what to blog about....

So I have been an absent blogger again.....not because I didn't have time, but more so because I didn't know what to write. I've been going through some "life" things that could provide for various discussions on my feelings and new realizations, but it's another one of those situations where I don't feel like I can expose much without also involving other peoples' personal business. What I can say is that I have learned that there are many more things in my life than I realized, that I really have no power over other than the power of prayer. I have always prayed, but to be honest with you I never really thought it did much....I felt of it more as a formality & I felt like God was just gonna do whatever he had preplanned whether I prayed or not. Well through my experiences and my wonderful book I have been reading I no longer feel this way. I am going to make praying a large priority in my life now because I believe so strongly in it. I am also thinking I may still do my prayer walk & a prayer journal because sometimes I feel like I would like to write my words down to pull more out. Another issue that has been swirling around in my head is also something I cannot specifically write because I don't want to expose anyone or hurt anyone's feelings, but I would still appreciate prayer. When I was growing up at our church people would sometimes have "unspoken" prayer requests....so people would know to pray that God's hand would be at work in their lives where they needed it even if they did not know specifically what they were praying for. Soooo....that's what I am saying.....I have an unspoken prayer request.  :o).....
On a seperate note....I had a great Thanksgiving weekend full of relaxation, food, family/friends, & good deals shopping. :o) Also happy to say I have less than 3 weeks until my Christmas break starts! That is all!
May God our Father give you grace and peace.

Witnessing.

few examples of definitions from dictionary.com:
a person or thing that affords evidence.

a person who gives testimony.

 

Simply hearing the word witnessing can make many believers uncomfortable. Why? Well in my case it's because it's one thing to personlly believe in something, another thing to want to tell people about it, and a whole other thing to feel confident that I would be able to answer any questions that someone may have for me while I'm telling them about Christ. In the past I would have normally rather eaten a few rocks than have to witness to someone because I was so afraid of what they would think of me. I didn't want people to think I was a freak. Now, I would love to share Christ with others, but still feel a little unsure of how to go about it. I don't want to offend others, but I also do not want to minimize anything about Christ. (does that make sense?) As I have previously mentioned, I also need to beef up on some of my knowledge and Bible references. The question came up in Bible study about how we are to witness to others. It's hard to say how, but we should be ready when opportunities present themselves. One thing my pastor mentioned is that the way we live our every day lives should be a testimony and a witness to others. I really, really want my life to be a good testimony and witness for Christ and I often think about it. I think I have already changed the way I handle myself in different situations and I even find myself much less bothered by things that used to really bother me.I know there is a lot more I can do, but for me it is very beneficial to remind myself that I am a witness for Christ every day that I am living on earth.

"For wherever your treasure is....

there the desires of your heart will be also." Luke 12:34
I love this verse even though it's one that can often be convicting for me. It's convicting because another saying that goes along with this verse is that where your mind wanders is where your heart is. When your mind wanders where does it most often go? It shows you if you are focused on earthly things or are you focused on God and his will for you? I wish I could say my mind always wanders to Godly things, but I would be totally lying. My mind often wanders to earthly desires and it often disgusts me when I actually think about it. I am hoping that as I spend more time in the word and in prayer God will reveal to me what it is that he wants most of me and I can focus myself on that.
On a seperate note....I head to the Dr. tomorrow morning, hoping all goes well....been having some issues. Felt better today though after prayer with the pastor's wife yesterday. And I am going to leave you all with another verse I read today.....(comforting knowing that there is one thing that is constant)...Revelation 1:8 "I am the Alpha and the Omega-the beginning and the end. I am the on who is, who always was, and who is still to come-the Almighty One."

Prayer.

It has recently come to my attention just how weak my prayer life is. First, it was hard for me to find a time of day to pray. I am not much of a morning person so I cringed at the thought of getting up any earlier to try to do that. As soon as I get home from work I am busy w/the kids, dinner, & cleaning. At night I end up being so tired that I fall asleep about 1-2 minutes into a prayer. I used to write out prayers sometimes because at least that helped keep my focus. I think I already mentioned this, but recently I started making my walk to work/school a prayer walk. This way I know that I get at least 15 min. of prayer a day. So I was all proud of myself for finding a time that worked and I felt connected, but then in reading and listening to some things I realized that I was forgetting so many things that I needed to pray for. I wasn't praying for my husband and my kids in the way that I should. I mean, they would make it into my prayers, but not in all the ways that they should, (is that makes any sense). My prayers would simply rather superficial and lacked depth. Not that I am some prayer expert now, but I feel like I understand how to pray better now. I still probably couldn't pray any eloquent prayers out loud, but they sound good in my head. :o) I have always despised praying out loud because I always feel like I am doing it wrong, or don't sound formal enough, or I'll forget what to say, etc. (random side note: my friends in college all knew that I did not like to pray out loud which is why Kate often thought it was a good idea to try to volunteer me to pray during cross country practice....that rascal!) Maybe one day I'll get over it...hope I do. I do pray with Malaki at bed time, so I guess that's a start! I wanted to include this passage tonight that I read in Jude, it's verses 20 & 21, "But you, dear friends, must build each other up in your most holy faith, pray in the power of the Holy Spirit, and await the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ, who will bring you eternal life. In this way, you will keep yourselves safe in God's love. "
That's all for tonight, so I will leave you with verse 2 as well, "May God give you more and more mercy, peace, and love. "

Thankful...

So I have heard that some people do this 30 days of thankful thing before Thanksgiving and clearly I missed the boat on starting that, but I thought perhaps I could fit 30 into one blog! Here goes nothing...
1. Thankful for a great Mom & Dad that did such a great job raising me, although I may have questions things at the time. :o)
2. Thankful for Malaki who is a Mama's boy to the max! He cried and layed in his bed for a half hour after I left for work this morning because he was so upset that it was Monday and time for me to go back to work again.
3. Thankful for Jaylee who is so sweet and affectionate and has personality like WHOA!
4. Thankful for my job that I really, really enjoy.
5. Thankful for the amazing church I have now been attending for about a year and a half.
6. Thankful for my best friends Lindsey who is always there for me & can always make me laugh.
7. Thankful for the experiences I was allowed to have while attending IWU. College days were seriously the best ever.
8. Thankful for God's protection in my life in many areas.
9. Thankful for my sister sending me the book, "Power of a Praying Wife" which is the perfect book for me right now.
10. Thankful for all the food I have to eat. I think I sort of have food issues, but I feel so happy & content with a large variety of food in my house.
11. Thankful for all my sisters....we are all so different, but it makes for good laughs and good conversation.
12. Thankful for living so close to my work that I can walk or ride my bike each day.
13.Thankful for the ability to run, (even though I haven't been doing it much lately), I am thankful that I have the ability to do so because it makes me very happy and just feel good all around.
14. Thankful that God has allowed me to serve him by using some of my gifts he gave me.
15. Thankful for the great worship music I have on my itouch right now.
16. Thankful for facebook so that I can keep up with my family easier that I am far away from.
17. Thankful that I was able to visit my family in Michigan so much this year....I miss them a lot.
18. Thankful for the beautiful things God created in nature....different landscapes.
19. Thankful that the time is getting closer where I may live in a house instead of an apartment....(no set date, I just know it's getting closer....now I just have to pray to figure out where we are supposed to buy)
20. Thankful for God's forgiveness or forgivingness? I dunno....but I am thankful for it cuz man do I really mess up quite a bit.
21. Thankful for the changes the Lord has made in my heart within the last 3 months or so.
22. Thankful that within the last year I am finally able to read the Bible because I want to and actually be able to understand and learn from a lot of it.
23. Thankful for my co-workers.....we are all very different, but I learn things from every single one of them and they are a great group of people.
24. Thankful for my very comfortable bed....might sound silly, but seriously you spend a good portion of your life on it, so I am just glad I have one that I really like and I kinda feel like a queen in it. :o) (yes I know that I am special)
25. Thankful for all of the great information we have access to over the world wide web....sounds weird, I know, but seriously....if used carefully the internet is a great source of information and avenues to further His kingdom.
26. Thankful that my kids both love going to church so far....we'll see how long I can have this continue.
27. Thankful my kids are both active and busy bodies like me so they love it when I take them all over the place.
28. Thankful that Plato's Closet is now located 1/4 mile from me so that I can get my fashion fix by bargain shopping there.
29. Thankful that no one has made any comments to me about how I don't proof read my blog posts very well or at all.
30. Thankful I am done with this post because a) it started to get difficult doing all 30 at once instead of day by day & b) I wanna go to bed. :o)
31. I had to come back and add this one....I have no idea how I forgot to put this on the list...but about 12 hours later while at work I realized I had forgotten it and this one just cannot be left off of the list...so 31 it it....I am thankful for Floyd! An amazing husband who cares for me, provides for me, and just loves me, (oh, & he's pretty good lookin too)!

**So some Thankful things were deep while others were quite shallow, but still I am thankful for them all!**

Letting go of expectations...

The small section I read in my "Power of a Praying Wife" book today was on letting go of expectations. Now in this book they are referring to expectations of your spouse, but I think it applies greatly to other areas of life  as well. I can remember numerous times when a friend has said they were going to call me, said we were going to do something, etc. &....well...it never happened. I used to be so upset by this because I was raised as a person of my word. If I say I am going to do something you can consider it done w/o a doubt. (side note: you can still consider it done if I say something now, but these kids of mine sometimes makes it take awhile longer to accomplish the goal :o)) Since these times of being upset I decided to change things to avoid my hurt feelings and frustrations. Now if I have a friend who says we are going to do something a certain I attempt not to plan other major things, but I still go about my daily business aware that I may get a call but not 100% expecting to. I figure if I am out doing something when they call it's not a big deal because they can just wait a little bit til I can make it over because I was on their time table and now thay are on mine. :o) I know it may sound weird and it's kind of embarassing to admit my hurt feelings from things like this, but oh well, I am just being honest. Ever since I have adopted this new attitude or these different expectations things have improved greatly for me. Do I think you should do away with all expectations? Of course not, but I think there are some things I can flex on and should to avoid certain outcomes or situations. The following is a paragraph from this section in my book....the paragraph is more directly referring to your spouse, but I really, REALLY like it:
"Let go of as many expectations as possible. The changes you try to make happen in your husband, or that your husband tries to make in himself to please you, are doomed to failure and will bring disappointment for you both. Instead, ask God to make any necessary changes. He will do a far better job because 'whatever God does, it shall be forever. Nothing can be added to it, and nothing taken from it' (Ecclesiastes 3:14) Accept your husband the way he is and pray for him to grow. Then when changes happens, it will be because God has worked it in him and it will be lasting. 'My soul, wait silently for God alone, for my expectation is from Him' (Psalm 62:5) Your greatest expectation must be from God, not your husband."
This all makes so much sense to me and reaffirmed how I was already feeling about things. Any thoughts anyone?
Well I am VERY tired so I need to sign out. May God our father give you grace & peace.

Being a wife.

Being a wife is hard work. I love it, but it's hard work. I may complain and think or say, "man, I wish I could just come home from work & plop down on the couch with some chips instead of vacuuming, laundry, dinner, etc." Well as much as I like to say or think that, it's really not true. I am really not the type to sit around watching tv anyhow. I really am sort of a busy body and I should really thank God that he has given me the energy that he does. I also for some reason find a bit of joy in being the last one awake in the house every night because I've been up finishing housework. Sometimes as a wife and mother it can be hard to balance things because I feel that so much is expected of me, not just from my kids & husband, but also the expectations society puts on me. What has helped me is to look at what things are important to God & place those things in the forefront. I know I mentioned earlier that I have been reading a new book, "The Power of a Praying Wife," & it describes the husband as being the head of the house & the wife as being the heart. I would agree with this & I take great pride in the various things I do as the heart of the household.
Some seperate thoughts:
1. I finally got my tattoo this weekend, but for some reason can't get a pic to go on this blog right now so you'll have to check my FB if you wanna see it. I really like it, cuz it was really something for me, & it's really special to me.
2. Having my BFF in town was amazing! I love having another girl in the house that just gets me! We laugh & have so much fun just doing whatever.Can't wait until she visits again.
3. I did almost half of my Bible study HW for tomorrow & will hopefully have time to do some more tomorrow night before I have to head over there...I kinda don't like this HW cuz I am unsure on some answers and kinda hate being wrong.
4. Tomorow is voting day and I did find out where my voting location is and am going to attempt to go vote....probably won't vote on everything though because I didn't have time to research everything.
5. I cannot believe Jaylee is turning 2 this week! My does time fly! She is the sweetest thing you could ever imagine!
6. I love Halloween candy!
May God our Father give you grace & peace.