Beyond Blessed: 2014

It's been 4 month since I have blogged. Something I love to do but I've been on a journey. I call it my "Get Real" journey. I discovered it's never to late and your never to young or old to start over, discover new things about yourself and to take your faith in God to a new level.
I was getting ready to type "it's like going from a caterpillar to a butterfly" and as I looked out my window I saw my first butterfly of Spring! Fitting don't you think? I call them "God whispers."
He's letting me know that is exactly what I have done and will hopefully continue doing for the rest of my life. Shut myself in a cocoon, renew myself and come out refreshed full of hope.

So if anyone out there has missed me or new to my blog here is a quick refresher about myself.
I'm 59 I've been married 27 years. He's younger than me so basically I guess I'm a cougar. We have six kids. Well, only 2 are considered kids now. We have three sons ages 36, 28 and soon to be 25. We have three daughters 18, 15 & 9. We have six grandest kids. One were not allowed to see anymore but in our hearts he is still our grandson. That's the amazing thing about the heart. Selfishness can take away someone or something but as long as you choose to keep them in your heart they are never really taken away. Two grandest kids are older than our youngest daughter. We have a daughter in love that rocks and a daughter through three of our grand kids. She gave us our first grandson and we have a great relationship.

What I love about my family more than anything is we love love! We are so not perfect and borderline on dysfunctionalmania ( yeah, I made that word up) but we get through everything because we choose to love, forgive and we are always there for one another. We are advocates for adoption and orphans. We have the "Hug Away Foundation." www.hugaway.org

So about this journey. In August 2012 little did I know our family was getting ready to have our world rocked and it was going to be a long painful road to recovery. We are still in the recovery mode. What happened doesn't matter. What matters is we chose to fight for what we believe in.
That's not to say there are not battle scars and wounds and once in a while a resurgent of questions. Some of the lessons I have discovered are:

Lesson 1: in this journey... God can take ashes and make them beautiful if you allow Him to.
Lesson 2: Step back take a look at yourself in the mirror. Hate to break it to you, but your not as perfect as you think.
Lesson 3: Focus on the goal and not the circumstances. This is by far the best advice my pastor gave us!
Lesson 4: What can I do to make a difference in this situation?
Lesson 5: Life isn't a rose garden. You better be in Gods word so you can handle it when it throws you a curve ball or bowling balls or boulders.
Lesson 6: Your stronger than you think, if you lean on God. He wants you to give your problems, hurts and concerns to Him.
Lesson 7: It's never to late change and grow. If your a believer and your heart is open this will happen a lot! Who wants to stay in a rut?
Lesson 8: Life is short. You can choose to live in the past or move on.
Lesson 9: You can't change people but you can change yourself
Lesson 10: God loves us...always! No matter what we have done, thought, said or feel He still loves us. I believe that is called unconditional.
Lesson 11: It breaks my heart that there are people in this world who don't know God. How do they handle what the world throws at them?
Lesson 12: Faith, Hope and Love... It's what you need!

So while going through this journey our life group was studying Job. When we first started the lesson I was in a dark place and I kept comparing my life to Job. Heck, just change the name from Job to Elaine that was my thought. What a pathetic pity party I was in. But as we got further in this study and I was really feeling sorry for Job or myself and wondering "why would God allow this to happen to such a faithful man?" I was getting ready to understand the reason for this journey.

Yes we knew God had allowed Satan to temp Job because He knew Job was faithful and would not desert Him. But Job didn't know that. He was confused and hurting and angry! Why God? Why me?! He had lost his family and everything he owned. He had sores all over his body. Yet even when he was angry with God and questioning Him he never quit believing. It's like getting mad at your spouse or kids. No matter how angry you get you still believe in them.

Then came the answer. The last chapter 42 "Surely I spoke of things I did not understand, things to wonderful for me to know."
God loved Job. God loves us. There are times God will allow our world to be rocked to the core, because He wants to remind us to lean on Him, depend on Him, trust Him. That we are so broken all we can do is look up. And that is all we need to do. He will do the rest. He may not answer all of our prayers and needs the way we want but they will be answered according to His perfect will.

Honestly this journey started out ugly. Face it caterpillar's are not the prettiest things. But once they have pushed through the cocoon that has protected them from the harshness of this world they arrive in full beauty, ready and prepared to take the journey that is before them.
God will send us on many journeys through our lives. Some we will relish and some we will hope to avoid at all cost. Don't avoid them. Go for them head on. Learn from them. Change for the good from them. Love others more. Trust God. He does know what He's doing.

And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love Him, who have been called according to His purpose. Romans 8:28

Wow! 2 months since I last posted anything. I do have several good excuses! Let's see there was Thanksgiving, three birthdays and Christmas. Put working full time, running a ministry on top of that and that gives me little time to blog, which I love to do.
It's a new year and in a few days I will be celebrating the 30th anniversary of my 29th birthday! So, when you get to this point in your life which begins going way to fast, you look back and wonder what did I do wrong, what did I do right and what could I have done different.
Thank goodness I became a Christian. Because I of God I did the one thing I needed to do and that was accept Jesus as my Lord and Savior.
God has blessed my life in so many ways. I have a great husband, 6 amazing kids, 5 awesome grandchildren, 5 remarkable sister and lots of wonderful nieces and nephews and far more true blue friends than any one could ever ask for. He has given me a passion for orphans and adoptions.
This does not mean that life has not had it's peaks and valleys. 2013 was the worse year I have ever experienced. Like I said on a previous blog, if it hadn't been for my daughter graduating and my youngest grandson being born there really was nothing I would want to remember from it.
But God in all His awesomeness used 2013 and it's events to bring me to brokenness, therefore giving me the opportunity to depend and trust Him totally. For what I was going through He was the only one who was going to be able to get me through it...and He did. It wasn't easy, it wasn't pretty and it sure wasn't fun. But my relationship with Him is so amazing now there truly are no words to describe it.
So if you are reading this and going through something that seems impossible to get through remember Jesus can do all things. He wants to be there for you. All you have to do is ask. If He can love me, a sinner in true form and care about me enough to want to die on the cross for me and get me through one of the darkest times in my life then I know that I know without a doubt He will be there for you. He wants to be there for you. Just ask Him.