It has been a while since my last blog I felt it time to put 'fingers to keypad' and close out the year blog style!
We have been busy with missionary life. Homeschool weekdays and travel weekends. We have been everywhere from NYC to NC to VA and all over PA. Tired...yes!! We have taken December at a little slower pace because January starts the running all over again. Thanksgiving we were able to spent with Mike's family in NC. Christmas will be with my family in upstate NY. We still call Avon, NY "home". It is nice to have a place to 'lay our heads'. God has been so good to us. I stand amazed everyday as He comes through in ways that only He can.
A week ago Mike and I were laying in bed exhausted. We were chatting about how tired we are becoming. Raising support has many highs and lows (ummm yeah no surprise there) so we had hit a low that night. Anyways instead of allowing our thoughts to proceed into the land of negativity, I simply prayed and asked God to fill our dreams with confirmations. We went to sleep and woke up. I had nada...Mike had nada. OK...gee thanks God...way to comfort your kids when they needed just a little something from you!
Mike leaves the room and Joel comes running in. Eyes bright and shiny. "Mom, I just had a dream...I dreamed I was in the biggest Norma's in Germany (our favorite grocery store there) looking for peas (yes, he only likes peas in Germany). As I was waking up 'something' told me I would miss Germany when we didn't live there anymore. Mom, it made me have a tear in my eye."
Well, son it made me have a tear in my eye too :)
Anyone that knows us knows this story is a 2-fold answer to prayer:
1. God more then confirmed to us that He has this all under His care. He didn't choose Mike and I for the "dream". He chose the one who needed it even more then we did.
2. Joel has been having the hardest time with the idea of moving to Germany. He has been pretty vocal about it to. He is my boy that likes to do things the same every single time (I think he's the milkman's kid ;). I tell people it is like this *we go to the park, swing in the red swing, slide down the blue slide and then get ice cream. Next time we go to the park we had better swing in the red swing, slide down the blue slide and get the same flavor of ice cream or to him it is not the same and he feels like he didn't 'go to the park'.*
Ever since the dream and what he heard, he hasn't said anything about not wanting to go to Germany!!! He seems at peace about it all now. I love how God works His way!!!
I have been contemplating many things going into the new year, as we all do, getting ready to make some new year resolutions. I was reading an Our Daily Bread (I 'steal' them whenever a church has some sitting out. Last months was a large print one, loved it for those early mornings when I can't see. lol). I read one whose verse has stuck with me.
It was called 'Living Letter'. The verse used was 2 Corinthians 3:3 "clearly you are a letter from Christ...written not with ink but by the Spirit of the living God." It got me thinking about my life. I want to be a well written letter. I want all that "read" me see God shining through each line of my life.
What do people 'read' when they look at your life? Do you read as a fake, a phony, proclaiming the Christian walk with your mouth but when your life is read it is a tragedy? Do others read you as negative, lagging in faith? How about superficial, a politician keeping both 'sides' happy. Work buddies love ya because to them you read similar to their lives. Church people love ya because you turn the chapter to "churchees 101" Sunday morning.
Our lives should read Jesus everyday. There should be a constancy to our lives. I love to read but nothing drives me more crazy then reading a story that fluctuates and seems to go in all directions. Almost as if written by a few different people with no consistent smoothness to it. Will there be times in your life that the reading takes a negative turn? of course. Will there be doubt, hurt, disbelief? of course. Will there be joy, peace, fun? of course. Our lives are to be exciting full of adventures. Full of real life experiences. It is what we do with the things we are handed that should read Jesus.
My prayer for you going into the New Year is that your life reads like an incredible adventure novel. Full of strength, overcoming things that have held you back for to long. I pray everyday as you walk through your day people read the things they need most. That you begin to touch lives and see them transformed by God's grace shining from you. I pray you become very aware of how YOUR LIFE STORY is being written!!
May you have a Merry Christmas and a very blessed New Year!
Love this post, very thought provoking. I often think about that, "What will my legacy be?" I know I often fail, and the last thing I want to be remembered as is mediocre or not remembered as a person who loved and trusted the God of the universe. Life has so many distractions, so many things to take our focus off of what's most important. My prayer is that God would use me in spite of all of my failures and weaknesses and that through His power I would be strong.
ReplyDeletePraying for you guys as you continue on this exciting adventure, as exhausting as it may be.
Danielle, your sons were not introduced individually yesterday but when we were praying for your family I sensed that it will be very important for your older son to form deep relationships with other deeply committed guys; I could see their roots interlocking and it made each stronger even when winds weren't blowing. Often we think we need strength when trouble comes but we need God's strength deeply when on the surface things seem calm. Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego suffered the cultural shock of having their names changed from good Hebrew identities to names that honored Chaldean gods. YIKES! but they knew their God and served Him, building each other up so both times the scripture records that the kind challenged them God is honored. This is the vital friendship I saw as we prayed. I'll let you and Michael judge.
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