Living a Box-Less Life

My sincerest apologies for the blog silence the last few weeks. I have some circumstances arise that have given me alot to think about, but little to write. I mean, I have had alot on my mind lately.

Doubt.
Fear.
Hope.
God.
Ministry.
Love.
Restoration.
Compassion.
Marriage.
Stalkers.
Frustration.
Helping.
Hoping.
Worship.

Last Sunday, at the peak of my frustration with current situations, I was driving to the Dollar Tree, and I began to just talk to God. I asked Him to help me find more ministry opportunities. The conversation was that simple. I stepped into the store a few minutes after that, greeted by a mentally challenged girl with a smile that immediately melted my heart and left a lasting impression on my soul. Normally I would've just passed her by, but her smile blessed my heart so much, I couldn't stop thinking about it. As I shopped, I saw a woman in a wheelchair pushing a grocery cart by herself. I walked away from her, thinking, I would love to push that grocery cart and just spend some time with her. After that I passed an older lady cutting her own grass, I drove by thinking, I would love to be able to cut her grass for her.

I began to realize that I asked for ministry opportunities, and God was beginning to provide them. They came in packages I would not have readily recognized in the past. They weren't familiar ministries that I have felt I was "called" to be apart of. And I began to understand that for years I have boxed myself in to a corner, where I have missed thousands of ministry opportunities because it was "my calling". I have blatantly misused the verse in the Bible, regarding people using the gifts they have, as a crutch and an excuse for me not to help others.

We limit the extent of our ministry and how much God can use when we use the phrase "thats not my gift". I have felt like the only tangible ministry I had to offer, was the experiences of my widowhood, but God wants to take my box, and tear it wide open, exposing me to multiple ministry opportunities. Opportunities to bless people in ways that I couldn't have imagined myself being able to do. God is challenging me to live a box-less life in all my ways of thinking. To see past the way I see my "abilities" and "inabilities" and see through His eyes...to see a hurting world, waiting for someone to simply just show them they care. That's how we reach people..."with one random act of kindness at a time".

One Word

Blogstipated.

I have lost the ability to coherently write my thoughts. Maybe the Lord will provide some inspiration tomorrow. We shall see...

Ode to the Sunday AKA Fun Day

Saturday night I drove home listening to one song over and over, "Always" by Hillsongs. Theres one part in particular that really got my attention last night "...Can I feel You in the rain? Abandon all I am to have You Capture me again..." It was raining last night which only emphasized the powerfulness of this one particular part of that song. I have been so confused lately about my feelings for CinderFella. I mean, he is wonderful, but we haven't exactly been clicking and its been leading me to a bit of frustration in my life. As I drove home, in the rain, thinking about that song and how God empties us only to be filled again, I could not shake the doubts and concerns I had about Cinderfella.

Later, I laid in bed, my mind a swirling vortex of thoughts and emotions. I could not sleep even if I wanted to, so I just laid there and gave in to the swirly thoughts...thinking thinking thinking. Of course all the normal thoughts popped in...should I blog, what to wear, Cinderfella, altar, Cinderfella, awkwardness, WHAT.

As I sat that contemplating the awkwardness I felt with Cinderfella lately and how things just weren't popping into place with us, I realized that I had neglected to fully give this up to the Lord, I did not fully lay this down on the altar. I had been so convinced that he was my answer to prayer, that I neglected to truly seek God's opinion on this. I laid in bed and began praying that God would truly direct my steps and that I could fully lay this down on the altar, and if it was not meant to be, then I would be fully content in this.

Its funny how, when you do something sacrificial like offer to give up the person of your dreams, God gives you little reminders that your sacrifice does not go unnoticed. Under normal circumstances, I would have woken up the next day down and would have been disheartened because I was slowly starting to realize that it was not meant to be, but instead God arranged a beautiful series of surprises just for me.

First, worship at Sunday School was probably the most intense I have felt it. Which was funny considering we were extraordinarily unprepared. After sunday school I went to meet a friend at Panera to go to a different church and I couldn't find him in Panera, so I went out into the parking lot and also in the parking lot at the same exact time was my best friend, Jessica, who had been in town at a wedding batchelorette weekend. She was on the way home, but stopped off to get something from Best Buy and decided to pop over to Starbucks. She lives over 4 hours away and she did not call me because she thought I was in church, but God arranged it that the both of us were in that parking lot at the same time, just so we could see eachother. The final gift was stepping into the church during worship and they began doing the song "Always"...I was like...hold up. Coincidence? Godincidence? The very song that got me thinking about abandoning everything I am and want simply for God's glory, that was the song they chose to sing.

So it was a day full of beautiful, glorious, unexpected surprises that made my heart so overflowingly full. God's still making beauty for my ashes...in so many unexpected ways.

Theology, Pack-Rattyness, and Promises...

Don't worry...this blog is NOT about theology.

I sit here on the couch beneath piles of books on Calvin, Covenant Theologies, Dispensationalism, and various assorted books on subjects that are too theological for my small brain to even begin to comprehend. I'm not reading these books (if I even ventured into that realm of understanding I would quickly run out as if the building was on fire).

I am sitting here though pondering how wonderful God' mercies and promises are. Constantly being reminded of how wonderful His love is for me and how beautifully it encompasses my very being.

"Not one word has failed of all the good promises He gave"
1 Kings 8:56

Tonight I went through my Bible, reading all the different notes and papers that were nestled inside of it. A few things caught my eye...things that I wrote down right after Shannon died, things that I was clinging to with all my life in hopes of understanding the depth of God's Love for me and His purpose in everything that happened.

I remember sitting down and writing on a piece of paper "What is God calling you to do? Is He asking you to lay your dreams on the altar? Is he asking you to throw your dreams in the trash?" This thought had consumed me for a long time as I thought about the fact that in being a widow, I not only lost my husband but the children I did not have. And in being obedient, I had to lay my dreams on the altar. Flipping through the paper once more I came across this note :

"5/3/2008

Claiming the Promises of Ruth

-Childless, Widow, Moved to a new land

Met her husband and together they began a family that was the predecessor for something amazing."

That was a turning point for me, a place where God gently held me in His hands and reminded me that my time was coming. And while hope fades in and out for me, His promises stay pure, stay true. He never waives in His mercy and love for us. He never fails. He never forgets.

Those who sow in tears shall reap in joy. Psalm 126:5

Let us not grow weary while doing good, for in due season we shall reap if we do not lose heart. Galatians 6:9

And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose. Romans 8:28

I am reminded ever so gently and constantly that a) God has a purpose for my life b) God is the restorer and sustainer of my joy and c) God's promises stand true. Just a random blog to voice how much I am in love with God lately.

With a Heavy Heart...

My phone rang this morning and it was my sister. The conversation started with "I have some bad news for you". I asked her on a scale from 1 to 10 how bad, she said "about a 7 1/2". She then proceeded to tell me that someone from our church had passed away. So in honor of this man, I'm going to take time to write my own obituary for him.

On March 24th, 2009 he passed away, leaving behind his beautiful and courageous wife, who has been a constant encouragement to me throughout my own season of losing my husband. He also leaves behind his eldest son and wife, who have been some of the closest friends I've had. They taught me what a marriage should look like and how a Godly family should function, and they offered me support throughout my dating and marriage...offering advice, hugs, laughs, and love. He also leaves behind his younger son and his wife, who also have been some of the closest friends I have ever had the privilege to know. I walked with them during one of the hardest seasons of their life and they walked with me when Shannon died. If ever God designed a family that single-handledly touched thousands of people through each member and their life and testimony - this is that such family. I have been honored to be with these people and experience their loving friendships to the point where I can call them familiy.

I love each and every one of you...and we are sending as much love and prayer your way as we can.

Please join with me in continual prayer for this family and their grieve the loss of their husband, father, and grandfather.

God, Can I take a Vacation From my Life now?

This whole beautiful dance with CinderFella and unclogging some hidden abilities deep within me, such as having a crush, has been one exciting, intriguing, and exhilerating time in my life.

And then tonight happens.

And then I have to tell him about me being a widow.

And then I am screaming to myself "WHAT HAVE I DONE?! I'VE SCARED HIM AWAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

Actually it didn't go like that. But I did have to tell him about me being a Widow and the whole story (at least bits and pieces). He did not freak out, he did not act different...It was me, whose mind went immediately to thinking that now I live in the "Non-Dateable" box. It was me, who immediately began stressing and thinking that he definitely won't ever date me now.

So we will just have to wait and see on this one. I have said that stupid phrase SOOOO much this week.

On another side note, out of 4 nights of sleep I had 3 Lazarus-Shannon dreams. It is reaking havoc on me mentally...draining all my energy. My prayer is God takes these dreams from me...each one I have is only a reminder of how Shannon did not get better, and I just can't bear continually seeing his face, knowing when I wake up he's gone. And then I'm faced with the reality that I am still alone and just wanting desperately to move on with my life.

This is the time where I am clinging to hope with all thats left within me.

But blogworld, don't worry. I'm not falling off the wagon. I'm really doing good...this is just a natural hiccup in the Widow Road. But the great thing about living on Widow Road, is that its not my permanent residency...soon I'm moving to a new place...on Hope Avenue. (My goodness, I sound like a cheesey christian author--haha)
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"Be joyful in hopeful,
patient in affliction,
faithful in prayer"
Romans 12:12
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"A dream is a wish your heart makes,
when you're fast asleep"
-Cinderella

Beauty for Ashes...

"To appoint unto them that mourn in Zion, to give unto them beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness; that they might be called trees of righteousness, the planting of the Lord, that he might be glorified."

—Isaiah 61:3

Sweet beauty for ashes. A thought I hold dear to my very soul. To think...when I think everything in my life is being destroyed, God takes this very thing, the bi-product of something being burned, and makes something beautiful with it.

Lately, I have been intrigued with the concept of beauty for ashes. I remember sitting months ago in the coffee shop at church, talking with my friend Kaleb about how I felt like people thought I was "moving too fast" and not "healing" and he stopped me and said that people cannot judge me for how God was making "beauty from ashes". I have heard Kaleb talk about this subject many times since then, each time making the subject grow deeper in my heart.

I really sit and think about the different forms of fires and ashes and how they can be applied to my life.

Life's Fires:

1. God burning away the chaff, the waste

2. Our living sacrifice on the altar

3. The passion of God burning through us

When we begin to see His face and to want to do His will, He will slowly begin to burn away the chaff in our lives. To remove the waste. At the point where we willingly submit our lives to Him, we lay ourselves down at the altar as a living sacrifice, pure and holy from his burning fire. Once we lay ourselves our the altar, He burns us with a passion for Him.

So after this three part burning process, what is left is simply a pile of ashes. I thought to myself, what are some real life uses for ashes. What I found made me take a step back and say "aha"...

~ Enrich Fertilizer

~ Block Garden Pests

~ Melt Ice

~ Control Pond Algae

~ Make Soap

~ Shine Silver

Think abstract. Very abstract.

After we lay ourselves down on the altar, if all we have left are ashes, how can we allow these ashes to be used? We can get the ground ready for a seed , we can keep away the pests in life, we can melt hearts of ice, we can control unhealthy growth, we can use what we are to help clean people, we can take something very dull and dark and make it shine again.

Something as seemingly useless as a pile of ashes, can be used to make an impact on so many. He can use these ashes that seem so useless and make something beautiful with them.

I want so bad for God to take this pile of ashes that I consider my life and make it something beautiful. I never asked to be a widow. When I was a little girl, I didn't say to myself "When I grow up, I want to be a princess or a widow"... God does not want us to say "where do you want me to go and I'll go", He wants us to say "I'll go, now tell me where". I grew up with thoughts and plans for my future. I wanted to be a wife and have lots of children. Even as I transitioned into adulthood I found these things to be intense desires of mine. Especially to be a mom. So many times I held my friends newborn babies and just cried out to God to be able to hold my own child. At the beginning of 2008, I told God I wanted to be content no matter what. I never once imagined life would take me down the road it did and leave me stranded...a barren widow. But from these ashes...from God removing the waste in my life, to me willingly laying down my life to do His purpose, He is bringing forth something beautiful, something indescribable.

I think...its beauty.

I have so many sweet, wonderful widow friends who read my blog. So many of you touch my heart in such deep ways. And I'm watching God making something beautiful with your life and your sacrifice. I think of E and how I have sat and prayed for her, consumed with compassion for her, and surely enough I am watching God make something so incredibley beautiful with her story that it ministers to my spirit. And many of you wonder, why me?

I cannot answer why you or why me for that matter. But I can say that such sacrifice is producing a beauty so intense and so powerful, I can only sit in quiet anticipation as I watch God's power and light resonate from each and every life.

So remember... He is making BEAUTY from ASHES.

And to keep having HOPE for your future....He has a plan. Otherwise, He wouldn't have specifically chosen you for this task. And if my God, who made the heavens and earth, armadillos and candy canes, Canada and a baby's sweet first laugh...my God who made all of this and more chose ME to specifically be the one He uses...If He CHOSE me, then I know I don't have to worry for a moment about where this road is taking me.

Oh such beauty.