Honestly

I have to be honest here. 2007 was a really tough year. This month is starting off on the difficult side too. It's hard to have SO MANY DIFFICULTIES swirling around our family. I guess I am trying to write about how I feel about all these difficulties without going into too great detail. That's a hard thing to do. Especially if the goal is to have people understand what in the world you are typing about not sound like a loon. Well, I have resolved myself to the idea of sounding like a loon. I just need to vent. This is a strange forum for that, but hey I am a strange person!

I've written before about being in need this past year. I have been able to see the blessings of being in such a position but sometimes I struggle. It's plain HARD. When we committed to place our whole family on the alter for the Lord's service back at the leadership commitment event at Palm Valley we really had not a clue what that meant. Only now are we beginning to catch glimpses of how all encompassing that commitment really was.

Yesterday, I was on the phone with my mom, unloading all my heart's concerns and asking her for more prayer I found these words coming out of my mouth; " It just gets hard. It's like every area of our life is under serious overhaul. We have SO MANY things going on." I was thinking of all the areas in our lives where we are absolutely in a position of utter need and we have no choice but to rely on the Lord for our provision or it aint gonna happen for us! While we sometimes grow weary of being in that position I have a gut feeling that years from now we will look back and see that this season produced a gigantic amount of spiritual growth in our lives. Sometimes, Dustin and I wonder if the Lord isn't calling us to spend the rest of our lives here on earth in such a position. To be totally honest that freaks me out a whole lot! It's HARD work to surrender myself to the Lord's care daily. To honestly not try to cling to the delusion of control of my own life. To live on the brink. To live by faith. IT takes lots of work. LOTS OF YIELDING TO THE HOLY SPIRIT.

To be completely honest once more, I can think of many, many, MANY days where I have failed to do that. I have been a grumbly little desert wanderer. I have an entire runway behind me lit up with God's faithfulness and provision for me and our family yet many days I wake up feeling sorry for myself over the fact that each day God only chooses to only light up enough of the day's runway for me to finish out the day. No more, no less. Really, I haven't often been happy about that.

To give myself a little grace I have to say that Dustin and i have faced down some seriously stressful situations lately and by God's grace we have been able to act faithfully. It may take us travelling the LONG way to get there, but the Lord always brings us to the place where we surrender for His glory.

That is where I am at today. We have huge burdens pressing upon our hearts this week. SO MANY LOOSE ENDS. We wonder about our future and what's going to happen. How will things play out. At this point we just feel the need to KNOW, we don't necessarily care how things turn out. It seems there is some kind of oppression here in the waiting place. Not that God is oppressing us, but that the enemy is trying desperately to steal anything and everything he can get from us in our weakness during the wait.

It is so appropriate for us to be studying Abraham and Sarah during this time. Talk about a LIFETIME of waiting on the Lord!!!! I can't fathom!! Nor, can I really honestly say I'd want to share in some of that (...but that's just my fleshy faithlessness talking... I can't give way to that!!) thankfully the Patriarchs study I did last year with all my precious sister is still very fresh in my mind and is wonderful to draw from while I read the text once more.

Who would have ever though that this is where Dustin and I would be?

Back to the phone conversation with my mommy. As soon as the words came out of my mouth about how all encompassing life change seems to be for us lately, the Holy Spirit confirmed in me that I ought not to wonder at this. It's as if he reminded me that placing oneself completely on the alter means that God will completely accept that offering and do what He will with it.

This is just the LORD doing what the LORD does. That ought to make me rejoice. And so that's what I will do during this wait. Rejoice in the Lord and continue to wait on Him.