About 3 years ago I started this blog with the intent to record my reflections on 40 day journeys with Christ. At the time, I was praying hard for a new home purchase we were pursuing. It was our first home purchase after 19 years of renting. God granted our petition and we are still enjoying our beautiful home and all it has to offer.
Somewhere along the way I lost focus and my prayer life and my walk with God slowly came to a fork in the road, where I chose the path full of hazards, tangles, and pitfalls. I forgot that my Savior walked with me yielding a machete and guidance around the really bad stuff and I took on the struggle all by myself. However, being the God that He is, He has continued to allow me to push through in my headstrong manner, getting my cuts and bruises, occasionally asking for His assistance, and then fighting through on my own again.
For three years I have fought. Now I am tired. Now I am ready to allow Him to carry me.
I am not broken. I am not lost. I am simply stubborn.
My stubbornness is an attribute that He gifted me with and it has given me willpower and perseverance in many circumstances. It is what makes me square my jaw, jut it out, and dare the world to take its best swing. It is this same stubbornness that I have to learn to put aside and allow God to care for me and guide me.
I learned to rely on myself at an early age because my mother, God rest her soul, was too weak to fight for herself, let alone me and my siblings. She allowed my dad to rule over our family with hurtful words and demands that no one could accomplish. The very fact that I was a girl was enough to incur disdain. I vowed never to let another man rule over me.
My fight against Christ's calling was no different. It took me years of planted seeds and questions, refusals and dismissals to listen to His call. When I did, I remember raising my fist to Him in a room by myself and saying, "I do not need another Father! I do not need another man to tell me what to do!" He knew I didn't need that and my reliance on Him would come from a place of love and acceptance despite my independence and stubbornness. Only Christ could call me to Him and find a way through the walls of my heart to be One in Him.
Eventually, He did. But He also knew the long road before us, fraught with my unwillingness to lean on Him, and my habit of doing it myself and plunging forward with plans I hadn't yet discussed with Him. (I do the same thing to my poor husband as well.)
So I will not make a stand and say, "From now on..." because He knows me better. I know me better. And only He knows the road ahead of us. However, I will say, "I will try harder." So this blog is for that very purpose: To share with you the thoughts and failings of a 40-something mom of 5 kids, wife of 21 years, personal trainer and fitness enthusiast, and hard-headed follower of Christ.
For three years I have fought. Now I am tired. Now I am ready to allow Him to carry me.
I am not broken. I am not lost. I am simply stubborn.
My stubbornness is an attribute that He gifted me with and it has given me willpower and perseverance in many circumstances. It is what makes me square my jaw, jut it out, and dare the world to take its best swing. It is this same stubbornness that I have to learn to put aside and allow God to care for me and guide me.
I learned to rely on myself at an early age because my mother, God rest her soul, was too weak to fight for herself, let alone me and my siblings. She allowed my dad to rule over our family with hurtful words and demands that no one could accomplish. The very fact that I was a girl was enough to incur disdain. I vowed never to let another man rule over me.
My fight against Christ's calling was no different. It took me years of planted seeds and questions, refusals and dismissals to listen to His call. When I did, I remember raising my fist to Him in a room by myself and saying, "I do not need another Father! I do not need another man to tell me what to do!" He knew I didn't need that and my reliance on Him would come from a place of love and acceptance despite my independence and stubbornness. Only Christ could call me to Him and find a way through the walls of my heart to be One in Him.
Eventually, He did. But He also knew the long road before us, fraught with my unwillingness to lean on Him, and my habit of doing it myself and plunging forward with plans I hadn't yet discussed with Him. (I do the same thing to my poor husband as well.)
So I will not make a stand and say, "From now on..." because He knows me better. I know me better. And only He knows the road ahead of us. However, I will say, "I will try harder." So this blog is for that very purpose: To share with you the thoughts and failings of a 40-something mom of 5 kids, wife of 21 years, personal trainer and fitness enthusiast, and hard-headed follower of Christ.
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