…you are not stuck in a box on an assembly line to nowhere.  Perhaps today you find yourself in a situation or circumstance either externally or internally that is very unpleasant to you – nearly unbearable…and it feels eternal!  Yes, we’ve all been there.  It’s ugly.  But I want to encourage you to believe God that it is merely a light and momentary affliction working something good in you (2 Cor. 4:17) and this temporary circumstance will not box you in and own you.  It is and it won’t if you will believe God and His Word.  Nothing is impossible with God.  He is always working, wooing, moving, growing stuff, speaking, brooding, shifting, poking, loving, drawing…  That’s why we’re never stuck.  Perhaps temporarily delayed, processed, massaged, cleansed, humbled….but if we move with Him, He’s always wanting to take us forward into new things!  He can change a heart, open a mind, bend a will, bring a surprise, write a check, close a door, open a door, heal, deliver, sell whatever, ad infinitum.  FIND HIM! BELIEVE HIM! LOVE HIS WORD!  And then come share your good news with me, ’cause I’m expecting God! P.S. Praise Him – out loud – through it all.

  Yes, as you can see I’m still catching up on everything after being away for our third-born’s glorious wedding week.  Can you relate?  I bet you can.  It doesn’t matter if you’re surrounded by toddlers and infants or teen-agers, work is always piling up because we’re always creating new messes with grocery shopping, cooking, laundry, organizing, bill-paying, home schooling and living life.  I’ve found that usually  it gets messier before it gets better. We’re all in this together girls, so take heart!  (I just need to invite someone for dinner and suddenly you can see the counter tops again…)

The community college creative writing class I enrolled my 16 year-old son in at 4 in the morning (December 4th blog entry) has once again proven to me that the liberals running higher education in our nation would like to turn all of our kids into a bunch of……….DONKEYS!  When the course book arrived and I began to tear out the 1st of 20 pages I came across with unscrupulous, i.e., inappropriate – even pornographic – sexual references, well let’s just say I knew we were in trouble.  (Creative writing?)  Then, when the ‘professor’ queried the students on a lengthy questionnaire and  my son respectfully voiced his concerns over the liberal ideologies of one of his last college classes and his preference not to ‘write erotica’ in his upcoming class, the ‘professor’ wrote back, assuring him he would be writing erotica and confirming that she also was ‘one of those liberals’.  We decided we have better things to do with our time and energy than to dodge moral land mines all semester, so today we *respectfully declined  to participate in the cesspool.  We’re believing the Economics course will serve us well and provide actual educational material to enrich our son’s intellect.  I’ll keep you posted…(get it?! ha.)

*dropped the class

Jared and Heather will enter into holy matrimony today, January 16, 2009.  They aren’t your average church kids.  They’re part of a group of young bucks I’m privileged to know and call my spiritual family. None wealthy or influential in the grand scheme of things as determined by this world’s values, yet filled with power and extremely dangerous to the kingdom of darkness. It’s exciting to know that God is building an army of such young people across the earth for His purposes in our day. Not only have they done the ‘hard things’ like tithing, giving to the poor, loving the lost regularly, serving the single mother and today’s U.S. orphans, they have said “no” to many pleasures and frivolities that America’s youth tend to indulge themselves in.  They are the kind who have endeavored to live Biblical Christianity.   They are not perfect people, but strive to be more like Jesus every single day.  They have endured through trials and felt the pain of being misunderstood. They have stood strong over time.  They have arrived early, stayed late, and ‘been there’  faithfully, consistently, like unmovable pillars. They don’t just show up at youth group – they serve as leaders in the body of Christ. They operate like fathers and mothers in a fatherless and motherless culture. They spend their gas money on someone else, for no personal gain.    I’m so proud of them.  I honor these covenant friends and specifically, this precious couple today on their special day.  I’m privileged to call them my children.  It is the greatest joy of a mother’s heart to truly rejoice in her son’s choice of a spouse.  Heather is ‘exceedingly abundantly above’ in my book.  She has been such a marvelous comrade and confidant to me, our local church and our family, in kingdom-building for more than a decade.

I’m walking on air today, celebrating this grand occasion.  God is so good.  All the glory is His!

As I sit here in a coffee shop in Tacoma, Washington on the eve of my third-born son’s wedding ceremony, I ponder the vast implications of this event.  I found this photo of my gorgeous groom, taken just shortly after we married over 28 years ago.  He’s sitting on the old plaid sofa I mentioned earlier in my blog, the spot that soon became my meeting place with God most mornings.  In retrospect, I was a somewhat naive 18 year-old bride who really didn’t have a clue about what I’d just done when I’d said “I do” to my Gregory at an altar in front of about a thousand onlookers.  Now I see very clearly.  I see that when a godly man and woman (not perfect, but hungry for God and committed to His Kingdom) are yoked together for life, they make a declaration to not only those watching in the auditorium, but to the powers-that-be in the spirit realm.  The words spoken and the promises made during their wedding ceremony contain spiritual power to change the world.  It’s not just about a couple of mutually-attracted young adults planning the BIG DAY, going on a fancy honeymoon to an exotic spot, then setting up house with all their pretty new things, double incomes and bright future.  It’s not about the American dream!  That’s part of it, and we’ve all tasted of the privilege of our nation’s prosperity, but it’s a very insignificant part of what marriage should be about.  When my son and his bride say their vows this weekend, and the pastor pronounces them man and wife, an edict is issued.  The Son of God looks down from heaven and I believe the angels sing and a supernatural decree will go forth from the holy occasion! “This is an historical, watershed moment! A godly household is being established – a base of operations for this kingdom couple – this power team.  Their home shall be a refuge, a place where altars are built for the living God, a place of love and grace, a place where the lost will be saved, a place where godly offspring will be discipled to become godly young men and woman who will, in turn, bring the kingdom of God to the earth through the power of their lives in Him.  History is being written!  This godly family will fill the earth and subdue it according to God’s plan and God’s scepter of righteousness will be extended in the earth!”  After the pomp and circumstance has passed, it’s no longer about them, it’s all about Him! His will, His purposes, His desires, His kingdom plan.  “Wow, that sounds so heavy, so serious, Denise,” you might say.  Yes, it is.  If we could see beyond the surface of things, if we could understand our role in the earth, if we could dare to live kingdom lives instead of ‘American lives’ then we would really live.  I am so excited about what God is doing and I’m tickled pink that I get to be a part of it.

IT’S A VERY BIG WEEK INDEED!

Here I am…yes, that’s my cup of coffee (how’d ya’ guess?) right there in the corner and I’m sitting here just behind it, typing away. (FYI, Sacramento airport installed these cool cyber-stops with ELECTRIC OUTLETS and little counter tops to stop and work, re-charge batteries, iPods, and all the other stuff we need to stay connected – hurray – a blogger’s dream and a blonde’s dream especially since she forgot to charge her iPod and cell phone this morning!). 

I wanted to pop in and say “Good Morning!”  I’m heading with the fam to Seattle for our third-born son’s  wedding this weekend.  WOW.  I said that real fast but if I ponder this holy occasion, this landmark, this turning point in history…once again I say with emphasis, “WOW!“  I’ll bop in again very soon and elaborate….

 …..Yesterday I woke up while the house was quiet and bopped downstairs to get with God and spend some time in the Word.  I had good intentions but then suddenly while I was praying and pondering, a negative thought crossed my mind.  It led to another thought, and another and before I knew it…I was feeling ‘ugh’.  Dreary, weak and slightly oppressed.  I began to trace where this sensation was coming from and it had all begun with a single thought…which led to more thinking, retracing, trying to re-do something in my mind…the whole thing colored a good chunk of my morning and robbed me of life, strength, joy, energy and precious time.

It occurred to me that particular thoughts can become my sinkholes – deep, dark  places filled with quicksand. It’s like I’m on my merry way, oblivious of danger, when suddenly I find myself mentally or emotionally tripping into what can become a pit of despair if I don’t crawl out of it quickly!  Oftentimes, it’s ridiculously unimportant in the scope of life and a ‘repeat sinkhole’ that I’ve already spent too much time in previously.

Ephesians 4:17 comes to mind, “So I tell you this, and insist on it in the Lord, that you must no longer live as the Gentiles do, in the futility of their thinking.” Thinking can be so futile.  Websters defines futile as:  vain, useless, lacking purpose, ineffective, trifling, unimportant, fruitless. 

The longer we think, mull and rehearse, the deeper the black hole becomes and the longer it takes to recover and get back up on top of that thing. 

If we can ‘flag’ our sinkholes, anticipating those weak areas of our thought-life, surely we can leap over them with a little effort, instead of falling into them.  Let’s beware of sinkholes in 2009 as we’re finding God.

Some thinking is fruitful and profitable according to Philippians 4:8, “Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things. 

Today was the first ‘get-back-to-real-business-day’ in a long time for lots of us stay-at-home moms.  I love the Christmas holidays.  I drink them in to the very last drop.  I extend them if at all possible! They really begin to hum around Thanksgiving week with a brief couple of weeks in-between in the first half of December (when we pretend to be productive ) and then…Christmas bells begin to ring and Bing Crosby begins to sing!!!  Then comes the pause of life’s must-do’s.  Glorious.  No papers to correct.  No stringent schedules.  Everyone chills and rides the happy wave of party time.  Offices keep odd hours and everyone understands – it’s the holidays! Eggnog lattes and peppermint mochas make their appearance. Snow cancels everything, we eat ourselves out of our favorite jeans and watch too many movies and football games.   Glorious indulgence. Slumber parties abound.  Alarm clocks are a thing of the past and daily chores aren’t so daily.  We can’t live there forever, but it’s sure a fun trip. Eventually, back-to-school Monday arrives.  That’s today at our house.

I just talked to my friend tonight (and by the way, mother of 8 wonderful, even delightful! children still at home – this incredible family living contentedly under the same roof in their 1600 square foot home!  God’s grace.  So many spoiled Americans whining about the size of their houses…).  Anyhoo…I phoned about something entirely unrelated to our ‘Mondays’ but then she told me she had been working on taxes for their small business the entire day…sigh.  That’s tiring.  (You know how I feel about taxes if you’ve been reading my blog ) I could hear subtle fatigue in her voice.  And I quite easily commiserated as I’d been working the entire day since 7 a.m. (actually – pull out the violins – I began yesterday morning until church, began again after church and called it a night around 9 p.m., too tired to go on) cleaning out shelves and files, evaluating, scheduling and adjusting the remainder of my home schooling year, attacking and digging through every drawer and closet I could get to and tossing anything I couldn’t live without; cooking, cleaning, repeat, waiting on sick kids, laundering the sheets from our recent houseguest – all the while defying my discouragement at the mountains I needed to move and aggressively deciding that progress would be achieved!   I was on a mission. When I put the phone down, it occurred to me that many of you are in the same boat today…paddling your way into 2009 with a vengeance!  At moments feeling very weak and small, but nevertheless pressing on.  I smiled.   It felt good to be in such good company.

Hubby scrubbed and I just now dried the last pot from breakfast (old fashioned oats with raisins-getting back on the wagon-ha!), lunch (leftover homemade vegetable beef soup and sandwiches) and dinner (fancy pants tuna casserole in disguise and steamed broccoli) and sat down to say ‘hi’.  So here I am, shifting gears today.  There’s no easy way to do it, but it’s gotta be done.  I pondered the last year and so many memories flooded my mind for some reason – some happy and some sad – making my eyes misty.   Seasons always changing.  Although on the surface things might look dormant, God is always working and the process He’s overseeing is carrying us on into the future.  Be strong, be bold, be encouraged and be found in Him.  The best is yet to come!