More coffee please...

Some days are an effort of the will.  Keep moving forward.  Don't give up.  Don't be lazy.  This morning in the One Year Bible reading, the Proverbs talked about the ant.  The ant doesn't need anyone to tell it to keep working.  If it doesn't then it dies.  Moral of the story: don't be lazy.  Well that was a bit of a spiritual spankin' today....you see I'm feeling a bit like this:

More coffee please.

I honestly have been feeling pretty yucky for the past week and a half.  I get this inner pH imbalance thing that gives me an internal infection if I don't eat like lettuce only (okay I'm exaggerating but I'm kinda cranky...sorry about that...) and that's been acting up (thank you birthday cake).  So I've been running a fever for a week and a half.  That just drains you, ya know.  But dude, life goes on!  I'll admit it's been a bit difficult to not throw myself a pity party (especially right after I burned my hand on a hot pan this morning...or when my oven caught fire on Saturday and wont get fixed until next week sometime...or when...oh wait...about that pity party I said I wasn't going to throw...I think I just did...dude!  Sorry about that, too...) but God's word is so sweet even when it stings!  Don't be lazy!

 Life keeps rolling so we do too, right?  RIGHT?!?

Sometimes I want to curl up in a ball and just go ahead and cry (when I burned my hand I did just that...) but we have to choose to LOOK UP.  Jesus has a good plan for my life so I need to put away my whiney pants and be a big girl and choose to look up into His face!  He will lift me up!  He will give me joy.  He will give me endurance!  He will provide for my every need! (everytime I get worried about money He just ROCKS IT cause He is gnarly cool like that! just want to throw that out there because not once have we not had what we need.  NOT ONCE.  He's for real about being a Provider.) I just have to look up at Him!  But that means that I also have to (ahem) look away from what is difficult.  Look away from my fevered and achy body and LOOK UP into His glorious face.  Look away from the stack of bills and LOOK UP into His powerful and able arms.  Look away from even the mounds of laundry and cleaning to be done and LOOK UP into His compassionate and caring face.  I need to look away from the deepest hurts and cares that I carry around with me and LOOK UP at a capable, loving, redeeming, rescuing, compassionate, caring, ABLE GOD.   As I do that, nothing changes.  BUT EVERYTHING CHANGES!  My fog of fatigue is lifted.  My joy suddenly abounds.  I can see from His perspective and everything in light of eternity is fleeting and unimportant.  My laundry and housecleaning are now a holy privilege done unto the Lord and I'm ready to put a podcast on and knock that out.  Don't believe that it's that simple?  Try it out and see...you won't be mad at me when you're done.

I really hope that I don't sound like I am complaining about my petty struggles as I write this out for the world to see.  I know my life is a cake walk and I truly am not trying to make it sound otherwise.  So I have this issue with fevers...so what???....it's not cancer...my babies are well...in fact I have a great hubs and an even better God...great friends...my life is SWEET.  And I am not just reminding myself apart from feeling.  I really do FEEL that way.  But I think regardless of the circumstances of life...whether we are super great or really in our most desperate circumstance ever...the temptation is there to BE LAZY mentally.  Not sure if I am making sense (my brain is a bit fuzzy) but I think it's like this.  If we are lazy in our minds...if we don't make the choice to constantly choose God's truth as the wallpaper of our mind then our flesh and the enemy of our souls will come in and fill the walls of our minds with YUCK.  Self-pity and self-focus and bogs of mire and old easter eggs from last year live there.  Isn't that a great word picture...bleck.  Once I hid easter eggs in my room...I was like 8...don't judge me.  It took my dad a few weeks to figure out what was killing our house with such a nasty smell.  I was definitely in trouble for that!

  Our ugly self-centered thoughts are like that.  They hide behind the dresser or in the back of closet...hidden to the eyes but sickeningly disgusting to your nose and every nose that comes near.  We have to make choices (I am preaching at myself here).  I have to choose to put up God's truth as the wall paper of my mind.  I make that choice by reading His word...listening to great teaching...teaching my kids so they can quote it back to me and convict me so completely...by whatever He says to do that moment that day.  I don't earn the joy He gives.  That's His and He freely offers it to me through the blood of Jesus Christ.  I don't earn a better perspective.  I don't earn a right heart or money to buy milk or anything good in my life.  They are His gifts.  Gifts cannot be earned.  I simply have to make the choice to LOOK UP at Him.  I have to choose to wallpaper my mind with His truth.  Wanna know my favorite truth right now?

His grace is sufficient...I could talk for days about that one.  I'm just choosing to meditate on that right now.  There's so much goodness in there!!!!

So my house will be sanitary but not necessarily gorgeous.  My laundry might be wrinkly but it will be done.  My face wont see make up but I promise you that Jesus still loves me.  MY list doesn't have to get done to fulfill the command to not be lazy.  Just His list needs to be heeded.  Put away the whiney pants, be a big girl, and LOOK UP today.  That's the only thing He has on His list for my day and I am excited to see that worked out!

This week has been a lesson in humility for me.  Things have been going well, really.  The church seems to be growing, a few in number (we have some of the sweetest women coming out and sharing this walk that I feel overwhelmed by the privilege to be a part of this thing) but mostly I feel like we are growing spiritually (not like "check me out I'm SOOOOO growing in the Lord" but like "wow, every day is so full of Jesus and His awesomeness that I can't seem to take my eyes off of Him")  I have never in my life felt more dependent on the Holy Spirit!!!  Everything matters too much to start leaning on us and end up messing up.  I know His grace is sufficient (and dude we have called on that grace daily, hourly, minute by minute for SURE) but we just feel the weight of knowing that Jesus has a call on our lives and we want to be right where He has us.  During our prayer meeting Saturday night I was just so moved by the picture of Him taking me by the hand wherever He wants to go.  Not to plant a church or find a place to settle in but just to walk hand in hand with Him wherever He goes, with childlike faith.  Like Seth when we go to the grocery store....he doesn't usually care where we are going and he certainly doesn't need to see my shopping list.  He is along for the ride and hey if there are samples at Costco all the better!  I want to be like that with Jesus....to stop asking for the shopping list.  I want to stop asking where tomorrows food will come from...He says He will provide....AND HE ALWAYS HAS!  He has never failed!

So everything sounds great, right?  Where's the lesson in humility, you ask?  In my heart!  My heart has been weighed down this past week hard core.  I hadn't been able to put my finger on it, but I just felt weighed down.  My mind was full of thoughts that had me so distracted!  I will be honest here and not sugar coat it, so skip the rest of this post if you want to not think less of me haha.  My mind was full of thoughts about how badly my hair needs a haircut and thus I look gross.  Why cant I pull off cute bangs anyway??? Do people at church like me, like for reals like me?  Will I ever get a chance to catch up on schooling the kids and housework and actually find some time for that sewing project that has been taunting me on my sewing cabinet all week?  Will anyone remember my birthday?   My mind was full of thoughts about ME!!!!  Okay world wide web....you now know the yuck of my heart.

As I sat and asked the Lord "what in the world is wrong with me???" I started to notice that nothing was wrong really.  Christian made two bonuses this week and I got to make a trip to Costco.  The kids are doing awesome at school.  Christian and I are doing great! We have sweet people at our church (and the presence of Jesus most importantly)....so what is my deal?

The deal is.......ME.  I was so focused on ME.  Jesus was doing His thing pouring out blessings and I was going all Israelite on Him....you know like the Red Sea thing.  He parted it, got all miracle on them and days later they're whining about water.  Did they just miss the whole miraculous giant powerful GOD thing?  But they did.  They got distracted with the every day cares of this life and it made them forget the character of the God who loved them.  Now me, I wasn't complaining this week about even an every day need....I was whining to myself about just plain JUNK.  Split ends???????  Really Jo?  In light of eternity?  Yikes.  Do people like me and remember me?  I feel so 7th grade typing this out (and I'm not altogether certain this draft will make it to publication) but that is how I felt.  I think there are tons of us that feel this way at times.  But....my identity is in Jesus.  If people like me, then I've got to use that for His glory.  If they don't, well that doesn't change my standing before the Lord in any way.  I need to cling to truth.  I need to make choices about what I spend my time thinking about!

Last week Christian was teaching in Ephesians 4 about putting off the old man and putting on the new...it's all about choices.

He used the example of the closet.  The word used in Ephesians gives the idea of taking off and putting on a garment.  He said you wouldn't take off old stinky clothes, you know the ones you work out in, and hang them back up now would you?  Of course not.  Who wants to walk into a closet full of dirty clothes? Yuck!  But take that a step further.  What if you sat down in poop?  Unless its like your fave dress ever (and you've got a strong stomach) then you're going to be like me and throw that dress away.  WHY?  Because it is gross!  And who keeps gross stuff in their closet??? You've got to toss the gross stuff and choose to walk in there and put on the beautiful stuff.  The Lord has challenged me as I thought this through.  Yes I need to toss the ugly stuff.  Like a 1980's neon middrift sweater (yes I know they are back...I just cant pull it off) I need to toss out lying and evil speaking and for sure I don't want to keep murder or stealing in my closet haha.  But what about the stuff I have grown out of?  It wasn't that ugly, it just doesn't fit anymore.  I recently lost 30 pounds (well in the last year...thank you broken gall bladder) and it was so funny when I went to go put on leggings this winter...they were so not the right size or look for me anymore...I was swimming in them haha!  Want to know what I did with them?  I folded them up, put them back and picked something else to wear.  What a dork!  They don't fit me anymore...I don't particularly want them to fit me anymore...why did I keep them???

 I feel like the Lord is begging me today to clean out the closet of my heart...to toss the stuff that doesn't fit anymore, behavior that I have grown out of (or at least I should have by now).  To be secure enough in Him to not need to find my identity elsewhere.  I need to toss fear of rejection (that one has been plaguing me my entire life).  I need to toss the tendency to compare.  So much more.

But also I need to a thorough purging of what doesn't look nice no matter who you are....those spiritual high rise bell bottom pants (I apologize if you are the 1% of the population who looks good in those)...selfishness...laziness...a give-up attitude (I am the worst warrior ever).

My sweet friend Christy Duff did an UHmazing study on this last year and I am still hearing Jesus speak through her in my mind.  If you want to listen it is archived on Calvary Chapel Vistas website.  (click on Calvary and it should scoot you over there...I am new to this whole link blog technology 21st century thing) But basically its like this (go listen to her really...she's way better at this than I am):

I have been given EVERYTHING I need for life and godliness.  Notice the past tense there?  It's not something I am in the process of earning.  It has been DONE.  But I have to choose to put it on.  I think of my daughters closet.  She has all of these great clothes that my cousin just bought her from Gymboree.  They all color coordinate and man they are CUUUUUUTE.  Also mixed in there are her favorite/AWFUL shirts that I just cant seem to get out of her closet  (Ive tried to make those shirts "pajama shirts" so that I am not quite so mean and just throw them away but they always sneak right back in).  So her closet is full of all of these great articles of clothing.  She did nothing to earn the clothes.  Her behavior during the previous day will not UN-earn her the cute clothes.  They are there waiting in her closet, apart from worth or merit, ready to be worn in all their cute-ness.  What an awesome picture right!?!  Jesus has given to me, apart from worth and merit, all kinds of awesomeness!  But I still have to choose to put them on.  I have to make the choice to peel off my nasty clothing of the old man and put on His gifts to me (they even coordinate, just like my daughters clothes hee hee I love analogies).  Christy's message threw me when I first listened to it...you mean I don't have to be driven by my feelings, other peoples silliness, or my special week of the month?  I have a choice in that??? OUCH!  But it is so freeing at the same time because Im not bound to my old man.  My King has given me a closet full of cute coordinating articles to put on......so today I choose to put off self-focus.  Today I choose to put off the fear of rejection.  Today I choose to put off the ugly ill-fitting old Jo and instead wrap His righteousness around me (and hope for a good hair day haha!  Just kidding!  Well, mostly just kidding :))  Anybody out there ready to be clothed in Him, too?

p.s. whiney-pants was not forgotten on her birthday by the way.  I have some of the sweetest friends and got spoiled with a box of goodies, gift cards, my favorite ice cream (strawberry frozen keifer....YUM) and so many sweet hugs and blessings.  I'm so dumb when I'm all self-focused!  Thanks everyone for making my birthday so absolutely special.

Birthdays and Blessings

The first two weeks of January get a little crazy style around here because there are three birthdays within the span of eight days...and I love it!!!  I try very hard to make the celebration for each of the kiddos separate, special, and all about how thankful we are that God has given them to us.  This year we didn't have a crazy party for either of them...monetarily that just wouldn't have been wise and they haven't made that many friends yet (although the ones they have made are super duper sweet ones!!!).

Abigail gave up her birthday in its entirety in order to raise money for kids in other countries who don't have access to clean water and die every day because of it.  It was SOOOOOOOOO cool to watch her face light up as we watched the number of children helped rise...to point out how little she really gave up for something that will change these kids lives FOREVER...greatest birthday experience of my life! But of course she still had to have a cake!

She googled and asked for this (a replica of the one from the American Girl Store where we helped celebrate a sweet friends birthday this last summer):

I'm not superwoman so what she ended up with is this:

She was gracious though :)

Seth turned 6 this week and instead of a party, he had a couple of friends over for an extended playdate and had cake with everyone from Bible study.

He took a turn googling and picked the most ridiculous cakes I have ever seen!  I was like really kid?  What do you think I am???  Like this:

Haha yeah right!  Not so much within my capabilities...
I looked through his fave pics though (he wanted Lego theme and couldn't decide between Ninjago or the new Chima) and came up with this:

 But I think he sorta liked it....

Yesterday was also my birthday.

 Yes I am 33 years old now, and feeling prone to reflection.  I am really loving where I am in life...this season is so sweet!  My husband and I are coming up on our TENTH wedding anniversary!  Which a year ago I thought would make me feel so old.  Now I have to say that it just makes me feel secure.  My life has definitely been in upheaval for the last year and there is no real tangible security in the foreseeable future...yet I feel so content!!!!  I feel so thankful that the Lord has sought fit to uproot us and move us and challenge us.  This move was probably the hardest move of my life (by the age of 23 I had moved 28 times in my life...11 times since we got married! so that is saying something!) but at the same time I KNOW that it was the best move of my life.  I LOVE Paris!  The sweet people and the church and the fact that in four years it had really become home.  But in the last year I have been challenged and stretched and I am so so glad that He moved us.  I've been forced to really look at what it means to be a christian even....which sounds silly for someone who has been in ministry for over a decade.  But its true.

We have been through different seasons and I think we had fallen into a super comfortable one.  And that's not bad necessarily but being UNcomfortable has challenged me.  Why are we out here planting a church?  What is it that I am really offering people?  A life full of better activities????  That's so not cool!  I don't want people to stop living destructive lives so they can replace it with a sober and clean life!  Thats not what its about.  Life is not about a series of good activities and clean living!!!  But the Bible is super clear that we are to live righteously...what about that?  It can't be bad to live in a way that honors the Lord!  Then I was challenged by a friend who really believes that if you don't feel like doing it, then don't!  Like if you don't feel like reading your Bible then don't do it....wait until your heart is right.  That challenged me to examine my heart...but still that didn't feel right either....ugh!  Ive been so frustrated.  Ive been praying Lord please help me to figure this out!

And little by little I think He has been answering me.  Through His word, through podcasts by godly teachers, I think its beginning to come more into focus.  The real answer..........it's a little bit of all of it!  Theres no real "figuring it out" until we get to heaven I think.  We NEED to have right hearts before God and not read our Bibles or go to church because it is a religious practice that makes us feel that we have atoned for our own sins.  For sure!  BUT I will NOT always feel like reading my Bible!!!  But I always need to!  So I go against my "feelings" by replacing my feelings with truth PLUS a prayer for the Holy Spirit to fill me up and change my heart.  If I miss a day, am I evil?  Am I a bad daughter to my KING?  NO WAY!!!!!!!  But.....I did miss out on something and I can't get that moment back.

Its like with my kids....I have a choice when they are rambunctious and full of energy and want to play....  I can choose to play with them because dude that sounds like a blast.  I can choose to do the dishes because hey they need to get done...nothing condemning about that!  Or I can choose to say Im tired, I have a sink full of dishes, a laundry basket overflowing, and a list a mile long BUUUUUUUUT I will never get this moment again and I don't want to look back and say "I wish I would've..."  So I will make the choice today in fact, right now just like this!  I have so much to catch up on (but do we ever really catch up?) and Ive been exhausted all day (sleep has been tricky lately) BUUUUUT I choose to take my kids out for an adventure!  We will go use birthday gift cards and have a sweet adventure together that will hopefully make a sweet memory and I wont be left saying "I wish..." (and when we get home I will make them help me fold the laundry and put it away hee hee)

Life in Jesus is a constant need for prayer...a constant need for a filling of the Holy Spirit to figure out what in the world I need to be doing!  If I think I have it figured out then I am crazy and need to come back to Bethel like the patriarchs in Genesis...come back to the place of worship and dependence.  At the same time, I'm finding its okay to have discipline in my life....it's in fact expected from me in the Word!  As I grow and mature, I'm not supposed to look the same.  I dont earn a thing!!!!  But I do make choices.

Galations 5:22-25 says

"But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, long-suffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control.  Against such there is no law.  And those who are Christ's have crucified the flesh with it's passions and desires.  If we live in the Spirit let us walk in the Spirit."

You see!!!  It's all of it mixed in together!  Love is joy....its cool beans when our hearts are all in it.  Love is long-suffering....if we are choosing to suffer then it sure sounds like we are choosing to go against our feelings right?  But not blindly...we CHOOSE to replace our feelings with truth from His word.  I was listening to a podcast today and he was talking about how the fruit of the Spirit includes self-control....implying that we go against our "feelings" and choose to walk according to truth.  But Revelation warns us not to leave our first love.  Again I say its all of it all mixed together added to prayer and for His glory.

Okay so let me start off this first blog post with this: I have no idea what I am doing!  I don't know how to have a blog or even write a post! haha!  Heres the story on how I got to here though...

I am a fairly busy person (aren't we all?).  I don't have a job outside the home because I am currently homeschooling my two kiddos and I just don't know how I would make it all work.  So I keep busy around the house trying to be a blessing to my family in that way.  In between laundry and bread baking I will sometimes find time to pull out my phone and check a few blogs that I have marked.  Its almost like semi-quasi-adult conversation.  I've got sewing blogs and baking blogs and a craft blog called craftgossip.com that gives me a little bit of everything crafty.  Recently I have found a couple of blogs that are mommies just loving Jesus and their families and writing about it and I have found myself so encouraged by them.  I began to think and pray through asking a sweet friend of mine to start a blog like that.  She is so wise and is a great mommy and always has a word from Jesus for everyone.  I kept praying "Lord you should tell her to start a blog! I would so read it and be encouraged". Then one day I was driving to drop off my husbands lunch that he forgot and I was praying that again and the Lord tapped me gently and said "actually, how about YOU start a blog?"  Now let me say this: I didn't actually hear an audible voice, but it was so clearly in my heart I couldn't deny it.  But I did manage to argue a little....I mean come on...I don't have wisdom and I make more mommy mistakes than good mommy moments.  And I feel like the only things I have to share with others from God's word are the things that He is convicting ME in!  But if He says to do something, then that is what I have learned I need to do.  Joy can only be found in obedience.  So here I am, typos and all, feeling like a dork, wishing I had a better purpose laid out.  Here we go anyway :)
Sometimes I'll share my cookie projects, my sewing fails, my newest health and beauty product made from coconut oil (I am in LOVE with coconut oil!) but I promise to always share with you what Jesus is working into my life, too.  Because we need the fellowship of shared interest for sure, but we really need shared fellowship in Jesus.  That is how we become rooted in Him...by being in His word and being encouraged and challenged by others who are also walking through life hand in hand with our sweet Jesus.

Soooooo here are some pics of my latest sewing project...

My little goober has been begging me for a "satchel bag just like daddy's" for a couple of weeks and since his birthday is Thursday I decided it would be a good time to throw one together.
 I didn't use a pattern (sorry, I like to just wing it usually) but it was a pretty simple boxy like pattern.  The outside is an old pair of pants the hubs never wears anymore and the liner is some fabric I scored over the summer when Walmart went crazy and put half their fabric on sale for $1/yard.  We make regular trips to the skate park these days so it seemed like a winner for this project. I had everything I needed for this project on hand (love it when that happens!)  Even the D rings for the closure were from and old belt that I saved.  (My poor hubs has to put up with my sewing supply hoarding) I didn't do a tutorial because Im still not sure if anyone will want a tute or even read this so yeah, let me know if you want a how-to on anything I throw on here and I will try to make it happen.

Here is the bag completed:

 It even has a handle like Daddy's!

 I repurposed the pockets of the pants to be his Lego holding and pen pockets.

I think he kinda likes it :)  He wore it yesterday from the time I gave it to him almost until bed and wore it to school this morning.  Gotta love those projects that they actually appreciate!

And now for the Word...

Psalm 1 is a super special Psalm for me.  It is the psalm that Christian and I read on our wedding day and has been a sweet reminder of how we want to live our life...in marriage, as parents, in ministry, as friends, everything.  It says:

"Blessed is the man
Who walks not in the counsel of the ungodly,
Nor stands in the path of sinners,
Nor sits in the seat of the scornful;
But his delight is in the law of the Lord,
And in His law he meditates day and night.

He shall be like a tree
Planted by the rivers of water,
That brings forth fruit in its season,
Whose leaf also shall not wither;
And whatever he does shall prosper."

I just love that image!!!!!!!  I want to be that tree...rooted in Jesus...planted deeply by Him because He is the source of life, of everything good!  I so want to bring forth fruit.  Don't you want to be fruitful???  Sometimes it feels like I would rather sit around and relax and cruise through life but in those "relaxing" moments I'm not relaxed.  Ever felt that way? I have!  It's because I was made to be fruitful and I will only find my joy there!
But I'm so challenged by the part where it says brings forth fruit in its season...ouch!  I want to be fruitful when I want to be fruitful.  I want to see the fruit of my labors! Like now would be cool.  BUT....I am called to plant myself next to Jesus and let Him do His thing in His time.  What a freeing thing that is really when you think about it.  I am not responsible for anything other than placing myself right next to Him, digging deeply into Him and just letting Him do His thing through me!
"Whose leaf also shall not wither".....oh my how I have felt like I am withering at times!  Like when I am sick or the kids are difficult or craziness like moving across the country for the second time in four years.  But if I am placing myself next to my sweet King Jesus then I don't have to worry.  He never fails, He never runs out, He never withers.  I don't have to be afraid of drought.  I don't have to worry about my provision (I am after all of more worth than a sparrow :))  As I am planted by Him, I wont wither.  That doesn't mean that no hard times will come.  There will be storms and there will be drought.  Kids will get the throwing up flu...the car will break down...people I love will hurt me deeply...major medical problems will arise.  But if I am rooted I will make it through.  He is enough to protect and provide and care for me!
"whatever he does shall prosper"...What a neat thought!  As I am planted by Him, I can have confidence that the things I do are not meaningless.  The runny noses I wipe...all those diapers I once changed...the math problems I help solve...the bread I bake (that closely resembles a doorstop in density)....not one of the tiny details of life is pointless.  Each one is an act of service to Jesus and each one done in His name will prosper!  I love the promises we find in God's word!  He so rocks!!!

I promise that not all of my posts will be novels, but thats a little insight as to where the name of this blog came from.  It is my deepest desire to be like that tree...to be rooted in Him...to be fruitful...to not wither in the droughts of life...to prosper in what He calls me to do.  And it is my desire that we might do that together.  There are a ton of blogs out there and you could read any one of them.  I promise you that most of them will be more beautifully written than mine.  I will spell things wrong.  I will not have enough pictures and what pics I do incorporate will come from my phone.  I will fail in front of the world wide web in fact.  Wait, why am I doing this again???  Oh yeah, because we all fail.  Because we all need encouragement and we all need to be reminded that we are not alone in this thing called life.  Because in the midst of making snacks and dropping kids off at events and doing the laundry we need to be reminded that life is more than food and clothing.  We need to be reminded that God is in everything...that He cares about the sparrow and the laundry too!