Girl, go wash someone’s feet

I am all for girl power and sisters encouraging each other, but I think we need to be very careful in how we are encouraging each other.  

Sometimes the voice of culture muddles the voice of scripture. It is important to take care of ourselves, but when the focus is on what to do to fix ourselves, then inadvertently the focus stays on ourselves.  I’m not speaking a judgmental statement, I’m just speaking from experience. When I have focused on my worries, fears, and shortcomings, I end up feeling more stressed, worried, fearful and coming up short.

So, I tried a little experiment. When I was feeling the weight of my worries trying to get me down, I served. In the midst of the daily to-do list, sometimes I need to remind myself that Jesus came to serve, and serving Him means serving others. I am not saying this to pat myself on the back.  I’m saying this to encourage you, friends, that we can break the chains of worry and fear and stress, and it starts by switching the focus.  

For me, switching the focus begins with worship music. I find it hard to focus on the worries when I keep hearing songs about how strong and mighty our God is, and that we have the same power in us that raised Jesus from the dead. Woah! If we have the power to raise the dead, then we have authority over our fears and worries. I am not downplaying the serious hold that anxiety can have. I know how difficult it is, but I also know that when I meet it head on and worship through it, God meets me there.  

Alright, back to the experiment. Together with my small group, we set up a service project to colllect supplies for our local women’s shelter. On the night we delivered those, we did manicures for some of the shelter residents. It was something that felt fun and lightehearted, but the woman who I was giving a manicure to enjoyed it so much that her smile lit up the room. That made my smile and my emotions overwhelmed, and I realized that I hadn’t felt worry or anxiety the entire night.

God helped me, in the midst of the mess of my life, to serve and love on women through manicures.  I felt free. It doesn’t have to be hard or huge, just let Him use what you are doing today to serve Him.

Serving Jesus, worshipping Him, and loving His people gives us a freedom that can’t come through washing our face, pulling up our bootstraps, or putting our big girl pants on. The focus is Jesus. He wants you and He will carry your burden. Serve someone, give of yourself and watch your burdens lighten. It doesn’t seem like it makes sense, I know, but try it anyway.

I keep thinking of the words of a hymn from Helen Lemmel dating back to 1922, “Turn your eyes upon Jesus, Look full in His wonderful face, And the things of Earth will grow strangely dim, In the light of His glory and grace.”

When you feel down, “girl, go wash someone’s feet.” Take the focus off of you, turn your eyes upon Jesus, serve others, and watch the things of this Earth grow strangely dim.  I promise it will change everything. 

I Need A Change of Heart

We are talking about legacy in our all church study this week, and it has me thinking about what legacy I would like to leave for my kids. I really want to be known for loving Jesus, loving people well, and making people feel welcome at any time. This week I have been challenged in this. There is a person who really bothers me, and I don't really know exactly why. I want to like this person, but I don't. Ugh!(Don't worry, I can guarantee that this person is not reading this blog). That does not really line up with the legacy that I want to leave, so that leaves me in a bit of a struggle. This might sound a little silly, but I really don't like the feelings I have had toward this person. I have been known to justify my feelings and actions in the past, but this was not really feeling justifiable. 

Then, the Lord stepped in. I know it was the Lord, because I did not want to do this. I felt a challenge in my soul to pray for this person.  To really pray for them! I have prayed for their work, their family, and just all around blessings. So far I still feel the same, but when I do run in to them or see their social media page, I pray. Prayer changes things, so I know that God will change my heart, and who knows what else He will do in this journey.  I have seen over and over again the way God does exceedingly and abundantly more than we can hope or imagine. Maybe this person and I will never be besties, but who knows what God is going to do?

Who is difficult in your life?  Will you take the challenge to pray for them? Let me know how it goes for you. I love to hear stories about God working in amazing ways! And I will keep you all posted on my heart too.

Dance your dance

If you had to choose one genre of tv to watch for the rest of your life, what would you pick?  I would pick reality dance shows. I adore watching people live out exactly what God created them to do, and dancing illuminates that so clearly. I also love watching people overcome the struggle of learning to dance because they are driven and have an amazing coach. 

My favorite stories are about someone overcoming an obstacle that should have sidelined them. There have been dancers/contestants with different life circumstances to overcome. Some of these obstacles to dance are prosthetic legs, death of a loved one, cancer, hearing impairment, and many more.  This past week, I watched a blind skier (yes, a downhill skier) who took the stage as a dancer. Her name is Danelle Umstead, and I was in awe and so inspired.  I sat and bawled through her story and through her entire dance. She danced that dance so beautifully, and trusted her partner so fully. I have not stopped thinking about this dance since I watched it the other night. 

As I processed, I thought of Danelle’s mom when she first got her diagnosis. I can’t imagine all of the thoughts and worries that went through her head. If it were my daughter, my thoughts would have been taken over by worries. I would wonder if she was ever going to live a “normal” life, if she was going to ever live on her own, if she was ever going to dance, if she was ever going to understand the height of a mountain (let alone ski one), and so many more.  I am not Danelle’s mother, but I have my own kids with their own diverse needs. Watching Danelle dance last night reminded me that my kids needs and diverse-abilities are their springboards to what God is going to do in and through them. 

Having 6 kids means we have a lot of needs here.  Some are big and some are small.  Some of these needs make me lose sleep, and some of those needs are easy fixes. I think watching Danelle reminded me of the bigger story.  Our Big God is so worthy of trust. He holds our hands and leads us through this dance of life.  We can trust Him to lead us through these steps. We can study Him with our unique abilities and trust that He’s using each one to write out our beautiful dance. I want to remember for myself, and encourage you, that we can learn to dance with our imperfections.  What is that obstacle in your life, or your child’s life that is causing all of the worry and loss of sleep.  How can you trust that to Jesus? Picture yourself (and your child) dancing that beautiful dance through this tragedy/obstacle/hurt/lie/addiction/pain/loss to get to the other side.  Some of our biggest obstacles are choreographing the most beautiful and impactful parts of our stories.

Refocus your eyes with me, friends. Lift them up and see the One leading you on this dance.  The beauty isn’t in the obstacle, but our in wonderful Savior. He will make this dance beautiful...we just need to trust Him. 

Perfection...the pressure is off

Perfection is sneaky. Sometimes it disguises itself as ambition, structure, checklists, anxiety, good intentions, work ethic, and so much more.  The world we live in is driven by perfection, but sadly, it isn’t attainable.  Perfection becomes our unintentional goal. We try living under this huge burden that we were never meant to carry. 

Several years ago I came to the realization that I had an unrealistic expectation of perfection on myself, and for everything in my life. When something wouldn’t meet this expectation then I would fall apart.  I held myself to a standard that didn’t even let God in, because (obviously) I was doing it for Him.  Not very realistic, right? My kids did everything in their power to remind me that there is no such thing as perfection in parenting, or life. God was using these little ones to help me to depend on Him. Through the unrealistic expectation of perfection, I kept looking at my inadequacy and claiming myself a failure. My life didn’t look like a Pinterest board, and my heart and emotional state looked even worse. I put so much pressure on myself to keep the perfect schedule, to be the perfect wife, to dress my kids perfectly, to keep the house perfectly clean, and to make sure my kids behaved perfectly. I thought that if I did all the right things, then my kids would turn out to be perfect.  I didn’t overtly say these beliefs, but I operated out of them.  It wasn’t until I truly looked at my heart and my motivation that I realized what I was actually doing. I was making myself crazy!

I find myself thinking about how many of us go through hard things and just want it to be perfect, taken care of, fixed, or over. It doesn’t matter how hard we try to hold it together: life just isn’t perfect. When my biggest fears became my realities and we went through seasons that were really hard, I found a faith in Jesus that only could have been born in the depths. Desperately hanging on to this faith got me through when I didn’t even want to get out of bed.  Looking for the good, the sweet things, the places of joy is what refocused me, not perfection.  

Our imperfections don’t make us “less than,” they actually make us depend more on Jesus. I want to grow in those moments that are trying to shape me. I don’t want to be like a toddler that is kicking and screaming as my Abba Father is walking me (through the yuck) to something so much better? 

Anyone else want to join me in taking the burden of perfection off of our shoulders?

Matthew 11:28-30 “Are you tired? Worn out? Burned out on religion? Come to me. Get away with me and you’ll recover your life. I’ll show you how to take a real rest. Walk with me and work with me—watch how I do it. Learn the unforced rhythms of grace. I won’t lay anything heavy or ill-fitting on you. Keep company with me and you’ll learn to live freely and lightly.” msg

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The Hate You Give

I’m a self-proclaimed Hallmark movie lover.  I truly adore predictable movies with happy endings, because...life.  In “real life” there are too many unpredictable moments and unhappy endings. I love reading books that are happy and predictable as well. The Hate You Give is not necessarily the type of book I usually read, but sometimes you have to step out of your comfort zone to grow. One of the ways to grow is to have people in our lives that challenge our thoughts, beliefs, and ways of doing things.  I’m in a group, Sisters in Christ, where we get together and discuss hot topic racial issues in a safe place of love and understanding (if anyone wants an invite to this, let me know). One of my sisters from this group shared this book with me, and I cant wait to discuss it with her.

 The Hate You Give is a fictional depiction of something that can and does happen in many cities all over the United States. It is about a girl named Starr who vascilates between two worlds: the private school she attends and the neighborhood where she lives. The book takes us on a journey of Starr’s self-discovery,  as well as people discovery, after she witnesses a cop shoot her friend from her neighborhood.

 The title of the book is based on Tupac’s acronym for T-H-U-G L-I-F-E. Read about this in the book, or look it up.  It is important. Tupac defined what people are still trying to deny: what we “feed” our little one’s brains is lived out. From the 90’s to now, you would have to live under a rock if you didn’t know who Tupac was (or is...depending on what theory you believe). .  What exactly are we feeding our kids with our words and actions? You don’t have to be a genius to figure that out, and I don’t think you have to be a genius to figure out that we need to un-learn hate and judgement. I’m learning that stereotyping and racism has a fine line between the 2. Some of the characters of this book are stereotypes, but it also goes deeper to explain that sometimes there is a reason for the stereotype. There is no easy fix for the hate that already exists in this world, but lets start with our little ones and teach them a new way, a better way.  We all can work harder to love better, whichever “stereotype” we maybe living out, or trying to overcome. 

The Hate You Give was hard for me to read for a lot of reasons. I don’t like cuss words, and I don’t tolerate them as a mama, but taking it out of this book would be unrealistic. So, my brain skimmed over those words as quickly as I could.  Also, I found myself longing to be done with the book so that it could be all wrapped up with a happy, neat, and predictable ending. I read on realizing that even though this is fiction, there isn’t a neat bow to put on this and call it wrapped up. I squirmed through the swear words and the real life depiction of a world I know very little about. 

I have been done reading this book for a little while now, and I find myself wondering what Starr is doing and if her relationship with her boyfriend is still going strong. I’m wondering if she is still struggling to be herself no matter where she is, and who is stepping up next to her in this journey? I wonder if she is still staying strong and what she is going to do next.  I try to picture what part I would play in this story, and realize, its not just a story. Do my friends all know that I love them and support them? I wonder what am I “feeding” my kids and how can I help them grow up to love intentionally and effect change for the good? 

  

I just want to encourage my friends: get out of your comfort zone and read something new.  Read about something that might change (or at least challenge) your view on life. I appreciate the way this fiction book is affecting my reality. I do not want it to stop there! Let’s keep growing, friends!

Temporary healing?

I wonder if the blind man that Jesus healed ever worried that his sight was just temporary, or if the woman with the bleeding issue ever thought for sure she was going to start bleeding again. What about Elizabeth? Do you think she spent her first trimester wondering if she was going to miscarry?  Maybe. I am not sure what they were thinking, but I do know a little about human nature and doubt surely tends to creep in pretty regularly. At least I know it does for me.

The other night Jason and I were snuggling in to bed. Just getting comfortable on the pillow, I opened my eyes and couldn’t see out of my left eye. I closed my eyes and opened again, still no sight in my left eye. I freaked out, and told Jason that I couldn’t see anything except blur in the middle of my eyes. His immediate response was to lay his hands on me and pray for my vision to clear. It wasn’t until he turned the light on that my vision came back. (There are all sorts of parallels I can make to vision coming when the light turns on, but that is not what the Lord taught me this time around.)  I went to sleep and woke up with a bit of a headache and my eye felt a little strange. So, I did what any miracle believing person does, I spent the day thinking that my vision was about to leave me at any time. Ugh. I wish I could say that I trusted in the miracle that happened, but I didn’t. 

Do you ever live in fear of the past, the sickness, the diagnosis, the trends, the future, the “fill in the blank”? Friends, we need to let go of what is holding us back and trust the one who holds us in his hands! Let’s trust that we’ve been set free, because John 8:36 reminds us that “who the Son sets free, is free indeed!” Believe me, I know that there are times that it is easier to stay stuck in the fear and the worry, but just like Jesus said, “take up your mat and walk.”  Believe that He can do it.  Believe for your miracle right in the midst of your mess.  It is not easy! I live here on “the hot mess express.” I promise you that there is always mess going on over here.  Sometimes the mess is emotional, sometimes it is the house, sometimes it is relational, and sometimes it is all of the above.  If I live focused on the mess, then I miss the miracle.  

You can’t miss the miracle when your eyes are focused on Jesus! Sometimes you just need your vision taken away for a bit to remember this, or maybe that is just me. Fix your eyes on Jesus, my sweet friends, and you can’t go wrong. The miracle will be there because you will see the miracle maker. That’s where I want to live, come with me?

My “39” bucket list - update 1

 Today I had a new friend say to me, “I like when other families understand our crazy.” I tell you what, I loved that statement so much! Being able to let your guard down to love and be loved is such a special gift that I never want to take for granted. It is not something that is easy to do, but when the chance comes along: I take it! 

Even though this is a bucket list update, it is also just a reminder to myself that in the hard seasons of life, there are so many gifts right in front of us. We just need to make the time to appreciate them. (Hence, the bucket list). 

So, here’s the update:

Number 21. Write 39 (snail mail) letters: 35 to go💌

I’ve written 4: 1 to a dear friend who still takes the time to write letters and I wanted her to get one in return, 1 to my favorite aunt from Florida, and 2 thank you letters. I am horrible at letting people know how thankful I am for them in a letter, so I’m working on that!

Number 33: Make a new friend✔️

We started our summer small group/ mommy and me playtime, and I already made a couple new friends! I have already been blessed by meeting them, and can’t wait to get to know them better... I think I’m changing #33 to: Make lots of new friends!

Number 4: take Hanna Joy to the American Girl Store ✔️

With 6 kids, 1 on 1 time tends to be in short supply, but adding it in to the bucket list makes it a priority.  This little trip was exactly what I needed and it was perfect that I got to check something off of the list too!

I  just mentioned letting your guard down to love and be loved and I got to do that and celebrate my girl! HJ and I went to the city with Amma(my mom), and Danielle and Annabelle, our heart friends. (You know, the kind that feels like family, even if they’re not really related). 

Our a adventure in to the city wasn’t just a quick trip to the store and then we left. I don’t really do things that way. I’m an all or nothing kind of girl. So, we made it an experience to be remembered. 

The first thing on the agenda was brunch, obviously. So, we went in to the city and got to Orange. This place makes me so happy!! Everything from the cucumber water, to the frushi, to the orange infused coffee, to the different theme pancake flight(this week was Avenger theme), to the scramble is a flavor explosion in your face. It was worth every minute of the hour that it took to find a parking spot.

Then we moved on to our 3 hour tour of all things American Girl. Thanks to my sis and awesome niece for letting HJ borrow their American Girl(and all of her accessories), we had such an incredible time. The cafe was so much fun and the girls even got to decorate cupcakes for themselves and their dolls. 

It was quite an adventurous day with an awesome brunch, lack of parking, a lost doll(she was found), yummy food, good deals at the Disney store, beautiful weather, fun with friends and fam, lots of laughter, and did I mention yummy food?

Hanna Joy had a great year in kindergarten, but it was kind of a tough finish. Which is why I was so glad that we could have such a fun trip celebrating life and enjoying each other. I really love being her mom and taking her on adventures! I can’t wait for the next one with her!

Also, if you’re still reading, I have a question...

One thing on my bucket list is to do a random act of kindness each week.  I might write about a few of them, but is it ok if I don’t really broadcast those? I never want to do a random act of kindness just to write about it.  I mean, as long as I promise that I am doing at least one random act of kindness each week, right?

This bucket list has already been so much fun! Stay tuned for the next adventure on my little hot mess express😉🌪🚂💛