Encouragement for my heart....

The Lord in His faithfulness had this in store for me last night… Just as I was wanting to give way to hopelessness. Just as my flesh cried out for me to just go to bed and think no more… the Lord in His mercy had a word for me. Oh that my heart would receive it. Oh that I wouldn’t doubt that He used someone in my life to write these words just for me. He is so faithful soooo good. If you are needing a special touch, just read these words… they are true for you too. You are the Beloved of Jesus if you know Him as your Savior. Thank you Jesus, for your servants who hear your voice and respond in obedience! Here are her words....

“I feel the heart of the Lord towards you and I just want to weep. So many of you have endured so much and you still love Jesus so much. You have not grown bitter. So many of you long to be near Him and no one else but Him sees how close you draw to Him in the secret when you are at work, at home, in the car, in your closet...and you keep drawing near when no one else is looking...He loves it. He sees it and His heart is moved. So many of you have been waiting and waiting for many different things. I have been waiting for several things my heart desires too, but how long I have been waiting pales in comparison to how long many of you have waited for desires and promises...and how long Jesus has been waiting to come back for His Bride, His desire, beats any of us...can someone tell me how He is so patient and how He deals with everything He must feel in the waiting?? Anyway, all that to say, I hear the Lord say, do not lose hope! He will indeed give what is good (Psalms 85:12). Let your hearts be strengthened in His goodness and faithfulness towards you. All you have walked through has not been in vain! Whatever you do, don't shut down your heart...it is our glory to feel. What else in all creation did God make that can feel what He feels? Stay steady! And in the waiting, we will get to know and experience the heart of the One we really are waiting for anyway. “

Thank you sweet friend for being used of the Lord to breathe encouragement to my heart!

Book blurb #2

It seems to me that we should be the most thankful for the top 5 most difficult people in our lives. If you will consider with me for a moment, I believe one of the quickest routes to holiness is through pain and rejection. How can we really fear God alone and not man if we always please men in the things that we do for God? Rejection by men, and especially men that we respect and love, will cause us to determine who we live to please. If we always are taken care of and put first, how will we ever get a chance to walk out true humility? If we say we love people, and we don’t have any difficult people in our lives to love, then how do we really know? It is the people who falsely accuse us that show us that the truth about our hearts belongs to God alone. It is the selfish and hateful people who teach us how to turn to the Lord to fulfill our deepest needs – and truly find the beginnings of the depth of His love for us.
The more we are rejected by fellow man, the more we must turn to the Lord to find our worth, and how deeply we are loved by Him. And there is no love that can match His love for us. How great is the Father’s love that He has lavished on us! It is important that we are being rejected because we are choosing God and not because we are being rebellious to the authority God has placed in our lives. God puts people in our lives for a purpose. The refining that is done to our hearts by relationships with difficult people is a blessing from the Lord. Even people who aren’t traditionally “difficult” will be used when necessary to bring about holiness in your life. It is time that we realize that we are difficult people too.
Until we know how to look past our needs, our rights and our feelings, we will not love as He loves. We will only love ourselves. We cannot on our own be perfect as our Father is. He loves us perfectly. Jesus wants us to understand that the bar has been raised. It is a standard unable to be met on our own. We must have the help of the Holy Spirit and we must keep our eyes on His cross. Oh, Lord help us to be perfect as you are perfect. There is no other way to read that. He wasn’t saying try to be perfect. He wasn’t saying, “try not to mess up too much”. He said be perfect.

Webster defines perfect as being entirely without fault or defect – flawless. Are you striving to be flawless for God? Romans 12:11 says, “Never be lacking in zeal, but keep your spiritual fervor, serving the Lord.” Let’s be zealous for the Lord – and less zealous for our own rights.

Our Lifebook is turned in!

Yeah!!! I turned our lifebook in on June 30! So, now we wait... we wait on the Lord's sovereign timing. We pray for our birth-mom and our baby. We pray that the Lord will keep us in His mercy while we wait on Him. I want it to be true that He renews our strength as we wait on His hand in this. I am still so excited to see what He has in store. I am still fighting for this excitement, as I know the enemy would love to steal it away. But, I LOVE that God's Word is true, and even as we wait - we can rest.

We just got home from Sea World and the kids loved it. I am ready to settle into some kind of summer routine, but it doesn't look like that is going to happen anytime soon. The picture is from the front entrance at Sea World... aren't my children just beautiful!!! We are blessed indeed!

A little blurb about a book...

So, I've been writing a book...? a Bible study? a lot of words on a page? I am not sure what to call it. But, I have been working on it a while. I just started writing, and it has blessed me to remember the lessons the Lord is teaching me about how strong my flesh is, and how opposed it is to His Kingdom. So, I am going to randomly choose a blurb from my writings, and post it. I am praying that the Lord will use it to be an encouragement to someone... anyone really. If nothing else, it has encouraged me to remember His faithfulness. What a full-of-grace God we have. So here goes...
We believe the wrong things about ourselves.
I never knew all of the places God would take me in my life. I didn’t understand that my free will was given to me so that I could choose freedom, but had the power to keep me in bondage all of my years. It was unimaginable to me that God had a purpose for the things that He allowed to happen to me – or should I say, around me? I didn’t know that His purpose for my life was not necessarily my happiness, but His holiness. Can you imagine? Every hard thing was allowed by His hand, of course every good thing, but every hard thing too. The day I clung to my father’s leg as he walked away from me, my mom and my sister – He allowed it. The day my mom died – my coach, my cheerleader, my friend – she was my whole world. He allowed that too. By His hand I faced the hardest times of my life. And by His hand I found the most precious gift in the world. In the midst of life’s hardships, in the midst of my secret shame, the lowest part of my life, I discovered the reality of His love. His unfailing, never-ending, all-healing, unforgettable love. He meant it for me. As if that was just for me, He made it personal...

So, that's the blurb for the week... maybe I'll write more later... :)

Did you say we have more to do???

We are having an exciting June! With birthdays out the waazoo, VBS, and Swim Lessons we have been busy! HOWEVER, we have been busy in other ways too. Our Home Study with Aggieland Adoption Agency was finished last week and now we just have to turn in our lifebook! It means that very soon, we will have a book out for birth-moms to look at. We are so excited! It is a great summer! We have no idea how long the journey will be from here... it could be 2 weeks, 2 months, or 2 years before we are chosen. Now we will have to wait and TRUST that our God is Faithful and in control of everything. I am specifically praying that we will be excited through the whole process - no matter how long it takes. I hope we can remember He is sovereign and that His timing is perfect. I don't want the enemy to steal anything from us in this time. I want to have my strength renewed in the wait. The Word talks about being strengthened in times of waiting. That is what I want for our family. So, if you are praying for us, please pray that we will be faithful in prayer for our birth-mom and for our baby. It is so exciting to even imagine! I can't wait to see what the Lord does as far as distance between Jude and our new baby.

Jake and Ken are gearing up for a father-son trip to Colorado this year. Just the two of them. It will be so great! I am gearing up for a summer at the pool. It is so hot already and we are loving the pool - Jude included. He does great in the water, and sleeping in his stroller. Jake is turning 11, Maddy is turning 8, and in just a few days, Jared will be 6 years old. Jude is already 6 months... time is just flying. I can't wait to see what happens in the next year. I am sure it will be an exciting year indeed! Hopefully I will post again before December- ha!

Is it really May of 08??

I mean, this seems crazy to me! Jude is already 5 months old - the kids are almost out of school for the summer, and time just keeps on ticking away :) I am so excited to post that we are REALLY close to being finished filling out all of our paperwork for the adoption process! We should be able to get it turned in before June. What a journey we have ahead of us! I can't wait to see what the Lord has in store. Summer is busy, but not too busy. We've cancelled a huge chunk of our plans, and that makes for an easier - more relaxed summer. I look forward to long days at the pool and a trip to SEA WORLD!!! YEAH!!!! I can't wait for my kids to see what that's like. I think they will love it. This was Jude's first attempt at a swimming pool - he didn't love it - but he will! Yeah for SUMMER!!! Yeah for time to stop setting the alarms and just relax a little.

The one post for April :0)

So, I am standing in church today and I sense an awkwardness as I lift my hands and worship. Have you ever been there... the people around you being so uncomfortable with your hands in the air (as if in some way it is an affront to them personally)... I don't mean to be insensitive, but all I could hear in my mind were Christ's words in Luke 9:26, "If anyone is ashamed of me and my words, the Son of Man will be ashamed of him when he comes in his glory and in the glory of the Father and of the holy angels." Over and over this verse played in my mind until I had to look it up to see EXACTLY what it said.

I want to be compassionate. I want to meet people where they are at, but if that means to restrain the love I have in my heart for Jesus so as not to offend them, then I think I am off track. Paul did say that we don't need to offend people because the cross itself is the offense... but isn't authentic worship what draws people in? Don't people want to see authenticity? Or if they don't - isn't that what they need anyway? I just stood - hands lifted, voice raised and mind in prayer... Oh Jesus if they don't know you, let them drop religion for a relationship, vibrant and holy. And oh, Father, if they do know you will you put this verse in their minds? Will you teach them with your Holy Spirit that it is not okay to be ashamed of you and your message, and your people. Maybe it is pride. I want the Lord to examine my heart in this. But, I can't help but think that it is time I became radical again... that I fall back in love with my first Love. Oh my heart is excited at the thought. It is as if the myrhh is dripping off the door knob again for the first time in a long time and my heart is awakened though I still feel asleep. (Song of Solomon...)

Then I begin reading a book that was at church today, it is called The Road to Reality by K.P. Yohannan. This is in the Preface of the book... "We've been taught to serve up a watered-down gospel for so long that the real Gospel has become an embarrasment. However, half a truth is no truth at all. Obedience must always be a vital part of our response to His love and grace."

There it was again... embarrassed... over the gospel, the good news... I don't understand. A HALF TRUTH IS NO TRUTH AT ALL! That's exactly it. I want to worship in Spirit and Truth. Did Jesus not sacrifice enough for me to raise my hands up to Him in adoration? Did He not love me enough to put Himself in uncomfortable positions? I don't know. I just think I've had it. I think I must be true to the One who has been so True to me. Sorry if that makes you a bit uncomfortable. It is time that we pray for those who say they love Him and yet, they are so worried about how THEY feel in worship that they don't stop to wonder how He feels at their embarrassment of Him. It is time to be serious about what we are serious about, and stop playing the "I really am in love with Jesus game." If you are in love no one has to guess with who.

Just because I want to make sure that I am balanced with the Word, I am going to look it up right now. What exactly does Paul say about offending folks... hang in there with me while I look this up....

Well, this is what I've found so far, but I am not through yet. I know this wasn't written by Paul, so I am still looking, but I am truly intrigued now. Matthew 15:11-13 says this, "What goes into a man's mouth does not make him 'unclean,' but what comes out of his mouth, that is what makes him 'unclean.' Then the disciples came to him and asked, "Do you know that the Pharisees were offended when they heard this?" He replied, "Every plant that my heavenly Father has not planted will be pulled up by the roots." I think that speaks pretty clearly. It is good that he makes the distinction that it is the Pharisees that are upset by this. He lets them know quickly that their offense makes it clear that they are not planted by the Father - therefore, they will be pulled up by their roots". Now for the verse I was looking for originally...

1 Corinthians 10:28-32 is the context for which I am saying that Paul pleads with us not to make men stumble. He says, "28But if anyone says to you, "This has been offered in sacrifice," then do not eat it, both for the sake of the man who told you and for conscience' sake - the other man's conscience, I mean, not yours. For why should my freedom be judged by another's conscience? If I take part in the meal with thankfulness, why am I denounced because of something I thank God for? So whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God. Do not cause anyone to stumble, whether Jews, Greeks or the church of God— 33even as I try to please everybody in every way. For I am not seeking my own good but the good of many, so that they may be saved." So there it is... don't cause anyone to stumble, saved or not... Now for true context. That doesn't mean don't offend people. It says, whatever you do, do it for the glory of God. If my motive was to offend people, because I am just that much more spiritual than they, then I am dead wrong... it is my glory at stake and it is my pride that leads me there. But, today, in my heart, as best I know, I wanted the Lord to be glorified, and I wanted people to come to know Him. I wanted people to quit worrying about my hands lifted up towards Heaven, and worry about themselves, and their salvation. I wanted to tell the Lord that I adore Him... more than I adore anyone here in this world.