Some Things I've Learned Over the Last Three Years....

The last three years have been educational, insightful and maturing for me. I have never had an issue trusting God. I have never doubted His presence. I have never doubted He had a plan for me. I have never doubted that He would provide for me. The experiences of the last three years, especially the last six months, have provided me an opportunity to exercise my trust. The hardest thing right now, is to look at the bank statement and not worry over what will happen when there isn't enough to cover our expenses. I know that worry is a sin, because it essentially means that we are not trusting God to take care of us. At the end of the day, I want God to be pleased with me. I want Him to look at me the way He saw Job. We have experienced many of the things that happened to Job. We have experienced bad health, lost our financial security, we have lost a close relative and we were betrayed by those we trusted. Just like Job, "I had heard of the Lord, but now I have seen Him."

God still has a plan for us. We will still serve Him. He will redeem our losses two-fold and bless us beyond any expectation.

It's a Jungle Out There...

I have recently started watching the show, "Monk". I am really starting to appreciate the theme song. It's the struggle between what you want to believe and what reality really is. It makes me smile just to think of the words. Personally, I feel that I'm trying to find my way out of a jungle. I can definitely think of better times than the one I am living in right now. I want to believe that the world is full of nice people, but it's not. I want to believe that everything will work out the way I think it should, but it doesn't. I want to believe that I'm doing OK and things are normal, but, as anyone who knows me can testify, that's never been true.

I have been reading about the Israelites and their journey through the wilderness. There are a few things that reassure me from their experience. One, there is a path to follow. Almost three years ago, Brian and I set out on a path. We didn't know where it would take us, but we knew we were supposed to follow. Two, God is a God of detail and order. The attention He paid to the smallest detail regarding the temple and its furnishings reassures me that everything has a place in His plan. Three, He was in constant communication and was available to answer questions. This tells me that God is not too busy to reassure me when I need it. And believe me, lately I've needed a lot of reassuring. Because of His plan for my life, I can live in the jungle as long as He wants me, too. I can not only live, but survive and thrive if I let Him work through me.

While things aren't as good for us right now as I had hoped, we haven't been abandoned by God. We get to see our family at least once a week. We still have a loving church family. I have a Bible study group to be a part of. My children are learning. They get to enjoy PE with other homeschooled children. My family enjoys good health. There are so many ways that God proves His love for me. Do you let Him prove His love for you?

Wheeeee! Let Me Off This Thing!

We are continuing our roller coaster ride. It began three years ago this April. We began looking for a church in March 2008. We recently were set back to square one and have started sending out resumes again. Our situation is much different than it was a year ago. I am exhausted and I'm ready to find out where the end of this ride will leave us.

If you think of us, please pray specifically about these things: we will know what God wants us to do right now; our house will sell quickly; and we will prepare ourselves to do the work that God will have for us.

Living Beyond My Means

Can you believe it? It is already February! I thought that I would have had exciting news to share with you, but alas, I do not. I can share some of what God has been telling me. On Friday, as I'm driving home from an appointment (and stressing about our finances), I asked God to help me find my One Year Chronological Bible. I had been looking for it off and on for several months and had run out of places to look. Well, Saturday morning dawns and I am hit by a burst of energy, so I decide to clean out my closet. Scaaaarrry! As I am digging around and pulling things out, I come across a basket and there is my Bible!!

After I finished cleaning the closet, I sat down to read the scripture for January 31. I found myself in Job 40:6 - 42:17. As I'm reading, I came across one of my favorite verses. Job 42:5, where Job is resonding to God's challenge, "I had heard about You before, but now I have seen You with my own eyes." I love this verse because I feel it everytime I go through a trial. The reading continues with God blessing Job with twice what he had taken away and with the birth of ten more children. In this group of verses, God promised me that he would give us a ministry that will be twice what we have ever experienced.

Brian and I have recently had a few discussions prompted by a church billboard we passed. It said, "Living beyond your means is the worst feeling in the world". Well, I can tell you that Brian and I both believe that living without Jesus is the worst feeling in the world. As we talked, we started talking about the fact that in Christ, we live beyond our means all the time. Through Christ, we are able to live an abundant life beyond anything we are capable of. God has told us that He will soon bless us with a ministry. It will be more than anything we can imagine and it will be more than we can handle alone. We will be like Job, whom God restored and richly blessed.