One Word

I've been inspired by a fellow blog friend to take part in the "one word" exercise. I am to choose one word that I want to focus on for the year and learn as much as I can about it. After much thought and prayer, the word that keeps coming to me is "Mercy". My life for the past year and a half has been an uphill battle and I've gone down paths that I shouldn't have from time to time. When I went to church last Sunday, I truly felt the mercy of the Lord fall on me like a thick blanket. He wrapped it around my shoulders just as the father wrapped his cloak around the shoulders of his prodigal son. As I stood there and felt the weight of His mercy on me, I was overwhelmed at how amazing my God is. Even after all I've done, having known better, He was still there to receive me with open arms. All I had to do was open my ears to finally listen to what He had to say to me.....and He was there to speak. Did He yell at me? Did He get angry with me. No.....He showed me MERCY!

I looked up the definition of mercy online and this is what I found:

Mercy - Compassion or forbearance shown, especially to an offender or to one subject to

one's power; lenient or compassionate treatment; a blessing that is an act of divine

favor or compassion; compassionate treatment of those in distress.

So many rich words in that definition that spoke to my heart about the mercy of our Father. Even though I am "subject to His power", He makes the choice to show me compassion, favor, and forbearance. He blesses me with His love to show me how much He treasures me, rather than heaping on more guilt for the things I've done wrong. What I want to know is, how can you not run to a Father that is like that?!! What keeps you from Him? Is it fear of the Truth? Is it shame? Guilt? Guess what? None of that matters to Him. He longs so much to have you in His arms, in His presence, that He shoves aside all the junk and choses mercy in its place. What a wonderful God we serve!

My goal for the year is to find as many verses as I can about God's mercy and share them with you on here. For now, I started with music as it is such a passion for me. I hunted through songs that had to do with mercy and added a few to my playlist. The first one that hit me the most was "Mercy Said No" by Greg Long. Take a minute and listen to it. Hopefully it will speak to you as it did me. Rest in His mercy, sweet one. He longs for you to receive it.

My Bucket List

The weekend has brought me to a new place....yet a familiar place that I have been before. On my knees. I am finding myself before the Lord longing to be emptied so that I can be filled with Him. I need to cleanse myself of the sinful patterns I have gotten into in my life so that I can be made new in His grace. I changed my radio station this morning. A simple thing you may believe, but a big first step to cleansing my life and replacing things that can be toxic with things that are Holy and pure. I need to rid myself of the music that penetrates my mind and brings me to the life of partying and "misbehaving" so to speak! My next step was to return to church, where I can be fed through the Word and be guided back into the place my heart longs for again. As one of my favorite Twila Paris songs says, "Lead me back into the simple pleasure I once knew. I will rest here in the perfect worth of knowing YOU! I will delight my heart in You!" I want Him to saturate me with His presence and His life so that I may again find the simple joy of just knowing Him and loving Him.

So what's with the Bucket List title? The sermon this morning was on that very topic. The pastor talked about delighting ourselves in the Lord so that what we desire may be in line with what He desires for us. It also allows us to find the extraordinary in the ordinary. To find God in the simple everyday things of life. My favorite part was when the pastor said that some of the things on our bucket list of what we want to accomplish in life can be placed there in retrospect. Meaning that there are some experiences we have in life that we are so glad we were able to have before our lives are through. I feel that much of my bucket list of things I wanted to accomplish is just that. Items that were placed there in retrospect as I realize just how many blessings the Lord has given me. My list started out with the following:

Become a Teacher

Get married

Have a family

It has now evolved into this as I have added the things that I have been able to experience to this day:

Find the joy in seeing a child learn something for the first time

Watch as a child progresses, even in tiny baby steps, from not knowing something to

having it mastered!

Learn extremely valuable things about being a teacher from a multitude

of professionals who have traveled the road before I.

Knowing life was no longer about me the moment I felt my baby move inside me.

Watching my belly move, visibly, as the life inside me played kick boxing!

Laying on an operating table and seeing the nurse hold up my baby girl.

Seeing my husband sitting in the nursery at the hospital, rocking his firstborn child as he stared into her face, totally captivated.

Waking in the wee hours of the night to nurse my baby, knowing that my body is giving her nourishment and helping her grow....as she stares into my eyes.

Seeing my grandmother bond with my children on a daily basis as we had the priveledge of caring for her in her final years.

Taking notes on all the fun little phrases my little girl says as she grows and learns.

Seeing two little pink lines on a pregnancy test and knowing my family is growing just as I desired it would.

Spending 9 months wondering if the child I carried was a boy or a girl.

Being completely overjoyed and overwhelmed hearing my husband announce, "It's a boy!" as they pulled him from my belly.

The look on my son's face as he looked at his mommy for the first time. (I actually have this one captured in a photo!!)

Seeing my little girl hold her little brother for the first time and kiss him on the head.

Watching my daughter pretend to nurse her stuffed animals. (got that in a photo too!)

Hearing my daugter say, "Mommy it's gonna be ok. I still love you," as I cried tears over my marriage ending.

Buckling my little man into his carseat and having him look at me and say, "Mommy I love you a really lot!"

Asking Simon, "Who's mommy's little man?" and hearing him answer "ME!"

Hearing my daugther sing along to the song "Voice of Truth".

Rejoicing that my daughter asks if she can go to church on Sunday.

WHEW! I'm exhausted just writing all that! What a list! Can you imagine the things that will be added to it in years to come. Not to mention that I had no idea how many things would bring me such pure joy in my life. I didn't know....but God did. He knew my heart, he knew me. He knew just what experiences would make my bucket list. He made sure that each and every moment made it into my life, even some of the harder moments. Every experience I have had is filled with moments that I can't imagine not having as a part of my life. They are those mastercard "priceless" moments that make you stop and smile and say "Life is good". What's on your bucket list...in retrospect?

The Land Between

Finally the time has come for me to settle into a new church. My whole family has visited and liked it just as much as I did. The children's programs are wonderful, praise music just as I like, and the message was straight to the heart. Yesterday the message was about the Land Between. In Exodus 3:15-22, Moses is completely exhausted with the Israelites as they moan and complain about the manna they must eat morning, noon, and night. They are stuck in the desert, in between their slave days of Egypt and the glorious promise land that awaits them. Moses goes to the Lord and begs for Him to relieve the burden that has been placed on his shoulders to lead these people. The pastor brought this home for all of us by showing us how the Land Between can often bring out the worst in people. Imagine living day in and day out for 40 years having to eat this bland and tasteless food that rained from the sky. Some of us may respond by saying the Israelites should have been grateful for what was provided. However, I challenge you to take a minute as I did and think about that time in your life, possibly now, when you moaned to the Lord, "I just can't bear this anymore. I can't take it anymore! I can't stand being in this place!" I know that for me, my Land Between is now. I am stuck in the middle, having left the bondage of an unhealthy marriage and headed for the promises that God has waiting for me. In the meantime though, I must wait. I must be alone and lonely for a time while God prepares me to accept those things He has waiting. It's not an easy place to be. It is often hard to look around me at those who have made it to their promise land.....happy with their loved one, building a family and a future. This was, after all, my dream. To be happily married, parenting my children in a healthy family environment. Not sending them off to spend time with each parent seperately, watching my son cry "Mommy!" all the way to daddy's car. Some days I cry out as Moses did, "Lord this is too much to bear! I can't carry it anymore!" Sitting alone on a quiet weekend, with no significant other to share my heart with, I cry to Him, "When will the end of this desert come, Lord?" As always, He answers back to me that I simply need to wait. Wait and listen to Him.

See, as the pastor also pointed out, The Land Between, wherever that may be, can also be a time of God's discipline in our lives. In the book "The Land Between" by Jeff Manion he says it this way, "I firmly believe that the Land Between- that space where we feel lost or lonely or deeply hurt- is fertile ground for our spiritual transformation and for God's grace to be revealed in magnificent ways." WOW! Couldn't have been put any better! God wanted Moses and his people to be transformed and renewed before they were ready to receive the gifts He had waiting for them. Sadly, they never even got to the promised land. They died in the desert and never were able to see their descendents find the promised land and bask in it's wonderful glory. In each of our lives, I believe God has a promised land. A place you are longing for that only He can bring you to. He knows the way and will reveal it to you. In the meantime, we wander in the Land Between, learning to trust Him, learning to honor Him, and learning to obey Him.

The song I have found fits this story the best is on my playlist and is called "You Said". It talks about the fact that if we ask we will receive whatever we need. I don't know about you, but I'm going to try and learn from the Israelites mistake and make sure that complaint is not taking up residence in my life. Trust is what resides in me and will for my time in the Land Between.

Somewhere in The Middle

As we enter into the new year, I look back on this year and think about what God has done in my life and in my heart. I searched for a song to help define this and found just the perfect one...as always!! It's on my playlist and it's called "Somewhere In the Middle" by Casting Crowns. It really is where I feel that I end up right now in my life. Let me use some of the lyrics and some of my own words to help make it clearer what the middle really is.

Somewhere between who I was and who I used to be

Somwhere between right and wrong...but far from the wrongs I allowed myself to live

Somewhere between rejoicing and repairing my heart and life

Somewhere between the darkness and the light

Somewhere between being hot and cold for my Savior...coming back into where He longs for me to be

Somewhere between perfect and a work in progress

Somewhere between happily ever after and new beginnings

Somwhere in the middle is where I am and where I shall stay while my Savior works to make me new again!

This middle ground is not a bad place to be, it's not a mediocre land. It's an "on my way" place. I may not be perfect, I may not be complete, I may not be on fire as I once was....but it will all come to pass when the time is right. I am in a season in my life of being in the middle. It's the comfortable place for me to heal. It gives me time, it gives me patience, and it gives me grace. The kind of grace only God can give when He knows we need to rebuild. Rome wasn't built in a day! Only God could form the earth in 7 days....and even He needed rest on that last day! I'm resting in the middle, taking time to breathe. Soon I will find myself rebuilt, renewed, and starting again. In the mean time, I am giving myself a little credit for making it as far as I have without completely breaking away. I haven't lost sight of the true prize, the light at the end of the tunnel. I may have only had faith as small as a mustard seed at times but it has always been there. Now as that seed of faith grows again, I find myself here, in the middle....on my way!