OUR WISHES AND GOD'S WILL



Oops- have we been gone since Thanksgiving?



My mom and step father at the Thanksgiving table.  They make me smile.

"If you could have three wishes what

would they be?"

questioned Michaela from the back seat.

The first one came quickly from my mouth:

"That all my children would trust on Christ,

walk with the Lord and will be with me for

eternity."  Easy.

~

"That I would have 50 million dollars" remembering 
how mentally taxed I was by all the 
"I wish I could" thoughts this season.

Not being able to feed every child, send every bible and

bless others lavishly...

~

The third one came a few seconds later- "and world peace."

 



Sarah holding mysterious packages that made everyone wonder...



How many hours can children stare and guess about packages tied with ribbons?

The girls cracked up that I would throw world peace in

like a "why not" after thought.

It did sound pretty bad.  But at least I didn't just

wish for a cute top or something!

~

Little four year old Hailey reminded me from the backseat

that world peace

is not what we pray for each night but salvation and

health for those we love and we know are struggling.

That's right...  I guess I need

more wishes!



Michaela, almost 14, folded the napkins and did a lot of the decor.



She even made homemade photo ornaments with her scrapbooking supplies.

Of course, you know we don't really trust in wishes

but in a Sovereign God who orders all

things according to His will.

So if we trust on Christ

why is it that our wishes-

or even our reality-

 come in conflict with

God's will at times?

~

So often we desire to make

resolutions

rather than prayer requests.

 ~

We meditate on what we "need"

rather than asking God what

He wants with our health, our money

and our time. 

~ 

And when we suffer trial

we often have far less clarity

than Paul when he received

a thorn in the flesh.

"to keep me from exalting myself, there was given me a thorn

in the flesh, a messenger of Satan to torment me--

to keep me from exalting myself!"

2 Corinthians 12:7



Faith, almost 16, led the charge in the kitchen making all the traditional goodies.

I ate way too many of these...

Of course when I say "we"
I really mean "me."

I do those things. 

And that is just what God has
been working on in my heart.


You see, as the annual Christmas letters are
delivered I am always tempted to think we
are not focusing on the right things.

Their family is so academic, we should be more academic.

Their family is so unschooled and gaining amazing
life skills, we should be more unschooled.

Their family is working on the mission field, we should
work on the mission field.

No.

~

Holy work is the work

the Lord is leading us to do.

Nothing more and nothing less.

~

He knows our frame.  Our limitations.  The season of life we are in.

If we are suffering from illness, He knows. 

"For it is God who is at work in you,

both to will and to work for His good pleasure."

-Philippians 2:13



How thankful we are for Lydia's health this year!

For some reason I was physically and emotionally
tired this year. 

I didn't even try to pull together the perfect anything.


And amazingly I watched

the pretty decor come together anyway-
all arranged by the hands

of capable daughters. 

Folded napkins, homemade ornaments, Christmas lights
and all the traditional goodies..

~

I did my best to keep things simple,

reminding myself that the goal was

gathering fantastic memories

around a relaxed table

and having my eyes open to

serve those around me.

And the rest just seemed to fall together.  Or in some
cases it didn't and that was ok.
 

I'm not sure how the little ones survived all the waiting...

I do know that I attended more than one little tea party with Lydia.

And around that time I read an interesting article on
brain plasticity.


The article made the point that
as we age we tend to
remove ourselves from the details
of life and as we do that we
lose what is called
brain plasticity.

~


As a young person we are continually gaining new information
and creating new systems in the brain.  Everything
is new and requires work to learn and master.

But by the third or fourth decade in life we are often
in decline.  Much of what we do on a daily basis requires
little to no attention (the physical acts of driving,
reading and other daily activities). 

~


We basically function
on auto pilot and are disengaged.  


If we do not take steps to put ourselves back into
learning mode and increase our plasticity or we will
grow fuzzier and fuzzier mentally and lose the
plasticity we once enjoyed.





I doted on more than one little nephew- when my mom wasn't nabbing them up!

Yes, both of my sisters had baby boys- can you believe it?

And as I was processing these

ideas of brain plasticity,

I began to think about

spiritual plasticity.

~

For those of us who have been Believers for some

time, I think it is tempting to begin to navigate

life solely on Biblical principles, rather than

praying about each and every little thing as

we might have in the beginning.

~

we can easily to fall into

"spiritual auto pilot"

almost disengaged as

we busily follow Biblical

principles rather than

going to the Source.

Do you ever catch yourself doing that?

I got lots of smooches, even though I never hang mistletoe.  :)





So when New Years Eve

came, we didn't make

resolutions.

~

We made a list of

prayer requests.

We asked God to help us in specific areas of

habits and character.

We asked Him to help us forgive others- all others-

and put away the grievences from the previous

year.

And we asked Him to help us to bring

everything to Him in prayer,

that we might have

spiritual plasticity

this new year.



   

How I pray you are seeking His will and living in that peace.

~

May we begin to consider if
our wishes- or our reality-
 are His will and embrace
whatever it is that He is calling
us to this new year for
His glory.



Richest blessings to you!