Love is a mysterious thing, isn’t it? I met my husband when I wasn’t looking for love. Truth be told, I had sworn off love. We became friends then fell in love very quickly. That was 16 years ago this week, and we’ll celebrate our 15th wedding anniversary on May 5th. And while you may think this post is about finding my man, it’s not. It’s not about me at all. At the risk of embarrassing her, it’s about my best friend.
My best friend has endured the dating game for so long. There have been too many frogs in her life -spineless amphibians who didn’t appreciate her love, beauty, talent, heart, and all of the things that make her special. I’m so happy that it seems she has finally found her prince. I’ve been praying for a Godly man for her since she and I met in college. Someone who would see her and love her for the amazing woman that she is. I’ve been puzzled as I’ve watched her make her way through the single/dating life, and felt guilty at times because we switched lives. In college we shared what we both dreamed/planned for our futures, and I’m living a big part of what she wanted while she’s living what my dream/plan was. Not that I would want a different life than the one I have, but I wanted her to have her dream too.
So today I’m grateful for Tawnya finding love and for God answering both of our prayers. I’m thankful that she has a man in her life who thinks she’s incredible and can’t imagine life without her. God is so good!
It’s Sunday afternoon and I’m sitting here at the dining room table looking out a window that faces the mountains.Actually, most of the windows in this house have a pretty fantastic view of them.The weather today is absolutely beautiful and I am a little sad that I’ll be leaving in a few hours to drive back to Denver.I could use a few more days here.
The weekend was good.Not exactly what I was hoping for, but I did accomplish all of my goals for the weekend.I slept in every morning until 9 am or later.I spent a whole afternoon with Linda.I did my best to live in the moment and not make a million plans and fill up every minute with “stuff”.I left my in-laws a lovely note telling them how much they mean to me and how grateful I was for them giving me a place to get away from my busy life for a few days. Though I did enjoy a Cherry Coke and some Cool Ranch Doritos, I ate other things as well…some of them were even healthy.
I’m going home with some definite ideas of things I need to work on, and one of the most important on the list is making time for mini-retreats.I can’t afford (financially or any other way) to drive to Buena Vista every weekend, alone, so I can get refreshed and refocused.I need those things, but I don’t have to be 2 1/2 hours from my house to do it.I do have a “day of rest” every other week, but my silly self tends to fill it up with activities I feel like I should do and I usually end up inviting a friend to spend my time with me.It’s not that it’s a bad thing to do that, but I wonder if underneath it all I’m avoiding being alone so I don’t have to face some of the things I struggle with.
I love people.I love spending one on one time with them.That is really difficult to do in this season of my life.I have three young children who need me and we can’t afford babysitters.I want to focus on my husband and give him the time, attention, and encouragement he needs and deserves.I rely so heavily on my day of rest to catch up with friends for coffee and personal chats we never get to finish on the phone, that I forsake the “me” time that I really need.I am going to have to be stronger in that area for awhile so I can be refilled not just with relationships with people, but the relationships I have with myself and with God.
Monday: The last thing we did before coming back to Denver was visit Cascade Falls on Mt. Princeton. This is a picture I took last summer. I try to visit there every time I make a trip to Buena Vista. I climb all over the rocks to find a good place to sit and think. Speaking of rocks, I found 9 heart stones not including this one which was too big to dig up. It measured about 9 inches across, but went deep into the ground. It wouldn’t budge even with me digging around it for awhile. Hmmm…could be another lesson I’m supposed to pay attention to.
I’ve been trying to take this trip for 4 months now. I’ve been snowed out of Buena Vista not once, but twice. I’m going this weekend if I have to snowshoe in! I was actually there a few weeks ago with my whole family, but this time, I’m going alone. Well, not alone, Heather is going with me. By alone I mean no children, no husband, no work, and no plans. Yes, I said “no plans”. ~GASP~ I think I can take a trip without my alphabetized packing list and my stack of magazines and books that I always take and never read.
My goals for the weekend are as follows:
Reeelaaaax
Attempt to sleep in past 9 a.m.
Live off of Cool Ranch Doritos and Cherry Coke. (I’m SO kidding! My college days are over.)
Spend 4 hours with Linda on Saturday.
Leave love notes for my in-laws for letting me stay at their house for the weekend.
Not a bad agenda, huh? We’ll see what happens. I’m going to let God lead the weekend instead of planning every stinkin minute out. Miss Type A/ J/ Supermom isn’t invited along on this little excursion of mine. I hope your weekend is filled with rest and I’ll see you back here on Monday!
I know this is getting posted late. This seems to be the week for that. I joined the rest of the procrastinators that didn’t mail their tax forms off until today. It has been a long day.
Not to copy Laura’s theme from last week, but today I am most grateful for God’s provision for our family. I’ve been working on taxes for a few weeks now. Our tax situation changed this year and the process really threw me off. When it got hard and I got scared, I began putting it off. A few days ago we owed the IRS a lot of money because I was struggling to figure out where to plug in some deductions and expenses. Yesterday I got it mostly figured out and still we owed, though not nearly as much. I still wondered how we were going to pay what we owed. Then Benny got a phone call. A friend of ours is a retired Private Investigator and sometimes hires Benny to do civilian surveillance for him. Guess how much he made working for our friend yesterday? Enough to cover what we had to pay the IRS. 😀 God is good.
As an added gratituesday, I am also thanking God for all the wonderful people who financially support our family and SEVENS. Without them, we wouldn’t be blessed enough to have to pay taxes.
You can sign up to promote the film in your area of the country, read reviews by people who have pre-screened it, join the discussion on the blog, send e-cards to let others know about the film, etc. I’m going to see it myself and review it here on MY Journey. The release date in the Denver area is April 18th.
I am a believer and a homeschooler, so many have said this film will be promoted by “my kind” to support our belief in the creationist theory. While that may be true, I am in favor of the freedom of thought, speech, expression, and debate. This film is more about those freedoms being limited to certain kinds of people and thoughts. Freedoms are allowed and sometimes encouraged for all religions, schools of thought and theories with the exception of Christians and the Creationist theory. Called small-minded, limited, steeped in fantasy, disillusioned, and many other insulting names, scientists who would bring a debate against Darwinism have been and are losing their credibility, jobs, and life’s work for going against the beliefs of a man whose theories have limited scientific thought for over a century.
Why the fear? Are Darwinists so fearful of being proven wrong that they have to shut down anyone who might believe differently than they do? Doesn’t that go against the true scientific nature of looking for solutions, answers, and possibilities? I warn you, this next statement could hurt. If you are a believer, do you share that same fear? Do you feel that anyone who does not share your faith needs to be shut up or shut down? If so, Why?
God is bigger than that. He’s bigger than our fears, our doubts, our frustrations with those who hold different beliefs than we do. He’s bigger than our questions and those who don’t believe in Him. There is nothing He can’t handle. We are the ones who fight to stay away from questioning what we believe or have been taught to be true. Instead of walking in faith and trusting God to lead us back to the Truth and feeling the freedom to have questions, we get scared of the questions inside of us and feel threatened by our friends who have questions they’re struggling with. I have a friend who is going through a time of searching right now. They have questions and answers that aren’t adding up for them and they are on the path of discovery. Another friend of ours is worried about that and is feeling the need to bring the first friend back from the brink. The brink of what? Losing their religion? A stronger faith because of the struggle of questioning? It’s fear-based. I think my second friend may be fearful that my first friend has gone too far with their questions and are lacking faith if they have the questions they do. That friend is feeling the need to “convert” our first friend again. They don’t know how to deal with the first friend’s questions. I’m trying to be careful not to give any hints away as to who it is, so I hope that makes sense.
I’m in favor of censorship for those things that bring emotional or physical harm to other people. I’m not in favor of censorship of thought and beliefs. My own thoughts are the only ones I have the right to censor, and I do, by taking them captive and making them obedient to Christ. I’m not perfect at it, but I try. I also examine myself to see if my faith is genuine and I test myself. Both are based on passages in 2 Corinthians. Can I lead people to what I believe the Bible says to believe? Absolutely. Can I force them to believe and live by my beliefs? Absolutely not. Can a Darwinist point out to me why they believe what they do? Sure they can. Can they make me believe what they believe and live my life according to those beliefs? No way. I wouldn’t have it any other way. Forced faith and living is not faith and living at all. It’s the opposite of freedom.
On a side note, I don’t have a problem with the theory of evolution being in science books across the nation. My problem is that Creation isn’t included as an alternative theory. offer all the options and let God draw his own to Himself. Isn’t that what the Bible says He does? We may speak boldly about what we believe and get people thinking about the options laid out before them, but we don’t make people go to God. God draws them to himself. It’s not the school’s job to teach that stuff anyway. What’s funny is that both the big bang theory and the creation theory require some sort of faith. One leads to a life of hope, and I choose hope. But I will not take away the right of another to choose for themselves.
