A Woman I Know

There’s this woman I know.  You would love to meet her too, I know you would.  She really is like no one else I know.

You see, if you knew the pain she has been through, the heartache she still carries, you would not expect her to love so unconditionally and deeply.  Some women with that kind of pain become bitter and hurt others.  Not her.

If you knew the losses she has experienced you wouldn’t expect her to give so freely.  I mean, ‘give you the shirt of her back’, kind of giving.  Women who have lost that much can often times hold on to what they have with a fervency like no other.  Not her.

If you knew the betrayal she has lived through you wouldn’t expect her to forgive and trust with wild abandon. Women who have been through that kind of betrayal tend to refuse to forgive and never trust. Not her.

If you knew the mistakes she has made you wouldn’t expect her to say, ‘yes, you are right, I did that, I am sorry.’  You might expect her to make excuses, to defend and blame.  Not her.

This woman, she loves, I mean, really, really loves.  She loves when her daughter gets pregnant out of wedlock.  She takes her in, loves on her, does everything she can to take away the shame.  Even when that daughter turned her back on her just a few years earlier.

This woman, she prays and prays.  She is there for her daughter for anything she has EVER needed.  Even when that daughter has no clue what a treasure her mother is. 

This woman, she has babysat countless times.  She has sent her daughter and husband away on weekends and honeymoons and stayed with the children.  Often times, she paid for the time way too.

This woman, she loves her grandkids with a fierce kind of love.  I mean fierce!  Not the, ‘oh, look at pictures of my grandkids’, kind of love.  No, I mean the chase them around the house, tickle them, play cards and color with them, make ice cream floats with them, kind of love.

This woman was born 70 years ago today.  She is a treasure, I’m telling you, you would LOVE to meet her.  I’ve known her my whole life.  You see, nearly 47 years ago she became my mom. 

Let me introduce you to Norma Jean, my mom.

Happy Birthday, Mom!  I love you so much and am so proud of who you are.  Thank you for loving me.

 

MUST READ!!

My friend, Kelly, from Generation Cedar has hit the nail on the head yet again.  Please read and share and repent.  If you have questions about some of the points she makes, please seek out Godly counsel (which may not be in your church) for answers.  Don’t just shove this under the rug because it pricks your heart.  Please.

On Mother’s Day, Abortion, & the Church’s Part

This approaching Mother’s Day  has brought about such mixed emotions. I read, with belly full of squirming life, the horrific details of the Gosnell trial in front of us, and am painfully aware that the abortion industry knows no bounds, and is becoming a bloodier and more murderous force, cloaking its audacity with “compassion for women”, all the while slaughtering them.  (Click here to read the rest . . . amazing!)

High-jumper

People like me, we jump really high with our dreams, emotions and hopes.  But we also fall really hard.

Some people, the ones I thought I am supposed to be like, they sort of float somewhere in the middle.  They have good days and bad days, for sure, though they are rarely so far up in the clouds that they forget the law of gravity.  No, that’s reserved for people like me. We have super-great, amazing days and horrible days.

I used to hate that.  Why couldn’t I be like ‘those’ people.  You know, the calm, not overly excitable and not so emotional folks?  They seem to float through their day with ease.

Why?  Because God made me this way. Crazy, passionate, jump off the cliff, whole-hearted.  I’m either all in or I’m not.

Realizing this and embracing it was one of the first steps to peace with myself.  The next step is realizing all of life has balance to it.  You simply cannot live at one end of the spectrum every day, though I suspect I will try to figure out a way to do this before I die.  If you are a ‘high-jumper’, the coming down is always the hard part.  It needs to balance out.

Those other people, you know the ones I always tried to be?  They’re really not that different.  The have joys and sorrows too, they just don’t  hit the ground so hard that they need someone to peel them off the cement.  But neither do they often breathe the thin are at those at those high altitudes that make one all silly and giddy.

I am not at all saying one is better than the other.  God made both.  Us crazy-passionate people need you wise, level-headed, count-the-cost folks.  Someone has to remind us to breathe, to slow, to brace ourselves and to help peel us off the cement.

Just like you need us to challenge and encourage you to dream and jump, and take a chance.

What about you, are you a ‘high-jumper’?

Interview About Our Home Business

My dear friends, Gloria and Julia, The Resourceful Gals, asked me to do an interview about what it is like having started a family business.

You can read about it here,

Featured Resourceful Gal - Michelle!

It was a fun interview in which I shared my struggles, advice and heart.  Hope you are blessed by it.

Thanks, Gloria and Julia.

Announcing!!!

I am so excited to announce a new blog that I absolutely love! The two women behind this new blog have a special place in my heart.  I have the utmost of respect and love for these gals.  I wish I could convey to you how wonderful they are.

They have supported, encouraged and prayed for me many times.  The type of people you know that you know, would lay down their lives for you.

On top of that, the wealth of knowledge they possess between the two of them is mind boggling!!  They have decided to share this knowledge in the form of a blog and I am sure you will want to check it out.

Let me introduce you to my dear friends, Gloria and Julia, better known as the “Resourceful Gals”!!

We're a mom-and-daughter team that enjoys a wide variety of hobbies and crafts... and we're all about being resourceful. Saving money, time, effort, and energy is our goal. We've been blogging for years (Julia has been blogging since 2008) but just recently (March 2013) decided to combine our talents to share in one special place... and this blog was born!
Read a little more here about Gloria & Julia.
A few of our favorite posts so far are....

Mason Jar Lamp Tutorial

The BEST Homemade Pizza EVER

DIY No-Sew Curtains

Simple Sprouting

Brunettes Bars

Homemade Soft Pretzels

See what I am saying???!!  Amazing.  Have fun, oh, and you’re welcome.

People of the Lord RISE UP!!

LOVE this song!!!

What He Did

As I was falling asleep last night, this verse quietly and gently drifted into my mind.   THIS is what HE did.  For me, for you . . .

For he hath made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in him. (2 Corinthians 5:21)

Meditating on this today.

When You Are the One Envied

This one hurts and hits a little close to home.  You see, The Evil Twins not only hurt the person who struggles with them, they also wounds the ones envied.  I know, I have been on the receiving end.

Dear Sister who Envies what I have:

Here’s what you don’t know.  You have no idea the pain and struggles I go through on a sometimes daily basis.  You don’t walk in my shoes, you just admire them from afar.

You have no idea what we have experienced as a family, the pain, the trauma, the agony.  You are so blinded by what you perceive as gifts, that you don’t see the mess behind them.  There have been times of such devastation that I thought I simply would die from pain and fear. 

Just because I have nine children and homeschool does not mean for one second that I don’t have daily battles. You have no idea how much I have fought self-hatred, insecurity and self-doubt.  So many days filled with feelings of failure and fear that I was messing everything up.  You have no idea how much time I spend on my knees or face just so I can get up and do it all over again.

This marriage?  Yes, it is beautiful and wonderful, but we are flawed and human and have a sin to contend with just like you do.  Even the most blessed of marriages take work and dying to self, daily.  You don’t know the battles that we have fought with each other and against each other.

The opportunities the Lord has given me to use the gifts and talents He has put in me?? I don’t know why, He allows me to do and experience these things.  You don’t know the self-deprecation I battle when He chooses to use ‘me’.  Really??  Me???  I really am just a girl, trying to do my best to honor and glorify my Father, just like you.  Only He and I know the depth of yuck in my heart, you really have no idea.

Another thing you might not know, when you make those comments or give those looks or have that tone, the envy and jealousy in you makes me feel dirty and ashamed.  Like it is my ‘fault’ I have this or that.  Those comments take something that the Lord intended for a gift,  and I become ashamed of it. 

I feel compelled to tell you, ‘well, it’s not all that good, my husband . . .  or my kids . . .’ anything to deflect what you are saying. I feel guilty and feel the need to counter it with something not so good, even to the point of feeling like I need to make something up just so you will feel better and not think so badly of me for the good I have.  Crazy, isn’t it?

Not only are you miserable because Envy and Jealousy are making you that way, they are sliming me too!  Both of us wounded.  It’s all perspective!  Our perspective of what the other person has is usually so off.  We never see the whole picture.  Only bits and pieces.

Signed,

A Woman Just Like You (with different gifts and different baggage)

Think about it from another perspective for a second.  There is always someone who has it worse off than you.  Perhaps your marriage is hard, but you are not dying of cancer.  Maybe you can’t have children, but you’re not going through the heartache of watching your children enjoying the ride on the train to hell.  Maybe you don’t ‘get’ to have a job or an outside ministry, but you also don’t have the baggage and spiritual battles that come with those.

I really believe this quote is true.

“If we all threw our problems in a pile and saw everyone else's, we'd grab ours back.”  Regina Brett

Remember, you are only seeing a small glimpse of someone else’s life!!  I promise you, it is NOT all rainbows and roses!!  Envy and Jealousy seeks to destroy you and me and relationships. 

Father, I pray for great discernment for each of us.  Show us when we are listening to the lies of the enemy.  Show us when it is his voice, the voice of Envy and Jealousy.  Give us grace to repent and walk away in the freedom you have provided.  In Jesus’ Name.

The Evil Twins and Comparison

Envy, Jealousy and Comparison all play really well together.  They feed off each other and help one another grow, drive the roots deeper into the heart, seeking to destroy and suffocate.  Sounds lovely, doesn’t it.

Envy, Jealousy and Comparison are really just fruit, bad, rotten fruit, but fruit, none-the-less.  If there is fruit than there must be a root.  I want to share a bit about some of the major ‘roots’ to these evil companions as I have experienced them in my own life.

I believe some of the major roots to Envy and Jealous have to do with a

• deep lack of knowledge of our value
• who we are in Christ
• insecurity
• lack of contentment
• a lack of trust in God
• (there is more, of course)

Let’s think about it for just a minute.  When I know that I know I am a treasure in the arms of Christ, that I am valuable just the way I am, that nothing I do or say changes that value in the eyes of the ONLY ONE who matters, I have no need or lack that sends me looking at others and what they have and what they do.  When I am comfortable in my own skin, I don’t go looking for someone else’s skin to try to fit in.

When I really understand who I am in Christ and because of Christ and that I am chosen, holy and dearly loved there is no ‘lack’ that needs filling.  I don’t look at what others have and long for it because I am so ‘fulled up’ (as my grandson says) that it doesn’t matter what you have or do, I know I am something special and it becomes enough.

When I begin to be thankful and content with who I am and what I have, I have no need for anymore.  The only way to a life of contentment that I can figure out is to be radically thankful for all that I do have. 

When I become so content with my lot in life, my gifts, my talents, my calling there is not need to compare to others.

Also, when I learn that I can trust my Father, even in the things I ‘think’ I lack, I stop looking to the other side of the fence for greener grass.

When we compare, we almost always will come up short in some way or another.

Instead of trying not to be Envious or Jealous, it seems more profitable to address the root. 

Saturate your mind with the Word of God. Read over and over chapters like, Ephesians 1 and Colossians 1. 

Meditate on all the verses that tell you who you are in Christ. 

I remember when we first got saved we would hear teachings on renewing our minds on who we are in Christ and I am ashamed to say that I blew it off, it seemed way to ‘elementary’.  “Come on, I know who I am in Christ”.  I now wonder how many years of struggling I could have avoided had I heeded this simple ‘elementary’ teaching. Sigh.

Be radically thankful!  Our dear sister, Ann Voskamp writes beautifully about this.

Do you see any of these ‘roots’ in your own life?  Have you overcome some of these?  Care to share a piece of your journey?

Escapism

Escapism: The tendency to escape from daily reality or routine by indulging in daydreaming, fantasy, or entertainment.

One thing that irritates me to no end is technology.  It is a love/hate relationship.  I think it is incredibly useful but also has the potential to destroy ‘family’ as we know it.  I am seeing our family be distracted with technology more and more as we all have smart phones and have reasons to be on the computer.  I am not sure what to do about it, but I am taking notice and don’t want to be slack in this.

I have noticed, for myself, that not only is technology, in the form of the internet, blogs, Pinterest, Facebook and Twitter, a giant timewaster, but I think it is actually becoming an acceptable ‘drug’.

Sound crazy?  Hang with me for a minute.   Drugs (and the abuse thereof) are used, in part, as an escape.  When life it too much or one doesn’t know how to handle life, they need to check out in some way.  Drugs, money, shopping, food, whatever the vice, the ‘need to escape’ is there.  Of course, there are a multitude of reasons that are the root of this abuse, but the need to be loved and to fill the empty, broken place are probably the most prominent.  I want to focus on one the things we use to ‘escape’.  (The Lord should be sought as to the ‘why’ we run to these things.)  Most of us are not getting drunk with alcohol, or high on drugs, but there are other ‘drugs’ that help us to escape.

Maybe this is just me, but have you ever just mindlessly clicked from blog to blog or Pinterest idea to Pinterest idea? Click, click, click. You should be making dinner, looking at your children when they speak to you, educating them, doing the laundry, . . .  It is so much easier to just click, click, click, and escape the responsibilities.  Or maybe you are just plain overwhelmed and don’t know where to start . . . click, click, click.

Or Facebook, do I need to check it a bazillion times a day?  Why do I?  Because I really ‘care’ what is on there or because I just want to escape my reality and dive into someone else's. (I could do a whole series on the evils of Facebook!)

Smart Phones have upped the ante.  We don’t even need to flip open the lid on our laptop anymore.  That’s so old school, we just need to start sliding our fingertip across the screen, and bam, we are transported to another place. Not to mention they are always with us, in the restaurant, while we are driving, at the coffee shop, on the playground, at the dinner table.

I absolutely have to use the internet, Pinterest and Facebook for our business, but I must honestly admit that I also use it to escape. I have not figured out the balance yet. I am an all or nothing gal.  I’d rather throw the computer and smart phone in the pond than have to find that balance, but I can’t.

The following verses have been speaking to me as I seek to find that balance and they are very convicting.  I’m still working these out ladies.

Pr. 14:1

The wise woman builds her house,
But the foolish pulls it down with her hands.

I wonder if a modern day translation could read, The wise woman builds her house, but the foolish pulls it down with click, click, click of the mouse. (Or her rapid-fire thumbs on her smartphone)

Ephesians 5:15-17

 See then that you walk circumspectly, not as fools but as wise,  redeeming the time, because the days are evil. Therefore do not be unwise, but understand what the will of the Lord is.  And do not be drunk with wine, in which is dissipation; but be filled with the Spirit,

Perhaps, ‘do not be drunk with wine’ would be translated today as ‘do not use technology to escape’??

Not trying to be disrespectful in anyway with the Word of God, I am just seeing yet another way in which I have been ‘unwise’ and have not been redeeming the time and have actually been getting “drunk” or “escaping”.

What about you?  Do you find yourself using an ‘acceptable’ “drug” to escape reality?