Spiritwick

Yesterday morning, I decided not to take my morning shower.  My hair wasn't that bad, and I figured it would help me not be quite so rushed to get out the door that morning with the girls if I just skipped it.  Skipping my shower freed up some extra time though, and I happened to look across my bedroom at that moment toward my Bible reading plan.  Perfect! I could actually start the day with my Bible reading rather than just squeezing it in at some random time in the afternoon or evening like usual. (I'm not a morning person.) My Bible app opened up with Proverbs 31:30 as the verse of the day. "Charm is deceptive, and beauty is fleeting; but a woman who fears the Lord is to be praised." I smiled at the sweet affirmation that choosing time with God over a shower was a great choice.  I read my Bible section for the day in Luke 23 and 24 about the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus, and I decided to write out my prayer for the day.  I was struck by how Go...

"I will sing of the Lord’s great love forever; with my mouth I will make your faithfulness known through all generations."   (Psalm 89:1) I'd been contemplating all week what to blog about.  Should I touch on my experience at the retreat?  Should I talk about the lessons that I'm preparing for the conference in Uganda? This morning, the idea occurred to me to blog the testimony that I prepared for the retreat.  We had been tasked to have ready a 5 minute version of our testimony to share at the retreat.  Several people would also share their testimonies in Uganda, so we were practicing keeping them relatively brief. I had some slight anxiety in preparing my testimony.  I had heard many testimonies throughout my life, and the ones people seemed to really like had some huge dramatic event smack dab in the middle that brought them to Jesus and/or that God dramatically delivered them through.  I didn't have any dramatic life-or-death exper...

As people find out that I'm going on this Uganda trip in just a few short weeks, I field this question more than I expected.  That's probably because I didn't expect it at all.  I'm never entirely sure how to respond, so I usually fumble through some vague "Sometimes I'm excited. Sometimes I'm in denial. Sometimes I'm apprehensive."  I'm not sure even that vague answer is entirely honest though.  Right now, the answer is probably "no."  That sounds horrible, and I don't even want to type it, but it's probably the truth right now.  Let me explain. First off, I'm an introvert.  I'm a talkative introvert, so some people assume I'm an extrovert, but very few people know me well.  I don't feel a deep, wonderful connection with others quickly like I hear that some extroverts do.  It's just not how I'm wired.  I don't get excited about new and unfamiliar situations with a group of people that I don't...

After the sadness of today's events, I was so emotionally weary as I headed upstairs to do the bedtime routine with my girls.  I didn't want to go up at all, but I went up.  I held one as she cried after a sibling spat.  I helped them pick up their toys.  I read them a Bible story...and a second one as they begged for more. Then, we started individual prayer times.  Melody was first tonight, and as I held her in my arms asking her what the best and worst parts of her day were, she looked up at me and said, "You're like Jesus in a way, Mama."  Quite surprised, I asked, "How's that?"  "You're wrapping your arms around me," she replied before starting her prayer.  Thank you, Jesus, for reminding me that that's exactly what You're doing today.  You're wrapping your arms around me, around us. He's been wrapping His arms around me gently, so gently for weeks now, but I couldn't quite recognize it through my own fears.  P...

God freed me from some of my internal traps through Phiippians 3, but I was still left with a big question.  If I'm not supposed to focus on being perfect at the plethora of things I could try to be perfect at, what should I be focusing on?  Fortunately, God was ready with an answer before I'd even realized I needed to ask the question, so He gave me a focus to address my energies toward in Philippians 4.  I turned it into a "to-do" list, and wrote it on my forearm to help me remember. Here is my simplified to-do list: 1) Rejoice. 2) Be gentle. 3) Pray with thanksgiving. I decided those would be my primary focus for the next day, and I've been trying to work on them for the days since. I knew that this was not a new list of things to try to be perfect at, but they were clear ways for me to fix my eyes on Jesus as I persevered on the path He's marked out for me.  I've already seen some benefits come from focusing on Jesus in these three ways. The...

Hello. I'm Amber, and I'm a perfectionist. (Hi, Amber!) I think when most people picture a perfectionist, they imagine a Type A personality who generally appears to have all her ducks in a row and/or to be in a tizzy if a duck gets out of line. I don't have a Type A personality, and I think some of my ducks may be lost under piles of laundry. In general, I tend to cope with my perfectionism by picking only a couple things to focus on at a time. "Sure, my house looks like a pack of hyenas came romping through here, but we made some progress today on Lily Beth's piano skills. I even managed to blog!" I tend to be more of a people-focused perfectionist. My environment may be pure chaos, but I'm focusing on the interactions and needs of the people around me. This means that a conflict with a loved one can rock me to the core. So, of course, a few days after our Uganda team met to talk about spiritual warfare and conflict resolution, I got in a fight with my...

I was planning to post about how hard it was for me to wait and rely on other people to provide the needed funds for me to go on the Uganda trip.  I was going to explain how I've seen God come through financially for me and my family countless times but how I somehow still had a hard time trusting His Body to come through for me. I'm not sure I can post about that anymore.  God seems to have placed me in a "Body Bootcamp."  It sort of started when He gave me these verses for my upcoming trip to Uganda:   “So Christ himself gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the pastors and teachers, to equip his people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ. From him the whole body, joined and held together by every supporting ligament, grows and builds itself up in love, as each part does i...