Today

Reminded as I read this at 5:20am how much I need to be content with where I am right now.  Right now.  Be present.  Be content.  Be thankful.  Be healthy.  Receive God's supply of manna...just for today.   Not looking backwards or forwards too far, but living in today.  Fully living in today.

I woke up - er, God woke me up as He so often does in the early morning hours because many times that is the only time that my mind is quiet enough to hear Him.  The first thing I did as I sat on the potty and decided if I was going to go back to bed or not, was to begin confessing my fears to Him.  Fears that many times I don't realize I have because I guess I am so used to it.  Fears that are sometimes just fleeting thoughts that pass quickly, and other times almost consume me...over things like our children's futures, our health, our children's spiritual health and the struggles that some of them are facing and our desire to "make it all better" and have wisdom and make the right choices in our parenting and balancing discipline and tough love and grace.  

And then I am reminded again.  

Be present.  Be content.  Be thankful.  Be healthy.  Receive God's supply of manna...just for today.   Not looking backwards or forwards too far, but living in today.  Fully living in today.  

And trust.  In Him.  Fully.  He is my portion, and my children's portion, and my husband's portion.  And yours.  

I am reading the book "Made to Crave:  Satisfying Your Deepest Desire with God, Not Food", and what I read this morning was empowering and very revealing about where I am at right now.   It talked about the Israelites and their need to learn to depend on God, how God took them on a 40 year journey (that journey by the way would have only been an 11 day journey...AN 11 DAY JOURNEY!! if they weren't detoured by their refusal to be satisfied and trust and depend on God!)  But they kept going round and round the same mountain for 40 years while they learned how to truly depend on God.  

Wow.  I don't want my journey to take that long.

"Each day the Israelites were to ask God for their portion of food.  Then God would rain down exactly what they needed for nourishment.  It was called manna...God wanted them to take only their portion for one day...It was a process intended to put them in the habit of dependence on God, and only God, each day.  We would do well to apply this same process to our struggles.  Each day God can be the perfect portion of everything we need - every longing we have, every desperate desire our souls cry out for.  God will be our portion."

As I sit here in my kitchen reading, and at the same time watching my computer's screen saver scroll through pictures of the last 6 years of our lives, I am reminded of all the prayers that God has answered in my life.  Those precious faces...who I have held in my arms as they cried over the pain of loss and frustration and despairs of life.  Who I have prayed over as they slept and cried out to God to touch them and reach them and be their portion.  Who I have seen the hand of God move in and through and continues to draw to Himself.  Even when I can't see it.  When I am blinded by my own fears and my own journey.  Even then, God is moving and protecting and working everything out for their good, and mine.  

And so I face today with hope.  With the expectation that good things will happen.  And despite the fact that I am lacking several hours of sleep, I am going to live today being present.  I will be content.  Be thankful.  Be healthy.  Receive God's supply of manna...just for today.   Not looking backwards or forwards too far, but living in today.  Fully living in today.  

"Because of the LORD's great love we are not consumed, for his compassions never fail.  They are new every morning; great is Your faithfulness.  I say to myself, "the LORD is my portion; therefore I will wait for Him."  Lamentations 3:22-24

In Awe...

I am sitting here.  In awe.  With my mouth hanging open.  Ok, not really because I hate mouth breathing, it makes me thirsty.  But spiritually, my mouth is hanging open and I am in awe.  All because of this post that I just read.  Twice.  Once to myself, and once out loud to Vince.  And I could hardly do it without bursting into tears because it is so, SO true for me right now.

This is a post from a blog written by Angie Smith, who is married to one of the members of the band Selah.  I LOVE her blog...she writes with a raw honesty that I can relate to and she always makes me dig deeper in my relationship with the Lord.  And makes me laugh too.  Her scripture reference at the beginning of this post, Isaiah 6, caught my attention because this past Sunday I chose that very same scripture to be read during worship, right before we sang "I See The Lord".   And it was powerful.  Not just because it was my husband who read it, and he always reads scripture with passion...but because the Lord moved among us as he read it.  He stirred things in our hearts, in mine I know it was only the beginning of something wonderfully amazing that He is doing in me and has been working on in my heart for the past few months.

He is revealing to me how very much He loves me.  And how holy and majestic He is.

Simple truths, I know, but how often do I acknowledge that I believe that and yet I have only begun to grasp the depth of those truths?  Do I really know how deep His love is?  Do I really grasp His holiness?  His majesty?

No, I don't.  Not even close.  But I am beginning to.  My hand is on the door knob and I am opening the door...ever so slowly.  Angie's post has helped me open it a bit more, and I am that much closer to taking a step inside.

I'm not sure I can handle the magnificence of the view.