Life of Eucharisteo

　 　 It's Friday, and that means I get to visit with a great group over at Lisa-Jo Baker's place. A place where the words flow like fresh water for my soul and encouragement abounds. I look forward to meeting here each week to read the God-given words of the women He's using to change the world. Wont' you join us? It's been a while since I've joined in on a FMF. I have to confess...I normally just watch the clock for my five minutes, so I usually fudge just a little. Today I set the timer. Man that five minutes went by fast! Here you go. My five minutes on..... DIVE The tree is down. The calender is marking the last day of December. I’m standing on the edge of 2012 feeling a bit like Peter standing at the edge of the boat. I feel Jesus calling me into 2013. Asking me to step out. Step out boldly. Leap. Dive. But like Peter, I see the water. The deep, dark, place of uncertainty. I see Jesus. I know full well He is there waiti...

The words spilled out before I knew what was happening. They spilled out like a jar of marbles scattering everywhere. Spilled from my jar. The one I keep inside for just such words. Christmas started out much like it always does for my brood. The day AFTER Thanksgiving starts our Christmas season. We collect our 15 year old tree from the box in the barn. We pull out all the ornaments and reminisce over each and every one. We bake cookies. We listen to Christmas carols for 31 days straight, and we celebrate the birth of our King. Every year I watch my girls revel in all things Christmas, and every year I share in their joy. But for me, it always tastes bittersweet. You see since her first Christmas, I’ve felt like a big fat liar. I’ve done a great job at stuffing it. Stuffing the big secret into my jar and feeding into the fantasy. Why not? I lived it. It was fun. It was magical. It was what dreams were made of and I wanted her to experience the joy of Christmas. At least ...

This weekend we have an opportunity. An opportunity to lift up the women in our lives. Sunday is the day marked on our calendars for the celebration of our Mothers. I applaud the Mothers that are reading here. Mothers everywhere. In whatever season of motherhood that you may find yourself. I want to give encouragement to women everywhere who long to, but are yet to be mothers. I want to let you know that even if you never usher a child into this world that shares your DNA, there is someone out there that needs a mother figure in their life. Sweet sister, you just might be that woman. To the Mothers who didn’t experience the pains of birthing, but have their own sense of birth pains through adoption. For the Mothers who carried that precious child for those days, weeks, or months and had to give him or her back to the Father.  For the grieving Mothers. The widowed Mothers. The single Mothers.  For the Mothers missing their own sweet Mamas. Longing for...

So it's Good Friday, or as I've learned recently, Holy Friday/God Friday. That's what they called it years ago. Up until this year....even though I knew what happen on this day....it's kinda been just another Friday. I know,  that sounds awful and so very disrespectful. It's not that I didn't appreciate what happen all those years ago on this day. I think it was just that I'd heard this story since birth  and I had just gotten used to it. Ya know what I mean? How terrible is that? I'd been churched into a state of complacency and routine. This year however, has been a horse donkey of a different color. This year has been intentional. I've walked through this Lenten season on purpose. Which by the way is a huge change for me since I was  raised Southern Baptist and didn't know a thing about Lent until this year. Anyway, thanks to Ann Voskamp  (who is such a humble servant of God), I started my journey of researching and diving head first into c...

I come to You Lord. Leaning into You. My soft place to fall. Burying my face in You. Bringing You my heartache and my tears. I bring You the offering of myself. As little as it is. I come interceding for my family. For my husband. For my girls. I come seeking guidance, seeking words, seeking wisdom. Help me Lord to balance these circus acts of motherhood and wifehood. I’m struggling to balance feeding myself on Your Word, and helping my children learn to feed on Your Word. Help me teach them Lord. Help me to show them how seek refuge in You. As I learn that You are all I need, help me to translate that to them. Create in their hearts a desire to know you more. You know the trials I face Lord. I thank You that You are for me Lord. (Romans 8:31) I thank You that when ever I need to hear from You, all I have to do is open Your Word. Thank You for meeting me here. I thank You that even when I don’t know what to pray that Jesus is there making intercession for m...

I think I’ve finally figured out why God moved us out to the middle of nowhere. And when I say middle of nowhere I mean at least twenty minutes in any direction from anything. Anything being, the gas station, the grocery store, church, friends, school, etc. I think He got me out this far so that He could talk to me on those long trips to town. I walk through each day, trying to talk with God. Trying to hear from Him. Our conversations usually get drowned out by a number of things. But it seems that every time I get behind the wheel of my car and head toward a destination, I feel this overwhelming peace come over me and He starts to talk with me. He has given me so many words on these trips. I’ve decided I’m going to have to start taking my laptop everywhere I go so that when He gives me these words, I can stop and get them down in black and white. Cause like I’ve said before, my mind is a vault and I don’t want them to get lost in there. That leads me to my post for today…gotta g...

Day 2 John 11:41-42 41 Then they took away the stone from the place where the dead man was lying. And Jesus lifted up His eyes and said, “Father, I thank you that You have heard Me . 4 2 And I know that You always hear Me, but because of the people who are standing by I said this, that they may believe that You sent Me.” 　 Jesus said “I know you always hear Me.” Wow….do we have this same confidence? Confidence that Our Heavenly Father always hears us? Jesus’ example in this passage says that we should. His example also tells us that we should be giving Thanks to God in everything (yes the bad time too) and we should be doing it publicly. What a thought…people could actually be led to believe in Jesus because of our obedience in Thanksgiving to God. I Thank my God today.... 184. The girls had winter clothes from last year that still fit this year. 185. I finally got the winter clothes pulled out of storage and organized in the closet. 186. Almond bark (my waistline...

Friendly Obstacles Anonymous For every hill I've tried to climb, For every stone that bruised my feet, For all the blood and sweat, and grime, For blinding storms and burning heat, My heart sings but a grateful song These are the things that made me strong! For all the heartaches and the tears, For all the anguish and the pain, For gloomy days and fruitless years, And for the hopes that lived in vain, I do give thanks, for now I know These were the things that helped me grow! 'Tis not the softer things in life Which stimulate man's will to strive; But bleak adversity and strife Do most to keep man's will alive. O'er rose-strewn paths the weaklings creep, But brave hearts dare to climb the steep. For about two weeks now my daughter has studied these words. Words that I've heard her recite....words that I've checked to make sure she was reciting correctly....but also words that I've not really heard until today. As my eldest reci...