Saturday, November 20, 2010

home is where the heart is

Tonight, I sit in my room. Not my dorm room. Not a cabin in Colorado. Not a friends houses or a hotel. MY room. I made the 13 hour drive home from Virginia to Massachusetts today with some great laughs with friends, naps, and m&m's along the way!


As I pulled up to my house, I realized that my home was just a house. I was staring at it, standing by the porch with all of my luggage in hand, and until my dad came out with his laugh and goofy smile, this house was not my home. I have come to realize that a home is being loved and a home is where your heart feels safe, comforted, warm, and complete. The word home is not bound by four walls, by couches, by kitchen tables, or by refrigerators, but by the people who you are with when you are in that place. I have been a girl on the move this year and this has been more and more real to me through this year that being home is about being with the people who love me. With it being Thanksgiving, there are so many things that I can be thankful for that I fail to remember day to day. Things as little as laughter and hugs, but as big as the sun rising every day as a reminder that God loves me and gave me that sunrise as a gift to reveal His beauty to me. The other day, a friend said that sunsets are her favorite scene in nature because a sunset is another persons sunrise somewhere on the opposite side of the world. How cool is it that God is constantly revealing Himself to the WHOLE world through the rising of His sun. Not only am I thankful for the rising of the sun, but the raising of God's son, Jesus Christ. He is the one who I am thankful to for every good and perfect gift, because I know that they are from Him alone and from above.


Again, I sit here now in my bed, with my puppy snoring next to me, and I am so blessed. I have a family who adores me and they found joy in their day simply by me coming home and surprising them for my Thanksgiving break! My parents have been there for me through the times when I was lovable, and even through the times when they did not think that they could even LIKE me, let alone love me. I am thankful today for who they are in my life.

Thursday, November 11, 2010

How you live your day, is how you live your life.

I guess you could say that I ask ALOT of questions. Curiosity sometimes kills this cat. I love knowing what song is playing on the ipod in the car, what street we are driving down, what time we are meeting for dinner, how many people are going, whos going, exactly what we will be doing when and where and why. It can be a little overwhelming to the poor person being asked all of these questions.

I have never wanted to know my future though. Being a planner, I like to know where I am headed, but I am ready and excited for change to sneak up and surprise me in this journey I am on. If we knew everything about our future and what we were going to do with our life, we would no longer have the desire to do it because it is something already known to us. Knowing the future would put a damper on my inquisitive heart and mind and ruin that element of uncertainty and what the Lord has in store for us.

Today, I received a mass e-mail from Tammy Trent about how to view the future and what dreaming BIG for the Lord looks like. She is a speaker, a singer, an inspiration, and a sister in Christ. This is what inspired my day:

Hello Ladies!

Ok, so here's some food for thought. And just like it does for me, may it speak directly to you at this moment!

May you take heart in knowing that God is preparing you for what He has already prepared for you! There is a new season that is already waiting for you. As you allow yourself to take on the fullness of God's processing in your life, He is doing a work in you already, even if you can't see it, so that you will be ready for the day when God opens up all the doors and allows you to walk into that new place. Maybe it's time to "clean house" so you can be fully ready for it. Don't let anything or any person hold you back from God's perfect will in your life right now.I don't believe God gives us impossible dreams or unreachable desires. He gently takes us through life step by step so that when we face each new opportunity or challenge, we are ready in faith to choose to keep moving forward, always towards truth.

Your challenge right now is not to ask God why things around you are changing, in transition or falling apart, but rather perhaps to ask, "What's next? What can I learn from this?" There's a reason and purpose in our struggles or time of difficulties. The thing is, we have to find out what that is and begin to see our difficult time in perspective and how God is using it to prepare us. Search my friend. Search. The answers aren't all that far away. Some times we just like to keep circling the questions hoping we'll land on the "right answer" WE were hoping for. Trust God in this moment, that HE is STILL in control of your next season.As true believers, we must never forget that God does not send "bad things" but He certainly uses them. And wow, do I sure understand and know that for my own life.

Thankful for you all today!

A fellow traveler,

Tammy Trent


For myself, I have been wrestling with the idea of time and this twenty-four hour period that the Lord has given us. If you think about it, George Washington, Carrie Underwood, Beth Moore, Billy Graham, Meredith Andrews, and all the people who we look up to because of what they have done and accomplished with their lives, have the SAME exact twenty-four hour day that we have. What did they do with their time and with the decisions and actions that got them to where they are today? In Francis Chan's book, 'Crazy Love', he said that "How you live your day, is how you live your life." I have always thought that these big dreams that I have for the Lord would just one day fall into my lap, but I don't really think that that is how it is going to be. We must realize that we have to make our day today look like what we want it to tomorrow by our ACTIONS; tomorrow is just another today that we get to make our own by what we CHOOSE to fill it with.

I pray and hope that I can find the way to make each and every average day that I have been given, and by my actions and desires, make it extraordinary for the Lord. Today is just a glimpse of what the Lord does have in store for us tomorrow, and if we do not see excellence, passion, and actions today, why do we think that we are going to see them tomorrow?!

I think that it is GREAT to have dreams and future plans and faith that God will do something BIG with and through your life, but without action, all they ever WILL be is thoughts. James says it so beautifully in James 2:14-17 says:

"What good is it, my brothers, if a man claims to have faith but has no deeds? Can such a faith save him? Suppose a brother or sister is without clothes and daily food. If one of you says to him, "Go, I wish you well; keep warm and well fed," but does nothing about his physical needs, what good is it? In the same way, faith by itself, if NOT accompanied by ACTION, is DEAD!"