New Years Reflections

From simplemom.net

Reflection Questions for 2011

1. What was the single best thing that happened this past year?

2. What was the single most challenging thing that happened?

3. What was an unexpected joy this past year?

4. What was an unexpected obstacle?

5. Pick three words to describe 2011.

6. Pick three words your spouse would use to describe your 2011 (don’t ask them; guess based on how you think your spouse sees you).

7. Pick three words your spouse would use to describe their 2011 (again, without asking).

8. What were the best books you read this year?

9. With whom were your most valuable relationships?

10. What was your biggest personal change from January to December of this past year?

11. In what way(s) did you grow emotionally?

12. In what way(s) did you grow spiritually?

13. In what way(s) did you grow physically?

14. In what way(s) did you grow in your relationships with others?

15. What was the most enjoyable area of managing your home?

16. What was your most challenging area of home management?

17. What was your single biggest time waster in your life this past year?

18. What was the best way you used your time this past year?

19. What was the biggest thing you learned this past year?

20. Create a phrase or statement that describes 2011 for you.

Week 2: Awaiting An Advent - Luke 2:22-35

Week 1: Promises & Patience

ADVENTure

Advent starts this Sunday! Here's a great resource with readings and family devotionals for each week from our friends at The Village Church!

http://www.thevillagechurch.net/the-village-blog/advent-at-the-village/

Givingthanks

"Oh give thanks to the Lord, for He is good, for His steadfast love endures forever!" Psalm 107:1

Gungor - Beautiful Things

How does He make beautiful things? I saw Gungor on Sunday and as they played this song, this is what I was thinking about. Picturing each frustrating aspect of my life: work, ministry, relationships... I mourned the idea that anything beautiful would come of them. And then the answer came; simply, subtly, unexpectedly. "Faith." The key ingredient that was missing from each situation. I have been trying hard to do God's work, but God is the one with the plan. I don't consult him as often as I would if I thought He was in control. Faith is the substance of things hoped for. Faith is the evidence of things unseen. Faith is the material God uses to build his kingdom. He makes beautiful things out of our faith, not out of our striving or even our abilities.

eh.

time for an update. not much to say. back on the yoga kick, thought about becoming an instructor (right now i can't even touch my toes) but it motivates me. also looked up the implications of such, as it pertains to my faith. still undecided. still riding my bike to work. the other day i turned to my husband and said "have you noticed that since i started riding my bike, i haven't been crazy?" somehow i feel much less anxious and more clear-headed when i exercise. it's not something i have been able to pull off consistently before, but i guess i found my niche. if you haven't found yours, that should give you hope. i have never enjoyed exercise before.

in other news, everyone is pregnant, and i love party planning. going on my second baby shower. theme: butterflies. inspiration: see below.



how cute is that!!! more pictures to come...

"Recently"

(an idea borrowed from a dear sweet friend)

Making: These things called "Poms". So much fun. http://www.marthastewart.com/how-to/tissue-paper-pom-poms-how-to

Reading: The book of Jude, and Amos. Trying to get back on track with my quiet time. Trying to finish "Having A Mary Heart In A Martha World", but I just can't get into it for some reason.

Listening To: Switchfoot (they never get old). Just realized that a song I used to console myself with actually had a lot of foreshadowing:

From the song "Golden",

"You're far from home, it's a perfect place to start."

"Like freedom in spring."

"The more we learn the less we know."

All things that I have experienced in the past year. Funny how God taps me on the shoulder sometimes and reminds me that he is faithful.

Going: To bed.

Goodnight!

Emerson

"To believe your own thought, to believe that what is true for you in your private heart is true for all men - that is genius. Speak your latent conviction, and it shall be the universal sense; for the inmost in due time becomes the outmost, and our first thought is rendered back to us by the trumpets of the Last Judgement. Familiar as the voice of the mind is to each, the highest merit we ascribe to Moses, Plato, and Milton is that they set at naught books and traditions, and spoke not what men, but what they thought. A man should learn to detect and watch that gleam of light which flashes across his mind from within, more than the lustre of the firmament of bards and sages. Yet he dismisses without notice his thought, because it is his. In every work of genius we recognize our own rejected thoughts; they come back to us with a certain alienated majesty. ...Else tomorrow a stranger will say with masterly good sense precisely what we have thought and felt all the time, and we shall be forced to take with shame our own opinion from another. "

There is a time in every man's education when he arrives at the conviction that envy is ignorance; that imitation is suicide;, that he must take himself for better for worse as his portion; that though the wide universe is full of good, no kernel of nourishing corn can come to him but through his toil bestowed on that plot of ground which is given to him to till. The power which resides in him is new in nature, and none but he knows what that is which he can do, nor does he know until he has tried. Not for nothing one face, one character, one fact, makes much impression on him, and another none. This sculpture in the memory is not without preestablished harmony. The eye was placed where one ray should fall, that it might testify of that particular ray. We but half express ourselves, and are ashamed of that divine idea which each of us represents. It may be safely trusted as proportionate and of good issues, so it be faithfully imparted, but God will not have his work made manifest by cowards."

From Self-Reliance

The Strangest Thing

I went to bed feeling bad about something I said to Bob, knowing it would still be eating me the next day... but I had the strangest dream that I was evangelizing this old man who felt that he had done so many bad things in his life that he was beyond hope. I don't recall any of the particulars, but I remember telling him "You can't have guilt without forgiveness" (something to the effect that it would destroy you... and that we have guilt so that we can also have forgiveness.)

hmm.

Lessons From Mose

I recently decided that my cat, Mose, would make a great therapy pet. He is very affectionate and not at all afraid of strangers. In order to get certified, he has to be leash trained. So I bought him a harness, which he hates. I've been putting it on him for short periods of time, trying to help him get used to it. We are now on day 4, and he still can't seem to walk forward. Either he just lays there looking pathetic, or crawls up the furniture backwards trying to rub it off.

This experience reminds me of God, and how He knows the good plans He has for us... how many times have I questioned His motives like Mose is questioning mine?

time for OWLS!

Weird stuff from old journals.

Ode To A Beloved Cousin:

Frustration.

Words can not convey

The concern I feel

For the unnecessary pain

Caused by a lack of unwillingness to pause

And see that life is not the enemy

And you are not it's hostage, or a victim -

But a prisoner of your own illusion.

I don't have the capacity to make you see.

My words fall short

And still there is no peace inside your soul.

It knows it could be so much more, and yet

It won't believe.

Stubbornly

You sit in the midst of a disaster

You say is all your fault

But your only fault is your choice.

Consequences are natural.

Anyone can wreak havoc with little effort.

But I see a light, an escape -

Everything you miss and hope for

Are more than just memories and dreams -

He lives.

This Morning

"Suppose there is a well of fathomless trouble inside your heart, and Jesus comes and says "Let not your heart be troubled," and you shrug your shoulders and say "But Lord, the well is deep; you cannot draw up quietness and comfort out of it." No, He will bring them down from above. Jesus does not bring anything up from the wells of human nature... The well of your incompleteness is deep, but make the effort and look away to Him." -Oswald Chambers

Lately

This post is dedicated to Rosydreamer.

Learning: That even the smallest things can alter my attitude towards God. Checking Facebook first thing in the morning will squelch my desire to pray, while praying in the morning will squelch my desire to shop later on (shopping is something I do when I'm anxious).

"You are already clean because of the word I have spoken to you. Remain in me, and I will remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me."
John 15:3-4


Also, my mom has a new blog! Check it out.