goodbye

As I was led to say goodbye, these words came to my heart.

For a time you were my mother
I loved you like no other
You were amazing, loving and kind
To be like you was my dream
now i miss you so much i could scream
But I know God has a plan
He's enveloped me in His hand
Now to see you again is my hope
To be with Jesus, my only hope
My love for you will never end.
Save a seat for me cause
I'll see you again!
Proverbs 3:5-6
Trust in the Lord with all your heart, lean not on your own understanding, in ALL your ways acknowledge Him and He will make your path straight.

I am so thankful to have a heavenly Father who knows my pain, feels it with me, and holds me close.

Count your blessings

As I sit and focus on God
my mind drifts to things rather odd
like why trees grow so tall
and why leaves change color in the fall

Then He speaks to me and to my knees I go
I would have published the answers if I wanted you to know
Some things take faith before you can see
Sometimes I just want you on your knees

He said each day count your blessings one by one
When you do this, the enemy will be gone
I have blessed you with love, friends, family even material things
yet you still wonder why i don't grant every dream

Sometimes these dreams are not for your good
I've never failed to provide a roof or some food
Just trust in Me and allow My will to be done
Stop playing God, the battle's already won
I'll grant you things you can't even dream
I love you this much
That's why I sent you my Son.

Love never fails

I am on this mission to maintain patience. To truly surround myself by the fortress of God and allow him to be my strength and my patience. Undoubtedly when praying for patience you will be put in situations where you need to be patient.

Today I was supposed to meet a friend. A friend who tends to stand me up a lot. I will end up somewhere waiting and waiting. This time, I was stood up again and the situation she left me in was awkward, uncomfortable, and a bit scary. Having already had a difficult day, I didn't need the stress of the situation that she put me in on top of being stood up. I handled it. I prayed for the people in this situation and I went home. I went home feeling like I just wanted to give up on this relationship. It's so hard! I put in effort and I never get anything back. Half the time I'm left standing somewhere. I was just tired of people being inconsiderate, rude, and uncaring. Then I thought, wow, some pretty big rocks I'm throwing...hope my house isn't made of glass. How often do we leave God, our heavenly Father, thinking about how inconsiderate we are, rude, he puts in so much effort and never gets anything back. How many times have I done it to Him? I'm reminded again of the last part of that verse..."love never fails"
What does it mean to fail? I know that I give to people and love people because it's what God wants. I love people because God loves them. my Father tells us to love others and to give to them (seventy times seven) without expecting anything in return. And I don't expect to get anything from her but i guess i felt some consideration of my time and feelings would have been nice. So I move on from this day, feeling as if the Lord is showing me a little bit of something about myself and the person he wants me to be. Learning a little more about patience. Patience is loving someone who doesn't want to be loved, and waiting for the day that they will accept Jesus as their Savior. I long for that day. But I'll wait. God's timing is perfect.
Father, help me be a better person. Help me to love when it's hard.
"love never fails"

patience

1 Corinthians 13:4-8

4Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. 5It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. 6Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. 7It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.

8Love never fails.

Don't try and take on such a transforming task all at once. Do it one bit at a time and pray that God will transform you to fit this bill.
Today I think i will start with patience.
Love is patient. What does patient and kind really look like?
The dictionary defines patience as this: bearing provocation, annoyance, misfortune, delay, hardship, pain, etc., with fortitude and calm and without complaint, anger, or the like.

"bearing provocation, annoyance, misfortune,etc, with fortitude and calm, without complaint."
Wow! I'm not sure I can say that of myself. Just yesterday I was provoked, and although I handled it so much better than I would have a few years ago and I was able to diffuse the situation I would not say I handled it with complete calm. Inside I was angry and definitely not without complaint. I also like the word fortitude. It reminds me of fortress.
The dictionary defines fortitude as mental and emotional strength in facing difficulty, adversity, danger, or temptation courageously.
That sounds like a fortress to me. God is my fortress and strength. I must bear provocation, misfortune, etc. with fortitude. To do that I need my fortress. I need my deliverer. I have to be so lost in Him that it's a very natural act to not turn to anger or other emotions but instead turn to my God. I believe God. He is my fortress. He is my strength. He is my deliverer and I will rest in Him.
Father, help me be patient. Help me to face all things with you as my fortress. I will stand steady and strong with your Spirit in me. I love you!

Marriage

You were united to your wife by the Lord. In God's wise plan, when you married, the two of you became one person in his sight. ~Malachi 2:15

This scripture touches me. Marriage can be tough. It can take a lot of work but God designed it to be amazing! Not just a man and a woman being in love but actually becoming one person. Having so much unity between themselves that there are no lines where one person begins and the other ends.

Too often in a marriage people think too much of themselves. They want to be independent. They want to believe that their struggles are worse than their spouse's, their suffering is greater. Why are we trying to one up the people who are supposed to be closest to us?

Marriage can be hard. The enemy wants to divide marriages. When you are not feeling like you are one with your spouse, remember that you were united by God, you are one person in His sight. Then ask the Lord to show you how to get to that place of being one. Stop thinking about yourselves as 2 people, you are one. And being one is a really great thing.

moms

You know, sometimes I just don't understand people. Sometimes the corruption of people's souls breaks my heart and creates such grief within me that I just cannot imagine how God feels.

I looked up the word mother on dictionary.com and here's what it said.
"something or someone that gives rise to or exercises protecting care over someone else"

A mother is supposed to love always, care for constantly, pray for, guide, teach and protect her child. It is a mother's natural instinct to protect her child from all harm even to her death. My mother did it. Right until the day she died she considered it her mission to love me, pray for me, teach me and protect me. Why then is it so hard for so many other mothers?

There are far too many mother's out there in the world today that don't take their God given role seriously. I take it seriously. But how do you protect your child from his own mother? That's what I struggle with. I know in reality that all I can do is love him and show him every moment of every day how much I love him and how special God created him to be. I know that I can encourage him in his creativity and help him discover the gifts God gave him. I know that I can pray for him unceasingly but then I have to leave it in God's hands. i know the struggles he goes through now will serve to create such wonderful things in him and God will use it in amazing ways. But my instinct is to take him in my arms and hide him away from all the pain.

Tonight his mother sent us a message that she doesn't ever want to speak to him again. How do I tell him that? How can I tell him that the person he seeks affirmation from doesn't want him to call her? I know it's important to guide him to seek affirmation from God, but that still has to hurt.

So tonight I pray and I hope that you will join me in praying for all of the mother's out there who somehow just don't get it. I pray that God will create in them a new heart, a heart of love and compassion, a heart of acceptance and joy and I pray that God will soften that heart toward Himself and toward their children. I pray for the children affected by all of this, that God would place people in their lives to love and encourage these kids, to tell them how special they are and help them find who God created them to be.

The Bible says to "love one another as I have loved you". My prayer is that more people will learn to live by that.

lasting love?

I was reading a devotional on marriage today. About how problems can occur at any point in your marriage and you have to work hard at your marriage every day of your life. You know me well enough to know that this got me thinking. Why is it that we work so hard at our jobs, our friendships, the gossip chain around the water cooler, we work hard at church but when it comes to our marriages we give up so easily? I spent a long time as a single mom thinking that God needed to throw my future spouse in my lap because I was done. When He did that, I was thrilled. I would no longer be alone, i wouldn't be a single mom. I wouldn't have to face life on my own any longer. I had someone beside me that God had handpicked who would support me and love me no matter what.

So we married, and can I tell you honestly, marriage is hard work. I had a child that had to adjust to having a dad and a brother. He had a child with an ex-wife, custody issues and parents who lived with us. we both had baggage and the first few years were hard as we blended. But we did it with God right in the middle of us. It couldn't have been done any other way. We were so united as a couple and a family. Then he started traveling. A spouse that travels a lot can be difficult, you can feel like you're alone again and you can feel like a single mom. That's when the hard work really begins, being one and united while you're apart. But it can be done. Just because things start going well does not mean that trouble won't come again. The enemy is constantly trying to tear marriages apart. You see it every day, divorce is common where having your 2 original heterosexual parents still married after all these years is uncommon. We need to turn that around.

Let's take a stand for our marriages. For the sake of our children and our grandchildren, let's get in there and fight. And let's not fight for passivity or just keeping the peace. Let's make our homes so fun and full of love that the kids don't want to hit the road as soon as they turn 18. Let's make our husbands feel like that are important and loved and wanted.

We need to first go to the Father and ask Him to reveal where we have passive. We need to ask Him to show us how to love our husbands and what our role in the family needs to be. As He reveals that, let's be quick to respond in obedience to Him. And then, let the children see your love for one another. Your children will learn from what they see, let's fight for our marriages, for our families, for God.
We know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose
Romans 8:28