The best elixir I know...being still

It makes us stop dead in our tracks, forces us to SLOW down and be still like a bitter, winter storm and icy roads frozen solid - wether we like to or not.  It makes me thankful for the times we aren't dealing with this unending bout with sickness.

However, it forces us to stay home and enjoy home. On the agenda...to sit with the sick all the while trying to comfort a throbbing head and the burning ever so hot fever. Just holding sometimes is the only medicine we can offer and sometimes the best elixir for these long days.  

Being summoned by Bitty saying, "I need you mommy" is heart breaking for me, but yet so rewarding to know as a momma and as a daddy - we are the ones who can make it all better.  It forces me to sit and leave the dishes and laundry, toilets and vacuuming for the healthy days - just be. Be with them.

I am reading "Jesus Calling" right now and loving each day. Each day a new reminder of what Jesus wants to tell me.  "I am leading you, step by step, through your life. Hold my hand in trusting dependence, letting Me guide you through this day. Your future looks uncertain and feels flimsy - even precarious. That is how it should be...This, like all forms of worry is an act of rebellion: doubting My promises to care for you." (-Jesus Calling)

So if you haven't figured out by no, I tend to worry. I remember as a child my mom telling me to stop worrying or else I would give my self a heart attack. I am sure you can imagine then what would overcome my thoughts, "a heart attack?!?" The vicious cycle would begin again in my worry-muddled mind. 

This week has been a challenge as I have let worry filled thoughts consume my mind as we have sick little ones at home - trying desperately to keep the littlest one or all healthy -  all the while fearful he will get sick too. So I needed 'Jesus Calling' me this morning to remind me to rest in Him and be still. How ironic that if the sickness isn't enough to slow me down, maybe this slipper, icy, snowy day will.



 

How lovely of my Savior to force me to SLOW all the while sending the beautiful snow is to cover the dark, dreary, muddy mess! A good day to sit and be. A good day for tea and chicken soup. A good day!

lovely days non stop

Today is one of those days
In the midst of chaos there are words spoken that dig deep
in the same breath there are sweet little, "I love Yous!"
There is no job I love more than being a mom - there is also no job that tires me like this one. But it is a good "exhaustion".
As we are getting ready for Christmas I am trying desperately hard to SLOW life down, to breathe deep and see moments unfold, to teach contentment & gratefulness. But around each corner is a distraction - for them, for me - exhaustion. Life continues on and I realize I am the one who has a choice whether life will be lovely or not...a choice each second of each day.

Then I read this,  "How when you are turned away from God, life turns ugly, but when you are turned toward God, life turns lovely." (Ann Voskamp)
This is the reminder I need day after day, imprinted on my forehead, engraved on my heart so I don't forget. The every day dishes, the mundane of the laundry, the never ending sweeping of  the floors, the dirty diapers and potty training, the teaching & reteaching, the tears of spilled milk...oh the spilled milk! the "I'm sorrys", the sticky kisses and fingers, the sore legs from ballet days before, all made lovely by a life turned toward God. 

With baby 5 just around the corner, I know these moments will increase and be multiplied again - for which I cannot wait! I know time will seem to shorten and days will fly like the wind. My prayer is to be a grace-filled momma, one who comforts and greets her babies each morning with kisses and hugs. And goes throughout the day with them never questioning love. One who helps them slow down and savor each moment as a gift and to help them remember even the mundane is sacred in God's eyes....how did He send our Savior & King? As a sweet baby in a lowly manger. So mundane, yet so unbelievable sacred & holy.

From Ann's Blog :

“To a man who lives unto God nothing is secular, everything is sacred.

He puts on his workday garment and it is a vestment to him.

He sits down to his meal and it is a sacrament.

He goes forth to his labor, and therein exercises the office of the priesthood. His breath is incense and his life a sacrifice.

He sleeps on the bosom of God, and lives and moves in the divine presence.

To draw a hard and fast line and say, “This is sacred and this is secular,” is, to my mind, diametrically opposed to the teaching of Christ and the spirit of the gospel…

Peter saw a sheet let down from heaven in which were all manner of beasts and four-footed creatures, which he was bidden to kill and eat, and when he refused because they were unclean, he was rebuked by a voice from heaven, saying, “What God hath cleansed that call not thou common” [Acts 10:15; 11:9].

The Lord hath cleansed your houses, he has cleansed your bed chambers, your tables…  He has made the common pots and pans of your kitchens to be as the bowls before the altar –

if you know what you are and live according to your high calling.

You housemaids, you cooks, you nurses, you ploughmen, you housewives, you traders, you sailors, your labor is holy if you serve the Lord Christ in it, by living unto Him as you ought to live.

The sacred has absorbed the secular.”

~ Spurgeon