Crayons

The other day as I was leaving work and headed to get little man I began thinking about how great that day had been. I had gotten up early to do my Bible study and prayer, and I had helped a lot of people at work. Yes, thank you God for a great day. You are a strong and mighty God and I give you all honor glory and praise for this day. I got to school and asked Haden if he had found his lost jacket, his answer was no. I started to get a little annoyed at his "I really don't care about my lost coat mom" attitude. We proceeded to his classroom to continue our (my) quest to find the missing jacket. We did not find it, but I did notice that his school box was open on his desk and only 3 crayons lay inside. I asked Haden where the crayons I bought him at the beginning of the week were. Well, just like the jacket, he had no answer, and really did not seem to be as bothered as I was. We drove home and as I thought and thought and thought about the whole jacket/crayon thing I just became more and more irriated. I started dinner and Haden was playing happily at the kitchen table. I began to think, "Wow, and I was having such a good day." It was as this thought crossed my mind that I heard God speak to me. "You just thanked me for a wonderful day, and now you are letting a missing jacket and a few lost crayons ruin it all?"
Wow...I thought of something that I heard recently on a radio station, and was recently reminded by a colleague.
"Our level of spiritual maturity can be measured by what it takes to steal our joy."
I was letting something so small and insignificant steal my joy, and the joy of The Lord is my strength! The devil was having a party thinking that he had ruined my whole day with something so trivial. Thank you Jesus for speaking to me. I pray that my spirit matures every day so that I will not be easily shaken.

Philippians 4:9
"Whatever you have learned or received or heard from me, or seen in me- put into practice."

Kitty Litter

When I taught writing I always told my students to have a great title or opening sentence so they could grab the reader's attention. So? Do I have yours? I will talk more about kitty litter later.

Lately, I have noticed that I seem to pray for the really big things in my life. Or I lift up things for others that are really major in their life. This is all great. I am actually really good at turning these things over to God. Problem is those pesky little things. Sometimes I feel as if I am bothering God with some of the things that bother me. But God tells us "Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God.” So if something is causing me to be anxious then I should pray about it and turn it over to God.

Ok. Enter, kitty litter. Cats. Never in my life did I think I would own one, not to mention two! After a year of Haden wanting a pet, and us not ready for a dog, and he not happy with the hermit crabs we tried to fulfill his need, we decided to let him have a kitten. New Year's Eve off we go to the animal shelter. We were placed in the cat room, and Adam and Haden immediately began holding cats. I on the other hand was inspecting their clothes to see which cat shed the most, because that was not going to be my pick. After a while, Haden picked a small black kitten. I have to admit that she did have the cutest little face. I turned around to tell Adam that Haden had chosen and we were ready to go. It was then that I saw Adam holding a much larger older cat. I cannot even begin to describe the look in this man's eyes. It was a kind of a pout and "oh please mommy" look that was a little disturbing. Two cats? Really? The animal shelter lady said, "Oh yes, you need two so they can play together."Look lady you run a shelter you are going to tell me to take six!

Ok, so we have had the cats a few months shy of a year now. They have been ok. Actually better than I thought. However, I just cannot get used to the litter box! We have moved it to the upstairs bathroom and still I think I can smell it everywhere. Recently I bought a new "all natural" kitty litter. This stuff is made from walnuts shells, does not stink, and you can flush it! I cannot tell you how excited this made me. Looking back now it is kind of sad just how excited I was about yes, kitty litter. Then it happened.... about a week after the new litter, Shadow,the youngest, decided that this new stuff was not for her and she would just go on the floor. Over and over and over. I was so upset. Adam said that we were just going to have to switch back to the old litter. What? This can't be happening! I can't go back. I was very anxious. So my first instinct was to pray, but then I thought, wait I can't pray about kitty litter. This is silly. But the more I thought about it the more anxious and worried I became. So I prayed, "Dear Lord, this may be silly, but I pray that Shadow will start using the litter box again. I pray that we are able to get through this very small detail of our life. Please help me not to be anxious about this." I felt sure that God was having a good laugh at me, and maybe he did, but ya know what else? Shadow started using the litter box again.

I truly believe God wants us to turn big and small things over to Him daily. He is God, and in control of all things. Yes, even kitty litter.

Tone

No, this post is not about "toning" up with my exercise. It is actually about tone in our everyday voice. I have noticed lately that how I react to someone, whether it be negative or positive all goes back to their intial tone.

There is a lady at school who speaks in a yell the majority of the time. We have a good relatinship, and I tell her often to stop yelling at me. She insists that she is not yelling she is just being passionate. Also, and I know I have mentioned this before, but the high school students I deal with everyday have no idea that my response to them is a direct result of their tone. For example, it just bugs me to death when a student says, "The computer won't let me log on." (Second post about this. Can you tell it bugs me?) When a student says this it just gets on my last nerve. On the contrary when a student asks "Can you help me log on? I am having some trouble", I am quick to jump up and assist them.

This all makes me think about my tone with others. No matter what the situation am I striving to be Christlike even with my tone? Those people I have a hard time dealing with, is it because of my tone. I do not like it when people say, "Oh that's just the way they are. They don't mean anything by it." If we are made in His image and are to be like Him, then no, that is not the way that they should be.

After realizing this this week. I am going to try my best to get my tone in check. Try to show the love of Christ to others. Even those pesky little high schoolers. :)

1 John 2:6
"Whoever says he adibes in Him ought to walk in the same way He walked."

Positive

Last week as I was walking into Walmart, I stuck my keys into my purse and found my purse was full of a slimy substance. I quickly discovered that a new bottle of hand sanitizer I had bought had opened into my purse and spilled half of its contents. It was on everything! So gross! I grabbed the couple of things that I needed and headed back to school. I very disgustedly told my friend what had happened. She just laughed, shrugged and said, "It could have been worse. Look at it this way, it smells good, and your purse is very clean now."

Looking to the positive. I have to say that this is definitely an area I can work on. I have a former colleague and close friend who we always called "Polly" (Are you reading, Polly?) No matter what was thrown our way at school she seemed to take it in stride, and look on the bright side of things.

Since God has blessed me with a job that I can have a do-over every 9 months, I have tried my best to start out this year being positive. Ok, I have failed miserably a couple of days already, but I am aware and trying to correct myself. What if I griped about my job all the time, and God said, "Ok, you are not enjoying the job I blessed you with so let's just take that burden away from you." Wow...

I love the verse in Philippians 4:8
"Whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable. Think about these things that are excellent and worthy of praise."

I like to say not only to "think on these things" but speak of these things as well. I love the part that uses the word "admirable". How many times have you heard someone say, "Man, I really admire them. They are always so negative." Hmmmm...

God in your strength help me to see the bright side. Help me to use positive words throughout my day so I may thank you and praise you for what you have given to me. Amen.

Fire

I heard a sermon a while back that talked about going through trials in your life. The preacher said that you are either, coming out of a fire, in one, or going into one. That is pretty scary when you think about it. This made me think of firefighters. Right before we moved to NWA, Adam was a volunteer firefighter for about a year. He had to go through many weekends of training before, during, and after. He did not have his initial training and then just call it good. He continued to train even though he was not invovled in many fires. There were the occcasional trash fires that got a little out of control, or small grass fire, but he never had to "fight a big one". It wasn't until July 4 he was able to put all of his training to work. We were happily watching the fireworks of the fourth from a grocery store parking lot. They were going pretty well, but suddenly something went wrong and the entire hill which we were gazing upon was quickly becoming engulfed in flames. Adam quickly drove us home out of danger, put on his gear, and headed back to fight this quickly spreading fire. He was gone for several hours, but they finally managed with the help of several near by fire departments to contain the threat. All of Adam's training prepared him for this night.

Even when we are not in a fire we need to train for the day. Read the Bible to know what it says to do during a fire. Pray and ask God to strengthen us for the day of trials. Speak to others about how God has protected you through so many previous fires.

Acts 14:22
"Strenthening the disciples by encouraging them to continue in the faith and by telling them, "It is necessary to pass through many troubles on our way into the kingdom of God."


One more thing I have heard said before about going through fires that has really stuck with me throughout the years. In the book of Daniel the Bible talks about Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego coming out of the fire and not even smelling like smoke. How many times does God bring us through a trial, but we still smell of smoke? We do not praise him, but we talk about how bad our fire was. Do not get me wrong, I do think we should share with people the fires of life we go through. In fact, I believe we go through things to be able to help others that are hurting. I am talking about when after a fire we still focus on the fire and not our God. I love it when I tell my first marriage story to someone and they say, "I had no idea! You seem so strong and together now." This gives me the perfect opportunity to share the love of God.

Matthew 5:16
"In the same way, let your light shine before men, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father in heaven."

Spiritual Exercise

After reading a a friend's comment on the last post I realized that I am receiving a lot of my "grain from heaven" during moments I choose to exercise. To read my blog as an outsider it would sound like I am totally fit and adore exercise. This is not true. I was an athlete in school and relied on that physical training along with a high metabolism to keep me in shape. Since then I dabbled in exercise. I would start this program or that and be faithful for a few weeks then think, "Hey, I look good enough. Why push myself?" It wasn't until this past spring that I really woke up to why I need to take care and myself. Upon the prompting of a friend from school I joined a spin class. This proved to be a horrible experience. I could not do it. Not, I was lazy and did not want to do it, I just simply could not do it. After about 10 turns of the bike I was light-headed and totally out of breath. I ended up turning the tension in my bike all the way down and just pedaling the rest of the class. My friend, who is almost 15 years older than me, offered to sit with me after class and was worried about me driving home. I was so embarrassed. It was then that I decided to get fit. Not out of vanity this time, but for my health.

Two things have occured beginning this quest. Of course, I feel better and stronger, and know that I am at least trying to do something each day toward my health, but I also had an unexpected benefit. Exercise has brought me closer to God. It was not long after I started doing some sort of physical activity each day that I started this blog. It is in those quiet times of exercise that I feel close to God, and he speaks to me the most. Just the other night I went on a late evening walk in our neighborhood and saw the beautiful sky as the sun was setting. I looked around at our sweet neighbors' houses, Haden happily playing in the front yard with friends, and thought about how different my life is now than about 10 years ago when I never thought it was in the plan for me to be this happy.

Also, as I have written in early posts, exercise has also made me realize that if I work on my physical body daily so should I work on my spiritual body. I am no where near where I need to be physcially or spiritually, but I am trying and feeling good.

1 Corinthians 6:19-20
"Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God? You are not your own, for you were bought with a price. So glorify God in your body."

Role Models

It is funny who we let into our lives to be our role models. We would each say that we only have people in our life that are the ultimate role model of who we would like to be, however, how many times to we let others influence us in the way we think about ourselves or even act toward one another.

I noticed this about myself today while at the gym. I had just finished 15 minutes of weights and running a mile, and I have to say that I was feeling pretty good about myself, not arrogant by any means, just feeling healthy and strong and proud of myself for fitting some exercise into my day. I finished up my workout with a cool down walk. The walking track is right above the main weight lifting area of the gym. From my vantage point I could see all kinds of people in much better physical shape than me. My early pride in my workout and progress slowly faded away as I gazed upon women lifting massive weights with ease when I had just struggled to do a measly 35 pounds on the curl machine. I started feeling worse and worse, but then I stopped myself. This was absolutely ridiculous. I had been successful in my workout. Looking upon others to judge how I should look or feel was not the right attitude I should have.

I realize that I do this in my Christian walk as well. I am always comparing myself to the women in church who always volunteer and are at every women's bible study class. I can feel good about my bible study routine, but then I will hear about a lady who gets up at 5:00 a.m. and prays and studies for 2 hours and my spiritual balloon bursts.

I am coming to grips with the fact that God does not ask us to look around at others to judge ourselves. He only asks us to look to him, to be Christ-like. Sure, there are things we can learn from each other, but our ultimate goal is to be more like our Heavenly Father.


1 Corinthians 11:1
"Be imitators of me, as I am of Christ."


1 Peter 2:21
"For to this you have been called, because Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example, so that you might follow in his steps."


Ephesians 5:1-2
"Therefore be imitators of God, as beloved children. 2 And walk in love, as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us, a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.

May I remember these verses the next time my eyes look to worldly role models instead of my Heavenly one.

Success

Toward the end of the school year and early summer I was super nervous about a training I was to conduct for the district. All school year long I had worked on a 21st Century Task Force to develop a grant for teachers to apply for what would allow them to have either laptops or Ipads in their classrooms. I worked with the director of professional development to create a week long training for the winners of these grants. This was to be the biggest training I have ever done for this district, and really the biggest I have ever built from scratch. Most teachers no matter what the training is for, do not love giving up an entire week of their summer to sit and be a student from 8-3 for five days in a row. It took me what seemed liked forever working and reworking the curriculum for this training. As the days got shorter to the first day of training I became overwhelmed. I had no confidence in myself left. I was really worried about what the participants would think of the training, and if is was really going to be beneficial for them.
It was then that I started doing my Bible study every morning before diving in to work on my "school work". Through the help of my devotional book I came across scripture about success. I hesitated at first praying these scriptures because I felt very selfish asking God to bless my training. Afer all it was just for school. It wasn't something at church where I would be reaching lost souls. But as the frustration grew I turned to the word. A place I should have started.

Hebrews 10:35-36
"So do not throw away your confidence. It will be richly rewarded. You need to persevere so that when you have done the will of God, you will receive what he has promised."


I even wrote this in my journal,
"It seems selfish in the moment, but I need God to help me finish preparing for this workshop. I want to do a great job.

God's Holy Word continued to speak to me...


Romans 5:3-5
"Glory in our sufferings. Suffering produces perseverance, perseverance character, and character hope."

Proverbs 16:3
"Commit to the Lord whatever you do and he will establish your plans."

Proverbs 2:7
"He holds success in store for the upright, he is a shield to those whose walk is blameless."

Genesis 24
"When I came to the spring today, I said Lord, God of my master Abraham, if you will please grant me success to the journey I am on."

1 Samuel 18:14
"In everything he did he had great success because the Lord was with him."

Then I replaced my name in the above scripture...
"In everything Traci did she had great success because the Lord was with her."

So how did the training go.... It could not have gone any better! Praise God Almighty!! The participants were very appreciative and the hard work that was put into the training, and it all ran very smoothly. Many commented that it "flew by" and did not seem like a week of training.

I give God all the glory. I honestly believe if I had not turned it all over to him and stayed in the word during my preparation time, I would not have be successful.

To God be all the glory, honor and praise forever and ever. AMEN!

Consequences

I read something just recently in "What Happens When Women Walk in Faith" by Lysa Terkeurest. She was talking about Joseph's brothers and every thing that they caused by the decision they made to place Joseph in the pit. She says, "They caused not harm to their own family, but eventually to the entire nation of Israel. Sadly these brothers were living their lives unaware of the tragic consequences of one act of disobedience." She goes on to compare, "As we make ordinary decisions on ordinary days do we have any idea the impact and influence those decisions make on those around us and generations to come."

This reminded me of Haden's second Christmas. It was the first one that he was really excited about waking up early to see what Santa had brought him. Unfortunately around 3:00 a.m. Christmas morning Adam was called out. A young girl had taken off with her baby, who was not in her custody, and no one knew where they were. Adam continued to help with this investigation as Haden woke up excited about Christmas morning. I tried to explain the best way I could to a 2 year old that Daddy was working, and he wanted us to wait on him to open presents. Bless his heart, he did not get upset. He just sat by the tree eyeing the goods. I kept him busy by doing fun activities around the house. We made french toast Christmas trees and decorated them with M&Ms, and played numerous games, but betweeen every activity he would find his way back to the tree to stare at the gifts. Finally, around noon, the young girl and baby were found safe. Although we were only inconvenienced in a small way, it made me wonder if that young girl knew the depth of her actions, right down to a 2 year old who had to wait on his Daddy to find her before he could have Christmas.

How many times am I short with someone at the store because I am in a hurry or just a bad mood? How many times do I not smile at someone, just because I am exhausted? I wonder what unknown influences I am having over people's lives.

God help me to not be selfish with my words, thoughts, and actions. May they be pleasing to you.

Hebrews 12:15
"Make sure that no one falls short of the grace of God and that no root of bitterness springs up, causing trouble and by it, defiling many."

It's My Life

Haden's has a new saying when I ask him to do something, like eat this or that,go to bed early, or brush his teeth, all things that are good for him, he says, "It's my life." He doesn't say it hateful or disrespectful, just matter of fact. I thought that I wouldn't hear that from him until at least 13 or so.

This has got to me to thinking that yes, it is our life to live, God given, saved by grace, yet we have a free will to make our own choices. I have started to think about some of the choices I make every day, why I make them, and if I give the same thought to my spiritual life as I do to other things.

First of all, as I mentioned in the last post, I have stepped up my exercising. Pushing 40 in a few years, and metabolism basically taking a permanent vacation, I have felt the need to get in shape. I try hard to do my best and push myself. I try to go a little farther each night.
I should do the same with my spiritual life in the way I study the Word. I should push myself to dive deeper into God's Word. Make myself a stronger Christian through daily spiritual exercise.

2 Timothy 2:15
"Study to show yourself approved to God, a workman that needs not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth."


I try to watch my I put into my mouth so that I do not undo all of the nights of running. I should watch what comes out of my mouth so that I do not "undo" my growth as a Christian or lead someone astray.

Psalm 34:13
"keep your tongue from evil and your lips from speaking lies"


I use a whitening toothpaste in hopes of making my teeth nice pearly whites. Thankfully God sent his son Jesus to cleanse my life of sin and make it white as snow. I need to remember to thank him, and strive to learn from mistakes and sin that I fall into each day, but it is great to know that I have a loving Savior who will forgive me time and again, and pick me up when I fall.

Isaiah 1:18
Come now, let us reason together,” says the LORD. “Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they are red as crimson, they shall be like wool”


God has blessed me with a great family, health, and happiness. I need to take care of everything he has given to me, and work hard in every way to strength my spiritual walk every day. It's my life and it is the only one that I will get.

Steady Me

I have always walked as my source of exercise. Recently I started what I call, "The old lady power walking". I race walk around the neighborhood while holding weights. I remind myself of the "older ladies" I used to see walking around the mall. To make myself feel a little younger, or older depending on how this turns out, I have started running. Since Haden is now very proud of himself for finally learning how to ride without his training wheels, he rides around while I run. Yesterday while on our run/ride Haden kept getting too far ahead of me (that probably says a lot about how fast I am running). When we stopped I told him that he can't get that far ahead of me because it is hard for me to protect him and tell him when there are cars coming. He really did not see the need for any help from me until he got to the hill. He stopped and said, "Mom, the hills are really hard. I need you to help because I fall off a lot on the hills. Could you hold my bike while I climb back on?"


I thought about Haden and how he did not see the need for my help when it was easy for him, but on the hill he wanted me to steady him. How many times do I get ahead of God when I feel like everything is going well? I get so far away that I cannot hear his voice warning me of dangers ahead. However, when those big trials in my life come up, I am quick to ask for his help to hold me and steady me. Even though I do this over and over, my Lord and Savior holds me each and every time and encourages me to make it up the hill with Him beside me.

Thank you Jesus for loving me unconditionally.

Awaiting

Wow. Busy weekend, and because of my busy weekend I have neglected diving into a scripture (yes, I am taking baby steps with a scripture or two) and letting it embed itself into my life. All day today I kept thinking about my blog, and if I am already backsliding into my same ole' pattern when it comes to Bible study, "Start strong, give up quickly." Many things ran through my mind today dealing with scripture. Since it is Mother's Day, Proverbs 31 kept coming to mind, and also verses about free will were also on my mind. These things may work into a post later, but I really feel as if God put this scripture upon my heart this evening.

Hebrews 12:2
"Keeping our eyes on Jesus the author and finisher of our faith; who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God."

This was the verse of the day on my Bible app. I read it this morning and first thought, "Oh, I have read that before." Then I took another look and broke the verse apart. I understood each part of its meaning except the part "for the joy that was set before him". I kept thinking about Jesus' journey to the cross and "enduring the cross" for us and thought to myself, "How was what before him joyful?" It was not until I read the previous scripture, which I also have read before, but never deeply.

Hebrews 12:1
"Wherefore seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which doth so easily beset us, and let us run with patience the race that is set before us."

That I was hung up on the part "the joy that was set before him", speak volumes about me. "Before him", made me think, before him right now, and what was before him was the cross. My simple easily confused mind liked the NLT version,
"Because of the joy awaiting him." I was not thinking that the scripture was referring to what was in store for Jesus in the future, a heavenly home, but I was stuck in the present.

How many times do I get stuck with the current circumstances that surround me, and never focus of the outcome or the future? I simply look at what is before me now, not what is awaiting. How I act and the choices I make while "enduring my cross" will determine my future, and that future is bright, a heavenly home with my Lord and Savior.

Responsibility

Each month at church Haden has a virtue and a verse to memorize. We practice this every night before he goes to sleep. I have to say that since he has learned to read this process has gotten a lot easier. He just says, "Here Mom" and takes it from me and reads it. He seems to even memorize it faster this way.

His virtue for the month of May is Responsibility, and the verse is Luke 16:10 “Whoever can be trusted with very little can also be trusted with much" It is so sweet to hear his little innocent voice repeat this every night. The last few nights we have been talking about what the verse actually means. This is good timing for us, because we have been adding new chores to his list of things to do to help around the house. We talked about how he takes care of his smaller bike will determine when he gets a bigger one. This seems to make sense to him.

Today at work the word responsibility kept coming through my mind. I work at a high school so all day long I hear from teenagers who take no responsibility for their actions. My favorite is, "This computer locked me out, and will not let me on!", not "I forgot my password and entered the wrong one too many times and now I locked myself out."

This got me to thinking about Luke 16:10, "trusted with little, then trusted with much". Maybe sometimes that I get frustrated with things I do not have or things I have not accomplished it is because God is waiting on me to be trusted with the little things. In my new position this year I felt like I should be doing "more important things". It bothered me to do the menial taks of resetting a password, or helping a student find a printer. I think that I should just be happy with the smaller things as God prepares me for the bigger things.

Enemy Attacking Already

Last night not long after I made my second post on this blog, the enemy started to attack me. Initially I was feeling very good. I could make a difference maybe not only in my spiritual life, but others as well. This is when I started hearing a voice saying,

"Who are you that you think you know so much that you can share with others? All you are going to do is ramble on about your day, your family, or books you have read. You are going to embarrass yourself. People already know the things you are going to post. What if you offend someone? No one is actually going to read this. You are just wasting your time."

Wow. Talk about knocking all of the wind out of your sails. Needless to say I tossed and turned for awhile. A few years ago I would have really been stuck here. Mulling over the negative thoughts in my head until I started to believe them. Adam has taught me to really identify the enemy speaking into my life, and call it for what it is.

James 4:7, "Submit yourselves to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you."

So it takes more than words. I needed to first submit myself to God before the devil will flee from me.

I submit that I will probably talk about my day and my family because what better way to see God working in my life. Jesus taught using parables. People may know and already have some of the spiritual revelations I am having but if that is the case Praise the Lord for me and with me that I get it! If you had a spiritual revelation because of something I said, then Praise the Lord for you!

Today, and my hope for every day is to submit myself to the Lord God Almighty so through His strength I can combat the enemy!

Reminders to Draw Near to God

I just finished reading a great book, Becoming More Than Just a Good Bible Study Girl. There are many, many things I learned from this book, but one thing I read just today was put to the test this evening.

Lysa, the author, says that "most times it's not the big things along my spiritual journey that tempt me to get off track. It's a culmination of small daily aggravations I know God could fix but doesn't" She goes on to say that, "What if instead of seeing aggravations as inconveniences, we see them as reminders to draw near to God."

I loved this when I read it, but an hour or so later I was able to put it to the test. I was starting to get overwhelmed tonight with all of the "Sunday evening get ready for the week" chores. I was cleaning the kitchen for the second time, finishing up laundry, steaming clothes for tomorrow, putting the sheets back on the bed, swiffering the cat hair, cleaning out the litter box (okay I do that daily, not just once a week, eewwww) Haden was tired and so what he does when he is tried is run around like he is a crazy man and be extremely loud. I also had promised him that I would play Candyland before he went to bed, but as 8:00 (bedtime) started approaching I started to get very irritated and overwhelmed. But just then my reading from today crept or actually slammed into my mind. I paused and thanked God for these things:

*I have a child who is healthly and strong and is able to run around and speak and play.
*We both have jobs that we love and are able to get up and go to in the morning.
*We have had plenty of food to eat, and a nice kitchen to eat it in.
*Haden wants to actually spend time with his mom and play a game.
*We have a nice warm bed to sleep in every night.
*It took me a minute to think of being thankful for the cat hair and litter box...... they are nice pets and make Haden happy. ;)

Once I turned this all around and thanked God for all of the things I thought were irritating me, I felt much better. If I can just apply that to the bigger things as well.

"Draw near to God and He will draw near to you" James 4:8

The Beginning

Welcome to my new blog. I started this for several reasons, but before I go into those, I have a confession. Although I grew up in church and was saved at the tender age of eight, I have never been good at Bible study. I have about every book on the market on how to study The Word, and have a quiet time with God. I start plans and stop them. I read from a legalistic point of view of getting it checked off my list of "good Christian" things to do. I want more. I desperately need more. Throughout my life my walk with the Lord has grown, but I can't imagine what I am missing in not getting into His Word more.


So, back to the reasons for the blog. The main reason was for another way for me to have my Bible study and quiet time. Here is my thinking. Part of my job at the high school requires me to read blog posts, rss feeds, and list serves to find the latest in educational technology. I then post my findings to a blog I have for the teachers and students. Teachers check this blog on a regular basis, and I update them weekly on new posts that I think would be beneficial to their teaching. Accountability. I have it at work, now I want to have it in my spiritual life as well. Enter social media.


My hopes for this blog is to share some of the things God teaches me everyday through His Word and interaction with others. Thus, the name, Grain from Heaven. As I was thinking of what to name this blog, I kept thinking of all of the things that God "speaks" to us all throughout the day and with things that happen to us in our daily lives. It is like He is raining down these moments for us from heaven.


"He rained down manna for the people to eat, and gave them grain from heaven."
I hope to share the grain from heaven that I receive and pray that we all get full, spiritually speaking.


Please follow and comment. I would love to know that someone out there is reading and making me accountable everyday.

God Bless.