a change of heart

I'd love to tell you that I have been silent because my life has been full to the brim with excitement and fun, so much so that I have not had a smidgen of time to sit and write about all the gloriousness that is filling my days.

but I can't... unless you count cleaning coffee off your ceiling exciting...

long story.

(my days are not bad... in fact they are mostly good... some great even, some terrible...you know, just normal life with young children.)

I have wanted to sit and write a post catching y'all up on what's going on here... but as my days slip by, and more days slip by, and they start piling up it seems so daunting. You know that feeling when you really need to clean out a horribly messy and over-stuffed closet... it just gets fuller and messier and silently screams at you every time you walk by it. So one day you open it all prepared to get down to the task, and then you see how much there is to do and you get overwhelmed and you quietly close the door go get a bag of chips, sit on the couch and watch reruns of some lame show instead?

That's how I feel.

This is why I am chubby.  :)

I used to love writing a blog post because it was a way for me to clear my head of all that God was doing and teaching me. I would relish the quiet times I could sit and think through what I was learning, write it down  and really reflect on it.

Then I had Ryder and all my quiet time flew out the window.

2 kids really puts a damper on all things peaceful and reflective.

However I feel I have needed to do this lately because I know God has done, and is continuing to do some amazing things in my heart and in my life.

So today I am determined to take the time and sit here during the brief quiet that is nap time and try to put into words what I have been learning and feeling over the past few months.

I have struggled most of my teenage and adult life with the sin of covetousness and materialism. (such a childish thing I know) Not to a degree that I am a shopaholic or have put our small family in monstrous debt, but my heart was always eaten up by the "I wants". I would see what someone else had and desire it for myself... I would see something in a store and think about it for days... weeks even.

I like me some pretty things.

But I don't like pretty things in a healthy, sinless way.

Over the past year I would recognise this more and more about myself... and the more I saw it within my heart the more I would dislike it.

I eventually started praying that God would change my heart. I was saddened that my reaction to loving something adorable would cause me to be so discontent with what I already had. In essence turning to God and saying "I think you could be doing better here... see that?... me wanty."

How arrogant.

How prideful

How ugly.

So I began praying that my heart would be one of thanks and gratitude. I wanted to invite people over to my tiny house and not fret about what I lacked. I wanted to give out of my abundance... because in truth, I may have less then some, but I have MUCH more then most. I wanted to be happy with what God deemed good for me. I wanted to be content with what I had.

And then the Captain lost his job.

And he got a new job that paid less then half of what he had been making before.

And then the Captain lost that job.

But he got a new job... making less then the previous one.

Right now, today, I am the poorest person I know.

And I can honestly say I am OK with it.

God has been changing my heart and refocusing my perspective. He has been repetitively teaching me (as I do my toddler) about what is "need" and what is "want".

He keeps showing me in small ways, through conversations with friends, verses that jump off the page, circumstances I am in, or examples from others that He knows exactly what I need and He has given me SO much MORE then I need.

And even in the tough, scary moments when I doubt, He is there reminding me that He is in control... that this is where He wants us right now... and He will provide and take care of us.

We are definitely in a tight spot... an uncomfortable place.

But He is here.

 Directing us, providing for us... loving us. God has been so much more than faithful in taking care of us financially, He has changed my heart.

I so want my life and my heart to be beautiful.

I love me some pretty things... but more important then the pretty things, I want to invest my life, my energy, my motivation in things of eternity. I want God to look at what I can lay before His feet and see the beautiful. I want pretty that will last forever,

And I am not sure you can buy that in a store...

“I judge all things only by the price they shall gain in eternity.” — John Wesley