Lost

Imagine you awaken in a room of darkness, black darkness so thick you can feel it as you reach out in search of the familiar. Darkness that causes you to cry out with sheer terror. Darkness that causes you to call out in fear because you are blind to all of your surroundings. Your heart beats uncontrollable. Your palms sweat profusely. Your screams go unheard. No one comes to your rescue. And slowly your eyes become accustomed to the darkness that envelopes you. You manage to find your way inside the black pit of night that you have found yourself in. It becomes part of you. Though you wonder why and how you got to that dark place, you no longer try to escape. You are no longer fearful, though a slight discomfort constantly invades your soul, as if you are bumping into things in the night. Frequently, you are again caught off guard by the darkness, but it always becomes your companion once more.

Suddenly out of nowhere you glimpse a light. A light so bright that it swallows the darkness that has become you and causes you to long for more. The light is fleeting, not wanting to stay long in the pit that is you. As you see the light looking for an escape you grab it and manage to steal a fragment of the brightness. But it doesn’t satisfy. Each time you close your eyes and open them again, you are fearful once more, in search of the little piece of light you found. The darkness is beguiling, convincing you that it just doesn’t get any brighter. Eventually your fragment burns out. You are left alone. Now your terror is unsettling. The light haunts you there in your pit of darkness. Why doesn’t someone reach out to you? Are you so lost that they can’t find you? Can they not shine their light into your black soul? You know the Light is out there, but you are drowning in a lake of black night. Your insides scream with restlessness. You are unable to move, isolated. You will remain there, waste away there. Helpless, lost, abandoned, forgotton because no one was willing to share the Light.

God, I want to share You. Rid me of my pride. Scrape away every part of me that is not You, so I can shine Your Light with boldness to those living in darkness. Because the truth is, without You, I am just a soul of night, too.

God gives...

Do you ever look at your kids? No, I mean really stop and breathe in every ounce of who God made them. Why do we get so busy that we forget to do this? I'm with mine pretty much 24/7, and I "overlook" them all of the time in lieu of homework, cleaning up, and general unimportant details. I don't want to. I want every day to be a day of standing in awe of what God has given me. My children's beauty and being often catches me off guard. It humbles me. Tucking Grayson in the other night I stared at him for the longest, telling him what a miracle he was. He kissed me as tears rolled down my face in thankfulness for what I do not deserve. It's as if God has to grab me by the shoulders sometimes and shake me and say "LOOK! They are what really matters in this life! Mother them as if you are mothering me!" If I was born for nothing else, I was born to be their mom and to be a wife to Graham. God has given me other things to "do," other people to love, but He always bring me back to Himself and then my little family for true contentment and joy. And that's what this week has been to me...a time of refreshing with my family. Graham was able to take off of work a few days, and we just hung out as a family. We had a picnic and silly fun at the park(some pics in sidebar). Friday we took Season to see the Bee Movie. Saturday the girls stayed busy at home, while the men did "men" things, you know burn stuff and build stuff. Graham and I even got to watch both of the Pirates of the Caribbean movies after the kids went to bed, and we finally booked a small vacation for our tenth anniversary.
This life bring ups and downs physically, emotionally, circumstantially. I do not want to take this "up" for granted. Because the truth is, it could all come crashing down tomorrow. This life is a vapor, as my husband often reminds me. And our God is no respecter of persons. Sorry, I don't intend to be a Debbie Downer, as my sister calls me, just a realist. So, yeah, I am thankful and overwhelmed by His blessings.

And whatever you do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him. Colossians 3:17