Crazy Good

Often we step out into new trust with God saying things like...

"I will go where you ask, God. "

"Do what you want."

It was two years ago that I stepped onto an international flight terrified by that very statement.

I have seen new words that are being used to describe a growing and enriched relationship with God. Words like radical, crazy, fearless, extreme, reckless....  God is teaching me these words may have a much more significance to us and our relationship with him than we think.

I remember sitting with tears running down my face as the plane lifted the ground and the fear that my crazy love was about to ruin my life. Most Mom's in the adoption process would not admit to such feelings or fears. But I remember spending the entire 20 hour flight to Africa with white fists unsure of what this new future would bring. Here I was... walking into a foreign place adopting a strange child. One who could not even how to say Hi to me. And here I was bringing him home to be a part of my family. What if it ruined my kids, or what if it was a bad fit...or what if I risk loving him and he rejects me completely? 

Often we consider trips to Africa, community outreach, adoption, and the willingness to lay down ourselves for the expense of suffering as the definition of radical and crazy in our relationship with God. I am realizing that these terms could have more meaning to our spiritual growth than just our self sacrifice and crazy adventures.

What if the most crazy and radical thing God is calling you to isn't traveling to Africa to save orphans, volunteering endless hours at a community center or opening your life and family to the adoption of a teenager?  All of theses things I have experienced and all have been challenging, and crazy. They all changed me and revealed more of who God is in my life.  But what I have been finding is that the greatest journey traveled may not seem very radical.

One summer right after the book, "Crazy Love" was released I was sitting reading by the pool. I made a decision sitting there reading and watching the kids swim that I wanted my relationship to look different with God. I wanted to risk it all to follow him no matter the cost. So in my newly defined excitement and commitment to what I was feeling in that moment I heard a voice say......

NOW! 

Jump in Amy.....

I remember sitting there not at all dressed to jump in a pool. I thought to myself that is crazy!

I will get all wet. 

of course... willing to accept the challenge of living crazy but not willing to get wet.

Great start Amy. 

Well, I overcame my need to play it safe and jumped in and felt a little crazy.  Now it stands out as a moment of handing over my willingness to follow God where He wants even if it means getting all wet. Little did I realize in that moment that going to Africa or adopting a teenager or even being abandoned with four small kids was not the "crazy" He was referring to. 

I go back to that moment a lot. As I look into the eyes of four hurting children... I have to take a big breath and say God am still willing to get wet. Why you have chosen me for this?  I don't know... but I am willing...

God was ready for me to take on this challenge that day and showed me who He really made me to be. He showed me early on change and complete change was in order. I remember walking in to apply for a PO BOX and it was my first step in moving on. Ironically she handed me my new address:  PO BOX 360- I love God's humor with me.  It was His way of saying I have NEW things for you. What has past is past. You said you would follow me with crazy love... so lets begin again.

The crazy part of this journey isn't starting a whole new life. It wasn't moving to a different house and selling everything I had to begin new, that was not a choice. The crazy part wasn't accepting the reality that my future would be new... though all of that felt crazy. The journey I have been challenged with is one that surprises me daily.

The crazy and radical part of our relationship with God is trusting him moment by moment. Accepting his goodness is a part of that.

Goodness you say? 

Yes. 

His goodness. 

After experiencing great loss, and extreme suffering I didn't realize how hard it would be to open up my life to good things.

In Exodus we see Moses talking with God asking him to show him his glory. God's response to Moses in Exodus 33:19 says,

 "I will cause all my goodness to pass in front of you and I will proclaim my name, the LORD, in your presence. I will have mercy on who I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on who I will have compassion."

I can just picture Moses that day walking up to that rock and I bet he was trembling... We assume that it was fear of God's mighty power, wrath or maybe we even label God as unpredictable and so we fear that.. 

But the one thing God wanted Moses to see was His goodness. 

Later we see that after Moses was exposed to God's goodness he removed the veil and he was radiant.

I have found that accepting God's goodness in my life has been one of the more challenging and extreme things He has asked me to do. Crazy really. 

Often things unfold in life that we can't control. As our world shatters we are often focused on picking up the pieces and the mess that has occurred. So much of the radical and crazy that God wants us to experience is beyond just sacrifice but accepting goodness that He places in our life. It may be small things or unexpected things that remind us that His love for us is immediate in our place of healing. He will go to all extremes to bring healing to us. 

He does not delay.

"It is true that some people may find they have to wait in the hall for a considerable time, while others feel certain almost at once which door they must knock at. I do not know why there is this difference, but I am sure God keeps no one waiting unless He see that it is GOOD for him to wait."  C.S Lewis

His response to our healing may be different. The process of waiting for 3-4 years to bring home two beautiful children from Ethiopia created in me a sense of God's faithfulness in the midst of great uncertainty. The daily trust and faith that God can do what He promises. He had promised that I would be a parent of two children from Africa. And even on the days the Ethiopian government was saying "NO", He was saying "YES". 

For what He promises is good.

Then there are times that we are expecting to wait for Him to heal and act, and before we can lift our eyes up to Him, He has already embraced us with His goodness before we even ask or before we even know we need to knock. This is the crazy goodness I have experienced as of late. The reality that He will go to many extremes to show me His unfailing love for me in my life. 

Embracing me.

God's whole purpose in creation was to do good. He proclaims over and over again that what He has done is good.  The goodness of our God is not only God's main attribute but something we often miss in our fear of His judgment or discipline. Or forget when it's grey  winter and life has us left hopeless... His goodness is still there, it's our job to accept it, expect it and receive it. 

"Every good thing bestowed and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation, or shifting shadow (James 1:17).

"For the LORD God is a sun and shield; The LORD gives grace and glory; No good thing does He withhold from those who walk uprightly" (Psalm 84:11).

He even went the extreme of sending His only son for our healing. Why then are we surprised that He would usher more goodness to us in dark times or just daily life? 

"He sends forth [rains], and they overwhelm the land or transform it." (Job 12:15 AMP).

Often we go through times where we are overwhelmed with rain in our life. Maybe life change, tragedy, suffering illness, loss, or just darkness. But what we forget is rain in the midst of a drought....is transforming. Rain brings new crops and new harvest and goodness from a hopeless state. 

We go through the rain and are overwhelmed. But God is faithful. And constant. God is good and He wants us to wake up each day proclaiming in worship of His goodness for us to us. He wants us to know He loves and favors us. We must be willing to accept His Crazy Goodness. When we keep His goodness at hands length we aren't at a place where we can do anything great. We are only minimizing His power in our life. 

Accepting God's goodness is accepting all of Him in our life allowing His power to take the darkness, brokenness, disappointments and transform them so that we see Him. The crazy part is that when we allow Him to pour out His goodness on us we do transform.

 We become radiant...with His crazy love for us. 

I love a devotional that my Dad sent me this week... it said "There is about to be a flood, but not one with water. You are going to see a flood of My Goodness, a flood of opportunity, a flood of healing, a flood of good breaks to where you are overwhelmed with God's favor. It's beyond your expectations. It puts you into overflow. It said.... Today get ready! Get your expectancy up. Be on the look out for His goodness because a flood of favor is coming your way!"

Why is it so difficult at times to just accept that God is good.

EVERYTHING HE DOES IS GOOD. 

It's been a crazy journey accepting the things in my life that don't feel so good and trusting Him that He is.

He is good. Just as Jonah found.... the dark and stinky fish that swallowed him whole..... wasn't for his defeat but for his good. 

I am seeing healing and growth take place in my life as I have taken a ride in the belly of the whale. I have seen God rescue me with His goodness. That even in a place where life has been unbearable He is flooding me with His goodness. He is leaving me with His crazy love and allowing my life to be transformed... I go from feeling dull, burdened and weighed down to feeling His love and acceptance and that He sees me as I am.... His radiant daughter. 

Cause I am good. You are too.

He says that to us but we have a hard time accepting that. 

I sit every morning across the table from Tad. I think about all the fears and risks I thought I was placing to allow Him into my life. Now I see that the biggest challenge was me just accepting God's goodness for more in my life. 

God is stable and constant. As people come and go we know His love is unfailing. His promises are true. And He reminds us that even with the risks that things may fall apart... He will in fact show His love and goodness with whatever He brings our way. 

Heard this song today "Not for a Moment" by Meredith Andrews and felt again it was God's crazy way of confirming this message to me:

You were reaching through the storm
walking on the water
even when I could not see
in the middle of it all
when I thought You were a thousand miles away
not for a moment did You forsake me
not for a moment did You forsake me


after all You are constant
after all You are only good
after all You are sovereign
not for a moment will You forsake me
not for a moment will You forsake me 

You were singing in the dark
whispering Your promise
even when I could not hear
I was held in Your arms
carried for a thousand miles to show
Not for a moment did You forsake me


and every step every breath you are there
every tear every cry every prayer
in my hurt at my worst
when my world falls down
not for a moment will You forsake me
even in the dark
even when it's hard
you will never leave me
after all

not for a moment will You forsake me

Be reminded today to accept the crazy love He has for you.

He is only good.  

How crazy would it be if we lived and believed that everyday? When we accept His goodness and see Him, it transforms us.... we leave the mountain radiant with His crazy love for us... for all to see. 

Ashes.....

Often we tend to sit in the ashes of our mess. We choose to sit in the broken and lose sight of what is ahead.  And maybe we miss the newness of what is waiting there for us. I have been pushing myself out of the ashes. In the Bible we see that burnt ashes after a fire was a sign of destruction. In that time when people experienced trouble they would sit in piles of ash and rub ashes on their heads as a sign of mourning or grieving.. I was talking with a friend a few weeks ago and she was mourning and grieving what has taken place in my life... I was taken back slightly...  I will explain. After everything had taken place I remember thinking how will I move forward? To my surprise God was quick with direction for me. The very next morning, tear stained I opened a Bible sitting on my parents night stand at their little lake cottage. I opened to Ecclesiastes 11:6

6Sow your seed in the morning and do not be idle in the evening, for you do not know whether morning or evening sowing will succeed, or whether both of them alike will be good. You wonder what could I have possibly taken from this verse that changed my response to a complete life change?  I felt like God was saying... keep moving forward Amy. Keep doing what you always do. Love your kids, love your family, love doing things for others, love your church, love friends, build relationships, water them and see what grows from it. The first thing I did that morning was put my makeup on... I still laugh about that. I stood looking in the mirror and started putting on my makeup in which I sat and cried it off but it was the act of doing it. It was the act of getting my feet on the floor and claiming that there was life to be lived and that the covers and my bed was not the seeds God was asking me to water!

This Christmas we decided to do something new. We all boarded a flight to Florida to spend Christmas at the beach. Once we were on the plane Samiah decided she was fascinated with the window shade. So up and down..... up and down...... up and down....... I moved the shade as her source of airplane entertainment. That was better than her screaming so I humored her. We started down the runway and with the up and down of the shade...and I said goodbye to the Indiana grey sky and the mix of falling rain and snow hitting the small window. Up and down..... up and down..... and then to my surprise just seconds from taking off when the shade went up, light flooded our seats.  I stood looking back at my friend who was concerned about the events that have unfolded in my life...  I felt my face gleam with my response. I explained to her, I  have found something very surprising in the midst of all this grey. She looked at me and I smiled and said... blue sky.  I am not sure that I claim verses or that I believe God claims specific verses for us. About a year and a half ago, I was drawn to Isaiah 61. I kept feeling like God was saying to me Amy the Spirit of the Sovereign Lord is upon you, because he has anointed you to preach good news to the poor. He has sent you to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim freedom for the captives and release from darkness for prisoners, to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor and the day of vengeance of our God, to comfort all who morn, and to provide for those who grieve in Zion- to bestow on them a crown of beauty instead of ashes , the oil of gladness instead of mourning, and a garment of praise instead of the spirit of despair. They will be called then oaks of righteousness a planting of the Lord for the display of his splendor.  Okay, at that time I was working with intercity kids loving them and wanting to make a difference in my community. I guess that makes sense. Little did I know the significance of what this verse means now.  Yes, I have been a prisoner of darkness, but I am proclaiming freedom for all you captives. You may have walked through something like I have, a husband bailing, father or mother leaving, parents divorcing, cancer, death, loss, sickness.... darkness seeps into our lives and tries to hold us down to a world of grey.... you may be held captive.  Grey may be surrounding you... it's thick like the winter sky and feeling like you are trapped in your ashes is overwhelming I know. I have walked through dark things, but the craziest thing is I have walked in the midst of darkness yet I don't feel grey. I feel like even though grey surrounds me, I am flying above the grey. God's favor is healing my broken heart. He has shown me His love and favor and instead of me sitting in the mess of the ash and the remains of what once was. I am seeing a loving God replace it with so much more. A crown of beauty... a promise of restoration that I can't even imagine right now. He is showing me in glimpses already and it excites me to what He is capable of. He has given me gladness for what is ahead and replaced my mourning with His presence and hope. In the midst of his lavish love for me I can't help but praise Him for his unfailing steadfast love giving me a spirit of praise instead of despair.  The realness of God in my life right now, is opening up an excitement to me with new things, even in the present grey that is surrounding my life. Once I opened myself up to His love and presence I realize something profound.... I am always seconds away from blue sky. There is freedom.  God has shown me I was once held captive. Often we are prisoners in chains we don't even know are there or the oppression we are facing. Even though at first I stared into a pile of ash at the ruins of what was.... I now see a beauty evolving into new freedom. I have been freed from a bondage I can't even explain. I am embracing it. I explain it as if we have always had poor eye sight and that is what we have always known. The world we lived in was fussy and unclear. Then you are handed a pair of glasses. The world changes, it gets clearer. A new reality to what you thought was there. Now you see it. Freedom is seeing life as it really is.. it is blue sky even when the appearance of grey is surrounding you.  I have found that I have been so captivated by the freedom and excitement of  God's presence and his promises of what is to come that the grey turns to something that shocks me..... blue sky.

Loss & Fear: What we get to choose....

"As my sufferings mounted I soon realized that there were two ways in which I could respond to my situation -- either to react with bitterness or seek to transform the suffering into a creative force. I decided to follow the latter course."

 -Martin Luther King Jr.

About two weeks ago I realized that my sufferings were mounting. I had a nice pile of sufferings I had neatly stacked in a pile for later... but the problem arrived when more suffering came into my life. My nicely mounted pile became bigger and started falling over into all the places of my life. Yesterday was a rough day. I was so focused on the things that weren't there instead of the choice I had to make the change that would give me new hope and relief in my distress.  I knew I had pain, and loss but forgot...I get the choice to choose suffering. Suffering is a choice to ignore help, truth and hope in the midst of pain.  

Fear, is walking through darkness and forgetting that all you have to do is turn on a light.

I used to hate Christian radio. I felt like sometimes the illuminated head in the heavenly a bliss was too much cheese for me to relate to. Mostly the fill in commentary annoyed me to the point that I dismissed the whole thing. With all that took place this fall, I was forced into a land of limbo. The kids and I spent two months living with my parents. Early on I made countless commutes into town in my parents car. Healing and protection started in a little red, BMW convertible. It makes me laugh at the things God uses to heal us. For me it was running to Starbucks and getting my morning coffee, always forgetting that my cup wouldn't fit in the cup holder! It was a great little car but old enough the cup holders will fit pop cans only! So I would balance my coffee with the arm rest without spilling it all over me and the car. I had a hard time with silence and honestly just being alone. My mind would run and fear would overtake me. So early on I started listening to Christian radio and an outpouring of truth and life flooded out of the speakers into my broken heart.  It is in that little car that I realized the power of music in my life. Worship provided a light to me in the midst of great darkness. Worship is our defense to fear. We forget that fear is the worship of everything that God isn't. When we worship the One Lord in our life, we remove fear and truth really can set us free. We can see beyond the pain and replace our suffering with something better... purpose. 

"When I am afraid, I will trust in you.  In God, whose word I praise, in God I trust; I will not be afraid."

Psalm 56:3-4 

When we open our lives up to worship- we eliminate the opportunities for fear to tell us that we must suffer.  Worship may look different. It may be singing, writing, designing, painting, whatever the form when we transfer suffering as a force to create worship we trade fear for hope.

I am becoming more efficient. So what was taking me till late evening I am now looking at my clock wondering what will I do with myself the rest of the night! This began a time of self pity. LOL  I was lost in my loss of what was missing I didn't see my opportuinties and the choices I get the freedom to make and have.  I had lost my purpose. I was replacing my hurt and loss with business and loneliness and wasn't choosing purpose. In my own choice I have been choosing suffering.  

I found a folded up paper this morning that was stuck behind some things I had just stashed for a time till I could figure out where they went. It was a list of my core values of what makes me...me.  I saw creativity, worship, people... In my loss I lost sight of the very things that will heal me. Fear of loneliness over took me and I gave into it and became a victim of self imposed suffering.  

This morning I have realized that I do have a choice. I have the opportunity to use my time to do what I love for people I love. My creativity can serve as not just worship but also purpose. That the fear of void in my life is my own choice. I can fill it! I can choose worship 

and truth in the very God that promises freedom from fear and suffering. 

My nights will still be self adjustment to the changes and loss that has occurred. But instead of fearing the loneliness of my loss, I have a choice. I can create an environment of worship that will flood new hope and purpose. I can not fear asking for what I need. I can praise God for the friendships he has given me in my time of loss, instead of questioning them.  And I can use the talent he has given me to fuel something good for others as an act of worship and declaration that fear & suffering will not win. Hope will. 

Pain.

“Pain and suffering have come into your life, but remember pain, sorrow, suffering are but the kiss of Jesus - a sign that you have come so close to Him that He can kiss you." 

-Mother Teresa

I hate when I stub my toe. It is crazy pain! It is annoying pain! It makes you bite your lip because you are afraid of the words that may come out your mouth! For some reason toes are the big deal for me. Maybe it's my kid sized feet that makes the pain so much greater. When I stub my toe it lingers there causing me to hop around one footed moaning on and on till the feeling finally goes away. And I hope no one is around to see my crazy! 

Pain is apart of life. When we stop feeling pain, we stop living.

I am not very fond of exercise. I do it when I feel overly motivated or have some extra steam I need to get out but for the most part, I am not one to choose to force myself to exertion! I played tennis in college, and I don't miss the miles of running around campus. I didn't mind taking in the scenery but it was that feeling of puking and heart pounding that I really don't find enjoyable.  There is a sense of soreness that I remember from hours of tennis and running, there were times it was good pain. Pain that made me feel better, if that is even possible.  There is a stretching of your muscles that can hurt but overtime you become stronger even when it hurts.

I have seen pain expressed, 

and held in and hidden.

 I have seen pain hurt,

 and have seen it restore.

Everyone, has pain. Past or present, pain is apart of us.  This season of suffering, tends to be long for the one traveling through. 

We must embrace pain and burn it as fuel for our journey.  ~Kenji Miyazawa

In times of pain, happy times may seem sparse, but they are more intense. Memories are stuck and held in time longer, and little things become impressionable. Pain, stretches my heart to the point I think I just may explode! Then the tension releases it in time for me to see that even in the midst of heartache my heart isn't growing smaller and bitter, it is stretched bigger and getting stronger. Pain creates something in us that allows us to see the very strength of our Creator. He shows us what we once thought was impossible is possible. Pain can cripple us at times. It can hold us to a bed, or encompass our mental state, but it is God's truth that sets us free even in the midst of being held hostage by pain.

This week I said goodbye to a grandpa. And in the midst of all the loss I have already walked through this felt like to much. The hurt, and pain in my heart was more than I could hold in. I felt weak and felt emotionally exhausted.  I sat in my car trying to grab enough strength to walk into the funeral home to say goodbye. I asked a friend to pray for strength, because I had none. As I sat down they handed me a bulletin.  On the front it said:

 "The Lord is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth. He does not faint or grow weary; his understanding is unsearchable. He gives power to the faint, and to him who has no might he increases strength, Even youths shall faint and be weary, and young men shall fall exhausted; but they who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with winds like eagles; they shall walk and not faint." Isaiah 40:28-31  

I smiled. God is near to me in my pain. This was His way of kissing me. Reminding me he is close. It is HIS Grace and HIS Power that is sufficient. Not mine.  His word, increased my strength. I felt His love, and His power and in the midst of more loss, and more pain. I was at my end and He gave me a new beginning.

In the midst of the pain I feel that unexplained feeling of being made stronger even at my weakest point. I have realized that truth, God's written promises are what sustains us. His word is the source of power that surges in us and allows us to move forward, to press on. It is His written word that leads us through the darkest places.  It is His very presence with us.

 "If you cut him, he'd bleed Scripture." -Charles H Spurgeon

 I am realizing how much I dismissed His word till now. Now if a verse is in front of me I am savoring it, treasuring it, because it is my lifeline through pain. It is the very medication that allows me to sustain all the hurt. It protects me so I don't trade hurt for more hurt but instead allowing the pain to actually restore and heal me. Seeing Jesus in my pain comes with seeing the many ways He is using His people to encourage me, and to love me. I have a promise he has given me through this. People have emailed me, called me and shared with me these words, and they say it the same not knowing they are speaking God's promise to me. Through their lips Christ is kissing me in my pain. His promise to me has been this. 

"God has you covered." 

This promise doesn't say, I will cover it, or I am working on it. His promise to me is that in all of this loss, pain, and hurt, God already has it covered. He is already working in my life in the darkness of the pain and he has it covered for me. All I must do is feed my pain with His truth and with the promise that He keeps saying to me. His grace and His power is sufficient for me. When I am weak. He will be strong. And as tears fall and my face is red stained with emotions, He brings His word, His truth and His promises to me. They kiss me on the cheek and remind me, I am His daughter, He loves me. His love will mend my pain. 

He has it covered. 

Difficulties or Discoveries.....

The challenge of single parenting hits me at various times. I laugh at the things that frazzle me. You would think it were big things. Nope, it's trash day. My trash can is impossible. It's Amy sized. It's a 5 foot awkward beast that has no way of maneuvering. I push it and it resists every move. I try pulling it and I trip over my feet and go flying. Every Friday I go and get a good look around the neighborhood checking to see if anyone is out and about, before I sacrifice myself to humiliation!  I attempt with various ways to get it down my driveway without falling, tripping or running over my heals. I have tried picking it up on one end and wobbling it... It makes a scraping sound that grabs the attention of the jogger running by.  They look at me like I have lost my mind. But every Friday when the trash can gets the end of the driveway you will see me doing a happy dance! Because YES, I have conquered the trash can yet again.  

Empowerment, the giving of an ability; enablement or permission.  There have been moments where I have felt empowered because I gave myself the permission to figure out something new and the ability to fail at it.

It started in a puddle of tears. I wish I was kidding but I am not, and I have a friend to back me up. I called her in a panic one afternoon, sobbing because I couldn't figure out how to hook up the DVD player!  I had let a little black metal box get the best of me. I sat it to the side and a few hours later walked over with the ability to give myself permission to fail and whaa-laah... I took one little cord and attached it to the TV and DVD player. The complexity of the problem was my inability to allow myself to try and fail and then try again until I got it to work. 

We have these moments a lot. There are things we are doing for the very first time that we are now seeing the freeing power behind a new challenge to conquer.

Instead of seeing moments of unfamiliar territory we are embracing them with a sense of  discovery. 

Like emptying the vacuum. Not sure why I never had this job or why in all my existence I hadn't dumped out the full tub, but I had been spared from this task! Zadyn and I looked and looked for how to release the junk inside into the trash can. He is a thinker and problem solver so this was a great game for him! As I held the vacuum tub, he pointed to the bottom. He showed me that the bottom was suppose to open up, but how? I pushed my thumb up against one side that looked like an imprint, and without hesitation in one loud pooof a cloud of dust and dirt covered poor Zadyn head to toe. We stood in shock and laughed and laughed at not only our accomplishment but our new discovery. 

It says in 2 Corinthians 12:9-10

 “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me. That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong.

Life will present us with new difficulties. Some may be big like an overbearing trash can, that seem impossible to maneuver. Others may come with a messy discovery and literally blows up in our face. But the empowering moments are when we realize that with each malfunction we are rediscovering who we are in Christ. Struggle and hardships are not just difficulties, they are discoveries that empower us to surrender our weakness so we can grow in His power. 

More than enough.

Each morning I awake with swirling questions of what has taken place in my life over the last three months.  My life has changed. There are even times that I see my reflection in the mirror and it takes me a moment to decide, "Oh yes there I am." This change has been from the inside out. The life I knew instantly stopped and a new life has begun.

There is loss. There are gains.

We wake up each day depending on things to remain the same. Each morning the sunlight wakes me up reminds me that God is again saying. "Good Morning" to his world that he has set into motion. We depend on water coming out of our shower, and the lights flicking on and off. We assume the people that make up our life will be greeting us. As I rub my eyes each morning I stumble on the same things that were laying on the floor from the day before and wonder when will I get that picked up! There may be small things out of place like your car keys, phone or your kids backpack but for the most part day after day the solid things remain.

“A person will worship something, have no doubt about that. We may think our tribute is paid in secret in the dark recesses of our hearts, but it will out. That which dominates our imaginations and our thoughts will determine our lives, and our character. Therefore, it behooves us to be careful what we worship, for what we are worshiping we are becoming.” 

- Ralph Waldo Emerson

Worship I have realized sometimes comes from a place of confidence in the things that surround me. I have my loving husbands arms around my waist as I sing to God, "You are more than enough." What if it were more than your car keys that fell out of place? The root of our souls are built around relationships. Some come and some go but there are ones like marriage that are suppose to be firm and solid and unwavering. What if your very foundation falls without a choice?

God is revealing his love to me in a new way. I have always know him to be a God of choices but in the midst of this new reality I have fallen deeper in love with the very freedom he has given us. Free will. Freedom to choose. We have the freedom to do anything. Our choices can either take us on a wild journey to nowhere or set us wildly free to live out His purpose. It seems crazy that he gives us the option to choose. When committing your life in marriage to someone you assume they will indeed choose you. That they have the free will to wake up each morning loving you in return. But the other reality is that they have the freedom to choose not to.

That very thing has happened. The world I once knew now looks very different. The things I thought were solid and unmovable...moved. I don't resent free will. I embrace it.  Free will molds us and shapes us into something new with each choice. It can make us or it can also break us. He gives us a choice to write our story to paint our canvas with all kinds of choices. We can choose to embrace Him and allow him to write the story for us or we can choose to write our story ourselves. The conclusion has a dramatically different effect.

God has a perfect design. He created us and then set us free to choose his love. 

 Real surrender is when you choose God to restore you and it requires letting go of what the end result may looks like.

I can run to Him in my reckless abandonment and know that he too understands the pain from loving someone when they choose something else. He allows me to see that I can surrender my heart to his restoring power. Surrendering to God is realizing that what has been broken may be restored and appear different than it did before.

It is like a dish falling from your reach and smashing all over the floor. Millions of tiny pieces are scattered. How will He ever restore it? There are still moments I look at myself and ask, "Who am I now?" I must trust that He is picking up the pieces and how He is restoring me back to a whole. I must surrender to Him the ability that what He is forming may not look like a dish anymore.

"But who are you, O man, to talk back to God? “Shall what is formed say to him who formed it, ‘Why did you make me like this?'   Romans 9:20

 In fact what if His restoration means creating something new? What if He takes the broken pieces of a dish and decided to now form it into a beautiful vase? Not only is He restoring it into something entirely different but it also may have a brand new purpose. What was used to hold something minimal may now be used as a center piece to hold flowers that are blossoming. When we surrender to His restoration we can expect that what was once broken will be restored into something brand new.

"See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it?"  Isaiah 43:19

My cousin made me laugh when he referred to himself as an individual unit, by him being single. I guess that makes me a value pack! Me +4. I am excited to see what new things he has for us.  How he is creating something new with pieces of brokenness. He is already overwhelming me with his vast love for me. His love reaches beyond all loss and pain. Even when I am sitting in the tears of my brokenness his love is being thrown at me as if to surprise me. I assumed that I would experience great loss every morning as I get up without a huge piece of me. But God's unfailing love directs me each morning....

"Let the morning bring me word of your unfailing love, for I have put my trust in you. Show me the way I should go, for to you I lift up my soul. "
Psalm 143:8

Each morning the sunrise and all it's many colors seeps into my bedroom window and His light says "Good Morning, Amy" as it kisses my cheek. His love is more than enough for me. He shows me that I am not enough for the pain and loss I see in my kids eyes. That they too will have the choice to accept His intoxicating love. That He will be more than enough for them if they surrender to His love. That even though we didn't have a choice to how this would be, we accept restoration as He helps us as a value pack embrace something we do get to choose. How to take what was broken, and make it great.

A Beautiful Season.....

I drove into our back driveway and sat in the car facing what was once our beautiful backyard where I dreamed of Awan some day dancing with her daddy at a beautiful wedding reception with twinkle lights that would be swaying with them in the trees. As tears streamed down my face I noticed that the tire swing was swinging alone, in the wind. Only a month ago she was laughing and giggling and soaring in the air with each push from her Dad. Zadyn was inspecting his fish pond and trying to cover the fact that he really just like to get into the water with them. And Tad was riding his bike in the driveway so proud of his newest accomplishment. I was sitting at the small bistro table sipping coffee and talking with my oldest daughter.  We were a happy family, living a beautiful life together but now these are now just ghostly memories of what was.

Fall is one of my favorite seasons. Not that I just get to wear sweaters and and flip-flops at the same time, but that it is beautiful. The trees are an array of mixed color and in some sense the trees are imitating fireworks that just seem to last. There is a difference in the way the sun shines against the blue grey sky and the colors of the grass with the golden glow of the bean fields. You get a sense that the colors are highly saturated. They are so bold. The light seems to pick out what it wants to and highlights certain areas and sends it a glow. This is a beautiful season.

As I was admiring the color and light dancing across the fields as I drove Awan home from school, I realized the reality of Fall. This is the stage just before the end, where in a few weeks these trees will be left bare, for a time being. Just a few months ago these very trees were just budding out and blooming and now they are in the grand finale of their beauty, their season is almost over. We don't look at fall and winter as the end. We see that it is a stage that will soon bring new life. God allows new life to come from something bare and something that may seem lifeless. We don't agonize over the leaves lost but we instead look forward to spring when new life will begin again.  The same applies to my dreams, though they seem to have fallen and my tree may seem bare, I am promised that soon new buds will blossom and new life will begin.

A Time for Everything
Ecclesiastes 3:1-8

3 There is a time for everything,
    and a season for every activity under the heavens:
2     a time to be born and a time to die,
    a time to plant and a time to uproot,
3     a time to kill and a time to heal,
    a time to tear down and a time to build,
4     a time to weep and a time to laugh,
    a time to mourn and a time to dance,
5     a time to scatter stones and a time to gather them,
    a time to embrace and a time to refrain from embracing,
6     a time to search and a time to give up,
    a time to keep and a time to throw away,
7     a time to tear and a time to mend,
    a time to be silent and a time to speak,
8     a time to love and a time to hate,
    a time for war and a time for peace.