Take time to realize......

In a world that never sleeps there are a million things grabbing for our attention....So many demands we feel as though we have to fulfill. Everyone in our world has some kind of expectation that they look for us to meet each and everyday.

Somewhere in the chaos the ones we love most are the ones that their voice becomes muddled. The people that we love so much and that all our activity is for are the very ones that we can no longer hear because there is so much grabbing for our focus.

We can love someone with our heart....

The problem is the people we love can't feel or see our heart....They can only see where our time goes and who it goes to.

So eight weeks ago with a world that shouted for my attention I decided to mute everything and to just get quiet.......I stepped away from a lot, and took time to realize what matters most.....

At the end of life what matters? Why do I do all that I do?

At the end of eight weeks I have realized that it really doesn't matter if the shoes are always put where they belong. What matters more are the little feet that fill shoes. When I look back over my life the placement of where the shoes were aren't going to matter....What we did while he was in those shoes is what we will remember the most.

Sometimes we can get so busy trying to get where we are going that we forget to chill out and enjoy the journey. To take a deep breath and realize that God is the one driving and that I will get to where I am going at the perfect time. So my windows in my house have a few more fingerprints......Instead of worrying about those fingerprints I am enjoying every single one. Realizing where there will be a day when I will have a house with everything in place, and when that day comes I will look back on these days and miss the shoes out where they don't belong. I will miss the little fingerprints from children laughing outside while they play. There will be a day when toys won't be hidden all over my house......Then I will look back to the day I am in today and smile.....I will have memories not just of cleaning the messes but enjoying the ones that made those little messes.

Have you ever stopped to realize that we are always getting ready to enjoy life, but we never actually start? We always say one day we are going to get away and do this or that....but we never do?

Last weekend we went on a mini family vacation in the middle of everything we just got away with our kids and had the best time. They did story time in their pajamas.....They ate food in the hotel bed. We did nothing but love on them and do anything they wanted to do.....We just took time to love the day we were in.

The greatest day of your life is today....The greatest blessings you will ever have are all around you right now. Today is the day you realize that your joy doesn't lie in your someday but rather it lies your today....Today has everything you need to live a happy fulfilled life...The question is have you taken time to realize it?

This just isn't fitting...

Rylan was four years old and loved cowboy boots. The only problem is the cowboy boots that used to fit him when he was three no longer fit him. One morning he was so sad because he wanted to wear those boots to school. I pleaded my case as to why the boots don't fit and that he would be so uncomfortable all day long if he chose to wear him. Even with all my good points he did not believe me. In his eyes he was still the same size and hadn't grown at all. In these moments you can either let them trust what you are saying is true or you can let them have their way so they can experience what you have told them is true. Needless to say that was one of the longest days of his life he came home and his feet hurt so bad. He was adamant that he would NEVER wear those boots again.
Unfortunately the mind of a four year old only remembers pain for a few days then he wanted to wear those boots again....Thus we went thru the whole ordeal again. After this time though I got rid of the boots so they would no longer tempt him any longer.
Rylan's story with his boots seems like a silly and obvious story in that he had outgrown the boots and shouldn't wear them right?
I have found though so many times in our life it isn't boots that we are trying to squeeze into it is relationships, attitudes, lifestyles, and a world that we don't fit into.

1Corinthians 4:10(msg)
We are the Messiah's misfits......

The further you go into the goodness of God the more you realize that the world you fit into a few years ago, months ago, weeks ago maybe days ago just doesn't fit you the same anymore. I have found that Christians are filled with pain and disappointment because we live in a way that we were never supposed to live. The Bible calls you a MISFIT not most popular. Sure we live in this world, but the moment you got saved you got the seed of everything that Jesus is on the inside of you. In that there are things in you that are bound to change in time.

Before I got pregnant with Rylan I hated tomatoes. Just the sight of them would make my stomach turn....That is until I got pregnant with him. I would dream of biting into large whole tomatoes. The sight of them would make my mouth begin to water. Finally I told my husband I can't stop thinking about eating tomatoes. What is wrong with me? He told me maybe you should try them again. I did and it was the most glorious thing I had eaten in weeks. To this day I love tomatoes now.

You see what was growing inside of me changed what I was hungry for. Changed my desires from what I used to like to new things that would have never appealed to me prior. It is much like when you begin in Christ the things that never appealed to you now is what you look forward to. There begins to develop a hunger that can't be quenched in anything else. I tried to be satisfied without eating the tomatoes however nothing worked. So many times we are hungry for what only the presence of God can bring and we try to fill it with careers, money, friends and other things. When what we are hungry for is more of Him.

I believe when we got saved there was a yearning inside of us to shine forth this light that has been implanted in us. To not just blend into the crowd but to stand up and stand out for Christ. To step out into miracles that are beyond our understanding. There is a longing on the inside of us to encounter this Messiah in ways that we never thought possible. I think when we get to Heaven we will see what all we could have accomplished if only we would have not worried about fitting in and just would have stood up for what God wanted us to do.

Isaiah 60:1,2
Arise and shine for your light has come. And the glory of the Lord has risen upon you. For behold darkness shall cover the earth and deep darkness the people; but the LORD shall arise over you, and His glory will be seen upon you.

There are several things that is happening in this verse let's look at it:
1. The Lord is telling you to arise. To get up means that first you must have fallen down right? So He is telling us no matter what problem has pushed you down it is time to get up again. That you can stand again.
2. Tells us that our light has come. Past tense. It is done. There is a light that is on you even when you are down or when you are standing. That the light is a fact no matter your position. He has placed this in you, and as you awaken to it there will be a response. That is response is that you will get up!
3. Next thing the Lord tells us is that we have light but that there is going to be a darkness around us, but not to worry that the light is still there. So many times the light of Christ in us if we got real honest makes us feel awkward because we don't see things like other people. We don't desire to live like other people, but being a light in a dark place makes us feel out of place and uncomfortable. So instead of shinning we just try to fit in where we were never made to fit in.

Again 1 Corinthians calls you a MISFIT! Paul calls us aliens in another text.

So I encourage you to SHINE. Don't worry about fitting into a world that you were never called to fit! When you decide to let the hunger of what is growing inside of you dictate your actions you will begin to walk in a fulfillment you didn't know was even possible. Together we can bring change to our world....It won't be done by trying to be like everyone else. It will come as we begin to step up and step out into what God has called us to!