Tuesday, November 28, 2006

Thankful on Thanksgiving

I found that there was a lot to be thankful for this Thanksgiving.

So here is my list: 1) God's provision: I was able to make Thanksgiving dinner and had the money to buy all the food and not stress 2) all the fam made it: mom and Al, Becky and her boyfriend, and my dad! 3) Al made it through the holidays and interacted more with us than ever before (miracle)! 4) amazing community of people (5 or 6 families came together on Thanksgiving and ate together) 5) A God that is in everything, who is faithful and good, and listens with perfect love and answers with our ultimate best at heart.

I wonder often why it is so hard to really tap into the essence of the holidays that we celebrate. It is so easy to go through the motions and lose sight of why we are doing what we are doing. When that happens the magic of the holidays is lost. In my job I have found that it is not always useful to focus on the "why". Like why did this happen to that person or why is this person the way that they are. It is much better to focus with people on "what and how". What is helping, how is your behavior helping or hindering you, what can we do to help right now. But with the holidays, I think it is important to ask why. Why are things important to us? I think sometimes understanding the "why" helps us to move into the "what and hows". So I guess the questions I keep asking myself are "how am I going to make this holiday season meaningful and not just go through the motions?" and "what does a meaningful holiday season look like?". Hmm....thoughts to ponder.

Monday, November 06, 2006

The Latest

Well, on Friday my grandmother tripped and fell and gave herself a black eye on the right, cut her left ear, and hurt her left knee. To say the least it was quite a spill and was quite a scare. Praise God, she didn't break anything or crack her head open. But due to severely bruising her knee, she was pretty immobile Friday night and all day Saturday. Through this little episode, I realized a few things. I truly realized how independence can be taken to an extreme. My grandma wouldn't let me help her up even. I had to become bossy and strict in order for her to sit down and let me do stuff. Somehow, my grandmother was bossy, demanding, and independent all at the same time.

This I do know. God has me living with her for a reason. I think that one of the biggest reasons is to work on my heart. My grandma can get under my skin and tick me off faster than anyone in my life. I wanted to help her, but when you feel like you have to fight to do it, you start to resent what they ask you to do. It is so hard to have a servant heart when you feel like what you are doing is wrong and you are treated like you don't know anything. With my grandma, I know that she doesn't mean to come across that way, but the way that she says stuff and the tone of her voice evokes feelings that go against reasoning.

Here are some conclusions that I ended the weekend with: you have to let the person be (if they insist on doing things that are not the best, you have to let them deal with the consequences); it is essential to ask for help and let others help you (that is the beauty of interdependence); and
we have to take care of ourselves body, mind, and spirit (quality if far better than quantity).

On a more positive note, I did get to go visit a church that I think I will like. What I need most right now is good peer Christian fellowship. I am hoping that by finding a different church that I will find that. I know that it is not going to be like The Grove and the small groups will not be like my community group, of which I am missing a ton, but I have to put forth the effort of building new relationships keeping in check my expectations, knowing that I can not recreate the past, but trusting in my God that He can do far more than I can ask or imagine.

The journey of life is funny that way. The flesh wants it to be easy and recreatable, but the spirit knows that is not what is best and so hence forth we go on our adventure just waiting to see what is around the bend or over the mountain. How thankful I am that I have learned to trust in God and His character to know that He is going to bring about my best.