Impossible things

My question for today is "what is the most humanly impossible thing that I will ask God to do this year?"
Really, this one is not hard. I have been thinking about this question for a while. My mom answered this question last year and she saw God do amazing things in the life of her and my father. She asked God to work in the area of my father's VA issues. He was at 60% disabled at the beginning of last year. My mom prayed for them to consider upping his disability to 100%. It was a legitimate claim that had been considered at VA and denied before. My mom prayed all year for them to reconsider. The found out in the summer that my dad's claim was accepted and he would be at 100%. For anyone who has ever dealt with VA this is virtually an impossibility. They sometimes take years to do this. Most of the time a person is dead before they get 100% disability. For my parents this was such an answer to prayer as now my mom and dad both have the security they need for the rest of their lives. My dad is physically incapable of working anymore. As I saw God work in an impossible way in my parents life I began to ask this question myself. What do I see as an impossibility right now in my life? I did not have to think long.

For me, it is all about my children. I want to see God work in the hearts of children like never before. I want him to especially work in the lives of Alex and William. I want God to move in their hearts so much that people cannot help but see the change in their lives. I want God to become such a part of who they are that there is no doubt in anyone's mind that they will do an amazing work for The Lord. I want to see God break down the bitterness and the walls that have been built up their hearts. For me this is my impossible thing. We have been dealing with issues with Alex for a few years now and I am discouraged about where he is right now. Wiliam has of late been having such a rotten attitude that it makes me sad. For those who say that it is just boys being boys I say you are wrong. I have met young men who are the same age as my boys who are on fire for The Lord. It is not a stage. It is a reflection of their spiritual walk with The Lord or the lack thereof. I know that my children are responsible for their own walk with The Lord. My happiness is not tied to that. I can pray and hope and believe that God will work in their lives. If they choose to take a different path than the one I want for them I know that it is their own choice, my job is to keep praying and hoping and believing. My job is guide them to make the right decision. It is my job to lead them to a better place. My joy is not conditional upon them changing. My joy is conditional upon the choice I make to pray for them and know that I have a Heavenly Father who loves them more than I ever could and wants them to live for Him even more than I desire that.
Mixed in with the impossible thing I pray for my children is the desire to see those very changes happen in my own life. I want God to move in such a way that I exude His name with every ounce of my being. I desire every word, thought, and action to honor his name. I desire for him to remove all the anger from who I am. I pray that I will become a woman of peace, prayer, grace, and mercy. This is my desire for the new year, my impossible things for the year.
With this comes my verse of the year. I am claiming this verse for the year and for many years to come.
3 John 1:4
I have no greater joy than to hear that my children are walking in the truth.

Three things I am thankful for today:
4. The creek outside in our backyard. Sometimes I can hear it trickling and it is peaceful
5. The warmth of our house on a chilly morning
6. NiNi's popcorn.

I love Carl because he took the time to snuggle with Sam this morning and kiss Tirzah while she was asleep. How precious.

A new year and already overwhelmed

At the beginning of a new year we are always encouraged to make new resolutions that we will keep throughout the year. This year is no different for me. This year I actually would like to keep them. I do well some years and others not so well. Last year was one of those years where I was just in a pit. It was self made of self pity and laziness and the stink of sin. For the sake of my children and my family this year must be different. I have been researching what I want to change this year. There is so much information out there. With instant access to the Internet with phones, iPads, and computers we can look up any kind of information we want. We can easily get overwhelmed. We can get to the point where we are so bombarded by good information from godly women that we do nothing. That is where I was last year. That is where satan wants me right now. I need to be careful that I do only what The Lord wants me to do. I have decided that I am going to take the whole month of January to reevaluate where I am and where God wants me to be. I am going to do that by answering 31 questions. These questions are designed to guide me to where God wants me do be. I have already made some changes and some resolutions. But I want to take it a step further. I want to prayerfully come before God and in his presence and like it says in Haggai 1:5 "consider your ways".
Question 1
What is one thing I can do this year to increase my enjoyment of God?
I think this one is pretty simple. I need to spend more time with him. I have neglected my walk with Christ this past year. There were times that I got close to God but it was not consistent. I did not have a day in and day out communication time with him. I need to come before him every day. I need to be in a spirit of prayer all day long. I need to purpose in my heart to do this everyday. I need to enjoy that time and look forward to it. I need to be joyful when it comes to meeting with my God. I need to think of things to be joyful about and confess that before God. If I think if just three things to be thankful for every day, by the end of the year I will have listed over 1000 things.
Today I am thankful for 3 things I hear.
1. Christian music that is God honoring.
2. The laughter of my children.
3. The pounding feet of little ones running to kiss daddy goodbye before he leaves for work.

I am also trying to list one thing a day that makes me love Carl.
I love him because he allowed us to take William and Nathan to see the Hobbit yesterday.

Advent Day 2

Well, really it is day 3. We were supposed to start on Tuesday but I was preparing and Baba was watching the kids overnight so I could get some things done. I got all the presents wrapped, the planning done, and found the bottom of one of the hampers. We had ten loads of laundry from vacation last week. I am still catching up.
I am glad that I am done with all the presents. I have spent too many Decembers focused so much on what to get everyone that I forget to put the focus where it should be. On Christ. This year I vowed would be different. I actually started in November doing a study called, Preparing Your Heart for Advent. I then made the decision to be done shopping by December. That goal is now complete as all the kids gifts are bought and wrapped. We are doing for gifts this year. Something they want. Something they need. Something they wear. Something they read. It made shopping so much easier and focused. What a huge relief to be done.
The next thing I really started focusing on was of course the actual focus of Christ. What did I want to do. I really have always wanted to celebrate advent like I did as a child. Tis year I made the commitment to do it. I did a lot of research and decided to do a Jesse Tree this year. We have a scripture, ornament, and reflection each night. The kids copy work and verses for school all come from the devotions. We did an intro and creation yesterday. I explained what a Jesse tree is and why we use that. We also talked about creation and what happened on each day. I so need to review that more often, I got a little confused. Tonight we did the first sin and discussed the fact that Eve was not  alone when she ate the fruit. Adam was "with her". We also talked about shifting blame and taking responsibility for your own sin. The kids and fun coloring the sheets and ornaments. We need to do some training with the little ones to be more still.
Another thing we did was to open a book each night until Christmas. I wrapped 28 books with paper and we read one a night. The kids are so excited to open the book and read. I am really liking this new tradition. Tonight we read Max Lucado's You Are Special. What a cute story. I can't wait to see what we read tomorrow. Since they are wrapped it is a surprise to me too.

Epic fail

What a day. Do you ever make a commitment to the Lord and the first day you embark on the journey you end falling flat on your face? Do you ever wish you could just erase a day from the memory of your children? Yeah, today was that kind of day. Epic failure to the 100th degree. Oh, boy. I had such high hopes. I met with Carrie Irish last night and had a wonderful conversation. It was so good to talk and pray with another Christian woman. We decided to work on two words this week and hold each other accountable. The two words were prayer and joy. These are two things we agreed that both of us need to work on. I started a prayer journal last night and even prayed when I woke up in the middle of the night. This morning I awoke and wrote again. Good start even if I did wake up late. The day just went downhill from there with me going to the prayer journal over and over again confessing my horrible, rotten, angry spirit all day. The kids got on my every nerve today. Everyone complained all day. Alex got very angry today and threw a chair at me over school. The kids destroyed the house every time I cleaned it up. The phone was ringing off the hook with telemarketers ( thank you time Warner cable company). Everywhere I turned I was met with something that just made me angry. I spent the whole day trying to recover and it just did not work. Add football practice and a husband who was running late to the mix and no food in the house to fix dinner and it was a recipe for disaster. I am currently out of butter,  eggs,  cheese,  lunch meat, meat, chicken, cereal. Oh I so need to go grocery shopping. We ended up at McDonald's for dinner. Needless to say my prayer journal for today is full of pleading for mercy and grace and a whole lot of confession. Tomorrow will begin with confession to my children for showing them a bad example. Oh how wonderful the Lord is to give us a new day each morning. How much more wonderful is it that he removes our sins as far as the east is from the west when we confess them. Epic failure today, you bet. Tomorrow is a new day and will I fall again, probably. But I will keep on praying and confessing and praying some more.

True Repentance

I have been given a great view of repentance lately. The latest incident came from my sweet Esther. It needs a little bit of background information first. Carl and I met about three weeks ago for a very important date night. I had been praying very hard lately about some things in our marriage. Since we got back from vacation things have not been good and they were getting worse. Without airing all the dirty details, let's just say things were really bad. I was suffering from depression and Carl was angry, all the time. The kids were suffering and Alex especially was starting to act out violently towards me. I was at the end of my rope. The Lord has really been working on my heart about where my joy comes from. For our entire marriage I have been struggling with finding my joy in my marriage and how Carl feels about me. Lately we have not been very loving toward one another so obviously I did not think too highly of myself. The Lord finally knocked me flat and made me realize that my joy and strength comes from HIM. Now, I know this and have known it for my entire Christian life but saying it and putting it into practice are two different things. Carl has been struggling with his priorities and putting God first in his life. Things came to a point on that date night that things were either going to change or drastic measure would have to be taken. Carl met with one of the elders the following Monday. I knew he was meeting in the morning and was praying hard. I was shocked to see Carl come home about 2:00 in the afternoon. He NEVER does this. I was scared to hear what he had to say. The last time he came home in the middle of the day it was not good news. He told me that he had been praying for several HOURS! The Lord was really dealing with him and he came home to ask forgiveness and repent. I was shocked and so proud of him. Things got even better on Saturday when he went to my parents and asked their forgiveness. WOW! The next day was Sunday and Carl had been planning to go before the church and repent. I knew this was the real test of whether this repentance was real. I had seen changes already in him but really needed to see him do this. He walked right up to the front of the church with one of the elders and truly repented. He asked my forgiveness and the kids and even the churches for not treating his family as God intended. I was crying especially when the men of the church gathered around him right at the front of the church and prayed for him. It was amazing to hear their prayers and see grown men wrap their arms around my husband in great big bear hugs. I was thankful, amazed, tearful, and joyful all the same time. It has taken us many years and many struggles to get to this point. I realize that Carl did not mess up this family on his own. I take part of the blame in this. Carl and I have been drawing closer to God each day and closer to each other. We have never communicated as well as we have these past couple weeks. Perfection, NO! Grace and mercy and forgiveness, YES!!!!!! Carl getting up and repenting before the church did more to make me trust and love him than anything he has ever done in our whole marriage. I am so proud of MY MAN!!!!! Now back to the story about Esther. We have been reading Hero Tales as part of Bible in school. We were reading about Moody this week. Each story has character qualities that the kids need to copy and illustrate. One of them this week was repentance. Esther copied the definition: repentance is not just saying you're sorry for sin, but going in a new direction. Her drawing is what brought tears to my eyes. She drew a picture of Carl before the church repenting. She drew the people and the elders and everything. I was just so thankful for the wonderful picture of repentance that God has given to our family. Please pray as now that we are starting to make some changes that the fiery darts of Satan would be useless against our family.

The rest of the story

Alex woke up for church and felt fine. He was fine all through church. After lunch I started to notice that he was really quiet and kind of off by himself. He eventually came to me and said he had a headache. I told him we would get ready to go. An hour later, yes I know, we finally left. We stopped by Pelicans, a snowball stand for you Northern people, on the way home. Alex did not finish his snowball and now I knew he did not feel well. He kind of perked up at home. I decided to take a nap for a while, a very rare luxury. The kids were either napping, watching TV, or working with Carl. Carl had to go to home depot around 5:00. He took two of the kids with him. When he left Alex expressed a desire to bake something. I was encouraged that he was finally feeling better. He picked a recipe and got out all the ingredients. He loves to bake and I normally just let him do his thing. He came to me about 10 minutes later and told me he needed my help. He told me he needed help concentrating. Red flags started going off in my head. I jumped up and went to help him. I asked him to read the first ingredient. He said "flour". So far so good. I then asked him to read the measurement and that is when I grabbed the phone to call the doctor. He could not read it. He got very upset at this point. I noticed his face was ticking and he started wandering around the kitchen mumbling. Things kind of got scary at this point. I was trying to call Carl to tell him to get home NOW! I accidentally called my mom and freaked her out. She was in church at the time. I found out later that she immediately left church and was ready to come up to our house but my dad stopped her. At this point Alex's speech went haywire. He could not form any words and his eyes just started to look around vacantly. I sat him down on the ground and had enough knowledge to know that I had to get everything out of his way. The thing that upset me the most was once I got him down on the ground he began to speak again, except it was only one word. He looked right at me and just kept repeating the word "please" over and over again. I lost it. I could do nothing to help him. I gently laid him down on the floor and yelled at one of the kids to get a pillow. That is when things got even crazier. Carl called and I not so gently told him to GET HOME! Nathan is standing over Alex asking what is wrong. Tirzah is crawling over Alex and trying to get him to play. The doctor calls back and at the moment I turned to pick up the phone Alex went into a full blown seizure. At this point I am screaming at the nurse. She tells me to hang up and call 911. Don't know how my hands managed to dial the number, keep Tirzah off Alex, move the high chair, and yank Alex's glasses off his face but I did. I just remember calling out to God LOUDLY over and over. The 911 operator must have thought I was crazy. I managed to get out what was happening. The seizure only lasted a minute but it felt like forever. I have never been so scared in my life. Carl decides to walk in the door at this moment. I hand him the phone because I just want to hold my son at this moment. Alex actually gets a little combative right after the seizure. By the time the calvary arrives he is no longer convulsing and is in the typical post seizure state. After they assure us that he is fine I feel a little better. I am trying to type all this before the kids all wake up but my window of time has ended. I will continue the story at a later time, hopefully tonight.

The Last Few Days

Complete and utter exhaustion. That is how I feel right now. I am so tired that I cannot sleep. Have you ever been there? It has been a whirlwind of a few days. Let me start back a few weeks ago. We went on vacation to Colorado. It was a very stressful trip with wrecking the van, breaking my foot, and several other injuries to various children. I came home to about 20 loads of laundry and all the unpacking. Carl had army duty the day we got back so he was not able to help me. He did as much as he could and he was so sweet trying to take a lot of the load off of me. The next few weeks I truly believe that I was in a cycle of severe depression. I did not get a lot done and just sat around. I was overwhelmed with the upcoming school year and trying to deal with some behavior issues that are evident in the kids. It has really been in the last week and half that the Lord has really been working in my heart. I was trying to do everything in my own power and I was failing miserably. I decided to just emerse myself in things of the Lord. I starting really making time for Him. My prayer life increased and so did my joy. I started to really feel like I could get back on track with my relationship with the Lord. The kids and I started reading the book Crazy Love together and I really started to see some changes in them. I think now now that the Lord was preparing my heart for what happened this weekend. He knew that I needed to be close to him to get through the last couple days. It all began with William. He came in our room about 5:30 on Saturday morning. We had spent Friday at the beach so we all were very tired and had slept well. He came in and told me that Alex was shaking the bed so bad that Alex woke him up. Very groggy at this time in the morning it took me a minute to realize what he was saying. He finally got through to me that Alex was convulsing. When that finally hit me I jumped up and ran into his room. Alex had stopped shaking by this time but had fallen out of bed. When I found him he was unresponsive and had a huge amount of saliva bubbled in his mouth. That was when it really hit me what had happened. My sweet 13 year old teenager had experienced a seizure. Alex was completely out of it but we were finally able to get him in our room and everyone went back to sleep. Except for me. I stayed watching him and looking up seizures on my iPad. I really was questioning whether he really did have one since I did not witness it. Of course right as I drifted off to sleep Alex popped up and started asking me whether we were going to Baba's house and whether he could get dressed. He was fine and had no memory of what had happened. I now realize that this is very normal and his deep sleep and unresponsivness was him recovering from the seizure. We decided to take him to the doctor and got a 10:30 appointment. On the way there we stopped by Golden Corral and that is when I noticed he was acting strangely. He did not eat anything and for Alex that is unusual, especially since Golden Corral is his favorite restaurant. By the time we got to the doctor he was just not himself. He was answering questions with one word answers and ended up laying on the floor of the exam room. When the doctor did his exam he was dizzy and kind of falling all over the place. She call the neurologist and the fear was that he was continuing to have small seizures that we were unaware of. Off to the ER we went. About 10 minutes before we got there he completely perked up and became his normal self. They did nothing in the hospital but monitor him for a while and then send us home. They told us that we would need to see the neurologist the first thing on Monday morning. We went home thinking this was going to be a one time thing. I of course had him sleep in our room so I could keep an eye on him. The next morning, Sunday, he woke up fine so off to church we went. Right now I am very tired so I will continue the rest of the adventure at another time, hopefully not 3 months from now.