaded F word....

Does anyone else remember the choose-your-own-adventure books growing up?  I have vivid memories of devouring those books one after another.  You would start with one scenario, then you were offered one of two choices for the next scenario and so on until you got to the end.  Of course I would always go back and try every single combination of scenarios until I exhausted every outcome.  And that is what my brain does when I give in to the dreaded F word....FEAR.

I don't typically think of myself as a worrier....or someone who has any abnormal fears (except snakes...I don't even like the stuffed animal versions...much less those pretending to be harmless behind glass displays....yuck, yuck, yuck....I would shoot one with a shotgun in a heartbeat).  But lately, I have been thinking of so many 'what if' scenarios.

 It's everything from little to big things.... we just had some hand, foot, mouth nastiness around here and I started thinking 'what if we just keep passing it on and we never kick it and never get to play with other people ever again?? it'll just keep mutating and between six folks in this house we'll just keep kicking it back and forth and become hermits for the next year and be known as those weird hand,foot,mouth people'.  See??  I quickly digress into a hopeless scenario.  Or swing to the other end of 'big stuff'....regarding our job and the Army - separation boards are coming up and my husband's class is one of those under evaluation.  What if in some crazy scenario we get separated and all the sudden we have no job (because I don't currently work...but I guess maybe I SHOULD be working then, just in case....or go back to school and get another degree...but what would I study???) and what if we need to move again?  I start analyzing our savings and investments and wonder what if?? Wow.  I'm pretty sure I burn more calories with my mental worry than I do in a 5 mile run.  And of course there is everything in between..... what if my kids grown up to be miscreants and terrors to society?...what if my kids fall in a pool and drown (almost happened today)?...what if I eat this/that and the chemicals cause me to grow a tumor in five years?...what if we buy this couch now and regret it???...

I am not saying to throwing prudence and wisdom to the wind...but there is a mighty fine line between wisdom and fear.   I walk that tightrope daily...sometimes hourly.

So, I was wrestling with how to combat these fears.  Because if you let it run rampant, it can devour you, your thoughts, and above all, your witness.  And then a verse came to mind from Proverbs:  "The fear of the Lord is wisdom and knowledge of the Holy one is understanding."  And the reminder to fear the Lord above all else is found again and again elsewhere in Proverbs, Psalms, Job and Ecclesiastes.  Even King David, a man after God's own heart, gave in to fear when he took a census of his troops before going to battle.

I pull a "king David" all the time...a fear comes up...I analyze what I have, my strengths and how to come up with my own solution.  Instead, I think fearing the Lord would mean coming to Him first.  Asking for His counsel and just plain 'ol trusting Him first, above all else.  Sometimes that's a hard pill to swallow and several times this week, all I have been able to mutter is "help me trust You God...help my unbelief".  Someone once reminded me that everything that comes our way, trials and joys, have first passed through the hands of God.  Our Creator.  Creator of the Universe.  So what have I to fear in comparison to that??  

In fear and reverence for God will come the knowledge we seek.  And peace.  And Glory to Him.  I will choose to fear none other than my Holy God.  And pray like crazy for my unbelief.

 

Forgotten

Recently one of my worst fears came true.  I actually forgot that it happened and then felt so terrible after being reminded about it because I had to be reminded about it.  Does that make sense?

I was in a new store with kids in tow and as we were headed out the door, I had a request to make a detour for a potty break.  I was at the front door so I went ahead and decided to park the cart, grabbed my little one from the front seat of the cart, and started walking towards the bathrooms with the bigger two straggling behind.......and they were s.t.r.a.g.g.l.i.n.g. BECAUSE I forgot their sister in the back of the cart!  Yep, I just started walking right off, focused on my task at hand, and had completely forgotten one of my kiddos in the back of the shopping cart.  Thankfully she seemed to take it all in stride and after I retrieved her, took our potty break and got back home I put the whole thing behind me. So I thought.

This same child of mine is known to repeat things over and over and over.  In the past two weeks she kept saying "don't forget me" every single time we got out of the car of walked out the door.  I had no idea why she kept saying it...I just imagined that she had picked up the phrase and was doing her thing. Repeating it.  I finally asked her, "why do you keep saying that?? Have I EVER forgotten you??"  Umm.  YES.  I had.  and she quickly reminded of the event...which I had forgotten, but which had left such an impression on her sensitive heart.  I felt like crumpling and crying and asked her to forgive me, to which she light heartedly said 'yes.  Do you forgive me for fussing?'  oh my heart.  It broke for her that she felt forgotten by me when I had never ever intended to.  It is one of my parenting lows.

And then it dawned on me how many things I forget and how often.  (don't even get me started on my preggo forgetfulness....it includes putting dirty diapers in the FRIDGE.  so yuck.)  I get annoyed when my son forgets to do something I've asked him over and over to do....and forget the degree of Grace I have been given....and should share abundantly with him.

I've also been realizing that I have forgotten how to not be in 'moving mode'.  For the past almost 6 months, we've been in transition and have moved twice.  I keep the mental timeline which ticks down the time til we move again.  I forgot that I don't have to worry about moving again...for a little while at least.

Moving has the affect of making me feel somewhat forgotten.  When you're trying to connect and plug in with an already established group, it's easy to feel forgotten in the mix of things.  When you're far from family it's easy to feel forgotten.  Because life just gets busy sometimes.

The combination of my parenting lows and side effects of moving had me in a place of feeling so unworthy.  Just overwhelmed.  Incapable.

Then someone reminded me of this simple fact.  Because, again, I had forgotten.  That I am BELOVED by Christ.  Despite all my flaws, ugliness, selfishness, failures and shortcomings, He has chosen to LOVE me with the purest, most perfect of loves.  First.  Because of who He is.  And then I remember that He restores all things.  he heals all hurts.  And He renews us.  I remember that I am His Beloved.  And that's all I ever need to remember.