retreat

This is where I was this weekend.

What a beautiful place to spend a weekend! High School group went on a retreat this weekend, and we went to a camp up in the mountains. The weather wasn't that great on the way up there, but as you can see, Saturday was gorgeous! This was free time - most everybody went canoeing or kayaking. It was fun to watch the kids gather out in the middle of the lake on their canoes - they called a "lake party". :)

I love a retreat. 

The opportunity to get away from regular life and retreat somewhere is wonderful. We retreated from all kinds of things. But most importantly we pushed on toward others. We studied the book of Ephesians, and spent time with God.We pondered what He wants us to do with our lives, and we prayed about it. That is an important question when you are in high school, but it's also an important question when you are a ways out of high school. Like me. :)

I am so blessed to be able to retreat, and to retreat with such a great bunch of high schoolers. 

I am grateful.

K

growth

This is a picture of what I put on my wall over my desk at school.

I had the bizarre circumstances of finding out what one of my parents said about me in an anonymous survey. I will say it was unflattering, to say the least. In fact, it was the opposite of those 4 words on the bottom: impatient, unkind, harsh and negative.

Needless to say, this took my by surprise. And my first impulse was to defend myself, and point out why I am not those things. OK, I freely admit to impatient. I am not the most patient person. I own that. I pray about it. I ask God to develop more patience in me. But unkind???? Harsh???

OK, I'm stepping away from defending myself, and taking this as an opportunity to become a better person. I put the opposite of those ugly 4 words above my desk, as well as the verse that is above them.

And now I am grateful.

I am grateful for the opportunity to be better. I am grateful to focus on these things, rather than the negative.

And I am SO grateful that God sent me a couple parents RIGHT on the heels of this thing to give me some wonderful words of encouragement. There were three different parents, in the span of a week, and they were so supportive, and told me how much their kids LOVE to have me as their music teacher, and what a great job I am doing, and how much they LOVED the concert.

So I am thankful that God sent me that encouragement to spur me on to become better. To focus on the good, and what I WANT to be.

And that I didn't get fired. :)
K

service

Last weekend I went with some friends from church to serve at the local Rescue Mission. We served dinner.

The mission serves dinner 6 nights a week to anyone who shows up. The only requirement is that you are in the door by 5 pm, and you sit through the message. Not a sermon, really, but more of a bible devotional or encouragement.

My friends and I passed out drinks, refilled drinks, handed out plates of food, and talked to people.

I often forget how good it feels to serve someone else.

I sometimes get so wrapped up in my own little world that I forget about the blessing of serving others. I get blessed, and I would hope they do too.

Anyway, I am grateful for the opportunity to serve. And I am grateful for the Mission and how they help people on a daily basis.

K

30 Days of Thankful: Day 27

I am thankful for all the blessings God has given me.

Today I went with a group of people from church to serve at the Rescue Mission's Great Thanksgiving Banquet. It is a free Thanksgiving meal for anyone who wants to come. It is largely homeless people who are there, but there are also some people who are not homeless but just down on their luck.

There were 165 of us volunteers there, and we served about 1000 people.

There were clothing giveaways, flu shots, free bibles, and lots of love and welcoming spirit. As the coordinator told us before starting, the people coming today are out guests.

And that's what it felt like.

I am grateful for every blessing in my life- both those given to me, and the opportunities to work for others. I am so blessed, that I couldn't even count them all.

Thank you God for your blessings, and for the opportunity to serve others.
K

30 Thankful Days: Day 3

Today I am thankful for service. For the opportunity to serve.

I heard someone say that service is one of the best ways we can see God because we take our eyes off of ourselves.

Today was church, and I served. I was asked a couple months ago to help prepare communion on the Sundays that we have it. So this morning I went to help prepare communion. I really enjoyed working with the other lady to get it ready, and to have it prepped for the second service as well. It is not a huge deal to get there early, and I enjoy the job.

After service, Pastor thanked us for our service and said he got to serve communion to someone for the first time because they professed faith in Jesus today.

It was a privilege to be a very small part of that.

I pray that continuing to serve will be a big part of my life.
K

LIFE2013

Oh wow.

This week has been HUGE.
Every 3 years my church denomination puts on a huge youth conference. It's like summer camp on steroids. And not in the woods.

But is IS pretty stinkin' awesome. I just got back, and this year was no exception.

We were in St. Louis this year, and it was great! There were awesome speakers, a concert by LeCrae, different seminars every day, lots of great time with my youth group kids, and even some great time with other youth group kids.

One thing I really appreciate is that the content that they presented was deep. It was meaty. We sat through sessions twice a day, plus 2 seminars each day, and for everything I went to the content was right on and very full. No fluff here.

There was service - for 3 days, a group of 2000 kids went out into the city of St. Louis and worked. We cleaned out an old cemetery, we painted a ballpark, we carried trash out of several different places, and it was great. I think when kids throw their hearts into serving others, great things happen.

We talked about God's mission, and how God's mission becomes your purpose. When you are called of God, His mission becomes yours. And he calls you to do this in lots of different places. Sometimes He calls people to go overseas, but most of the time He calls you to do His mission right where you are.

We sang to a video about cranking a chainsaw?!?!?!?

We ghosted people. Well, I didn't ghost anyone, but I did get ghosted. :)

We spent time talking about things that are going on in my kids' lives, and how they respond to what God is doing.

We listened to each other talk about what God was telling them, and their response.

There were seminars on lots of different topics: Identity in the post-church generation, spiritual disciplines, missionary panel, Jesus and consumerism, how to choose a college, how to be a Christian artist in a non-Christian world, and so many more.

It was a great week, and I'm grateful to have gotten to go. I'm grateful that there wasn't any major drama. I'm grateful that we all made the 14 hour drive back.
K

even bigger

Well I thought things couldn't get bigger and more scarier...(scarier?) but they have.

...

I bought a house today.

Holy cow - this is HUGE.

Really I'm not sure how to feel. I'm excited, but I'm also scared, and a little overwhelmed, and still waking up in the middle of the night thinking about things I need to do.

Oh. My. Word.

But the bottom line is that it will be a great thing. I'm trusting God. I've prayed this WHOLE time that He would work out all things in this big endeavor. And He is good. All the time. Regardless of what is happening in my housing situation.

And that's exactly what I have right now - a housing "situation".

So, I'm off to pack. I've got to get all my stuff over to Mom and Dad's house, because next weekend I'm moving the furniture into a storage unit for awhile.
Here's to cardboard boxes.
K

firsts

This has been a couple weeks of firsts.

I sold my first house this week. Well, it's technically not sold yet - I signed the contract on Tuesday, but it won't be "officially sold" until mid-July. 

Today I met with a mortgage person (she was incredibly nice and unfailingly patient with my questions) and got pre-approved for a mortgage, so when it is time to buy a new house, I'll be ready.

I changed the bulbs in both my car headlights for the first time.
Let me be more specific - I've "been involved" in changing the bulb in the rear headlight before. I didn't *actually* do it, but my friend did it, and I got my head right down there and watched and asked a bunch of questions. The front ones were the same, but it was harder to get my hand under and around all the engine stuff. But I did it!

I called a plumber to fix a little water leak. OK, it's not the first time for that, but I'm proud of myself nonetheless.

I am getting ready to buy a house by myself (not first house, but first "buying experience"). Tomorrow is the first day that Mom and I will go out looking at actual houses with a Real Estate Agent. "Real Houses" as opposed to pictures on the internet. :)

This has all combined to make me feel pretty stinkin' self-sufficient! BUT, as we learned in last year's VBX, "no matter what, TRUST GOD!"

So I am trusting God to provide the right house, at the right price, and to work out all the little house-buying details that I don't even know about yet.

I'm not going to worry about it. I have a saying on my desk at work:
"Worry is like a rocking chair. It gives you something to do, but doesn't get you anywhere."
So, I will not worry. It's not productive, and besides: God's already got this worked out! (I just don't know how!)
From the old house,
K

countercultural

This weekend I went on a High School retreat up in the mountains.

No, I am not a High Schooler. :)

But I did hang out with High Schoolers all weekend. And that means I didn't get enough sleep. But now it's a week later and I've mostly recovered.

But the most striking thing about this weekend was something our speaker said. He said that we have to "live weak". He was talking about 1 Corinthians, where Paul talks about his "thorn in the flesh" and when he is weak, then he is strong.

Runks (our speaker) was talking about how we always try to live in our own strength, but really we need to be counter-cultural. We need to live weak.

Huh.

I never really thought about how often it means to live as a Jesus Follower means to be counter-cultural. And it struck me that unless you aim to be counter-cultural, you really are not any different than everyone else around you.

Counter-cultural.

Fitting in, being like everyone else, going with the flow - these are all things that go AGAINST us being counter-cultural. We need to go against the flow, not with it. We need to live weak. Because only then can God really work through us to accomplish much greater things than we can by ourselves.

Counter-cultural: my new favorite word.
K

doing good

Today I bought a hair clip.

On the side of the road.

I had gone to target to get some really exciting things, like toilet paper, and dishwasher detergent and such. As I was headed home, there was a guy standing on the corner with a sign that said "I am not a panhandler-just doing what I can with what I have."

I was intrigued by this, so I rolled down my window and asked what he's selling.

And then came the reply: "hair accessories".

Even more intrigued.

...

So I pulled around and parked. This guy was great - he announced to me as I walked up that he loved Jesus, and that he wanted me to know that Jesus loves me. He got saved 2 years ago, and just wants to make sure people know. I shook his hand and told him I am a Christian also - I got saved when I was 7. He asked if I had been saved ever since, and I said for sure. He showed me his shirt that said "Rep the King". (For those NOT in the 'hood, Rep means "represent". Clarification: I am not in the 'hood either - in the interest of full disclosure.)

I looked at his hairbands, hair clips and what he was selling. He told me that his wife made all of them, and he was just out trying to do his best at selling them. So I bought one.

Here it is, sitting on my computer.

As I drove away, I felt really good about buying this little hair clip. I ALWAYS feel conflicted about people standing on the corner asking for handouts. I want to help, but NEVER know how I could actually help. And then I hear the statistics that some huge percentage of any money you give is used for drugs and alcohol, which makes me feel even more befuddled about what, if anything, I can actually do.

But today, I felt really good. I felt like I helped. I felt like making the decision to spend 5 dollars on a hair clip was the good one - whether I actually wear the hair clip or not. But if for nothing else, I really appreciate his creativity, and willingness to DO something besides just stand there.

No, I don't know how that money will be used. But I know that there was time spent making these, and creativity spent in coming up with something they could do. And I fell really good about rewarding that.

So, for now, I will just keep my hair clip, and pray for the hands that made it, and the family that hopefully will benefit from today's interaction.
I know I did.
K

reverence

While in Washington DC, Carol took me to the National Cathedral. I was NOT expecting to be as moved by this building as I was. Even though it is an Episcopal Church, and services are held there all the time, it is really a beautiful Gothic Revival building.

Awhile back, the whole east coast had a pretty big earthquake, and some pieces fell off the cathedral:

I'm SO glad that this random guy walked behind them, just as I was taking a picture, so you can see how huge they really are! These are sitting out in front of the cathedral, and I'm not sure when there are plans to replace them.  If you look at the following picture closely, you can see the minarets that they fell off of. They are flat on top, unlike their neighbors:

Broken minaret - right in the center.

The main sanctuary is beautiful, and has gorgeous stained-glass windows all around it. Note the black netting on the inside, because they weren't sure if any pieces would fall on the inside:

This picture is from the main platform, looking up into the nave where a service was taking place:

As I was taking the above picture, right next to my left leg was the seat where Nancy sat for Ronald Reagan's funereal. Lots of Presidents and important people have had funereals here, and Woodrow Wilson is actually buried here. Well, not actually buried - his crypt is here.

Woodrow Wilson's crypt

The stained-glass over Woodrow Wilson's crypt.

There are other beautiful stained-glass windows also, like the Space window:

And the Colorado window. Look closely for the Air Force Academy Chapel at the top:

There is a hall with the flag of every state:

And lots of little chapels off of every hallway. This one was being prepared for Sunday Services, with fresh flowers:

I happened upon this crucifix while wandering the halls and finding other little chapels:

Carol and I went up to the 7th floor observatory, and could see several states. This is a view of Washington - notice the Washington Monument sticking up right in the middle:

And this is looking down from the observatory, on a garden that is on the property:

I think the thing that struck me most while visiting the National Cathedral was the diversity of the people there - not just different cultures, but different religions as well. I think that this place inspires reverence, no matter what you relationship with God. I'm sure that every person there was not there because of their close, personal relationship with God, but because it is beautiful, and one of the things to do. But, I really appreciate that this place is about the collision of daily life with the Holy; About how the Divine reaches down to us, regardless of what we call ourselves.

I reveled in the reverence that was there.

And it didn't matter what the people around me labeled their religion: God was there.
K

humbled

Last week I was humbled.

No, not like "I'm such a humble person."

I did something wrong, and totally had to humble myself and ask for forgiveness.

I spoke to someone at work harshly, and I shouldn't have. I had to go tell them I was wrong, and ask for forgiveness. But I am fortunate, because she was sweet to me, and everything is alright now.

Then, I had to apologize again. I had talked to our Assistant Principal about something, and gotten all upset that several of us weren't told about a situation.

Well. It turns out that the information we had was wrong, and we never needed to be told. I had to tell her I was sorry, and that my information was wrong, and that I should have checked it out before getting all irritable with her. She also was very gracious, and said I could talk to her any time. I do believe that. I believe that I CAN talk to her anytime, and if she has any answers she will give them.

But I also know that I jumped the gun, and should have checked out that information before assuming that we were slighted.

Huh.

Doesn't it always seem like things are clicking along great, and then a stick is thrown in your bicycle tire, and you end up gym-pants over tennis shoes on the ground? Then you have to regroup. That's what I felt like last week. Like I had to regroup. Like I was not a very good person. Like I am a big mess.

But you see, I am a big mess. I am human, and make mistakes just like everyone. Just because I have a low tolerance for mistakes doesn't mean that I don't ever make them.

I guess the lesson from last week is to think before you speak. Lesson learned. For now. I'm sure I will have this problem again, but I'm thankful that I am flexible enough to learn lessons. That I can learn from my mistakes. That I am able to humble myself and apologize.

I used to pray for flexibility, and I guess this is the answer to those prayers. Thank you God, for loving me enough to teach me and make me a better person.

Can it not be so painful next time???
K

redeemed

Today I went to a baby shower. It was for my friend Beth, and she writes here.

A wonderful lady named Esther gave a devotional for Beth, and it was great. But one thing she said really stuck out to me.

Esther was telling Beth not to be afraid of making mistakes - we all make mistakes. Then she said "God will still be God after your son is born. He has and always will redeem the things that we mess up."

Wow.

God is in the business of redeeming the things that I mess up. And I mess up a lot. But not too much for God to handle.

Again, wow.

How can I be in my 30's, and have this hit me like a hammer between the eyes? I mean, I GREW UP hearing this, and I made it through 30 hours of Bible and Theology in college. I KNOW this.

But I guess it goes to show that to know something with your brain, and to know something with your heart are totally different things.

Thank you Esther, for speaking to right where I needed to hear it, and for ministering to me even though I was just a guest at this shindig.

Redeemed. God has and will redeem the things we mess up. What a comforting thought.
K

beef and cheese

Last weekend I was at the High School Winter Retreat. It was fantastic! I am SO not a high schooler anymore, but I got so much out of it, I might have a hard time articulating all of it. Shocker...

I want to start off with Chris' talk from Saturday night. Chris Simning was our speaker, and his website is here. You can read his bio if you want, but the short story (from my perspective) is that he woke up one morning when he was in 8th grade, and he couldn't hold his head up. He had a really rare musculo-skeletal disease that not many doctors knew much about. He spent 5 years getting worse, and was in a wheelchair by the time he was a Senior in High School. Eventually, God has given him some freedom,and now he can drive, walk, and do most things by himself.

But if you were to look at him, he looks like he has something like CP. he doesn't, but from a first glance, you wouldn't know that. And there's the rub. He has lived with this situation since he was in 8th grade, and as such his perspective on life is much different than most of ours.

Chris' talk on Saturday night was about what or who you put on your throne, instead of giving Jesus the rightful place there. He started off with a movie clip from Elf, where Will Farrell accuses a department store Santa of being fake - he KNOWS the real Santa, and this guy is not it. Will says he stinks. Will says he smells like beef and cheese. Will says he sits on a throne of lies.

Now this scene is funny, and still makes me laugh today. But Chris talked about how we put fake things on the throne of our life, and that should be Jesus' rightful place. This could be lots of things - activities, athletics, people, even Youth Group. but if Jesus is not on the throne, all these things are taking the rightful place that He should occupy.

God really used this to convict me that I do a good job of being "in Christ" during church, and during devotions, and on retreat, and even at Youth Group. But the rest of the time, I don't really live "in Christ".

I don't know why, but I felt convicted about the radio. About what I listen to in the radio in my car. Most all the time, I listen to the news or to talk radio. But I felt like God was calling me to be connected more closely to Him, and the radio is one way to do this.

So, for the past week, I have listened to Christian radio in the car. This is a pretty big deal, mostly because I don't like Christian radio. But I'm open.

And I will freely admit, it has made me more focused on God. It has helped me to pray more. It has helped me to talk to God more.

Not that news and politics are bad things, but this whole week I have felt the difference - I've felt more closely connected to God. So I am grateful that there is not one thing on the throne of my life that smells like beef and cheese, but that I have gotten closer to having only Jesus on that throne.

Here's to not smelling like beef and cheese.
K

intestines

Well.

I have SO much to say...

There is no way I can describe all the things that happened this weekend, so I think this will come in installments, like a loan or a mortgage. But better. :)

This weekend was High Altitude, which is our High School winter retreat at church.

There were 48 kids and 10 adults who went.

I am not positive, but I think the camp was at about 10,000 feet. So the name fits. My asthma was not happy, but everything else was!

Our speaker was Chris Simning, and I can't say enough about what an awesome speaker and man of God he is. More on this later.

I had about 9 hours of sleep the whole weekend, and might be getting too old to handle that very often...

Intestines were mentioned several times over the course of the weekend.

I refereed lots of games of Dodgeball, and lived to tell about it.

OK, the deal with intestines:
At family time (where just our youth group gets together and talks about the speaker and sessions), the subject came up about how God often works in weird ways. Like sometimes He will work in our lives through something we didn't even realize was happening, or those "coincidences" where someone we meet talks to us about the very thing we are struggling with.

I said that that was like intestines.

Bear with me.

God created intestines. Who would have EVER thought that making a tube-y thing super long, and then coiling it up in our abdominal cavity would be a great way to process waste. And if you stretched intestines out they would be ridiculously long, but all curled up they fit perfectly.

Who would have IMAGINED that as a great idea? But God did. Point: we cannot know what God has planned, or how He is going to work. His ways are not our ways. We can't know how He is going to bring people (or Youth Retreats) into our lives, and change us for the better.

I guess that the example didn't have to be about intestines, but we had talked about intestines on the drive up there (before the blizzard over Berthoud Pass - I didn't talk during that AT ALL.) so it seemed like a fitting analogy.

But really, have you ever thought about intestines? And how amazing they are? And I once knew someone who has Crohn's Disease, and she had some of her intestines removed and replaced with plastic. Wait, not on topic.

But really, God is amazing, and worked in the lives of our kids all weekend.

I'm grateful for this retreat. I'm grateful for our Youth Group kids and their realness. I'm grateful that we made the drive up there. I'm grateful for intestines.

More to come.
K

day 28 grace

November is the month for thanksgiving, so I'm linking up with my friend Dawn to be thankful all this month.

Today I'm thankful that, every-so-often, we are given grace. Today I was given a little grace.

This week is the concert with my older kids at school. We have been preparing for this for the past 3 months, so as this week rolled around, it's been pretty exciting that it is actually here.

But...

Last week I got together with my accompanist, and discovered that I had rehearsed part of a song wrong.

And I had taught it to all my 5th graders wrong.

Oh no......

So today I had to go in there and just say, "Have you ever read a word wrong? Just looked at it and said a totally different word? Well, that's what I did with this song. So now we have to learn this part again.".

It was pretty humbling.

So we got to work. But the really good news - the part where I received some grace - was that after we sang it about 4 times, one of my kids looked up and said, "That's not very hard at all."

And that was the end of it. We sang through that song, and everyone was pretty fine with it. I felt like I totally got a huge portion of grace. Like it could have been a big fat deal, but no. It all was fine.

As I was all relieved that it wasn't a big deal, I realized that I had just gotten a huge gift of grace, and was spared any big hoo-ha over the matter. That it could have really been difficult. That we could have struggled with it for the whole class, and still not gotten it right.

But they got it.

And I was spared. What a blessing, to have things work out like that, when it could have been so much worse. So today I am thankful for grace. For the grace that God gives to us, but also for those little gifts that we randomly get. Right when we need it.
K

day 13 listening

I'm linking up with my friend Dawn at theGoodlife, and being thankful all this month. And it's been fun! Head over there to see what everybody is thankful for.

Tonight I was at Youth Group, and one of the questions I asked my small group of girls was "when was a time you responded to a 'nudge' from God?"

After they shared, I shared with them about this student I have had some difficulties with in the past. I told them about how one day I was working with that class, and I thought to myself that I needed to really give him a new chance every day. That every day is a new beginning, and so I should grant him a new beginning each day.

And then God spoke to me, like he leaned down an audibly said in my ear "Like I do for you."

Wow.

He does, you know. Every day, God looks on me and give me another chance, another do-over, a brand new day. He never holds stuff against me. He never holds a grudge. He never looks at me and sees the stuff that I've done wrong in the past.

And that's what I need to do for this student.

So this is what I'm thankful for today: that God still speaks to me.
And that I have ears to listen.
K

Lincoln, Nebraska

Where has the summer gone???

This is the big news of the summer so far:
2 weeks ago, about 70 of us hopped in several identical 12-passenger vans and went to Lincoln, Nebraska. There is a baby church there, and our church here in the springs wanted to support them. So, we went and did our WHOLE Vacation Bible Experience (VBX) at their church. And, we had about 6 or 8 guys that did construction or repair work around their church while the rest of us did VBX.
It was really a great week.

There were about 140 kids total that came, and only about 25 or 30 of those are affiliated with their church in Lincoln, so the rest came from the neighborhoods and community centers around there. There were 50 kids that made a decision for Christ that week, so that in itself was worth the trip. My mom went, and helped with the cooking, and it was fun to have her there, even though we only saw each other about 5 minutes a day.

Painting

Getting ready for VBX

Construction on the ceiling of their Gym

Evening service with our group, me playing the drum

Group Picture!

I had a fantastic trip, and I'm glad we went. It was worth it to encourage the Lincoln church, and most of all to see lots of lives changed for Christ.

car keys

My keys, with the BRAND NEW car key prominently displayed!

OK, Here's the end of the story, that began here. on Monday morning, I trucked downtown, on icy streets, I might add, and in my Mom's car to talk to the guy at the key place. When I walked in, he asked if that was my car in the lot, and I said yes and laid down my car key on the counter. He said, "Well, you don't even need to tell me what happened. I can tell just by looking at the key." And he proceeded to tell me exactly what happened over the weekend. He then said that they would take the entire ignition out of the car, and remove {something} that had worn down, and replace it with {something} that would not catch on the key anymore. Like my grasp of the technical jargon??? And, oh, by the way, my driver's side door is going to be the next to go because it is the next most used lock. And then the trunk. So I asked him to cut a new key while they were at it so I had a fresh key to work with from now on.

I handed over the keys, and he said he would call me when it was fixed.

I headed mom's car toward home, at a rather leisurely pace, and stopped close to my house to replace some of the gas I had used over the past couple days I had driven her car. As I neared my house, the phone rang, and it was the lock place - they were all done!

Mom and I headed back downtown and picked up my now working car. Turning that car key was the most blissful thing I had done in a long time. And the kicker: the whole deal only cost me $71. Amazing!

Lesson: Don't give in to the knee-jerk reaction of freaking out when something happens to your car. Or when something happens in general.

Lesson: Ask people who are knowledgeable and see what they recommend, instead of imagining the worst. God put people in your life for a reason.

Lesson: Lean not on your own understanding, ESPECIALLY when it comes to cars or other technical matters.

Lesson: Be grateful. I am SO grateful for my parents, and their help. For so long, I lived 3000 miles away from any family, and got very used to being self-sufficient in almost everything. I am grateful that I have a loving supportive family that graciously helped in whatever I needed.

Here's to learning what you can in every situation, and for God's grace in my life, making me teachable and flexible. And to not freaking out next time...
K

healing

My facebook status update from 2 minutes ago: cannot even deal with a broken car right now...

This whole thought of dealing with my car that won't start is really stressing me out. It's not the battery, or anything else engine-wise - it's that the key physically won't turn. I fiddled with the steering wheel and got it to turn once, but then I got to church and parked it. As soon as I took the key out, that was it. No more turney-key.

So I am home, safe and warm, but with my mom's car in my garage instead of mine. Mine is still at the church.

Yes, yes, I know that car troubles are not the end of the world, but it just feels like that right now. It makes me all stressy and unpleasant.

The upside of this is that my parents live here in town, and came to my rescue. Dad came and picked me up, mom let me borrow her car, and they are going to help me tomorrow when I try and get it started with a different key, and hopefully drive it down to the lock place with me. Otherwise, I will have to get it towed there.

{breathe...breathe...}

Really, in the big scheme of life, this car thing is not the end of the world. My parents are helping me willingly with getting it fixed; I am safe and warm at home; I AM able to take off on Monday if I need to deal with it then.

I just need to get some perspective, and talk myself into NOT having a panic attack over nothing. To be able to deal without losing my cool. As if I had any cool to begin with...

I subscribe to (in)courage by e-mail. (in)courage is a blog written by a group of christian women, and I love reading them. There always seems to be something pertinent and timely on there, and I get an e-mail each day with the day's message. Today, as I came home all twitterpated over this car thing, I opened up the (in)courage e-mail, and Mindy Carlettini had written about her 10 year anniversary as a follower of Christ, but this happened to also be her 10 year anniversary of being off narcotics. She was pondering the times when she could escape reality by getting high, and she said that she didn't tell anyone this for a long time. Finally she talked to her husband about it, and realized that she didn't really want to go back to that escape like she thought she did. And then she writes:

"The difference now though is that when the storms of life come, when I turn to my father in Heaven, I don’t feel the need to escape from reality.  God’s love gives me strength and a confidence that I never could have imagined.  He gives me the will and the desire to keep on going.  He reminds me that He loves me with a love that is so huge and so encompassing that I don’t need to get high when everything around me seems to be spinning out of control. He gives me peace.
I am so thankful for the ways my father loves me.  I am so thankful for the ways He is healing me and transforming me.  I am so thankful for His spirit that is always with me and I am never alone."

Yes, I realize that her experience is very different than my car thing, but it still applies. I AM thankful that my Father loves me, even when I am stressing over my car. I have unimaginable peace, knowing that He even cares about the things that otherwise seem insignificant. I can turn my eyes toward Jesus, instead of having my eyes on the rear view mirror in worry.

So, I am praying that He will heal my car, using the guys at the key place. And I'm praying that He will give me peace in the middle of the key situation. And I'm thankful that God heals in  big ways (broken lives) and in little ways (broken cars).

You should check them out: www.incourage.me
K