Yes in the Morning, No at Night

For those of you who are still following my journey here, thanks for sticking by me during my recent days of absence. As Christmas nears, my time has been claimed left and right by various activities that the children have. Things will slow down just in time for me to pack our bags and head to Rochester for a week.

I thought I'd give a general update on my say Yes lifestyle.

In some areas, I've been doing really well. I have been in the Word of God almost every day (I think I have only missed one day since starting this blog). I am still studying Judges with the Precept upon Precept study, and I have read Genesis, Exodus, and Leviticus in the last three weeks. I am learning so much and have developed a new appreciation for the gift the Bible is.

I have continued to stay open to the will of God. There haven't been very many "obvious" moments where I know that God wants me to do something, but on the other hand, that means that I haven't had to have the experience of being disobedient.

There are definitely some areas in which I still struggle. Most of them deal with things that involve energy and discipline: housework, healthy lifestyle living (diet and exercise), and having the fortitude to truly do for the children what they deserve (undivided attention being so difficult sometimes with seven).

I find that in the morning, I have firm convictions. I will keep the house picked up as my children tornado through it, I will only eat foods that provide my body nutritional value, I will read to the children individually and keep the television turned off.

But towards the end of the afternoon, everything tends to fall apart. My energy starts to wane, and the children's energy doesn't. So I can't quite keep up as they create their whirlwinds, which makes me feel inadequate so I turn to junk food. The junk food makes me feel sluggish, so I turn on the television so that the children will be occupied while I try to clean up after them. The day ends with me praying for renewed strength the next day to be able to be the mother I know God wants me to be - not perfect, but better.

So this is where I am at. I have made some forward steps, like asking a dear friend to be my accountability partner for my physical health choices. Since the computer just sucks my time away, I made the decision to not use it until my morning chores are done and I have done my daily Bible study. This has helped a little.

My goal also is to post more here. I miss my quiet writing times; the way that God showed me a topic when I was praying for ideas.

I know that God did not give me seven children so that I could find out that I don't have the ability to do it right. He gave me seven children because He knew He would give me the strength to succeed. I just need to keep my eyes on Him.

The Reason

The craziness of the season has descended.

Between managing more than ten Christmas lists, checking and double checking the calendar every hour, and trying to make sure that everyone is where they need to be when they need to be there with what they are supposed to bring, I hardly have a moment to breathe.

But this year, I have made myself a promise. I promise that in those sacred breathing moments, I will remember the true meaning of Christmas. I will remember that family and friends and church and ministry is important, but that all of those things exist for the glory of God. Without Him, everything else would be meaningless.

He doesn't need to be set apart from all our busyness, either. My prayer is that in all things that we do, we will strive to bring forth the light of Christ. Whether that means saying, "Merry Christmas," to the store clerk that offers, "Happy Holidays," or taking the time to sit and discuss the birth of Christ and God's purpose for His life, we can keep Christ in Christmas.

This is the season that people who don't have Christ as their Savior tend to start searching...questing for something they might not even know they're looking for. But we know. By keeping our focus on Him this season, He may bring before us an opportunity to lead someone to a saving faith.

And we all know that's the best gift they'll ever receive.

Blinded

I woke up in a great mood this morning. Why? Because I was leaving the house to have breakfast with an amazing friend. Just the two of us, sans screaming and whining children. Complete bliss.

I was so anxious to get to the restaurant that I decided to forgo the "scraping of the windshield" part of going anywhere if you live in Wisconsin. After all, I could technically see. And besides, the beautiful ice crystals that danced across my line of vision were very pretty.

All was well for 75% of my drive. Then I turned left, right into the path of the sun.

Uh oh.

I couldn't see *anything*. Nothing. Just a brilliantly bright light.

Thankfully there was a side road directly to my left. Truly, I wouldn't have been able to go any further if it hadn't been there. I immediately realized why people scrape their windshields before driving. Apparently it only took me 16 years to learn that lesson.

So I made it to my breakfast by parking in the lot adjacent to that side street, in the opposite direction of the morning sun. I hurried to meet my friend and had a fantastic time catching up with her and sharing how God was moving in our lives.

I told her about my morning journey, and she laughed. "There is a parable in there somewhere," she said (proving once again why I just adore her.)

She was totally right. How many times in my life have I allowed myself a thin veil of the world? After all, I can still see God through it, can't I walk that fine line?

No, I can't. Because time after time I've seen that allowing the shadow blinds me to the perfection of His light.

Yes, it takes extra time. I have to make time to read the Bible every day, I have to remind myself to be in prayer. But dedicating those sections of my day to Him keeps my vision clear and my paths straight.

It's so worth it.

"Just Happened"

It was one of those mornings.

Steve called me to tell me that he had run out of gas while driving to the gas station. Both of us having not followed our typical rule of keeping at least 1/4 tank in the winter, I knew that I was almost out of gas also. Yet it was up to me to drive to the gas station to fill that lovely red container and bring it back to Steve so he could get to work.

As I turned on the van, alarm bells rang. My tires, all four of them, were low on air. Of course. But that "little" detail was going to have to wait for later.

Then it took me ten minutes to pull out of my driveway. Apparently 8:37 is the prime time in the morning for buses to drive down my street on their way to the high school. Finally I was on the road.

The window fogged up on the way down a steep hill. Nothing like driving down a snowy, curving road with no gas and no visibility!

I prayed all the way to the gas station, and moments later I coasted safely to the beautiful gasoline pumps.

After getting gas, I sat for a few minutes to let my windows defrost. I knew Steve was waiting for me, but I couldn't call him because...you guessed it, his cell phone had died. And I had the charger.

Finally I got back up the hill and pulled in next to Steve. He was freezing and very, very happy to see me. He quickly poured the gas in his tank and drove away.

As I pulled into my driveway, the spare key I had taken, since I couldn't find my regular keys, fell into the crack between the steering wheel and the dashboard. I imagined a long stick with a half-chewed sticky piece of gum on the end, but opted instead to just finally walk back into my house.

You would think this would be enough to shatter my day. But guess what? I was elated!

Instead of seeing all the negatives, I reveled in the blessings:

Steve's cell phone is broken and can't make outgoing calls. I "just happened" to call him right as he ran out of gas. Had I not done that, he would have been stuck with no way to let me know.

Steve was supposed to take Kahlan to swimming this morning. I "just happened" to decide at the last minute to give her the morning off, and so we slept until 6:30. Had he run out of gas at 6:15am, I couldn't have helped him until I was finished getting all the children to school.

I had an appointment with the dog groomer this morning that I "just happened" to cancel right before calling Steve. Had I not canceled the appointment, I would have gotten the children ready and headed out the door without ever calling Steve and finding out his predicament.

Scripture "just happened" to pop into my head as I was driving down that winding hill. I wish I could tell you what it was, but I truly have no idea. He gave it to me when I needed it, and it got me through with no anxiety.

After losing my spare key to the cavernous hole and walking back in my house, my regular car keys "just happened" to be sitting right on the counter...in plain sight.

God is so good. This could have been a horrible day, but instead it left me filled with joy and thankfulness.

Idolatry

I've been reading through the book of Judges, chapters 6-8. I can't say enough about the Precept upon Precept study that I have been doing, the content is just phenomenal.

So this week while looking at these versus, the study had me doing some cross referencing on idolatry. Which was actually really good timing, because Steve had just come home one night and told me that he heard a podcast that talked about the fact that idolatry isn't just worshiping idols made of wood. We make idols for ourselves in other things, like food, money, people, fame, etc.

Now thinking of those things, which certainly have and do tempt me to turn my sight from God, read this verse from Romans:

"And just as they did not see fit to acknowledge God any longer, God gave them over to a depraved mind, to do those things which are not proper,
being filled with all unrighteousness, wickedness, greed, evil; full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, malice; they are gossips, slanderers, haters of God, insolent, arrogant, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents, without understanding, untrustworthy, unloving, unmerciful; and although they know the ordinance of God, that those who practice such things are worthy of death, they not only do the same, but also give hearty approval to those who practice them. (Romans 1:28-32)

Wow.

Now if that doesn't hit you like a ton of bricks.

And it is SO true. I know these things are wrong. But yet so many times I allow them to creep into my life. When you look at it all listed like that, it really gives you pause, doesn't it?

My prayer is that I will pay more attention to those things that I have set above God in my life, and that I will be conscious of my priorities.

When my perception was that idols were just wooden statues, I thought I had this thing in the bag.

I'm so glad that my eyes were opened to the idols of our world.

Gifted

It's that time of year again. My parenting message boards are filled with the adventures of moms and dads questing to find and purchase that perfect present. We laugh together, we offer ideas, we sit by the computer waiting for the online toy store to restock its virtual shelves so that we can share with our friends the link to this one coveted toy.

We stand in line on Black Friday. We memorize Walmart's delivery truck arrival times. We trudge through snow and rain and cold, just to place our hands on the item that completes our child's wish list.

Why? Why do we do it all?

We do it because one of the best things about being a parent is being the source of unbridled joy in our children. Our hearts light up with their faces. Their excitement makes every dollar and every harried moment totally worth it.

Tonight as I was making a batch of Christmas cookies, a thought came to me.

God gifts us every day.

His grace. His Word. His promises. His truth. His Son.

Why? Why does He give it all?

Because He loves us. Because He wants to be the source of unbridled joy in His children.

His gifts aren't just available on holidays. They are ours for the taking every single moment.

Our joy is His joy.

Let's delight in the Lord, thanking Him for His gifts.

In My Tent

For years, I knew them. As if sharing blood, my heart was exposed to theirs. I drew no lines between us, my trust limitless.

The sons of Noah who came out of the ark were Shem, Ham and Japheth. (Ham was the father of Canaan.) These were the three sons of Noah, and from them came the people who were scattered over the earth.

The time came when the world pulled me down, my body falling to the ground as it fought mental battles.

Noah, a man of the soil, proceeded to plant a vineyard. When he drank some of its wine, he became drunk and lay uncovered inside his tent.

And one, for whom I would have done anything, came out from within the dark place I had revealed, speaking my truth unspeakably.

Ham, the father of Canaan, saw his father's nakedness and told his two brothers outside.

Two others, in spite of rumor and gossip's tantalizing temptation, came to me with cloaks of compassion, covering and shielding me when I couldn't.

But Shem and Japheth took a garment and laid it across their shoulders; then they walked in backward and covered their father's nakedness. Their faces were turned the other way so that they would not see their father's nakedness. (Genesis 9:18-23)

Betrayal versus Commitment. Judgment against Unconditional Love.

Forgiveness has long since faded the wound I felt so long ago, but I will never forget those who stood with me.

We can make a lasting impact in someone's life. Whose tent can you enter without judgment? To whom can you offer the warm garment of compassion?

All the Difference

Branches scratched at my arms, thorns dug into the space between my jeans and my shoes. Every third step saw me grabbing desperately for something to hold on to, my body either falling or swaying dangerously.

Finally I reached the top of my wooded mountain. Standing triumphant, I tipped my face to the sun and soaked in my victory. A moment later, I was back on my journey.

It wasn't long before my feet hit the forest floor. Going up and over the twenty foot mass of fallen trees and brush was my choice; I easily could have entered the woods from the other side. But I relished the adventure, I wanted to do it my own way.

Sitting on an old cement block in a pool of sunlight, I pulled an antique book from my backpack. Opening the familiar pages, I began to read aloud the words of poets who penned their words a hundred years before my time. My own Dead Poets Society.

At seventeen years old, they were some of my gods. My worship was the breath I gave their words, transforming text to life.

But inside, deep within heartache and disappointment, the void I longed to fill remained.

Today I worship a God who is alive, and that void is gone. I no longer feel the need to climb through dangerous obstacles to find that pool of sunshine, because it radiates from within me. The Book I read from doesn't have cracked and faded leather, but its words are timeless.

I think of the Robert Frost poem that ends with these famous lines:

"Two roads diverged in a wood, and I--
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference."

Before Christ, I thought of myself as an adventurous young woman who would do anything to take the road less traveled. But I didn't realize that the path of individualism I thought I was foraging was actually a wide, well traveled highway. Seeking to find my own personal god, I was accompanying billions who quested for the same.

While walking what was really the wide path, I found the narrow one.

"Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it." (Matthew 7:13-14)

"Jesus answered, 'I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.'" (John 14:6)

And that has made all the difference.

Praying for Health

I won't be writing much tonight, but in the eve of December, I wanted to at least come on and make my daily post. My daughter Aimee grew suddenly sick tonight, and I see a long night ahead of us. I am praying that she feels better soon, it's so hard to see our children suffer.

It's times like these that truly makes me appreciate the magnitude of God's love for us, His children.

I pray for health for all of us and our families tonight.

Standing On Our Own Faith

My oldest daughter will be baptized on Sunday. She accepted Christ at the tender age of four, and has been strong in her convictions and beliefs every day since. She truly loves God, and her incredible faith has been a witness to many.

My second oldest daughter, Kayanna, accepted Christ as her Savior as a result of hours spent talking to Kahlan about what a saving faith means. She told me that Kahlan showed her how to know when she was ready to make that personal commitment:

"You'll know when you're ready," Kahlan said, "When you know that if everyone you love suddenly told you they no longer trust in God, you'd still believe that He is the truth."

Wow.

There is such a lesson in that one statement. Think of the person who led you to Christ. What if that person told you right now that he/she had changed his/her mind; that the Bible is nothing more than a collection of fictional stories meant to keep society living to a set of moral standards?

Would your faith waver?

Would you, even for a moment, question the existence of God?

Would that be all it would take to plant a seed of doubt?

We can't profess Christ simply because someone told us to. It needs to be personal, it needs to be a commitment made because we truly believe. God wants us to be all in for Him.

If you looked around and suddenly realized you were the only Christian left, would you still raise your hands to Him?

"I will praise You as long as I live, and in Your name I will lift up my hands." (Psalm 63:4)

True Thanks

There are so many things in my life that I am thankful for: my family, my children, my husband, my friends, the ability to stay home with my kids, my home...truly, there are too many to list.

But then I had a sobering thought. I am guaranteed none of these things tomorrow. They are blessings from God, but I do not have the right to them.

Would I still be thankful if I lost everything?

I think of Job, who lived the reality of the nightmare I can barely allow myself to glance at.

I hope my reaction would be the same as his. I hope that even if everything I am thankful for vanished in front of me, that I would still be thankful to God for His love for me, for His strength, and for His Son through whom I have been given the promise of eternity that will never be taken away.

So today I am thankful not only for everything I have, but for the blessing it is to have it all.

Happy Thanksgiving!

His Rest

A couple days ago a friend of mine came over to my house to visit. We were talking about how she dedicates an hour or two every morning to God, through Bible study and prayer.

"I know why everything seemed to go wrong for me this morning," she confided. "I wanted to sleep in for just a little bit, just until 6:30. But my bed was warm and comfortable, and though I meant to rest for just a few minutes, soon an hour had passed. By the time I got up, I only had fifteen minutes of Bible study before it was time to wake the kids. I just know that's why my day has been off!"

I've been there so many times before. Though I don't do a morning devotion time, I try to dedicate an hour over lunch after I have put my children to their nap time. Most of the time, this works perfectly. But there are definitely days when time slips away from me and I don't get in as much as I'd like.

It made me think of something, which I shared with her. I think that when we choose to rest in an earthly way, such as stretching out in bed or watching a television show on the couch, or talking with friends on the computer, we are granted rest for those moments. Doing those things is relaxing, and our bodies reap the reward of that rest while we are still. But soon, as life continues and we have to get moving on with our day, that rest fades away.

We need to make sure that our days include quiet time with God, because His rest lasts long after our time with Him. When we take part of our day and devote it solely to God, we get inner rest. Our hearts and bodies are calmed. Our mind is satisfied, and our spirit is refreshed.

A Post

This is my post. It's really about nothing, and I hate that. It means I am too busy. I did, however, get in a nice solid hour with the Lord this afternoon, studying Judges chapter 5. Excellent stuff, highly recommended.

So that's it. For now. Because I am a perfectionist (working on that, really I am) I will be coming here tomorrow and putting a real post in the place of this one.

For now, I'm off again...out the door for the many-th time. (For fun, this time, though!)

I hope you all have a blessed night. See you tomorrow!

Thankful for Friends

Tonight I had the rare opportunity to go out with two different friends. One is a close friend with whom I have shared a deep friendship with over the last three years, another a woman who I deeply admire and have gotten more of a chance to sit and talk to over the last few weeks.

God blessed me so much through both of these women tonight. I am so thankful for Christian friends who accompany me on this pre-eternal walk.

For any of my friends, new and old, those I have met and those who I have only "met," I am grateful for you.

All You Need is Love

I just finished playing a creative card game with my daughter, Aliegha.

The name of the game is Fluxx. It's probably the oddest card game I have ever played, as the rules and the goal of the game change every round. The object is to get to the point where you have the cards that match the current goal.

It's a lot like life, actually. There is a television card, a brain card, and a goal where you have to have the television, but no brain. There is a tank card, a tombstone card, and a goal where both war and death are necessary. Of course you can't forget about the chocolate card and the milk card, I know my life sometimes necessitates that combination.

But I held the secret weapon in my hand. A goal card that read, "All you need is love." And I had the love card.

Within two rounds, that love goal and card won me the game.

In the midst of real life, where temptation, death, war, and endless distractions assault us; love truly is all we need.

Not just love for our family, our children, and our neighbor. We need God's love. He is our strength, and His love and grace offer redemption from the sins of this world.

It was because of His love for us that He sent His Son to die so that we could enter heaven and feel His love eternally. What a perfect gift.

We hold the Love card in our hands. It's already been offered to us. All we have to do is accept Him. That's the only way to win.

"For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have everlasting life." (John 3:16)

Looking Up

"I want up."

I looked down at the little boy standing by my feet. He was looking at me earnestly, his arms reaching for mine.

"What do you want?" I asked, only partially paying attention as my eyes roamed around the church nursery to make sure that the chaos was organized.

"I want up," he repeated calmly.

"Oh, okay, sure," I said, picking him up into my arms.

"No, up!" he said as I started walking around the room with him.

"You are up, silly!" I tickled his belly, but he remained stoic.

"Up," he said, looking into my eyes and pointing his finger to the ceiling.

I looked up. There, fastened to the ceiling tiles, was a rainbow colored decoration. "Aha. You want to touch it?"

I smiled as he grinned at me. Lifting him up as high as I could, he stretched his little body and tapped a tiny finger at the design. As it started spinning, he clapped his hands.

Then he led me in the direction of the next one.

I hadn't even seen them. All these times of doing nursery duty, and I didn't even notice those decorations once. Yet this little boy, not even half my size, saw it right away.

Why? Because children are used to looking up.

Somewhere along the way, our world becomes less about what's above us and more about what is at our level.

But God wants us to look up. We are His children, and He wants us to reach our hands up to Him, opening ourselves to things we need His help to reach.

When, through Him, we see or learn something that is new, that child-like excitement comes rushing through us.

Delight in its truest form.

"Delight yourself in the LORD and he will give you the desires of your heart." (Psalm 37:4)

New Moon

I am going to go see New Moon with a good friend tonight.

The theaters for this movie are almost sold out. Just our small theater was fully packed in all eight screening rooms for the midnight show last night.

Lines of people waiting for hours for tickets to be the first to see this anticipated film.

What if all this passion was for God?

Standing-room-only church services. Lines of people waiting with eager hearts to hear the gospel of Christ.

What a world that would be.

What a world that will be.

Lost

As I walked out of the courthouse tonight, I patted my back pocket to make sure that my cell phone was still tucked neatly inside.

Imagine my surprise when all I felt was a folded tissue.

Frantically I started searching my coat, looking here and there, my fingers flying through old receipts and spare change with no luck.

"I can't find my phone!" I lamented to my husband.

(Who I was talking to on the phone.)

Oops.

Have you ever had one of those moments/days/seasons where you just feel lost? We look at our life and wonder where God is, because it just doesn't seem like He remembered to show up that day.

How easy it is to forget that no matter how frantic our search is, we're actually sitting right in His hand.

"I will never leave you, nor forsake you." (Hebrews 13:5)

From Paul's Pen to my Eyes

I've been studying Titus recently with my Precept upon Precept Bible study. What a fascinating book! It's amazing how three chapters of the Bible can have such a profound impact on my life.

My plan was to start school again in the Spring. I thought it made perfect sense to take one or two courses a semester in pursuit of my teaching certification. Surely I was going to be able to raise seven children, take care of my home, be there for my husband, write my daily blog entry, and go to school. Yep, it made perfect sense...until I thought about it.

This is the passage that has been especially convicting me: "So that they [the older women] may encourage the young women to love their husbands, to love their children, to be sensible, pure, workers at home, kind, being subject to their own husbands, so that the word of God will not be dishonored." (Titus 2:4-5)

Yikes.

Truly, I have struggled many times in each of those areas. Suddenly I realized that becoming busier wasn't going to make any of those things easier.

So, feeling that Say Yes to Me feeling, I called my husband and told him I thought school could wait. He was very, very happy. He would have supported me no matter what, but he was concerned that it was going to be too much. Rightfully concerned, I realized.

The thing is, having seven children doesn't give me the excuse to not do things the right way. Amazing that this was a new thought to me. God did not place these children in my life so that I would accept less than His standard. Having this many children doesn't allow me to settle for less, it means I have to work harder to be that young woman that Paul is describing to Titus.

So things are changing around here. Amazing how saying Yes to God about one thing tends to shift a whole lot of other things into their rightful places.

Paul's obedience in penning the Word of God in this letter is changing MY life almost 2,000 years later.

Our obedience can have effects that are just as astounding. All we have to do is hand the reins back to the One who has the right to hold them.

False Starts

I couldn't watch. I've never been able to. My nerves just can't handle it.

I'm always so afraid that she's going to...

SPLASH

There it was. The sound I've always been afraid of hearing. Looking up, my fears were realized as I saw my daughter climbing out of the pool.

The crowd was silent. The coaches and judges walked forward, letting her know that she had the opportunity to try again.

Kahlan got to her feet and walked to the front of her starting block. Her shoulders started to shake, and it was all I could do not to run down to my baby girl and tell her that everything was going to be fine.

Instead, I watched as she allowed herself to cry for just a few seconds. I sat in awed amazement as she physically relaxed her shoulders and took a deep, purposeful breath. She lifted her goggles up (later telling me that she did that so her tears could escape from where they had pooled in her lenses) and nodded to the judges.

She was ready.

Up on the block she climbed. The announcer said, "Take your mark!" and she bent forward, her legs locked in place. The horn sounded and she dove perfectly into the water to begin her race.

She swam hard and took fourth place. The man sitting next to me, the father of two girls on the opposing team, said something to me that I won't forget. He said, "You tell your daughter that she won that race. The way she picked herself up, shook off her mistake, and went for it again...that is a winner."

We all have false starts in life. Times where we make a mistake and find ourselves tumbling into the water. But it isn't the mistake that people remember, it's what we do afterward.

Do we allow ourselves to slink off in embarrassment? Do we get angry and blame someone else? Do we give up entirely?

Getting up, dusting ourselves off, allowing a moment for sadness, then pressing on with resolve and determination; that's what God asks from us.

Let's allow our mistakes to be mistakes.


Brothers, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus. (Philippians 3:13-14)

Imperfect Heroes

She was a woman of the night, an immoral outcast.

Living on the very edge of society, she welcomed men into her home and her bed who had no right to be there.

Though she grew up worshiping idols, she heard the whispers of a God who caused mysterious plagues, a God who opened the Red Sea for Israel and then closed it upon Israel's enemies.

Somewhere in the days before she would be called upon to serve Him, she chose to believe in Him.

Two men appeared at her door. She knew they were spies, knew they were the enemy of her king.

In faith, believing that God who sent them was the one true God, she hid them in stalks of flax. Under the cover of darkness, she helped them escape.

Their escape culminated in the destruction of Jericho; a victory for the Lord and His people. Because of her obedience, she and her family were saved.

Later she would marry Salmon and give birth to Boaz, an ancestor of Jesus Christ. (Matthew 1:5)

Rahab, a hero of our faith.

"By faith the prostitute Rahab, because she welcomed the spies, was not killed with those who were disobedient." (Hebrews 11:31)

She was a woman of God, strong in her faith.

The wife of Abraham, she gave up everything to follow her husband, led by God to a land they did not know.

Devastated by the heartache and prejudice of barrenness, desperate for an heir, she led her maidservant into her husband's bed.

Filled with jealousy, she treated with disdain the woman who now carried her husband's child.

She laughed at the angel of the Lord when she overheard him tell Abraham that, at around eighty-nine years old, she would bear her first child one year later. Hearing her laugh, God asked Abraham why.

Fearful, she lied to God, "I did not laugh." (Genesis 18:15)

One year later she gave birth to a son, Isaac, an ancestor of Jesus Christ. (Matthew 1:2)

Sarah, a hero of our faith.

"By faith even Sarah herself received ability to conceive, even beyond the proper time of life, since she considered Him faithful who had promised." (Hebrews 11:11)

Rahab, a prostitute who grew up worshiping idols. Sarah, a woman who walked away from the life she knew to follow her husband and God.

Two women, two different backgrounds.

Rahab, a woman of mistakes, follows God's leading and acts in obedience though it could have cost her her life.

Sarah, a woman who made mistakes, follows God's leading and acts in obedience though she struggled to believe He would provide.

Both women chosen to be in the bloodline of Jesus Christ, who died so our mistakes could be forgiven.

We don't have to be perfect. The sins of our past and the sins of our present don't make us unworthy of God's love.

Imperfect and flawed as we are, our obedience to our Lord and Savior can make any of us heroes of the faith.

Thankful

I can't believe that Thanksgiving is right around the corner! I thought I should dedicate a blog post to the things that I am thankful for this year.

In no particular order:

I am thankful that the adoption of my three daughters is coming along. I know that it all is happening in God's timing. We hope to be finalized next March, which will be a great way to start 2010. I am thankful that all three girls have chosen to call us Mom and Dad.

I am thankful for my husband. He loves his job, but work is still work, and I am thankful that he provides so well for us. I am thankful that he puts up with my little quirks and loves me because of them. I am thankful for our 12 years of marriage, and that he is a strong believer.

I am thankful for all seven of my children, and my three former foster children who we still get to love like our own. I am grateful for a year where they were healthy and grew in their faith.

I am grateful for my friends, who stand by me no matter what. I am thankful that God has brought me to a place in my life where I have Christian women whom I love.

I am thankful for my grandmother, who has always encouraged me. I know there will come a time when she will no longer be with me on earth, and I am grateful that I will get to see her in heaven.

Finally, I am thankful for my blog readers. God laid this blog on my heart, and I would write for that reason even if no one read a word of it. But you all make it so enjoyable for me, and I truly am thrilled that you keep coming back. You are the blessing for my obedience. Thank you.

I hope everyone has a wonderful night! This would have been a night that I wouldn't have blogged at all, since today was very busy. But I am thankful for NaBloPoMo for making me sit down and write all of this out. I go to bed with a smile in my heart.

Goodnight! :)

High Beams

There are two things I started having difficulties with after having children: amusement park rides and driving at night.

Thankfully, my sudden inability to stomach riding on large contraptions that spin me haphazardly through the air is easy to avoid.

Driving after sunset, however, creeps up much more often.

And so it was that I found myself on high alert tonight as I drove my oldest daughter home from her swim meet. Forty five miles through winding, pitch black, creature-filled country roads made me more than a little nervous.

After watching two deer run a few meters in front of me and narrowly missing a large raccoon, I finally gave in and turned on my high beams.

The road was instantly lit, and my muscles relaxed. For a minute, anyway. Because as all of us who have used our high beams know, you have to turn them off as soon as headlights appear in front of you.

On, off. Light, dark. Relaxed, tense. Playing the little dance of "can I or can I not see more than a few feet in front of me" was getting to me.

Letting my thoughts drift, I reminisced about times that I had to adjust the brightness of my inner light.

When I first became a Christian, I had my high beams on at all times. Anyone who came in contact with me heard the gospel of Christ. I was passionate and I wanted everyone around me to feel what I felt.

The problem was, high beams sometimes cause people to squint and look away.

I needed to learn how to adjust my light. Matthew 5:14-15 tells us, "You are the light of the world. A city on a hill cannot be hidden. Neither do people light a lamp and put it under a bowl. Instead they put it on its stand, and it gives light to everyone in the house."

A city on a hill gives off a bright light from a distance. To me, I think of this as doing things that reflect Christ to many people, things like writing or speaking publicly. I think of people who I don't know well who live their lives for Christ in a way that anyone can see their passion.

A lamp on its stand in the house provides a warm glow. It invites people into its presence. This reminds me of people who I love, family members and friends, who I know that I can turn to if I need Godly counsel. People who I want to be around, because they make me feel the presence of God's love.

Sometimes high beams are necessary. There are times when we need to be bold and bright in our witness. But being able to provide the right light for each situation will help us to show Christ to those who might otherwise have looked away.

When it Goes Untouched

I think I walked past it three times.

I didn't mean to.

I had every intention of giving it the attention it deserved.

But I got distracted: my daughter was crying, the microwave beeped, the phone rang.

Each time I walked back in the living room it stared at me.

As I turned to grab it, something else caught my attention.

Today it was milk spilled on my hardwood floor. A little puddle that, ten minutes later, I finally wiped up with a washcloth. Left for much longer, I would have been forced to stare at the resulting stain forever. Today it was milk.

Two years ago it was my Bible.

I think I walked past it three times.

I didn't mean to.

I had every intention of giving it the attention it deserved.

But I got distracted: my daughter was crying, the microwave beeped, the phone rang.

Each time I walked back in the living room it stared at me.

As I turned to grab it, something else caught my attention.

But I let the distractions spiral into one another, and soon days had passed and my Bible sat untouched.

Days slid into weeks, weeks into three months.

Finally, I reached for it.

But there was a stain in my life that I will look at forever. Wiped clean by God's grace, but not forgotten by me.

He did not breathe His Word into those who penned the Bible so that it would look pretty on our bookshelves.

He gave us His Word so that we can hide His wisdom in our hearts.
"I have hidden Your word in my heart that I might not sin against You." (Psalm 119:11)
He gave us His Word so we can make choices that honor Him.
"In all your ways acknowledge Him, and He will make your paths straight." (Proverbs 3:6)

When we let ourselves get too distracted by the world, we're the ones who suffer. If we allow too much time to pass where He is not our priority, we may find that our choices can't be easily wiped away.

We can make time for Him. Our paths are blessed when we have His road map in our hands.

Rescued

I had no idea what the sudden sound from the backyard was, but a sudden mothering instinct reared up inside me and I raced to the patio door. I scanned the yard, searching for the source.

The sound came again, a plaintive squeaking that resonated with desperation, so very close to where I was standing.

That's when I saw him. He was clutching to the tree in front of me, a foot or two off the ground, his body trembling with the effort.

A little baby squirrel, calling for his mama.

"Steve!" I yelled, waving my arms wildly so he would notice me. He turned quickly and headed to the house, anxiety suddenly hastening his steps.

"What's the matter?" he called back.

"There's a baby squirrel stuck on the tree!" I replied, pointing at the terrified creature.

My husband stopped in his tracks. "You screamed for me about a squirrel?" he asked, slightly frustrated. But given my track record with animals, he wasn't really surprised. "I thought something was wrong with one of the kids!"

"Sorry about that, dear. The squirrel needs help!" My mind was already racing, planning ahead for what bedding materials to use, mentally choosing key words to enter into search engines for advice on caring for a squirrel who wasn't even old enough to climb a tree.

My husband sighed. He had gone out of his way to save animals before, but not wild animals. He sat looking at me for a long minute before deciding it wasn't worth the argument. "Go get the cat carrier," he instructed, "and some blankets."

I gathered all my materials and headed into the backyard where Steve was now sitting by the tree. He was making soft squirrel-like sounds, which appeared to be working. The squirrel had released its death-grip on the tree and was crouched only a foot or so away from where Steve sat.

"What..?" I began, stopping as Steve raised a finger to his lips.

He talked quietly to the squirrel for no more than thirty seconds before the neatest thing happened: that little baby crawled right up onto his leg.

"Well, he's won me over now," Steve admitted sheepishly, reaching a finger out to touch the squirrel's back.

I opened the cage door, and Steve placed the squirrel on the grass in front of it. Needing no coaxing, he ran right in, burying himself in the soft, white blanket.



I ran inside and started googling for information. Remarkably, there was a Wildlife Rescue Center only fifteen miles away. I called them and they gave me the information I needed to keep the squirrel safe for the night.

We brought our new pet to the Center the next morning. Three weeks later, all healed and ready to scamper among the tallest branches, they returned him with three of his new friends to our yard.

He still lives in that very tree he fell from. Though his distinctive markings help us recognize him, the fact that he loves to sit on the thickest branch and stare in our patio door would identify him anyway.

He added himself to a long list of animals-in-need who have ventured through our lives: a stray cat with a leg wound so deep she wasn't supposed to live, hermit crabs we drove four hours to bring to a suitable home, a toad too big to jump out of his egress window prison, an abused dog who trembled when we put our hand out to touch him.

Maybe we have a heart to help them because we have been where they are. Lost, lonely, hurting. Needing rescue.

But our Savior did so much more than clean our wounds, travel long distances, lift us up, and calm our hearts.

He died to save us. Alone on a cross with nails through His hands, He died for us.

All so that, through His name, we could be rescued.

"Call upon Me in the day of trouble; I shall rescue you, and you will honor Me." (Psalm 50:15)

"For You have rescued my soul from death, my eyes from tears, my feet from stumbling." (Psalm 116:8)

Matched

I almost never wear matching socks. One will be white and the other might be black. My left foot might dance with bright red hearts, while my right swirls with light blue clouds. Stripes and polka dots, blue and ladybugs, purple heel next to gray heel. Maybe, on a good day, they'll both be white; but on closer inspection you might notice that one is long enough to reach my knee and the other barely covers my ankle.

I call them my wacky socks, and they feel really good on my feet. When I wear them I remind myself that I am fun and unique. I could tell you that I choose to wear different socks as a bold statement of individuality. The reality, though, is that I actually hate folding socks.

I have bags of unmatched socks just waiting for someone to throw a big find-your-mate sock party. But since my mailbox hasn't been graced with such an invitation, I just grab two socks that both meet the "fit on my feet" requirement and push the bag back in my closet.

I would love to wear matching socks every day. They would still be wild and crazy, but it would be nice if they were identically wild and crazy.

Before I was a Christian, I tried to match myself to the world. I wanted to be as pretty, as popular, as funny, as successful. But every potential match I found demanded that I try to be like someone else. Something within me was missing, but nothing I added filled the hole.

The fact is, it's Jesus who completes us. He meets us where we are and He cleanses us from our sin. He doesn't ask us to become perfect in order to receive Him, He perfects us. When we choose to walk on our own, we journey through a mismatched world of individuals. When we accept Him as Lord and Savior of our lives, we join a body of unique believers whose hearts are matched in the most significant way.

"For God so loved the world that He gave His one and only Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have everlasting life." (John 3:16)

Not a Single Hour

Last night I sat on my bed talking to myself. Over and over again I practiced my upcoming speech into the empty air of my room. The words were a mess. Ideas tumbled over and through each other, I faltered and stuttered and so many times I dropped my head into my hands and thought, "I can't do this, Lord."

I began to doubt my desire and passion for speaking. If I couldn't form thoughts in the calm privacy of my home, how would I be able to convey them to twenty people the next day?

But thinking back on my life, I couldn't find one example where God gave me the strength to do something before I needed to do it. He promises in Philippians 4:13 that, "I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me," but He doesn't say that the strength will come beforehand.

When I was pregnant with my third child, I worried a lot about the labor. I had two labors under my belt, and I couldn't kid myself about what I was going to experience. So for the last three months or so, I grew more and more anxious about the pain and my response to it. Having had a severe reaction to medication, I worried that I wouldn't be able to labor without pain relievers. As the due date grew closer, I became frantic. What if I couldn't do it? What if it was too much?

Then one morning I felt a series of contractions that I knew signaled that this was the day. And you know what? I was peaceful. I was serene. I took each contraction as it came, opening my body and my mind to what was happening. The pain came and went, stronger and stronger, and I never had one moment of panic. I just let it happen, knowing God was going to give me the strength to get through it.

All the preparation I did helped me immensely. The studying of natural labor methods and talking to friends who had given birth using different strategies all paid off. But the worry and anxiety was for nothing.

He gives us the strength to do all things when we need the strength to do those things.

And so at 11:00 last night, I closed my binder and turned out the lights. I had done everything I could to prepare. What would three more hours of anxiety give me? Nothing. "Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life?" (Matthew 6:27)

And guess what? When the time came to speak, I spoke. I spoke from my heart and everything went just fine.

His timing, not ours.

Ebb and Flow

While cleaning out the garage a couple days ago, I stumbled on a few diary pages that I had written and torn out of a notebook in 2000.

It was startling to me how much my life has changed since I penned those words, yet at the same time I felt a touch of nostalgia.

I wrote that at that point in my life, I had no one who called me their friend. My phone was silent, there were no outings or girl-time. Instead of giving in to depression, I had decided, I was going to dedicate that period of my life to growing closer to God and realizing who I was in Him.

I didn't know it then, but I know now that it would take me a full year before people I still today have as friends walked into my life. You would think that 365 days of solitude would be unbearable, but I remember those days with fondness. I took the time I would have spent on the phone or out at a restaurant, and I simply walked the path of self-discovery and God-discovery.

I truly don't think I would be where I was today if I had tried to force friendships to fill the void I felt within me.

If I ever find myself at a crossroads like that again, I hope that I will remember that God uses all things for the good of those who love Him. (Paraphrased from Romans 8:28)

Picket Fences and Desperate Housewives

I hate to admit it, but this would probably be a "no post" day if it were not for accepting the NaBloPoMo challenge. Not because I don't want to write, but because I have written so much today and still have so much left to go.

Almost 5,000 words later, I have written the first part of my "speech" (for lack of a better word) for my teaching time at my favorite Moms group on Tuesday. I am so thrilled to be able to present a message that I have been thinking about for almost a year now. It is exciting and daunting at the same time. I want to make sure that I present the information in a way that is honoring to God, and I don't want to make it about me.

This gets difficult when part of my talk includes my testimony.

So I would just like to ask, in this space where a typical post would have gone, for your prayers as I get ready and deliver my presentation, "Picket Fences and Desperate Housewives" on Tuesday. Please pray that God will give me the words He wants me to say, and that my message will be completely honoring to Him.


Thank You!

Being Still

Influenza has struck our house and its current victim is my five year old daughter. Anyone who knows the struggles that we have had in re-parenting Shaylee would be surprised to hear me say what an absolute joy the past couple days have been with her. But it's true.

I am not going to go into Shaylee's history here, because that is her story to share or not share someday. Suffice it to say that she has a very severe form of attachment disorder that manifests itself in many difficult ways. Every morning, Steve and I wake to the challenge that is raising a child who fights every attempt at the help that she desperately needs. Constantly watching her to make sure that she is kept safe from herself is tiring at best.

Along with attachment disorder, my daughter also has major sensory regulation issues. A look of praise from us will send her into a frenzy of excitement, a look of disapproval into sullenness or rage. There is not much middle ground with our beautiful girl, and so in the hectic days of trying to take one step forward in her development, it is many times hard to just enjoy her.

Enter the flu. Wracked with fever and exhaustion, all she can do is rest quietly. There are no temper tantrums, no rages. There are no screams from other children and there are no punishments. All there is is a tiny little girl who needs a mother and father to love and care for her.

In the still moments of illness, I get to show her all the good things about a mother's love.

In a few days, she'll be all better. We'll be back to trying to reconnect the dots in the midst of chaos. But she will know for a fact that the words we've been repeating for eighteen months are true, "You can let go, we'll catch you when you do." She doesn't need to be in control anymore. How many times have we said that to her? I couldn't even begin to count. But never was she able to do it...because she was scared that our words were empty promises she's all too familiar with.

Now she knows.

We love Shaylee the same whether she is listening to us or not, but she only is able to make progress when she makes herself stop to hear us.

In the busyness of life, if we forget to stop and open our ears to Our Father, He still loves us. But when something happens that halts us in our tracks and causes us to throw our arms up to Him, He gets the opportunity to fully show us His love and grace. It isn't that He wasn't there before, it's that we weren't looking for Him.

Shaylee doesn't have to get sick to see evidence of our love, and we don't have to go through difficult times to see evidence of God's. When she chooses to reach out to us, we pull her into our arms. When we choose to reach out to Him, He does the same.

Tale of Two Songs

A few days ago I was listening to music on the radio as I drove home from running errands. Tapping my steering wheel, I sang along to Chris Tomlin's hit, "Holy is the Lord." I have always found the lyrics to be sweetly simple and completely compelling:

"We stand and lift up our hands,
For the joy of the Lord is our strength.
We bow down and worship Him now,
How great, how awesome is He!

And together we sing:

(Chorus)
Holy is the Lord God Almighty
The earth is filled with His glory
Holy is the Lord God Almighty
The earth is filled with His glory
The earth is filled with His glory"


The song ended and a series of commercials began. While scanning to see if my other favorite Christian radio station was currently commercial-less, I stumbled upon a song that had a particularly energizing beat. Listening for a minute, I was struck by how different these lyrics were from the ones I had just finished listening to:


"You change your mind
Like a girl changes clothes

Cause you're hot then you're cold
You're yes then you're no
You're in and you're out
You're up and you're down

You're wrong when it's right
It's black and it's white
We fight, we break up
We kiss, we make up" ("Hot N Cold", by Katy Perry)

The combination of those two songs really made me sit and think about the spiritual battle being waged in our world today.

When we put our hopes in the world, we don't know what we're going to get back. Something or someone we feel we can rely and depend on may be completely different from one day to the next.

But God, in His infinite Holiness, is unchanging. We don't need to depend on our own strength, because He is our strength. We don't need to worry about who will be there for us tomorrow, because He is with us always.

"Every good thing given and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shifting shadow." (James 1:17)

"Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today, yes and forever." (Hebrews 13:8)

"The grass withers, the flower fades, but the word of our God stands forever." (Isaiah 40:8)

"But You, O LORD, abide forever, and Your name to all generations. Of old You founded the earth, and the heavens are the work of Your hands. Even they will perish, but You endure; and all of them will wear out like a garment; like clothing You will change them and they will be changed. But You are the same, and Your years will not come to an end." (Psalm 102:12,25-28)

Buried Treasure

I don't know whose bright idea it was to dig a hole to China in my backyard. I was maybe six years old at the time, and the result of that inspiration was four or five little girls sitting in the back corner of my yard armed with silver spoons and determination.

Somewhere along the line, as days of work yielded a hole about one inch deep, we changed our goal. Instead of China, we thought the ice cream store in our town would be more realistic. Plus, we probably found ice cream much more thrilling than the idea of ending up in a foreign country where we wouldn't have any idea how to even ask for dessert.

We dug for weeks. Summer's sunny days grew shorter, the cooler night air beginning to wear down our enthusiasm.

Then one day we struck gold. I don't remember who found it, but there among the dirt was a gold chain and cross. What's the only thing better than unlimited ice cream to a child? Buried Treasure!

We rode the high of that incredible find for weeks. It was the talk of the neighborhood kids, and we felt so important. The tunnel was forgotten, lost in the excitement of maps and "X marks the spot."

Years later we found out that the gold jewelry wasn't from some pirate of yore. Our parents, their hearts stretching out to their faithful tunnel digging girls, had planted that treasure in the dirt for us to find. In a world that is so full of disappointment, they had the foresight to turn what would have been an unreachable dream into a delightful fantasy.

You might think that I would have been upset when I found out that the truth was much less glamorous than our fiction. But the opposite was true. It meant everything to me that they had done that. It was a tangible touch of love that affected me deeply. Though I was years away from experiencing and understanding the depth of parental adoration, I was old enough to see that it was bigger than I had ever imagined.

Be a Brand New Fuzzy Towel

I had an interesting experience the other day when I was getting out of the shower. (I know, there are a lot of bath and shower references on my blogs, but I tell you, it's one of the only times that I have uninterrupted thoughts! I can see you nodding your head in commiseration.)

I had brought a brand new towel into the bathroom with me. It was a really soft beach towel that had a thick black border and brown and black horses parading across its center.

I grabbed it and quickly wrapped myself in its warmth. A minute or so later I discarded the towel to the bathroom floor and climbed into my clothes.

But what strange thing had happened to my arms? Why would I be dirtier after a shower than I was before?

It took me seconds longer than I care to admit to realize that what looked like dirt was actually towel fuzz. Lots and lots of towel fuzz.

One minute of contact with that towel and I would be picking off the remnants all day.

We should strive to be brand new fuzzy towels for Christ. God's Word tells us that we are the light of the world. (Matthew 5:14) Can we not, by shining His light through us, touch others and leave those fingerprints of God's love behind?

After seeing the joy of our hearts, might not someone wonder where the "fuzzies" have come from?

It doesn't take much. Just like with my momentary encounter with that towel, a moment is all that is needed to leave the imprint of Christ on someone's heart.

Be a brand new fuzzy towel. You never know what the results might be.

The Color Purple

I have often referred to my salvation experience as feeling like what Dorothy must have experienced when she walked from her black and white Kansas into the vibrant color of Oz.

Black and White for me was unbearable. At 21 years old I was clinically depressed, suicidal, and devoid of hope. I commented to a therapist at the time that the only reason I was still alive was because I didn't want my one year old daughter to lose her mother. In a world that hadn't yet given birth to the "emo" culture, the scars on my body bore witness to years of self-inflicted injury. I loved my husband and my daughter, but I hated myself.

Hours before I accepted Christ as my Savior, I commented to my mother-in-law that I didn't believe that God did any more than create the earth. "Sure, I believe that God made the world," I remember saying, "but Adam and Eve and all that? It's just nonsense."

Later that day I decided to drive to a friend's house. She was actually the mother of my husband's best friend, but she and I had developed a friendly relationship. I sat at her kitchen table with her and her husband, and "for no reason at all" I brought up Christianity. Through the course of that life-altering conversation, I came to realize that even though I felt unworthy of love, God loved me anyway.

He loved me in spite of all that I had done. I had always believed that He had abandoned me, but the truth was that I had abandoned Him. He had been there with me the whole time. Though I felt ugly and twisted inside, He looked beyond all my failures and gave me what I had needed all along: grace and forgiveness.

In an instant my heart was changed. I prayed right there for God to enter my heart. I apologized for the hurtful things I had done and asked Him to wipe my slate clean. I praised Him for sending His Son to die on the cross so that I could feel the peace that was rushing through my veins.

I opened my eyes to color. So many things from my life suddenly made sense. I knew that I had a road ahead of me; I had hurt many people in my years of desperation, and it would take time to heal those wounds. But for the first time since I could remember, I felt hope.

And so eleven years passed. What so many people thought would be a "passing fancy" grew and blossomed into a strong faith that affected my entire family.

But even in the happy moments of my born-again life, I knew something was missing. I wasn't growing like I wanted to be. My heart yearned for a closer relationship with God, but days would pass and I would suddenly realize that it was Sunday again and my Bible was still in the van from the week before. Why couldn't I put God first when He was so important to me?

I realized that I needed to actively participate in my relationship with Him. Out of discipline, desire was born. When I started listening to Him, reading His Word, and devoting my quiet moments to prayer, that pure joy that I had been questing for blossomed.

This morning I was talking to a dear friend after my Bible study. I was relating all of this to her, and describing my Black and White to Color analogy. I then told her how exciting my life had become since making the commitment to say Yes to God.

"It's like finding the color purple," I said. My post-Black-and-White life was wonderful, but finding that next shade has made it even better.

As I was walking away, something struck me. I may have picked that color randomly, but it just happens to be the one that completes the rainbow.

"But you, beloved, building yourselves up on your most holy faith, praying in the Holy Spirit, keep yourselves in the love of God, waiting anxiously for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ to eternal life." (Jude 1:20-21 NASB)

Fighting for Joseph (Part Three: Saved)

This is the last of three blog entries that will focus on my 9 year old son, Joseph, looking at our journey through his autism diagnosis and how God held our family in His hand as we fought for our son.

When I walked into the doctor's office with Joseph, I wasn't looking for reassurances. I was done with, "Everything is fine." Something was wrong and I wanted to know what it was and what we could do about it.

It's amazing how far we have come in diagnosing autism in the last six years. Now there are screenings and evaluations that take place right within well-baby checkups starting as early as fifteen months. Back then, there was just the hunch of parents and the hope that the doctor believed them.

Our doctor believed us. Walking in her office I felt like I had stumbled into the eye of the storm. I didn't have to convince her that there was something wrong. She didn't try to tell me a hundred reasons why my observations were ridiculous. It was such a change from what I had gone through with almost every person who cared about Joseph.

Smiling sweetly, she watched as I lifted him on the table. He was still clutching a bead toy from the waiting room floor because I had known better than to try to pry it from his fingers. "Hello, Joseph," the doctor said.

There was no response. Joseph continued to spin the beads along their wires as if neither of us were in the room.

The doctor tried several more times before turning to face me. "There is definitely a problem," she said.

How odd that her words made me want to shout with joy. It hadn't all been in my head, it wasn't me trying to make something out of nothing. And where there's a problem, there's a solution.

She set us up with Birth to Three services, which transitioned quickly to Early Childhood. Joseph had turned three shortly after the appointment, and as we waited for further testing from the doctor, I met with the special education teachers that had come to our home to evaluate him.

At some point in the weeks of testing, I had confided in a friend. Expecting the usual response, I was surprised when she nodded her head in agreement. "Have you ever thought it might be autism?" she asked.

Autism? Sure, I had considered it. But just as quickly I had discarded the possibility. Joseph did so much more than sit in a corner and rock mindlessly, and that was the face of autism to me by that point. Plus, autism was a lifelong disorder. Our doctor was going to find the people who would make Joseph better. It couldn't be that.

So when one of the teachers took a deep breath and told me that they had decided that Joseph fell under the educational category of autism, I bristled.

"Okay, then tell me this," I said, "Isn't it true that if a child with autism was given the ability to speak perfectly, that he would still have it?"

"Yes," they all responded.

"Then you tell me what it is about my son besides his speech delay that makes you think he has autism," I challenged.

It was to be the last sentence I would utter in the world of darkness I had been in for over a year. As papers flew around the table, they pulled out a list of criteria for the diagnosis. Speech was only one of five sections. Joseph qualified under every single one.

"Oh." That was all that I uttered for over a minute. The clouds were parting for me. Everything they had showed me: repetitive behaviors, social delays, obsessions and preoccupations, meltdowns, meaningless speech repetitions; they all fit together to form what my life had been for more than a year. Autism went from being a stereotype to a complete world that definitely included my son.

I cried all the way home from the meeting, but the tears were not from sadness. I was so relieved to have an answer, and so grateful for the team that showed me that there was a plan to help bring Joseph out of himself.

I won't tell you that there was never any grief, because there was. Sometimes there still is, even though my son today is nothing like he was back then. But for that night, I only felt incredibly grateful that God had brought me through the forest and back into the light of hope.

There have been many times in my life where I have felt God's arms carrying me, but that period was the longest. In the nights when I couldn't imagine waking to go through one more day, He was always there.

That day began a long series of testing, therapy, and appointments that would take much longer to write about than I have here. We began an intense regimen of Greenspan's Floor Time therapy that included 8 to 10 twenty minute sessions of encouraged social interaction a day. When we started, Joseph could only sustain seconds of contact. Today he will talk to you for hours.

God's hand was all over our journey. A pediatric neurologist chose Joseph for her long term case study, giving us coveted one on one time with her as she trained me to enter Joseph's world. We had the opportunity to bring a team of therapists into our home thirty hours a week for three years. An amazing lady stepped forward when she heard that we couldn't attend church because Joseph's needs were too immense for the Sunday school program, and she personally watched him every Sunday for many years. An entire Special Needs Sunday School program was then developed to help other families in similar situations, where a team of people faithfully donate their time so that my family and others can worship together. Joseph was blessed in school by two teachers who not only worked with him intensely, but also loved him personally. In a world where people sometimes struggle to see God's influence, we watched as one of those teachers chose to move with him from Kindergarten to First grade, and then a year later, to Third.

Probably the biggest lesson I learned came when Joseph was seven. We were sitting in the parking lot of the school that Kahlan attended, waiting for her to be done with her day. At that point Joseph was getting better with talking with us, but it still came in short bursts and in his own timing.

Out of the blue, Joseph asked me why Jesus died and what it meant to be a Christian. The words that formed that question were a miracle in themselves! As I answered his questions, he asked more. For a full twenty minutes we talked as I explained the answers to questions like, "What happens when we die," "What happens to animals when they die?" "Will I see you there, Mommy, if you die first?" He also asked if there would be a time when the people who had died and gone to heaven would return to earth.

My little boy who still struggled with communicating his basic needs was asking complex questions that most typically developing children his age hadn't yet wrestled with.

He gave his life to Christ that day in the van. As he prayed, I apologized to God. Even with everything He had done for us, I had decided that Joseph becoming a Christian was too big for my little boy. How could he ever understand?

Somehow in thinking that Joseph's ability was small, I forgot how big God is.

Today, as Joseph turns nine years old, all I have is gratitude. My son has been blessed with a vocabulary that now tests above grade level. He can read well, devouring Garfield books in hours. His faith continues to grow, and his sense of humor keeps all of us laughing. Most amazing of all, he can explain to me what autism feels like. He has told me all about the "movies" that make him sometimes struggle to respond to us.

He asked me one day if I have autism. When I told him that I didn't, he looked sad. "You mean you can't see movies in your head?" he asked with disappointment in his voice. "I'm so sorry for you, Mom."

Sometimes I forget the intensity of the pain and bleakness of those first couple years. Never have I forgotten that God carried us through them.

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Thank you so much for reading through Joseph's story. For those of you who are interested and haven't already seen the videos, please feel free to watch a fifteen minute video that I prepared back in 2004 to thank Joseph's Early Childhood teachers. The movie contains text, pictures, and video that documents Joseph's regression and our journey through autism. It works best in Internet Explorer, and can be found here: Fighting for Joseph Movie

A five minute update movie was made in 2006 to show his further progress. There is a short "interview" with him at the end. :) Joseph's Update Movie

Fighting for Joseph (Part Two: The Battle)

This is the second of three blog entries that will focus on my almost 9 year old son, Joseph, looking at our journey through his autism diagnosis and how God held our family in His hand as we fought for our son.

Though I can look back now and see the date in pictures, I didn't know at the time that our lives had changed. At 22 months you don't pay attention to every glance (or lack of) or word (or lack of) from your child. What we saw when he started spending hours studying the wheels on his cars and the balls in his ball popper was a future in engineering. Why would we be concerned when he seemed more interested in "things" than he was in his family? To us, he was just our sweet baby boy who was questing to understand this big world he'd been born into.

That Christmas Joseph loved bringing me presents. He would drag each box over to me, crawling on my lap as I bent to pick it up. Sitting together on the couch he'd put his hand on mine and guide it to the striped wrapping paper. Over and over again he would move my hand over the present as I counted the stripes.

"My son is so smart," I marveled. Why would I know to think otherwise? (How I wish I had known to think otherwise.)

There was one concern that grew within me in those days. Could Joseph be losing his hearing? My baby who had always turned to my voice no longer responded when I called his name. I whispered, I screamed, I clapped my hands, I banged on the table. The only way he would look at me was if I touched him.

Somewhere during the days when tests revealed that there was no hearing loss, he stopped responding to my touch.

I caressed his cheek, I tickled his belly, I pulled gently on his shirt. Nothing in our world enticed him out of his.

Then one day I turned on the radio. Kahlan wanted to practice her dance steps, so I put in a CD that the kids had always loved listening to. As Kahlan danced, Joseph walked into the room. With a definite intent that I hadn't seen in weeks, he walked over to the speakers and started to dance.

I hadn't believed that the hearing tests results were right. But how could a little boy who didn't hear his mom dance to music?

The words that he had before were gone. There was no more "dada", "mama", "ball", or "cup". There were no more peek-a-boo games. The sounds he did make were repetitive and meaningless.

As our concerns grew, other people's excuses multiplied. "He doesn't need to talk, Kahlan talks for him," and "He's a boy, they develop slower," were only a couple of the many reassurances we were given from family and friends. Every time I got close to looking for help, I remembered what others had said and tried to stop overreacting. Some even went so far as to insinuate that I was trying to get attention for myself by making problems in my son.

One day I had both children in the van. I can't remember where we were supposed to go, but I will never forget what happened when I placed that favorite CD in our new CD player.

Joseph began to sing. He knew every word to every song.

I had forgotten what his voice sounded like. Babbling is sound, but words is voice. It was the most beautiful thing I had ever heard. We drove for over an hour, the CD repeating as my tears fell.

The signs scream at me in hindsight. Having devoured countless books on autism, I now see that Joseph could have been a poster child for the syndrome. But back then, I had no idea. And if I thought I had it rough that day as I parked my van in the driveway and carried my once-again-silent son into the house, I had no idea what was coming.

The meltdowns started. A meltdown in a child with autism is very, very different than a temper tantrum in a typically developing child. If a child is having a temper tantrum because they can't have a piece of cake, and you give that child a piece of cake, the tantrum stops. If a child with autism is having a meltdown because they want juice and you, having no clue what he wants, give him milk, you can give that child juice all you want and it will do nothing to stop the rage. It isn't about milk or juice anymore. It's about living in a body that you have absolutely no control over.

He screamed, he threw himself on the floor. He banged his head into walls while howling in frustration. There was nothing we could do to help him.

I took him bowling one day. I should have known better. I may not have known he had autism, but I knew that chaos brought on meltdowns. He was so excited when we walked in. He bounced up and down in my arms, repeating the sounds he made when he was happy. But when it was his turn, and he let go of the ball, it didn't come right back to him. And that's all it took.

I had him in one arm, twisting and yelling and banging his head against my face. I was trying to get my bowling shoes off and my other shoes on while holding my keys and keeping him from falling to the floor. Everyone in the building stopped what they were doing. The people whose birthday party I was attending formed a circle around me about two feet away. I remember screaming in my head, "Please help me!" but I didn't say a word. This was my life. And no matter what it looked like to everyone else, I knew that Joseph was in much more agony than I was.

As I walked out of the building, a man at the bar muttered, "Spoiled brat."

Joseph and I walked to the van, both of us crying. As I buckled him into his carseat, I said, "I'm so sorry," over and over again. I truly was. Sorry that I had brought him into that building, sorry for the man who so carelessly judged him. Sorry that I couldn't do anything to break my son out of his terrifying prison.

My body was bruised and my heart was broken, but I loved him so much.

Somewhere around this time, the straw broke the camel's back. Steve and I were downstairs one evening when we heard an odd sound. We had tucked the kids in bed an hour before, but it sounded as if one of them was up. Seconds passed, but no one came down the stairs. The sound continued.

I walked to the bottom of the stairs. I will never forget what I saw. Joseph was walking back and forth in the small hallway above the stairway, muttering nonsense to himself. Back and forth, back and forth. Once in a while a strange giggle escaped, but he never looked at me. Back and forth he paced.

I turned to Steve. "I'm calling the doctor in the morning," I said.

Enough was enough.

Fighting for Joseph (Part One: Before)

This is the first of three blog entries that will focus on my almost 9 year old son, Joseph, looking at our journey through his autism diagnosis and how God held our family in His hand as we fought for our son.

Joseph was born on November 2nd, 2000. We had tried to get pregnant for two years before conceiving him, and even though the pregnancy was full of complications, every difficult moment was erased when we held him in our arms for the first time.

Staring into his baby brown eyes, we couldn't help but envision his future. Toads in his pockets, football games, rough-housing with friends, all the way to asking for the keys to the car so he could take his date to the dance. The possibilities were endless and we couldn't wait to experience the ride.

Joseph developed normally. He wasn't born with autism, so he hit every milestone on time. He crawled at 10 months, walked at 13 months, and patted my leg with an affectionate, "Mama," at 14 months. He loved to play peek-a-boo, and anytime we pulled out a camera he became the star of the show. Every ounce of attention we gave him he sucked right in. Because he hardly ever cried, we nicknamed him our "angel baby".

Back then, autism was what Rain Man had. That's all I knew. Amazing toothpick counting and inflectionless words. I didn't need to know about it, because it wasn't ever going to happen to me. My children were Just Fine.

Just Fine ended on September 22nd, 2002.

In a way, my son died on that day. It took me another year to come to terms with the fact that the son I had known was gone. Toads in pockets and football game dreams turned into fantasies about what his voice would sound like and how it would feel if he told me he loved me.

But that's tomorrow's story.

Parading About

I spent a good portion of today doing something that I really wish I didn't do at all: complaining. My verbal ire was especially directed to one particular thing on today's calendar. Being the day before Halloween, it was time for the annual Halloween parade at my son and daughter's school.

Why would I complain about a parade? Well, it's more the hassle of getting there, finding a babysitter or taking the other children, finding a parking spot, finding a chair (or a spot on the wall), and waiting for fifteen minutes just to enjoy approximately 3.2 seconds of seeing each of my children prance by me in costume. To make matters worse, the parade falls right in the middle of nap time, which happens to be the one time during daylight hours when I can get something done.

So I whined. I groaned. I mumbled. Pretty much anyone who was within earshot of me today heard how much I didn't want to go to the parade.

Steve ended up working from home so that I wouldn't have to bring the children. This should have put an end to my sullenness, but it really didn't. I tried to convince him to go instead, but apparently he doesn't think his job would have wanted to hire me for an hour or so that I could replace him.

It was up to me. And so I soldiered on to do my parental duty with all the energy I could muster.

As I entered the gymnasium, I felt very convicted. I opened the book I had brought along to read as I waited, an autobiography by Pastor Greg Laurie. As I read the words, my conviction grew to the point where I felt tears pooling in my eyes.

Who was I to complain about taking a very small portion of my day to devote to something that meant so much to my kids? How God has blessed me through them! Has He not provided everything I ever prayed for in my children? Am I not thankful every day that I am able to be here to love them?

A minute or so before the children came in, the tears started flowing. I'm sure people were wondering why a mother was crying before the parade had even started, but I didn't care. I prayed right then and there for God to forgive me for my poor attitude and my careless words. I thanked Him for the opportunity to be there for Joseph and Kayanna. I praised Him that they both have teachers that care for them, and a school where they are supported and nurtured.

I had myself under control by the time the parade started. I watched eagerly as the children filed by, waiting for a glimpse of my zookeeper and baby. My heart lept as I found them and watched their faces fill with joy at seeing their mom in the crowd.

I kept thinking, "I wanted to miss this?"

When it comes time for the Christmas sing-a-long, there will be no complaints from me.

Roundabout

We recently had a new roundabout constructed in our city. The idea behind it was good: keep the traffic flowing and reduce accidents by removing tricky merges and stoplights. But for a long time it caused problems, and many people (including myself) ended up choosing the wrong exit and heading in the opposite direction.

Why all the trouble? Well, the roundabout itself was built very nicely, but the signs directing traffic were either misleading, not well placed, or missing entirely.

In fact, I just read in the newspaper a day or so ago that a young man, having missed his exit thanks to a missing sign, decided instead to drive across the middle section. His truck had to be towed out. In an effort to correct his path, he'd gotten hopelessly stuck.

Isn't that just like walking in the world? If we attempt to live our lives by putting our faith in what the world has to offer, we're going to have problems. We're going to end up going the wrong direction, or we'll have to go around in circles a few times to reach the right path, or we'll get frustrated and try to forage out on our own...possibly making things worse if we get mired in the mud. Even if we enjoy success, we have to hope that our achievements are repeated the next time we reach one of life's roundabouts.

Today I noticed that the sign issue had been fixed. I entered and exited the roundabout with no problems. In fact, it was so smooth that I finally experienced what the engineers had envisioned when it was designed.

God is the engineer of our lives. His Word is the signposts. By putting our faith in Him, and by reading and keeping His Word in our hearts, we're never going to wonder which way we should turn.

"In all your ways acknowledge Him, and He will make your paths straight." (Proverbs 3:6)

Laundry Days

With seven children, every day should be laundry day. Actually, it should probably be an all day, every day event. Especially when said seven children decide to change their clothes two or three times a day.

Saying that I hate doing laundry would be an understatement. I actually detest doing laundry. I'm one of those people who loves mowing the lawn because you can watch as, strip by strip, your job is accomplished. With laundry, I don't ever feel like I get to the point where I can sit down and say, "It's done!"

I've tried many different things in battling this monster. I've tried only saving seven outfits for each child and giving the rest of them away. I've tried laundry marathons where I don't do anything but laundry until the entire mountain is gone. I've tried throwing away the "sock bag" of mismatched socks and just buying new socks that all match each other (sorry, Joseph, that you've had to wear socks with purple heels!).

I've tried everything. And yet, week after week, life gets busy and soon the laundry room resembles Mount St. Helens.

Then in my Bible study yesterday, we read these verses: "And why are you worried about clothing? Observe how the lilies of the field grow; they do not toil nor do they spin, yet I say to you that not even Solomon in all his glory clothed himself like one of these. But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which is alive today and tomorrow is thrown in to the furnace, will He not much more clothe you?" (Matthew 6:28-30)

Now those verses are illustrations as to why we should not worry or be anxious, but today they struck me in a different way.

Why am I whining about the fact that I have so many clothes to wash? Why do I look at the gigantic pile of laundry and stomp back up the steps in defeat?

How many mothers in this world would give everything they own to be able to clothe their children every day? What I see as a drudgery, mothers who struggle through extreme poverty would see as a blessing.

And that is what it is. God has blessed me with the ability to provide clothing for our family. I need to see that for what it is.

Now my laundry isn't just going to disappear. It's going to be something I simply have to do. But instead of dreading the thought of walking downstairs, I'm going to look forward to the opportunity to see an example of God's blessings bursting right in front of my eyes.

My chores won't change, but my heart will.

In a Minute

After about two months of watching it gather dust on my dresser, I decided to strap on my calorie and step counting armband this morning. Renewing my commitment to diet and exercise, I wanted to make sure that I could gauge exactly how I was doing at any moment throughout my day.

One of the most exciting things that I realized when first purchasing this system was that the experts really are correct, doing exercise burns calories long after the actual physical exertion is over. For example, when I am at rest, I am typically burning 1.7 calories per minute. When I go for a 30 minute run, I get up to somewhere around 12 calories per minute. This adds up to a really nice burn! But the best thing is, when I stop running and collapse on my couch in heap of exhaustion, my body is still working. Even two hours later, my digital display reflects the fact that I am still cruising along at a nice 4.2 calories per minute.

That thirty minutes of dedication and determination turns into hours of results.

The same is true of the time we spend in God's Word. How many times have I told myself that I don't have "enough time" to sit down and open my Bible? How many times have I stood in a group of moms nodding my head as we all agreed that someday, when the kids were "older," we'd be able to really dig deep, to memorize and truly study the Word of God? Many times.

What I am learning is that we DO have time now. The problem isn't actually how much time we do or do not have, it's our concept of what it takes to study the Bible. We envision ourselves sitting in a quiet room devoid of distractions and taking a good hour or two to envelop ourselves in the lessons God has laid out in front of us. But we all know that that scenario is almost impossible for those of us who have young children. And even those of us who aren't yet blessed with a family, or whose children have grown and gone off into the world, you are still hounded by the pressures of work, and friends, and the telephone ringing, and the myriad of responsibilities that leave you running from moment to moment.

Guess what? It would be great to have a solid block of time to devote to God's Word, but we don't have to have it to do it. It only takes thirty minutes to read through a chapter of the Bible. It takes maybe ten minutes to study a Psalm. And sometimes, when we truly have only one minute, we can open our Bibles and just read whichever verse God places in front of us.

Our study of God's Word doesn't have to be perfect in order to affect our hearts. Just like the calorie burning system has shown me that the effects of physical exercise last for hours, taking a few minutes here and there throughout my day to open my Bible and soak in God's lessons has shown me that the effects of spiritual discipline last all day.


"I have hidden your word in my heart that I might not sin against you." (Psalm 119:11)

Sacrifice

I will never forget the expression on their faces as they looked up at me. A mixture of trust and excitement tumbled through their eyes. Something was up, and they knew it.

My hands trembled as I placed my Bible on the podium in front of me. I was taking a risk, and I knew it. I hoped that I had earned enough of their trust to make the experiment reflect what true sacrifice looked like.

I loved every single one of them. I wasn't looking forward to what I was about to put them through, but I hoped that the lesson it taught would carry with them long after I stopped being their third grade teacher.

"I asked all of you to bring something to the classroom today," I began. "I asked you to find something in your house that could never be replaced, something that holds special memories for you. I'd like you all to come up one by one and show the class what you chose."

I stepped to the side as I called the first student up front. One by one they filed toward me, each turning and showing off their prized possession. Many of them brought stuffed animals that had obviously been well loved. One brought a tattered blanket, clutching it in her arms as she told of the day she'd been brought home from the hospital wrapped snugly in its softness. Others brought beloved toys, another a guitar.

My voice caught as I asked the final student to sit back in his desk. I took a deep breath, catching the eye of the parent volunteer that I had requested. She knew what was coming, and she picked up a tissue box as she smiled reassuringly at me.

"I asked you all to bring your special belongings today for a reason," I said quietly, looking in their eyes that twinkled from the excitement of the activity. "I want you each to bring your item up here and set it on the table."

Excitement was replaced by questioning looks. They knew me well enough to know when I was being serious, and I was more serious in that moment than they had ever seen me.

"You are going to put it on the table," I continued, "and I am going to give these things to the children who need them the most."

I can't begin to describe the wave of emotion that slammed into my precious students as my words began to sink in. Almost all of them took their special toy or blanket or stuffed animal in their arms, holding it tightly as they stared at me.

"Will we get it back?" one boy asked, his voice cracking.

"I am going to give them to the children who need them the most," I repeated with a hitch in my voice.

"But will we get it back?" a little girl echoed desperately.

I repeated the same answer back to her.

The looks they gave me still stand with me today. "How could you do this? Who do you think you are? I TRUSTED you!"

A few children stood up, giving me a glance that said they were only doing this because my standing as their teacher outweighed what they desired to do. They placed their items on the table, walking with slumped shoulders back to their desks. Each one of them placed their heads down on their arms in defeat.

More children followed, tears rolling down their cheeks. My entire body was shaking, my tears mirroring their own. Doubt laced through my mind. Was I doing the right thing?

Finally only one little boy remained. He held a stuffed animal that he had cuddled with every night since he could remember.

"I can't do it!" he screamed at me.

"Yes, you can," I answered brokenly.

"I won't do it!" he yelled again.

"You will," I said, forcing strength into my words. "You will do it because I am your teacher and I am telling you that you have to do it." How I longed to take him in my arms. How I yearned to stop this whole thing. But I knew that this sweet child was embodying the exact point of everything I was trying to do.

He glared at me for a long time. The parent volunteer walked up and down the aisles handing tissues to the children who were crying. Finally, with a loud, guttural cry, he walked up to the table and put it down.

A few steps in front of his desk, he collapsed on his knees.

I buried my head in my hands as I waited for him to pick himself up and sit at his desk.

As I pulled myself under control, I opened my Bible and read aloud:


Some time later God tested Abraham. He said to him, "Abraham!"

"Here I am," he replied.

Then God said, "Take your son, your only son, Isaac, whom you love, and go to the region of Moriah. Sacrifice him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains I will tell you about."

Early the next morning Abraham got up and saddled his donkey. He took with him two of his servants and his son Isaac. When he had cut enough wood for the burnt offering, he set out for the place God had told him about.

Abraham took the wood for the burnt offering and placed it on his son Isaac, and he himself carried the fire and the knife. As the two of them went on together, Isaac spoke up and said to his father Abraham, "Father?"

"Yes, my son?" Abraham replied.

"The fire and wood are here," Isaac said, "but where is the lamb for the burnt offering?"

Abraham answered, "God himself will provide the lamb for the burnt offering, my son." And the two of them went on together.

When they reached the place God had told him about, Abraham built an altar there and arranged the wood on it. He bound his son Isaac and laid him on the altar, on top of the wood.

Then he reached out his hand and took the knife to slay his son. 11 But the angel of the LORD called out to him from heaven, "Abraham! Abraham!"

"Here I am," he replied.

"Do not lay a hand on the boy," he said. "Do not do anything to him. Now I know that you fear God, because you have not withheld from me your son, your only son."

Abraham looked up and there in a thicket he saw a ram caught by its horns. He went over and took the ram and sacrificed it as a burnt offering instead of his son.

So Abraham called that place The LORD Will Provide. And to this day it is said, "On the mountain of the LORD it will be provided."

The angel of the LORD called to Abraham from heaven a second time and said, "I swear by myself, declares the LORD, that because you have done this and have not withheld your son, your only son, I will surely bless you and make your descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky and as the sand on the seashore. Your descendants will take possession of the cities of their enemies, and through your offspring all nations on earth will be blessed, because you have obeyed me." (Genesis 22:1-3, 6-22)

The students were familiar with the story of Abraham and Isaac, having heard it many times through their Sunday School years. You could see relief and understanding dawn on their faces as I began to read.

By the time I finished reading, they knew that they would not have to give away their special belongings. But though they were relieved, I saw exactly what I had hoped to see in their expressions: understanding.

At eight years old, they could never comprehend what it would be like to be asked to sacrifice their only child. But they could now understand what it would feel like to sacrifice something that was truly special and unique to them.

That year as we studied the life of Abraham, the children listened and responded in a way that none of my previous students had.

I don't know if the lesson carried with them, but it carried with me. It emphasized to me the value of making God's Word personal.

I will never forget those children. Though I had thought the lesson through many times, experiencing it with them taught me more than I could have imagined.

It brought me to a new understanding of what ultimate obedience to God would look like. It gave me a small glimpse of what makes Abraham a hero of the faith.

Most of all, it reminded me that even when we are asked to sacrifice to our Lord, His intent and reasoning is always based in love. And when we cry because we can't see His reasoning, He grieves with us.