I can't believe we are leaving tomorrow for Latvia!! 2 weeks in Latvia!! I am thrilled we get to see Sergeis. I am thrilled to be getting to see a country that has touched my heart so very much. And I can't wait to see what God has in store for us while there!! I don't think it's actually hit me yet that we are REALLY going tomorrow!!!
Oh my goodness....
Tuesday, September 8, 2009
Wednesday, August 5, 2009
We're going to Latvia!!!!!!!!
Just wanted to say I am soooo excited! Last week God confirmed to us that we should take this mission trip to Latvia! We're going in September--just a little over a month from now. All of us are going! Woo hoo! We'll get to visit several orphanages, including Sergeis'. We all can't wait to see him! So after we have the headache of ordeing plane tickets for all 5 of us over (hopefullly tomorrow) we can work on all the other logistics for this whirlwind trip!!
Just wanted to voice my excitement!
I told E to tell her friends that she gets to spend her fall break in Europe. hehehe
Just wanted to voice my excitement!
I told E to tell her friends that she gets to spend her fall break in Europe. hehehe
Tuesday, July 28, 2009
faith like a child
oh to come to God with a request and have the faith of a child. As adults, something in us has died...our ability to fully trust. After seeing God work in so many ways, after seeing prayer after prayer answered and watching God perform miracles in answer to prayer, I still have some sort of inability to trust my God fully. Why is this? Why does a child not lack the faith but we do??
We have been asking God for a confirmation about an opportunity we have to go to Latvia in September and He gave it to us. Of course He did. We asked Him. But part of me thought I'd have to get that confirmation solely based on my "feelings." Ya know--I felt good about going so maybe God's saying yes. But no...God answers prayers--in crazy ways sometimes! For whatever reason, it still surprises me!
"Oh ye of little faith."
God, increase my faith! Increase my trust in You. Thank you that you answer our prayers and hear your children! Help me to remember moments like these when I'm in another "delay" and can't figure out what's going on.
I love you, Lord!
We have been asking God for a confirmation about an opportunity we have to go to Latvia in September and He gave it to us. Of course He did. We asked Him. But part of me thought I'd have to get that confirmation solely based on my "feelings." Ya know--I felt good about going so maybe God's saying yes. But no...God answers prayers--in crazy ways sometimes! For whatever reason, it still surprises me!
"Oh ye of little faith."
God, increase my faith! Increase my trust in You. Thank you that you answer our prayers and hear your children! Help me to remember moments like these when I'm in another "delay" and can't figure out what's going on.
I love you, Lord!
Saturday, July 25, 2009
for God only
"My soul waits in silence for God only;
From Him is my salvation.
He only is my rock and my salvation,
My stronghold; I shall not be greatly shaken.
My soul, wait in silence for God only,
For my hope is from Him.
He only is my rock and my salvation,
My stronghold; I shall not be shaken.
On God my salvation and my glory rest;
The rock of my strength, my refuge is in God.
Trust in Him at all times, O people;
Pour out your heart before Him;
God is a refuge for us."
Psalm 62:1-2; 5-8
I have been waiting on God. But have I been waiting for God only? Have I made Him my only rock and have I trusted in Him alone?
I have been waiting on circumstances, on people, on advice...I have put my trust in those things and telling myself that I am relying on God to show me what is next. Yes, God does work through circumstances, people and the advice of godly brothers and sisters in Christ, but I have put my hope in those things when my hope should be in God.
I have poured out my heart to other people instead of God. There is nothing wrong with telling others your heart; nothing wrong with confiding in someone and receiving advice and their opinions. However, I have poured out my heart to others and not to the only One who can actually be my refuge. I have spent my energy elsewhere and forgotten to confide in my God and receive strength and wisdom from Him.
Lord, forgive me for where I have trusted in others instead of you. Help me to seek You alone for true wisdom. Help me to rest in your glory and your presence. I thank You, Lord, that you are persistent with me and that You are patient with me. I thank you that you are teaching me your ways and that you are leading me closer to You. My next step is to be closer to You than I am now. Each step should lead to You; always closer and closer to God only.
From Him is my salvation.
He only is my rock and my salvation,
My stronghold; I shall not be greatly shaken.
My soul, wait in silence for God only,
For my hope is from Him.
He only is my rock and my salvation,
My stronghold; I shall not be shaken.
On God my salvation and my glory rest;
The rock of my strength, my refuge is in God.
Trust in Him at all times, O people;
Pour out your heart before Him;
God is a refuge for us."
Psalm 62:1-2; 5-8
I have been waiting on God. But have I been waiting for God only? Have I made Him my only rock and have I trusted in Him alone?
I have been waiting on circumstances, on people, on advice...I have put my trust in those things and telling myself that I am relying on God to show me what is next. Yes, God does work through circumstances, people and the advice of godly brothers and sisters in Christ, but I have put my hope in those things when my hope should be in God.
I have poured out my heart to other people instead of God. There is nothing wrong with telling others your heart; nothing wrong with confiding in someone and receiving advice and their opinions. However, I have poured out my heart to others and not to the only One who can actually be my refuge. I have spent my energy elsewhere and forgotten to confide in my God and receive strength and wisdom from Him.
Lord, forgive me for where I have trusted in others instead of you. Help me to seek You alone for true wisdom. Help me to rest in your glory and your presence. I thank You, Lord, that you are persistent with me and that You are patient with me. I thank you that you are teaching me your ways and that you are leading me closer to You. My next step is to be closer to You than I am now. Each step should lead to You; always closer and closer to God only.
Mercies are new in the morning
For at least one week, God has had me to wake at (almost) first light. I am impressed upon to spend time in His Word and with Him in prayer. Instead, however, I justify my desire to sleep longer and miss out on the opportunity to start my day in uninteruppted QUIET time (rare in my house) with God. How do I know that it is God who wakes me? I am in no way a morning person. In my whole life, the only way I wake up before 8:00 AM is with an alarm or with my children waking me up. I have been waking up before 7:00 most mornings.
Last night, I made it a point to tell myself that I would not miss that quiet time today. God is faithful. I awoke at 7:00 and I won't lie--it was a struggle to get myself out of the bed. I seriously had to fight the temptation to just go back to sleep.
Here I am, though, ready to share what God is teaching me this morning.
"My heart is steadfast, O God, my heart is steadfast;
I will sing, yes, I will sing praises!
Awake, my glory!
Awake, harp and lyre!
I will awaken the dawn.
I will give thanks to You, O Lord, among the peoples;
I will sing praises to You among the nations.
For Your lovingkindness is great to the heavens
And Your truth to the clouds.
Be exalted above the heavens, O God;
Let Your glory be above all the earth."
Psalm 57:7-11
"But as for my, I shall sing of Your strenth;
Yes, I shall joyfully sing of Your lovingkindess in the morning,
For You have been my stronghold
And a refuge in the day of my distress.
O my strength, I will sing praises to You;
For God is my stronghold, the God who shows me lovingkindess."
Psalm 59:16-17
Does God want me to spend time with Him "in the morning?" Oh yes, He does! Today I will revel in the glory of God! I will praise and worship Him all day! He is the rock I stand on. He will not fail me. Today I will just joy in knowing that God is guiding my next step. Am I still waiting on God? Yes. Is it still frustrating to not know what that next step is? Of course. But I have made that my focus. I have complained to anyone who will listen how frustrated I am. Oh the opportunities I have missed to joyfully sing of God's lovingkindess, His provision, His truth, and His guiding hands to those who would listen.
Don't let yourself become so wrapped up in the problems and the uncertain or unknown that you forget to give God all the glory, honor and praise He deserves!
"Oh God, you are my God, And I will ever praise you. I will seek you in the morning, And I will learn to walk in Your ways, And step by step, You lead me. And I will follow You all of my days."
-Michael W. Smith song Step by Step,
Last night, I made it a point to tell myself that I would not miss that quiet time today. God is faithful. I awoke at 7:00 and I won't lie--it was a struggle to get myself out of the bed. I seriously had to fight the temptation to just go back to sleep.
Here I am, though, ready to share what God is teaching me this morning.
"My heart is steadfast, O God, my heart is steadfast;
I will sing, yes, I will sing praises!
Awake, my glory!
Awake, harp and lyre!
I will awaken the dawn.
I will give thanks to You, O Lord, among the peoples;
I will sing praises to You among the nations.
For Your lovingkindness is great to the heavens
And Your truth to the clouds.
Be exalted above the heavens, O God;
Let Your glory be above all the earth."
Psalm 57:7-11
"But as for my, I shall sing of Your strenth;
Yes, I shall joyfully sing of Your lovingkindess in the morning,
For You have been my stronghold
And a refuge in the day of my distress.
O my strength, I will sing praises to You;
For God is my stronghold, the God who shows me lovingkindess."
Psalm 59:16-17
Does God want me to spend time with Him "in the morning?" Oh yes, He does! Today I will revel in the glory of God! I will praise and worship Him all day! He is the rock I stand on. He will not fail me. Today I will just joy in knowing that God is guiding my next step. Am I still waiting on God? Yes. Is it still frustrating to not know what that next step is? Of course. But I have made that my focus. I have complained to anyone who will listen how frustrated I am. Oh the opportunities I have missed to joyfully sing of God's lovingkindess, His provision, His truth, and His guiding hands to those who would listen.
Don't let yourself become so wrapped up in the problems and the uncertain or unknown that you forget to give God all the glory, honor and praise He deserves!
"Oh God, you are my God, And I will ever praise you. I will seek you in the morning, And I will learn to walk in Your ways, And step by step, You lead me. And I will follow You all of my days."
-Michael W. Smith song Step by Step,
Friday, July 24, 2009
Journey with my Lord
So, last night I began my reading where I left off the night before: at Psalm 22. Honestly, I had planned on reading only a few of the chapters and then picking up the latest YWAM book I'm in the middle of. But for some reason, I was compelled to keep reading. I read through psalm after psalm--most of which had something to do with "waiting on the Lord" which is so a problem for me lately. I was wondering what exactly God was trying to teach me when reading all of these. When I got to psalm 40 I read:
"I waited patiently for the Lord;
And He inclined to me and heard my cry.
He brought me up out of the pit of destruction, out of the miry clay,
And He set my feet upon a rock making my footsteps firm.
He put a new song in my mouth, a song of praise to our God;
Many will see and fear
And will trust in the Lord.
How blessed is the man who has made the Lord his trust,
And has not turned to the proud, nor to those who lapse into falsehood.
Many, O Lord my God, are the wonders which You have done,
And your thoughts toward us;
There is none to compare with You.
If I would declare and speak of them,
They would be too numerous to count.
Sacrifice and meal offering You have not desired;
My ears You have opened;
Burnt offering and sin offering You have not required.
Then I said, "Behold I come;
In the scroll of the book it is written of me.
I delight to do Your will, O my God;
Your Law is within my heart."
I have proclaimed glad tidings of righteousness in the great congregation;
Behold, I will not restrain my lips,
O Lord, You know.
I have not hidden Your righteousness within my heart;
I have spoken of Your faithfulness and Your salvation;
I have not concealed Your lovingkindness and Your truth from the great congregation.
You, O Lord, will not withhold Your compassion from me;
Your lovingkindness and Your truth will continually preserve me."
(Psalm 40:1-11)
What I realized through that is that I have been waiting on God to do SOMETHING, to show me my next step, to lead us somewhere and give us a purpose. I have been waiting on God to give me purpose. The only thing wrong with that is that I ALREADY know His purpose! He is a missionary God and I am to speak of His truth, His lovingkindness, His righteousness to all people, everywhere, no matter where I am. I am so concerned about the future and where God wants us to live and what exactly we'll do when we get there and how it will all work out that I am forgetting to just live for Him now. I am forgetting to just take JOY in the fact that the Lord is my God! He is my hope, my salvation, my everything! I am forgetting that while I waited on Him yesterday to tell me the next step for my future, TODAY is the future and I am missing it! Oh Lord, forgive me for waiting to delight in You. Forgive me for thinking I am serving you while I wait when I truly haven't been serving You daily. Help me to change my heart and my attitude towards waiting on you for our next stage of life. Thank you for Your Word which speaks volumes to me!!
The psalm I ended with last night as the need to continue reading subsided was the
41st one and it ends like this:
"Blessed be the Lord, the God of Israel,
From everlasting to everlasting.
Amen and Amen."
And then I was able to put my Bible down, turn out my light and rest. This journey I am on sometimes seems long and tedious, but oh to have the Lord in control makes it worth it all!
"I waited patiently for the Lord;
And He inclined to me and heard my cry.
He brought me up out of the pit of destruction, out of the miry clay,
And He set my feet upon a rock making my footsteps firm.
He put a new song in my mouth, a song of praise to our God;
Many will see and fear
And will trust in the Lord.
How blessed is the man who has made the Lord his trust,
And has not turned to the proud, nor to those who lapse into falsehood.
Many, O Lord my God, are the wonders which You have done,
And your thoughts toward us;
There is none to compare with You.
If I would declare and speak of them,
They would be too numerous to count.
Sacrifice and meal offering You have not desired;
My ears You have opened;
Burnt offering and sin offering You have not required.
Then I said, "Behold I come;
In the scroll of the book it is written of me.
I delight to do Your will, O my God;
Your Law is within my heart."
I have proclaimed glad tidings of righteousness in the great congregation;
Behold, I will not restrain my lips,
O Lord, You know.
I have not hidden Your righteousness within my heart;
I have spoken of Your faithfulness and Your salvation;
I have not concealed Your lovingkindness and Your truth from the great congregation.
You, O Lord, will not withhold Your compassion from me;
Your lovingkindness and Your truth will continually preserve me."
(Psalm 40:1-11)
What I realized through that is that I have been waiting on God to do SOMETHING, to show me my next step, to lead us somewhere and give us a purpose. I have been waiting on God to give me purpose. The only thing wrong with that is that I ALREADY know His purpose! He is a missionary God and I am to speak of His truth, His lovingkindness, His righteousness to all people, everywhere, no matter where I am. I am so concerned about the future and where God wants us to live and what exactly we'll do when we get there and how it will all work out that I am forgetting to just live for Him now. I am forgetting to just take JOY in the fact that the Lord is my God! He is my hope, my salvation, my everything! I am forgetting that while I waited on Him yesterday to tell me the next step for my future, TODAY is the future and I am missing it! Oh Lord, forgive me for waiting to delight in You. Forgive me for thinking I am serving you while I wait when I truly haven't been serving You daily. Help me to change my heart and my attitude towards waiting on you for our next stage of life. Thank you for Your Word which speaks volumes to me!!
The psalm I ended with last night as the need to continue reading subsided was the
41st one and it ends like this:
"Blessed be the Lord, the God of Israel,
From everlasting to everlasting.
Amen and Amen."
And then I was able to put my Bible down, turn out my light and rest. This journey I am on sometimes seems long and tedious, but oh to have the Lord in control makes it worth it all!
Thursday, July 23, 2009
School
Okay, so I know I wrote that we were officially starting school a few weeks ago but...that didn't happen. :)
We started this week--on Tuesday. Our first day of school was spent at the zoo, enjoying the animals and having Eileen lead us around the zoo with a map. (One of her activites was to find her way on a map.) When we came home, she made cookies as part of her life skills. :)
Yesterday we had a gentle bookwork day with things and today was full swing ahead. (Sort of.) We went to the library to do school but the parking lot was so very crowded. It finally dawned on me that today was the Summer Reading Party and we were right on time! We went there instead and had a blast with a clown who did tricks, told a story and made balloon animals for everyone there. She was really very good. We went to a bait shop in Monroe and bought some worms for an experiment since we haven't found any in the yard in weeks. (No rain--although it is, of course, currently raining.)
Our experiment is one where we have different colored layers of soil and we put worms in there to discover what their niche (or job/role they have) is in the world. Craig wouldn't touch the worms so Merrick and I had to do it cause Eileen didn't want to either! So I am excited to be taking picture over the next few days to see how they will mix the soil.
The rest of our school day consisted of learning introduction things to world geography. We have a cute song to learn the continents as we point to them and all 3 of the kids are enjoying that. Eileen has labeled (with my help) a world map with a few different things and has really enjoyed "teaching" me and anyone else who'll listen about all the different things she learned. How fun!! Of course, our memory verse this week is John 3:16.
So, school has been successful today and FUN!! Finally, Eileen is enjoying herself in school. I pray it continues.
We started this week--on Tuesday. Our first day of school was spent at the zoo, enjoying the animals and having Eileen lead us around the zoo with a map. (One of her activites was to find her way on a map.) When we came home, she made cookies as part of her life skills. :)
Yesterday we had a gentle bookwork day with things and today was full swing ahead. (Sort of.) We went to the library to do school but the parking lot was so very crowded. It finally dawned on me that today was the Summer Reading Party and we were right on time! We went there instead and had a blast with a clown who did tricks, told a story and made balloon animals for everyone there. She was really very good. We went to a bait shop in Monroe and bought some worms for an experiment since we haven't found any in the yard in weeks. (No rain--although it is, of course, currently raining.)
Our experiment is one where we have different colored layers of soil and we put worms in there to discover what their niche (or job/role they have) is in the world. Craig wouldn't touch the worms so Merrick and I had to do it cause Eileen didn't want to either! So I am excited to be taking picture over the next few days to see how they will mix the soil.
The rest of our school day consisted of learning introduction things to world geography. We have a cute song to learn the continents as we point to them and all 3 of the kids are enjoying that. Eileen has labeled (with my help) a world map with a few different things and has really enjoyed "teaching" me and anyone else who'll listen about all the different things she learned. How fun!! Of course, our memory verse this week is John 3:16.
So, school has been successful today and FUN!! Finally, Eileen is enjoying herself in school. I pray it continues.
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