Count It All Joy (part 2)

My brethren, count it all joy when you fall into various trials,  knowing that the testing of your faith produces patience.  But let patience have its perfect work, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking nothing.  If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God, who gives to all liberally and without reproach, and it will be given to him.  But let him ask in faith, with no doubting, for he who doubts is like a wave of the sea driven and tossed by the wind.

Here I sit. Rather annoyed. I wont go into why Im annoyed, but lets just say …I get annoyed sometimes. I get annoyed with family members, ya know, because living with people has its moments when it kind of just rubs you the wrong way. Mostly though Im annoyed with myself for being annoyed. I mean, really, what would I rather be doing?  I can remember my first day home from the hospital with my twin girls 10 1/2 years ago. Two beautiful, perfect, stunningly beautiful and healthy baby girls. I mean they were gorgeous, thats not my point, Ill get there in a mo, just let me say all this first. They came out via c-section absolutey perfect, Im telling ya! Such gorgeous rosy skin, screaming their faces off, but they were beautiful…. and they were twins, two of them. I was thrilled, I mean I was huge, and sick, having two people yanked out of your body by an over zealous intern …I dont know, it just made me sick! I puked. Thats not my point either.

What was my point…

I spent five days recovering in the hospital from that c-section. I can remember looking at my messed up body, I mean I was tore up, crying, asking the nurse ‘When will this go away?!’ ‘This’ being the stretch marks, the saggy skin, I was a monster! The nurse said ‘Let me guess, you used to wear bakinis?’ I sobbed… My girls were over 6lbs each and I had gone 38 weeks before I started begging the dr to please take them out of me, they werent budging! So the c-section was planned for a week later. I had them, they were perfect upon evacuation… then I had to start being a mum, mom, whatever you want to call it. I was one of those. In the hospital I had quite a bit of support, the breastfeeding consultant was SO helpful (even tho I nearly suffocated Sophie. Her whole head turned REALLY blue!). The nurses had heard about me because the dr delivering me was bragging that he had delivered nearly 13 lbs of baby. My husband, however, was still in the UK … long story, visa issues…  That first night was a good night. Talk about starting as you mean to go on. I can remember being driven home with my beautiful babies, we get home, evening rolls around and I can remember trying to get us all down for bed. They start crying, in unison. I can remember not panicking at all, I was a bit overwhelmed, obviously, but I didnt panic. I mean I was a new mum and nervous, and felt alone, I did, but I scooped them both up into my arms and said to myself ‘Well… what exactly did I expect?’ and nursed and loved them both till we all fell asleep. It was a good kind of ‘what did I expect?’, sort of me saying ‘Well, just get on with it, you signed up to love them and be their mummy, lets do this!’

For some time I had that attitude. It was the honeymoon period after being saved, born again. Then something  happened. I can look back now and see when and why and how I lost that joy. Being a wife AND a mum, that was hard (here comes that stupid lump in my throat)… I can remember getting to a point where I no longer had that attitude ‘What did I expect?’ This is where I lost that joy…. and to be truthful I think for the longest time, since losing it, Ive been searching for it! Funny, that! Now I get stuck in James chapter 1 and particularly those first few verses, as if, (as if! I know what He’s doing!)…(‘He’ being God)…its as if Im being led to rediscover that joy again. To pick up where I left off. Problem is…

…what is the problem?  Stubbornness? But stubbornness needs a host, like a parasite, a willing host. Here I sit, annoyed, frustrated maybe, with the lot of them for one reason or another, some valid reasons, some not so valid. Im mostly annoyed with myself! And humbled, thinking back to those first few days of our lives together.

The joy I had at first is still avaliable through Christ, all HE needs is a willing host!

If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God, who gives to all liberally and without reproach, and it will be given to him.  But let him ask in faith, with no doubting…

Father, I sincerely pray that today I may have the wisdom to respond with kindness when Id rather be frustrated. That  Id be filled with your joy to full capacity, overflowing, beaming with the joy and life I know you promised to those who trust you. Im sorry for doubting, because you know I have, OH you know I have! Ive even been angry with you for the things Ive not liked very much about my life, and for that Im very sorry. I praise you for the life you provide, I pray I can walk in it more today then I did even at the start of my walk with you. I love you, adore you, worship you. You are my everything. In Jesus name. Amen.

Count It All Joy…

Im not sure what to say actually, and I cant promise this wont be disjointed or that it will even make much sense… but here goes.

Been reading in the book of James. Chapter 1 to be precise. Interesting stuff. Here’s what it says…

My Bretheren, count it all joy when you fall into various trials….

Then a cross reference is to Acts 5:41

So they departed from the presence of the council, rejoicing that they were counted worthy to suffer in His name…

‘His Name’ being that of Jesus Christ. And I must admit that I have never ‘considered it ALL joy’ whenever *I* have fallen into ‘various trials’, even if it was for the sake of doing something in Jesus’ name, as much as I love Him, I have never considered it joy to suffer at all. Maybe its something I hadnt previously understood fully.  Some of the trials I have faced were rather painful actually. Even now, I find some things difficult and I well up when I dwell too much on them. For instance, missing my family in America, that is a particular ‘trial’ that I find especially painful to think about… especially this time of year. I wont go into the history of it on account of having no time to do so at the present, but maybe I will someday… What Im trying to say is that I am finally getting ‘it’ when it comes to ‘trials’… not necessarily the rejoicing bit, altho I do get it… and Ill go into that in a moment… but the ‘various trials’ part. You see, and I know some of my friends, maybe even some of my family will even dig what Im saying, but for those of you who dont I have to clear that part up. You see, I know that when someone meets Jesus Christ, they are never the same. In fact I find it hard to believe that anyone who actually meets with him would walk away from him. I should put it this way, that whenever we choose to take him up on his offer, His free gift of life, salvation, and we actually walk with him, hand in hand as it were, we are never the same. I have just enough time to look back now on my walk of faith in Christ to know this much. I also know that I had no idea what I was ‘getting myself into’ when I started this journey, NO idea whatsoever, it was definately a leap of faith. My friends and family know that too. I knew, something in me *knew* to take His hand and never, ever look back. And I havent. Through various trials of all sorts, and while I never rejoiced before now FOR the trials, I have known pure joy IN them. That joy is a result of something I now *know* I could get NOwhere else. Its a result of genuinely knowing my Creator, my Sustainer, who is also my Comforter, and I believe you cant know what the heck Im talking about if you havent known Christ for yourself.

Ive even spent some time doubting and taking up some of the concerns of my friends, family, the world(!), that Jesus is just some cultural religious icon, nothing more then a good man, maybe. One of the many religious icons, on the par of Ghandi, (whoever else is a posterchild for peace and humility, moral uprighteousness…etc, etc). I have spent some time wandering, considering all those types of things. I keep coming back to the fact that there are things about Jesus Christ that I cant deny and which defies all that. That He indeed was more then all that. This is where I find it hard to articulate actually. To look at Jesus Christ as …someone other then who He said he was… is to really misunderstand him. To look at Him and not consider that He *might* be more then who the culture around us, the secular media and culture, thinks he is, I have to admit that would be a *great* shame. To look at Him and scoff is bad enough, scoff at me all you want, thats ok. However tonever actually consider all the claims for yourself, or even check out all the claims for youself… I dont know what to call that, shallow, and definately more than unfortunate.

That was a bit of an aside, I did get sidetracked there. I was talking about joy in trials. Im going back to that now… You see, because  the rest of those verses in James 1 about rejoicing in trials brings me back to my original point and goes a little something like this…

My bretheren…blahblahblah, various trials…keep rejoicing….(here it goes)

knowing that the testing of your faith produces patience, but let patience have its perfect work, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking nothing. If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God, who gives to all liberally and without reproach, and it will be given to him.

Having complete faith, no doubt whatsoever, complete confidence that God, who IS wisdom, will give you the wisdom you are asking for. Now, if you do that, you have to expect to be surprised. Because… like I said earlier, anyone who meets with thE Living God will never be the same. I have asked for that wisdom, and recieved. Its not anything like the wisdom of the world around us. It does produce patience, and more. In fact, that kind of testing, that sort of wisdom produces an ability to wait for God to do what he says he will accomplish in you. And again I come to the riches of knowing Christ. There is nothing like it! Nothing on this earth can stand up to it, nothing compares to it. There IS nothing to compare it to!

So, I never rejoiced in trials for the sake of suffering some kind of masochistic, altruistic, pious nonsense… dont get me wrong. I have rejoiced during trials because through them Jesus Christ gave me some kind of supernatural, incrediblely real joy. Ive rejoiced in the riches Ive found in Christ during trials, Ive rejoiced that in those trials Ive seen Him at work in ways that I couldnt have imagined before knowing Him. Ive rejoiced after a trial for a) Getting thru it,  not only unscathed, but changed, humbled, stronger, wiser (I like that one;)) and b) because what God said He would accomplish with that trial, prior to walking into it, was amazingly and miraculously most certainly accomplished! I rejoice now, because the foundation laid during those trials is eternal and will never be moved. And I rejoice that God began a work in me, in my family, my husband, my children, even my parents, brother and sister (even some of my friends who I pray for regularly… you unsaved heathen freaks!), a work that will be completed… I rejoice a lot actually about that one.

Ive learned that to know Christ requires a massive shift in understanding ..things like trials (and everything else to be honest). Understanding what hope is, that you hope for what is real, tangeable. Its not an empty concept, this is what the world around us describes it as. To know Jesus Christ is to know what peace is, and again, in reality its the polar opposite of what the world around us describes it as. These things are not shallow and hollow, empty or meaningless tidings. They are very much real and I will be as bold as to say that we can find the depth of their truth and meaning nowhere else save IN Jesus Christ. Some may be satisfied with the lesser meanings, but Im talking about depth, even truth of their meanings and not just what these words mean, but what they truely are. The fullness of knowing them..for real.

Saturday…

Today is my ‘massive cleaning before Christmas’ day. I was on my hands and knees washing the floor in the kitchen all morning. Im afeared this may be all Im able (traslate ‘willing’) to do… bc I stink and need a bath. I dont mind housework. I even like a clean house. I hate a mess that somehow mysteriously appears within 30 minutes of me finishing all that hard work. I must keep in mind this is the plight of mothers and housewives the world over. Its also ‘clear our the freezer’ weekend! What a treat!! There’s yummy stuff in there that I had forgotten ALL about. Mostly soups, bc I love them but no one else is a massive fan. So we had some chicken dumpling soup, chicken noodle soup, and potato soup with cabbage. I also found some Wholewheat Honey and Yogurt bread. YUM!! I was all bummed bc I didnt go shopping this week as a result of a minor(ish) tooth emergency. My poor husband suffered an abcess in his … face… and by divine intervention we were able to see a dentist on a friday, otherwise it wouldnt have been a minor(ISH) emergency, it would have proven to be a full blown MAJOR emergency as his face was found to be swole up today upon waking even tho he managed to get some antibiotics yesterday. I cant imagine how bad it would have been if I couldnt get in touch with an emergency dentist. So in an effort to get thru to the dentist yesterday morning I didnt get to do my weekly grocery shop. Which really is ok actually. We’ve got all we need. Cat food, toilet roll, frozen leftovers… each other… and a recovering daddy! What more could we want?

My girls are busy doing girlie things like making posters for their latest club ‘Tiara Club’ (invented today after what must have been an unsuccessful attempt at revamping their old ’spy club’)….

Their poster reads something like this (in very pretty and girlie colours and lettering)…

‘Join our Tiara Club… Only 10p… which will be donated to charity (the one I volunteer at, very altruistic I think)…NO BOYS ALLOWED! OK?! PAY OR ELSE!!’ and other such girlie-nesses. I asked her why it was so bossy? She smiled and said she didnt know.

and other such stuff. Josh is eating, and…. eating… and eating some more. Denis is sleeping. He must be very unwell for him to not be on the computer saving some distant online middle earth sort of world from certain destruction.

On an off topic sort of rant, since this is what this post is turning out to be anyway… I was at the charity shop, which I volunteer at on a thursday afternoon, and we managed to get a 6ft christmas tree for a fiver, a King James Bible (woohoo!!) and some other stuff but the reason for my off topic rant here is the KJV Bible. Ive read from an NIV and NKJV for years now and havent read a kjv since I was a baby christian 11 years ago. I loved it back then and, I mean, I knew I missed it but just how much I didnt realise until I found this tiny very old and delicate book that came into the shop and seemed to just wait for me for a few days when I could pick it up and lovinly pour over it again. The language in it is just beautiful and seems so much more full of meaning and depth. My other versions seem to lack something. I cant put my finger on it but I just want to pour over this little book. Denis and I ordered a KJV Bible last week from amazon… Its a Greek and Hebrew dictionary study bible, so we’re eagerly waiting for that one too but it was lovely to find this one in the shop.

This was a random sort of post. My apologies. Its just nice to keep a record of my random thoughts …even if its just for me, I guess… its also nice to have something I *need* to do in the way of avoiding housework…;)

Im sorry Im not so good at this posting in my blog thing…/The (obligatory) Christmastime entry

Im having another go. Im sure any of my friends or family who have visited my blog have long since given up hope on me ever blogging again seeing that I havent since my first or second entry. I dont even know what to say. I dont care, Ill say stuff anyway.

Tis the Christmas season and Oh how I love the Christmas season.

I have never been any good at doing the Christmas stuff tho. The running around like a mad woman, the getting all the pressies in, the decorating, the baking, the christmas day planning. Ive never ever ever never ever been any good and being consistant with any of that. My poor family. They have to put up with whatever they get on Christmas day. For 11 years its been like this and this year is no different. I LOVE the Christmas season actually. I LOVE Christmas music. LOVE IT!! In the shop this morning and when I was walking home I realised I was singing ‘Oh I wish it could be Christmas every daaaAaay!’ because it was playing in the shop, didnt even realise it until I left the shop. I even dont mind the cold weather. What I dont like is when my house is cold and I cant afford to heat it bc the price of gas is SO high! But, we snuggle up and in the end dont mind it. Nevermind that, this will be a post about Christmas… Our christmases.

Now, we do try to do bible study every day, the kids and I. I am not always so good at that either, but again, thats another story (and we are getting better, more disciplined). Yesterday, I had Julie open the bible to a proverb so we could read it before we dashed out the door for the school run. She opened it to a very apt one actually.  It was Proverbs 17. I only read the first verse…

Better is a dry morsel with quietness,
Than a house full of feasting with strife.

That is kind of the story of my life. Now, we all know life is full of all kinds of strife and our family life is no exception and as the kids are getting older, boy is ours NO exception. Coming up to Christmas tho this is having a deeper meaning. And Im sure there are millions of blog entries out there about the ‘real meaning of Chrismas’, whatever that is… to us, in the strictest sense, it is about Christ’s birth, even tho everybody knows it never happened on Dec 25th. I dont know what the real meaning of Christmas is to anybody else. Even to us. Every year, its as if God is stripping us more and more down to the financial bone. And I dont mind one bit. Oh I am so greatful for it,actually. Now, its not nice on my pride, or in regards to  my desire to have more things. BUT, having ‘a dry morsel in peace [rather then] a house full of feasting with strife’… THAT is priceless! (I guess its a good thing too), but, Im not even sure we’d strive for it if we werent forced to financially. Its nice to get ‘things’ for christmas, but being full of the Joy of Christ, THAT is priceless! And it IS pure JOY! Its REAL joy. Knowing Christ is real peace! Eternal, solid, a FACT that nothing and NO one can take away.

Now, every day is a new realisation of the joys of knowing Jesus Christ but Christmas time is a special time of …how do I say it… being challenged for me as a christian and a daughter of God. Every year is the same actually. I want more stuff for my kids under the tree. Ill just be honest. Id love a few other things for myself actually as well. But it doesnt happen.  Every year its less and less and actually every year I stress and wrestle less and less about it.

This year tho Im actually planning on a joyful Christmas no matter what we’ve got under the tree … hang on, I think we decided on not even getting a tree this year! So, no matter what we ‘get’ this year, *I* as the mother and keeper of my home am intentionally being NOT stressed, not overcommitted, having less ’schtuff’, and more peace and fun and joy and more focus on Christ then EVER. Thats the bit Im not sure about. How to have more focus on Christ, but its the first year of being intentional about it, so not too much pressure there, just gonna roll with it, walk it out in faith.

Its all good.

We are supposed to be fishing…

Now… today, we were supposed to go fishing. However, its Denis’ day off we had company late last night and didnt go to bed till late and at half 2 in the afternoon, he’s snoring away on the setee. So I went to take pics of the kids while they played out in the field behind our house. I have no idea how to publish photos here so Ill have to wait for it. They’re good. As usual… I just cant help it I guess, I take awesome photos! What can I say. Anyway, I guess night fishing can be just as fun and …day fishing. I was looking forward to it as well…. oh well, its a glorious day out as well. Anyway. I got my new cd today, matthew west Happy. Its got my current favourite song on it More…

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mITRKCDel44

That there’s a link. Or it should be a link to that song. And now, here’s a link Ive been sharing with everyone, so if you’ve seen it already sorry, but its funny. I think anyway… here’s a link…

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-ltqz…e=channel_page

Does anyone know how to upload pics here. Oh well. Ill figure this all out soon enough. How do you make this all pretty and personalised? Anyone?  Well, I actually have nothing more exciting to blog about so…. Ill be off now…

My first blog entry

Wow, Ive wanted a blog for …well ages now. And here it is and here is my first entry and here is me not knowing what to say. Its our first day of summer holidays in Plymouth. We made it thru a school year here. Its been challenging to say the least. Interesting. I love plymouth, its a very very nice place to live, and I do believe thats an understatement. Its quite central to all the most beautiful spots in England. We’ve probably tapped into a very small portion of that so far. In my mind Im still settling in. This summer has the potential to be a busy one, if I feel up to it. Its been a challenge in settling in because when we moved we lost everything. EVERYTHING. Thats another story, there are lots of other stories in our lives. Ill type a bit about myself here, since its my first entry, and this could be messy, disjointed, uuum… confusing. It is for me anyway. Im Gen. Im 32. Im married to a wonderful, hard working man, Denis. Im American, he’s british. We’ve been married for 10 years (almost 11 actually) and we have three awesome kids. Me… Wife, mum, American Brit. What else is there? Im a devoted Christian and have been for almost 11 years. I love my husband, I love my kids, I love Christ. Now, the rest of me… thats where it gets … confusing, interesting, boring, who knows, depends on your perspective. All that makes up who I am, and, ya know, defines me, but there is so much more. I think every wife and mum/mom gets to a point where they are lost in these roles. This is kind of where I am at. Im at the start of another very big adventure. A lot behind us, and the unknown ahead of us. This is where trust comes in. My blog will have a lot to do with God, for me, to know me is to know that that will be an inevitability. This blog is also, for me, to do with a bit of self discovery. So, Im kind of at a point where everything about me, apart from what Ive already mentioned is subject to change. Im a sahm. But that is subject to change, very soon, bcuz at this point, I have to be honest and say its driving me NUTS! When my kids were babies (they were the best, most fun children to be around!!!), well I was very busy, they needed me so much more and in such a different way. Now, they still need me, but well, its different. And Im guessing to be needed, for a mamma, is very important. Im feeling like a 5th wheel, a packhorse, someone who runs behind everyone picking up after everyone, and its just chaos, for me. *I* need to change ‘with the times’.  And this is what this blog is about. And probably a lot more. The half hasnt been told yet….

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