This blog has been put on hold lately. Despite my best intentions to keep the family journal/scrapbook via blog yearbooks ongoing, I honestly just got over committed last December. So, I am playing catch up and adding events from previous months. But, at the same time, I plan to start journaling the present too. God is doing some major molding and revamping of my heart and it just helps to get it all out sometimes! I hope one day you girls can see the ways God works through the "ordinary" by reading my non-formal vomiting of feelings on here every once and a while. And, non of it is genius or rocket science~so just try to have patience with me!
REST~~~
That's been a reoccurring topic God undoubtedly wants me to settle into--
rest of my mind
rest of my soul
rest of my body
rest in my thoughts
rest in my heart
rest in my actions
just overall a woman in REST!
I caught myself crying out to Him that I got the message. I know I desperately need to rest in the peace that comes from His truth and love. I just have trouble engaging in the active state of REST. (and although that might sounds contradictory to some, to me, rest is very much going to be a result of actively choosing it on my part!) At first anyway, but I have complete faith that soon it will come as natural to me as driving, eating, playing, etc.
So, back to the crying out~~"What do you mean by rest? Really, I know you know my current calendar and the schedules I am trying to keep up with. Don't you think I want to REST? I just can't figure out what you mean exactly." While I was hoping He was saying "lay down and take a little nap, my beloved Mande" I knew too well that He was asking me to find rest in the midst of the choas! To find a stillness in my soul in the midst of my current circumstances of mom of many, wife of one, friend to all, daughter of two, manager of a at home job, volunteer of the less fortunate, servant of church, coordinator and cleaner of the home, landscaper of the yard, and on and on.
Kindly, I was shown a picture of what it would look like this week. And, as simple as it was...it sent chills across my body to feel and hear His presence ever so real and close to my plea, a supplying of my answer from so many prayers lately. And, as much as I would have liked it to be a vision of what the "outcome" of this heart change would look like through the completion of certain circumstances, it was actually SO much better! See, I think rest can only come when a job is finished. When the work load is over. I can only feel relief when the crisis is over and I know the outcome. Otherwise, I settle into the anxiety of analyzing all the different ways it could play out. Are you getting the picture of why He might be calling me into a place of "rest."
So, here Adelynn and I were in the hottest part of the day on one of the hottest days this year. I desperately needed to go for a run to allow my mind some time to "deal." Running lets me sort of veg-out. I guess because I am not at home to let my hands find work to get into so my legs just take me somewhere, anywhere and my mind can just follow it's own path. I loaded her in the stroller with all she might need to take the journey-water, snack, sunglasses, toys, and a few more things she snuck in there. Off we went. My praise music going in my ears and my mind found a happy place. Then, God joined right in step with me. As Christy Nuckols was singing about coming "out of the ordinary and into the glorious" I felt His glazed fall directly on me. In the heat, I felt the chills of His awesome presence. And, He simply said "look down at your girl." There she laid in the stroller with sunglasses on, sweat dripping down her face, arms limp and in a complete and total state of REST despite and chaos surrounding her. It was HOT, cars zooming by with loud noises, bumps constantly in the road, the constant voice of her momma as I prayed aloud, speeding up and slowing down and, yet, she was at peace during the "battle." I was carrying the burden for her--all she had to do was agree to take the ride with me. And, it hit me right in the heart, instead of trying to find a way out of the "battle," if I just with hop in with Him, He will take my burdens (even give me some sunglasses to help block out the devils schemes against me) and rest is possible through it all. I will be made new through the challenges, I will be molded into more like Christ BUT I must stop squirming in the heat and put on the armor He has given me and start taking one victory at a time. I don't have to know the route or the destination--the ordinary for me no longer is enough. He is calling me "into the GLORIOUS" and I am jumping in. I hope I will showcase the "rest" aspect. I caught a glimpse of it and now I crave more. Not depending on my circumstance, but because of the peace offered in spite of it.
Happy Labor Day weekend!!
