Tag: bible memory

This is your 5 Minute Reminder to Stop Worrying

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I saw this today and thought, yep, that about sums up where I am right now. 

 

Now, I’m not sure if my theology quite  puts me at the place where I think God is deliberately setting me up, but I definitely think he allows me to get into places where I am not in control and all I can do is trust him. 

 

I have to tell you, I don’t like this place. When a problem presents itself, I am one of those people that wants to come up with a plan right away and then implement that plan right away, whether I have given it enough thought, prayer, counsel etc…I just want to be moving…forward…sideways…any direction, as long as I’m moving and not in a standstill. 

 

I am fortunate to have married the man I did. He is a great balance to me. His inner rhythm is at about half my tempo. Where I rush and scurry, he slowly ambers along. Where I finish the job quickly, though a bit messily, and perhaps not quite the way it was supposed to be, But it’s done! He methodically takes one step at a time, takes a lot longer than me, but ends up with a perfectly finished product that doesn’t need any tweaking. We balance each other well, because he can come to a complete standstill and sometimes needs a bit of nudging, while I need someone to rein me back a bit, hold on, let’s think about this a bit longer.

 

Right now we have two major areas in our life that need some solutions. Right now. Like, maybe yesterday. Or last month. 

 

And I am very impatient to see these areas fixed. Very impatient. It interrupts my sleep. It messes with my peace. I feel like I am on edge, unable to relax because these things are looming. 

 

In both situations, we can do nothing. We are waiting on other people to do their part, and we have no way of hurrying up the process. Though I am tempted to suggest some ideas, maybe if we did this, this, and this it would hurry it up? But really, that’s just me fretting. 

 

This past week, everywhere I turn, whether it be my daily bible reading, a church service, memes on Facebook…everywhere…the message says, over and over again. Trust God. Have Faith. Don’t Worry. And so, I say, yes, I am just going to give this to God and stop worrying. And then five minutes later I find my mind stuck in the same rut. Oh, yeah. Wait. I’m giving this over to God. Ok. 

 

This has not been one of those sunbeam-through-the-clouds situations where I say, Oh! I get it! I just need to trust that God is taking care of this, now I am going to stop worrying! No. It’s been more of a daily, every hour, turning it back over to God. Forgetting. Worrying. Turning it back over to God. Forgetting. Worrying. Turning it back over to God. If you get what I’m saying. 

 

Does this make me an imperfect Christian? Lacking in Faith? I don’t think so. No, I have not been an example of calm, unshakeable faith…but I have consistently been calling on God for help. God and I have had a lot of conversations about this. I feel an urgency to stay close and connected to him right now as my worries try to overwhelm me. I feel his hand on me, I know that not only is he working in the physical realm, but he’s also working on my heart, wanting to grow me in this area of faith. And that’s a good place to be. 

 

Last night I suddenly remembered that I hadn’t picked out our new Bible Memory Passage for the new school semester. This last semester we covered some of the basics with Psalm 23 and the Lord’s Prayer. We’ve already done my two other favorite Bible passages, Psalm 139 and 1 Corinthians 13. What should we memorize now? I flipped through my Bible and hit on the book of John. I love John. Especially the passages where Jesus prays for his disciples, and talks about the vine. I scanned a couple chapters and decided, lets do John 14: 1-6. 

 

So, this morning, I quickly looked at the first verse again, so I could memorize it and teach it to the kids while we were driving to school. 

 

It says,
“Let not your hearts be troubled. Believe in God; believe also in me.” (John 14:1)

 

And there you have it. My daily reminder to stop worrying, believe God is who he says he is, and he can do what he says he can do. 

 

I will continue to remind myself of this. Every five minutes if necessary.

 

Having Fun is Exhausting

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It’s Saturday night and we just got back from a family outing to Ripley’s Aquarium of the Smokies in Gatlinburg, TN. It was a special treat, a reward to my younger kids who memorized 1 Corinthians 13 this fall semester. It was our first time visiting.

Let me tell you. Having fun is exhausting. At least this kind of fun. For those of you not from around here, Gatlinburg and Pigeon Forge are the Tourist Towns of the Smokies. Pigeon Forge (which we drove through to get to Gatlinburg) is one long strip of amusement attractions: minigolf, outlet malls, go-cart racetracks, ferris wheels, exotic museums, dinner-and-a-show places, buildings that are made to look upside down, a Titanic looking building, buildings with King Kong on top of them. It’s quite a sight. We have never taken our children to any of these attractions, but they were all quite delighted just to drive past all these crazy-looking places. My five year old exclaimed, “This is the funnest road ever!!” It was bumper-to-bumper traffic and by the time we got to Gatlinburg the traffic was barely crawling along. The sidewalks were overflowing with people, the parking lots and garages all had FULL signs on them and I felt a bit like I was at CARNIVAL or some such occasion, instead of a Saturday during Christmas break.

I am curious if it’s always like that, or was it just crazy because it’s Christmas and New Years? I wouldn’t know. Even though Gatlinburg is only an hour away (or so my GPS claims), I rarely go there. I haven’t driven down the main street in Gatlinburg in probably 8 years. Mostly because it’s just as I described it. Very touristy and full of people. (If you like touristy and lots of people, it is a very pretty little town, and everyone did seem to be having a lot of fun!)

So, after we finally found a parking place about a half mile away from the aquarium, we maneuvered our nine children through  large crowds (my oldest didn’t come….boo on her…yes I know you’re reading this sweetie…love you anyway!), and spent several hours at the aquarium. (When you fork out for 9 children to go to an aquarium, you figure they better look at every single exhibit and enjoy every single activity!) We split up, my oldest boy taking the next two oldest boys with him and my teen girls pairing up, but even then I still managed to lose the four year old once, got a bit snappy with my husband over who was watching which child, and ended up bribing all the kids with candy at the end, when we had to wait in line to pick up our family picture (conveniently taken for you when you first entered the building), (extra money, but we wanted photo evidence that we had had fun). Despite the hiccups, it was a successful trip.

We hiked the half mile back to the car, me holding tight to the four year old who hopped, skipped, and jumped as he careened down the sidewalk. We finally got to the car and I felt my shoulders lower about ten inches as I slowly relaxed from the stress of taking small children out in public. When we were leaving the parking garage, the traffic was so bad that we couldn’t turn left to go home the way we came, we had to turn right instead and just go with the flow. Which is why we ended up driving home a completely different way, through the Smoky Mountain Park to Wears Valley then Townsend then Marysville… The quiet side of the Smoky Mountains. My favorite side. Where we always end up when we go to the mountains. I needed that drive. The entire time we were in the park, the road ran right next to the river. There is something about flowing water that soothes the soul, calms the spirit, refreshes. There was mist on the mountaintops and the naked trees were gray and felt like winter. This was my idea of a nice time.

I am fortunate that I married someone with similar tastes to me. (Or maybe I just became so accustomed to my husband’s preferences, that I adopted them as my own). When we go out to have fun, we generally do something in nature. We’re not real keen on large crowds. I have never been to Dollywood, and I don’t really want to go. When there are big fairs or festivals, we skip. The Tennessee Valley Fair is held two blocks from our house every fall, and we have never gone. It’s just not our idea of a good time. But, we go to the river and splash around in the water. We go canoeing. We go biking. We take walks. We watch movies at home. We take long drives in the countryside. This is the kind of activity that I need to nourish my soul, refresh myself, relax.

As far as the kids are concerned, I don’t think it’s hurting them to miss out on all the “fun”. They do get opportunities every once in a while, like today, when we visited the aquarium. And having that kind of treat happen rarely makes it a lot more special.

So, hurray for trips to the aquarium, and Thank You Lord that they don’t happen often!