Category: Inspiration

So, this morning, after I went and worked out, as I was sitting on my back desk with my coffee getting ready to do my devotions I noticed the “smoke” in the hills. Around here, it is not an uncommon occurrence, but it struck me as extra beautiful today. The thought of the new mercies we receive every morning from God was sticking in my head, and I took a picture, just because it was pretty. Now, in the south, in June, you have to catch it early because the fog burns off pretty quickly as we heat up. I took my picture, then got started with my devotions.

20 minutes later, as I looked up from my devotions expecting the fog to have lifted, I was shocked to see it had gotten thicker.

All of a sudden, I was struck by how much this mimicked life. You see, we keep looking for this “abundant life” as being life with lots of things and people, without challenges and difficulties. We watch for the clear picture of who or what God wants us to be, then despair because it isn’t clear. In actuality, we are living our abundant lives when the fog gets thicker. It is our abundant life because God is with us, even though we don’t see him through the fog. He handpicks us and, just like the mountains, is there whether we can see him in our current circumstances or not.

My community has had a rough 6 weeks. We have lost people suddenly and tragically, and it feels like our small town has been touched by something that we don’t think of as happening here. It feels like things have changed and may never go back, but, I’m also seeing people pull together in support and compassion. That is our abundant life. God is here, just like our beloved mountains didn’t go anywhere when I couldn’t see them for the fog. It is not easy, and there is a lot of difficult healing that will still have to take place, but eventually the fog will lift. For today, I’m just thankful that God is there, in my abundant life, whether I can see him or not.

2018, so far, has been all about trying new things that test my comfort zone.  I started a bullet journal, which pushes my boundaries of being creative and is forcing me to step away from my computer more often; I started the year down one organ (everything is ok, but I am definitely looking forward to seeing how life changes without that extra baggage); I just finished the Crossfit Judges course (which is pretty comical to have thought this time last year that I would be judging other people on their workouts); and I have chosen a word of the year.

The bullet journal is something that I had looked at for a few years, but never committed to because I thought I couldn’t keep it up and that I wasn’t artistic or creative enough.  We are one month into 2018, and I have been keeping up with it ok.  This week I have not done very well, but I am trying desperately to give myself grace and remember that skipping one week is not the end of everything.

Speaking of “Grace,”  I guess now is the time to announce my 2018 word of the year.  I have chosen Grace.  It kept coming to me when I was thinking about how I want to grow this year, so I finally just looked it up to see the exact definition of grace and determined that there are so many (8!) definitions (for real there are 8 definitions for the word grace https://goo.gl/Jkvbsv ) that it really fits what changes I would like to see in myself over the next year.  With my bullet journal I am learning to give myself grace to not be perfect.  Grace to let things slide every now and then.  Grace to keep rolling when something doesn’t go as planned.  I also want to push myself to give others more grace when they mess up or irritate me or don’t follow through.  I am a slight (yes, I know you are rolling your eyes if you me in real life) control freak and I tend to not give very much grace when things don’t go as planned.  Also, let’s just be real that the person who broke her arm falling off a box from a step-up needs a little more of the physical type of grace as well.

I have truly been making a concerted effort to show more grace and I am finding that I feel better about daily life when I am able to stop myself and give grace, whether it is to me or someone else.