a new one…

There is soon to be some growth in our family. Today I am 15 weeks pregnant with our first child! We are so thrilled. God has truly blessed us! Up until now, it has been hard for me to think about bringing a child into the world and all of the responsibilities that come with a new life. But I know that this time before the baby arrives is the time that God allows for us to prepare ourselves (as much as we can anyways).

I got the idea from some old friends of mine to blog to the new baby. They would blog prayers for their coming bundle, tell some cute stories about the pregnancy, keep all the family updated, and now that their precious baby boy has arrived, they can put up pictures of him and tell stories. I thought it was a great idea…mostly because after reading their blog this morning, I realized that I should be praying for and realizing the gravity of the situation that my husband and I find ourselves in…..bringing a new life into this world for God’s glory. It has a whole new weight this morning!

Please pray with us as we enter this new and exciting time in life. Pray that our new baby would grow to know God in a personal way. Pray that we will be godly parents and examples.

You can check out the baby’s blog at http://www.littlefarley.wordpress.com.

taxes

Well, I went to my grandmother’s house on April 15th, just a few days ago. First of all, you must know that my grandmother is legally blind. She has a condition called macular degeneration, in which case, basically, she has lost her central vision completely and only sees through her peripheral (and even the peripheral is very poor). Although she will tell you within the first 3 minutes that she meets you that she is indeed blind, you almost wouldn’t know it. She is very ambitious and loves to surprise her family by doing things your typical blind grandmother may not even attempt. She also is the type who prides herself on finding a great bargain. She would buy something that she might need or want one day just because “it was only $2!” Anyways, that is just a little bit of background on my grandmother, just to let you know a little bit of who we are dealing with!

So, I head over to her house that Tuesday morning because she has convinced me that I need some plants in my tiny little yard (Among other things she is an avid gardener. I mean, this woman knows her stuff!). So I walk in her house, in my ‘playin’ in the dirt’ clothes, and the first words out of her mouth are, “would you do my taxes?”

I literally froze in my skin. I thought maybe I’d heard her wrong. “What?” I asked. “would you do my taxes?” Nope, I’d heard her right! I said, “I don’t know the first thing about taxes!” I would always just hand the little papers that my employer send me to my dad whenever he asked for them. I literally know nothing about it! And they had to get in the mail on that day! April 15th! Well, she explained to me that Rebecca (her daughter, my aunt – she and I are relatively close in age) had got online the night before and did her taxes herself…and for FREE. Well, when I heard the word ‘free’ come out of her mouth, I knew there was no convincing her away from the idea. And if Rebecca did it all herself, I supposed that I could give it a whirl. So, we sat down in front of the computer. Me with my sweaty palms and pounding heart, and she with three little social security income papers. I was so nervous!

Well, we went to irs.gov, and found our way around to the TurboTax site. Still I am so nervous, so my grandmother decides that we will call my aunt since she did this the night before. Well, with Aunt Bec on the phone, my nerves calmed a little, and we proceeded through the process. And to my surprise, it was actually quite painless! TurboTax literally walked me through every single step, and we answered its questions and checked the boxes that applied to us, and it printed out our tax return. Wow!

Now, in a few months, once we get word that everything was in order, and the IRS isn’t coming to take my grandmother away, I’m definitely planning to give my kudos to TurboTax.com. It really was very simple. And I’m sure there are people out there who have had a bad experience with it or think its terrible, but to me, TurboTax was my lifesaver that day! And I owe a lot to them!

So….thank you TurboTax! You have not only kept my grandmother out of jail, but you have renewed my sense of self confidence!

a weekend away

This weekend, I got to go with some of the girls in our youth group to a cabin on Lake Allatoona for a sleepover! It was such a blast! Getting away from it all was so refreshing for me. I don’t get to be in the middle of nature so much anymore, so being on the lake in the woods was so uplifting. I see God’s hand so clearly in nature…it reminds me how beautiful He is, and how great He must be! It was a sweet time for me personally, on top of all of the craziness of the sleepover games and snacks and what-not, to have some quiet time in my own self and be reminded of how amazing God is.

That being said, following you will find some thoughts that I shared with the youth group on our daily devotional page. (A page you should check out…… dailydirection.wordpress.com)

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I just wanted to point something out to those of you who were there this weekend (and to those of you who weren’t)….kind of an add on to what we talked about Saturday morning keeping in mind what Bro. Aaron has been showing us in this series. Remember we read Psalm 139 for our Quiet Time. And what did that show us? God knows us, He knew who we were before we were born. He is always where we are…there is no where we can go to get away from Him! He is everywhere.

Do you know what that says to me? …… He is available!

He is always right there for you to turn to. All of this that Bro. Aaron has been teaching us, its revealing to us how we can walk closer to God Almighty. And the responsibility for closeness of that walk falls on us, the believer. There is nothing else that is left for God to do – He has done all He can to make Himself available to us! He sent Christ to make the way for us to have access to Him. Now we can come boldly to Him! He has given us that ability through the power of the Holy Spirit. He has given us prayer so we can talk with Him. He’s given us His word that we can hear Him talk to us. He has extended out His hand to us and made the way for fellowship! Its ours for the taking!

Now it falls on us…..We must make the decision. Do I walk with the Almighty, following His way? or do I choose to chase my own selfish desires? Its a choice we make everyday….even ignoring the choice, we opt to go our own way. He has already given us the power to live the Christian life – we just have to RECKON that to be true in our lives! ‘How do I do that?’ you ask. Just keep reminding your self of these verses that tell us that our flesh has been crucified and that we now have Christ’s life! Claim that to be true for yourself, in your own personal life! Then all that’s left is to yield – stop trying to make things happen, but to just sit back and let the Spirit live it through us!

Its my prayer to see a group of young people get a hold of these truths early in their life. To see them walking with God, and yielding to His Spirit daily, allowing Him to do mighty works through you all! It’s there for the taking….. now, its up to you!

I’m hungry…

A few years back, the Lord provided me with some unforgettable opportunities to spend time abroad. I spent about 7 months living and studying in Arequipa, Peru and periodically traveling to some other areas of South America. Now, I don’t say all of that to brag and to let you know what an extensive world traveler I am (if only you knew the trips my father has taken….what I’ve experienced is nothing!), I merely wanted to set up some background for a thought I had this morning.

While this was an amazing experience, and I would never trade it for anything, much of my time spent abroad I was physically miserable. I was constantly tired, usually sick to my stomach, and almost everyday feeling weak. I mysteriously gained weight. Took several trips to local doctors. A couple of times ended up bed ridden. From time to time I was up throughout the night either vomiting or struggling with diarrhea or both. Physically I was beat. Why? Well, I wish I could have realized at the time that it was the food and the water that I was putting into my body. Although it was filtered, my body was not used to the Peruvian water. The food we ate was not food I was used to – it was grown and produced in an entirely different part of the world, prepared in a different way and using different ingredients. After months and months of putting this fuel into my body, I guess I couldn’t take it.

And this morning, the Lord drew a parallel in my mind between that experience and my spiritual life. Why do I feel so weak in my walk with the Lord at times? How can I seem to be so distant from Him and out of the reach of His healing hands? It’s because I’m using the wrong fuel. Those times in my life where I’m depressed or I can see that I’m producing no spiritual fruit….when I stop and evaluate it, EVERY TIME I see that there some point that I slipped in my devotions. That time that I spend before God in His WORD. My time seems to be taken with shopping for our home, or watching tv, or spending time on the internet, or focusing on my own self and what I want – no time was given to the Lord that day. No time was spent feeding my soul and my spirit with His precious Word – His direction and comfort and encouragement to His people. Instead I was feeding myself with the things of this world – substance that is foreign to a redeemed child of God. Its not what we were meant to survive on. It makes us weak and sickly, and most times it leaves us unable to function as a true CHRISTian.

Instead of feeding on junk today, feed on the sweet Word of the Lord. I know I sure am hungry for His presence this morning.

He wants to reveal Himself to us! It just takes us turning to His word -

For He satisfieth the longing soul, and filleth the hungry soul with goodness! (Ps. 107:9)

is that a rat in your granola?

Where do I even begin this story??

The other day, I noticed a few little “surprises” in my pantry that I knew should not have been there. I began to move things around on the shelf where I’d found these small “droppings”, and noticed the bag that holds my favorite candies had been nibbled through and the little sprinkles from the candy had spilled out of the bag onto the shelf. Hmm….as I stood there, putting two and two together, I realized….we’ve got a RAT!

Disgusted, I cleaned up the mess, and informed my husband of our infestation! He, like the wonderful protector he is, set out a couple of traps (the really sticky kind) to catch the creature – one on the shelf, and one on the floor just below the shelf. I decided they needed some persuasion to venture onto the traps, so I sprinkled some homemade granola on the one sitting on the floor. That should do it. I thought

Earlier in the week, our boys’ basketball team had won the regional finals, so they were planning on heading for the state competition in Athens this weekend! Go Eagles! Well, my husband was asked to go along to help chaperon the guys. He agreed to help out, and informed me that he’d be gone this weekend. Well, of course, the first thing that entered my mind was….What about the RAT?!?

Despite my concerns about facing the rat, Aaron thought it best that he go and help the guys out (and I agreed, although selfishly in the back of my mind, disagreed) So, my sweet little sister offered to spend the night with me the first night he was gone. I told her about the rat traps in the pantry, and we prayed that we wouldn’t catch the rat while Aaron was out of town! Well, the Lord works in mysterious ways….apparently, He thought it was best that I have to deal with the rat. I guess He figured I should overcome my silly fears and learn to be a true “keeper” of my home!

We woke up Friday morning, and as Rachel was getting ready and packing up her things, I proceeded downstairs to make us some breakfast. (This is where the story gets good!) My eyes were still a little sensitive to the light, so I decided I would leave it off for a while. I entered the kitchen, passing right by our pantry door…not even thinking about the rat traps….until… I heard a faint squeaking coming from behind me. And then I remembered! I turned around to see a dark shadow on the floor right outside the pantry door! Before I knew it, I was screaming, “AAHHH! AAHHH! AAHHH!”…still in the dark….cornered in my own kitchen!

My sister came running to the top of the stairs from the bedroom, “What is going on?!?” she asked, confused.

“WE GOT THE RAT!!” I screamed, as the rat continued to cry for help, stuck on the trap in the midst of the granola.

I finally mustered up enough courage to leap over the trap to get out of my kitchen and ran upstairs to my sister, who was in shock.

“What do we do?” I asked. She looked at me blankly, and I searched for my phone to call Aaron. He began to instruct me to get some pliers and a trash bag and to just pick it up and throw it away. Yeah right! I thought. “It’s still alive,” I told him. “It’s screaming at me!” So he says, “Once you get it in the bag, you can just hit it with a shovel to kill it. Aim for its neck!” Ha!
Well, I got off the phone and looked at the clock. Rachel needed to leave in 10 minutes, so we didn’t have much time! I went into the garage and grabbed the pliers, and I got the trashcan from underneath the sink. The rat is still screaming its little head off, trying desperately to get off of the trap! I got behind the rat so it couldn’t see me, and Rachel went out to the garage to get the shovel.

I took a deep breath, and slowly inched toward the edge of the trap. I grabbed hold with the pliers and quickly, but very cautiously, picked it up and placed it in the trashcan. I took the bag out of the can, and met Rachel outside where she was ready to “whack” it…literally!

“I get to do the fun part!” she exclaimed. And I thought, I’m glad she wants to because there’s no way I could hit this thing!

She got in her rat whacking stance, and brought the shovel down one swift time. “Did I get it?” she asked.
“I’m not lookin’!” I said. “Just hit it one more time to be safe.”

She did, and we threw the bag into the outside trashcan! We came back in, looked at each other, and began cracking up laughing! My heart was still pounding as I said, “You better finish getting ready so you’re not late!” The I let out a deep sigh. I felt, although still a little weak in the knees, as though I now knew what it meant to be a keeper at home! I was those hands that helped protect (even though Rachel did the killing…I still got it out of our house). I honestly didn’t think I had it in me. I mean, I realize it was just a small rat, but still….now I know that I can do more than my mind tells me I can. I can be the keeper, those hands that guard and make a safe home for our family! I thank the Lord for that crazy morning! I didn’t think I could handle it, but He knew what He was doing! May I be a wife and mother, a keeper, that God would be pleased with! May He receive glory because of our family!

a fresh love

Last night, we had our youth meeting in the Fridge followed by our discipleship groups, as usual. Nothing really different or out of the ordinary….or so it seemed. For some reason last night, in my time with those three girls, the Lord just filled my heart with a fresh love for them. A true desire to see God move in their lives and become so real to them that they could only crave Him more. I could see the desire in their hearts to know God and to please Him with their lives. And I could relate to them, struggling to do so. So many times I want to want to serve God. I want to want to do what would please Him, but for some reason I keep letting other things take His place. In me, that is in my flesh, dwelleth no good thing! And they were getting that last night. Realizing that they NEEDED the LORD!! I was so renewed with a passion to help them find Him! And to start helping them by finding Him myself! I had such a beautiful time with the Lord this morning….and then throughout the day! Like I haven’t had in quite some time! I’ve prayed for those three girls all day long…that God would draw them to Himself, that they’d be safe from temptation, that He give them a desire and passion for His word! And in return…I feel Him drawing me to Himself, helping me avoid temptation, and giving me a desire to know His word and seek His face! What an amazing thing! What an indescribable God that makes things this way! I’m so thankful for those girls!! I can’t wait to see what the Lord has in store for EACH and EVERY one of them!!

new year’s resolutions……

I never really got into the fad of making resolutions for the coming year. I guess I always thought that people just made them up so they would have something to talk about at the new year, and that they didn’t really mean them. I had no desire to participate in this trend simply because society told me I should, so I always skipped out.

This year, however, as the Christmas season ended and the New Year rolled around, I felt the need to examine myself. I realized that I was probably lacking in a few areas that could probably use some attention. I decided that if I was going to participate in this tradition, that I would only pick one resolution and focus on improving myself in that specific area for the year. It would be something that would really help me to better myself overall. Since that time, I have officially counted nine significant bad habits that I would like to correct. NINE! And that doesn’t even count all of the little things like taking better care of our dog or finally painting our bedroom. We are talking significant flaws in the way I have been living my life. I have been so depressed the past couple of days. I hardly know where to begin to remedy all of these issues that have been brought to my attention. Its been quite overwhelming.

My mother suggested that I come up with 365 separate resolutions and merely do one each day. Her suggestion made me smile. Somehow she always knows how to do that.

But, despite my sweet mother’s attempts to cheer me up, the fact remains that I have so much work ahead of me in life. Will I ever become the person God wants me to be? I fall so short so much of the time. Its rather defeating to think about it. In all time I’ve been here on this earth so far, I still don’t have a very good grasp on life. I feel so small. So weak. So worn out. I think I’ve missed the point of setting the resolution…..

a glorious body

Well, lately I have really been struggling to keep my body under subjection as the example set by Paul in 1 Corinthians. And I get so frustrated with myself because is it so elementary….one of the basic disciplines of life….and I still struggle with it immensely to this day. Why is that? How is it that I still cannot have a disciplined life? How do I fall to the same temptations nearly every time?

And then, looking back at my track record, I wonder – will I EVER conquer this? It doesn’t seem likely.

But then, yesterday as I was reading – desperate for a filling of the Holy Spirit in my life – He showed me this:

In Philippians 3, Paul explains to us that he doesn’t let the past bog him down. But forgetting those things which are behind, he presses toward the mark or the goal. What mark? The prize of the high calling of God in Christ! Wow….quite the mark! He then instructs us to have this same mind. Not focusing on the weight that holds us down, but keeping our eyes on the One who has apprehended us – the One who is so great in majesty that He has captured our attention and our being.

And I thought to myself, “isn’t that a beautiful thought,” in partial disbelief that I could ever reach this place in my life. But then, as I continued to read, the final verse in this chapter caught my eye! It was as if the Holy Spirit Himself was standing right there with me, reading it aloud and giving me some understanding – showing me how it applied to my situation at that time! I was in such awe!

“Who [Christ] shall change our vile body, that it may be fashioned like unto his glorious body, according to the working whereby he is able even to subdue all things unto himself.”

Now, probably Paul is talking about once we get to heaven (since he mentions heaven in the verse above)…I don’t really know. But this is how I saw it apply to me that day when I was so down on myself and felt rather hopeless: first of all, I have a vile body! There is nothing good in me, that is in my flesh. And the thing is, I cannot change it on my own. I have been trying all this time in my own power to make myself “a better person”. When really, not only should it be done in His power, and His working through me, but the purpose should not be just so I can be a better person – having discipline and self control. But that Christ be glorified…in the vile body that He has changed into a glorious body (one that brings Him glory). Because He is the only One that is able to do so…..”whereby he is able to subdue all things unto himself.”

All things! That’s my God! And He chose to make a way for me to have fellowship with Him! I’m just blown away this morning! He is a merciful and gracious God! He is Almighty, yet comes to where I am, and molds me into something that can fulfill His purpose. What a humbling thought!

Hello world!

So, its official….I have a blog. I’m not really sure what I am doing, or how to do all of this, but my husband convinced me to dive right in. So, I did!

The content of this blog will probably just be some crazy stuff that happens in my life, little things that God is showing me, and who knows what else. It should prove to be an interesting experience for me. We’ll see what happens…..