He is Greater.....John 3:30 says He must become greater, I must become less"

You know how it feels when you set things up to go a certain way and then they go......a different direction?  Sometimes I can feel resilient and adjust.  Sometimes I just have a tantrum......and sometimes, well.....I just get really really salty.  Tonight I'm salty. My mom gave me some corn tortillas she was not going to use and I also had some.  They were left from a meal I made last week and I didn't want to throw them out.  I spent time today looking at recipes to use them.....and I found some good stuff.  Chicken taquitos.....cinnamon and sugar tortilla chips......and I planned a meal for tonight.  I was looking forward to it.  I had saved a lot of my daily calories for this meal......when I began dinner tonight, I quickly discovered that the tortillas were rather stale and didn't roll well....they fell apart before I could put them into the hot oil....and I had a mess.  Dinner plans had to adjust and shift a bit.  I was disappointed and salty. A couple of days ag

A couple of  years ago, my friend Liza gave me a gift.  I was visiting her on my birthday and she is an artsy friend.  It was a print that says this.  Hope Changes Everything.  I loved it and put it on my dining room wall with sticky tack....because that is what I do when I find something I want to see every day.  Hope changes everything. This month, I took down all of the arts and crafts that were on that wall from my children.  Things they had made this past year could come down and make room for new assignments....but Hope Changes Everything just could not go in the garbage or some storage tub.  It is still true.  I moved the print to my bedroom closet door.  Every time I wake up and go to get my clothes, I am reminded that hope changes everything.  It is a call to hope. Hope that Hurricane Harvey passes without more devastation. Hope that the political climate in this country gains wisdom. Hope that the Confederate Flag goes into History as a lesson learned.....and all of th

Summer 2017 is finished.  The kids return to school tomorrow and Josiah goes back to regular daycare...meaning 4 days a week instead of 1 or 2.  I return to my career as a home visiting community health nurse.  I have barely kept my flame burning all summer but it is time to go back to work now.  The children will be settled in their places for about 7 hours a day, 4-5 days a week....that gives me about 28 hours are work, give or take a trip to the grocery store or a haircut.  Maybe even lunch or coffee with a friend......dreamy. Don't get me wrong.  It was a great summer.  All the kids were given a break from their friend drama, and homework, and betimes and curfews.  We spent a lot of time at the baseball fields and in the pool.  We grilled out.  Kids went to ball camps and theater camp, bible camp, daycare.  Claire went to Haiti, California and served at foster kids camp.  Isaac and Claire worked a lot.  Jeremiah rode his bike all over town and had fun golfing a lot with frie

I have had a conversation with people many times about understanding the will of God.  How do you know what He wants?  How does He speak?  What if you are wrong?  The unspoken question is often........why does it matter?  Why do I have to seek His will at all? Here are some answers from the last to the first. If I don't seek His will, then I will never know what could have happened....what could have been.  He has some good ideas.  He has lots of opportunities...but I need to decide which ones are meant for me.  Or not.  If they are not meant for me it is because there is a better plan, a better part of His Will.  Sometimes it agrees with mine and sometimes it does not.  When God's will and my will collide and do not join, there tends to be misery for me.  Emotional misery.  A sense of being off-balance and out of sync.  When my will joins His will....I tend to thrive. That's the answer to why it matters.  Living in God's will feels right and good.  There is power

Matthew 6:33 says "But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well".  Seek God's kingdom first.  Ask yourself what He wants....what He considers righteousness......and then there is the Golden Rule, that transcends religions : Do unto others as you would have them do unto you. These are values I live by.  Values I strive for.  I talk about them with my family.  I surround myself with friends and co-workers who also understand them and strive for them......I sing the songs that refer to them......and I believe them. These values are my energy, my gasoline, my inspiration, my measuring stick for decisions I make in my days.  I don't know when or how that came to be my reality.....quite possibly it was when I asked Jesus into my heart as my Lord and Savior, and I asked for his Holy Spirit to rule and reign in my life.  Don't get me wrong here.  I am a broken, flawed and sinful human.  I'm talking here about

A week ago we stopped along the road after Sunday Church service.  There was a vendor selling sweet corn and I had decided that if I saw corn for sale I would stop and purchase some for our dinner party.  My parents-in-law were coming to visit and we were also entertaining our college student from Great Britain, and my mom (cuz....well, she is helpful at a dinner party and always welcome here.)  Roger had put a beef brisket on his green egg smoker and I had prepped baked beans....and I thought sweet corn would be a delightful addition. I got out of the vehicle and he smiled and said, "did you just come from church?".  I said that I had and we had a conversation about church and my town and how people don't generally work on Sundays here.  He was baffled and confused.  He could not understand why we would choose to take a day and not work.  I smiled and said that it was a lovely thing to know that I did not have to do more than necessary on Sundays, that we go to church

August 1 brings mixed feelings, doesn't it?  Teachers feel sad knowing their break is over.  Mothers of school-age children feel hopeful....knowing tearchers' break is almost over....and soon the kids will be back in their care and out of our hair.  Wait.  Did I just say that out loud?  Yes.  I did.  I love my kids.  I love to have them home.  I also love when they go to school and I don't have to worry and wonder and plan and parent from 8am-3:30pm......and actually get my own work done.  My grocery bill will cut in half and instead I will just write checks for hot lunch at school. August 1 brings one of my last grocery runs that filled my cart with chips.  August is the last month that chips count for a vegetable.  It is the last month of summer for us, but even though school doesn't start for a few weeks football does.  August 1 brings football camp to our lives....and next week football practice for Isaac in high school.....I love football.  I confess I don't