My newest adventure with God

It is now 2015 and I have 3 children. Its been awhile since I've written on here. I decided to pick it back up so I could keep a journal of my newest adventure with God. It all began this past September. I was still hanging on to about 8 pounds of baby weight and I had pretty much decided that I would just stay that size. I wasn't over weight, but my clothes didn't fit right and I didn't feel good at all. I decided I needed a change. I then began to watch what I ate and count my calories. I'm amazed at how much my diet has changed over the last 9 months. I went from eating sandwiches, Goldfish, and whatever fast and easy I could get my hands on, to salads with grilled chicken and apples for snacks. I've never been much of a fruit and veggie eater, except for the occasional strawberry and banana when I was feeling "really healthy". It took about six months to lose a little more than 8 pounds.I felt awesome! After hitting my ideal weight though, I started to add more crap back into my diet. I have gained about half of my weight back due to poor self control and a little help from birth control pills. It has been frustrating to see weight come back on and clothes getting tighter. After a 10K in May, I noticed my heart fluttering and it didn't stop for about a week. A friend of mine who is a nurse practitioner told me to come on into his office for a physical and EKG. After the physical, my EKG was fine and it looked like the only electrolyte out of whack was my magnesium. The one thing that took him by surprise was my cholesterol. I have had elevated cholesterol before when we got lab work drawn for life insurance policies, but had never had it checked out by my pcp. He was very concerned about it and, since it is in my family history, he suggested medication. I am not even thirty yet, medication for my blood cholesterol is not something I'm just going to jump into at this point. So I decided to try a diet I have heard many people talking about recently. It's not really a diet but a complete change in life style for me. I forgot to add that although I started eating better in September, I was still eating a lot of sweets and unnecessary sugar. After researching, I found out this sugar and the amount of carbohydrates I am eating could be causing the increase in my blood cholesterol levels. So I decided to be a little drastic and cut them out completely! So here is my new adventure with God that I began yesterday: Eating Paleo. Yep I'm eating like a caveman. Just eating things that are natural and whole. It's going to be a huge challenge and an even bigger adventure! So I'll be writing in here about how things are going and what I'm learning along the way. Hope you enjoy!

The Bagel Bites

Awhile ago I wrote about how the Lord woo's us and shows us how much He loves us through the most simple things if we take the time to see it. Yesterday something happened to me that would seem so small to anyone else but meant so much to me. I have to give you some background information first to understand why what happened to me was so small yet reminded me that God was looking after me. Ty and I have been in a "growth oppurtunity," as one of my favorite authors and sister's in the Lord, Lysa TerKeurst, calls it, with a certain person from his past about money for the last year and a half. This person finally got what they wanted which is going to cut a pretty hole in our budget, at least until Parke gets here in February. This has been weighing on my mind but have tried not to let it worry me. Ty and I are going to close on our house later today which will then also cut a pretty hole in our budget compared to what we've been paying. I was thinking about this today as I was also weighing the difference in money with me on maternity leave starting in a few months. It started getting to me and quite frankly is now as I write about it. I soon found myself in a ball of anxious nerves and frustration and worry about the future. I had to call out to the only One who has full control over all of this. I know He will provide for us no matter what happens. He will provide exactly what we need. He always has! I found myself in my car calling out to the Lord and having to surrender everything to Him, including our finances.
Now to what God did for me yesterday. I went into Kroger to get food for our potluck at work and decided to go to the frozen food aisle. I found some bagel bites and remembered all the good times of eating them at slumber parties in high school and thought they might be a wonderful addition to a potluck. I then noticed there was no yellow kroger sticker saying these items were on sale and my heart sank as I saw the price tag. It would end up being almost 20 dollars to buy as much as I needed for the potluck which is alright but not really what I wanted to spend on bagel bites after all the anxiety from earlier. I decided to go on and get them and once I got to the check out and scanned them in I saw they were on sale!! I ended up spending on three packages what it would have been on two! I know that's so small but it made me smile. It reminded me how God cares about the smallest details in our lives like saving a few bucks. It was like God was reassuring me saying "see Mary, I'm watching out for you and going to financially provide what you need." SO AMAZING!! What an amazing God we serve!!

Why me, Lord??

As some of you know the Lord has opened up a wonderful oppurtunity for me this month. This is something I've been praying for for years! It blows my mind because He opened up this oppurtunity right after a 6 week period of very little communication with Him and some really big struggles for me. It hit me though that might be exactly why He can send me right now. I feel like I'm a little more humble than where I was months ago. Right now I feel like I'm the last person the Lord should use. I feel like I have so much to work on but then I guess that means I can relate to more people. Instead of me thinking I have it all together right now I'm thinking I'm a huge mess up. Maybe that's where I'm supposed to be. I need the Lord! I don't know what I was thinking for 6 weeks not going to Him, like I can go through a very tough time in my life without Him? Don't think so, Mary. What I really need to remember is it is all Him anyways. It doesn't matter exactly where I am because it's the Holy Spirit going anyways, right? Just got to rely on His power and not my own because I'm not strong enough on my own. Maybe that's what that 6 weeks was there to prove to me in the first place.

My Little Fire in the Fireplace

I did something yesterday that I think everyone should do at some point in there life! My mentor had encouraged me about a year ago to write down things in my past that had hurt me or past sin that been weighing me down. She said write down what happened, how it made me feel, and then give it over to the Lord. She then said to burn this book of all my past regrets and hurt to symbolize them being forgiven and everything now being in the Lord's hands and not my own. I didn't do exactly what my mentor said but every time I felt bogged down by my past I would write in a certain journal of mine. I have also been writing down what the Lord is teaching me during my time with Him in the same journal.
I finished this journal yesterday. I then realized I hadn't burnt the part of my journal that had all my past in it so I started a little fire in my fireplace. It is the most freeing and peaceful thing to watch your past mistakes and hurts burn in front of your eyes. I really did feel this awesome peace watching these pieces of paper disappearing in front of my eyes. These pieces of paper that I had cried over and poured my heart into, they're now gone with all of my past mistakes. Praise the Lord who forgives all sins and forgets it right then and there!! Praise Jesus that forgave me years ago for the things I watched burn to a crisp yesterday! It's amazing to know those things are behind me and my life is now filled with an amazing husband, son, and future baby that have all changed my life as I knew it!!

Where I am

So I haven't written anything on here in about a month and a half. There have been several things I've been meaning to write but haven't had the time or completely forgot about writing it. I hope to post some of those things soon. The last 5 weeks have been pretty hard for me. I cannot really say exactly why except that being pregnant has made me moody and feel awful. I honestly don't feel like myself at all in any ways. My relationship with the Lord has been stagnant as my focus has gone from Him to how I feel. Work has also been so stressful lately that when I'm home I tend to be in the corner thinking "woe is me and my completely stressful and sick feeling life." It's sad to me that I'm more focused on how I feel than the fact that I have someone growing inside of me. It reminds me again how selfish I really am. It's sad I'm so selfish I'm complaining about sharing my body with someone else. I feel like things are looking up though as I have realized my stinky attitude and have cried out to the Lord more in the past week than I have in months. I realize how I much I rely on myself and my strength when times get tough instead of calling out to Him and asking for His everlasting strength. I feel like I'm actually hearing His voice more, maybe because I'm actually listening right now. Work has also been a little slower the last few nights which has made life more enjoyable all around and the fact that I'm only scheduled for 36 hours this week instead of 48 makes my attitude 100 times better. I still want my attitude to be the same no matter how much I work. I want peace and to stop staring at my "tight spot" and focusing completely on the Lord. Jesus has been the One that has helped me change my attitude this week. I was reading about him in Matthew the other night and I couldn't help but to be brought to tears at His compassion and love for us. There will be alot more to that coming soon though.

How's my heart?

This is actually a completely different blog than I originally was going to write today but the Lord keeps bringing something up to me over and over again so I decided I need to write about that instead. I've learned in the past that if the Lord continues to repeat something then there's a reason for it. He keeps bringing up over and over to me in my date time with him that the condition of my heart (and everyone else's) is extremely important to Him.
I'm in Matthew 6 now but this whole idea of the importance of one's heart begins in Matthew 5. In Matthew 5:21 Jesus starts preaching to the crowds about anger. Here He brings the new idea that it's not about if you kill someone or not out of anger that matters. He says if you're even angry in your mind to the point you're thinking awful things about this person then you've already murdered them. I wonder how many people I've actually murdered, not literally, but in my mind. There are probably hundreds. That's awful to think of! So here we see how Jesus says he looks at our hearts more than our actions.
Then in Matthew 5:27 Jesus talks about how if we lust after someone that isn't our spouse then we have committed adultery. Wow! He is also looking at our hearts here. We may have been completely faithful to our spouse physically but if we've thought something lustful about someone else then it's sin. I think this is really hard for our society to grasp. When it seems like anything goes or if you do everything but have sex with someone else it's ok. It's so sad!
Then skipping to Matthew 6:1 Jesus talks about giving to the needy and how people can do righteous acts just for the attention of others. He's talking about motives here. Are our motives of doing good things to please the Lord or to get the approval of others? Again He's looking at our hearts. Jesus says our left hand shouldn't know what our right hand is doing. We should give with good motives not to get anything in return.
Then to Matthew 6:5 Jesus talks about how prayer should be a private thing. Not that we can't pray out loud in a group of people but we should look at our hearts and our motives for that. Is it to get others approval or to please the Lord? Jesus says here that the hypocrites like praying out loud in front of everyone so people can see them and think they are "righteous" people. The Lord looks at our motives above all things.
So how does this apply to me you may ask? Well I've been doing some soul searching over the past few weeks to see what the Lord may mean by this. I know I struggle with making the approval of others my focus. I've had to honestly look at my heart about why I do the things I do. Is it to please the Lord and show others His love or is it for me to look like a "wonderful Christian woman"? So right now I'm searching and asking the Lord to show me my heart and see if there's anything in it that needs to be gone. Psalm 139: 23-24 has become my prayer. "Search me, oh God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts. See if there is any offensive way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting." I hope the Lord is pleased with my heart; and if there's anything in it that's offensive to Him that He would show me and I'd quickly get rid of it. For my heart is the "wellspring of my life". (Proverbs 4:23)

How He loves us!

Tonight at work I was somewhat puzzled at a patient's condition. It hit me in the middle of my confusion, why don't I ask God for help? It seems so simple to ask God for your needs. I tend to think of asking him for things like when we really need money for something or when someone I love is sick but tend to forget that He cares about the smaller stuff too. It's amazing to me that I can ask Him to help me with my patient or anything else in the day and He is willing and happy to give me His wisdom and discernment. I'm so glad He loves us that much that He would willingly help us out. Crazy isn't it?!