stretch

When people ask how I manage to blog so faithfully, I always say that blogging is how I process...that it is through the writing of the stories that I am able to work through them...through the proclamations of faith that I find it.

Being stranded without internet through this week and a half of packing up our home hasn't been all bad. I feel like I've had a dozen things to work through, and very few answers.

Yesterday after church we headed over to some dear family friends house, people who have known me and loved me since the day I was born, loved me  just 'cause they loved my mom and dad.  Every summer we catch up and talk and eat at Bonnie's, and she always has an ice cream cake, even when it's brunch :)  She and her sister and mama read our blog and pray for us every. single. day.

And we're sitting there, and I'm being so amazed at the man and woman their children have become, loving watching my girls playing in their living room, listening to everyone talk about Haiti as if they have been there every day, because they are, every morning.

Before church, we sent my sister and her babies and a loaded down trailer back to Philly, trying to keep a few things of mom's close, trying to remember that it's ok. That mom doesn't live in the house, that we take her with us...all the while knowing that BEING in the house always brings back memories I can't seem to find or feel or hear or smell anywhere else...and that that part is gone.

Letting go of our stateside home.  Saying goodbye to place I first brought all my babies, the yard I played in and they played in, the tables that have sustained so many meals and laughter and prayer.  Letting go of mom in a new way, letting go of how life has been up until right now.

Tomorrow morning we head East as well...spending time with a lot of dear family and friends, speaking at several different churches, healing a bit and praying and searching and allowing and visioning and stretching some more.

It's all s-t-r-e-t-c-h-i-n-g.

Stretching is ok.

I'm trusting Him in the stretching.

Sitting with our friends yesterday, just being "normal" people with people who love us, regardless, I was so grateful to BE loved, regardless.

Reminded of my gratefulness for His love, regardless.  Unmerited.  Just because.  Always been, always will.  And not loved as our God far off and unaware, but loved as One who is with us in all the many details of the heart.

I hope wherever God has you in this journey, today, that there are moments of truly realizing His unwavering, regardless love for you.

It is there for our rest, there for our peace, there for our home.  It is also there for our holy, for our dying to self, for our being far more than just ourselves, but God's great and unwavering and unmerited love is there for us to be His great, unwavering and unmerited love to others.

Trusting Him in that stretching, too, without worry.



O.Chambers, Utmost for His Highest July 4th:

Fretting means getting ourselves “out of joint” mentally or spiritually. It is one thing to say, “Do not fret,” but something very different to have such a nature that you find yourself unable to fret. It’s easy to say, “Rest in the Lord, and wait patiently for Him” (Psalm 37:7) until our own little world is turned upside down and we are forced to live in confusion and agony like so many other people. Is it possible to “rest in the Lord” then? If this “Do not” doesn’t work there, then it will not work anywhere. This “Do not” must work during our days of difficulty and uncertainty, as well as our peaceful days, or it will never work. And if it will not work in your particular case, it will not work for anyone else. Resting in the Lord is not dependent on your external circumstances at all, but on your relationship with God Himself.

Worrying always results in sin. We tend to think that a little anxiety and worry are simply an indication of how wise we really are, yet it is actually a much better indication of just how wicked we are. Fretting rises from our determination to have our own way. Our Lord never worried and was never anxious, because His purpose was never to accomplish His own plans but to fulfill God’s plans. Fretting is wickedness for a child of God.

Have you been propping up that foolish soul of yours with the idea that your circumstances are too much for God to handle? Set all your opinions and speculations aside and “abide under the shadow of the Almighty” (Psalm 91:1). Deliberately tell God that you will not fret about whatever concerns you. All our fretting and worrying is caused by planning without God.