So the routine is beginning again. We made it through the holidays despite another illness; some of the children are still getting the last of the scum out of their lungs. I feel hopeful that I will be able to pull my focus onto the things that need it. I feel God is already helping me to be faithful and diligent with my responsibilities. I probably accomplished more yesterday than in the last two weeks put together, though that may be the reason I am especially tired this morning.

This year I want to really work on becoming a better planner of our diet. I usually have a fairly good plan for a week at a time though after all the illness and vacation this has fallen apart and I'm constantly thinking "What are we going to eat for our next meal?!?" I do not like that question. I am determined to serve more vegetables and have good snack food available. Otto and Olivia both need to eat often and sometimes there isn't anything quick to grab. I have been spending more time in my Nourishing Traditions cookbook and it is so amazing! Granted I will probably never be into raw meat, organ meat, or seafood other than fish, but there is so much in that book that I want in our diet. My challenge is that a lot of it requires planning ahead. My first goal.

Although I do bike to the store quite a bit, I want to bike more. We have, over the holidays, acquired appropriate attire to help us ride more comfortably in the rain. It makes those few missing items a lot more obvious, like Greg's shoes. It will always be a work in progress, but as long as it is progressing we are happy. This, too, requires planning ahead.

Perhaps the most important goal I have is to spend more time focussing on my Saviour. I am not terribly deficient in the time I spend with the Lord, praying, reading, etc., but I feel a need to grow more. I do not have a plan in this area, but I have some thoughts. I suppose it may be that I want to be more evangelistic. I'm not sure. I will continue praying and thinking and listening.

Speaking of responsibilities, mine are calling.

This is always a difficult time of year for me. Constantly, all year, I struggle with feeling like a failure. I was thinking this morning about how positive and how forgiving I am about other people and their actions, but not about my actions. Naturally I know the reasons I don't accomplish things as I should; I know I was procrastinating and making poor choices in the use of my time, the selfish reasons behind my actions, my laziness.

It is obvious even to me that I am not a complete failure. Our children are as great as they come (though I am biased). We have a relatively clean and usually happy home in an area we love. I don't neglect everything. In the big scheme of life none of the things I am concerned about really matter anyway. Unfortunately, I am not spending much time thinking about those things that matter, eternal things. And I now feel strongly convicted. Maybe I don't feel like a failure for the previous reasons, maybe it is because I am being negligent and careless with opportunities to effect the eternity of my neighbors, friends and my family. Perhaps I'm wrong thinking that it is the busyness and unroutineness and pressure to make good decisions and performances of this time of year that bothers me. Instead it may be that my guilt increases with the opportunities missed, ignored.

Trying to think again.

Yesterday was my father's birthday. He is great, more than great, but words could not describe my feelings for him so I'm not going to try. This last summer he and my step-mother began a family website to prepare for a family reunion this next summer. What a wonderful experience it has been, conversing with relatives that I see and speak to rarely because we live so far apart. Even when I am in the area there are so many together that I often don't visit much with some. I am sure we will have much more fun at the reunion having first reunited on the website. Thanks Dad and Eunice!

I have been too busy complaining to myself about my inability to accomplish all the things I feel I should to think deeply about anything. Well, except this: the last several years I have noticed that I am not able to fast (sacrifice something for the Lord) for any length of time (depending on the thing sacrificed) for any reason. I had thought it was because I didn't feel passionately about anything for which I was praying. Perhaps I have been too comfortable and lazy and don't want any discomfort, I'm selfish. Perhaps I have been more tired and feel worn out at the prospect of more discomfort, it isn't important enough to me. When I have begun a fast, I quickly begin to feel like I'm trying to control God, I don't trust him enough to let him be sovereign and do as He feel is best. Maybe those feeling come because I don't really want to sacrifice anything. I haven't come up with a good answer, but I'm praying about it and asking others their opinions, others whose opinions I value. (If I haven't asked you it isn't because I don't value your opinion :-)) I also decided to start fasting once a week at least. I'm not sure why, but it seems important and many times it is the 'seeming' important or 'right' that God directs.

Check out the aura on this moon one early morning last week:

Thoughts From My Devotions

I've been reading about Moses during my morning tea in my chronological Bible. How God talked with him face to face as a man talks with a friend. The Bible says Moses was humble. I know in the past I've thought he was cowardly at the burning bush when he tells God he can't go to Pharaoh, even after such incredible miraculous signs. But, then I thought about how often we read about him questioning God, reasoning with God, almost arguing with God. He may have been wrong to stand up to God at the burning bush and not want to go, but it could not have been easy. The Almighty God is talking to you out of a burning bush, performing miraculous signs involving you and you argue about the orders being given. Certainly not cowardly. Later, God wants to do away with all the Isrealites when they blatantly create their own god and worship it and Moses reasons with God and persuades Him to spare them. And there is so much more. It is an amazing story. It must have been an amazing experience. I can hardly wait to hear more about it someday.

Yesterday I read about when God was giving Moses the law and said not to worship any other gods, for the LORD, whose name is Jealous, is a jealous God. And I thought at first, jealousy doesn't seem like a very good character trait. But, why? Then I realized that if we were good and faithful and trustworthy it wouldn't be a good trait, but we are not. So often we are the unfaithful wife, turning from God and allowing our worship to fall on the profane and undeserving. He is jealous because He loves us and desires us to love Him most of all. And why should he not? He sacrificed His only son, Jesus, for us. And not a clean and easy sacrifice, but torturous and painful and humiliating. Is it wrong for Him to demand that we believe it?

Confirmation

I was reading last week about Abraham's servant going to find Isaac a wife and God granting his request for proof that the girl he found was the right girl. 

In 1990 I moved from California to Oregon; my dad recommended a church and they had a good sized college/career group. I remember when I first met Greg. He had long hair, half way down his back, and a leather jacket. I had not been attending Beaverton Nazarene very long and I thought they must have a street ministry and they saved him off the street. Turns out he was born and raised in that church. Not my point. The first time Greg and I went out together I arrived home to find a message on my answering machine from my sister-in-law, Kathy. She said something about my mother and was anxious for me to call back. My mother had been sick for several years with a disease which we knew was likely to cause a stroke at some point. That is what happened. I knew right away that God was going to take her away from me, but that Greg was going to be the support I needed in her place. I went and visited her in the hospital. Soon they moved her to a rest home. It was a couple of months later that I became anxious and Greg told me I needed to do whatever it took to get down there and see her. I did. She mostly laid in bed without much seeming awareness of what was around her, but some. I remember a nurse, a lively nurse, came in talking loudly and happily and asked Mom who I was. She told her my name and I was so glad to know that she knew who I was. The day I arrived back home she died. I am so thankful for being able to be there for her last days. I knew that God used Greg to get me down there for that time; I knew God would use Greg to lead me the rest of my life. I have always been thankful for that confirmation of God's desire that Greg be my husband. We were married July 2, 1992 by my brother Rick in Greg's parents home, seventeen years this July. We have five children, Henry (14), Louis (13), Otto (11), Solomon (9 today!), and Olivia (5). We feel so blessed. I always wanted to be a wife and mother and God has granted that desire in abundance! I am thankful for his constant presence and sovereignty. He is good.

Something? Maybe not.

I find myself sitting here in the middle of the day trying to think of something to write. My last post was more... direct than I usually am. I believe what I wrote and don't want to delete it; it needs to be said. But I am usually more cautious about offending people. I thought it came across as potentially offensive depending on the reader. It would be an easier subject to talk about face to face where the tone of voice and body language always play an important role for the speaker and the listener.

Our life is beginning to settle down again. We had some crazy weeks with selling the trailer (see the Our Trail post). There were other things that kept us busy and the house a terrible mess. This week has been great for getting things cleaned up again, not that its done to my satisfaction. Next week we will work at it some more and work on the new schedule, too. I will keep plugging along at whatever God puts before me, and try to enjoy it.

Are you a wife in charge of her husband?

How many of you wives out there are trying to control your husbands? Do you think it will make them love you more? It will not. Could you open your mind to what may be a new idea?

Do you know how to make your husbands love you as the best wife he could ever imagine? Respect the fact that he is an adult and can make good decisions. The decisions he makes may not be the same as you would make; can you handle that? Is it your way or the highway? Is that what you really want? Do you really want him to think of you as his mother: coming to you for permission to do things, saying no to his choices because you have other plans for him, staying away from home because as soon as he gets there you demand (though you think you are asking) that he clean the garage (or some such work)? How about you try treating your husband as if he were a grown man?

Listen, he may make wrong choices. Have you ever made a wrong choice? Do you like it when people rub it in your face? When he makes a wrong choice do not feel the need to tell him; he will know. With his new freedom he may be gone from home more, unsure of how long it will last. Don't worry, do the things that are your job to do, do more than your share. When he comes home and you are happy and don't make a bunch of demands on him... surely you can imagine how he will feel. Serve him, love him, sacrifice for him.  It may be difficult (that's why it is called 'sacrifice'), but you will receive an inner joy that only God can give. Soon, he will want to be home. He will want to take you with him. He will love you as the best wife in the world.

This is an extremely abbreviated version of my thoughts on this matter, but it gives you the idea. It is painful to me, sad to see women in charge of their husbands. I always think: those poor men; and I feel angry at their wives for making both their lives so miserable.