...Missing HER...

How do you tell when you are ready to own another dog? Does that special feeling just happen in your heart? How do you "know"?
Matthew and I, well if I'm going to be completely honest, I have been the only one looking online at the local animal shelters hoping to adopt another dog. I found one in particular that stole my heart. His name was Mo, he was 8 years old and had been in a shelter for 2 years. In his previous years he was abused and the foster parent is unsure as to why he was actually alive. She said that he had a rough past. I came home that night from the library beggin Matthew to allow us to go up to Sidney and get him. He said to call the next day. I called. Reported back to Matthew what I heard and he said no way. That there was no logically way that we could adopt him, which he was right. It just couldn't happen.
I began praying about the big decision of owning our own pet. I repeatedly asked God if this was something that we should be doing. Are my motives right Lord? Am I just trying to filling the void?
The Lord is slowly but surely revealing to me that I just miss HER. My CoCo, my babes, my Colimolie. When looking back over my repeated scrolling through the many dogs, I began to realize that I was skipping over many dogs that needed a home. I was skipping over them because they didn't look like HER. My CoComokers.
I miss HER.

I'm nervous about facing this Christmas. It's the first time in 15 years where she hasn't been present. It's the first Christmas where I won't be scouring the shelves trying to find the perfect gift for her. It's the first time where we won't be filling up her stocking and loosly wrapping her gifts. This will be the first time that I don't hear her chomping on her new toy trying to break the squeeker while we are finishing up our own gifts. The first time I don't see her trying to hide her bones in the couch only to lift her head and see that everyone is looking at her as she picks the bone up again to run off to find another place. It's the first time in 15 years where we won't have the joy of spending Christmas with HER.
The last week of looking for new dogs to adopt is my way of avoiding Christmas this year without HER. Oh! how I miss her! If only I could have one more hug, one more smell, one more kiss from her! Miss you CoCo!!!

Ladybug

Have you ever had just one of those weeks were you felt invisible? Invisible to everyone around you, no one even hears you when you speak, and that no one would even notice if you fell off the face of the planet? I've had one of those weeks.

This morning, I ran upstairs, turned on the wall heater in "my" bathroom, shut the door, and let the hot air blow around and around the small bathroom. A couple minutes later, I went back upstairs and hopped in the warm shower. As I was scratching and wadding up this mound of hair on top of my head I was stopped dead in my tracks. Something was moving on the small window sill. It took me a moment to realize that it was a little vibrant red ladybug. But it wasn't crawling. It was upside down, stranded on it's back with his little legs flying around in circles trying to flip itself back over. In a moment I related to that ladybug. I shook off my hand of the excess water and tried ever so gently to flip him back over. After many times, I succeeded but he remained frozen. I really don't know if he ever started crawling again. I went on with the rest of my shower.

In many ways I feel like that ladybug. I feel lately that my apendages have been flying rapidly in all directions trying to get back on track in life. I feel like no matter how hard I try, I just can't flip myself back over. There have been little blips here lately, where I feel that I have been helped, and that I have been flipped over back on my own legs, but instead of moving, I'm frozen in place. My legs are just too tired to try anymore.

"Let us acknowledge the LORD; let us press on to acknowledge him. As surely as the sun rises, he will appear; he will come to us like the winter rains, like the spring rains that water the earth." Hosea 6:3

Struggling to Grow

With any new job, you have many new challenges that you have to overcome. Sometimes those challenges are learning new computer processes, learning the new skills to do your job excellent, learning to mesh with new people that are different than your personality, and some are just ovecoming your own insecurities and pulling yourself up by your bootstraps and overcome your fears.

With my new job at the Avenue, those are some of the challenges that I have been facing along with others. In no way are these challenges bad. They are good challenges that the LORD has placed before me to help me grow in my talents and also in my love for Him.

He's been teaching me especially here lately about the Holy Spirit. I'm going through the membership class here at Ginghamsburg and last week our lesson was on the Holy Spirit. I can honestly say that in the last fourteen years that I have been a believer, I've never understood the Holy Spirit. It's like my brain has just not been able to comprehend the role that He plays in every believers life. I know what some of his character traits are, but how it personally applies to me and how I can tap into His help has baffeled me.

I purchased a book at the Library book sale last summer about the Holy Spirit. It's still sitting on my bookshelf. Was that a clue from the Lord to read more about Him? Then why is it still on my shelf? Now that the topic has been brought up again, I'm beginning to take notice.

I also feel that the last month and a half since I have been working here, I've been given a spirit of distraction from the enemy. By no means did I have to accept that distractive spirit, but I in many ways I feel like I welcomed it. It allowed me to write off God and say that I don't have time, or that my life is too crazy with handeling two jobs, Sudan art projects, and Suessville cardboard cutouts for the Library Christmas show on top of trying to be a good wife and making meals, cleaning the house, and doing mounds and mounds of laundry. I'm NOT too busy for God, I just need to reprioritize. I don't have an excuse.

In my bible study that just ended last Monday, the topic was "By Faith Moses". It is the workbook "Believing God by Beth Moore". This hit my soul....and after letting it steep in for awhile one of the ways I have applied it is with my new job. She writes:

"Try to place yourself in Moses' position. You are mortal flesh and blood. You have virtually no confidence in yourself. You've faced terrible failure in your past. (Murder, no less!) You have heard the audible voice of God. He has unmistakably called you, though you have no idea why. He has performed wonders before your eyes; yet your vast insecurities incited His anger because you persisted in your resistance. He relented only enough to raise your brother to stand beside you, even though God was all you needed. In obedience to God, you have repeatedly approached a stubborn and powerful pharaoh to demand the release of the mistreated nation of Israel. To complicate matters, you probably know this pharaoh intimately because you grew up with him in your adoptive home. You know his priorities and his prejudices all too well. You are also well aware of his power to slay you and your people. God has given you instructions to prepare the nation of Israel for the wonder that will result in a mighty deliverance. You mind is whirling. In moments you must tell your people."

We all are like Moses. Facing your insecurities and doing the job that God has called you to do, without looking back. Press on!

Last Saturday I got a little crazy and went wild on the alien space ship flowerbed that we have in our backyard. When we first moved in, we were overwhelmed by all the flowerbeds and most of all the weeds growing in them. We decided to work sparingly in the "spaceship" for it was a lot of work and I was partially afraid that I would be trampsing through the homes of various animals and reptiles. Especially ones that are long, have no legs and slither along the ground.
The lilies and hibiscus stems finally started to turn a pale yellow, and the mums were on their last leg. With the weather being unusually warm, it was time to venture in.
We had just got back from a 1.5 mile run, was sweating profusely and I was just tired of looking at the eye sore front and center in the backyard. I put on my garden gloves, got another yard waste bag from the garage (this is probably the 25th one we've used this year), pulled down the rake and spade and went at it. We had grass in there that was at least two feet long!
As I was pulling clump after clump of weeds/grass from the soil, I was again taken back to the parable of the sower. God has been continually bringing this to my attention this year as I work in the beds. What kind of seeds of faith am I planting?
I started to realize the implication of weeds. Not only did they make our flowerbed look terrible! They also choked out the life of the thriving plants. The grass was hanging all over the place, the thistles were sharp and prickly, and the overgrowth almost made you cringe.
That first clump of grass was the worst to pull up. Not only were the roots deep, but they were strong. They held on for deer life for they liked where they were. But once I got that first clump out, the rest all came up quite easily.
It made me think of the sin in my life. Sometimes the gardens of our hearts are so full of sin that our outward lives are an eyesore for others. But once you take that first step to be redeemed, when you bow down before the Savior and he pulls that one clump out, your life and all the other things that you once held deer, just start to uproot and you're back on the path of salvation. All the sin that you secretly loved to do comes out in the open and it's easier to admit your faults and your errors and ask forgiveness.