Green Pastures and Still Waters......In Our Own Homes......

Tonight I'll give a talk at the homeschool support meeting on Psalm 23:2, "He makes me lie down in green pastures.  He leads me beside still waters.  He restores my soul."  The theme of that verse is rest.  Something we all want and something we all need. 

I'm going to try to communicate that this is something we can actually achieve in our life!  In fact, we need to pursue rest, particularly in the areas of physical rest, emotional rest and especially, spiritual rest.

As I wrote the talk, it was great to reflect how God has brought rest to our life in these areas.  When we were younger with a very young family, only 3 children, but all under 3 (a busy time!) we found ourselves involved in just about everything you can imagine in church, from men's ministry, to women's ministry, children's programs, even church leadership.  But we were drowning!  It was clearly becoming too much.  We were in the middle of a move to a new home, living in a rental.  I had a newborn that just wouldn't sleep and a very active toddler that got into so much trouble I would be calling my husband with a new story just about every day (my top three stories about him involve him drinking vegetable oil because he thought it was apple juice, dumping the Raisin Bran all over the floor because he wanted the raisins, and putting his hand in the peanut butter jar and then the other hand in the jam jar because he wanted to mix them together......I started taking pictures of each thing he did so I wouldn't scream, but laugh!)

All this unrest in our lives told us we needed to make a change in our level of involvement, not just in church life, but in all our activities.  At this point I don't even think we realized what the name of the street was that we were moving to.....Stillmeadow.  What a great name of a street!  That's when we started to experience rest, as we slowly took out the things that were taking away our peace and started to concentrate more on keeping me at home with the kids and focus on the homeschooling.  It wasn't overnight.  We lived on Stillmeadow for 7 years.  But we learned to watch for the signs that showed where we lacked peace and peace came.

We moved into Stillmeadow with 3 busy kids and a high level of activity and more stress and we left Stillmeadow with 6 kids and a lower level of activity and higher levels of peace. 

One interesting change we made to achieve peace was the debt-reduction plan.  We had to stop the financial drain!  Piano lessons were killing us.  We also had hired art teachers at one point.  We had them in certain sports when they were little, all every expensive activities.  At first, making this change was very hard.  I found it to be such a loss at first.  How would my kids ever be active or physically able to play with other kids on sports teams if they weren't taught "professionally"?  How would they learn an instrument if someone didn't teach them?  Art?  I am hopeless at art.  How would they learn without a teacher?  What about sewing?  I knew nothing, but I knew I wanted them to learn!  Seemed impossible.

This has to be the most amazing part of the story.  They have taught themselves!  In all of these areas.  I am not an athlete, but they have just gone outside and played.  They haven't shied away from a single sport and for the most part, they're pretty good!  Our oldest boy was once asked, "Aren't you ever going to play organized sports?"  "Yup," he said, matter of factly, "I organize 'em and I play 'em."  Perfect answer.  All my kids can hold their own and take on just about anyone, even those who have paid coaches.  We have the space on the farm, so we bought balls, volleyball nets, and then away they go.  They invite friends over and play for hours. 

As for music lessons, we kept the oldest one in with a paid teacher, which is still killing us, but she's been teaching the younger ones so hopefully it'll come back to us soon!  But the older 3 are teaching themselves guitar, just by playing, watching on-line instruction videos, using the books my husband has lying around on how to learn guitar.  And again, they are not bad!  They are improving and playing all the time.  Sure they would probably improve at a much faster rate and achieve higher skills for sure with an instructor and truth be known, I think I would like to hire someone eventually, but right now, until the financial picture changes, we are being forced to learn on our own, at home.  It's actually been a great homeschool opportunity for us and once again, I have to stop projecting my fears or my insecurities on to my kids - just because I never taught myself guitar doesn't mean they can't!

Sewing?  We had a friend teach us the basics, then boom - we jumped in.  We bought the machines, all the equipment, patterns, material and then looked for things that we like to sew.  My oldest is now very adept at sewing and even gave a sewing camp last spring to a bunch of little girls.  My next daughter has picked it up, too, and now sews a lot of different presents for friends and family.  I remain an "ok" seamstress.  I do enough to get by, but as usual, my kids are advancing past me!

As for art?  It's crazy, they just keep drawing and drawing.  I can't even instruct them I'm so hopeless at it, but we have books and supplies and a couple of them have real talent!  I think the most amazing thing in this whole process that I've loved the most is that our evenings are together, our afternoons are together, our mornings are together.  I am not in the car, driving them all over the place, leaving the little ones behind.  There is a strong sense of peace which comes from not feeling rushed and yet lots is going on in the home which makes for a very busy household, but that I love! 

So, that is what I'll be communicating to the women tonight - strive for peace and rest!  It doesn't have to look like my house, but seek to find out what is causing stress in the home and make changes!  Why are we so afraid to make changes when they are going to help us emotionally and spiritually?  The enemy of our souls is so happy when we are so unhappy.  I'll remind the ladies about his lie, "Good is the enemy of best."  As we meet as husbands and wives, we must discuss what is BEST for our families, instead of settling on what is good.  I think that is the secret in one sentence.

Now I don't live on Stillmeadow.  I actually live by green pastures!  But few of us actually live by green pastures and still waters, yet we can!  These idyllic pastures and quiet waters can be found in our own homes with a little soul searching and perhaps a few changes.  But it'll take a certain amount of bravery.... it's going against the crowd for sure.  The only thing I can say to that is - it's worth it!

"The Mongolians are Coming!"

"C'mon guys, let's tidy up!  The Mongolians are coming!!"  Those have got to be the funniest words out of my mouth yet, but that is truly what happened yesterday.  We had to tidy up because we literally were having Mongolians over!  We have had visitors from far away before here at the farm - as far away as the Solomon Islands (friends that were missionaries there), but Mongolia?  Wow. Mongolia! 

Three ladies and two little girls (18 months and 3 years) were here picking grapes.  They are in Canada as the two little ones are waiting for heart surgery.  They are part of the heart project with Samaritan's Purse that seeks to help those who cannot get the surgery they need due to lack of expenses, doctors, equipment, etc. in Mongolia (and other countries).  My in-laws are good friends with a widow who takes these moms (or aunts) and their children into her home as her ministry.  They stay with her for weeks, even months.  She feeds them and keeps them busy as they wait for the doctors in Toronto to find time for their surgery.  They keep experiencing delays.

Well, what have we been doing lately, but picking grapes.  My in-laws come every week and pick and pick and pick.  They mentioned this to their friend who lives just a few minutes away and she thought, "Why not?" as their surgery had just been delayed again.  The concern is to keep the girls healthy before surgery, but outside where there aren't near as many viruses as indoors, it seemed safe!  The weather has cooperated lately and so they came.

The timing was amazing.  We had literally been reading about Mongolia in history, about Genghis Khan and his raids into China.  I'm sure Mongolia is famous for more than that, but sure enough, I mentioned the name when I first met the women and right away they said, "Genghis Khan!" and nodded their heads.  Apparently he is quite famous to them, a hero.  That's why it was even funnier to make that announcement to the kids about cleaning up for the Mongolians as it sounded like we would be tidying up for Genghis Khan himself! What a hilarious thing to imagine!

Well, these sweet people were hardly Genghis Khan, but quiet, gentle souls.  They came with their translator who speaks perfect English.  I could tell there was something different about her right away.  She was hugging me and my children, smiling, being so kind and friendly.  She had to be a Christian.  She had come on her own with the widow the week before and we hadn't had much time to talk, but yesterday when she came with the other Mongolians, I asked her more questions. 

Mongolia only let Christian missionaries in once the Communist regime fell.  Before that there was no Christian influence.  She had never heard of Jesus.  She found herself divorced with a young son at that time.  Then, once the regime fell, Christians made their way in and she met a woman who introduced her to Christ.  She then got involved with Youth With a Mission.  She gave her life to Christ and full-time ministry.  She was ridiculed by her family, but it has been 13 years now having raised her own support and her family leaves her alone now as they see she is serious!  It was wonderful to hear her testimony.  Faith truly knows no geographical boundaries.  I witnessed that yesterday.  We knew the same God.  I shared an immediate bond with her though we had only just met.

It was such a blessing to us to have them here yesterday.  Their little girls melted my girls' hearts.  They were so affectionate.  One of them, the littlest one, wanted my 11 year old to hold her.  So she picked her up and ended up holding her for the rest of the time they were here.  When my daughter put her down, she cried and cried until she picked her up again.  Finally, they got her in the car, crying and crying, but she eventually settled down.  When she looked out the window as they were pulling away, the little girl tilted her head and put her hand on the side of her head.  She kept doing that.  We wondered what it meant.  The translator shouted out the window, "It means, 'I love you!'"  We were so touched!

While they were there in the vineyard, we continued to pick our little fingers off, too.  Sadly, a buyer never worked out, but we are oddly so happy about that!  We have had so many different friends and family come and pick.  It has been so wonderful to see it used like that!  But, as I was saying, we picked and picked yesterday.  We filled many bushels.  We are going to try to make a concord wine/syrup/drink.  We figure we may even have a market for it!  We keep looking for what type of crop we should plant and yet, here we have it, right on our property.... already planted!  So we have decided to give it a go. 

My hands were so itchy from all the destemming we did all afternoon!  But it was so fun at the same time.  All of us were down in the not-wet-and-stinky-basement anymore (such a blessing!) taking stems off, picking out ladybugs and snails.  It was truly a great family experience.  Our house is full of fruit flies, but I love it.  That is how I want to spend my time, being together, doing something meaningful.  Way back when we first decided to prune the grapes last spring was one of the best decisions we've made.  It came full circle yesterday as we were standing there in the vineyard picking the grapes they had pruned, then being in the basement going through each grape cluster one by one getting ready to preserve what had been harvested.  We assumed all along that we would hire a harvester this year, but it didn't come to be.  We have been the ones harvesting.  God has been gracious in keeping the weather favourable so we can harvest when we have the time.  But now we're thinking about truly harvesting it all on our next year, not just piecemeal, the way we've been doing it this year.  It's kind of exciting to think about.  We never thought we'd be able to prune it ourselves and we did it.  Why not harvest it ourselves?

The fact that the weather has held out doesn't seem to be coincidence.  Back in Leviticus again, it says in Ch. 26, "and the grape harvest shall last to the time for sowing.....". The key phrase there is, "the grape harvest shall last".  God knows how long to keep the grapes on the vine.  He knows how much time we have to pick them and He's keeping them on for us!  It's so amazing!  When we go down there, each time we figure surely there won't be any left or surely they'll be overripe, but no, every time we head on down to the vineyard, sure enough, the grapes are still in perfect condition.  All the leaves are off the vines now.  It's even easier to pick as you can see the grapes.  Before it was quite an effort to pick.  I don't think we've ever harvested this late.  I think the principle in the verse is that God knows when to schedule in each thing we need to accomplish in our lives.  If He wants us to do grapes, He'll keep them on the vine.  And that's what He's doing.  If we had had a brutal early frost, if would have ruined the grapes, but it hasn't happened.  So until it does, we keep going down there!  Once again, Scripture coming to life.

A Plague?

We are in the middle of a very strange pestilence right now, kind of half-wondering if we really are the Israelites, or maybe the Egyptians!  We are being invaded by wasps!  They are always around this time of year anyway, looking for food for winter and maybe even a warm spot inside, but then, it gets cold, they go away and it's all good.

This year, they're after us and it's no joke.  We noticed them back in August before we left and saw them flying around a certain part of the house.  We sprayed where it looked like they were getting in and it seemed to solve the problem.  We went away and never heard any complaints of wasps.  Then when we got back, we would see one here or there, would kill it (sorry, had to), and then we wouldn't see one for awhile.

Now, they are flying around the house, several in a room sometimes, in different rooms, all at once. It's almost as if we left a window open.  The only thing we can think of is that they are eating through the wood or the foam around the windows.  We keep spraying and swatting, but now we are all living in paranoia as we are starting to get stung....

Who cares if it's RM or me, but our littlest girl got stung 3 times in the last two days!  And according to our bee friend, he'd rather get stuck 3 times by a honey been than once by a wasp.  Their stings are powerful!  She even got stung when she laid her head down on her pillow!  She thought she heard something buzzing, got up quickly, but they couldn't find it.  She went back to put her head down and wham!  Right before bed I was dealing with a screaming wasp stung 7 year old - so sad!  She had just been stung a couple hours earlier when she stepped on one unknowingly.  Fortunately, she's not allergic and with all my little remedies she's doing fine.

We find ourselves praying, "Lord, show us the wasp nest!  Show us where they are getting in!"  This is serious!  We are all walking around in a state of fear, looking at our feet, where we walk, where we sit, where we lie down......arrrgggh!!

There is a little bit of humour though.  If you did come over, you would see anyone in our family in the middle of a sentence jump up, whack a wasp and then just keep talking...it's becoming like the wasps are just part of our life!  But, I do pray that is not the case...

So hopefully locusts aren't next.  We aren't quite sure what God is teaching us through this latest trial, but another reason to be praying, that's for sure.

Redemption Picture

When we were given the amazing gift a few weeks ago of a paid-in-full meal, we didn't know what to do or how to react.  We were dumbfounded for days.  Then, just a couple days later, my husband came into the room and said, "I think I know why our dinner was paid for."  Then he shared something he'd been reading in a devotional book he has.  In the book, the author was trying to describe Christ's salvation and the idea of redemption where you get something that you don't deserve.  The author went on to say, "Pretend you are in a restaurant and someone comes up to you and tells you, 'Your bill is paid in full'......."  As my husband read that out loud, we all looked at him and said, "You're making that up...." as that very thing had just happened to us.  But no, that was exactly what was written.  Suddenly it was crystal clear.  We were all given in a "restaurant picture" the idea of redemption.  We were given a free meal.  We did nothing to deserve it and yet some kind stranger paid for our meal, in full, expecting nothing in return.  It was the neatest thing for our children to experience - redemption.  Perhaps that wasn't the intention of the gift-giver that night, but it was a great opportunity for us to explain to our children, "That is what redemption is like."

Chasing Chickens Takes on New Meaning

This past week we had our chickens slaughtered.  Not a happy day for the chickens, but a great day for us!  Our freezers were full to overflowing as we had already filled them with quite a bit of grape juice and grapes.  A "grape" problem to have, (couldn't resist the bad pun....)

"Chicken Day" is always quite an event.  We get up early while it is still dark in hopes that we can catch the chickens off-guard while they are still sleeping in the coop.  Then, as we creep into the coop, one by one a chicken is caught and quickly put into the waiting crate.  It's genius, really.  Otherwise, we'd literally be like a chicken with its head cut off, running around the whole yard!  The morning we caught all the birds required 5 of us, chasing at 100 birds.  You'll never believe what I read that morning back in my new favourite book, Leviticus.......

Speaking to the Israelites about blessings they'll receive for being obedient,

"I will give peace in the land.... Five of you shall chase a hundred....." Lev. 26:6,7

Isn't that incredible?!  I couldn't believe it.  Of all the mornings to read that verse, why then?  I've read through Leviticus before and never seen it.  But, that morning, 5 of us were outside, chasing 100 (well, actually 107!)  The verse seemed to jump off the page.  Now I realize, of course, that God isn't speaking about chickens.  In fact, He is speaking about their enemies.  Yet, I still took it as no coincidence and as a strange encouragement.  God is really seeming to say, "If you follow my commands, I will make your enemies fall at your feet."  I don't see chickens as my enemies, hardly!  But, in a way, having them in our freezer is a symbol of God's blessing... they fell at our feet as we chased them and now we have food for a year.

Though we are not perfect, as I've said before and will continue to admit freely, we are trying to stay on His path, trying to walk in His statues, observing His commandments.  God promised the Israelites many blessings is they did so, too.  The Bible certainly has come to life for me out here.  I never would have made the connections I've been making by staying in the city.  Living on a farm has really made the Bible's principles so clear as many of the examples used are from an agricultural perspective.  Leviticus 26 speaks to just about everything we've been going through this year on the farm.

The next half of the verse speaks about "a hundred of you shall chase ten thousand.....". Hmmm... we aren't planning on having a 10, 000 chickens in the near future, but again, the principal I see in Leviticus, is how God simply multiplies blessing when He sees obedience.  Do it God's way and He'll bless you for it.  So, once again, I am encouraged from one of the most unique books in the Bible that I have never enjoyed so much.  Little did we know that chasing chickens could be such a spiritual experience!

A Story of "Suddenly"

Yesterday's devotional was such an encouragement to me, but it wasn't what was written in the passages after the verses, though that was encouraging, too.  It was the verses themselves from Acts.  Here they are:

"Suddenly an angel of the Lord appeared and a light shone in the cell.  He struck Peter on the side and woke him up.  'Quick, get up!' he said, and the chains fell off Peter's wrists."  (Acts 12:7)

"About midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God... Suddenly ether was such a violent earthquake that the foundations of the prison were shaken.  At once all the prison doors flew open, and everybody's chains came loose."  (Acts 16:25-26)

I had all the kids sitting around me and I asked them what they had noticed in the two passages.  To me, it was obvious.  I'm not sure they caught on right away.  I explained what had jumped off the page to me.

Immediately, the phrases I "bolded" above stood out to me - "Suddenly", "chains fell off", and "everybody's chains came loose."  Without even reading what the devotional said, I immediately felt such a sense of hope from God's Word.  It was just like I had written the day before.  God can do anything He wants.... and without warning.  He can free us with an angel coming to visit or with an earthquake... and our chains will fall off and we will be loosed.

Such an encouragement!  Then I did read the following devotional and it reminded me of how God can and will be a deliverer.  One author wrote, "He possesses a resourcefulness equal to any difficulty."  Nothing in my life is a challenge to Him or a surprise.  "It is always safe to trust God's methods and to live by His clock."

It closed with these great words, "Difficulty is actually the atmosphere surrounding a miracle, or a miracle in its initial stage.  Yet if it is to be a great miracle, the surrounding condition will be not simply a difficulty but an utter impossibility."

So, once again, that's how we prayed, so grateful for what appears to be utter impossibility, for difficulties, that we might just truly be in the initial stages of a miracle.  As we sat around the table, immediately I asked the kids, "Don't you remember when God has worked like this in our lives?  Can you remember a time?  I sure can!"  I quickly retold one of the greatest stories of God's working out a miracle in our lives at a time of utter impossibility.

It was when I was only a few weeks from delivery our 7th baby.  We were in the middle of building the house and had been told we needed to leave the rental house as our landlords intended to move in.  We needed a place to live for only a few more weeks until the house had its occupancy permit.  Otherwise we were going to be homeless.  I mentioned it at our ladies' prayer meeting that week as a point of prayer.  Later on that same week, I went to another ladies' spring banquet where there was a speaker who spoke on how faithless the disciples were as they went out fishing and caught nothing.  Yet because Jesus told them to try again, they did, and of course there nets were overflowing.  I can't remember much of her talk except I came home encouraged to think I just needed to believe that God was going to provide "fish" for us.  I shared it with the children the next morning, specifically thinking about housing, when suddenly the phone started ringing.  Within a few minutes, I had two phone calls from women at church saying they had accommodations for us.  One was a little further away, but would have been suitable and one was slightly closer.  We just needed to go check them out.  I hung up the phone in awe!  Within minutes of sharing what I felt we needed to do, God was beginning to work "suddenly"!

Off we went to visit the one closer by - it was amazing!  Our friends had just finished their basement, intending to rent it out.  They were willing to let a family with 6 children and two adults stay downstairs, oh, and of course I was still imminently due... very brave of them.  This is when the miracle became apparent.  Up till this point, the places we had been staying had no air conditioning.  It had to be the hottest spring on record, or at least that's how it felt to this very pregnant mom.  I was dying!  I wasn't sleeping, I was getting more and more swollen, and was generally suffering - not to mention the emotional upheaval I was experiencing.  It made for a very bad combination.

When we moved into their basement, which had 3 bedrooms (unheard of for a basement apartment), I nearly died and went to heaven.  Not only did the air conditioning work, but it seemed to work unusually hard because we were downstairs.  All of my discomfort was gone!  On top of that, just because God can do this, He threw in a pool.  Yup, our friends upstairs also had a pool which our children were allowed to use pretty much whenever they wanted to.  I'm not sure my friends' knew what they had signed up for when they let us move in!  My kids were in that pool nearly all day it seemed!  The miracle there was I didn't have to go anywhere!!!!  I could waddle up the stairs with my coffee and sit and watch them or even go in the pool to cool off myself.  It was heaven on earth.  On top of all that, God gave me a friend to talk to the whole time I was there.  My friend who lived upstairs became someone I came to know even better just because we saw each other everyday in the backyard by the pool!  Perhaps she doesn't even realize the gift she was to me during that very hard time in my life (you know now, dear friend!)

The funny side of the story is that I ended up giving birth in their basement - didn't quite make it to the hospital.... and our 7the baby became known as "Basement Baby".  Oddly enough, and just to keep the bond between the two families strong, he was born on their daughter's 1st birthday!  God has a sense of humour.

As I reminded the kids of the story, it encouraged us to know God has worked "suddenly" in our lives, without warning.  I never in a million years could have pictured we would have lived at our friend's house, in their basement!  I had actually prepared myself for camping the rest of the summer... what a relief that God had a better plan, a "resourcefulness equal to any difficulty", so I am filled with hope.

The Number Seven

I am no movie reviewer, but I can tell if I like a movie or not.  We went to War Room on Friday night, just RM and me, and we left very inspired.  The writing for the movie isn't fantastic, but the premise is - pray, pray, pray and be on guard for the spiritual warfare that is all around us.  That is pretty much it in a nutshell.

Though we've always prayed and always been aware of spiritual warfare, it was a great wake up call to be even more on guard.  Specifically, the movie has the wife praying for her husband.  I do pray for RM all the time, but again, it was so good to be reminded to be even more specific in my prayers, more intentional, more disciplined and praying against the enemy in his life who longs to have him frustrated, confused, depressed - all things so many men battle.

The last few mornings have seen me up as soon as I am awoken.  It has been earlier than usual, but I figure, if I'm being woken up, I better get up.  So down I go.  I had been keeping a separate journal alongside the blog, but with the busy summer days, I hadn't been writing in it for a while.  In that journal I did record all my prayers, wrote them all out.  I picked it up again and starting writing feverishly!  I can see how Satan tried to sideline those prayers, even the writing, as the pen is one of God's weapons.

Yesterday was Thanksgiving Day - gorgeous weather.  We had slowly but surely been bringing in the grapes.  We froze many liters of grape juice and even some bags of grapes to be made into pies at a later date.  But yesterday, knowing the weather is going to turn cold soon, we gave it one last effort. That morning, when I'd gotten up to read and pray, I couldn't believe what I read in the Bible.  Sometimes I want to skip over certain books, like Leviticus - how in the world can they apply to me when it's talking about leprosy or certain skin conditions, but I read it anyway thinking there must be something.  So there I was, in Leviticus 25,and sure enough it was about grapes, couldn't believe it....

"For six years you shall sow your field, and for six years you shall prune your vineyard and gather in its fruits..."

We haven't exactly been pruning the vineyard ourselves until this year, but still, there were so many neat parallels in our lives in this verse.  We've been in Niagara now for 6 years - this was the year we pruned our vineyard for the first time, in our 6th year, and this was the year we were literally gathering in our fruits.  It was a great picture.

I read on.  I've discovered the Bible uses the number seven a lot.  In the 7th year, often there is freedom from bondage.  For example, in Exodus 21:2 it says, "When you buy a Hebrew slave, he shall serve six years, and in the seventh he shall go out free, for nothing....".  There is also a time of rest, such as on the Sabbath, or a time to let the land rest in the seventh year.

Still in the passage following Leviticus 25, it goes on to describe the Year of Jubilee.  After seven periods of seven years, 49 years, they celebrate the Year of Jubilee.  Verse 10 says it best, "And you shall consecrate the fiftieth year and proclaim liberty throughout the land to all its inhabitants."  The Israelites are not supposed to plant in the 7th year which makes no sense as they will need to eat, but Bible addresses that question....." And if you say, 'What shall we eat in the seventh year, if we may not sow or gather in our crop?' I will command my blessing on you in the sixth year, so that it will produce a crop sufficient for three years."

Ok, so what am I getting at..... all I know is we are in the seventh year now of going at this mortgage debt thing.  We calculate it based on when we decided to sell our house back in the city, build a new one to sell and kill debt.  We don't know if we start the debt clock from the time we listed or when we sold or even when we moved here, but we know, generally speaking it was 6 years ago, just entering our 7th.  We are no different than the Israelites in that we haven't been perfect in our debt resolve for the entire 6 years.  We have had really good months where we are extremely diligent and then really bad months where we have been tired of being good, but all in all, we've stayed focused, knowing that we long for freedom from debt.

We just wonder, could it, might it, possibly, hopefully, be this year?  We have no reason to believe it will be.  There are no big contracts out there, no obvious things that we know of to suspect it could be this year.  When the Israelites ask, "What shall we eat if we aren't supposed to sow or gather?"  God's answer is so simple, "I will command my blessing on you in the sixth year."  Am I allowed to pray that?  I think so?!  The reason I like God's answer so much is that it really has nothing to do with anything that makes sense - the only reason they'll eat is because God makes their crop produce enough for three years.  It wasn't anything they would do.  I have a funny feeling that's how it would probably be with us, too - it would only be because God would command His blessing on us.  We will stay faithful in what He has required of us, but really any work we've ever gotten is entirely because God has chosen to bless us.  So, will this year be any different than any other?  We don't know except that we have seen how God uses numbers in the Bible to represent certain things and in the case of the seventh year, it can mean freedom, rest, liberty.  One of the requirements in the Year of Jubilee is that they are to proclaim "liberty throughout the land".  Would I be willing to do that?  YES!  A RESOUNDING YES!!!!

I know that in writing this, I may be setting myself up for a fall as God is not a genie nor is it a lucky number thing as in Vegas.  He may have a completely different plan, better than I can imagine.  He may still keep us in prison for awhile longer, or even for my entire life as He knows I may just need to stay in a position of humility for that length of time.  I have read of people who have taken longer than 7 years to get out of debt.  However, I still wanted to write about it, to document what I'm learning as I read and study.  I will proclaim whatever God wants me to proclaim, not just freedom from debt.  He is about much more than just me and my little debt issue.  That's actually one of the greatest things I've discovered as I've been writing about this for two years now.  As I've written many times a week, most of the time it isn't about money or getting out of debt.  I've found I've written more about the faithfulness of God to our family and how He is such a personal and loving God than I've written about debt strategy.

Interestingly, the number 3 is also in the Bible - it is the 3rd day where we see Christ risen from the dead.  Victory over death.  I started blogging about all of this almost exactly 2 years ago.  I'm now going into my 3rd year of blogging.  How I long to see victory in my 3rd year of writing!  So, it's a big year potentially ahead of us, our 7th year of attempting to kill debt and the 3rd year of writing about it, coincidence?  Don't know.  I'm certainly aware that I need to remain faithful no matter what happens, but as I've written before, until God stops me from praying for freedom, I will keep praying and keep trying to be as good with the finances He's blessed us with as possible.  Just like in the movie Facing the Giants, right before the big final game of the season, the players decide what they're reaction will be, "We'll praise Him if we win and we'll praise Him if we lose." This is no football game, but the idea still applies.  We, too, will praise Him if He frees us this year and we'll praise Him if He doesn't.

Hardly a Regular Week

So we got some slightly shocking news the other day..... my daughter's arm modeling career is over.  That's right, she'll never be an arm model.  Why?  Because of her broken arm!  It seems in the healing process, she acquired what is called "growth arrest" in one section near her elbow where it should not have healed.  This means her arm will never fully straighten now.  She'll always have one arm slightly bent.  No big deal.  We weren't planning an arm modeling career anyway, however, the doctor is now concerned more "growth arrest" could possibly continue to occur affecting her growth yet again in that area of her elbow.  Solution?  Surgery.  Uh, no.

I thought this was going to be the last appointment this past week.  It has now turned into more appointments!  Not happy.  However, it is another area to trust the Lord for proper healing. 

Silly things really bug me about going to the hospital.  Mainly the cost of the parking.  It is nearly $20 every time I go.  It feels like I'm throwing money away each visit.  I have to choose to not let it bother me.  I also can't stand the wait.... almost always 3 hours per visit for a 10 minute appointment.

This past appointment, I sat in the waiting room and I just prayed, "Lord, bring me someone to talk to."  I always hope it'll be someone I haven't seen since high school or from years ago, but this time, I go to talking with the lady beside me and it turns out she was from the same area as me in Niagara and is going to a church that is associated with one that we have been considering.  I had a chance to grill her with questions.  It was fascinating!  Of all the people God could have sent.  It was really neat.  Meanwhile, we still have not settled on one, so we trust the Lord for His clarity, too, in this area of our lives.

I also have self-proclaimed this week "Birthday Week".  I am not shy about announcing my birthday to my family.  I joke that each day something special will happen.  Not because people have to plan things.  I just look forward to what the week will hold, never knowing how things will unfold.  This week, oddly enough, I have had really neat blessings for the whole week.  Simple things, and perhaps it is just a regular week, but my eyes are more open to the blessings around me.

It started by attending our friend's Sound of Music Concert - amazing.  They performed with their violins and cello all the songs from Sound of Music as well as some singing of a couple of the classics with their whole family.  It was like I was at the Austrian concert hall!  Such a blessing to all who came.

The next day was the Above Rubies Retreat.  I could go on and on about that.  I've already shared what I learned with a small group of women and they were all determined to go and switch their kitchens around to make their family dinners work better, too!

Sunday was "Kitchen Renovation Day" and we had a lovely family over for the afternoon.

Monday was Doctor Appointment Day.  I had been gone for hours and when I came home, I walked into an absolutely spotless kitchen, candles burning and my daughter busying herself around the kitchen tidying as she walked.  I was speechless and said, "The kitchen looks so clean!"  She responded, "Birthday week!"  So sweet!  The day ended in pizza, so that was fun.

Tuesday was Hang Out With Husband Night, which I always enjoy, and Make Pie Night.

Wednesday, my daughter headed out to get some groceries for me.  She came home and I heard rustling of paper.  I headed back into the kitchen to find a bouquet of flowers - that girl gets Birthday Week!

Tonight, I'll head out for dinner with my sister and mom which is a tradition that I love.

Tomorrow, who knows, perhaps a dinner with my husband as I received a lovely coupon from his parents to go out.  We had hoped for a night away, but we have to pass this year due to our long holiday!  Makes sense.

So, perhaps it is just a regular week, but I'm just a little kid inside who was raised to love birthdays!  My husband doesn't have to worry about spending money though.  My gift list is all from the Dollar Store!  I just need a new colander/sieve with a handle that isn't broken!  So, truly, I'm easy to please.....

Vineyards We Did Not Plant

It's been nearly 3 days with my "new" kitchen and we are all just loving it.  Oddly, my kitchen seems bigger and cleaner!  The times around the table are richer and more meaningful.  The little ones aren't even running off as much and the conversations go on and on.  I was worried I was losing an island for prep space, but I gained one that is probably nearly 3x as long!  It's even made homeschooling easier as I can walk around the table as they all work on their books, whereas before, when the table was up against the wall under one of the windows it was so limiting.  I was marking all the kids things upside down across the table, very awkward!  So, once again, so glad we made the effort.

Harvest time for grapes has definitely come if not passed.  We are trying to get a grape harvester in, but so is everyone around here, so we're finding it hard to get someone in.  Meanwhile, we pick the grapes ourselves and are enjoying them so much.  I had been so disappointed that we hadn't planted a garden this year, but as it turns out, we wouldn't have even been here when all the vegetables would need to be harvested.  The grapes have given me a big enough challenge as it is.  We've already canned some juice and jelly has been made.  Last night, I took on the challenge of grape pie.  Not for the faint of heart.  You have to separate all the seeds from the skins one at a time, there is no shortcut on that.  Then the pulp and seeds have to be boiled.  Then you have to separate the seeds from the pulp through a sieve.  Then mix all the pulp with the skins, sugar and lemon juice.  It is quite a process, but I think I have a few grape pie believers in the family now.  "To die for" were the words out of RM's mouth......

It got me thinking.  We make desserts all year.  Probably once a week, maybe more often.  All the ingredients for desserts are often very expensive.  I made a decision last night.  I think I'm going to try to process enough grapes for a year of desserts.  I started to think about how much work it would be, but it would save us so much money!  Yes, everyone would probably hate grape pie after a while, but I can mix it up a bit!  Grape crumble!  Or grape sauce on ice-cream!  Ha.  I'm not sure if they'll buy it, but who cares!  I'm trying to save us some money! 

The other blessing about the farm is that we also have a few apple trees on the property.  They aren't huge apples as we don't spray them or prune the trees.  They've been growing wild for years, but they still taste good.  So I think I'm also going to try to go nuts and process a ton of apples for pies and applesauce as well.  At this rate it doesn't sound like I'll be sleeping I suppose, and perhaps I've bitten off more than I can chew, pardon the pun, but I'm feeling quite determined!

I still marvel at the new life we have.  I would never have attempted any of these types of things when I was in the city.  It was almost as if I didn't know these ideas existed or that people even did canning.  I guess I just never thought about how things were done before.  Moving out here has really been the most stretching experience of our lives.

It also continues to bring scripture to life.  Joshua 24:13 says it so well...'

"So I gave you a land on which you did not toil and cities you did not build; and you live in them and eat from vineyards and olive groves that you did not plant."

I think that is so amazing that a verse like that even exists in the Bible.  It's as if it were written for me personally.  Ok, maybe we don't have olive groves, but we have apple groves!  We really are eating from our vineyard, not to mention living in a house we didn't build and enjoying all the barns that were here when we got here. 

So we see the blessing of the Lord in the fruitfulness of the farm.  It is also all the children's hard work come full circle from the Spring when they spent long hours in the vineyard pruning.  I wonder if we'll have them do that again.  I can't see why not!  Now they are literally enjoying the fruit of their labour and we didn't pay anyone to do it. 

Unfortunately, I can't rely on RM for much help getting the grapes off the vines as he injured his hand this week on his compound bow.  It was a freak accident that has left him with a hand looking like a muppet.  So, he's been trying to nurse it back to health, but it'll be a slow recovery!

I'll end on another verse similar to the Joshua 24 verse.  Deuteronomy 6:11, 12 says "...and houses full of good things you did not fill, and cisterns that you did not dig, and vineyards and olive trees that you did not plant - and when you eat and are full, then take care lest you forget the Lord, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery."  We are still in the house of slavery perhaps, but we've been brought out of slavery in other ways and really are enjoying so much that we cannot take credit for.  The warning at the end of those verses is so key, "then take care lest you forget the Lord...".  We know it is nothing we've done, just His mercy towards us.

A Whole New Kind of Conversion

I've done conversions in a kitchen before where you have to change milliliters to teaspoons, but I've never seen the kind of conversion I'm about to describe to you....

It all started years ago when we first heard someone describe his kitchen table.... supposedly it seated 20 people.  There was a reason he loved his table - all his guests could sit around it and enjoy the hospitality he and his wife loved to offer others.  That put a thought in my husband's head that he just couldn't shake.  How could we do that?  But we were not in a position to buy a 20 person table and even if we could, our kitchen wasn't big enough to fit it.  So many times we had stood in our kitchen and wondered how we could fit a bigger table without knocking down a wall.  The only way we could do it was to take out the island and that was possible, but I needed all the drawers that were full of things I regularly used in the island.

Then we thought, how about moving the table a few steps away to the homeschool room?  Big enough, for sure, but I wanted to eat in the kitchen!  It just made it so much more complicated to walk all the way to the other room.  Not to mention, where was I supposed to put all the toys and things in the homeschool room if there were suddenly a big table smack dab in the middle of the room? 

After all those potential scenarios, as much as my husband didn't like it, I just couldn't see a way to do it, so I dropped it.  He left it.  We carried on.  Sure enough, for awhile now, every meal has resulted in our family scattered everywhere as there is just not enough space for all of us.  Some sat at the island.  Some sat at the table.  RM and I would even have to move to the family room.  We both hated it, but didn't feel we had a solution.

Now flash forward to this past weekend.  I made a last minute decision, literally in the 11th hour, just before 11 pm on Friday night to go see Nancy Campbell from Above Rubies who had flown in one more time to Ontario for another retreat similar to last year.  So early Saturday morning, a friend and I, as well as my oldest daughter, drove off two hours to London.

I am soooooooo glad I decided to go.  This year, just like last year, she gave a much smaller group of women the same call as last year to be the best moms and wives that we have been called to be, reminding us of the importance of family worship as well as the call to hospitality.  All things I knew, all things I've been trying to do.  It was a great refill to my Mom and Wife "tank".  This year, because it was a smaller group of women, she had been asked to model for us exactly how she and her husband, Colin, actually do their family worship in their home by role playing it as we ate lunch and dinner together.  It was amazing!

The evening family dinner time was what struck me the most.  The tables had been set up in such a way that we were eating as if we were a family with Nancy as both Mom and Dad.  She modeled how at dinner they guide the conversation each night with a very specific question as simple as "What was the best thing that happened to you today?" instead of just rambling through dinner with less meaningful conversation.  Each night it is a different question.  The point is family togetherness. When you come to the table it isn't just about filling you with food.  She suggested it is an opportunity to fill your soul and spirit as well.  The only way to do this is to engage their spirit through conversation and their soul by the reading of the Word. I had tried that as she had suggested it last year, too, but as our family kept growing bigger and bigger, we could never sit together and this resulted in all sorts of conversations going on that just were never together. 

Our conversation around the table that night was very fun.  Nancy asked us to describe the most special thing that happened at our weddings.  Each one of us went on and on when it came to us.  Some even teared up as they recalled their weddings.  It was such a better way to spend the typical dinner hour and what a wonderful way to get to know one another, especially as none of us really knew one another that well. 

I came back that night late, but RM and I stayed up late into the night talking once again about all that I had heard and learned.  Just as I was about to fall asleep, I said one more thing to him, "Oh, by the way, tomorrow we're changing everything around in the kitchen or the homeschool room.  We're going to make the table fit us somehow."  "Oh, ok...." he mumbled as he was already half asleep.

That next morning we were standing in the kitchen, a little more awake, and we looked at our situation in the kitchen and thought once again, how could this work?  I still didn't love the idea of walking all the way to the homeschool room, so how could we get rid of the island to turn the table the other way so it could fit all of us (with another table attached at the end for more people)?  Suddenly it hit him.  The miracle began to unfold.  I love it when that happens!  In under two hours we had a whole new kitchen..... This all started around 10 am.  Only 2 1/2 hours later we were expecting lunch guests, a family of 6!  We were renovating literally minutes before they arrived.

So this is what we did.  We moved the island to the other end of the kitchen where there was just enough space for it if we cut off the overhang on the top of it.  Fortunately it hadn't been attached to the floor, so it slid nicely, revealing all sorts of things that needed to be mopped.  Also, fortunately, my husband had a skill saw which chopped it off nicely, but definitely meant we were doing something more permanent!  Kind of hard to attach the piece he was cutting off later!  The island now occupied a space in the corner of the kitchen so I still had my pots and pans nearby.  We then moved the table to the center of the kitchen and just turned it around 90 degrees so it was taking up the length of the kitchen instead of the width.  My husband ran out to his office and got the little table he had been using, cleared it off and brought it into the kitchen adding it to the end of the other table making it much longer, able to seat at least 6 more people. There was still lots of room for people to pass by.  It was starting to look good!  Here's a picture of the final product....we add the big church pew when we need it, otherwise it sits against the wall opposite the table.

For seating, we had an old church pew which could seat quite a few people along one side.  We found a few more chairs around the house adding them to our other chairs in addition to a small bench and even the piano bench if necessary.  It was amazing the transformation that happened.  Soon, our guests were about to arrive.  We set the table and amazingly, it looked like all 16 of us would be able to sit around the table!  We couldn't believe it!  My husband and I were so happy!

Then, when they did arrive, I explained, "You have to know, you are walking into a kitchen that looked completely different only an hour ago!"  I told them that I had gone to the Above Rubies retreat and how I had been so inspired to make all these changes, even if it was just minutes before they came.  Then, I told them where they were to sit.  Nancy had reminded us, "Never tell your guests to just sit anywhere.  They are important!  You must make them feel like they are special and that you have a place for them!"  So I told them, "Because we don't all know each other that well (we hadn't had them over as a family ever before, just the moms had connected), let's sit with one person from your family and then make sure the next person is from our family so that you don't sit beside someone you know."  Then, in the spirit of good conversation I told them what we would talk about!  How funny, I was being so obnoxious, but I loved it!  I told them, "Ok, once you have your food, we'll start with introductions of ourselves.  You have to say who you are and what your interests or hobbies are."  It was amazing!  I found out things about this family and their children that I never would have!  It led to amazing questions from one another as each person revealed interesting information about themselves.  It was so great.  I think the best part was that the children were involved.  Instead of being set far away from the adults, they were now a part of the conversation and I could tell they couldn't wait to be asked what they loved to do.  My son looked up to me and said, "You haven't asked me what I like to do yet!" 

The most interesting thing about the afternoon was that we all ended up sitting in the kitchen (after a tour of the farm) all afternoon, literally from 1-7.  I couldn't believe it.  No one got up.  We went from lunch to coffee and dessert to more coffee and then eventually I had to put in a frozen pizza to feed them for dinner!  The conversation just wouldn't stop!  And what was so fantastic in the whole process was that the children never left the room.  Only the little ones played outside, the ones under 7.  Everyone stayed and listened and participated.  It was our dream come true of what we longed for in our hospitality.  Thank you, Nancy, for inspiring me once again!

Today I came down to my new kitchen and I just loved it.  It feels like another answer to prayer as not a single dollar was spent, no walls were knocked down, no furniture was bought, yet God opened our eyes to what we could do and in a matter of minutes we had a whole new room, a new table, a new opportunity to be hospitable.  And Nancy's whole point?  Hospitality changes lives.  It brings salvation!  Sounds impossible, but in Acts it describes how the new church daily broke bread together, both communion as well as actual meals, and then it says how many were added to their numbers.  Breaking bread together is part of people coming to the Lord!  I have lived this and have proof in the person of Stephanie finding Christ through hospitality in our home as well as Jen who found wholeness as well.  Not because of us, but because we were willing to be used by Him despite the fact our house wasn't perfect, wasn't completely anything!  Just trying to be obedient, having people over.  Now, I feel like we can take hospitality to a whole new level and I am excited about it!  The mom who came over yesterday said, "I needed this reminder to have people over.  I haven't done it in a long time."  She left inspired, too.

There you have it.  My kitchen got converted!  I told you it wasn't your typical conversation story.....

Planks of Thanks

How many emotional events can one person handle in a day?????  Yesterday our good friends left for potentially forever.  In a last attempt to put off saying goodbye, we delayed and delayed the final words until they were all actually in their vehicles, out of their house, on the actual route to the west.  So yesterday morning, after they had packed all their gear in their trailer, they were going to come by our house for the official final goodbye.  I wasn't prepared for it.

I knew they would come up the same way they always had where I could see them from my kitchen window, so no need for emotion, but this time, when they drove up the road, there was a trailer on their van.  It was a new image that I hadn't seen before - the trailer.  It signified so many things - they were really leaving, never coming back.  This wasn't a quick coffee visit or another time to play cricket with them, this was a visit to say good bye.  Of course, the emotions took over and I was feeling all welled up inside.

Almost as soon as my friend got out of the van, she was crying, too.  I couldn't stand it.  But what I loved about the whole bumbling mess of tears was that we quickly came inside to get out of the wind and I still was able to get her over to my mixing bowl where I asked her why my bread wasn't turning out!  I think that has been one of the neatest things in our friendship!  She has taught me so much about the workings of the kitchen and the wonders of doing more from scratch than I ever thought possible.  She's put me on to challenging the status quo of regular eating and pushed me to really do things I've never done or even considered doing!  Because of her, I've learned to make my own bread, mill my own flour, pickle things I didn't know I could, make sausages, soak grains, make cream cheese.... the list goes on and on.  She's always doing research and then shares what she's learned with me.  The best part is, her mother-in-law has caught on to all this healthy cooking and is planning on coming over to visit me and teach me even more as she is going to need a grandkid fix now that they're leaving town (which I can provide!) so I'll still get a tutor!  So all that to say, there we were with tear-stained faces and she said, "I'll email you tonight to see if your bread worked out!"  Such a great friend through all these years. 

They pulled away and I just couldn't believe they were gone.  I found out later all of our children had exchanged little gifts without me even knowing it, that made me tear up again.  Each one had given something so significant, like a coin my son had been wanting for ages.  Another child gave my son his famous Rubik's cube, with the instructions on how to use it, so sweet, a real treasure for that boy. 

I was a little shaky the rest of the morning.  If somebody mentioned something about our friends, I would find myself near tears again. 

Meanwhile, all week we had been waiting for the mystery cheque.  We had been told it was sent, but it wasn't showing up.  The day before my husband used the classic words, "If it doesn't come tomorrow, I don't know what we'll do."  I've heard those words before and it always strikes fear in me, so I really had to fight it.  If the devil knows I'm weak I can hit it with attacks all day and literally all night.  I'll wake up and start thinking about our finances and it will just make me feel sick so that I can't get back to sleep.

This time, as the attacks came, I was a little more prepared.  We had been doing family worship more regularly than ever, in the morning and in the evening and then again during school, so we were constantly reading the Bible together or praying.  It was a time of tremendous faith being grown when I look back.  I also have my trusty Ann Voskamp calendar near by me everyday and she was like a friend living with me all week knowing what was going on.  She wrote, "Trust is the bridge from yesterday to tomorrow, built with planks of thanks.  Remembering frames up gratitude.  Gratitude lays out the planks of trust.  If I can thank God for the good of the past, I can trust Him for the good of the future, no matter what lies down that road.  I can walk the planks - from known to unknown - and know:  He holds.  I could walk unafraid."  That was it - I needed to walk unafraid, too, so I had to make a decision.  Would I trust?

One time I remember being at the washer and dryer, folding clothes and the fear started to enter my thoughts.  I consciously took the thought and decided, "I will not be afraid.  There is nothing to fear.  I am trusting you, Lord."  The fear left. 

Each day the mail truck came this week, we ran to the mailbox, but nothing.  Then my husband made that statement about not knowing what to do, so when the mail truck came yesterday, I was super excited to see if it had come.  My daughter ran out and brought in a hand full of mail.  "Give it to me!"  I said with a scary mom voice.  Ahhhhh, the right coloured envelope was in the pile!  I made sure by ripping it open and then just leaned back and said, "Thank you, Lord.  Run, go give this to Dad."

"Thank you, Jesus," were his words when he found out.  "I know what I'll be doing today......". That always means he'll be paying all the angry suppliers.  What a blessing to be able to pay the people you owe!  In the "olden" days, we would have gone out for dinner to celebrate when a cheque had come in.  Lately we hadn't done that as we were trying to be more careful, but yesterday, in the name of relief and perhaps just as a blessing to the family, RM said, "Do you have dinner plans?"  So at 4 pm, we all jumped in the van, mailed some cheques to the suppliers, went to a quick eye appointment for my daughter and then went to sit down and celebrate God's goodness at a restaurant.

It was a lovely time.  Everyone was thoroughly enjoying the surprise dinner outing.  We had a great waitress, good food.  RM and I had been talking throughout the whole dinner about how both of us had really decided to not be afraid.  He is very prone to fear, too, but knows he needs to stretch his faith, so he told me how he knew that God knew if we needed that money.  He reminded me of the George Mueller story we had read years ago about being completely out of food, yet he had the children in his orphanage set the table, sit down to it and give thanks as they waited literally for God to supply their needs.  Sure enough, just at that point, a bread truck broke down outside the orphanage and food was supplied in the 11th hour.  RM told me, "A bread truck will break down in front of our house if God wants it to." We had no idea a bread truck was about to break down right then and there.

Just then, the waitress came up to me and leaned down, "I just wanted to let you know, your bill has been taken care of...... you have a lovely family."  "What?"  I couldn't comprehend what was going on.  Did I just hear her correctly?  This was no little coffee bill, it was a bill for 10 people, 6 of whom had eaten adult meals, not little kids meals.  My husband saw the look on my face, "What's going on?"  I think he must have thought there was a problem.  I told him what she said, "Someone has paid for our bill!"  Disbelief from him, too.  For the second time today, tears were in my eyes (seriously, I was already unstable!).  "Who?  Are we allowed to know?"  "No, they didn't want you to know.  But they wanted you to know you have a lovely family."  Were we being watched that closely?  What did they see?  We had prayed together, was that it?  What was it?????  We were stunned.  My thoughts were swirling around in my brain.  The goodness of God - we were living it yet again.  In one day we'd seen His provision of friendship and then the provision of finances and then the provision of a miracle, just because.  Our children were just as stunned.  I can only think that God gave us that miracle for our children, as a tangible reminder of how "planks of thanks" are what we must walk on.  That is how God works.  We thanked Him for His provision in the restaurant and the miracle was imminent, as Voskamp has written.  We are living proof of the amazing ways God works. 

As we walked out of the restaurant, I looked at the waitress who just couldn't stop smiling at me.  She patted me on the arm because she could see I was still on the verge of tears and said, "Have a lovely evening."  I wanted to sit her down and say, "Do you realize the significance of this?!  Do you know what this means to us?!  Do you have any idea?!"  I wanted to tell her our whole story.  It occurred to me later, I wondered if she paid for it!  I have no idea who our angel was, but we sure had a meaningful family worship when we got home, praying for whoever it was to be blessed.  We thanked God, each one of us right down to the littlest boy. 

Today is a different day.  RM isn't feeling the same pressure he felt 24 hours ago.  We aren't out of the woods yet, but God is continuing to show us He is taking care of us.  I pray we won't be like the Israelites and forget so quickly, but instead that we will remember.  Voskamp wrote, "Because remembering with thanks reminds them not only of the character of God....  but emboldens them to fiercely trust God for their future."  I want to be like that, fiercely trusting God for my future.