To Be Still and Know

April 6th, 2020

Hello All! I'm home, I'm starting to get bored, I figured it's time to dust off the ol' public journal...errr I mean blog. I was homeschooled until I was 17, guys. HOMESCHOOLED. I should be well prepared for this quarantine thing. I should be a master. BUT, even then I had youth group and church to break up the days at home. PLUS, I lived in the days of instant messenger on facebook and MSN and I feel like TYPE chatting to people was also helpful. I haven't washed my hair/done make up in a long time.. so I'm not big into video calls.. but if anyone wants to type chat, I'm here for it. 

OKAY.. anyways.. thats a quick peep into my current life. We're all holed up, we're all doing a million Instagram challenges and we're all getting sick of them at the same time. 

Yesterday I finished my second book since the shut down started and in TRYING to keep off my phone, I experienced straight up boredom. I was so bored! I started unloading my dishwasher and cleaning things ( Which I USUALLY dislike doing). Guys, I'm caught up on laundry. My bed is made. These are all miraculous things that don't happen when my life is full of things and places to go and parties to host and attend and life. 

I had a nephew say the most profound things once when looking into my overly stuffed and pack trunk of my car, I said, "ha.. my trunk is a mess!" and his profound 5 year-old self said, "It's not a mess! It just has a lot of stuff in it." (MY HEART!) Profound. BECAUSE, when life is crazy and my laundry spilling out of the dryer and my closet and the floor, my house a mess but its because my life has a lot of stuff in it. 

Anyways, life has slowed down quite a lot lately. Instead of our Sunday rush of going to church, coming home and quick grabbing lunch before Shane's volley ball game and then quick rushing home to give Emma a little attention before rushing off to my Women's Bible study. And that's just how our SUNDAYS went. Monday through Friday was mixed with work and being at the school to direct play practice, connection group and whatever other sports event going on. Busy, good, full. 

But, God has been doing major reconstructive surgery on my heart lately and being busy doesn't really work very well when God wants you to be still and know Him. Any of my blogs written in the last several years touch on it a little. To sum up, right before Shane and I got married, one of our good friends at the time wrote this really long letter with some very unkind things in it but claimed it was all inspired by "God" and when we attempted to address the issues and restore the relationship, it went very poorly and we had to walk away from that friendship indefinitely. I've spent a good amount of the last 3 years sorting out God's true nature, my identity in Christ and how to love people who aren't loving. I never thought I'd be one to struggle so  much to love another person, but it's been a real battle. But, my husband has been a brave leader these last 3 years as well. Forcing me to pray when I didn't think I could. Forcing me to ask for healing when it felt like it hurt too much to fix. Reading scripture over me when I didn't have a taste for it.  But, the Lord laid it on my heart to be "Over it" by the end of this year. I mean, honestly, 3 years is already too long to be broken, right? But when your heart gets shredded, I don't think you can put a timeline on WHEN you'll be healed again. But, for me, it's time.

And the busy-free time to be still has opened up a space for me to rest in the Lord. To rest my heart in the Truth.