The Secret Place

I'm not always an open book...okay, I'm often not an open book. My husband and I are total opposites in that area. As with most everything in life, balance is what is needed and in my attempt to be more balanced, I'm being more transparent today. 

Life can be hard. Especially when the hard, goes on and on...You know we often go through a "hard time" but as we glance back, we see that time but can see before that time and remember that it was really such a small part of our life - just a moment in time. But, when you look back over the past months, even years and you see mostly hard times, life becomes more challenging. Trust me, I don't believe in living in the past, or even focusing on the past, but the past can, does & should shape us; for the good. The only way it can shape us for the good, is if we pull the good from it,  yet it will shape up for the bad if we focus on the wrong parts or just focus too much on the past altogether. So for me, this looking back is really like glancing in the rearview mirror.  I'm a mirror checker, though y'all!  I'm always checking my side & rear view mirrors when I'm driving and I live my life that way too. I want to be aware of my surroundings so I can learn from them, grow from them and be thankful for the things God spares me from & brings me through!

So I've been doing a lot of assessing of my life lately. Our family has been facing some challenging situations - really since the beginning of 2016. So not only have I been assessing these situations, but also, my heart, my relationship with God my Father, my response to Him & to these situations. I've discovered something about myself that is not what I hoped would be, yet provides opportunity for change and growth. 

You see, I have BIG FAITH. I have some of the best roles models. Men and women that have built an amazingly strong, Godly, faith-filled heritage for me to walk in. So when I look at the challenges that my family has been walking through, my faith is strong. It doesn't waiver. Do I have moments where I ask God, why? Yep! Do I have moments where I ask Him for just a little understanding? You bet! Do I have moments where I plead with Him for a brief reprieve from these things that feel so heavy? Absolutely! But through it all, I am confident that He knows the "why", that His ways are higher so it may not be humanly possible for me to understand and that He will bring reprieve, although He may bring it in a different way than I expect, because He knows what's best. 

Here's what I've got to change...the secret place. The place I run to when life gets overwhelming. When the waves are crashing over me so fast, that I fall again, before I ever make it to fully standing...when the quarters of the game are without a halftime or even a water break. The secret place is not a place to run to initially, then just stand out in the rain hoping that the prayers I prayed back "there" will sustain me in the downpour. The secret place is always there. It's the break my heart so desperately desires, even if for just a moment. It's the rest my mind needs when I've taken on more than I should. It's the answer to every question I may ask of God. It's the peace, the peace that most certainly passes my limited, understanding. It's the secret place, just me & my Heavenly Father. It's more than quiet time. It's more than my daily scripture or devotion reading. It's deep. It's refreshing. And it's not a place that I should visit only at the onset of a challenge. 

It is quite possible that in my walk with Christ, I have not fully-developed this practice yet, but for me, I have not been able to make it to the secret place each day. In fact, with the very best intentions & even a strong desire, I set my heart and mind to get there last night and the next thing I knew, I woke up and it was 3am!  But as I make the time to go there, more and more frequently, the path becomes clearer. When you walk through an untouched field for the first time, you path quickly becomes unrecognizable, but as you commit to walk that path more and more, the weeds and grasses in that path begin to lay down to your footsteps and you can reach the secret place with more ease & confidence. 

I pray that if you need answers, healing, hope or faith restored, that you'll make a path to the secret place with God, and go there often. I'll be there too!

Hit the Pause!

My kids love the pause button on the remote! I think it's their favorite -

I'll hear, "Where's the remote??" . . . and the next thing out of their mouth is, I wanna get a snack, or I need to go to the bathroom, or I wanna go get a toy... honestly, it dries me crazy. I always feel a hint of the entitlement mentality that is eroding our society, but that's another topic for another day. ;) It did lead me down a thought process that so many moms & dads need to put into practice though, me being the first to jump in that line!

How often do you pause to asses why your son or daughter is misbehaving? How often do you pause to ask God for guidance in disciplining your little ones? How often do you pause to ask yourself if this battle, be it with your kids, your spouse or co-workers, is really worth it? I have to insert a little disclaimer here...I'm not a huge "pick your battles" kind of Momma - if it is a rule in our house, you gotta follow it! If I've given my child direction about what to wear or what to eat or how to handle something, I'm not one to just "pick the battle" and allow them to do whatever they please if the battle seems to big or might make us late or whatever. (We do work towards compromise though, if the situation allows.) So what I'm really referring to, in bringing up battles, is this, am I simply fighting the problem or the actual source of the problem?

This past Sunday, we taught on fighting the good fight (1 Tim. 6:12). Learning to choose the "good fight" takes work and moments of pause. The Holy Spirit is always at work in my life, but it's often in a moment of pause that I truly receive the clarity I need from His guidance. Often, I, and maybe you, begin a moment of pause but as soon as we feel guidance is being given, we jump into action and use it at our discretion instead of in the timing and way He intended. In reality, there is the guidance, hope, peace or word that we need being given, but immediately following is the wisdom to walk it out! IF, we take the time to hear it. 

This past Sunday we had a situation where we thought we "lost" a child during children's church. I take this very seriously, and have conveyed to volunteers to seriousness of their responsibility to make sure our kiddos are safe. In a moment {void of pause} a panicked search party formed and a bit of chaos ensued. Reality was, the child left church with his family and was on his way home for a relaxing Sunday afternoon, while folks frantically searched for someone that wasn't even lost. A lot of lessons were learned and a huge moment of pause was taken to reflect on what we should have done differently. I'm certain though, that we do this in our personal lives far more than we want to admit. We miss times of rest, times of peace, times of guidance, times of learning, times of growth because we don't take time to pause. 

When something happens in my house that turns things upside down (anger, a bad attitude or wrong decision, running late, etc) and we then realize things need to change, we say, "let's press the reset button".  We're adding another button to our family remote...PAUSE!

What do you think, do you need to begin intentionally take moments of pause? Join us in taking time to "press the pause button" in our lives!

This is one of my favorite places to "pause"!  Orange Beach, AL

Time to revive the blog!  Today has been a whirlwind of a day; actually it's been a whirlwind week. My little loves started school today and the only one that cried was me. I'd call that a success for sure. "T" began 3rd grade and "K" began kindergarten...WHAT? Time for baby #3 - if I can just get the husband on board... ;)

I've been reading a book that is so apropos for this moment in time, it is titled, "Praying Circles Around Your Children" by Mark Batterson. If you've ever read any of his books, you know how impactful they can be and this one is no exception to that. I keep going back to the very first few paragraphs in the book where he mentions the good and the bad about parenting & prayer for our children. The bad news, as we all have experienced, is that we make a lot of mistakes. If you're like me, it's easy to allow those mistakes to consume your mind, to fill you with guilt, to cause you to walk in shame or to promote parenting that never follows through. If you fall into any of those categories, then we have to change our mindset, because as Batterson puts it, the good is that "our worst mistakes double as our greatest opportunities"!

Did that grip your heart like it did mine? If we're wrapped up in the mistake we've made, we miss the greatest opportunity for modeling behaviors we want to see in our children - repentance, sorrow, forgiveness, kindness, humility... Being "human" in front of our kiddos also opens up moments for deep, meaningful connections. It takes choosing to look past the mistake and see that we made a mistake, but we aren't mistakes. That isn't always easy, but making that choice positions us to grow in Christ, as parents & in relationship with our Littles. 

Another huge opportunity for connection is actually praying your prayers for your children, with them. Letting them hear your heart for them and hear how you call their name to our Father, leaves an imprint other life that doesn't quickly fade. Speaking of prayer, I have to share some great news that we received today. My little guy has been begging to play football for years now and we thought the time had finally come; until, the sports physical stopped us. After some testing on his heart, we received the call late this afternoon with great results, and he has been cleared to play! The other beautiful part of this is that although it revealed some ongoing issues, we can now deal with them medically, but also speak directly to God about them. This is amazing news and we are so thankful for the many friends and family that called his name out to our Father!

If you aren't praying daily for and with your children, make it a point to start.  I fully agree with Batterson that "Spiritual disciplines take sheer determination". Determine that you are going to take your prayer life up to a higher place!