Just another reminder that we serve a faithful God. As we are walking this new adventure, we are holding onto the Trust that God is in control and placing all our Hopes in Christ.
Just 2 months ago, we were celebrating the start of what we thought would be our journey towards our first child....
(Filling out our application and child request for an Ethiopian adoption!)
Only to be surprised that God had other plans for us right now! I have moments of worry and what-ifs, but am constantly reminded and assured that we all are truly at God's mercy. We need only to align ourselves with Him and His plan, and all will fall into place. It may not be perfect, or the way we had planned, but it will be in His plan.
This verse that my dad gave me over 12 years ago has never meant more to me than it does right now:
"May the God of HOPE fill you with all JOY and PEACE as you trust in Him so that you may OVERFLOW with HOPE by the POWER of the Holy Spirit." Romans 15:13
PS- Sean and I are still super passionate about adoption and cannot wait for the day when we grow our family that way, too!
So, here's how it all went down when I found out I was pregnant. Sean went to Spirit West Coast on July 29, and I took my first PT on July 30. After so many years of seeing only one line on those things, I couldn't be sure I was seeing correctly. So what's a girl to do? Call her best friend, of course!! So I called my BFF Tracy, and she freaked out with me. :-) She told me to go get more tests and take them too. So I did that at lunchtime, hence my six pregancy tests!
I called Tracy again at lunch, and she asked me "Was one of your lines a little bit lighter than the other?" I told her "Well, kinda." She then told me that she just took a pregnancy test and is pregnant too!! She was going to the dentist that afternoon and was about to take her Valium, but decided she should take a quick PT just to be sure she wasn't pregnant. What a surprise!!! Finding out that my Best Friend and I were pregnant on the same day is one of my greatest memories EVER. I am so greatful to God for that time with her!
(On a quick side note... I thought all along that I was about 8 weeks pregnant, and she thought she was 11 weeks or so. So when I went to the dr. yesterday and found out I was only 5-6 weeks I was shocked. Tracy had her first appointment today, and can you imagine her surprise to find out that she, too is only 6 1/2 weeks pregnant?!?! CRAZY! I have no idea how the pregnancy tests detected our pregnancies SOOOO early. That is really unheard of! No matter how things turn out, I will always cherish that memory with my best friend!)
So, I found all this out on Thursday, and Sean wasn't due home until LATE Saturday night! I had to keep all of this a secret from him because I really wanted to tell him in person. So, I came up with a little scavenger hunt for Sean when he got him. I figured since I had all this time to come up with a way to tell him, it had better be good!
For his first clue, I bought a little jar of BB's, because the baby was about the size of a BB at that point (well, or so I thought at the time!).... I put the BB's and a card in his truck so he'd have it to think about on his drive home. Here's the card:
"This treasure hunt is more of a game
I really hope you don't think its lame.
Clue # 1
You'll shoot your eye out
is the old fable
Your next clue is waiting at
home on the table."
The next clue had to do with the baby's due date (or what I thought it would be at that time...)
Clue # 2
"They call it 'March Madness'
with good reason, too.
But what could this mean for
handsome 'ol you?"
Clue # 3"This is a brush
But its not for a tooth
What, then could be
Its possible use?"
Finally, he ended up in our bedroom, where I handed him my Bible and had him read this verse: (Sean said he knew I was pregnant when I handed him the Bible!)
20 "See, I am sending an angel ahead of you to guard you along the way and to bring you to the place I have prepared. ... 25 Worship the LORD your God, and his blessing will be on your food and water. I will take away sickness from among you, 26 and none will miscarry or be barren in your land. I will give you a full life span." Exodus 23:20-26
Before Sean got home, I searched ALL OVER Fresno for two things: a card saying something like, "You're gonna be a daddy!" and a Duke or Cincinnati baby outfit. I was really surprised that I could not find a single card ANYWHERE... not Hallmark, Wal-Mart, Target- NOWHERE had a good "Congrats Daddy" card. However, it was no surprise I couldn't find a Duke or Bengals baby outfit. So I had to settle for something else. I made the card and found a still cute outfit:
(Inside it says "We Did It!" Sorry if you're offended- ok, I'm really not. Sean loved it because this is so totally my sense of humor.)
So that's the story of how I told Sean. I caught it on video, but have chosen not to post it. Rather I am going to just keep it and treasure it as the greatest moment to date for the two of us. Anxieties have tried to creep into my mind a lot, especially since finding out I'm not as far along as I thought. However, I am constantly reminded that perfect love drives out all fear. :-)
I don't even know where to begin, but this will be kinda short, with more to follow in the coming days. To make a really long story short, I'm pregnant! I've known I was pregnant for about 3 weeks now. It has been so hard to keep it a secret! I thought that I was about 8 or 9 weeks along now, but the ultrasound today showed I am just about 6 weeks along. Bummer. But, we saw a flickering heartbeat, so doc says everything is good at this point. Of course, this makes me worry, but I am trying to be grateful for what we have at this moment, and take it one day at a time. As I wrote about yesterday, God is the ultimate giver and taker of life, and I have absolutely no control over anything really. So for today I am giving my worries to him and thanking him incessantly for these moments in our lives.
So I just finished reading the book of Genesis. I started on Saturday, so that means it took 4 days to go from Creation to the death of Joseph. Whew! It feels like a whirlwind already. Before I started this reading, I tried to think of a few "themes" that I wanted to look at throughout the Bible. If you read much of my blog, you know I have a longing to understand and to grasp this whole concept of "home." Home here on earth, home in Heaven, Home with Christ. So going into this, I thought that would be a concept or theme that I would look for and maybe research a little more. However, as I started reading through Genesis, a completely new theme began to jump right off of the pages for me-- the theme of life. (I know, shocker. Especially since Genesis actually means "beginning" or "birth." Hang with me though...)
Now, saying that is almost as broad as saying "the topic of God." In college, we had to give a thesis statement that we would eventually base an entire paper around... more times than not, my professors would come back and tell me to "narrow down your topic." But in reading Genesis these past few days, narrowing down the topic of life was not at all a problem... The thing that kept coming up time and time again was that God is truly the giver of all life. I know this may sound so elementary to some, but let me explain a little more.
We all know the creation story... God created life. God breathed life into every single being on this planet. He gave life to every plant, every creature, every bird and every fish. He is the ultimate giver of all life. To talk about God as the giver of life in such broad terms is kind of like the effect some statistics have on our brains... they are simply too big to grasp. I can tell you that there are a 143,000,000 orphans in the world, but until you hold just one fatherless child in your arms, the gravity of that number does not sink in.
So here's where it sank in for me. 5 times in 50 chapters, I read about how God either opened the wombs of women, or he closed them. You don't have to be much beyond 6th grade science to know that no life on earth has ever existed without first growing inside of a mother's womb.
- Genesis 11- Sarai was barren, she had no children
- Genesis 20- The Lord closed up every womb in Abimelech's household
- Genesis 25- Isaac prayed to the Lord on behalf of his wife because she was barren. The LORD answered his prayer and Rebekah became pregnant
- Genesis 29- When the Lord saw that Leah was not loved, he opened her womb, but Rachel was barren
- Genesis 30-Then God remembered Rachel, he listened to her and opened her womb
As I was reading these and thinking about how God truly is the giver of all life, I then read to story of Abraham and Isaac. For decades longer than most of us will ever live, Sarah was barren. Then God promised her a son, and Isaac was born. But then, God tells Abraham that he wants him to sacrifice this son-- the only son, whose life brought fulfillment after so many years of emptiness. But as we all know the story goes, Abraham remained faithful to God and God spared his son's life.
So where am I going with all of this? You may not quite be tracking, but it all makes sense to me, I promise. :-) Like I said, it may seem elementary, but for me, this has taken on a deeper meaning. Perhaps it is because I am living a part of these women's stories. To be barren for so long, can you even begin to imagine the humble awe that Sarah and Abraham felt towards God when they realized she had a life growing inside of her? Can you imagine so many years of trying to conceive on their own, but then when it seemed the least likely, and they had given up all hope, the Creator of the Universe intervened and openend her womb? We then read the story of Abraham and Isaac and think that it must have been even more difficult for Abraham to make the sacrifice because of the years it took to have Isaac. But now, reading all of this in context, and really thinking about it, perhaps Abraham had a much better grasp on the Giver of Life because of those years of struggle. Perhaps the trials it took to bear his son helped him to realize where his son's life truly belonged-- in the hands of God. And not that it was any easier for him to make that journey to the place of sacrifice, but maybe he understood the Source of life, the bigger picture to it all, a little more than most.
Whew! Ok, that was a little heavy. I promise to have a happier post tomorrow. Hopefully. :-)
Oh-PS! I almost forgot! Bob Sjogren, author of Cat and Dog Theology is going to be speaking at our church again this weekend. And I am soooooo excited about what he's preaching on... he is preaching through the entire Bible. That's right... Genesis to Revelation. He'll be doing the same sermon in all 3 weekend services (Sat night & Sun am), then there will be two additional sessions on Sunday afternoon that will take us through the rest of the Bible. I am so excited about how this will kind of be a neat introduction to the rest of my B90X readings! So if you're around Fresno this weekend, you should definitely stop by! Its going to be great!
So, it all started with a project for my brother-in-law's youth room at his church in Arizona. He asked me to cut out their group's mission statement from vinyl so he could put it up on his wall. I, of course, had to try it out before I could just send them something that I wasn't sure how to work. So here's my little mini-project. This literally took me 20 minutes. NO JOKE! So here's the finished product:
Step 1: Set your machine to Speed 3; Pressure 3.
Step 2: Set your blade to 3 also. That's pretty easy to remember... all 3's. These settings will allow you to cut through the vinyl, but not through the backing.
Step 3: Peel off the surrounding vinyl, leaving only your letters. Don't forget to take out the middles of the "o" "e" "b", etc....
Step 4: Put masking tape over the letters to be transferred. As you can see here, I have used a Post-It not to sort of mask just the word I want. This is handy when you have letters of different words running together... mask the words one at a time (its easier for application).
Step 5: Make sure the masking tape is stuck really good to the vinyl letters. Use something to smooth it out.
Step 6: Peel the masking tape and vinyl letters away from the backing.
Step 7: Position the first word on the wall. In my case, this is the "base" word, upon which I will layer the other elements. Make sure its straight!
Step 8: Using something sturdy (this is a wooden tongue depresser... but a credit card would work, too), rub each individual letter really well. This is super important because this is what makes it stick to the wall! It will take some elbow grease, but will be worth it when you start pulling off the tape!
Step 9: Begin pulling off the masking tape. Go SLOW....If some of the vinyl starts to come off of the wall with the tape, just go back over it with the smoothing tool.
Step 10: Position the other elements and repeat the application process.
Annnndddd.... you're done!Now how easy and cool is that??!
Ok, here's my revised schedule for B90X, starting tomorrow. I think you should be able to right click, Save as, then print it. Let me know if you can't do that and I can email you a PDF version of it if you want! This is gonna be intense!
Our dear friends and former NC neighbors, Clayton & Holly are visiting our old town in Roanoke Rapids, NC this week. Clayton send Sean this picture from his phone:
Its our old home! I LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE this little house. I opened the email that Sean forwarded me from Clayton and almost wanted to cry! I love this place so much. It was our first home and it was filled to the rafters with love, warmth and Southern charm. If we could move back, I would do it in a heartbeat and I would gladly pay twice what we originally paid for this little place. Look how green the grass is! And how huge those beautiful, flowering crepe myrtle trees are! See the flower beds out front? Sean and I dug those ourselves! OK, it was mostly Sean. But it was HARD WORK! We had to haul all this dirt off and the ground was hard!! We had such big plans for this house, but obviously, God had plans too. I still really really miss NC and the friends we had there. Nothing beats the South. As I've now lived in nearly every part of the country, I've come to realize that I truly am--and always will be-- a Southern girl at heart. Give me BBQ and Sweet tea any day over Sushi and Sake. I still love this house and am so glad they haven't drastically changed the outside. I don't even want to know if they've changed the inside... I want it to forever remain the way we left it! They've added a porch swing! And shutters! Both things I would have definitely done! Here's a look at the house when we lived in it...
Love that porch... you just don't see that out here.
Our living room... I LOVED the crown molding... it was EVERYWHERE! And that tray ceiling and recessed lighting was the BEST!
This was the kitchen... it was open to a dining area and then the living room. I loved the together feel of it all!
Guest bedroom... again more FABULOUS molding! Would have made a great baby room!
Guest bathroom that we COMPLETELY gutted and remodeled. Lots of work went into this!!Below is a "before" picture of the bathroom... yeah... it was bad. :-)
Clayton & Holly lived one house down and we would walk over there in our pj's and play Settler's until afte rmidnight. That or we'd play Mario Party. Man, good times! I am so greatful for the time we had there. I will always look back on that season of Sean and I's life together as one of the best times ever.
I don't twitter. And I don't twitter on purpose. There are several reasonings behind this, but mainly because I really don't need one more thing to keep up with. Well, that, and the fact that I really don't care if you're sitting in Starbucks listening to the latest Kings of Leon CD, or driving your car down I-95 at midnight. BUT, all that said, I have heard some tweeting of the latest rumblings making its way around Twitter and blogs... and that is something called B90X.
"B90x is a revolutionary system of intense, truth-absorbing, brain-busting Bible reading that will transform your understanding of Scripture from intro to nitro in just 90 days! Your personal trainer, Ruach "The Breath" Yahweh, will drag you through the most intense infusion of His vision that you have ever experienced and you won't believe the results!"
Its really simple: read the Bible in 90 days. Yep. The WHOLE THING. In 90 days. I've been in churches that have challenged us to read through the Bible in a year, but c'mon... we all know a lot can happen in a year. And try remembering on December 31, 2009 what you read on January 1 of the same year. Not so easy to do. The challenges are put out to congregations, but then a year later, the completion of this "Read Thru the Bible In A Year" is an afterthought. Its either not mentioned at all, or a "GREAT JOB!" is put as a one-liner in the already loaded bulletin.
But 90 days? That's pretty crazy. But 90 days? I can commit to that. A year? That's a long time to do the same thing every day. But 90 days? I think I can do that.
Pastor Steven Furtick (whose church I've written about on several occasions--they're doing awesome stuff there! Check out some of his sermons here) has challenged his whole staff (and their wives-- LOVE when they get us involed, too! We are a big part of the ministry, too ya know!) to take on the B90X readings. How cool is that? I can only imagine the awesome things that are going to come out of this church's leadership in the next 90 days-- and beyond! They're all on the same page, reading the same Good Words, and keeping each other accountable to doing those readings.
So.... I'm gonna do it. Just jump right in. However, seeing that I'm already a week behind, I'm going to alter the schedule a little bit. I think I'll start this Saturday, the 15th. Good round number. I'll post my new schedule when I am finished making it. I may even make a separate link up top to follow it. But here is the Elevation church's B90X schedule. If you decide to do it, too, you can follow Pastor Steven on Twitter and post everyday that you read, for accountability's sake. I won't be twittering, but I will be trying to post periodically on here how its going. Leave me a comment and let me know if you're going to be doing this too!
I have a new job!
That's all for now, but I am super excited about it. The whole thing has "GOD" written all over it, as I wasn't even looking for a new job. But I have been reminded over and over in recent weeks that God's timing is perfect.
More examples to come. Hopefully in a few weeks things will be in some routine of normalcy and I'll get back to blogging regularly too!
(This photo has nothing to do with the new job. I just like it! Me & my bro at Buffalo Ranch (or what is left of Buffalo Ranch) in Oklahoma)
