Father's Day & Anyah's Dedication

In His Image

I have always been a bigger girl. I love my curves. Right now I've lost weight, but I'm still a bigger girl. I still love my curves, I wish they would come out from under the wobbly skin that is left over from Anyah's previous abode...but time will do that all on it's own.

I am not trying to lose weight. I am not trying to gain weight. I just am. And what I am is a constant evolution. This week I purged my closet into garbage bags and stuck the bigger clothes in the attic... in case I need them again... because I might you never know.

I was made in the image of a God who loves me just the way I am... wobbly gut and all. And that is the most important thing I can teach my daughters. Being healthy is important but being able to love yourself is priceless and it leads to great things.

I am extremely healthy (fertility aside). So healthy that my Dr makes comments about how healthy I am every time he runs a test. I am healthy because I love me...and treating me like crap doesn't feel good. So I eat well, I get sunshine and I dance in the living room with my kids. I keep moving, I keep trying new things I keep learning and growing.

Those things I keep....they keep me... they keep me changing so I never get bored with myself.

I love that God gave me the ability to be ever changing and yet always the same. I love that he gave me stretch marks, eyes that change color and a mouth that gets me into trouble. I also love that I have no idea where I am going or how I'll get there...but he does.

Prayer Request

I spent a month trying to decide what to do. Every time I prayed I was overwhelmed with a sense of "this can not be right" and I prayed and prayed more and I wait and waited more. I am not patient. But, I waited. Because that's what it felt like I should be doing.

I started to make resolve with the inavoidable truth as I saw it. We would be ok. I would be ok. It was ok.

Then the dream came. The dream that said...maybe you should try hope out one more time.

So I tried another test of faith.

Test of faiths cost me $9.95 a box and have pee strips.

This one was a miracle. A fast showing, clearly marked with a + miracle.

This week a blood test confirmed it. In addition to a cyst I now plan ignoring until future notice... I am also growing a baby.

My very own baby who hopefully will arrive sometime near May.

Pray for us. We need prayer. Financially we're ok. Spiritually we're ok. Emotionally we're shocked but ok. Mainly, we need a prayer for strength for the baby & for me as I am usually a high risk pregnancy.

Three miscarriages later though, I still have hope. So many people have their hope lost when they aren't looking. So for that and for little tiny miracles I am thankful. So I pray...and I wait...like life is teaching me to do.

Oh... I so SEE you...

It has come. That point when you want to give God the arched eye-brow and let him know "hey buddy... I see what you're doing here and the intention was good but come on... I'm so up to my knees already".

And while I know I have a few things coming up that I'm going to have to deal with and I know they are going to make me a better person...

Sometimes...

I just don't want to be the one that makes the effort.

Tis a gift to be simple

Some part of me wants to be Welsh but only in the shower. I keep finding myself at 5 am surrounded by steam and shampoo smells humming the same old welsh bible song.

I have decided this might be God's time each morning after I pray to remind me to keep my worries in check. A simple reminder, in a simple song called simple gifts.

'Tis the gift to be simple, 'tis the gift to be free,
'Tis the gift to come down where you ought to be,
And when we find ourselves in the place just right,
'Twill be in the valley of love and delight.
When true simplicity is gain'd,
To bow and to bend we shan't be asham'd,
To turn, turn will be our delight,
Till by turning, turning we come out right

Resolved

For Christmas this year, one of Jon's family members gave us a set of three reusable water cantenes from LL Bean and a list of reasons to drink more water. Although, I don't think the list of reasons is anything that really interests me... the containers interest my daughter to know end. She carries them around the living room like little lanterns and clinks them (they are metal) together. Everyone could use to drink more water, and I will actually use this gift. Having said that...

Drinking water isn't something I plan on making a New Year's Resolution about.

We had someone come by my new job (a monthly guest speaker) and he talked about how most people make New Year's Resolutions and fail. He talked about the reasons most people fail (unrealistic goals, vague promises, bad plans, no room for give in your resolution...stuff like that).

I've never really been big on making a New Year's Resolution...but since I've been an adult I try to keep myself always working on something. Right now I'm working on being more trusting about admitting when I feel hurt. Which is totally against my nature and my survival instincts. I'm also working on journaling my food intake and weight so that I can be aware of what I'm consuming. (Not so much fun during the Turkey and Sugar Cookie season)

My main resolution this year has been to actively pray for others DAILY. Sometimes I miss a day... or a person on my list... but it makes me feel like I am helping to change the world. If nothing else, I'm changing me... and I'm part of the world.

So here is my current resolved prayer list (names removed to protect the less than innocent) and I'm going to put it on the internet so that you can add to it. Need a prayer? Leave it in the comments. I'll put you on my list for January...or now really...because I'm starting tomorrow and going through January.

I pray for my daughter that she may learn patience and that she may always feel loved and supported.

I pray for my husband that he may feel loved, supported and that our marriage will grow stronger with time. I pray for his happiness, contentment in our relationship and for his job...which he loves even when it doesn't always do what we think it will.

I pray for ** that she may know God's true love and forgiveness in all things, even tragedy.

I pray for ** that he may find a job that gives him joy and allows him the social nature that makes him beautiful and for his girlfriends nerves that she doesn't kill him in the meantime.

I pray for my grandparents that they may enjoy old age instead of being burdened by it.

I pray for **'s and their families that the financial troubles and jobless woes they all have will help them to grow as people and that when they end (which I pray is soon) that they will serve in their testament as proof of the greatness of God's love.

I pray for the new baby I just found out one of our family members will be having in August.

I pray for ** and his new family that they develop a loving and strong bond with my daughter and that they know that we already love them.

I pray for **, that I can forgive her for hurting me (which is about me just as much as it is her but it's all I can muster at the moment) and that she may learn how to be the grandma that just invites herself over.

I pray for ** that while she is watching my child she feels the overwhelming love God has for her through my daughters overwhelming ability to love her...because she is loved by me, God and my daughter more than she knows.

I pray for ** that she doesn't go crazy in the snow and kill her significant other and that her relationship with God continues to grow, and that she know the value of her friendship for me and how much I love her, and that her son be always aware of the blindly beautiful love that God, ** and I have for him.

I pray for ** that he may find his soul mate because I know he wants it so much and for the high school group which he leads because there is no such thing as too much prayer for a man leading teenagers anywhere.

I pray for **, ** and ** that the relationships that God has put them in will make them happy and let them shine even if they are still working on creating them.

I pray for ** to feel proud of what he is because he's like my brother and a job isn't as important as a man's character.

I pray for **, **, ** and ** that they grow up to be loving, forgiving and intellegent human beings.

I pray for ** that they may know that they are not forgotten.

And usually at the end I say a blanket prayer for all the people I forgot to pray for...because I know I'm human and I probably forget people every day.

Got anyone you need to put on my ** prayer list ? You can put a ** for names if you don't feel comfortable.

Hound of Heaven

I've always had a special place in my heart for the poem Hound of Heaven by Francis Thompson the Catholic poet. Something about a God so loving that it would persue someone who ran in ignorant fear always felt real to me. Perhaps, that is why when I converted to Christianity, God stalked me in the quiet places and in the public places until I stopped fighting back. What does this poem remind you of?

The Hound of Heaven


I fled Him down the nights and down the days

I fled Him down the arches of the years

I fled Him down the labyrinthine ways

Of my own mind, and in the midst of tears

I hid from him, and under running laughter.

Up vistaed hopes I sped and shot precipitated

Adown titanic glooms of chasmed hears

From those strong feet that followed, followed after

But with unhurrying chase and unperturbed pace,

Deliberate speed, majestic instancy,

They beat, and a Voice beat,

More instant than the feet:

All things betray thee who betrayest me.

I pleaded, outlaw--wise by many a hearted casement,

curtained red, trellised with inter-twining charities,

For though I knew His love who followed,

Yet was I sore adread, lest having Him,

I should have nought beside.

But if one little casement parted wide,

The gust of his approach would clash it to.

Fear wist not to evade as Love wist to pursue.

Across the margent of the world I fled,

And troubled the gold gateways of the stars,

Smiting for shelter on their clange d bars,

Fretted to dulcet jars and silvern chatter

The pale ports of the moon.

I said to Dawn --- be sudden, to Eve --- be soon,

With thy young skiey blossoms heap me over

From this tremendous Lover.

Float thy vague veil about me lest He see.

I tempted all His servitors but to find

My own betrayal in their constancy,

In faith to Him, their fickleness to me,

Their traitorous trueness and their loyal deceit.

To all swift things for swiftness did I sue,

Clung to the whistling mane of every wind,

But whether they swept, smoothly fleet,

The long savannahs of the blue,

Or whether, thunder-driven,

They clanged His chariot thwart a heaven,

Plashy with flying lightnings round the spurn of their feet,

Fear wist not to evade as Love wist to pursue.

Still with unhurrying chase and unperturbed pace

Deliberate speed, majestic instancy,

Came on the following feet, and a Voice above their beat:

Nought shelters thee who wilt not shelter Me.

I sought no more that after which I strayed

In face of Man or Maid.

But still within the little childrens' eyes

Seems something, something that replies,

They at least are for me, surely for me.

But just as their young eyes grew sudden fair,

With dawning answers there,

Their angel plucked them from me by the hair.

Come then, ye other children, Nature's

Share with me, said I, your delicate fellowship.

Let me greet you lip to lip,

Let me twine with you caresses,

Wantoning with our Lady Mother's vagrant tresses,

Banqueting with her in her wind walled palace,

Underneath her azured dai:s,

Quaffing, as your taintless way is,

From a chalice, lucent weeping out of the dayspring.

So it was done.

I in their delicate fellowship was one.

Drew the bolt of Nature's secrecies,

I knew all the swift importings on the wilful face of skies,

I knew how the clouds arise,

Spumed of the wild sea-snortings.

All that's born or dies,

Rose and drooped with,

Made them shapers of mine own moods, or wailful, or Divine.

With them joyed and was bereaven.

I was heavy with the Even,

when she lit her glimmering tapers round the day's dead sanctities.

I laughed in the morning's eyes.

I triumphed and I saddened with all weather,

Heaven and I wept together,

and its sweet tears were salt with mortal mine.

Against the red throb of its sunset heart,

I laid my own to beat

And share commingling heat.

But not by that, by that was eased my human smart.

In vain my tears were wet on Heaven's grey cheek.

For ah! we know what each other says,

these things and I; In sound I speak,

Their sound is but their stir, they speak by silences.

Nature, poor step-dame, cannot slake my drouth.

Let her, if she would owe me

Drop yon blue-bosomed veil of sky

And show me the breasts o' her tenderness.

Never did any milk of hers once bless my thirsting mouth.

Nigh and nigh draws the chase, with unperturbe d pace

Deliberate speed, majestic instancy,

And past those noise d feet, a Voice comes yet more fleet:

Lo, nought contentst thee who content'st nought Me.

Naked, I wait thy Love's uplifted stroke. My harness, piece by piece,

thou'st hewn from me

And smitten me to my knee,

I am defenceless, utterly.

I slept methinks, and awoke.

And slowly gazing, find me stripped in sleep.

In the rash lustihead of my young powers,

I shook the pillaring hours,

and pulled my life upon me.

Grimed with smears,

I stand amidst the dust o' the mounded years--

My mangled youth lies dead beneath the heap.

My days have crackled and gone up in smoke,

Have puffed and burst like sunstarts on a stream.

Yeah, faileth now even dream the dreamer

and the lute, the lutanist.

Even the linked fantasies in whose blossomy twist,

I swung the Earth, a trinket at my wrist,

Have yielded, cords of all too weak account,
For Earth, with heavy grief so overplussed.

Ah! is thy Love indeed a weed,

albeit an Amaranthine weed,

Suffering no flowers except its own to mount?

Ah! must, Designer Infinite,

Ah! must thou char the wood 'ere thou canst limn with it ?

My freshness spent its wavering shower i' the dust.

And now my heart is as a broken fount,

Wherein tear-drippings stagnate, spilt down ever

From the dank thoughts that shiver upon the sighful branches of my
mind.

Such is. What is to be ?

The pulp so bitter, how shall taste the rind ?

I dimly guess what Time in mists confounds,

Yet ever and anon, a trumpet sounds

From the hid battlements of Eternity.

Those shaken mists a space unsettle,

Then round the half-glimpse d turrets, slowly wash again.

But not 'ere Him who summoneth

I first have seen, enwound

With glooming robes purpureal; Cypress crowned.

His name I know, and what his trumpet saith.

Whether Man's Heart or Life it be that yield thee harvest,

Must thy harvest fields be dunged with rotten death ?

Now of that long pursuit,

Comes at hand the bruit.

That Voice is round me like a bursting Sea:

And is thy Earth so marred,

Shattered in shard on shard?

Lo, all things fly thee, for thou fliest me.

Strange, piteous, futile thing;

Wherefore should any set thee love apart?

Seeing none but I makes much of Naught (He said).

And human love needs human meriting ---

How hast thou merited,

Of all Man's clotted clay, the dingiest clot.

Alack! Thou knowest not

How little worthy of any love thou art.

Whom wilt thou find to love ignoble thee,

Save me, save only me?

All which I took from thee, I did'st but take,

Not for thy harms,

But just that thou might'st seek it in my arms.

All which thy childs mistake fancies as lost,

I have stored for thee at Home.

Rise, clasp my hand, and come.

Halts by me that Footfall.

Is my gloom, after all,

Shade of His hand, outstretched caressingly?

Ah, Fondest, Blindest, Weakest,

I am He whom thou seekest.

Thou dravest Love from thee who dravest Me.

Christianity Unsensored

In deuteronomy (11:18) there is a passage that haunts me sometimes, "You shall therefore lay up these words of mine in your heart and in your soul. You shall teach them to your children, talking of them when you are sitting in your house, and when you are walking by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise." Notice anything?

Everytime I look at this passage I see God telling us what to be in our every day life to show our children religion. He doesn't talk about loading into the minivan and carting them off to the stepford women in the church nursery. He doesn't tell us where to send them on Wednesday nights to recite things over and over until their faith is trained in them like a soldier headed to battle.

God calls us to nurture our children. He calls us to see examples of him in every day life and to point them out to our children and then to talk to them about them when we are home and they feel safe. He calls us to teach them to pray, to love, to forgive, to worship... from our homes and from our day to day journeys.

Do you know why? I think I do. I sit in church and I look around me at a hundred faces. Some of them are really there, really listening but some of them are searching and some of them still are there blankly waiting for the time to pass. I see people who say 'but I'm a good Christian' just before they get in their car and cut someone off in the parking lot impatiently cursing the two second delay.

God knows we can fake it.

I think he calls out to us to be more than a Sunday sermon. He calls out to us to be his voice on Monday, and Tuesday, and Wednesday and every other day of the week. He calls on each of us to be our own kind of Christian so that while you give your personal witness to the people who are just like you... I can give my sermon to someone who is just like me.

Because somewhere out there is someone who is lost, just like I once was, and they curse like a sailor but they love like a mother lion and they are waiting for someone to call them aside and tell them "it's ok to curse when you pray because God already knows you and loves you and he knows you curse... but he wants to hear from you anyhow".

So while he sends you to Raley's on Friday afternoons or to baseball games or to the opera or to where-ever God sends you, I'll be talking to the hippy chicks, the attachment parents, the library staff, the farmer's market vendor and the girl with the spider tattoo... because that's what he put me here for... and that's what he's asked me to show my daughter.

Encountering Thanks

Albert Schweitzer once said "In everyone's life, at some time, our inner fire goes out. It is then burst into flame by an encounter with another human being. We should all be thankful for those people who rekindle the inner spirit."

This Thanksgiving I am thankful for the people who taught me to live, love, laugh and keep learning even when I thought I knew it all.

I am thankful for the friends who called and stopped by even when my little light was dim. I am thankful for the family who taught me the value of loving people well and the work ethic to keep moving forward. I am thankful for my husband who waited patiently even when he wasn't sure what he was waiting for. I am thankful for my daughter who reminded me that life is brilliantly new and constantly changing every single day.

Mostly, I am thankful to God for giving me a set of everday angels to remind to love, to teach me to change, to be honest with their own weakness so that everyday we could find the strength to worship him a little better.

Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight and the sin that clings so closely, and let us run with perseverance the race that is set before us. ~ Hebrews 12:1 ~

Mt Erebus

There is a cross on Mt Erebus, it marks the site of a disaster and stands as a solemn reminder that there is always hope. The cross originally put there (shown here) eroded and was replaced with a metal one, a reminder that hope does not fade.

For me this picture has long been one that reminds me of the strength of God. God was on this mountain long before that disaster and the people there that day left this lonely cross to remind us that he will be there long after we've forgotten why it mattered.

I used to think having hope was a choice we made, as I grew up I changed my belief. Hope is not a choice we make. Hope is always there... our life is just about whether or not we choose to acknowledge it.

"So the poor have hope, and injustice shuts its mouth." ~Job 5:16~

Together

I saw this little graphic today. It made me smile. It reminded me of a time when all we needed was to think outside the box and we could make something beautiful out of nothing. I saw it and I remembered that we are never alone. I saw it and I thought about all the times that my hands have touched the hands of the people that I love for no reason at all and in that moment the most brilliant spark of life has gone off and I marveled at the closeness of them. Today I saw a little graphic and it brought me hope.

What does it bring you?

Waiting to Excel

Dear God,

I really want a job now. I believe in you, I really do. But, I'm scared and I feel very alone and vulnerable. Could you help me out with that?

Love,
Your favorite sinner

You are my hiding place: you will protect me from the trouble & surround me with songs of deliverance. ~Psalm 32:7

Void

There is a little rumble in the bottom of my heart. This month will be a HARD month financially for the family and I am not looking forward to the chaos that will come with having NO money for a period of time. It also marks the last month of my UI benefits and I'll have to try and getting the ever ellusive EXTENSION. I am not looking forward to that.

I'm easy to frustrate and panic when money is this tight and I know it. I feel like I'm walking around with an egg trying not to break it while I struggle with day to day things that could and would be much easier if I just got both hands free.

I clamber for something to do that would relax me. Cleaning no longer works, cooking no longer works, I can't sleep well, I read...but so fast that it's not giving me calm because I'm constantly yearning for more to read. I try to pray... but that makes me feel the void even more.

If this is a test... I'll be lucky if I skim past it with a passing grade. How's that for Christian honesty?

Hello November

Like someone had planned it, the weather swept in cool and damp the day before Halloween providing the local children a calm dark evening to creep along the streets in search of candy. Scenes from an old paperback novel recreated themselves around us as we made our trip. Autumn leaves dancing on the wind, little puddles reflecting the headlights of the car, and a slight scent of burning wood wafting over the world around us as we proceeded past the houses with fires in their fireplaces and bite sized candies by the front door.

Anxiously the world watched as a magically evening made children and adult alike pretend to be something more. Something more playful, or scary, something without bills sitting on their desk or work in their inbox. That is what Halloween has become for me. It used to be a pagan holiday filled with so much fellowship for me that the first year of my Christianity it was like trying to avoid the best drug I'd ever had. Last year I was graced with a newborn and halloween was just a flicker on my radar. But this year, I worried would be the year I longed for what I used to be... what I used to do... what I used to know.

Then it was here and I ensured myself that with a busy schedule and a toddler I wouldn't even notice but I still awoke that morning moarning the magic of what used to be. There was a long and silent prayer to God in my heart. A prayer for peace... I suppose.

I guess I shouldn't have been suprised when I noticed the world around me was still magical. I shouldn't have been suprised when I started to see God where I had once seen a different kind of magic. After all he was always there. He was the wind that lifted the leaves around me, he was the light that reflected in the puddle, he was the warmth that came from the fires glow. I had been looking in the wrong place.

So now it is November and once again, like so many times before I find myself making a hard and conscience effort to see it. To open my eyes and let the season of thanksgiving and the season of hope glitter in the little things around me. The little things that remind me of where I came from, where I am, where I am going and of the faith that was always with me.

Just call me Isreal

I read a blog over on Mel's site today and I started to write a reply in the little comment box. My reply became this twistedly long blog post which I didn't want to subject her to in the comment section of her blog so I decided to post it here.

Mel was talking about how in her authentic relationship with God (and that of several people she knows) she struggles with doubting God and then feeling like she's making God "prove himself"... if you want to know more click the link HERE.

So I immediately started thinking about the story of Jacob in Genesis. Jacob had lied to his brother and was planning on going back to make ammends with him. Just before he got there he stopped alone alongside a stream and started to wrestle "a man" (no one knows if this is God or an angel but it was a biblical man with the power to bless him).

Jacob struggled all night and in the morning the man knocked Jacob's hip out of joint and told Jacob to let him go but Jacob wouldn't. Jacob kept wrestling. The man asked Jacob his name and when Jacob told him he told Jacob... "no longer...now you will be known as Isreal which means God wrestler".

Jacob begged the man to bless him before he let him go and kept asking the mans name but the man would not tell him. In the end the man blessed him, Isreal (Jacob) was let go to go talk to his brother and he limped off to do his task from God.

He named the place Peniel because it means God's face and he said in that place "he saw God and lived to tell the story". (Now if you want the exact story you can click HERE which will take you to the Biblegateway verses for Genesis 32:22-32)

I'm a lot like Jacob. I think we all are. We have this task in front of us and we struggle with either wanting desperately to know we are blessed before we move on or wanting desperately to know more about our relationship with God and his plan for us before we can take another step in our journey.

The thing is, in this bible story we learn that God knows that in our authentic relationship with him we will come to points in our journey and we will struggle. Some of those struggles will change us (Jacob got a new name and a limp) but in the end we will know more about ourselves and God (even if it's not what we expected to know- Jacob never learned the name of the person he was wrestling with but he was blessed).

God expects us to be human. He expects us to make choices and he even expects us to struggle over what choices to make. God knows we won't always be comfortable with our relationship with him. It is human nature *just like Mel says in her blog*.

But where my opinion of human nature differs from some is that I don't think God wants us to feel guilty about being human. God's entire existence is constant proof that he wants us to desire to know him and love him. And he wants a restored relationship with us... that's what he calls it "a relationship" and for those of us in any type of relationship (marraige, friendship, love, family, hate) you know that the struggle to understand and know each other is ever changing.

God uses those changes *just like our friends and family* to know us deeper, to understand us more, to reveal to us the desires of his heart, and to show us how the desires of our hearts can reflect his love to others.

God would rather call us Isreal than take us to a place where we have no relationship with us.

So for now... he can call me Isreal whenever he wants.

Find Joy in the Little Things

I came that you may have and enjoy life and have it in abundance,until it overflows. - John 10:10

He will fill your mouth with laughter and your lips with shouts of joy. - Job 8:21

Good luck with that

Today my husband had a talk with his mother. The talk basically could be summed up as an ass chewing where she thought we were on the wrong spiritual path. I have been told this conversation was rooted in a couple assumptions she's made...

1. She does not see our spiritual journey. She told him we used to be "such good christians" and now she doesn't know. Part of this arguement was that I am currently "angry with God". And we haven't been doing a bible study or going to church that she knows of.

2. We curse to much and lead a non Christian lifestyle because we have events at our house where we or other people may occassionally become drunk.

Those were the big ones.

I'm pissed. Mainly I'm pissed because I think the worst thing about Christianity sometimes is the Christians who make things about what they need or want to see out of other Christians. Sometimes God needs a Christian with two arms covered in tattoos, or one that swears like a sailor or even one who has been ANGRY and is willing to admit it. You see I used to spend a lot of time doling out advise and passing judgement and one day in a prayer to God I was struck deeply by Mathew 6:5-6

Matthew 6:5-6: "And when thou prayest, thou shalt not be as the hypocrites are: for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and in the corners of the streets, that they may be seen of men....when thou prayest, enter into thy closet and when thou has shut thy door, pray to thy Father which is in secret...."

So I've been spending a lot of time praying for things in private (usually the shower if you must know) and not letting the opinions and judgements of others cloud my praying. I'm still talking to my pastor (when I need more help or research material), I'm still talking to my closest advisors (in fact I've even blogged about those conversations here lately) and I'm still reading Christian Materials (see links in sidebar for FaithLifts which is one of my favorites). Through the people I trust I have learned information that was very helpful to my struggles with going to church at the moment.

I don't think ANYONE has the right to tell me how to have a personal relationship with God. In fact when I first knew I was struggling with God my mother in law was one of the people I broke down crying in front of and instead of being like the friends who pointed out Psalm 22 to me she instead waited until later to bring another burden on to my husband and I by having me not only be angry with God but now also angry with my husbands mother in a time of high stress and emotion in our household.

For the record it is ok to be angry with God. I know because it's not the first time I've had real emotion with God and God appreciates my honesty and my love despite my anger. Just like right now how I love my mother in law even though I want to call her at 10 pm and rip her a new one. (If you want to read more on Anger with God Bible studies I recommend this link). You can be angry with God, you can be anything you are with God... because God needs you to want to be real with him.

So I'm not keeping a public tally for my mother-in-law. I don't call her at 11 pm when my best friend and I finish yet another spiritual discussion on the difference between the Christian and Catholic views of God's love and salvation. I don't call her up when I make a Christian offer to a person who needs my help or when I feel I've done something worthy of a God Gold Star. It's not my job.It's not her job either. If I did that, I might start doing it for her praises. And frankly, that doesn't interest me much.

I've also stopped having other people pray for me with reckless abandon. I've decided instead of requesting prayers like making a grocery list I would let others hearts lead them to what they should be praying about. Certain gifts I've seen in myself and others spiritually tell me that the right message will always find it's way to the right person.

So now that I've vented on that subject. Let's go on to the other one...

We've had 4 parties in our house since December. We attended 2 adult type parties not in our house. One we went to together and one Jon went to without me. I didn't drink at either out of those parties... Jon barely drank. He drove others home from one and we left after 1 beer at the other because we had a baby with us. As for the 4 in our house. I drank at 2. One of which I had 3 drinks at (Jon stayed sober it was my birthday) and the other one I had one drink at (Jon's turn to drink his cousin threw a party at our house).

We've also had the same friends over to the house multiple times a week or several times a month (depending on the friend) before and after that event. Usually, no one drinks. You of course wouldn't know that being as you are basing your opinion on the stories people bring home from parties and on the invites which I always put an adult drinking disclaimer in to be safe. I guess that means I'm an alcoholic...when I warn people that there will be liquor in case they don't want to bring their 2 year old.

I do curse a lot. I especially curse a lot when I am stressed out, don't have a job, need money, am angry with God, having health issues and don't feel especially like pretending to be something I'm not so that you won't have something to judge about me. I usually curse about judgmental Christian relatives (you recently made that list...congradulations), people who butt in without being informed (check and check) and things that have no reason to be cursed about ... because words only have power if you give them power... and it's always been part of who I am. I don't however curse in front of babies or small children unless I know their parents do. I am not, after all, going to be the one that explains the f bomb to your 4 year old using two barbie dolls and a water balloon.

My husband says today he yelled at his mother and kept correcting her misguided opinions. I'm jealous. I'm envious that he got it all off his chest to her face. But, I also know that if I got this off my chest to her face I'd also talk about how selfish and childish and judgmental some people are. I'd talk about how un-christian it is to miss a family event because of your wounded pride. I'd probably mention how inappropriate it is to judge a friend of the family by their myspace page or their morbid sense of humor. I'd talk about how it's not alright to not check in our your family when you want an update but instead of calling or stopping by just start forming little stories in your head.

Instead, I'm writing a LONG blog with the comments turned off. A blog about how I feel because that's what a blog is... it's my journal about how I feel. It's not about you. Just like my relationship with God, just like my friends, just like my hobbies, hopes, and dreams... it's not about you.

Next time you want to judge someone... look at yourself and ask... am I doing this for God? Or am I doing this because I want to feel involved.

Granted, there won't be a next time because I'm taking your living room off the safe places to talk about my spiritual journey and chalking it right up next to the crowded couch full of relatives I guess I don't need to ask for help when I am struggling.

Choices

I recently heard it said that "making a good choice is 30 % luck, 50 % decision, and 20 % perception of others". Ain't that the truth. Think about it, how often to do you make a choice thinking... yep that's what God wanted... only to absent mindedly stumble into what God actually wanted you to do? How many times have you changed your mind at the last moment because of what someone else might say? How many times have you re-wrote the same pros and cons list in your mind only to decide it really didn't matter what side you choose they both had equal pros and cons.

The things I find more important than the choices I make is how I react to what happens after I make them. That's also what I use when I'm looking at others to see what kind of people they are. You could always do the "godly thing" or the "right thing" or the "proper thing" but I could care less about that. I care more about what you do when the Godly thing backfires for your cousin, or the right thing crumbles under you little sisters feet or the proper thing flips off your best friend. There in that moment I define you.

I define you but I don't judge you. I would never sit down and tell you that you were good, bad or indifferent because of what I think about how you handled something. I don't do it because I don't believe in putting you in a box. I don't assume I have all the answers.

I assume that maybe today you had to make the stupid choice of your life so that 4 generations from now your great grandchild could save an entire culture because of something she learned from some man you never met. But you see, she wouldn't be here if it weren't for that stumble. I assume that maybe tomorrow the dumbest thing you've ever done might save a life, strengthen a marriage or start a revolution.

It's a lofty assumption and it might not be right. But, I think it's better than assuming you're flushing your life away because you accidently stepped off the path and made a foot print in the grass. You see, I have to believe that. I have to believe in you. Because mistakes, whether you know it or not, are the thing that keep our eyes on God.

Our mistakes draw us to him in times of desperation, salvation and forgiveness. Mistakes teach us to love, they show our kids that forgiveness can save a nation and they show the people who don't know him yet that they are just as broken and lovable as we are.

And if we aren't choicing to show people that... what are we really saying about God?

The Answer...

I've been praying a lot lately about jobs, money and the possibility of downsizing our home due to high rents. There is a small possibility that today God answered one of those prayers. We'll see... only time will tell.

Today I also went to the Apricot Fiesta in Patterson which you can read about here. There is also a cute pic of my daughter eating garlic fries.

Tomorrow I am cursed with a DMV appointment and an interview for a job. Pray for me. 1) that I don't kill a DMV employee or commit suicide while I wait for the DMV to see fit to help me 30 minutes after my appointment and 2) that my job interview goes well.

The Rat Race

Interviews, interviews and not a job to be offered. Ok that's not true. I got offered one job but I don't want it because it doesn't have sick time and you can only take your paid vacation (which you get very little off) during a three month window which is retarded.

This week I have 3 interviews. Two of which I already had. Next week I have two more and I have three more resumes to get out this week. I haven't heard from the job I really wanted which I interviewed for on Wednesday but that's ok.

So far God has been providing for us in ways we didn't see coming. And we are ever so appreciative that although it's tight we're not screwed yet by my not having a job. In fact we're even going to be blessed with a normal Christmas.

So we keep charging on. I keep sending out resumes and applications and Jon keeps going to work every day and coming home to listen to me worry about money while we watch Law and Order.

This weekend we'll be lucky enough to be too busy to worry. It's a weekend of friends and family and I can't wait. And next week we might go on a road trip to visit a cousin between interviews.

With our cat being sent off to live with someone else my daughters issues with dry skin rashes and snotty noses have completely gone away. It's making her much more fun for daddy who was a little frustrated with all the "i need mommy" ness of a baby with snot.

All in all it's been a blessed month. I can't believe I'm saying that but so far it has. I'm also reading a great bible study book which I'll be writing all about when I finish. My cup flows over...so much so I am behind on my blogging. I'll try to be better about that. No really... I will.