God is a giver. From the very first book of the Bible, Genesis, God gives good gifts to His children. He gifts Adam with a companion, Eve. He gifts both of them with the Garden of Eden, providing a place to live and work. He gifts them the trees as food. Even after sin enters the world, we see God giving gifts and blessings to His children. So it’s no surprise that the Holy Spirit gives gifts to people as well. God’s gifts are meant to be shared with others. There’s no stinginess in the nature of God.
In 1 Corinthians 12, Paul talks about the spiritual gifts God gives various people to help with the work of the church as a whole. Each gift is important and necessary if God’s church is to do its job in the Kingdom of God. Every person has a spiritual gift. The gifts are given at the discretion of the Holy Spirit. No gift is better than another. There isn’t supposed to be prestige attached to any particular gifting or calling in the church, but how often do we look at ourselves and downplay our spiritual gifts?
Many times in the body of Christ, we feel insignificant and unimportant. I often hear people complain about their lack of talent, envy another’s gifting, or lament that they are “just” a custodian or a nursery worker or a (insert any position outside of leadership here). I think “just” in this context must be on God’s least favorite words list. When we denounce our spiritual gifting as unimportant, we are saying that we know better than God what is good for us. When we envy the gifting of another, we miss the opportunity God has given us to play in His kingdom. Paul addresses this by using the analogy of the physical body to explain the church and its gifts.
He points out that we don’t compare our body parts to each other. We don’t favor one part over another, and in fact, we would miss any of our parts if they didn’t function properly or had something wrong with them. The same is true of the church. If you hold back your spiritual gift, if you refuse to share your talent and gifting with your local church body, the church is hindered. It’s crippled. It doesn’t function the way it was meant to function. Your spiritual gift isn’t there to make you important. It isn’t even there to bring you closer to God. Your spiritual gift is there to bring others closer to God. It’s there to serve your brothers and sisters. All of God’s gifts from salvation to the spiritual gifts mentioned in the New Testament are there to be shared with others.
By using our gifts for the benefit of others, we become more like God. We become a gift-giving people. Perhaps you don’t know what your spiritual gifts are. This online assessment can help you figure it out. There are many gifts listed in the New Testament. Some people have only one gift that they are very strong in. Some people have a mix of gifts. Whatever the case, these gifts are given the way they are given because God knows the needs of the local body. He also knows the plans He has for each person in it. Your spiritual gifts can change over time. I think this is because we all have different seasons in our life where we are asked to play different roles.
Whatever the case may be, your gift is important. Don’t be like the foolish servant who buried their talent in the ground out of fear of their master. Be like God, the Father. Share your gifts with those around you. Build up your local church body. Do your part for the Kingdom. We will miss you if you don’t!
“Repent, then, and turn to God, so that your sins may be wiped out, that times of refreshing may come from the Lord, and that he may send the Messiah, who has been appointed for you–even Jesus.”
Do you feel heavy laden? Do you feel burdened by your past sins and mistakes? Peter knew that his audience needed a spiritual awakening and revival. He knew their sins weighed heavy against them. So he admonished the people to repent and turn to God.
Sin separates us from God and from everything He has in store for us. It creates a barrier. A wall that stands in the way of the blessings God has already provided. When we have unconfessed sin in our lives, we can’t receive from God. The flow of blessings has been closed off by our sin. We need to remove the barrier if we want the blessings to flow again. Repentance does this for us. When we repent, we change the way we think about our behavior, about our identity, and about God. The change within our hearts that leads us to repentance acts like a catalyst to a change in our behavior.
We turn away from our sin and toward God. When we confess our sins to God, He is faithful to forgive our sins and cleanse us from them (1 John 1:9). He wipes them out. They no longer exist. He removes the barrier that separates us from Him. The flow of blessings is restored. We can receive spiritual refreshment directly from God. Not only that, but we receive Jesus himself in our hearts. We acknowledge Him as our Messiah.
If you are struggling a lack of refreshment in your life, take an inventory and see if there is any unconfessed sin in your life that might be hampering the work of the Holy Spirit in your life. Repent, turn to God, and receive refreshment.
Father, I thank you that you sent your son Jesus to die on the cross as payment for my sin. I thank you that I can come to you, confess my sin, repent, and that you are faithful to wash it away. When I repent from my sin, you make it as though it never happened. You wipe the slate clean. I don’t want anything to separate me from your presence, Lord, so I ask you to examine my heart. If there is any unconfessed sin in my life, bring it to my attention. I confess it now. I repent from it. I turn my heart back to you, God. Send your refreshing Holy Spirit into my life. I thank you for it in Jesus’ name, Amen.
I’m a Type A personality. I’m very goal-oriented. Nothing gives me a greater sense of satisfaction than checking off an item on my to-do list. I even put “make to-do list” on the top of the list just so I can check it off! Seriously! I love the sense of accomplishment that comes from a job well done. I also tend to have perfectionists tendencies. I have a hard time starting projects if I don’t see the perfect outcome from the outset. When things get overwhelming, I have to really focus on breaking the situation or task into smaller, more manageable chunks in order to get rid of anxiety and to feel like I can tackle it in a successful manner.
This is a great asset when you’re talking about the business world or when you’re talking about succeeding in education or work, but it’s not a great asset when you’re talking about spiritual things. On the one hand, I am driven to do my best. That’s awesome in both the temporal and the spiritual realm. God wants our best. He wants us to be a people of excellency and integrity. My drive to be the best and do my best work makes me want to be excellent and to have integrity. At the same time, I have a hard time seeing God in ways that aren’t related to works.
I have the tendency to fall into the trap of viewing God as sitting on His throne with this cosmic checklist, judging me on what I did or didn’t do. Read my Bible that morning? Check. God is happy with me. Forgot to read my Bible? No check mark. God is mad at me. This is a huge disservice to the person of God. The Bible makes it very clear that we are saved by grace and not by anything that we can do. We all know that, but do we live in a way that demonstrates that we actually believe it? Do we check off marks on our list for “good” behavior, thinking that God will bless us if we just do enough? Do we become fearful and want to give up when we don’t have enough check marks on our list?
God loves us. He loves WHO we ARE, not WHAT we DO! God wants us to do the right thing because we desire to do the right thing, not because we are afraid of doing the wrong thing or because we feel a sense of duty to do the right thing. God has blessings in store for us by virtue of the fact that we are His children. We don’t have to be perfect to be blessed by God. We just have to receive the blessings He has already given us. Ephesians 1:3 says that He has already blessed us with every spiritual blessing.
When God has work for me to do, I feel empowered, but sometimes God doesn’t call me to work. He calls me to rest. Rest is important. My body requires rest in order to restore my energy level, repair my cells, and grow. Studies show that lack of sleep leads to a host of physical health problems. My mind requires rest as well. Lack of sleep and rest results in lack of focus, an inability to concentrate, and impairs judgement. Lack of sleep impacts my emotions. It makes me more irritable, short tempered, and angry. When we’re tired, the littlest thing gets under our skin and makes us want to lash out. We can’t be Jesus to the world around us if we’re operating under sleep deprivation!
God rested. We know that God rested because the Bible tells us in the very first book, Genesis, that after God completed His work of creation He rested, and He created the Sabbath to remind us of the importance and holiness of rest. Even knowing all this, I have difficulty resting. Satan wants us to turn our backs on the work God has called us to do, but if he can’t get us to NOT work for God, he is content to wear us out working so hard for God that we forget to rest. That’s when serving God crosses the line from serving to striving.
Striving gets us nowhere. Like a hamster on a wheel, we keep running and running, trying to get closer to the blessings and the promises of God, but we make no progress. This isn’t God’s best for our life. God calls us to rest. He says in the Psalms: “Be still, and know that I am God.” He pleads with us in the Song of Solomon to “come away with” Him. Jesus tells us to “come unto me all who are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.” Isaiah tells us that our salvation is in “repentance” and “rest.” It isn’t about what we DO for the Lord, it’s about the condition of our hearts.
How beautiful it is to rest in the Lord! There are times to work. There are times to plant. There are times to water. There are times to reap and harvest. But…there are times to rest. There are times to let the ground lay fallow. There are times to cease from striving. Rest restores our soul.
I think the tendency in Type A personalities like myself is to look at rest as laziness, but rest and laziness are not the same thing. Laziness is an unwillingness to work or use energy. We are lazy when we know that it is time to work, when we have the energy and resources to do the work we’re asked to do, and when we refuse to do it. That’s laziness. The Bible has plenty of negative things to say about laziness. Slothfulness is even one of the seven deadly sins! But rest is a ceasing of work or movement in order to relax, refresh oneself, or recover strength. Rest is God’s will for us. Laziness is not.
This past year has been hard for me. The initial chaos and confusion of dealing with CPS and foster care and the court system put me into a tailspin. I fell back on my old coping mechanism of praying, “God, what do you want me to DO?” I thought maybe God was punishing me for not doing enough. I thought maybe the kids were taken because I hadn’t been diligent in cleaning the house or I hadn’t homeschooled them at a high enough level or maybe I hadn’t taught them the Bible enough or I hadn’t served enough at church or maybe….. Or maybe this wasn’t God’s will at all. That thought didn’t cross my mind until much, much later.
Not too far into my tailspin, I decided I just needed to seek God more. I just needed to have God bless my life. I just needed a miracle. So I tried doing everything I could to “earn” favor…to “earn” a miracle. It’s funny to look back on it now. I was so desperate for a miracle. I read entire books in my Bible. I prayed several times a day. I attended every church service. I read Bible study type books of all kinds. I volunteered at everything I could possibly do. I started attending two separate Bible studies. And I was worn out. I had been worn out when this whole mess started, but now I was running on fumes.
Then one morning I reached for my Bible to do some reading, and I heard God speak right to my heart. “Laura, I don’t want you to read the Bible today.” I argued with Him. That’s right. I argued with God. I told God that I was supposed to read my Bible. That’s what good Christians do! I couldn’t believe He didn’t want me to read my Bible. But I heard God say again, clear as day. “Laura, I don’t want you to read the Bible today. You’re reading it for the wrong reasons. You’re striving, and I don’t want you to strive. I don’t want you to read the Bible, and I don’t want you to pray. I don’t want you to do anything on that list of “good Christian things” as long as you’re doing it to earn a blessing. If you WANT to do it, you can, but if you’re doing it to get me to bless you, don’t bother.”
It was at that moment that I realized my entire picture of God and how He worked was wrong. I put down my Bible, and I didn’t pick it up for nearly a week. Instead, I rested. I slept in. I lazed on the couch watching TV. I barely read my stack of books that I had neatly mapped out to read. I still attended Bible study and church, but I didn’t worry if I missed a session. My prayers started to focus on what I was thankful for. I started asking God to teach me how to rest. God is faithful, and He answered those prayers.
Reading the Bible is a good thing. Prayer is a good thing. I’m not advocating that anyone give up good things. I’m advocating that we examine our motives for doing these things. Are we doing them because we want to do them? Or are we doing them because we are afraid God will punish us if we don’t? If it’s the latter, we need to look again at who God says He is throughout His word and at what our salvation really means. Faith without works is dead. That’s true. But works for the sake of earning favor is a trap of the devil! Satan is more than happy to have your life entirely out of balance. He loves when you have a false picture of God.
So if you’re like me and you find yourself in a tailspin or you find yourself striving to check items off a list to be a “good Christian,” stop. Rest. Ask God to give you a better, clearer, bigger picture of who He is. Then fall into His loving arms, and allow Him to give you the rest you so desperately need. I promise, it is well worth it!
“Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives; the one who seeks finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened.”
The sermon on the mount contains some of Jesus’ most powerful teachings. In this section, Jesus is teaching his followers about prayer. Prayer is the way we talk with God. It’s a means of communicating with Him. God isn’t a distant god. He isn’t sitting far away in heaven. We don’t have to go through complex methods of appeasing Him or gaining His favor. Instead, God is our Heavenly Father.
As our father, God is intimately concerned about us. He is close to us. He cares for us deeply. He is approachable, and He is willing to listen to us and speak with us. Just as it’s easy for us to go to earthly parents when we are young and in need of something, we can approach God when we are in need of something. Just as parents enjoy giving gifts to their children and taking care of their children’s basic needs, God enjoys giving gifts to us and taking care of our basic needs.
There is another aspect of prayer at work here as well–the concept of being persistent in prayer. The words used for ask, seek, and knock indicate that these are ongoing actions. We are to ask and keep asking for the things that we need in our everyday life. If there is any good thing which we do not have and which we need, we are to ask for it and keep asking for it until we receive it. We are to seek and keep seeking for God’s face, for relationship with Him, and for wisdom and knowledge. We should be seeking after those things that are precious to us in our relationship with God as if we were seeking after treasure. We are to knock and keep knocking on the doors of heaven that appear to be closed to us.
Jesus assures us that if we ask and keep asking, we will receive. If we seek and keep seeking, we will find what we are looking for. If we knock and keep knocking, the door will open and we will gain access to the throne of God. And this promise is not limited to the best of the best or to the lucky few, Jesus tells us that this promise is for everyone. God longs to have relationship with us. He longs to take care of our needs. He longs to speak to us and to give us good gifts. He longs to let us into His presence. All we have to do is ask, seek, and knock.
Father, thank you that through the finished work of Jesus Christ on the cross I have access to your throne room. I can come directly into your presence and speak with you face to face. Thank you that you care for me intimately and deeply. There is nothing that I need that you do not desire to give me. Father, I know that if I have a need I can bring it to you, and you will meet that need. So Father, teach me to ask and keep asking, to seek and keep seeking, and to knock and keep knocking until I know you the way that you want me to know you. My greatest desire is to have an intimate relationship with you. In Jesus’ name, Amen.
January is an interesting month. It starts with all the excitement of the Christmas holidays and New Year celebrations, and it moves into the heart of winter. There’s an atmosphere of excitement around the first few days of January. It’s full of promise and new beginnings, but by week two resolutions are broken and reality has set in. This is one of the longest months of the school calendar because school resumes after the Christmas holidays and there are no real holidays to break up the monotony until Valentine’s Day in mid-February.
Winter is a difficult month for me. I absolutely abhor the cold. Being born in the South, anything under 60 degrees instantly freezes me. I have difficulty moving around. I don’t want to be outside. I can’t possibly put enough layers on to be able to maintain my acceptable level of warmth and still be able to move. And, of course, I now live in a place where the air hurts my face….literally. This quirk serves as a never-ending source of mirth for my husband, who is naturally warm all the time. They say opposites attract, and as far as temperature is concerned, that’s certainly true of us!
My husband can be outside in the dead of winter in a light jacket and shorts. I refuse to go out in the dead of winter, preferring instead to stay inside with the heat cranked up and a humidifier going to mimic a tropical rain forest. This way, I can be in denial about how nasty the weather outside really is! Usually, our bed is covered with no less than seven layers of blankets of various thicknesses. I sleep snuggled under these layers in heavy winter pajamas and my trademark “fuzzy socks.” This past winter, however, my wonderful in-laws gifted us their Norwegian duvet to keep us warm.
Oh, heaven! I know my in-laws love me truly after this gift! I can finally get away with a light layer of PJs, light socks, and only the duvet (although on seriously cold nights I still need another blanket on top). Add my hot-blooded husband to the mix, and I can die happy! My husband puts his layer of duvet on top of me, and then begs me to put my cold feet against him so I can absorb some of his excess heat. It’s absolutely wonderful. Happiness is a warm butt….at least that’s what I think.
The other thing that gets to me about winter is the monotony of a white, snow-covered landscape. Even when the snow melts, you’re left with a nasty, muddy mess. There’s no green to be seen anywhere. The sky is an awful shade of grey, and everything just feels mucky and drab. Even the days when the sun comes out are deceptive because they look warm and inviting when they’re really icy cold and awful. I have a hard time with the lack of greenery in winter. As a result, I keep an aloe plant in my kitchen window so that I can have green all year round.
This particular aloe plant has taken on a life of mythic proportions. I purchased a small aloe two years ago as my Mother’s Day gift (my husband doesn’t do cut flowers as a gift). Originally, I had it in a reasonably sized green ceramic pot. The plant grew in height but didn’t really add any girth, so I had the brilliant idea of putting it in a larger pot to give it more room. I picked quite a large green plastic pot to use. I transplanted my aloe into some of the Miracle Grow cactus soil. I don’t know what’s in that Miracle Grow stuff, but grow it did!
The aloe is now about 2 feet tall! Its fronds hang a good six inches over the side of the pot. It’s also made some good runner offshoots. I removed four offshoots the first time I tried to clear it out. I have about six more to do now. I think I’m going to invest in some small dollar store pots and give away aloe to all my neighbors! Maybe that will be one of my pay-it-forward deeds for February, which is another awful winter month around here.
Today’s weather is typical of this time of year around here. Today was quite warm, upper 40s, which is a bit unusual. We’re getting quite a lot of rain–almost 2 inches, but it can’t last. The colder temps return tonight creating the possibility for a winter storm of nasty icy sleet, sheets of ice on surfaces, and a ton of snow tomorrow. The weather is so volatile that the main predictive models are spitting out drastically different results. On the one hand, we might get away with some icy rain mix moving to less than an inch of snow. I’d be happy with that result. On the other hand, we might get some nasty ice moving to upwards of a foot of snow. Boo! Hiss!
In keeping with my focus on positivity, I’m looking on the bright side in all this. I have nothing scheduled for tomorrow. I got my grocery shopping completed today while it was warm and before the rain really got started. I have a full tank of gas in my car. So I’m looking forward to spending my weekend knocking off some items on my January bucket list. Item number one–binge watch Netflix. I haven’t decided what show to binge yet, but I’m considering either a mystery, a sci-fi, or the Great British Baking Show because it’s extremely binge-able….is that even a word? binge-worthy, maybe? Oh, you get the picture.
I picked up some lovely thick, soft blanket yarn, and I’m itching to get a start on my Viking Ragnar blanket as the DIY knit blanket option on my bucket list. I can easily knit and watch at the same time, which will knock two items off my list. Given that a third item on the bucket list is “embrace hygge,” I might just have a triple play at work. I have some candles ready to light, hot tea ready to steep, and a CD of lovely Celtic instrumental music that is exactly what I picture “cozy” to sound like.
This is one of the ways I’m hoping to cope with the long winter. I have a long list of books I want to read. I have shows I binge watch when my teenager is home, and I have other shows I binge watch when my husband is home. Binge watching TV together is one of the relationship builders we enjoy. It’s very odd to be alone this winter. The kids left the end of January last year, but that experience was so traumatic and so surrounded with stress that it feels as if it happened ages ago. So this year, I have the unique position of being alone and being okay with it. With God’s help, I’ve made peace with this season. I’ll be happy to see it end, but I’m finding ways to be happy if it lingers a bit longer, which is exactly what it looks like at the moment.
When the kids were home, we survived winter with movie marathons, craft projects, and school days spent snuggling under comfy blankets on the couch and reading. We had a few awesome winter-time field trips that were a yearly tradition as well. It’s wonderful to take one of those cold but beautiful days and spend it riding through the snow on a sleigh, and then to warm up with hot cider and donuts at the local farm. There were sledding trips and trips to the local museum to break up the monotony as well. As a special treat, I would pick up some Turkish delight and hot chocolate from the world food section of our local grocery store, and we would enjoy it while we watched the Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe.
The curse in that movie was that the White Witch made it always winter. “Always winter, but never Christmas. Think of that!” Lucy says to her brothers and sisters in the movie, and I have to agree. Always winter is an awful curse. At least Christmas brings us joy and hope, but then we’re faced with the rest of winter, which in Michigan can last well into May. Luckily, I’ve found some new coping mechanisms to get me through the drab, dreary, coldness of the winter months. How do you survive the winter?
“He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the human heart; yet no one can fathom what God has done from beginning to end.”
This verse is really packed with two important concepts: everything is beautiful in its time, and eternity being set in the human heart. Throughout the Bible, we hear about time: season of time and God’s timing. From the creation account, we learn that God placed the sun, the moon, and the stars in the heavens so that we could mark time. Time is important for us, even if it is less important to God. Later in the Bible, we are told that God views time differently than we do– “with the Lord a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day.” (2 Peter 3:8)
So what does it mean that everything is beautiful in its time? Not everything is beautiful. We know that. There are plenty of circumstances in life that are not beautiful. There are moments of trial and tribulation. There are times of lack. But the Word says that everything is beautiful in its time. Everything is beautiful when it comes in the proper season of our lives. When we allow our lives to be governed by God’s timing, the things we encounter and experience bring beauty, even if they are not beautiful in that moment. When we work with God during times of trial and tribulation, the harvest of fruit we reap is beautiful. God always gives beauty for our ashes. When we accomplish things in God’s timing, they fit beautifully into our lives without striving and without forcing them to fit.
What about eternity? What does it mean to have eternity set in our hearts? Ever wonder why there are certain concepts that seem to be universal? We don’t have to explain them to anyone, regardless of whether or not we have the same upbringing or background. We all understand them. Things like love, beauty, and hope. We all long for things in our life to feel fulfilled. We search and we seek after things that we think will satisfy our deepest inner longings.
“There is a God-shaped vacuum in the heart of each man which cannot be satisfied by any created thing but only by God the Creator, made known through Jesus Christ.”
― Pascal
This is what the Bible means by saying that God has set eternity in the hearts of men. We have within us the knowledge that there is more to life–something that satisfies at a deep level. We all understand that the optimum level of living is one of satisfaction, of peace, and of contentment. God has given us this desire so that we will realize that only He satisfies and that life without Him is an endless pursuit of the next big thing to fill that longing.
It all comes back to our reliance on God. When we rely on God to order our steps and guide our lives, we experience things at the proper time. We experience beauty in all things because we look to what God is doing in us through that circumstance. And we experience a deep satisfaction and contentment because we are not filling our lives with useless things, but rather we are filling our lives with the very thing they need: the Spirit and presence of God.
Father, thank you that you cared enough about a relationship with me that you created me. You created me to have relationship with you. You created me to long for the kind of relationship that only You can provide. Thank you that when I rely on you to order my steps, you make everything beautiful. Even in the darkest of trials, I can see the beauty of your plan and appreciate your joy and your peace. Help me to keep my focus on you and on your timing for my life. In Jesus’ name, Amen.
If you’re really goal-oriented, then making New Year’s Resolutions and setting goals for the new year is a relatively easy and life-affirming task, but if you’re not a goal-oriented person, it can be overwhelming. Sometimes it’s hard to envision yourself a year down the road, decide who you want to be at that point and what you want to have accomplished, and then to break that all down into bite-sized manageable chunks that are measurable and will make good goals. I believe dreams should be big and goals should be small. Big dreams let our imagination run wild. We don’t have to know how we’re going to get there. It’s all about the destination. It’s about potential, whether it seems possible at the time or not.
Hold fast to dreams, for if dreams die, life is a broken-winged bird that cannot fly.
The difficulty of setting realistic, achievable goals is one of the reasons that I have chosen to pursue a word of the year. Having a word, gives the year a since of purpose. It points me in a certain direction. Then, I can gain a clearer vision of where I want to be at the end of the year. I know that anything I choose to do during that year is going to be in furtherance of that focus. Last year’s word was “breakthrough“. It meant I spent most of my year on getting through internal baggage, working through issues that had held me back. My goals involved self-help books and seminars. It was a year of struggle and growth. This year’s word is “flourish.” So my goals look a bit different.
Part of the issue of achievement is to be able to set realistic goals, but that’s one of the hardest things to do because you don’t always know exactly where you’re going, and you shouldn’t.
When I see the word flourish in my head, I get a picture of exponential growth and potential. I see abundance. I see life. It’s a huge picture than can encompass a lot of things. So I’ve broken my goals down into certain categories. There are the things I want to achieve overall throughout the year…the projects I want to do, the places I’d love to go, the things I hope to purchase, etc. Then there are the things I want to achieve on a month-to-month basis. Some of my overall goals are a one-time thing: attend such-and-such conference or go to such-and-such place. Some of my overall goals are more about consistency: drink x number of ounces of water every single day. But my month-to-month bucket list is more about enjoying the month to its fullest.
Jeremy Bishop via unsplash.com
Pinterest is a huge help with this. There are so many options to choose from! I have organized my Pinterest boards by month to make it easier. Each board has a scripture writing plan for that month. I’m utilizing that pin for the daily devotionals I am writing for this blog. Each board has a couple monthly (or sometimes seasonal) bucket lists. There is a kindness calendar for acts of kindness broken down for each day of the month, and a calendar for some type of self-care. I’m determined to live life to the fullest each day!
The great thing about these bucket lists and such is how wide-ranging they are. January’s includes things like getting a blue/white manicure and pedicure, decorating my home with a white floral arrangement, and celebrating cuddle up day or bubble bath day. It also includes things like hosting a winter’s idyll, embracing hygge, and trying a new instapot recipe. There are some DIY crafting projects included as well. I have a list of books I want to read, some of which are left over from last year’s want to read list. I keep track of them through Good Reads. And, of course, my planner is invaluable when it comes to keeping track of all this stuff.
Checking things off my various lists gives me a huge sense of accomplishment. The hard part here is to not view those lists as “must do’s” but more as “would like to do’s.” I don’t want to be so goal focused that I lose the joy of the moment. If there’s a day I don’t make any progress on these goals, or if I end the month with more than one unchecked box, I still want to be able to say that I have absolutely no regrets in how I chose to spend my time. What a wonderful idea! To end the year without feelings of pressure, stress, or discouragement. Now that’s freedom!
So far, I’m off to a good start. Here are the goals I’ve already accomplished:
Overall Goal Progress:
Yearly Goals:
1) I’ve read 27 chapters of the Bible. My ultimate goal is to read the entire Bible in one year.
2) I’ve lost 5 pounds. My monthly goal is to lose 10. My ultimate goal for the year is simply to weigh less on December 31st than I did on January 1st.
3) I’ve saved enough money to register for the Midwinter Getaway through my local church’s Women’s Ministry. This is a once a year event that I had on my bucket list for the year.
4) I saved enough money to purchase new glasses for my husband. This one was actually accomplished the last week of last year, but since I had it on my wish list for purchases for this year because I didn’t think I’d make the end of the year deadline, it’s marked off in my 2020 planner.
Monthly Goals (from my various bucket lists):
5) I began two new devotional books.
6) I set up my planner for the New Year, including planning the month of January, adding in all the already scheduled events, filling out important information, and making bullet journal pages for goals like this as well as writing out my resolutions.
7) I decorated my home for the month of January, using snowmen and white floral arrangements. I also put out winter scented candles.
8) I took some time to cuddle up and read on Cuddle Up day as well as celebrated Bubble Bath day.
9) I purchased the planner I mentioned above, plus began some bullet journaling in the designated pages.
10) I watched an episode of Marie Kondo’s show Tidying Up on Netflix.
11) I finished reading three of the books on my reading list, including 2 specific to the winter reading program at my local library.
12) I tried a new instapot recipe. (Full confession–all the recipes I try for my instapot are new since I just got the instapot as my Christmas gift this past year!)
13) I made some crochet boot cuffs from a pattern I had planned to use last year.
14) I celebrated JRR Tolkien Day (part of my idea to celebrate the random weird holidays of each month) by watching Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers on Netflix.
That’s a huge sense of accomplishment for just the first full week of January! This year feels lighter already and more full of abundance. It’s like the air around me is electrified with promise and possibility. I can’t wait to see how much I get done by the end of 2020!!
“Brothers and sisters, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus.”
Regrets are a terrible thing. They keep our mind focused on what might have been instead of on what is. When we meditate on our past failures, we lose sight of the opportunities around us. The same thing is true if we meditate on our past successes. We can live so long in our glory days that we forget to pay attention to the opportunities to do something new and spectacular today. Paul understood the danger of focusing on the past–whether it be past sins and regrets or past successes and victories. He knew that the only way forward was to look straight ahead to the next opportunity.
Philippi was an ancient city in Greece. The people of Philippi would have been surrounded by Greek culture, and a big part of that culture were the Olympic games. One event of the Olympic games was the long jump. When athletes competed in the long jump, they held onto heavy weights. They had trained with these weights to strengthen their muscles. The weights were supposed to increase the distance of their jump. Athletes would hold onto these heavy weights until the height of their jump, then suddenly they would throw them off behind them and use the inertia to propel themselves forward in search of the greatest distance and the prize.
Paul, in this analogy, is comparing the works of our past to those heavy weights. In order to gain the maximum distance, we have to let go of our past. We have to throw the past far behind us, leave it there, and not look back. Instead, our focus should be on what God has in store for us today and in our future. In that way, we can continue to move forward in faith and win the prize that God has in store for us.
How sad it would be to end our lives and find that we had missed out on countless opportunities to see God’s glory and blessings in greater measure simply because we allowed our past to hinder our future. So let go of the past and those things that are behind you; take hold of the opportunities of today; and press forward with renewed hope in the limitless possibilities of tomorrow. You’ll be amazed at what God has in store for you!
Father, I thank you that you have great plans for me and for my life. Today, I am letting go of the things that have held me back. I am throwing away the weights of my past–the good AND the bad. Instead, Father, I want to focus on what you’re doing in my life right now and where you’re taking me in the future. Help me to keep my eyes focused on you. Help me to press forward in faith so that I can attain the full prize you have in store for me. In Jesus’ name, Amen.
Life is hard. Sometimes life is really, really hard. Right now, I’m experiencing the really, really hard part of life. It’s an on-going struggle with good days and bad days. The trials we go through in life often make us wonder where God is in all of this. These are the times when we have to walk by faith because there’s nothing else to walk by….no light of our own circumstance to say we’re on the right path. I could focus on all the things that are going wrong in my life right now, but instead, I’m choosing joy.
Over and over again, the Bible tells us to rejoice. Rejoice in the Lord, rejoice in trials, rejoice in suffering, rejoice and be glad….rejoice! A cursory google search listed at least 66 verses dealing with some version of rejoicing. God knows our struggles and our trials, and He experienced our heartache and our pain when He came to earth as Jesus Christ. How can He possibly expect us to rejoice in difficult times?
Joy and happiness are wonderful feelings to experience, but are very different. Joy is more consistent and is cultivated internally. It comes when you make peace with who you are, why you are and how you are, whereas happiness tends to be externally triggered and is based on other people, things, places, thoughts and events.
Rachel Fearnley, lifestyle mentor
When things are bad….when they’re really, really bad….it’s impossible to be happy. When we’re in the midst of trial, when we’re suffering, when we experience physical pain, when life just isn’t going our way, when God is answering every prayer “no” or “not yet,” it’s absolutely impossible to be happy. Happiness is an emotion based on our circumstances and our experience in the moment. It’s a response to something outside of ourselves.
Notice that the Bible doesn’t tell us to “be happy” though, it tells us to rejoice. Joy is different. Joy is a choice. Joy comes from a sense of satisfaction inside of you. It’s more stable than happiness. It’s longer lasting. Joy, according to the above quote, is internally cultivated. I would suggest that biblical joy is not based on our reaction to our circumstances at all, but rather founded on the unchanging character of God.
When things are bad….when they’re really, really bad….God is the same. God is still good. God still loves us. God is still for us. God is still working things for our good. God is the same. And because God is the same, we have the ability to look beyond our circumstance and our trials of the moment, and see a bigger picture. We have the ability to think positively in the midst of a negative situation. We have the ability to reframe what we’re seeing in light of an eternal perspective.
My kids are still in foster care. The judge is still ignoring any evidence that points in our favor. The court is still dragging this out through red tape and endless bureaucracy. My circumstances haven’t changed. But neither has my God. I still have the promise of victory in Christ. I still have the promise that God is working all of this out for my good. I still have the assurance that God is fighting this battle for me.
So I have a choice. I can focus on the things I don’t have and the things that don’t seem to be going right, OR I can focus on the positive things around me. Positive things don’t have to be big things. They just have to be positive. The fact that we had small progress at court that will finally allow my husband to visit with our sons is a positive thing. The fact that it could have come out much worse (termination of parental rights) but didn’t is a positive thing. The fact that it didn’t snow (I hate snow!) while we were out and about is a positive thing. The fact that we got everything on our checklist done while my husband was home (like finally putting away our Christmas tree) is a positive thing. The birthday dinner (my husband just turned 40!) we shared with friends after court is a positive thing. The time my husband and I spent together is a positive thing. And suddenly the small, positive things tip the scales away from the negative. My perspective has changed. My thoughts have changed. My mood is uplifted. And I am rejoicing!
Our thoughts have tremendous power over us. Research shows that positive thinking affects our health, our brain waves, and even the length of our lives. Article, after article, after article show the overriding benefits of positive thinking. Satan loves to bombard us with negative thinking. He knows if he can put our focus on the wrong thing, he’s got a foothold into our lives that allows him to wreck havoc on our health and our well-being. God’s Word tells us the way to combat this attack is with putting our focus on God.
When I’m going through trials, I can choose to focus on the circumstances of the trial itself and on the pain and discomfort it is causing in my life, or I can focus on the things that can come out of it. I can focus on the suffering, or I can focus on the patience that the suffering is producing in me. I can focus on the discomfort, or I can focus on the growth that discomfort is causing. I can focus on the struggle, or I can focus on the ministry opportunity that God might be building in my life because of this struggle. I can focus on the isolation and feelings of loneliness, or I can focus on the fact that God is with me through all of it. I can focus on how crappy life is, or I can focus on how good God is.
The choice is mine. So instead of focusing on all the garbage around me, I choose to focus on the small kernels of beauty and goodness and peace that happen all around me everyday. I choose joy!
“I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove form you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh.”
He’s so hard-hearted. She’s so cold. How often have we heard these descriptions of others or even used them ourselves? We often label people who are self-centered or unemotional as hard-hearted or cold. We even say that we have become “jaded” by our past experiences. The idea is that past hurts and wrongs make us hard and unfeeling.
In our sinful nature, it’s easy to be hard-hearted. Past hurts and wrongs damage us. They make us put up walls of protection around our emotions to keep people from being able to hurt us again. We try to suppress or turn off our more tender feelings in the hopes that it will protect us. The tendency to wall ourselves off from the outside world is a normal one, but walling our hearts off from others also closes us off to God.
Isn’t it wonderful, then, that God promises us that when we allow Him into our lives, He will give us a new heart? God is able to take our brokenness and make us whole. He is able to heal our past hurts and right our past wrongs. He repairs our hearts and gives us the ability to show our emotions and trust in others without fear. It’s not that we won’t be hurt again, but rather that we know that God is able to take care of it for us and to keep it from negatively impacting our lives in the long run. We rely on God to make it right, rather than on the person who committed the wrong. We know that God is faithful to do this because He always keeps His promises.
So if you’re suffering from past hurts, or you’ve hardened your heart towards others, turn your heart over to God. Allow Him to do a work of healing within you, to give you a knew heart in place of your heart of stone.
Father, thank you that you make all things new. Thank you that you can take our past hurts and wounds and that you can heal them. We know that if we let you into our hearts and into our lives, you can reshape them. You can give us new hearts that are free to love without fear. Create a new heart in me, God. Give me a heart that is quick to respond to your Spirit and full of your love for the world around me. In Jesus’ name, Amen.
A Beautiful Mess 