Wrestling with Rest

We took a vacation last week.  It was exactly what I was hoping for on so many levels.  Memorable.  Happy kids.  Lots of pictures.  The Train Museum, panning for gold, one-room school houses, huge fireworks, s'mores, lakes, miles and miles, BREATHTAKING vistas of the back side of the Sierra Nevada mountains that I've marveled at from this side for years without remembering from childhood trips what they looked like from the back.  

And yet...  in spite of everything going so well and being so delightful, I wrestled.  

IT. IS. SO. HARD. FOR. ME. TO. RELAX.  I would wonder and ask you if I am the only one who has trouble resting on vacations, but I know I'm not.  Even when we were out there and the wrestling match was in full swing, I read these words written by Emily:  

No matter where you go, the list-making, future-looking whir will follow you. You can sit outside a bakery on a street in Paris and be miserable for all the noise in your head. You can watch the calm ocean waters and the deep blue sky as they mock you with all their peace and quiet. You can breathe in the deep mountain air right along with your worries. It isn’t the place that brings peace.

So I know I'm not alone.  This particular time, there were several factors feeding into my restlessness.  I've had several painful "buttons" "pushed" recently and there has been a wave of emotions triggered because of it.  And being on vacation gives me all sorts of time for the emotions to surface.  I read something else the week before our trip about how people are often unprepared for the sense of grief and loss that often surfaces during sabbaticals.  I get that.  I know I can be so busy with life and work and serving and ministering and playing that in a way, I constantly anesthetize the pain in my life.  It's not that that's always bad...  but when the pain is finally felt...  well, I typically want to run away.  Turn on the computer and wander around Facebook or read other people's blogs or watch TV.  But this last week that wasn't really an option. 

Still, I tried not to face the feelings that were swelling under the surface.   I fought them, attempted to suppress them, and I stayed busy washing the few dishes we had to wash and taking care of the kids and arranging sleeping bags in the tent and whatever else - just about anything but get away by myself for a while with God to work on whatever was bothering me.  

My heart eventually calmed down.  With a few good chunks of time with God and a couple of good conversations with Lowell, I was actually able to thoroughly enjoy the last few days of our trip.  I've also learned a few more things about myself and some of my tendencies - as well as what helps to relieve the emotional pressure when it starts building.

One of the things I've concluded is that like curvy roads make me carsick, transitions in life make me not feel so well.  eMotion sickness or something like that.  : ) And just like I'm the only one in my current family who gets sick on the curves (PRAISE GOD!!!), I react differently to transitions than the rest of my family does too.  And just like it hurt me like crazy when I got my ears pierced even though some people hardly feel it, other things in life hurt me more than they hurt other people.  

BUT how funny is it that even though I almost didn't get my second ear pierced because the first one hurt so much, I gave birth to two babies without any kind of drugs???   Ahhh...  well, I think the rest of this story is going to have to wait for another blog post.

I noticed when I was typing "wrestle" up there that the word REST is right in the middle of WRESTLE.  Funny, isn't it?  : )  May you, too, learn how to REST even in the middle of whatever you may be wrestling with.  Go to Jesus...  He promises to help you.  (Matthew 11:28-29)  And you, too, will find rest for your soul.

Waiting for Harvest

 

Hi there.  I can't seem to wrap words around what's going on in my head or heart these days.  Which is why I keep starting blog posts and not finishing them.

Or maybe I don't want to wrap words around what's going on.  Maybe I just don't want to talk about it because I don't like it.

I don't like it when I am fighting feeling discouraged.

I don't like when I'm feeling confused about how to manage my time.

I don't like how transitions in schedules and routines throw me off so much.

I don't like knowing that we've done some things we wanted to do during our internship but that we weren't able to do it all.

I don't like feeling overwhelmed and tired.

I don't like having to work to be thankful and feeling guilty for not being more thankful.

So I haven't wanted to talk about it.  But somehow it feels like I need to.  Not out of obligation, but out of purpose.  I need people to pray for me and I need them to know what I need prayer for.  If I'm not willing to say it, how will they know?  How will you know?

So because I KNOW God is faithful to hear and respond to our prayers and because I know that many of our faithful prayer supporters will read this and pray, I invite you to join in praying for me...

That I will not grow weary or discouraged as we finish our internship and dive fully into fundraising.
That I will keep my eyes on the Lord and not on others for approval.
That I will hold unswervingly to the hope I profess because He is faithful. (Heb. 10:23)
That I would let God's peace reign in my heart because I have been called to peace. (Col. 3:15)
That my quiet times with God would bear fruit and that I would be patient when I don't see the fruit at first.

Hmm.  I took these pictures last week sometime when I was thinking about focus and how my days are lacking focus.  (Kids being out of school and other changes have made it more challenging for me to focus my time and energy.  It's a weakness of mine I am PAINFULLY aware of.)  As I was taking pictures of the little jalapenos, I realized that while I was focused on one tomato or pepper or zucchini that was growing, there were other little (or bigger!) ones around I hadn't even noticed at first.  (The second pictures are all the ones where I noticed what I had missed at first.)

I know God is at work.  He's my faithful Gardner and Father (John 15).  He is allowing me to go through these times and at the very least it is preparation for transitions in the future.  He will not give up.  He has a plan.  He has a timeline.  He has a purpose for all of this... for every single step. And someday there will be a harvest if we do not give up.

Lord, every time I look at the plants growing on our patio or eat a peach or anything else someone has harvested, let me remember Paul's encouragement and Your promise: 

"Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time

we will reap a harvest if we do not give up." (Galatians 6:9)

Keep teaching me about the power of HOPE.  I believe, Lord, that if I put my hope in You I will not be disappointed!  (Isaiah 49:23) You are so good. I put my hope in You.

Sneaky Pride

PRIDE.  Bad, evil stuff.  (OK...  before I write more I have to go deal with the security light outside that keeps turning on and off and blinding me off and on.  Be right back...)

(I'm sure there is a reason I had to include that piece of non-information, but I don't know what it is yet.  Maybe I just think you'll be amused by my rambling about stuff that is completely unrelated to the point.)  (And I do have one, by the way...)

Anyway, back here I was thinking about pride and humility and insecurity and confidence.  I was praying for God to deal with my pride because, to be honest with you, pride scares me.  I know how much trouble it can get people into.  I know God doesn't ignore it.  And...  I think I'm also afraid of the public humiliation that could happen if God needed to deal with my pride.  Which...  probably means I have some pride issues that need to be dealt with.

(Did you follow that?)  The fact that I'm afraid of pride is actually an indication that I already have pride that needs to be humbled.  (But I didn't recognize that until just now.)  So because I was so scared of pride (and because I know humility is God's way) I prayed for God to deal with my pride.  I hoped it wouldn't be too painful.  It was painful anyway.

But in the process, I feel like I've discovered a secret that has actually been right in front of me forever.  Like Toby's medicine last night that was right in front of me when I was looking all over the house for it.  Like my keys that were hanging on the hook but I couldn't see them because there was something else hiding them.)  But finally, like the flashing security light (see?  I knew it would tie in!) the truth God has shown me about pride has brought some much needed clarity and revelation.  And freedom.

Want a clue?  Look at Matthew 11:28-30.  I'll explain more tomorrow.  In the meantime, are you afraid of being humbled like I am?  Have you ever thought before about "fear of being humbled" actually being pride in disguise?

Day 36

Making Up My Mind

God and I had an interesting conversation yesterday.  After a FULL week of trying to get settled into our new temporary home, into a new school for the kids, a new job, a new daycare, new roles at home, new weather, a new church, a new city, new country, new friends, a new language (eh?), I was still feeling wiped out.  OK.  So maybe the language isn't completely new, but lots of other stuff has changed dramatically for our family in the last weeks and the transition into life here hasn't gone as smoothly as I dreamed it would.  The kids have done super.  We can tell that Timothy is a bit irritated with all the changes and is testing all the boundaries to see if they're still there, but even he has done remarkably well with his new "school".  His teacher is super sweet and (praise God!) his little daycare class is right across the hall from Toby's class!!! How cool is that?  : )  Mikaela and Toby are enjoying their new school and having tons of fun with the two kids from Paraguay whose parents are in training with us.  Our house is beautiful, our program is going to be rigorous but is off to a great start and the people we're in training with are quickly becoming good friends.

So what was the problem?  Well, that would be me.  I was exhausted when we got here - physically, emotionally, mentally, spiritually...  and I haven't felt so unsettled and discombobulated in -- well, ever!  And all week I've been struggling to stay positive and not get discouraged.  I knew I needed to give myself time, but instead of it getting better as the week went on, it was getting worse.  A few things came up this week that left me thinking "I didn't sign up for this!"  And the struggle I was having adjusting left me afraid of how I will do when the adjustment is even more dramatic.  I just plain got scared - but mostly felt sort of depressed.

In His never ending grace, God called me on it yesterday.  I spent some much needed time in His Word and ended up reading Lamentations 3-5 and Revelation 15.  Lamentations is pretty full of... lamenting while Rev. 15 has an amazing section of worship sung by victorious saints with harps.  While I noticed a major contrast between the two passages, I didn't feel very moved while I was reading (though I do want one of those harps someday!), but afterward felt God pretty clearly telling me I needed to make up my mind.

"Do you want to be here or not?"

(Long pause.......)

I knew my answer was going to be "Yes" but I wasn't ready until a few hours later to admit it.  I knew I had to really think through it and choose what I wanted because I had the distinct feeling that if I wanted to go home, He would let me.  And I didn't want to decide what I wanted based on how it would impact all of you or our church back home or our youth group...  this time it was just about deciding for myself what I wanted.

"And if you do want to be here, do you want to spend the next 3 1/2 months lamenting or worshiping???"

Well, that was an easier question to answer.  But later as I prayed with a friend from home (on the phone) I realized one of the reasons I was struggling with the first question was my fear about what "being here" means.    I'm not just saying "yes" to being here.  I'm saying "yes" to going somewhere further away and far more foreign than this little city.  And I needed to make up my mind again that I still want THAT.

So, I did.  : )  And somewhere in between God asking the question and my finally answering it a few hours later, the fog lifted and the sun came out in my heart and my head.  I'm done with the lamenting and am feeling at peace and more at home than ever... at least for now.  I'm also so grateful for the lesson God taught me because I KNOW that I'm going to have to keep making up my mind every time I discover new challenges.  Every time I think "I didn't sign up for this!" God will likely say again...  "No, you didn't.  So what do you want now?  Make up your mind."

And sometimes, knowing what I want will make all the difference.

"And I saw what looked like a sea of glass mixed with fire and, standing beside the sea, those who had been victorious over the beast and his image and over the number of his name.  They held harps given them by God and sang the song of Moses the servant of God and the song of the Lamb:  'Great and marvelous are your deeds, Lord God Almighty.  Just and true are your ways, King of the ages.  Who will not fear you, O Lord, and bring glory to your name?  For you alone are holy.  ALL NATIONS will come and worship before you...'"  -Revelation 15:2-4

Well hi!

Just wanted to say hello to you all after a month of bloggy silence! This has been quite a month... camping, first days of school for Mikaela, Toby AND Lowell... lots of stuff! This morning I got to go to a Beth Moore simulcast event (she was in Green Bay... it was broadcast live in over 500 satellite locations) and I was SO blessed. God spoke to me about so many things I REALLY needed to hear right now.

One of the last things Beth said was to keep speaking faith to each other. You know how there are times when we need a shoulder to cry on or someone to nod along in understanding... but other times, we need a sister or brother to just speak some FAITH to us! I know I need that right now. I'm sick of whining and feeling sorry for myself and really don't need anyone else to join me in feeling sorry for me. I need people to get in my face and speak the truth (in love, of course!) and remind me of what I know already!

Can any of you relate?

Well, I'm thinking that this blog is one way I can throw some faith out there in someone's direction... maybe even just back at myself. : ) But either way, I'm hoping to be sharing some more soon about what God's showing me. He's doing some deep cleaning in my heart these days and it's not pretty... but I know it's needed. And I know He's good.

What's He been teaching you lately? Any words of faith to share? I'd love to hear it...

See ya soon (maybe even with some pictures!),

Melissa

Can't Find the Words

Well, there is a lot going on in my head and heart these days and every once in a while I think about blogging about it all and I keep not doing it because I'm not sure what to say. It's also probably because much of what's going on has to do with resting more and being still more. Sometimes that means blogging less. Hopefully soon I will have the words to explain some of what God is doing in my heart. But for now, I will just say IT IS VERY GOOD. You might remember that back at the beginning of March I talked (in this post) about the chaos that has been drowning me for so very long and how badly I needed God to speak and let there be light in my darkness and confusion. PRAISE GOD, He is answering my pleas and doing something DEEP and I hope PERMANENT in my heart and mind in this area. He is breaking through!!! Yay!!!

Genesis 1:1-4 "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. The earth was formless and empty, and darkness covered the deep waters. And the Spirit of God was hovering over the surface of the waters. Then God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light. And God saw that the light was good. Then he separated the light from the darkness."

: ) The light is GOOD. And the tide is coming in. : )

March Memory Passage #1

Sorry this isn't a fabulous retreat recap. While our retreat was AMAZING because God is AMAZING, since coming home I've been back to life and it's challenges and God is wanting to do some Spring Cleaning in my heart and head (and apparently, my house.) Genesis 1:1-4

1 In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. 2 The earth was formless and empty, and darkness covered the deep waters. And the Spirit of God was hovering over the surface of the waters. 3 Then God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light. 4 And God saw that the light was good. Then he separated the light from the darkness.

I picked this passage because I feel so out of control with my house and "time management." My weakness in this area is consuming me and draining me in a ridiculous way. If you have struggled in this area, you might know what I'm talking about. If you haven't, all of my most wordy and elaborate explanations will never really be able to help you understand my dilemma. So just trust me that it's bad. The Hebrew words that describe what the earth was like in verse 2 imply that the earth was chaos and I feel like I'm living in chaos. I know it's not that bad compared to some people. I know it's not so bad that I can't have people over. I'm not beating myself up here. I just know how much it affects me and my family and I SO want to be done with it. I have tried and tried and made progress but still struggle. Life is fuller (and in MANY ways more wonderful) (and more challenging) than ever around here and I'm thankful for that, but it's making it even more obvious that i NEED God to speak Light and Truth into my chaos. And I'm going to ask Him to do that and expect Him to do that. It's what I "preached" about at the retreat! Trusting God's grace to do the work in our hearts because we can't do it with our efforts... We have to approach Him in humility and confidence in His ability and desire to do what we cannot do. Whether it's set us free from our sin or help us in our weakness. His grace is sufficient and His power is made perfect in my weakness and that's what I'm after. So now you know. : )

I Think I'm Back (& I Have a Disease)

Well, I think I'm back... But I'm not making any promises! : ) What I DO know is that I miss blogging and am feeling ready to start talking to you all again! (Even though I'm still not really sure who some of you are... Feel free to delurk anytime!) I do expect there will be some changes around here, though. For one thing, I don't expect to be talking so much about adoption quite so often. While I'm still a HUGE FAN of adoption and how our family has been blessed by being allowed to adopt Timothy, at this point it's not the huge focus of my life that it was a few months ago. As of tomorrow, Timothy will have been home for 2 months (wow!) and in many ways it feels like so much longer. He belongs with us as much as any of the rest of us do. I'm sure I'll still be talking about adoption some, because I definitely do still think about it, BUT I'm hoping that I will be thinking about a lot of other things, too. Especially about God and Truth and the Truths I'm learning from God. For example... Yesterday I determined & declared that I HAVE A DISEASE. I'm still attempting to diagnose it, but I know that the symptoms are: selfishness, self-pity, grumbling & complaining, woe-is-me-ing, whining (OH, the WHINING that goes on in my head!), sighing, depression, blah, blah & blah. Your basic ungratefulness, I suppose. I've tried praising God and counting and thanking Him for all the uncountable blessings in my life. But it doesn't really fix how I'm feeling when I'm feeling bad. It often actually makes me feel worse, because on top of the selfishness, self-pity, etc. (see list above!) I then add GUILT & CONDEMNATION for feeling that way when there are SO many people in the world and even in my neighborhood with REAL problems and not just laundry piles and hungry children and sticky kitchen floors. There are so many people who are really suffering in the world. I AM NOT ONE OF THEM. I HAVE NO EXCUSE. SO. Yesterday, I discovered it was 3 weeks before Thanksgiving and I asked God to PLEASE HELP ME learn how to be thankful and show me what in the world is going on in my heart that is causing me to be so ungrateful. And He has already been showing me that it's even worse than I thought. It's like a cancer that has been effecting decisions I make and how I feel even about having to make decisions (wah!). And you know what? Surprisingly, I am already feeling more thankful and praising God because I've been in places like this before. Often, when I get to a place where I'm feeling the grossness of something in my heart that I hadn't really noticed before, it means 2 things: 1. God is exposing it because, 2. God wants to deal with it and free me from it! Hallelujah! So if you decide to come back and visit me again, hopefully you'll hear more (among other things) about what I'm learning about being thankful. Actually, I'm sure you will. Because God very strongly desires that I be thankful and I know that since I'm asking and it's something He agrees with, HE WILL DO IT. And I'm gonna thank Him when He does!!! See ya again soon. (It's nice to be back.) : ) Y, Melissa

Legoland Recap

Hi Everybody! Well, I've discovered there was a downside to taking a break from blogging. I now have way too many things I wish I could tell you all about... Christmas was wonderful and full. One of the special things we did was surprise our kids with a trip to Legoland. They had no idea we were going until Christmas morning. We left a few hours later to drive to Bakersfield where we spent Christmas afternoon with my dad, stepmom, grandma, siblings and a whole bunch of uncles, aunts, nieces, nephews and cousins. (Did I miss anyone?) (It's one of the things I would love to tell you lots more about.) We spent the night there and drove the next day through day-after-Christmas-LA-why-are-we-doing-this-traffic and arrived at Legoland (30 min. north of San Diego) around 4:00pm and stayed there until the fireworks show at 7. We returned for another 7 and a half hours the next day before returning to Bakersfield and then home the next morning. (I tell you all this b/c I know you care about our travel itinerary. And maybe I'm out of practice blogging.) Anyway! We had a lot of fun. If you want to see a lot of pictures, watch the video below and you'll see dinosaurs, giraffes, zebras, the Washington Memorial, other skyscrapers, and a mariachi band all made of LEGO!!! Really amazing!!! What you won't see is me about to go nuts late Thursday morning because we were spending too much time PLAYING and not enough time standing in line. Because I like to pack as much as possible into a day like that because we might not be there again for a very long time and isn't that why we're there??? To do as much as possible??? (You can laugh at me. It's ok. I'm laughing, too.) Oh, and my wonderful hubby? Well, he mostly just shook his head and smiled at me knowing I was churning inside and that there was no reason for it. And he let me go take a walk while he and the kids kept playing. Well, praise the LORD, God helped me realize (just in time) that if I kept feeling stressed and thinking everyone in the park was having more fun than I was (and many were having more fun b/c I was being a little, ummm, let's say uptight) that the kids would eventually pick up on it and stop having such a good time just loving being there. God helped me to let go of my control-freaky-ness and just enjoy the rest of the day. We had a fabulous time and (surprisingly or not) we DID pack an amazing amount into the day. One thing I remember from growing up is that the adventures are great, but many times, what is so precious about them is remembering them together. The trip was a gift from God in many ways. We are really thankful for it and are going to enjoy remembering it together for a very long time. If you watch this 5 minute video, know that if I were with you I would be telling you about everything in the pictures because I like doing that... but then, of course, it would take even longer. : ) Y, Mel

The Ups and Downs of a Paper Pregnancy

Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah!  That's how I'm feeling about all this paper stuff right now.  Wed. of this week I was all gung-ho about getting our dossier stuff together.  It amounts to more than 20 pages of documents telling everything about us like our birth and marriage certificates, letters from Lowell's employer, our bank, our Dr, our friends, a copy of the 1st page of our taxes (and a copy of our extension form since we haven't actually filed our 2006 taxes yet...  ahem...), our home study, a Thai adoption application (in English, not Thai!!!) some other licenses and stuff from our adoption agency and whatever. 

 

Some of it we had to have notarized.  I was REALLY excited when I found out there was a Regional CA State Dept. office in Fresno because that meant we didn't have to send everything to Sacramento to be certified.  SO.  Lowell took it all down to the office and found out he had to take it to the county clerk first to verify the notary's license and signature.  Then he took it back.  Now we have a state seal certificating the county clerk's seal certifying that the notary was certified to verify our signatures on our dossier.  You'd think that was enough, right???  Well, now we get to send it all to Washington DC for the US Dept. of State to certify and then it will go to the Royal Thai Embassy (also in DC...  we'll hire a courier to walk it to these places for us) to have the US State Dept. certification verified.

 

Are you confused yet???  It's just making me tired today b/c I thought we were going to be able to skip the DC part of it until I discovered today that the Thai law changed LAST MONTH saying now it does.

 

Interestingly enough, God and I wrote another song over the course of the last couple of weeks and it's all about "counting it all joy."  I don't have time to type out all the words right now (and I've already made you read enough!) but whenever I think about the song, it reminds me to count everything as joy.  EVERYTHING.  Even the fact that if we'd gotten this done a month ago it would (supposedly) be a simpler process.  Who knows?  (God.)  I have been trusting God all along to help us get our paperwork done at just the right time so that we will be in just the right place on the waiting list when our child's name is at the top of the other list.  And this is probably just part of that process.  Or maybe it's just developing perseverance.  But no matter what, I can count it all joy. 

 

So if you'll excuse me, I'm gonna go find some joy and praise God He's gotten us this far down the road.  We're almost done with the paper part (I think) and will soon start just waiting.  And I'm sure I'm gonna need some perseverance and joy for that.  : )  Bye!