I'm Thankful

I'm thankful for:

• God's grace to me, and His faithfulness. Why He's shown such favor to me I don't know. But I'm thankful for it.
• My kids. They exasperate me and challenge me to be less selfish. They mirror me and humble me. They hold me immediately accountable for my private, inner life. If they were any cuter, my head would pop.
• My husband. He's always wanting to be doing the right thing as well as it can be done. He's more and more often acting in love toward me at cost to himself, which is also very humbling. And he does the dishes. :)
• My church family. They continually encourage and challenge me with their examples and friendship and allow me to serve in ways that are meaningful to me. My Virginia experience would be 100% different without them.
• My extended family. I'm thankful that we can go make a tour of both of our families with joy instead of grumpiness. I'm thankful for our parents' generosity and care especially. I'm thankful they all try to encourage us in parenting rather than insinuate that they know precisely how we're messing up. Even if they do.
• Deepening relationships with siblings.
• My car that takes me away to a grocery store loaded with edible food that I can largely afford.
• My house that keeps me appropriately warm and dry at all times, gives me a place to host others, gives my kids a safe place to play, and does it all while looking nice and being comfortable. Wow.
• The internet. My sister lives in Hong Kong; Mark's sister lives in Russia--and I get to see them and speak to them both whenever I want. For free! Skype is amazing. And I love email.

I'm sure there is more, but it's getting late. I'm thankful also for sleep. What are you thankful for?

Isaiah 40:11

I just posted on diligence. In that context, I'll say that I've been skimming a book called A Mom Just Like You: The Homeschooling Mother by Vickie and Jayme Farris, which I picked up for free at a moms' group swap last month. Vickie Farris has 10 kids and has/is homeschooling them all. In chapter 7, "Mary V. Martha," she descrribes her struggle to find a consistent alone time with the Lord. Imagine that! I thought I'd just share a little excerpt because I found it encouraging and interesting:

After all, how can you tell a screaming baby to wait while you
finish your devotions? (And even if you could, how could you continue to pray and meditate on Scripture with all that commotion in the background?) One day, I was talking with my friend Linda, who is the mother of eleven children, about this problem. When I expressed my frustration...she nodded sympathetically...[and said,] "Think about that promise in Isaiah 40:11, 'He shall feed his flock like a shepherd: he shall gather the lambs with his arm, and carry them in his bosom, and shall gently lead those that are with young' (KJV)...It's just comforting to know that he 'gently leads' those of us who have little ones.'" (160)

To think of the Lord gently leading me ...and you, my friends with kids; makes me smile.

Thoughts on Diligence

I had my 3-month reassessment at the gym yesterday. 6 pounds, 2% body fat; and improvements all around. Biggest gains in pushups and crunches--went from "well below average" (12) to "average" (30) in push-ups, and from barely average (30 in 60 sec.) to "above average" (49) in crunches. Yay for newfound muscular endurance. But the biggest changes have been in my attitude--I'm now able to think of exercise as a healthy and occasionally fun activity rather than as a threat. I also have found it transferring to my non-exercise times. I'm more likely to "just do" something instead of sitting there feeling lazy. Score one for diligence.

Diligence is so important. It's tied for me to consistency in disciplining, training, and follow-through with the kids instead of just letting things slide and not making the most of many opportunities; appropriate and competent preparation for teaching Bible study instead of mediocre and half-hearted preparation; reasonable housekeeping given my lack of other employment; useful and thoughtful personal Bible study times; and fidelity in prayer and also in intercession for others. Without diligence, I find myself being a procrastinating guilt-ridden slacker masquerading as competent servant (of my family, of others, of the Lord). Don't want to be that. I know, I know, I shouldn't be too hard on myself...I do lots of things sorta competently. I'm not having a pity party here. I'm just talking about what it's really like in my heart...where it counts.

I had been moaning to myself lately about what seemed to me to be a lack of my own secret personal spiritual life with God--that during the kids' waking hours I struggled to find time to be alone with God...just to think straight and try to form a coherent prayer in my mind! But I got a Proverbs 31 Woman devotional in my inbox the other day that really challenged and encouraged me. The author basically said she had been having the same trouble until the Lord challenged her just to be with Him in the crowd and noise rather than worry about being alone too much right now. To learn how to pray or otherwise enjoy Jesus on a personal level in the company of the tots because...I'm always in their company! So I think that's good and worth pursuing, though I did manage to get up with the alarm early this morning before everyone else to catch a brief quiet time. It was nice.

Parable of the Soils

I enjoy growing plants, but I am not good at it. I hope over the next couple of years cultivate the skills to cultivate. But in the mean time, here's something interesting I noticed in my kitchen window.

Zinnias. They came as a pack of seeds in a tiny little pot from Target. Planted on the same day; transplanted on the same day; living in the same window and on the same watering schedule:

Yes, yes, yes. Zinnias. And a weird poky India plant. And two African violets. And an English ivy. And a little scarecrow. So I'm not a gardener. But don't get distracted. Zinnias.

Pot #1: average zinnia height--15"+

Pot #2: average zinnia height: 5"

As far as I can tell, the only difference here is....their soil and what else they're planted with.


[insert parable here]