Day 7: Rest

And on the seventh day, God rested and so will I.  But I will share with you a wonderful blog post written by a dear friend of mine.  Enjoy!

Day 6: 10 Years

It's crazy that Josh and I started dating 10 years ago today!  We met at a christian sports camp at Campbellsville University where he was the camp pastor and I was a chaperone.  I was 19 and he was 21.  He said he knew the day he met me that he was going to marry me and that it took him 2 years to convince me.  After meeting and getting to know each other that week of camp, we exchanged numbers and talked on the phone almost everyday that summer.  He had plans to go to Southwestern seminary after camp but changed his course to move to Birmingham, AL, where I was attending college and got a part-time job as a middle school minister.  We dated until I finished college and got married 3 weeks after I graduated. We began our marriage in Savannah, GA, then moved to Lexington, KY, and have finally settled in Tampa, FL.  In the 10 years we've been together, we've known better or worse, richer or poorer, and in sickness and health.  He is my other half, and I can't imagine spending life with anybody else.

Day 5: Momma's Boy

My mother posted this on Facebook the other day for me, and I love it.  I'll have to say that these last few days though I have been a little sad because as of now, my little boy is not a momma's boy.  He loves his daddy and cries when he leaves and flaps his arms when he sees him and reaches for him when he's in my arms.  Of course, I want him to love his daddy and do all those things for him. I just want him to do that for me too.  But before I could throw my little pity party and be jealous of my husband, I was reminded tonight that yes, I am Landry's momma and I did give him his first kiss and he is my whole world.  While I was rocking him and giving him his bedtime bottle, he grabbed my hand and held on to it tightly.  In that moment, I realized how silly it was for me to be upset.  He's 10 months old, and so what that he favors his daddy right now, he knows who his momma is and loves me too.

Day 4: That Devil

Well, this is Day 2 of my juice cleanse, and it started out really rough.  I woke up with a major headache that lasted a good part of the day.  It was one of those headaches that almost debilitates you.  I somehow managed to get through a meeting and a 5 hr. tutoring session and host bible study at our house.  Don't ask me how.  It's like when you don't remember driving some place, but you know you did because you are there.  Anyway, while I was in the middle of this incredibly painful headache, I started feeling sorry for myself and questioning why I was doing this cleanse in the first place.  I started going back and forth between all the reasons I should give up the cleanse and all the reasons I should march on.  I felt like I was experiencing spiritual warfare over my three-day juice cleanse.  And that got me thinking about a sermon I heard at CLASH camp last week.  The speaker was saying how we like to blame the devil for everything, even things that just happen.  For instance, being stuck in traffic or failing a test we didn't study for or having a child misbehave.  We just say, it's the devil when something doesn't go our way or we don't want to take responsibility for it.  I was feeling a little that way this afternoon when my monster-sized headache was obviously depleting my judgment.  I was looking for someone or something to blame my headache on, and I was looking for Josh to feel sorry for me.  When I asked him why he wasn't more concerned about me, he just shrugged and told me I had brought it on myself by choosing to do the juice cleanse.  Hello! How many times do we look for someone to feel sorry for us for the things we have brought on ourselves? Ouch.  Today, it might have been something as silly as a headache from a juice cleanse, but there have been times in my life where the consequences have been much greater and instead of owning up to them and correcting them, I have thrown my own little pity party and done my own share of blaming the devil.  Well, today I shut down my little pity party and thankfully, my headache subsided, and as of now, the juice cleanse is still underway.  One more day...

Day 3: The Juice Cleanse

I don't know what possessed me to do a juice cleanse, but here I am at the end of Day 1.  I did a 3 day cleanse two years ago, and I remember it being a good experience, so I thought I would try it again.  However, two years ago, I didn't have a walking 10 month old to chase around.  Several times today I have seriously considered caving, but now it's more of a pride thing that I finish.  I primarily decided to do the cleanse because I was feeling sluggish and needed a jump start to eating better, and if I lose a few pounds along the way, I'll take that too.  Today, while I was scrolling through Facebook, I came across a new weight loss product, which is, of course, supposed to make you lose 25 lbs. in a month or something ridiculous like that.  I even clicked on the ad to find out more about it.  I was thinking how great it would be to just take a pill and lose 5 lbs., instead of doing all the work of eating healthy and exercising.  As I contemplated signing up for a free trial, I thought about how tempting it is in life to take the easy way out.  We are always looking for ways to cut corners and get the same results in less steps.  And then I thought about how often those gimmicky things fail and how skipping steps often makes things harder further down the line.  I don't think there is never a time to take the short cut, but for me, I have to ask whether I'm always taking the easy way out and what that says about my character.  Does that mean I'm impatient? no follow through? lazy?  Just some food for thought. Sorry if this post is a tad disoriented. Lack of concentration is just one of the side effects of the juice cleanse.

Day 2: Spheres of Influence

I had 3 different meetings today, all church-related.  Being a pastor's wife, church-related things are synonymous with life, it just goes with the territory.  I have come to love that about it.  I love being connected to the church and being involved with what's going on.  I'm not one who can just sit back and say well that's Josh's job, not mine.  I may not receive a paycheck for it, but it's as much a calling on my life as it is his.  Although I am fairly involved, I envy Josh for having all the influence.  People know his name and what he does and he has a position.  People often don't recognize me unless I'm standing beside him or holding Landry.  But as I stepped back and reflected on my day, I realized the 3 meetings I had today encompassed 3 different ministries at Grace that I am involved with, and that's not even all of what I do.  There's also the college small group that I lead and the mom's ministry I attend.  All in all, I have my hand in quite a bit of what is happening at the church.  And even though I may feel like I do not have influence or at least not the influence of my husband, people still look at me, to lead and guide and listen and walk along side of.  Where I think I have little influence, my sphere of influence is actually quite large.  And that's intimidating.  I don't know what's worse- not having any influence or having the responsibility of having so much.  When I look back on my life up to now, I am so grateful for the many, many people who have had a positive influence on my life, and realize now, that many of them may not even know it.  I can only hope that the way I live out my life is a positive influence on others. I will strive to look at my sphere of influence, not as an intimidating burden, but as a privilege and an opportunity.

Day 1: Getting Where You Want to Be

I am going to attempt to blog for the next 30 days, whatever is on my mind-- long or short, simple or profound.

For the past few days, I've been thinking a lot about where I want to be in life.  I think there was a time when I used to dream and have goals, but I can hardly remember the time when the world was at my fingertips.  We just got back from CLASH camp with over 600 middle schoolers and high schoolers, who are all on fire to change the world for Christ.  While it was so exciting to see them worship and pray in unison, I couldn't help but wonder why, we as adults, don't have the same fervor and same expectation for God to use us to change the world.  The speaker made a statement that was meant to pump up the kids, but only depressed me.  He said, "I love speaking to students because I don't really know who I'm talking to.  There could be doctors, lawyers, or the President of the United States in this room.  When I speak to adults, I pretty much know who I'm getting."  It's unfortunate, that as adults, we no longer feel like we can be or do anything.  And that's what spurred me on to think about where I want to be in life, to think about those big goals and dream big dreams.  I'm good at the daily to-do lists, and I can plan with the best of them.  The problem for me is execution and staying faithful to the task when it seems impossible.  I think that's why it's so hard for me to plan and set goals for the future because all I can see are the obstacles in my way.  I think that just because I can't achieve the simplest daily goals like getting all of the laundry done in one day, that there is no way that I can come anywhere close to the big ones.  But then that's where I am reminded that I don't do it on my own, that God has set those dreams in my heart and given me a purpose, and through His power working in me, I can see those dreams become a reality.  So when it feels impossible, I can shift my focus from all of the obstacles and put it on Jesus and be faithful to keep walking.