Light at the end of the tunnel?

I see a glimmer of hope at the end of the tunnel. There may be a job for Bear as a Chaplain. Things are still pretty undecided and up in the air, but for now there is hope.

I'm convinced that God never gives us more than we can handle. Yet, it is never an easy road, for what good would an easy path do for you, there would be no growth, no stretching, and no muscle toning.

This past year has been very hard, with unemployment, deaths, reposseessed vehicles, utilities disconnected. But it has also been sprinkled with grace. He has been there in the midst of the storm, gifts from friends, assistance with bills, gifts of food, and much much heartfelt prayers for our situation.

Bear was ordained in February, he graduated from seminary in June and was commissioned as a Chaplain in the Individual Ready Reserve last month.

I'll keep you updated as soon as we know the situation for sure, in the meantime, we would covet yur prayers on our behalf.

Beth, you've done it again...

Beth Moore you have once again chipped away at what's eating me.

Deep down in my heart of hearts, in the deep dark places of my soul, I am afraid that God is a taker and not a giver.

Beth, why is it that whatever I am feeling, comes out in your study. For instance; you say, "Sometimes when you want to go on the ride of your life with Jesus, you have to let go of where you are right now." (or somehing like that, ok, I'm not the fastest note-taker ever...) and this: "what is keeping us from the ride of our lives with God?

Ok, so, yes. I maybe having a hard time letting go of somethings. Well, like, income for instance, a house, schools for my kids...etc.

And another thing: Abraham didn't know beforehand that he wasn't going through with Isaac on the alter. But we do.

Hindsight is always 20/20. That's hard for me to put into perspective...how would I have handled the situation? Probably not without much screaming and falling on my face before God, and whining, and pouting, and generally carrying on like a spoiled brat!

POW!! Thunk! Arrow, swift to the target. Bull's eye!

That's the problem right there. I'm afraid of the test. I'm afraid that God is a taker, not a giver. I'm afraid that the path He has called us to walk will require too much of me. Oh, my! There's another one! I'm afraid that I will be pulled, literally, out by the roots. Asked to leave home, asked to move, asked to downsize, asked to transition.

Why can't we just BE!! For goodness sake? Change is hard and I don't like it.

So, Beth, since you seem to have a twitter acount with God, ask Him what He's doing...'cause, I don't have a clue.

Down and downer

I had this post written earlier in my head and now it doesn't come easily for me.

I had gone to a Beth Moore Bible study last night at my church and was feeling very lost and alone.

The topic was inheritance. How in God's word it says that I am an heir with Christ. We discussed afterwards how sometimes you just don't feel this way or that and that is when you have to just believe the Words of God, even if you don't feel that way.

Well, what if you can't even just believe that anymore. What if, you don't trust those words any longer. So what if God says he will never leave us of forsake us, if I feel left or forgotten, that makes it awfully hard to trust and believe then doesn't' it.

What if God says He will give us the desires of our hearts, but the waiting period has been too long and you have lost the joy. What if it just takes too long and in the process you just can't take another step in any direction because you don't even know which way to turn. Each seemingly good step has turned out badly, each place you turn looks worse off than where you are standing, so why bother anymore.

That is where I am today. I'm only here because there isn't any where else to go. I'm only existing because it is better than the alternative.

The Bible says, (I even hesitate right now to say 'God's Word', because I'm not really sure if it is God's word.) that he owns the cattle on a thousand hills, that he has resources that we can never even fathom. So why are we sitting here after 11 months of unemployment, still no job, no direction, no income.

What would you have us to do, God? Are you even there? Do my prayers and groanings and petitions heavenward even make it past the ceiling?

What if there isn't anyone bigger than me running the universe? What if God doesn't even care? Has he just created us and then left us to our own devices?

This may all sound terribly blasphemous, but that's where I am today. Maybe I've listened too much to Job's friends, that they are filling my head with lies and doubts, maybe it's just me. But I'm not sure the path we are on is the way to go. What if God never has anything better in store for us than to just scrape by, never have even enough to pay the bills, always be late on payments, always having bill collectors calling. I can't believe that that is God's best for us. Yet, that is where we seem to be.

So does that mean that I am not in the center of God's will? Does that mean that we have gotten off track somewhere? Does that mean that the desires of our hearts, specifically to serve and minster to soldiers and their families as a Chaplain and his wife, are never to be?

I'm tired of getting nothing for an answer. I'm tired of hearing "just wait, God will provide." I'm tired of hearing "all in God's time." What if, he doesn't have a time line for us? What if he couldn't care less about Bear getting into the Army as a Chaplain. What if others have sabotaged things beyond repair? And who really cares anyway?

Uh, off again...

I feel like I am the rag hanging in the middle of the rope in a giant game of tug of war. (Great picture, huh?)
Back and forth, tugged here, yanked there, drug through the mud a little, squished by the teeming masses, ripped backwards only to start the whole process all over again.

In order to save what is left of my little brain power, I'm just copying my facebook post, I'm too tired and discouraged to do anything more than this.

"Due to a Department of the Army administrative glitch, Barry's packet did NOT make it before the board!! The next board meets June 23rd. We are slowly sinking...into despair, into debt, into the muck and mire of self pity. The DA is transitioning to a paperless board system, Barry's packet was there and complete, but for some reason did not get transmitted, (along with many other packets as well.) Big DA SNAFU!!

I am so jealous of everyone else who has gone through this process. Why did it seem so easy!? Why is it so hard for us?

Barry keeps saying that we will emerge on the other side of all of this smelling like smoke, but not burned. (Reference to Shadrack, Meshack and Abendigo, in the fiery furnace.) I'm not so sure. I'm trying to trust, but I am so very tired of the hanging and holding on. My grip is slipping.

Why are we forced to sit on the sidelines when everyone else in in the fight, working for the Lord, we sit, we watch, we wait. I'm growing lethargic and lazy, frustrated and frazzled, discouraged and disappointed.

Prayers please

My sweet little great-nephew, Michael, has had serious brain issues. He had a tumor which was partially removed through an operation last year.

He has been having chemo radiation therapy once a month to shrink the remaining portion of the tumor. It was surrounding his optical nerve and couldn't be completely removed.

On Thursday, April 30th, he will be having another MRI to see if the tumor is shrinking and then later that afternoon he will have another chemo treatment.(Two weeks after that his Momma will be having a C-Cection to deliver a baby brother for Michael, please pray for her too.)

Please pray that God will cause the tumor to shrink and no damage to the optical nerve has occurred.

He is such a sweet little babe.

I know that God can work miracles. I've seen Him do it.

Ah, Spring!

I hung my clothes lines today. In honor of this springtime rite of passage, I'm reposting the rules, for those of you who don't know them already...
1. Wash the clothes line before hanging any clothes. Walk the length of each line with a damp cloth around the line.

2. Hang the clothes in a certain order and always hang whites with whites and hang them first.

3. Never hang a shirt by the shoulders, always by the tail. What would the neighbors think?

4. Wash day on a Monday...........never hang clothes on the weekend or Sunday for heaven's sake!

5. Hang the sheets and towels on the outside lines so you can hide your 'unmentionables' in the middle.

6. It doesn't matter if it is sub zero weather.............clothes would 'freeze dry.' (Too wet in my part of the world!)

7. Always gather the clothes pins when taking down dry clothes. Pins left on the line are 'tacky'.

8. Hang the clothes up so that each item does not need two clothes pins, but share one of the clothes pins with the next washed item.

9. Clothes off of the line before dinner time, neatly folded in the clothes basket and ready to be ironed.

10. IRONED?????????? Well, that's a whole other subject. I'm off to play with Boo...

On again...

Bear's Chaplain packet will go before the board on the 13th of May; our anniversary and also two years to the day from when Bear got out of the military to pursue becoming a Chaplain.

We are very excited that the packet has been pulled out of the recruiter's bottom drawer and will be submitted.

It is with much prayerfulness that we have gotten to this point, and we are asking for prayer during the selection process.

God is indeed sovereign and we are trusting Him for the outcome.

Surrender...

Is this what I'm not doing?
I thought that I held loosely to what was in my hand.
Apparantly, I have not.
I guess if it feels as if part of me has been ripped away, I was clinging pretty tightly to it.
I'll try Lord.
My hands are open Lord.
I'm letting loose.
Take what you want.

Funny Pic to share

I've been sorting through oodles and gobs of pictures. (ha ha, my mother used to say that!) Anyway, a lot! Been trying to edit, crop, identify pictures to go in a memorial album for my brother Clarence's family.

I think we are up to 24 copies so far. I'm doing them digitally with a great program from Creative Memories called Storyook Creator Plus. It makes me look like I'm a graphic designer, which clearly, I'm not! But anyway, it's great.

I came across this funny picture of my Daddy and brothers. Thought I'd post it here.

Clarence is on the right standing next to Dad. I guess they were playingping pong. Although I don't remember that there was a ping pong table in that room? Hmmm, maybe they were just being weird, which is tipical behavior for the men in my family.

Old Home

While we were away at my brother's funeral in Idaho, Bear and I drove to the house I lived in for the first 14 years of my life. It is a very old (120 years?) home in Meridian Idaho. It was called the Wireless Ranch, there was a wireless radio tower on the property when it was first built.

I loved the home. My dad had done so many great improvements, there were built in cabinets, drawers, shelves, special display shelves for my brothers' model cars, drop down desks, etc. Dad and my brothers built this huge drop down train table with pipe legs that screwed on when it was down. There was always something fun going on, and I loved living there.
Bear and I drove up to the home to take some pictures. Bear drove up the driveway and I started snapping pictures. Mr. Todd Owner, (not his real name...) came out of the house. ”May I help you?” he said somewhat reservedly. I told him who I was and that we once lived here. He remembered us from a few years ago when we had driven by and asked us if we would like to come in and see the inside. Of course we did!

We talked with him about changes Dad had made, knocking out walls, the maid’s quarters, etc. I took some pictures, which I will post on my blog. Some of it has changed drastically, other parts of it are just as it was when we lived there.
There was dirt in the sandbox and I didn’t want to dig to find our handprints, but I took a picture of the back patio dated 1970. It all looked much smaller than I remember. Hmm.
Todd said that the historical society had been out and looked at the garage. The roof has termites and they weren’t interested in putting it on the registry because of the damage.
The pole house was gone when they moved in, and the basement rooms had been changed. Brian and Clarence’s room had been enlarged into the pink shag carpeted girls room. Todd was going to redo the downstairs bathroom soon. But the pink upstairs bathroom was just as I remembered it. Pink fixtures and the same pink rose wallpaper.

I told him if he ever wanted to sell it there were a few family members who might be interested. He said, oh good, it starts at one million for the house, out buildings and 4.5 acres. Wow!