Tonight I got to sit down with a great friend of mine while our girls were doing gymnastics and talk (adult conversation with a girl I love=another gift). She was talking about the "treasures" post I did last night. She said that I was a good mom to sit down with Jess and talk about her treasures...I had to stop her! She has known me for awhile now so I reminded her that is not who I am at all. I am the mom that yells and screams and gets frustrated. I am the mom who will do dishes 16 times a day to not have to look at dirty dishes in the sink and I will follow my kids as they play just to put all of their things away so I don't have to look at the stuff. I will play hide and seek and not seek. That is who I truly am...until.
Until, God wrecked me. He exposed how controlling I am. How I have these monstrous expectations and if they are not fulfilled I break into a million little pieces. How I spend a ridiculous amount of time doing things with no eternal value. He called me into another life and I believe He is calling us all into another way of life. A life where we train ourselves to see Him everywhere. We live in a society that makes it so hard to see Him. We have so many distractions, so many roles to live up to, we just have so much period. I have the opportunity to go to Kenya in July to serve a village of people that have so little, but are described by others who have gone before as incredibly grateful and joyful. They see God everywhere. I surrendered my daily routine and way of life to God. I couldn't take Groundhog Day everyday anymore. When He spoke to me in the verse that defines this blog (Psalm 107:43) I knew exactly what He was calling me into. A life of gratitude. I told my friend that it is my calling to see Him everyday. That is why I am constantly hitting pause on life. This blog keeps me accountable.
Today I had a bad attitude for a good portion of the day. Little things began to creep in and annoy me. God's path is described as straight but I had jumped back onto mine and it was dizzying. I prayed and asked God to show me Him. He responded by telling me to go for a walk. Well, I am preparing dinner. Well, go anyway I am training you. So, I asked my family if anyone wanted to join me and my little free spirit was game. We grabbed the camera. I told God, "I have 20 minutes" (and no the irony of me telling God how much time I had did not escape me). Jess knows about my "training" so we began to open our eyes and see. Our 20 minutes turned to 30 and 99 pictures later we made our way back. Will was more than happy to finish dinner (a husband who lets me wander=a priceless gift) while I rushed Jess to her gymnastics class. After we got home, we picked our 10 most favorite pictures...all love letters from God. All would have never been had I not been training.
I love how the tips of these branches look like they are reaching for the last little bit of light.
My encouragement.
Although you can barely see it on here, we took about 80 pictures of the moon (I need to invest in a zoom lens). It reminded me of the saying, "God made the moon and God made me. I see the moon and God sees me."
I had just written this verse down a couple of days ago (I am visually obsessed with clouds and the sky) "The deeper your love, the higher it goes; every cloud a flag to your faithfulness. Soar high in the skies, O God! Cover the whole earth with your glory!"
(Psalm 108:4-5)
Fearfully and wonderfully made.
We loved this tree because where it splits, it looks like two people are about to kiss. We decided that Dad, the story-teller, would have to come up with a good tale about this tree.
Jessie's turn. She took about 30 pictures. I love her point of view and I wish I had a camera to photograph her taking pictures. She kept saying, "mom, it's so beautiful." It took us 10 minutes to go 10 feet. In her prayers tonight she thanked God for being such a wonderful artist.
By the end of our walk the clouds had turned pink...Jess' favorite.
Who would have ever thought training could be so beautiful?
"Be generous with me and I'll live a full life; not for a minute will I take my eyes off your road. Open my eyes so I can see what you show me of your miracle-wonders." (Psalm 119:17-18)
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