Something Beautiful

I feel like I am on a path that is not of my choosing...and yet at the same time it is. I realize that this doesn't make a whole lot of sense, but I feel like my life doesn't make a whole lot of sense at times. I asked God to make my heart His own. And He is doing that, but not in a way I would have chosen. I asked God to refine me. And He is doing that, but not how I would expect Him to. I asked many things of Him, and I gave Him every part of me. I'm realizing that I had a lot of expectations of how my life would look after I gave it over to Him, but He is taking me down a path I would never have chosen, and that's His right because my life is not mine but His. Unfortunately that is sometimes a hard pill to swallow. I used to have a plan for my life of how I wanted it to look, how I wanted it to go. Almost nothing I planned for myself is looking like it will become a reality at this time. All I know is that God's timing is perfect, mine isn't, God's plan i

My hands are black because I helped pit cherries today, and the acid from the cherries makes your skin black tinted. I haven't blogged in a long time (well for me anyway) and there are several reasons for this. One is that I've just been super busy. Having two steady jobs and another for whenever I don't have the other two is keeping me busy. Another is that I just haven't had words to write. And I haven't really cared to blog about what has been going on with me lately, partly because I don't know what is going on. God is doing something in my life, and He won't clue me in as to what He is doing. It's been frustrating me a lot lately. I'm also sick of Him not satisfying me. I know that He is the only one who can satisfy me, and so whenever I have desires spring up, I take them to Him and lay them at His feet and ask for Him to fulfill and satisfy those desires in me. It has been a long time since I felt like I was satisfied. So I don't know what

This song has been running through my head for the last day and a half...ever since I went to the lake yesterday. That was such a fun way to spend my evening. We went out to the lake, and I wasn't planning on getting in the water, so I didn't wear a suit, but when we got out there, I decided that it just looked so good, so I ended up skiing in my clothes...which wasn't too bad. This was the first time I have been water skiing in probably 11 years, so I was a little rusty, but I caught on fairly quickly, and I had a nice good run at the end. I also got to take a lot of pics, though, which was fun!! This pic is currently the background on my laptop as I am preparing for the beach in about 7 weeks!! I'm so excited!! I got my first paycheck from BH today which was exciting!! I also closed by myself for the first time tonight, and I am catching on to the way things work fairly well. So right now I'm just chilling out, drinking a Blue Moon with orange, listening to some

I started reading the book Pursuit of the Holy by Corey Russell this morning, and I am a little blown away so far, and it is basically everything that I need to hear. I had to make myself stop reading it though because I really want to absorb what he has to say instead of just reading through it quickly as I know I can do. I'm taking a break from work today. I don't have BH tonight, and I decided not to go to my other job today either. This is what I love about having a flexible work schedule. Also I'm still waiting for the doctors office to call back about getting me in for an appointment, so that might happen today, but who knows. I feel really horrible because I am not going to be able to celebrate Father's Day with my family. I have to work lunch and dinner on that Sunday, and then I'm leaving that evening after I get off work to go to Springfield for a couple of days. I think that my immediate family is going to probably end up celebrating on a different day,

Today's title comes from this fabulous video Lee Ellen Starks Oh so good!!! I've been reading Psalm 66 a lot lately...God gave it to me the other evening when I was really having issues with Him. He really reinforced that I am in a refining process, and that this is just a season. The loneliness and all that that I have been feeling is just a season that I'm going through. I found an old e-mail that my aunt sent me last summer. I'm not much of a person to pay attention to forwarded e-mails, but this one just really grabbed my attention which is why I have kept a hold of it. It talks about the process of refining silver in relation to a passage from Malachi. Basically the process of refining silver involves putting the silver into the very hottest part of the fire in order to burn off all of the impurities. However, the sliversmith does not just leave the silver sitting in the fire, He sits there the entire time watching the silver or else the silver will be destroyed by

My sis made chocolate crinkle cookies...and I made a sundae out of one of them today...it was delicious!! Today I've been working on getting ready to sell a car on ebay...this has been an interesting adventure. First I had to get an ebay account. I went through all the steps only to find out that I already had an account that I just didn't finish signing up for. Then I spent a while figuring out how to get that account finished. Then I spent some time working through how to set it up to be a seller. Then I gave the lawn a hair cut...which was fun because we have an awesome riding lawn mower!! Then I worked on the car some...finishing up with some of the detail work. Tomorrow Dad and I are going to finish up on that and hopefully get it up for auction. Then I spent my afternoon pulling trees. Yes, trees...with my bare hands. Okay, so the trees were already partially uprooted, and some were rather small, but it was still hard, dirty work. I learned what it means to truly have de

God loves me....and He likes to remind me of that because I have a very short memory. Last week, He showered (literally) His love on me in a very unexpected way. A while back, I remarked to K that one thing I was looking forward to when I get married is my husband washing the car windshield when we fuel up the car. It isn't something that I hate doing. I just would rather not spend my time on it. During the summer it gets especially bad because of all the bugs. Well last week, my windshield was gross, and when I fueled up my car, I just really did not feel like washing it off, so I didn't. Well later in the day, it sprinkled just a little bit which caused all the bugs just to smear all over the place. I was a little frustrated, and then as I was driving, it actually started raining. And then my windshield was clear!! God washed my windshield for me!! He is so amazing!! This morning I was reading Song of Solomon Chapter 1, and I got to verse 3 which says "Thy name is as oin

I realized while I was driving home tonight that my heart was aching for something that I could not name. And then all of the other desires that I am intimately familiar with came up. And at the same time I was desiring my husband, my friends, my family, Heaven, my Beloved, and a thousand other things. I was just chilling out with Jesus and all of a sudden all of this came up...so as I am learning to do, I turned to Him with all these aching desires, and a questioning heart. Why is it that when I'm just sitting with Jesu that my heart aches and all of my desires come to the surface? I then realized that I am seeing lived out in my life something that I have just studied about in the Word up until this point. I am always drawn to the stories of Jesus' miracles because there always seems to be a common thread in them. Someone comes face to face with Jesus and in doing so has all of their desires exposed because that is what Jesus does. He exposes our hearts and the desires that d

Right now I am sitting in Panera sipping an iced chai tea latte and waiting for K. What an incredible day/week this has been. When the week started, I had one job...working for the parents...and now at week's ending, I have three!! This week has flown by as I have actually had things to do aka work to go to. Monday I worked for my parents and that was fun...my Dad and I worked on the yard. Then I got two calls within 2 hours of each other for other work. So the next three day I spent with C cleaning and working on different jobs around her house. Then today I helped B set up for an auction...sidenote: I don't think it would be good for me to be around that very often. I saw waaay too many things that I liked, so I'm actually really glad that I wasn't able to stick around for the auction...I probably would have spent my entire paycheck. And today I was hired for my third job...being a hostess at the Brookville Hotel. :) I'm really excited about it, and it will work w

I was thinking this morning about how I am a quality time person...and how it sucks for long distance friendships. I woke up this morning thinking how all of my friendships are not real and how we don't really like each other, but what I have to realize is that that isn't true...I just feel this way because I haven't hung out with people in so long. Also, I'm super frustrated with my ipod right now because it somehow got rid of all the music that I had on it, and I have to restore it again, but the internet at my parent's house hates me, and so my computer won't download the software to install on it and restore it. This could make the trip to Springfield rather long tomorrow. And I really don't understand why it keeps doing this...this is probably the 3rd time I have had to restore it, and I've only had it since Christmas....so frustrating. I got paid today, though, and that was exciting!! Also I applied for another part time job. Which would make 3 par

I realized when I was running today that it's June which means that my year of purification is almost half over. I also have been realizing more and more that I no longer have a drive to run. I enjoy it, but I no longer really have any motivation for it. Today is the first time I have ran in probably a week. Part of me wonders if the half-marathon was a one shot deal. Kind of like I did that now I'm ready to move onto something else...I don't know for sure...God hasn't told me anything else. I also was thinking back to running the half, and I realized that two of my friends told me that they knew I was going to make it when I didn't think I would. They saw something in me that I didn't and still don't see. That made me wonder what God sees in me. Sometimes I wish I could catch a glimpse of things through His eyes...to truly see the world as it is. God has a very different perspective on everything than we do. We only see a little piece of the painting...He s