******This is the 12th chapter in the series The Real Army Wives, stories from a young military bride at the beginning of Operation Iraqi Freedom, 2003.******

Previous chapter: When Alan First Deployed: My New Friends at 9-1-1.

Getting Help

I followed through with my vow from the previous night to hop off this crazy train and get myself some help. What kind of help, I had no idea, but I figured I’d try the doctor’s office first.

Military clinics are a unique entity. The appointment line system in and of itself is enough to make a person go absolutely mad, but somehow I managed to secure myself a same day appointment. I must have called at 7:59 am, and God was just smiling down on me that day because it’s normally about impossible to get an appointment.

I remember that every single time I would go to the Fort Hood health clinic they would circle my BMI (too low–which I can’t even imagine now) and take my blood pressure and my heart rate twice, because “that just couldn’t be right.” Ha! Yet it took 13 more years to figure out I needed heart medicine. We always just thought I was nervous, which really I was.

On that particular day of desperation, I saw a female, civilian physician who I’d never seen before. She was probably in her 60s, a thin, upbeat woman with short white hair and glasses. I liked her immediately, which is very unusual for doctors. Don’t you love it when things actually work out?

Telling my shortened tale of woe to this doc, who we’ll call Dr. Jones, was a humiliating thing to have to do, but I knew it had to be done. I told her about my jaw and my inability to sleep before 4am. I even admitted about calling 9-1-1, though I doubt I told her how many times I had done it.

The tears came. I couldn’t help it. This was so embarrassing. What kind of adult can’t even handle living alone? Well, me, I guess.

She asked me if I was depressed, but I didn’t feel like I was in general a depressed sort of person because I’m not, but the situation was definitely getting to me in a bad way.

After listening, Dr. Jones told me a little part of her own story.

Apparently, she went to medical school in Chicago. Her apartment situation was on the wrong side of town. Dr. Jones confided that she had once even accidentally left her keys in her front door!! She said a neighbor knocked on her door, handed her her keys, and reprimanded her kindly, “Girl, this ain’t no nice neighborhood. You can’t be leaving your keys in the door!!!”

So Dr. Jones counseled me that while break-ins do happen, most people are basically good. She reassured me I would be okay.

Then she prescribed to me a 30 day supply of Ambien, a sleeping pill. Dr. Jones said that it would fix both my sleeping problem AND my jaw.

My jaw?? How could a sleeping pill fix TMJ? That was because the jaw was the result of constantly grinding my teeth, which I was doing, unawares, in my sleep.

I’ve never left a doctor appointment so relieved. Maybe I was a touch embarrassed that I needed sleeping pills, but mostly I didn’t care. I just couldn’t wait to get a full night’s sleep and be able to eat potato chips again.

And you know what? It worked!

My jaw stopped hurting within a couple of days, and I stretched that Ambien out to well past 30 days and then never had to take it again.

Sometimes when times get hard enough, we just need a little boost to get us through.

Unfortunately, I was still actually more depressed than I was willing to let on to any doctor.

My life was not working out as I’d planned it at all. My Mr. Right was oceans away, and I could only hope that he would even come back. This was a tough situation to work through. There was no way around that.

[clickToTweet tweet=”Sleeping pills could fix my physical problems, but not my spiritual problems. #milspouse #armywife #faith #Jesuscan” quote=”Sleeping pills could fix my physical problems, but they couldn’t fix my spiritual problems.”]

However, the sleeping pills did provide me with some mental clarity during the day. Y’all! Sleep is so incredibly important. Never underestimate it!

The sleep allowed me to look at my life and examine myself more honestly and realistically.

My whole life I had always been a spiritual person. From the age of 4, I remember looking up at the sky and simply feeling the all-powerful presence of God. I didn’t know anything about Him. My family did not go to church, but I knew He was there. Creation testifies to the Creator.

While I was 4, a neighbor invited me to church. I was so excited to go with her and finally learn who in the world was God!! I can still remember the blue dress that I wore the first time I went, with the white lace at the top and the pretty sleeves. That was the day I first heard about Jesus.

After that, there was no turning back for me. I wanted to know more, and more, and more. My mom started taking my sister, my brother, and me to church herself. It was extremely difficult to take my big sister, Amanda. As I mentioned before, Amanda was blind, mute, profoundly retarded, and handicapped from birth.

While Amanda was mute, she could yell, just not talk. She often yelled out, but not with words, and she rocked back and forth, shaking her wheelchair enough to make it roll whether the brakes were on or not. Plus, it’s a lot harder to carry around an 85 pound person than a 30 pound toddler.

It was almost impossible to take Amanda anywhere. Therefore, after the first few years, Mom began to let Amanda stay home with my dad. It was just Mom, my brother, and me that went to church from then on.

But Amanda was a blessing to us too. From her we had all learned more about love, compassion, sacrifice, work, and serving.

From God’s Word, we found comfort and healing from some of our own hard situations.

By the time I was seven, my Mom went forward and accepted Jesus as her Savior. I got saved soon after her, and my little brother did a few years later.

We firmly believe that Jesus is the Son of God, sent to Earth to reconcile man to God. God loves us, but we are sinful. There’s a price for that sin, but Jesus paid the price for us, and we need only believe with our hearts and confess with our mouth that Jesus is Lord.

Salvation is a gift of grace, not a work that we accomplish. Not one of us is any better than any others of us.

Over the years, starting in middle school, I became a devout student of God’s Word. At that age, it isn’t enough to hear a preacher say something. You have to examine the truth for yourself in order to believe it.

Misplaced Faith

But between high school and college, I somehow seemed to have put too much of my faith in the Bible study that I was doing rather than in what Jesus has already done for us.

You see, after getting married, it was harder to keep up my Bible study routine. Alan was always there, it seemed, and reading my Bible isn’t something I can do if I’m not alone. As the deployment approached, and I needed comfort from the Lord most, I was praying and reading my Bible less and less.

I didn’t mean to. It was just a new routine to work out.

Once Alan deployed, I was stuck in this absurd mindset that I couldn’t reach out to God because I had not been reading my Bible every single day. How ridiculous! Ya’ll! Reading your Bible doesn’t benefit God nearly as much as it benefits YOU. Your Bible reading doesn’t make you more worthy either.  Only Jesus makes us worthy.

Whether I read my Bible or not, God was still there. I could have called out to Him at ANY time, any place, and he would have heard my prayer. But at the time, I was stuck on stupid.

That’s when I realized that I had become puffed up, thinking highly of myself because I read my Bible so much and thinking that was why God answered my prayers.

That year I learned that God doesn’t work that way.

He is not a bank that you deposit prayers and study in and then cash out in hard times. No. God is always here. He’s always available. We need only seek him. We need only have faith. He will always be found by those who seek him.

Suddenly, I was seeing clearly. I don’t think Alan had even been gone much more than a month before I realized how foolish I had been.

I wasn’t just depressed because of my circumstances. The problem was that I was focusing too much on my OWN problems. I was being self-centered, and I was depriving myself of even praying under some foolish notion that I didn’t deserve answered prayers.

God answers our prayers because He loves us, and you know what? He still loved me, and I finally realized that once I got my head all sorted out!

I vividly recall bending down on my knees, at the foot of my bed, with tears all over my face and probably snot too, and realizing all these things as I prayed. This is where life had brought me–to my knees!!

My next steps were suddenly crystal clear. This year wasn’t about “how I was going to get through this” at all. Instead, it was time for me to focus on helping my friends “get through this”. It was time for me to build a support network.

Some of my friends from church: Jessie, Ashley, me, and Theresa. Ashley’s husband was also in the 4th ID. Jen and Theresa’s husbands deployed later that year with the 1st Cav……..By the way, those are none of their real names.

Time to Reach Out to the Other Real Army Wives

I didn’t have much to give or many talents that I could think of to use, but I could cook, and I had a cute little duplex to visit with friends and neighbors in.

So from that day on, my mission was to gather Army wives in my living room and attend any outing I was invited on. We would laugh, we would cry, we would gossip (sorry, but we would) and encourage one another, and none of us would truly be alone anymore.

There was Elsie across the street, who seemed to be doing just fine, but I needed her. I was going to have to start with building that bond. There was Sarah, the bubbly specialist’s (or was he a corporal??) wife I’d met at a unit sports day before Alan left. There was Katie and little Garrett, and Ashley and the gals from church, and so many more that I was yet to meet. But I was ready to get started supporting others and no longer thinking ever so much about myself!

Want to know what happened next? Click here for the next chapter: The Coffee Group

Come back next MONDAY for the next tale in this series of Real Army Wives stories, right here on storiesofourboys.com.

Need to catch up on previous chapters? Click here for last week’s and here for a somewhat complete list.

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Look closely to see the olives!

After Nazareth, and before Capernaum, we headed over to Tabgha, to see where Jesus called his first disciples and later performed the miracle of feeding the multitudes with the one basket of bread and fish.

If only these flowers would fit in my suitcase…

Tabgha

This sign below provides a nice overview of what happened here:

I love the historical value here! They had these sites marked from as far back as the days of Jesus, and the mosaics I will show you today were created around 480 AD!!! Y’all! Wow! That’s so long ago!

History and the Bible

People often want to compare Christianity with science, which is baffling because Christianity is not science. Those are two different fields. I mean, yes, I believe God created the world because I look at creation, and I don’t think amazing things like life on earth just happen on their own. I guess in that way it’s related to science.

However, the actual study of the Bible and what happened in it is not a scientific topic. That is history. It is a historical account, and there is so much evidence to back up the existence of Jesus that whether or not he lived is not even debatable.

In fact, when you consider the humongous cloud of witnesses around the time that the Old and the New Testaments were written, it is nothing but strengthening to your faith.

Now whether or not Jesus was the son of God, that’s a matter of faith, so we could debate that,  but whether or not he walked among us, that is well documented history.

For more on that topic, see this post.

I regret not stopping longer to soak in just how much happened in this place! That’s the thing about touring. It is always a hustle to stay with the group, and having lost my group one time already (back in Jerusalem), I wasn’t in a hurry to lose them again.

an olive tree

The list of things that happened here is astounding. Holy ground.

This was our last day in Israel. I didn’t want to leave!!!

Below the altar is the rock where Jesus divided the loaves.

site of the miracle of the loaves and fish–Look at the mosaics in front of the rock. You see the fish? These were created in 480 AD!!

I don’t recall if that front right part of the tile that is colored differently was damaged or if that was a mosaic map. I think it’s a map.

As you can see, only portions of this amazing floor survived the test of time.

Some of it has been repaired and restored over the years, but you would not believe how much of this is ORIGINAL!

My mouth hung wide open when he was telling us about this!

From the letters and the types of birds, archaeologists determined that Egyptians created them.

Do you know what this is!!??? Squeeeeaaaaal!!!

That is the Sea of Galilee, where Jesus walked on the water, where Jesus taught from a boat, where the disciples fished!

On my next Israel post, I will show you more of the Sea of Galilee and we’ll go into Capernaum. It was our favorite part of the whole trip. I cannot wait to share it with you.

Here are a few more photos, and a few quotes from the famous Sermon on the Mount, preached near Tabgha.

Seeing the crowds, he went up on the mountain, and when he sat down, his disciples came to him.

The Beatitudes

² And he opened his mouth and taught them, saying:

³ “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

⁴ “Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted.

⁵ “Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth.

⁶ “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied.

⁷ “Blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy.

⁸ “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.

⁹ “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons^[a] of God.

¹⁰ “Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

¹¹ “Blessed are you when others revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account. ¹² Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you.         Matthew 5:1-11

It really was the trip of a lifetime! For more Israel photos/stories, see below! To read the rest of the Sermon on the Mount, go here.

Can’t get enough Israel? Click here to snag my book about the whole trip, with over 180 full color photos and stories.

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After we left Golgotha, where Jesus was crucified, located now within the Church of Holy Sepulchre, we headed down the Via Dolorosa. All day I had the song Via Dolorosa, in my head. Okay, sometimes I couldn’t help but sing a little of it out loud. I’m one of those people. I usually have a song in my head that occasionally accidentally comes out for others to hear.

The Via Dolorosa means “the way of suffering.”

Jesus did not get to head down it as we did. He walked UP it, to Calvary, after being brutally beaten by Roman soldiers, and carrying a cross on his back.

So what is the Via Dolorosa?

It is simply the path Jesus took as he carried his cross up the hill to Golgotha, where he was crucified.

What shall I do, then, with Jesus who is called the Messiah?” Pilate asked.

They all answered, “Crucify him!”

23“Why? What crime has he committed?” asked Pilate.

But they shouted all the louder, “Crucify him!”   (Matthew 27:22-23)

When Pilate saw that he was getting nowhere, but that instead an uproar was starting, he took water and washed his hands in front of the crowd. “I am innocent of this man’s blood,” he said. “It is your responsibility!”

25All the people answered, “His blood is on us and on our children!”

26Then he released Barabbas to them. But he had Jesus flogged, and handed him over to be crucified.    (Matt. 27: 24-26)

Funny story: Alan met this German man on his flight from Sweden to Tel Aviv, and then we ran into him on the Via Dolorosa in Jerusalem! You never know who you will see again.

It’s a beautiful city. I loved these trees, which were everywhere.

I don’t know what this pathway looked like back in the days of Jesus. Our tour guide said there were no buildings here then.

These days, in order to trace the Via Dolorosa, you actually have to walk through a Muslim market area.

You can click here to see our Israeli tour guide talking to us about it. She was outstanding. The video may be hard for you to hear, though, unless you have a device that’s capable of loud volumes.

Station 9 on the Via Dolorosa: I think she said this is one of the places where Jesus fell.

Then the governor’s soldiers took Jesus into the Praetorium and gathered the whole company of soldiers around him. 28They stripped him and put a scarlet robe on him, 29and then twisted together a crown of thorns and set it on his head. They put a staff in his right hand. Then they knelt in front of him and mocked him. “Hail, king of the Jews!” they said. 30They spit on him, and took the staff and struck him on the head again and again. 31After they had mocked him, they took off the robe and put his own clothes on him. Then they led him away to crucify him.   (Matt. 27: 27-31)

Station 7 is in an extremely busy area. Actually, pedestrian traffic was high the whole way.

Yes, they sell American sports team gear in Jerusalem too. LSU, anyone?

Where Simon took the cross.

As they were going out, they met a man from Cyrene, named Simon, and they forced him to carry the cross.

33They came to a place called Golgotha (which means “the place of the skull”).   (Matthew 27: 32-33)

The lights hung above us remind us that we are standing in a Muslim area, where they were celebrating Ramadan at the time that we were there.

crossing through the Muslim market

We couldn’t get close enough to get a picture of the giant gold-domed mosque. These guards only let Muslims past the stairs.

Alan, placing his hand where the legend was that Jesus had stopped and held on to the wall.

And this is us at the security checkpoint to the famous Western Wailing Wall. Yes, we went there too. We’ll talk about that next!

crowded street through the Muslim market, overlapping the Via Dolorosa

“From noon until three in the afternoon darkness came over all the land.

46About three in the afternoon Jesus cried out in a loud voice, “Eli, Eli,^c lemasabachthani?” (which means “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”).^{d   (Matthew 27:45-46)}

Back in those days, the Bible wasn’t divided into chapters and verses the way we do today. They named a passage by the first words of that passage. “Eli, Eli, lemsabachtani” is Jesus not only crying out to God, but also referencing Psalm 22.

This part will give you chills, if you stop and realize what Psalm 22 is. It is a promise fulfilled by Jesus:

Psalm 22 is long, but it begins like this:

My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?

Why are you so far from saving me,

so far from my cries of anguish?

and it ends like this:

All the rich of the earth will feast and worship;

all who go down to the dust will kneel before him—

those who cannot keep themselves alive.

30Posterity will serve him;

future generations will be told about the Lord.

31They will proclaim his righteousness,

declaring to a people yet unborn:

He has done it!

True. He has done it. Praise the Lord!

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Romans 12:21

To begin with, I will say that no one ever said overcoming evil is easy.

This has been an exhausting week, with both Art Camp and Vacation Bible School going on. It’s hard to explain why. It’s difficult to tell you what it’s like to get 4 little boys ready to leave the house 3 times a day, wake up early, and stay up late.

It’s hard to explain why I completely melted down yesterday morning, but I did. Let’s just say I was heavily weighted to the evil side. I can be truly horrid at 5:45 am.

It doesn’t matter what my excuse was. What does matter is that I pulled myself back together, I apologized to Alan, and I learned from my mistakes.

Because that’s what we do. The only way to fight evil (even the evil in ourselves) is with good.

The first step is to recognize it, and what usually causes it is just selfishness and pride. Parenting and marriage will work the selfishness right out of you, won’t it?

But some people never get past the whole pride thing. Those people get on my nerves. I mean, because I surely never fall into that category, ahem, *cough* okay yes, I do.

So, as this “overcoming evil with good thing” sunk into my brain today, I thought of ways I could put this into action.

Here’s what I’m going to do to overcome evil today:

1. Be kind to the people around me.

It’s easy. Just bite your tongue sometimes…

2. Leave the house. (Check! Did that one!) Last year I just couldn’t much. I was adjusting. This year I can, and it’s fun. It’s challenging:

“All right! Everybody put on your shoes, and head to the car! Why can I never find JD’s socks? I keep buying socks, and yet all the socks in his drawers are too small.”

“Where are your shoes, Daniel, I don’t understand.”

“They’re on the wrong feet. Here, let me fix them.”

10 minutes later the shoes are back on the wrong feet. He likes them that way. I don’t get it.

“Would someone please buckle Daniel?”

“Well, go get a drink then, but hurry up!”

“No, I don’t know where your Transformer cup is.”

“Yes, get whatever you want, just get in the car!”

“Oh, good, everyone is buckled. Ew. Oh, JD, are you poopy?”

“Yeth. Poop.”

Great. “Okay. I have to run back in and change JD’s diaper. NOBODY move. NOBODY get in the front seat. Caleb, make sure Daniel does not get in the front seat. I should probably make you all get out of the van. Just leave the doors open, and I’ll take the keys with me.”

I change the offensive diaper and come back to …….fighting, of course.

“He pulled on my seatbelt!”

“He hit me!”

“He called me a boron!”

“Now we’re late,” but thankfully most people expect us to be late anyway. If you don’t understand why, then we just aren’t much alike, and that’s okay. The world needs more people like YOU and less procrastinators tripping over themselves like me..

3. Cook supper for Alan.

All week there has been no supper made for Alan because the kids and I were at VBS, and VBS supplies supper for the workers. Alan got home late all week. I figured he’d be fine, but  the man ate pizza 3 out of 4 of those nights, so tonight I’m making him his favorite chicken dish and chocolate chip cookies. (I feel like I should mention that Alan cooks everyone breakfast, everyday. But I guess he doesn’t want to also have eggs for supper.)

See, spreading good doesn’t have to be that hard.

4. Disciplining my children.

You are welcome. That doesn’t mean they will be perfect, but I promise to train them to the best of my ability. We’ve all seen what happens to the kids whose parents don’t bother.

5. Helping at Vacation Bible School

This has been an exciting week. I got to pray with two sweet little girls in Caleb’s group to accept Jesus. I get to answer their questions about God every night. It’s a lot of work, but if it helps even one of them, it’s worth it. (Now, as I said before, I’m not really doing that much. There are people there who are working all day on this. We are thankful!)

6. Giving to Big Causes

America is not the only country in the world. There are a lot of people living in refugee camps or third world countries where just getting clean water is a struggle. Maybe one day I will get to do more than just give money to other people who help, but for now it’s what I can do. I recently learned that I have friends who grew up in refugee camps, that are run by UNHCR, which made me proud to give to that organization. But do you know what organization it was that got my friends out of refugee camps and into America, where they are now citizens?

Catholic Charities. That was a blessing to hear. There are still so many people doing good things, throughout the world: BIG things that make a huge difference to people.

Then of course, there’s Compassion International. I will shout their praises ’till the cows come home. Compassion gives people in need food, education, encouragement, and the knowledge of Christ. They meet the physical needs of the people before trying to meet the spiritual needs, just as Jesus did. If you support just one charity, what a great one to support! With Compassion, you can even go and visit your sponsored child and their family, if you wish.

7. Did I mention I baked my kids cookies?

Full tummies just feel like love. 🙂

8. Spending time loving on my children

I am so privileged that I get to spend all day with my boys. So many people would love to do that and can’t, so I am grateful.

my foot and Caleb’s foot: The big boys are so proud that their feet have almost caught up with mine. I’m just happy that I can check the mailbox wearing their flip-flops.

Now you may laugh and say I haven’t changed the world at all, but I know better.

I know that these are better things to dwell on than all of my mistakes. These are better ways to grow love than lashing out at people we disagree with. I’m just going to focus on praising God and seeing what good that I can find to do. Hopefully, in the process, I will also become a better person.

“Finally, brethren, whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report; if there be any virtue, and if there be any praise, think on these things.” Philippians 4:8

Teaching Dan how to make biscuits: Hopefully, his future wife and kids will thank me one day. 🙂

You have all spread good just by reading my blog and occasionally even commenting.

I feel so far from my family and many of my friends. It’s like a giant hug when I get comments or emails from you. Thank you for this encouragement! I hope you all have a fun weekend.

The post What to Do to Overcome Evil With Good Today appeared first on Stories of Our Boys.

Last night, I felt restless in my spirit. You know that sensation that you get when you have plenty to do, but you don’t WANT to do any of it? I had the need to get out. Some people call it “ME” time.

I don’t call it “ME” time. I never found spending an hour pampering myself to be refreshing at all. However, I DO find a nice, long, not too slow, and not too fast, walk to work WONDERS. I didn’t allow any little boys to come with me, because that would have been counterproductive. This was not family time. This was not ME time. This was God time. Oh yeah, I’m talkin’ Jesus again.

In person, I’m not comfortable sharing my spiritual thoughts with others, but I have become so accustomed to sharing them right out loud on the internet that I honestly forget that anyone reads it.

I’ve been hearing the Holy Spirit speaking to me a lot lately. (I’ve discussed this before. It’s not an audible voice. Please don’t mail me a straight jacket.)

“But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name, He will teach you all things, and bring to your remembrance all that I said to you.” John 14:25-26

Lately this is what I have heard from God.
-Trust me.
-If you stay in tune with Me, it will go so much better for you.

I sometimes joke that I am “just not good at life.” Of course, I am no better or worse than most folks at life, but I love to exaggerate to the negative, focus on the problems rather than the blessings, and forget to just trust God.

I am still slowly reading through the New Testament this year. My focus is on learning more about Jesus. Jesus is an amazing window into the heart of God.

“Most assuredly, I say to you, he who believes in Me, the works that I do he will do also; and greater works than these he will do, because I go to My Father.” John 14:12

It is greater, but I had a hard time figuring out how anything we could do could be greater than anything Jesus did, so I looked it up in my favorite reference book:

The works that we do are greater in that we are doing these works in the power of the Holy Spirit. This is a miraculous thing in this world!! For God to have taken His Spirit, and rested it on the heart of every single HUMAN believer, that we may be his agents here on Earth, that is AMAZING. How can we be so unholy, and yet be agents of God?

Only through Jesus, only through God’s grace.

Today I got to do something, at church, that is great fun to me. I got to sing. I love to sing. However, singing in front of an audience is not as fun, because I get so nervous my body actually shakes. I quiver, right down to my legs. I can’t steady my spirit. I’m a sickly, selfish, vain little soul, but if I rely on the Holy Spirit, I can. God will help us do things that are done for his glory.

Stories of our boys……from this week:

This whole week is exciting for our family. This week we fly again. We are flying back to the South. First, just the boys and I are going. Alan will join us later. I will get to go to Destin TWO times, once with my mom, and once with Alan and the boys.

I’ve had a sore throat all week. Thursday I couldn’t even read out loud to the boys without coughing, so I had to cancel reading time. Joshua had all of his brothers stop what they were doing right there and pray for their mom to feel better. LOVE!!

I took this photo from the boys’ window. JD and Dan love to play in their dirt pile, usually with cars. Joshua was eating watermelon, which he consumes unbelievable amounts of. Caleb was repairing the trampoline net, where he had ripped it straight across.

JD has earned the name “the Great Communicator”. This boy cracks me up. He is so good at getting his point across. He always knows exactly what he wants and finds the words to get that across. Sometimes we have to guess…

“Eck. Uck. Ruck!”

“Back?”

*Scowl.* “No,” in his cute little tiny voice.

“Truck?”

*Smile. Giggle.* Then he runs in the direction of whatever he is currently calling a truck. Any vehicle that is not a car is a truck, even motorcycles.

********

“Juice?” (By far, his favorite word)

“No, JD, you’ve already had enough juice. I will pour you some milk. You need to drink a little milk.”

*Scowl.* Then he almost howls, in a fretful, fretful voice, “Noooo! Juice. Juice.”

Poor dear. I don’t drink milk either, but disappointment is just one of those things you have to learn how to deal with. Besides, if he drank all the juice he wanted that’d be a never-ending case of runny poop….

By the way, JD has finally fully recovered from his ear infection and is sleeping through the night again. 🙂 Hallelujah! By the fourth kid, I’ve just forgotten to worry about sleep issues. I just go with the phases, and eventually, “This too will pass.” It takes a long time to fully recover from colds sometimes, and sleeping is the hardest when you have snot in the back of your throat.

***********

One last thing I’m excited about this week:
Money Saving Mom is teaching a course on increasing productivity by “making over your mornings”. Oh, you’d better believe I will be there!
Money Saving Mom is one of my favorite blogs. Crystal has accomplished an insane amount to include writing several best sellers, maintaining a successful website, keeping a tidy house, and home schooling her 3 children. As you can imagine, I feel like I can learn a lot from her!

For my full review on this Make Over Your Morning course after I took it, click here.

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I have never been real big on reading commentaries or even the study notes in the several study Bibles that I own. In fact, Daniel ripped out so many of the first pages of my oldest study Bible, I don’t even know what version it is. HA!!  Parent problems!

HOWEVER, part of my goal is to STUDY, not just read this year, so I’m living outside my comfort zone. This week I pulled one of Alan’s off the shelf that has moved with us every blessed time we’ve moved, all over the country, and yet I have never once opened it. It has chapter by chapter explanations, and I think it’s swell. 🙂

Yeah. It’s expensive too. That means it’s either really good or out of print. Either way, if you buy it, I make 6% profit, and that’s why being a blogger is cool. 😉

Anyway. I blew the dust off of it, and gave it a look-see. It changed my week. Not really. IT didn’t. It just introduced a thought into my head–a JESUS thought–that changed my week.

These verses that I am referring to come directly following Jesus’s explanation of the parable of the sower, Luke 8:11-15.  Hang with me, this DOES get good, I promise.

Luke 8:16-18

The Parable of the Revealed Light

¹⁶ “No one, when he has lit a lamp, covers it with a vessel or puts it under a bed, but sets it on a lampstand, that those who enter may see the light. ¹⁷ For nothing is secret that will not be revealed, nor anything hidden that will not be known and come to light. ¹⁸ Therefore take heed how you hear. For whoever has, to him more will be given; and whoever does not have, even what he seems to have will be taken from him.”

Now, just so you know, that’s Jesus talking.  I always kind of thought this was just like the “let your light shine before men” verses. The Holy Spirit lives in all those who have accepted Jesus as their Savior, so we need to share that wonderfulness with others.

But, as I read it in its context, that didn’t relate much to 17 and 18, and I didn’t get 18 at all.

My study Bible bailed on commenting on these verses, as did Halley’s Bible Commentary.

I LOVED how Larry Richards explains it, though. This is on page 659 of The Bible Reader’s Companion.

First, he described how important lamps were–hello–no electricity, so they left the lamp burning all night, for the benefit of those who entered the home in the dark. When someone entered the circa 30 AD housing, he would see only the light at first.

So here’s where I think it gets GOOD:

“One must see Jesus first and only. When we have fixed our eyes on Jesus, we can be sure that the hidden things of our life will gradually be revealed to us. He is the key to our understanding of all things and possession of all spiritual insights. Seeing Him we will be given more. Not seeing Him, even the little spiritual insight we have will be taken away.”  (p.659)

This makes SO MUCH more sense than anything I thought up on my own to explain these verses. I never could understand that whole “even what he has will be taken away” part, but Jesus isn’t talking about worldly things. I have such a hard time not thinking in worldly terms!! Jesus is talking about spiritual understanding.

So how did this radically change my week?

Oh, this is hard to explain, and I have really always been one to keep my spiritual feelings to myself. These things are so personal. I share in hopes that it will also help someone else.

I’ve always gone to church, and I have listened to excellent preachers and teachers, but I have never gone to any Christian schools. I grew up in more of a young Christian house. Mom got saved when I was seven, and we kids were saved soon after. Naturally, we were still learning the simple truths of God’s word back then. Nowadays, my parents go to a Bible college, and they probably know a lot more of the details than I do. They get tested on it! But I’ve never been tested on the Bible.

I heard the idea, “always focus on Jesus.” but I didn’t understand how to apply it, until I HAD to. It was not until this year, this trying, patience-provoking, pushing the limits of my capabilities, year, that I learned to keep my eyes ALWAYS on Jesus.

Isn’t it funny how we have to sometimes travel down the rockiest of roads to come to the end of ourselves? God has helped me to do tons of things, my whole life, don’t get me wrong, but this was a year of staring hard at that light. (first year of homeschooling, cross-country move, the baby that didn’t sleep, etc….)

I’ve been applying that to my life, everywhere. It pops into my head constantly, “Look at the light. Jesus is the light.”

“You’ll get through this. Focus on Jesus, and the pieces will make more sense.”

The point is:

Jesus is the light.

If we are looking at Him, all the things that need to be revealed to us will be so much easier to see.

Listen closely to His words.

Whoever is looking at Jesus, will grow more and more spiritually, and if we are not looking at Jesus, even the spiritual understanding that we have will be lost. 

Wishing you all a happy weekend!

The post This Scripture changed my week for the better. appeared first on Stories of Our Boys.

“God gave you the power to do what you cannot do. Every road we travel, he’s traveled down before, and there ain’t no need to worry where he leads to anymore. I’m walkin’ on. I’m walkin’ on.”

Lately I’ve felt a little discouraged by the national and international news. Ugh. I hate to think about all the problems we are not dealing with and are instead handing down to our children!

How do we keep on going and enjoying life, and not shutting down every social media account that we have in the face of great fear and opposition? How do we resist the urge to lock our children up in their rooms and bolt the doors? Okay, I’m being dramatic here, but you know what I mean.

I believe the answer is love.

As Elsa said on Frozen, “Love thaws.”  hehe  Okay. Hang with me. That part is just for the Frozen fans *ahem* back to business…

God is love.

How do we overcome evil?

The Bible says, “Be not overcome of evil, but overcome evil with good.”  Romans 12:21

Our God teaches us to pray for our enemies. I love the book of Matthew, where it refers to the prophecy of Jesus, being fulfilled,

^“19 He shall not strive, nor cry; neither shall any man hear his voice in the streets.

²⁰ A bruised reed shall he not break, and smoking flax shall he not quench, till he send forth judgment unto victory.

²¹ And in his name shall the Gentiles trust.”

God is a gentleman. Jesus didn’t come preaching in the streets or forcing anyone to believe him. He came teaching in the synagogue and healing people. He healed so many people that they just followed him everywhere he went. He had to wake up early and go hide on a mountain, just to have some peace and quiet to pray!

That last part kind of reminds me of motherhood. Feed them a few times, put on a few band aids, and they follow you around incessantly.  hahahaha  No seriously….

There are so many lessons to be learned from Jesus; it’s incredible. Love your enemies. Pray for those that hate you.

It’s a tall order, isn’t it? It’s a hard thing to do, isn’t it, to love people who want to kill us?

¹⁶ And we have known and believed the love that God hath to us. God is love; and he that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God, and God in him.

¹⁷ Herein is our love made perfect, that we may have boldness in the day of judgment: because as he is, so are we in this world.

¹⁸ There is no fear in love; but perfect love casteth out fear: because fear hath torment. He that feareth is not made perfect in love.

      1 John 4:16-18

“Jesus walked on the water. Peter walked on it too. God gave you the power to do what you cannot do. Every road we travel, he’s traveled down before, and there ain’t no need to worry where it leads to anymore.

I’m walkin’ on. I’m walkin’ on.”

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