Taking Faithful Steps

  One of the hardest things about prayer for me is honesty. I resalize that makes me sound like a big fat liar, but let me explain. The past few years, my relationship wit the Lord has grown in ways that I never thought possible. Granted, I had to go through some craziness to get there, but I wouldn't trade it for anything. There were a lot of late nights and early mornings and general crying out to him, but I can say without hesitation that he used all things for his good. Lately, when I sit down to pray, I have a little bit of difficulty. I know that there are things that I need to change, and I know that I need to pray about it. But, I have a hard time getting honest with God about it, because I know that means I need to get honest with myself. And that can be hard. Because when you get honest, you have to feel things and work through things. The healing is amazing, but the going through it is challenging. For example, there have been many times that I have prayed that some of t...

  Closure is a word that I have heard a lot in my adult life. Everyone was always looking for closure in situations or in relationships. Hollywood does a great job of showing 2 mature adults, who meet in a public place, sit down over a meal, have a rational conversation, shake hands and part ways. By show of hands, how many times has that every happened to any of you? About 8 years ago, I recieved something in the mail from my father. It was a fairly sizeable box, filled with my baby pictures, pictures of him with my kids, pictures I drew him, projects I made him, my old band shirt (yep, I was a band nerd), and a 2 page, typed, single spaced letter listing all of the ways I was a terrible person, mother, daughter, wife and Christian, and he pretty much submitted his resigantion to our lives. I spent some time during the last 8 years processing the whole thing. I was hurt and angry, I didn't understand why there were such extreme measures taken. I tried the "screw you, I'm ...

          I am a list maker. I tend to do better with lists and with schedules than without. Some of that is my personality, some of that comes out of necessity of balancing a full time job, 2 full time kids, 1 full time husband and a household.      I also like to write down goals that I have and the steps that I'm going to take to achieve said goals. Several years ago, when I got in to what was probably the best shape of my life, I had every little detail of my life written out. I'm talking calorie intake, meals, how much water I needed to consume, the latest I could eat. I'll admit, I got a little bit obsessive about it. But, I was determined to get healthy.     This past year, I had some goals that I wanted to accomplish. And, I did my best to line each of them up with Biblical principles. I looked at each one and thought, "What does Scripture say about this?" Everything from being a good steward of my finances, to my health, to mana...