Friday, April 15, 2016

Joy

I have had many times in the past few weeks a chance to lose my joy and just let depression and anxiety get the best of me. To know Jesus is to know Joy. To have a relationship with Him is to have Joy. Joy is my focus. This(something negative) is happening in my life BUT I will have Joy because this(something positive) is happening in my life. I have so many reasons to just give in and let things steal my joy. I can't do that though, I have a husband, four precious children, two dogs, family, and friends that are depending on me. The enemy would have it no better than to make me feel as if I'm invisible. There's a difference between being humble and dismissing ourselves from being involved due to pride.  I have felt like so many times in the last week that I'm just not enough. Why do I bother doing what I do? I'm not important. The enemy will not win though. I've come to the conclusion that I had went back to some old eating habits which include less water and more soda. I believe my diet and the lack of exercise had a lot to do with my down feeling. I spent Tuesday in bed all day. Wednesday I was up but felt so very tired and anxious,  I was spiraling downward really fast. I truly believe if I would have given in to the enemy he would have rendered me useless and let me know it clearly. I however, CHOSE to force myself to go be with my family on Wednesday evening. I felt a little better but still had this feeling of dread and I was beginning to really hate how I felt. At the time I thought I must have been coming down with a cold or something. Thursday morning we had somewhere to be at 9:30. This whole time I've not been feeling well I had not been doing my Bible study. Big mistake there. It's so important to start with the Word even if we aren't feeling anxious and everything is just great in our lives. When things get rough, then we are equipped with how to handle it. Then I thought about my bad habits. I worked out Thursday morning and felt so so so good. I felt so much better all day. I made it a point to eat and drink as healthy as possible. Friday morning I got up feeling better. I've started my day off with the Word. There have been so many distractions. I really believe Satan would have no better than for me to prioritize things over my time with Jesus in His Word. 

To know Joy is to have a relationship with Jesus. We can't just expect things to happen. I think I may have said this before but I will say it again. To get to know someone that we have become friends with, we MUST spend time with them. We must learn about them. The same has to happen with Jesus. Attending church is being obedient to what the Lord tells us to do in His word however, that doesn't give us that relationship. We must spend more than 3 hours a week with Him. I know that it's not enough for me. Praying will help with difficult situations. It will not help with the day to day life events. We must have a relationship with Jesus, our creator and our children's creator to know how we need to handle discipline. It's different for each child. We should be prayerful about how we respond to others however if we have no relationship with our sweet Jesus we can't and won't respond with grace and in love as Jesus does. No we aren't Jesus and we are imperfect but God calls us to be LIKE Jesus, we can respond with grace and love. It may be that we respond with silence until we can respond like Him.

I have so many things I want to share but I need p get up the nerve to share. I am also seeking guidance on how to write it out so as not to offend people. It is my intention to only encourage and life up through this blog. My intentions are never make anyone feel inferior to me for not doing things like I do them. We are all different, lead different lives but I believe if you are reading this your mission is the same as mine and that is to live with absolute abandon for God. Our mission is to raise our children to be world changers. This is different for everyone. The calling is different for our lives but our mission is the same. Jesus first always!

Tuesday, April 5, 2016

Joy unspeakable

Joy Unspeakable....What exactly does that mean? For me it means the love I have for Jesus gives me so much joy that I can hardly even explain it in words. I don't have a vocabulary eloquent enough to describe it. The love that Jesus has for me is vastly larger than what I have for Him. Joy is something I feel when my toddler puts her sweet little arms around me and in toddler language not yet clear to others she says "I love you mommy"! Joy! I feel Joy when I teach my children. When we have been working on something for longer than usual because they just can't get it and finally they do. That lightbulb moment. It shoots Joy all over me. Joy! I feel Joy when my oldest son sits down and reads a book to my toddler. These things make me so happy. I feel Joy at the end of the week when my husband comes home from work. I am so happy and joyous to see him. He makes me happy. Our relationship gives me joy. It's something I am very proud of.

Now I can point all the things that don't give me Joy. There are many things in my life that I could choose to focus on. I could choose not to have Joy because I just can't keep up with my home the way I want. We are a one income family. We have wanted to put new flooring down for a while but financially we haven't been able to. Is it disappointing? Of course. But I choose to focus on the things and mostly the people that give me Joy. Those new floors will come in Gods time. Would I like to redecorate my house? Of course. But I choose to focus on the fact that I have a home and it provides my family what we need. Joy is a choice. Our words are a choice. We can choose to have Joy in every word we speak or we can be known as the negative one of the bunch. I don't want to be know as what I call "bubblebusters". My house is not company ready right now but I am choosing to have Joy in the fact that God has called me to be my childrens' caretaker 24/7. Through Gods help with lots of prayer I am a tool in shaping and molding my children. What a wonderful blessing that is. I choose to find joy in this. I also choose to find good in every person. This is something that is super challenging for me sometimes because I am making a choice to be critical of a person without knowing their story. I don't want to do this. I want to choose to make my conversation good and say good things about others or nothing at all. This is my heart. ❤️

Psalm 19:14