Excuse me, time? could you hold on for a sec. thanks.

There are days when I remember to stop and look around at my life, and I can't believe my eyes. How is it that it's been almost 6 months since my wedding day. How is it that i'm almost through my fourth month of pregnancy. This time a year ago, it was me and the roommate deciding where to go for dinner, days laying out by the pool and just having fun together. Now, it's budgets, and husband, and baby kicks, and what the heck are we having for dinner... oy! Don't get me wrong, I still have a lot of fun, everything is just so different. The last 12 months have been incredible with dramatic changes and surprises all around, but I wouldn't trade it for anything in the world!

I was thinking not so long ago that in a year I will have:

 moved away from friends and family (packing is obviously not my forte) and moved to a new world 1600 miles away

married a godly, wonderful man that I am learning to love more all the time. I LOVE being married :-)

I turned 30...30?? Who does that?? ha, well everybody does, but I don't think it will sink in until i'm 31... and it was a good birthday! A night in the big city of Little Rock with my husband watching some baseball, we LOVE that  

I will be a new mommy! We found out that we'd be a family of 3 come January. That was one surprise that was hard to wrap my head around for awhile. Now that i've had some time to process, and that morning sickness is on its way to a halt for a while, I really can't wait to meet this little person! 

new state, new decade, new wife, new mom... and this was all just in the first half of this year! ha, I guess we somehow turned on the fast forward button... we must be crazy! 

We have learned so much in these past few months. You are opened up to a whole new world when you attach yourself to someone through marriage. You learn things in a very different way and I am so glad that I married a man that is patient and so willing to talk things out as they happen. I've learned how much I didn't know how to trust in God. I have much more issues with wanting to control my life than I ever was aware of. I was worrying about having enough or doing it right and I was forgetting that I serve a sovereign God that is in control of all things. He is our provider and helper and our main concern needs to be our love of the gospel and using these lives to display it well to those around us regardless of how we feel. God provides all the rest. 

I have no clue what the next 6 months will bring, well except that there will be a beautiful baby in our arms at the end of it all. I am thankful of what God is using all of this to teach us. It has been hard to be away from all we have ever known and loved. We ache for our family and friends all the time. We also find comfort in God's great grace, knowing and believing that his purpose for having us here will glorify him. We have so much to learn and it has been one heck of a journey so far. I really never expected anything less. My prayer is that whatever else continues to come our way that we we will grow in faithfulness and trust well in the God of our salvation. 

All The Days Of My Life

I've been reflecting on this past year of my life over the last few weeks, mulling over where i've been and what i've done. It's so strange to be coming upon another birthday again, as if it is a surprise... It comes on the same day every year! Yet here I am, a little stunned to be adding another year to life. Sometimes I just want to make life stop so I have some time to enjoy my treasured moments a little more. But life isn't meant to stop, it's meant to be lived, to seek God and love well while you're living it. And truthfully, I don't want to be stagnant in this season in my life. There is so much to learn, so much to become, working towards a career, and whispers of dreams of marriage and babies someday. I look forward to the way life unexpectedly unfolds and moves you forward whether you're ready or not. I rest in the fact that while I don't see it coming, God does. He always does! Knowing this is an unbelievable comfort to me!

When I think back to everything that transpired through the past year I can be nothing less than thankful. And thankful doesn't feel like a strong enough word for it. This past year felt so very short, but my heart has grown by 10 times I think. From moments of complete and utter happiness to sinking into deep mire. Taking the risk of investing in others left chips and cracks in my heart, but God restores in such a beautiful way. Through it all, through moments when I felt so broken and helpless and those in which I felt confident and sure, there has only been one constant, God is faithful. God has been faithful in his discipline when I've been caught up in sin. He has been faithful to comfort and sustain when I had nothing left. He has been faithful to soften my heart and incline it towards him. In everything he has been faithful and he has made his grace and mercy evident in everything and in every way.

So today, as I celebrate being granted another year of life I am weighted with an indelible gratitude for who I've been surrounded with in my life. My crazy, beautiful and loving family whom I love so deeply. A guy who, for reasons I still don't understand, chooses to stand by me throughout this crazy time in life and is striving for Godliness in his life. For the most amazing circle of friends who encourage me, push me, and love me and bring so much laughter into my life. For a beautiful and intentional body of Christ that I am so blessed to be in community with and that shares and teaches me so much. When I look at it this way, how can I dare to complain! "One thing have I asked of the Lord, that I will seek after: that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to gaze upon the beauty of the Lord and to inquire in his temple." All the days of my life, this is my prayer, my desire and what I hope my life reflects.

The day of LOOOVE!

Oh valentine's day! i keep forgetting that it's this week already! As much as I could do without the marketing and overwhelming decor in every store you walk into... i just love valentine's day! I love walking through the store and watching people walking around with flowers to buy and I wonder who they're for and how their eyes will light up when they get them. I walk past the picked over card aisle and think of all the fun and meaningful gifts people are thinking up right now. And then there's the little boys and girls making the very important decision of what kind of valentines cards they want to give their classmates. I have such fun memories of this fun party day when I was a kid. My mom would make it fun for us too with the occasional gift bag full of the typical valentine's day candy and the wonderful reminder of how much we are loved. I have enjoyed reading the blogs and stories of the things people go out of their way to do to surprise the ones they love right now. They just make me smile from ear to ear! To stop and take a day to blatantly remind the people around us how much they mean to us does wonders for the heart. Everything can go back to normal on monday, even though I hope we continue to show our friends and family how much we love them in the everyday, little moments kind of way. This all just reminds me to be thankful for those i'm surrounded with! God has been gracious to me and I am blessed beyond what I deserve.

we do not run aimlessly

What can we say to be encouraging? When others around us are going through the lowest of lows and heart wrenching pain, what do we say? What do we say even to ourselves when we are struggling and fighting all those things that threaten to crumble our faithfulness to God and turn a blind eye to his commandments? I know I struggle with wanting to say the right thing and utter profound words that will be helpful and enlightening. Here's what I have been reminded of today. It is isn't how profound we are and how poetic our words can be. It is our responsibility to use scripture and God's truths that are interlaced in those words to remind each other that God is worthy of glorification by remaining faithful in those painful times in life. The word of God is more powerful to encourage, uplift, and spur on the heart in steady faithfulness than any words that I can muster up from my feeble mind. My encouragement today as I deal with my everyday struggles of the heart and pray for those on my heart comes from
1 Cor 9:25-26. God has plucked me out of death, has called me out and softened my heart towards him in order to be shown his mighty power and praise him for it. And that is worth fighting for! Fighting to remaining faithful to the one that graciously saved me! It is a daunting task, much too large for me and thankfully God knows that. Like vs. 26 says, "I do not run aimlessly, I do not box as one beating the air." So I will fight against the sin that threatens me, I will serve the God that saved me, and I will love those that fight along side me! I know that none of this is in vain, for Christ has already revealed his mighty power in his birth, death and resurrection. That is crazy love! Oh, how worthy he is! For the sake of the gospel, for the sake of his glory, I do not run aimlessly.

love this!

Absolutely loved this. great song, great band. Pomplamoose music... very fun!

My Portion Forever

Today was one of those days when I ended up repeating to myself over and over again "The Lord is my strength and my portion forever". It might of had something to do with the fact that I spent most of the day christmas shopping and dealing with crowds and lines, which is never much fun. Fairly sure that's not really the case though. I've been going through this cycle lately that mostly looks like this: stable, unstable, train wreck, stable, semi-stable, meltdown. Thankfully, those train wreck and melt down moments are few and far in between... I am blessed to be surrounded by such wise counsel and incredible love! As I lay here reflecting on where my thoughts have been throughout the day I realize why this part of this verse kept coming back me. I started to focus on the word portion. I started to feel the weight of making such a statement, that God is my portion forever. The image I instantly got was related to food. This may sound a little strange, it does even to me! In this sense, I was thinking about how the portion of nourishment our bodies receive sustain us and fulfill us. We can't live without it. It keeps us vibrant, energetic, healthy... alive. I always have struggled with the sufficiency of Christ, wanting to find fulfillment in more tangible means. This is an area that God works quite severely with me because it is far from being second nature to me. It's more like 732nd nature to me ( if that makes any sense), which I also think is giving myself way too much credit. There are moments when I think I'm getting the hang of it and then I say, God but I want this, and need that, and don't forget about these dreams and those desires!! oh, such a finite mind I have!! Why I grapple with the fact that God knows all, God is good in all he does I do not know. The fact remains that he does know and he is good! In more ways than I deserve!

After moving away from the food related image in my head I looked up the word portion ( i know that sounds silly but i love looking up words, even the simple ones). All the definitions were just like I imagined dealing with the amount of something and piece of something. I then came to one of the last definitions given and it said, "A person's future as allotted by fate; ones destiny or lot". This is way better than my food image I had when I thought of the word. I may be a simpleton, but I had never thought of this word in this way. This took my thoughts even further than earlier because it reminded me why Christ is sufficient for me. I believe in a risen Savior! He sustains me and fulfills me with a love and hope that surpasses all things. I am cradled in his comforting truths and promises. I am guided by his teaching and wisdom. I am a member of the body of Christ, the called out ones, thriving and fighting to become more like christ everyday and even when I fall short and stumble, there is God with his strong hand demanding repentance and granting forgiveness. Absolutely brilliant. He and he alone is my portion. Forever.

Whom have I in heaven but you? And there is nothing on the earth that I desire but you. My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever. Psalm 73: 25-26

... As I live says the Lord!

This is written about the book of Ruth. This could not have come at a more perfect time for me. And I will savor and delight in the beauty of being held in the hands of an all knowing and all loving God... wherever that may lead. Blown away.

The life of the godly is not a straight line to glory, but they do get there. The life of the godly is not an Interstate through Nebraska, but a state road through the Blue Ridge Mountains of Tennessee. There are rock slides and precipices and dark mists and bears and slippery curves and hairpin turns that make you go backwards in order to go forwards. But all along this hazardous, twisted road that doesn't let you see very far ahead there are frequent signs that say, "The best is yet to come." And at the bottom right corner written with an unmistakable hand are the words, "As I live, says the Lord!"
-John Piper