A Little Taste

I am getting my favorite meal in the oven to make ahead for my Mother in law who will have the Littles for a week.

I remember almost by heart the seasonings and measure them out in a bowl. I have run out of pepper and need to fill the shaker again. The words "POUR" stand out to me and I fill my teaspoon to running over because I am thinking.

And I remember, as I have always remembered since making the recipe for the very first time, not to add the full amount of Thyme that it calls for. I smile thinking that I have never had to write it down on the recipe, it has just been permanently written on my brain.

Half the Thyme.

I pop it in the oven and sit and think a bit more.

This afternoon I was just back from visitation and my eye caught sight of what seemed to me as a sea of daisies just waving in the sun.

I did what any normal sleep-deprived Momma would do. I walked through the prickers and thistles and bugs and began to pick them.

As I bent to snag the first beautiful bloom, the Lord brought this verse to mind:

 O taste and see that the Lord is good: 
    Psalm 34:8

And as I picked it just ran over and over and over in my head.

There are days when it is easier to praise the Lord than others.

Easier to notice His goodness.

Trace His smile on your life.

I was drawn to these daisies because I so longed to see some goodness. They are cheery and lovely and I had them right outside my doorstep when life was good, the kids were happy and the floors were dirty.

Is the devil so deceitful that he would bring these to my notice to spark some feeling of discontentment in me???

Youbetyourbottomdollar he is.

But God did not leave me comfortless.

"O taste and see" He would remind.

And I realized I was picking daisies left and right.

I was picking more than I had even meant to.

I was picking and picking and picking so many that one hand could hardly hold them all.

And I lifted my eyes to see yet so many more around me.

Waving at me their cheery blooms and God softly saying, "O taste and see.."

See that there are so many blessings to be had.

More than you can hold in your hand. In your heart.

I am good.

I am God.

I am your Provider, Father, Maker, Healer, Comforter.

Look around you.

This is just a taste.

Enough to wet your appetite for me.

My eldest girl sees me picking like there is no tomorrow and it makes my heart happy that she knows me and is not surprised that I am knee-deep in prickers and comes to see me.

She warns me that there is poison ivy where I am.

I shrug.

I've never been allergic to it, and she knows this.

She also knows  that she IS very allergic to it.

She comes in to be with me and we smile and my heart is overflowing that she knows the risk, yet she comes to pick with me anyway.

She comes for a taste. O that I may always be seeking the right things to show her where the blessings are.

Life is not easy. Thorns and prickers hit us all.

You may even know that you are stepping into something that will make your life miserable for a while.

But it is worth it for a taste.

On the way back to the van, the Lord brings in the rest of the verse that I had not yet thought upon.

  blessed is the man that trusteth in him.

Isn't that just like the Lord? To give you what you can handle, to bring your heart to the truth you are struggling with?

And my hand is overflowing with flowers and he tells me He can be trusted.

He can be trusted in the prickers and poison ivy.

It's a risk, but the taste reminds me that it is only the beginning of the Lord's goodness.

The daisies are still waving, reminding me that there are so many more yet to be picked.

After all, it's His church, His house, His possessions, His money, His children, His man.

If everything comes from Him, can He not  be trusted with them all??

I run to turn the oven on low. This dish is best when it simmers low all afternoon.

And I am seeing how funny it is that I am so concerned with too much Thyme, and in reality time is fleeting.

My youngest learned to ride a bike yesterday.

She didn't even ask us if she could.

If we were ready for some childhood time to be taken away.

Are we ever ready?

And I want half the Thyme, but all the time I can get to learn, to lean on Him and to trust Him for what is His already.

Vases come out and the youngest gets pollen on her lips and nose from too much smelling of this goodness.

She hands them to me and I cut them to size and we distribute them in vases of various colors and sizes.

Blessings come to us in so many colors and sizes, don't they?

And she holds a bundle and tells me that they are a family.

I could have squeezed the stuffing out of her right then.

We ARE a family.

My family needs to know that God can be trusted.

They need a taste of His goodness.

We scatter vases and the oven fills the house with a delish aroma.

Just another day of learning, of leaning hard into Him.

Because He can be trusted.

*Pictures forth coming. They are too sweet not to share.

Footprints on my heart

I'm sucked into the vortex named Pinterest and see a cute Father's Day idea.

Socks with paint footprints on them filled with lovely things to deodorize Dad's shoes.

I smile.

I smile first, because my dear husband's feet do not stink. No kidding. They are boats with toes on the tops and they for real don't stink.

I think it's a cute and well thought idea anyway.

Who wouldn't love to see the teeny footprints of their littles on some stuffed socks falling out of their shoes in the morning?

My Pinterest staycation is ended with dishes that someone forgot to gather in the rush to complete their chore for the night.

Sigh.

I gather cups and forks and grumble.

It's amazing how I can gather Father's Day ideas one minute and want to put someone to bed three hours early the next.

Motherhood is surprising like that.

You can smile and accept yet another wildflower offering in the mid-morning and grumble that there are no clean glasses left at the end of the day.

Almost like you need a deodorizer for your spirit.

Walking though life with littles is wonderful.

It is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to show a glimpse of God's character in these little years when kind words heal and soft hugs turn little girls into spaghetti in your arms.

It is a cotton candy, rainbow, marshmallow fluff kind of feeling at times.

These times are usually before you remember how much laundry has rolled-over from yesterday.

And while showing someone who the Creator of the universe is to them is amazing, we too are just flesh and bone created by the very same one we are pointing little eyes to.

We fail, we disappoint, we hurry and speak harshly and forget and remember wrongs.

We are not God.

We are his creation.

We are learning right along with the little ones in the little years.

And just as they are learning to jump into our arms and lay their head down and rest, so are we learning to jump and rest.

Last night I walked home from church through a sureal pasture of dandelions going to seed. The sun was almost set and white seeds were launching out with each step towards home.

I put one foot in front of the other and thanked God for the ability to do so. Little did I know that once home, I would be summoned to view a gash in a little's head and comfort him after a staple kept it closed. I looked at his little hospital band and thought that this is what memories are made of.

Jumping, resting, remembering that God is holding it altogether without my help.

Then one bites through her tongue on both sides. I should have spent more time wondering how to stop bleeding than trying to figure out how you do such a thing to YOURSELF while singing.

And back I go to the dishes. Joel and I sigh at eachother.

I am too tired to give everyone a bath again tonight so we wash only what dirt is viewable.

Hands, face, arms, and then it dawns on me that I am forgetting black little feet.

After setting a dish to soak I set a little on the counter to wash their feet, yes, in the kitchen sink.

Before I could warn they set their arm up to their elbow into the greasy dish.

This is too much.

I scold. I set them down to run to get changed, and I have changed.

Surely somewhere in the Cosmos it is justifiable to scold for sticking your arm in greasy water, but I know that I have hurt those I am supposed to be showing how to rest.

They come back, I lean down and catch tears on my arm. I swoop them up and kiss tears away.

I was wrong.

I ask for forgiveness and begin again.

I run the water just warm enough for little black stinky feet and lather up the soap.

"Look Mama! The soap is shaped like a heart!!"

Bright dark eyes still wet look at me as if we have unearthed a treasure that has been waiting on us for hundreds of years.

I roll the soap in my hand, around and around, and around while they just giggle at the thought.

A heart.

That's what we Mama's do. We show the heart of God by using our own.

Sometimes it's dirty and smelly and sticky and rough, but we do it because it's our job. And when the coffee is poured and the last light turned out, we remember that we love it, this job of ours.

And each toe is clean and they lean into me and tell me that they "Love when you wash my feet."

And you think of the disciples who wanted nothing to do with the Lord touching their toes.

All dirty and smelly,

And yet they could have no part of Him if they did not understand what it meant to be a servant.

I dry feet carefully and wonder how the Holy Spirit can teach me so much in a moment's time. As if everything stood still and nothing was more important than dirt between toes.

That's just how He is.

Knowing where to meet us, knowing when we would jump and when we would lean hard into Him.

The days of Motherhood are long.

Though the years are short.

May I learn more of Him to teach Him to them.

The love of God and white shoes

I am spending today typing out a bit of my story and studying about the Love of God.

It's so vast it's hard to know where to begin.

So, I just unravel my own story and look for His hand in my own life and relearn some lessons about who He really is.

I didn't come from a "Lovey" "Touchy" "Feely" type of home. I remember vividly wanting to "Feel loved," and did things to try to get that feeling. The only way I can describe my home was that we all just did our own thing.

I wanted to make my parents proud and to me in that measuring up I would feel loved and complete and life would be grand.

But that's not how things worked out for me. That's just not my story.

My parents were busy trying to provide for us, and trying to be the best parents they knew how to be. They both grew up with a parent who was distant or whom didn't actively "Show" them love and so they learned that you just "know" your loved and that's good enough. We didn't even tell each other that we loved each other.

It's not bad, it's just doing what we know, and living-out how you are raised. It really hasn't been until this year watching my oldest girl slowly becoming a teen that I have realized how hard it must have been for my Mom to not have a doting Mother herself.

I really felt that if I was  good enough that I would feel loved, wanted, adored, needed and everything else a kid wants to feel.

And so, I looked at God this way.

I work, and it is understood that He just loves.

I remember going off to college and feeling so alone. I don't think I have ever felt so alone as I did that first year away from all I knew.

My room mates were dear gals and I think I was hugged more by my room mates in that first year than all of my years growing up.

One of my room mates had parents that loved to visit and bring treats. They lived a good distance away, but it seemed like nothing to them to stop in to see her. They would come and take her out and spoil her a bit and it was fun to watch.  One particular visit it was close to Easter and they were taking her out to get her an Easter outfit.

We didn't say much, as I had much to do that day, but I do remember feeling lonely and ready for my first hard freshman year to be over.  I was feeling so unloved.

You can imagine my surprise when I came back to my room after they had left to find a box for me. I was wide-eyed and remember thinking what I could have done for this family for them to want to gift me with anything. It was a shoe box with bright white pumps in it. I couldn't remember the last time I had had new shoes for  Easter. Just remembering how I felt then brings tears to my eyes now, some many years later.

I remember feeling so loved. And embarrassed that I had not done anything to earn that love. I had hardly said two words to them on their visit. It was such a reminder of who God was to me. I was beginning to understand that God did not love me because of what I did for him or didn't do. He loved me simply because He created me and delights in me.

Standing in my room with my shoes in my hands I felt like the earth was tiny and that God did indeed see me and knew how lonely I truly was. I felt in awe that God would prompt someone who barely knew me to meet a need for me and to even find out my shoe size. They didn't just love on me. They loved on me in a very specific way, individual to only me. And that is how God loves us.

This was just the beginning of understanding God's vast love for me.

I wore those shoes until they fell apart.


These shoes started me off on a journey of realizing that I will never need to be "good enough" to warrant God's love. It is freely given.

A hair-splitting discovery.

Has it REEEELLLY almost been two whole months since I've posted, friends??

tsk tsk (slapping wrist)


So much to tell.  Let's just sum up that time by saying that the Holidays, really trying to enjoy the mystery of Christ coming for even me, Celebrating with family, Sending family far far away to the Mission field and four solid weeks of chicken pox has kept me busy.

Now if that doesn't beg for a pardon on my behalf, I am sunk.

In other news, I have had two very influential things happen to me this week and that brings me back to you all for a catch-up and a heart sketching.

One was the phone call that will not soon be forgotten, in which, a certain gal that will remain nameless, spoke life into these dry bones. Dry writing fingers to be exact.

She just spoke truth and love into me and just got me out of that spot that we all get into from time to time. Not going forward, not retreating, just.plain.stuck.

I think we each have a hand full of people who's words are worth their weight in gold to us. Everyone has an opinion, but this hand full, they mean something to us. If they are cross, we feel it deeply, if they are sure of something, we are sure of it, just from their enthusiasm.

This someone whom I adore, had no idea that their call would reach through the phone and give me that push that I needed for some time, followed by truth in who God has made me to be that enveloped me as a great, enormous hug does when you are down in the dumps. Sometimes you really can feel the blue leaving your body when someone dear to you loves on you in that way.

The way they did for me.

And sometimes it is easier to allow something to really stick and sink down into you when you aren't face to face, reading every eye movement, every glance, every smile. You can just stare out the window and let it take root in your heart, and not be embarrassed when they see it move you.

Have you been there, friend??

And so here I am, back anew to share that God is amazing and each of us are uniquely qualified to bring Him an amazing source of joy. I cannot bring Him glory just like you can. You are unique to Him. And this uniqueness was never more understood to me than today.

You see, I got a hair cut.

I had that "I HAVE to do something with this" feeling about my hair that can come upon us females as a craving for an expectant mother. One that will stop you dead in your tracks and make you head over to the computer to indeed see if your checking account can aid you in your mission.

One that will prompt you to ask a friend to drive you over a coupon saving you yet a few dollars more, totally sealing the deal for you. You know what you need to do. Lunch can wait, dishes can wait, make-up can NOT wait and at last you are bounded for that corner place and in your head you are just praying that your Stylist has most of her teeth and only one tattoo.

I was in luck.  A full set, and not-a-one.

I gave her the, "I think it would look nice a certain way, but have no idea how to explain that in stylish terms" smile.

She seemed to understand.

A year or so ago when I was in the same predicament, I asked the same question that our husband's love, "How do you want me to do my hair." And this particular day the response was precise and freeing.

He liked it short.

Well Hallelujah for that.                                                    

Thus began my search for something that was "me." This led to one evening of me on the phone with a friend who was helping me get ready for a huge event that would have me and the family reuniting with college friends after 14 years. No pressure. Not an ounce. Ok a LOT of pressure. Ok, lots of phone counseling.

This friend finally basically dared me to wear my hair with my bangs pinned to the side. Yeah, full-forehead.

I know, I was shocked too. I called it "Shock and Awe." As in, "I know your are shocked, and Awe, why did you have to dare me to do this! "And something amazing happened, It was freeing. It was me. It was what my husband liked and I finally was free of them. The... bangs I mean.

Now back to the salon...

This sweet gal has never worked faster or harder for twelve fifty. Hey, I had a coupon! I won't even mention that she didn't even wash my hair. This was diff-er-ent. She listened to me him and haw about what I thought would look nice and got that look in her eye that made me think she knew what I was rambling about. Either that or she was regretting the fact that I had used the coupon after all. THIS is why you WAIT to say you are using a coupon. When will a tightwad like me ever learn?????

She trimmed, and I would stop here and there to locate my glasses and check things out. Yes, I felt like an old lady. But without them I just saw what seemed to me like the outline of a chia pet. So, old lady or not, I hunted for them.

 In no time flat I was headed out the door. And it was there that the feeling grabbed a hold of me. You know the one where everything is in slow motion and you feel like Esau did when he gave away his birthright? The one where each passerby seems to KNOW that you decided on not paying the extra three dollars for a blow-dry and style???!

I had some errands to run before heading home for dinner and while out, my hair began to sporadically dry in different sections. Maybe I should say, "fluff" in different sections....

I caught a glimpse of it in the frozen food isle glass and wondered where on earth I was going to have to hide for two or three months!

Ok, ok, it wasn't THAT bad, but you know that feeling, right???

At dinner my husband didn't even notice! This is good or bad. Good that it doesn't look as crazy  different as you had previously felt, or bad because he has lost almost all of his peripheral vision.

I chose the former.

Once he does see it, he likes it. Scratch that, he loves it. Yes, he really said that. Those words just leaped out of his mouth.

It is at this very moment that you begin to take a tally on one hand of those tried and true friends who will stick with you. The rest you feel you can avoid to some extent... and you surely can avoid a facebook picture for a month or....seven...?


Then, while I was doing absolutely nothing today,  the thought occurred to me that I had never even decided if I liked my hair! I was too busy worrying about what everyone else would think that I had thrown my own thoughts about it out the window! And you know what??

I like it! Scratch that, I love it. I LOVE MY HAIR! I may even get myself a bumper sticker and spread the message that self-loathing is for the birds. Something, we women, made in GOD'S image should throw to the curb. Enough with that! Be uniquely YOU!

I love my hair because it is fun.

I love my hair because it is something I would probably never do unless I was on a deserted island and was able to change my appearance without anyone around. You know, like finally grow your eyebrows out.... you've never thought of that???? Ok, just forget you ever read that, will you?

I love my hair because it's me. It's unique and that's just dandy.

I love my hair because my husband fancies it.

I just love.my.hair.

And I am determined to keep on loving it, any way I grow it, cut it, or style it. A bad hair day has been replaced with a "uniquely created" day!

A few days pass and I was listening to someone online speak truth again to this heart of mine. She was reminding me how God loves us because we are his. He doesn't love us because of what we have to offer him, or what we will become. He loves us because we are HIS.  Two truths sent right from God to this heart of mine in one week. I am grateful and blessed! I soak it all in. Friend, you are uniquely created in God's image. I am created in God's image and can bring him glory and joy. And I tend to think that He loves my forehead.

You are loved, and you are so so lovely, friend.

Do you know that?

I mean REALLY know that?

It might just be time for a trim......

A little "humbug" for Mom's

Here's a list of things I have done and left undone to get you to that stack of papers that need desperately to be graded, that sink full of dishes, or that laundry pile.....

With a crazy smile on your face.

1. I have worn my husband's pajama bottoms under my clothes for too many days to count. And I have worn them so long that I am actually believing that black plaid goes with everything.

2. I have eaten a whole container of cookies that were designated for some Little's stocking. Here's the long and short of it: I thought they were in the bag in the closet. They fell out. Technically they were unclaimed by a child until taken out of said stocking. I ate them. They were delicious. I will find a replacement.

3. I have picked presents out for myself this year. And even thanked the customer service folk a mite too much for shipping me my gift asap.

4. I have wrapped an item from Goodwill for someone I love. It's in great condition and it was less than a dollar.

5. I forgot I had a gift for one of the crew under my bed. It may have been there since we moved. A lovely surprise.

6. I've thrown a snowball out the window at my husband after coaxing him to look closer at the chimney for a supposed crack.

7. We were out of whites for two days. It wasn't pretty.

8. I have taught school so many days without doing my hair that when I did do my hair once in a week's time, the kids gathered around the bathroom door to find out what was up.

9. We have eaten celery as a snack like we are vegetarians lately. It was time to go shopping many moons ago.

10. Until the holiday rush is over, Cheez-its WILL stay on the nightstand. They are my new BFF.

Go friends, be free. Black plaid is the new "black."

Filled to the brim.......with HIM???

Hello all.

Hang on to your hats, this is gonna sound like a rant.

And I believe it is. It is time for it. It is for me, and perhaps you as well.


It all began a few years ago now. When I found a cool book club for ladies and followed each weekly reading and video. It was an amazing book. AMAZING. God used that book to really change my view of Christianity as a whole.

It was great, there was this emotional connection to these gals and I as we read it together. EVEN though they had read the book like, six months prior......ANNNND  prerecorded the videos, ANNNND never met me. Yeah. Like that.

I found blogs. I followed. I cried. I laughed.

And a year went on and I am at this place now where I have grown weary of following,

THEM.

Women love to be a part of something. Something big. They love big ladies meetings, BIG door prizes, Big lunches and even Big shopping sprees.

I get it. I am one.

There finally reaches a point where Bigger isn't better. Ok, unless you are talking about Mallow Cups. Just.cannot.get.enough.of.them

But besides them, bigger is not better. Sometimes, many times, smaller, quieter, unnoticed is better.

I found that this fantastic woman who writes, takes pictures with really expensive equipment, has narry a bad hair day, yeah, she loves God. That's great.

But she's also meeting her besties several weekends out of the year to just enjoy each other. Flying down south for private teas in gardens, just to know God. Travelling without Littles hither thither and yon eating delish food and hanging out with a whole bunch of other ladies for a week who pay to hear them just "share."

If I could gather twenty of my besties for a weekend every few months, I'd be writing the next bestseller too.

Catch my drift???

When I pop on twitter or instagram and see that no one is caring about the pic itself, but where they can find those boots, those skinny jeans and for Pete's sake that hair color, it just turns my lip up and reminds me that people are people.

Even people who love the Lord. Like, a LOT.

Women helping other women is important. Older women teaching, guiding, loving on the younger women is part of God's design.

But all to quickly, we can look to other women as some kind of Hollywood stars, place them on a pedestal that they themselves might not even want. They comment on OUR comment and we swoon.

Look, I've been there.

Approval from someone we admire is great.

But it's not necessary.

We've swapped it all for the Martha Stewart Christianity thing again.

Sigh.

Because of the spotlight and book promotions we have been drawn to that perfect woman and away from the lady down the street who is so unbelievably wise.

We have forgotten our Pastor's wife who loved us through our ugly cry over not being able to handle one more discipline problem.

We somehow think that the glam makes someone more wise, more adoring, more spiritual than that Mom of four behind us in church who will never see worldly promotion.

Her boots will never be coveted, Her hair color never matched with fervor, Her written words never poured over.

And that is a terrible shame.

Though I never make the NY Times list, my writing is still valuable, and so is yours. If God enables you to do something, do it with your might, though no one may ever know.

Buzz around people takes our eyes off of Him who has always been sufficient for our every need.

He knows our hearts better than a best selling writer.

He wants to meet with us more than hundreds of ladies at a conference.

He IS our BIG NAME speaker.

And you don't need tickets to see Him. You don't have to wait for a sale to nab his latest masterpiece of a book.

You can conform to Him all you desire and find real peace from Him who changes not.

So.

Click out of Twitter. Get your face out of facebook. Forget that book that will be sure to make you the best Christian wife, mother, friend, sister, neighbor, car pooler that you could ever be in the whole entire existence of mankind.

Remember that it's not "them." They don't even know your name.

But He does.

His bestseller will change you and I more than any book known to man.

Sure, they are great in their own way. God used them, terrific. No hate to them.

But good people can be bad people if they keep you from the best PERSON.

My thoughts today.

Self-reliance gets a thumb's down

This week I had a Doctor's appointment. After a ruptured appendix in college and six littles surgically removed from this body in the span of nine years..... I am plum tired of them. Doctor's that is. :)

And though I love what they do, I hate seeing them.

You anticipate the visit, you get all sweaty waiting in the waiting room with day time soaps blaring and people trying not to stare at one another all equally disliking the fact that they are there as well.

Blah.

So, not my favorite thing to do.

I was wayyyyyyy overdue for a checkup so it was scheduled and on the calendar and I feared it like the plague.

On the way to the office I began to ponder all the things that my mind just hadn't had quiet enough to let settle. You Mom's know what I am talking about. This is why, on any given night, when you and your husband have just polished off the last of the brownies he catches you with a furrowed brow and a tear beginning to emerge. He asks you what on earth could possibly be wrong when you just ate half your body weight in chocolate. Any woman's dream.

You choke out that you were "just thinking" about whether or not your second grader will ever learn to tie his shoes and avoid public humiliation, combined with the fact that the washing machine part you need to stop it leaking costs more than you have in the budget.

He may think you half crazy, but it's in the quiet that those brain nags come and take.over.

So it was these nags that haunted me on the way to the Doctors. Financial hiccups, scary news, discipline problems, attitudes creeping up, losing hearts slowly..... they just hovered over like a black cloud.

And then, it was an October miracle. The clouds parted and grace covered everything like the heat that had finally kicked-on in the van and began to cover me head to toe. It was divine. No, it really was. God said, "I am bigger." I am in charge. And He reminded me of the devotion I had read that morning about refining.

When I saw the title after finding my glasses and still waking up, I cringed. "Lord. Fire? Refining? TO-DAY of all days???? I just cannot deal with it!" I read on anyway. The way that the author described the refiner and their delicate care moved me. The way the refiner sat and watched carefully, lest the metal would be lost or taxed beyond what it needed was speaking peace to my weariness.

I thought of God, loving me enough to put me through a fire, only to sit and lovingly watch lest I suffered too greatly. Only heated enough to mold.

Only heated enough to mold.

To MOLD.

I haven't been the most pliable human being, wife, mother, friend as of late.

I thought of all of this while I drove and while the heat warmed me from the outside in. I walked into the office with a calm and peace of knowing that God loves me enough not to leave me in the fire, but sit beside me with a watchful eye on the fires around me.

Only heating me enough to mold once again.

The visit was fine and I was off to have blood drawn. I could, by personal experience probably draw my own blood, but I sat and offered my left arm and without a wince, watched.

The tingle down my arm and pain shooting back up again brought instant tears. This was not normal for me. I found out quickly that it wasn't normal for a lot of people.

The needle hit a nerve.

In all my years of blood drawn I have never had someone hit a nerve. I never even knew to fear it. I just lived sticking my arm out and letting someone stick something in it. The nurse was obviously horrified and I did my best to comfort her and assure her that it could have happened to anyone.

As a side note, I have this weird way of comforting people who feel badly about a service they have rendered me. I once gave a gift to a hairdresser who chopped all my hair off with all smiles and hugs, only to head home and cry for two days..... Well there could be weirder things I guess....

No instructions were given about what to watch for, how to take care of the nerve... I think that nurse just wanted to go and cry herself and get me outta there like last week's recycling.

I headed home and was just thankful the whole thing was over. That is until the next night after knitting. I could hardly stretch my arm out. I was fearful to move my fingers, especially my thumb, and the pain was back. It was enough of a bother to make you a bit cranky from the pain. I sighed. Then I got a little hypochondriac-ish.

I googled and for fear's sake just read the first post regarding blood draws and nerves. The rest of my nerves were on edge and I went to bed spent with worry.

The next day it still bothered me but not to the same extent. Then the following day I began to wonder if this was going to be a looong road.

I have things to knit! A Christmas craft show to prepare for!

Finally, I ran to the Lord. Joel had the kids on an errand and I had time. Time to finally read deep. The Lord took me to 2 Chronicles 6 and 7. I marveled at Solomon's loong speech regarding the building of the temple after such a long wait. FIVE times in chapter six Solomon asks the Lord to forgive the people when they come to Him with a transgression. That really spoke volumes to me. He didn't just ask the Lord to forgive all their sins. He chose five separate instances where the people might fall and asked Him that when he heard their cry, to forgive them.

Solomon also asks if it is even possible for the God of heaven and heavens of heavens to dwell in that temple; if the temple could even contain a piece of his glory. Wow. That took God out of the neat box I always seem to put him in and reminded me of His infinite power and might. Then in verse 30 Solomon says:
     "Then hear thou from heaven thy dwelling place, and forgive, and render unto every man according unto all his ways, whose heart thou knowest; (for thou only knowest the hearts of the children of men:)"

He is all powerful. And only He knows my heart.

Chapter seven carries that all familiar verse 14 we hear quoted so often for our nation:

"If my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways; then will I hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin, and will heal their land."

Many of us fail to remember that this word from the Lord came at night after Solomon had offered the temple to the Lord. The Lord had already accepted the sacrifice of the people. Had already shown them His glory. This word in the night, was more of a reminder to Solomon. And that is sweet to me.

God didn't withhold his glory and blessing from the people until they had met Him and settled some things. He knew their hearts as only He can, and then after blessing came to Solomon and reminded him of what that relationship with Him meant.

We are His temple. I am His temple. And the Lord, in that quiet time, reminded me that it is He that gives my arms strength. It is He who loves me enough to keep me moldable for His purposes. I turned to Him, repented of my idolatry ( making myself a God before Him) , and even making a good pastime the most important thing. He met with me just as He had Solomon, and forgave. In that stillness of spirit, I was reminded of the vastness of God.

He loves us enough to allow the fire to bring us back to a moldable state.

For HIS glory.

I am thankful for a little bit of a bum arm. Will it last? God knows. But I know I am a child of his this day. I am a child that He loves very much. So much that He will allow trial small or great, to remind me of Him and His ultimate plan for my life.

He loves you too. Look for Him in your fire. He is sitting there beside.