Category: Choosing Courage

Let’s Talk Purpose

Posted on by Mary
Purpose

Purpose, We all struggle with knowing and understanding it sometimes. Even as believers we want to know what my purpose is. What am I called to do? (and let me begin by saying that this topic answers this question for followers of Jesus.).

Jesus tells us exactly what our purpose is. We have discussed it here many times before. We have talked about them as COMMANDMENTS WE MUST FOLLOW but it is also our purpose. It is our WHY. Why we do what we do. It’s why we are kind, it is why we are self controlled, it is why we have peace, joy and patience (It’s why the fruit of the spirit is evident in our lives!)

Mark 12:29-31 NLT

29 Jesus replied, “The most important commandment is this: ‘Listen, O Israel! The Lordour God is the one and only Lord. 30 And you must love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, all your mind, and all your strength.’[a]31 The second is equally important: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’[b] No other commandment is greater than these.”

The purpose is two fold-

  1. You MUST Love the Lord Your God with ALL your Heart, Soul, Mind, and Strength (it’s not optional)
  2. Love your neighbor as yourself.

Now I am going to say something radical

It doesn’t matter WHAT else you do with your life as long as you do these two commandments and you will be fulfilling your purpose!

You can be anything! You can do anything! because when you keep these two commandments (your purpose) you won’t sin against God . Ok so I know what you are thinking. Yes we are still sinners, yes we are going to make mistakes. But when you keep these things forefront in your life. You aren’t letting things like anger and bitterness hold on to your heart…Your heart isn’t divided.

See there is this little word ALL and it is used as emphasis. I didn’t when I listed the first commandment.

When you love God with :
  • ALL of Your Heart
  • ALL of your Sul
  • ALL of your Mind
  • ALL of your Strength

There isn’t room for much else.

See you cannot love God with ALL of your heart and have hidden anger and bitterness in it. It’s just not possible. You aren’t going to sacrifice your morals and convictions to follow your passion or dream. Too often we think we have to let those go in order to achieve……..You fill in the blank. Often times it starts with dishonesty on a resume).

It’s not about doing better

I know that the propensity for me is to look at these things and be like “I’ll just do better” I’m not relying on God and building my relationship with him. I am fighting to do things on my own and THAT my friends is not what we are called to do.

I need to surrender these things to God. That’s what it means to LOVE HIM WITH ALL of our being.

Let’s be honest- We live divided

We don’t want to admit it- I know I don’t but we have divided hearts, souls minds and strength.

I live in a constant state of dividedness and if I don’t keep myself in check with Jesus it isn’t long before impatience, unkindness, anxiety and all of those other negative influence traits we talked about a few weeks ago start creeping in.

I want you to see that ALL of these things are connected. Our purpose is DIRECTLY connected to our influence. We cannot subdivide our lives and declare our influence different from our purpose and our purpose different that our walk with Jesus. When we become Followers of Jesus we surrender ALL parts of our lives and dedicate them to Him- They become His and if they aren’t his that we have

  • divided hearts
  • divided souls
  • divided minds
  • divided strength

And a negative influence.

Hmmm Sounds like a blog series to me!

(The one I promised a few weeks ago). Welcome to the DIVIDED series! We will discuss these areas of Dividedness next Tuesday Wednesday, Friday and Saturday.

Thank you

I am so glad that you joined me today as we learned about our purpose and set up the framework for our upcoming mini series.

If you are new here please introduce yourself in the comments below. I would love to get to know you.

Feel free to check out my 100 day blogging project series called Choosing Courage and My Write 31 Days Challenge called The Power of Your Influence

Wasted Words- Parenting Edition

Posted on by Mary
Words

Have you ever felt like the image ? Like your words have been hacked to pieces? I find myself as a mom asking the question “Am I speaking a completely different language?

I think we go through life sometimes feeling like we are…Speaking a different language that is. We all want. to be heard and listened too. And if we are honest we all struggle with not being heard at various points in our lives. We feel misunderstood and ignored.

As moms

I can give the same instruction all day long or give the same piece of information 7 or 8 times and when 5 o’clock rolls around they still have the same burning question, “what’s for dinner”.

As a human I hate this- because I feel like all those words fell on deaf ears, like what I said wasn’t important.

But as an introvert I hate them even more- because those words represent something greater- ENERGY. AND interrupted focus. Usually the 7 versions of what’s for dinner are asked while I am deep in thought while I am doing something….like making dinner.

Dinner is just a fun example though, it’s became somewhat of a joke in our house….

This is the conversation:

Kids 1-4 at various times throughout the day” Mom what’s for dinner?

Mom Food

Kids (with a sigh): what kind of food

Mom Yummy Food

Kids MOM!!!! (all while groaning rolling their eyes and/or whining)

Mom: Look at the menu on the fridge.

The answer has been there all along written on a magnetic white board on the fridge

And yet that too goes unnoticed (The older two have finally caught on). But I struggled with why I took the time to tell them (or write it down) because it didn’t feel like it at all mattered.

Not just dinner

  • Put this away….
  • Take this to your room…..
  • Do your chores…
  • Do your homework…..
  • Don’t hit your brother….
  • Don’t kick your sister…..
  • Don’t lick the dog, table, brother, sister, me…..(wait what?)
  • and the list goes on and on….

Only to find the item moved from the kitchen table to the entryway……Kids playing legos instead of cleaning their room, an artist drawing like crazy instead of doing his homework, everyone in an argument fighting over something, somebody or something getting licked (wait what? – It’s an autism thing) and I am left standing there feeling like a broken record and like I am speaking a completely different language.

Mamas DON’T give Up. CONSISITENCY IS KEY even if you feel like your words are wasted. They aren’t. That patience training you have been teaching your kids – you know the love each other speech, be kind…if you can’t say anything nice…..You know the one…..It’s not really falling on deaf ears. (Just make sure you are living it too)

A few years ago

I was REALLY struggling with this. We had 3 Pre-teens in our house 6th, 7th and 8th graders to be exact. I was pretty sure I had failed as a parent (as a side note- you should NEVER base your parenting on pre-teens…..N.E.V.E.R. ) Actually don’t judge your parenting at all. Do your best teach your children God’s word and be a living breathing example of Jesus, because here’s the thing. They have this nasty little thing called free will. They aren’t little robots as much as we try to train them to be.

We too often claim “Train up a child I the way they should go and when they are old they will not depart from it.” as a promise but the reality is Proverbs is a book of wisdom….as in wise sayings. Both my hubby and our pastor teach this. We have too often been taught that you can claim these verses as promises BUT they aren’t promises.

Our pastor used this example of crossing the road.

We tell our kids “Don’t cross the road without looking both ways, otherwise you will get hit by a car. ” I’ve said it…..and our child crossed the road without looking both ways and didn’t get hit by a car. Was I lying? No I was just giving a piece of wisdom. Does it mean that if you do look both ways that you won’t get hit by a car? NO. It means you are less likely to be hit by a car. The same is true with that proverb.

Our wasted words aren’t so wasted

So in the middle of feeling like I had failed with these three pre-teens who seemed to have woken up one day with hatred towards each other something began to take shape. I began to see these three work together in public.. They were helpful and kind not just to other people but to each other. And then it started to move home. They became buddies especially the older two. Who were my biggest fighters.

Then one day we were having a conversation about something…don’t remember what…..and the end statement that our daughter said was “but you and dad have taught what it really means to love other people.”

My words and my time weren’t wasted . I wasn’t failing. The reality of the matter was we are raising a bunch of sinful human beings. And they have to work out and practice what we have taught them and sometimes they get it wrong and I will feel like a broken record again and again and again.

Letting Go

I just need to remain consistent. AND PRAY! LOTS AND LOTS OF PRAYER. And trust God that He loves them far more than I ever could which is hard to wrap my brain around but it’s true. I need to remember that I am not defined by how my children turn out. I can do all the best things and in the end they have a choice- they have free will- and they are accountable. Yes we all make mistakes, we can learn from them and change. That’s humility.

I know that it feels like our teaching and training and truth are falling on deaf ears but as these children grow up they will remember back to the things that you have taught them and the example that you’re to them. They won’t be able to shake it.

What is something that makes you feel like you are a broken record? Have you seen your children change over time?

Thanks for joining me today for day 81 of My Choosing Courage 100 day writing project. You can check out the rest of the writing project posts here.

Magnetic write board from Arteza here (not an affiliate link)

Stay tuned for more Wasted words posts!

Hello November- Joy Dare

Posted on by Mary
Hello

Hello Friends. Hello NOVEMBER!! Can you believe we are already to NOVEMBER. Well know I can’t. I am so glad to be back again. I know that I pretty much missed all of October but we are back with November and I look forward to sharing what we are thankful for again this month,

So Let’s jump into this weeks Joy Dare

Day 29- 3 Gifts on time

  1. God His timing is always perfect
  2. soccer practice
  3. The end of soccer season

Day 30- 3 gifts overjoyed

  1. A Place
  2. A Purpose
  3. A calling

Day 31- 3 Gifts Hallowed

  1. The body of Christ
  2. Time in God’s word
  3. worship

Day 1- 3 Gifts Eaten

  1. FOOD-HA_ Candy- Chocolate specifically
  2. Peirogies, soft Pretzels, Ravioli
  3. Whatever I wanted with gluten in it for a month

Day 2- 3 gifts warm

  1. Sweatshirts
  2. fuzzy Pajama pants
  3. fuzzy socks

Day 3- 3 Gifts that start with “N”

  1. Nature
  2. Nachos
  3. New Beginnings

Day –  A gift gathered, given, and good

  1. gathered- Friends for a game night
  2. given-a Fun t-shirt to hubby
  3. Good- a day at home together

I’m so glad you came by to say Hello and join in on the Joy Dare this week and I’m praying You all have a fabulous week full of gratitude and Joy!

And how about You what have you found joy in this week?

For more Joy Dare posts click here and for more Choosing Courage Posts click here.

To Check out The Joy Dare and One Thousand Gifts  by Ann Voskamp click here.

Catching Up: Weeks 9-11

Posted on by Mary
Catching

Well Hello There

Today we are going to do a little catching up! I can’t believe that it has been three weeks since we last did an update. Life has been a whirlwind of busy here.

October wasn’t necessarily supposed to work out the way it did- but it was amazing. And that’s ok. It was super amazing really! I have no complaints other than the month of October was complicated by hubby catching a cold (He has to do some work in the cold rain and he paid for it).

But let’s get on with the Update,

Choosing Courage 100 day Writing Project

Today is day 79!!!! I can’t believe it! It’s been a whirlwind. When I started this Journey I was so stressed about it- I have received so much flack about my writing. Now it’s just part go my morning. I have hit a few rough patches though where Satans lies start echoing in my brain.

I have also hit and” I don’t want to stage”- “I’m too tired”. This really came up over the last few weeks and that really had a lot to do with some stuff my body was going through physically. I fought through and basically that is why I had to let go of the “extra” posts during the month of October.

I did accomplish all 31 days of the Write 31 Days writing challenge. WHICH WAS HUGE!! That was 31 days of writing something HARD every day. Thankfully it fit into the 100 day Project.

Little Old Me

I mentioned above that I hit a snag in the Challenges where my body and mind said “I don’t want to do this anymore”. I am so glad that I have a team behind me now. Just as those thoughts started entering my mind they would send me a text saying how encouraging the posts were. They didn’t know the struggles. It was the shot in the arm I needed to push through. I am also glad a had a few blog posts done ahead so I could just do a little writing and the posts that were already written would go live.

Testing for Celiacs

At the beginning of October I was told I needed to go back onto gluten so I could be ready for a double scope that was scheduled in December. (They put me on a cancellation list so I had to be ready for at least 2 weeks but ideally 4). Well gluten makes me feel like a slug and also affects my iron levels- My iron has been in good place since August so yeah slug-like is a great definition of how I felt.

Then one night I was sitting at our kids soccer game and I got a call- Can I do my scope next week. YEP. So then that last week I ate as much Gluten as I could and was just a couple days shy of that four week mark. I still don’t know the results yet but it feels good to be off the gluten.

IVIG

The week before the scopes I had my first dose of IVIG. It’s a dose of Immunoglobulin I get via an IV infusion. Basically I have an autoimmune issue that keeps my body from making enough antibodies so I can spend much of the winter sick. And as we discovered Vaccines only work a little bit.

I had gotten two infusions of iron in August and those were easy. 45 minutes and I am done. HOWEVER IVIG took 3 1/2 hours. I was a little nervous about getting antsy. I don’t sit well. It wasn’t as bad as I thought I read half a book, ate breakfast (yeah that was a neat surprise) . I went home and was fine. Until the next day.

HOLY NAUSEAUSNESS.

So now Zofran is my new best friend for the two days afterwards. BUT I have been living on allergy medicine for a while with huge sinus headaches. Guess what I don’t have anymore?!?

Even in the middle of hubby catching his cold and then our daughter being next and taking care of them I only had one day I was iffy. THATS AMAZING!

Hubby

My poor hubby has been run ragged over the last month. But it has been a good month for him as well. I wish I could say November was going to be different but likely it won’t be.

Hubby Taught his first of two Old testament survey classes (The other is Next weekend). This has always been a dream of his and he is so good at it. He has been working on the class between the two sessions as well prepping for the next in person session grading assignments and the like. He has also been working his construction job and working part-time for the church we attend,

Not to mention the various church interviews, applications and questionnaires, phone calls and emails and all the other stuff that comes with The looking for a church process.

Plus he has been working to finish up some other jobs that were not supposed to take that long but goodness it has been a wet summer and fall. It has been crazy to fit it all in. All the while taking time to make memories with friends and evening hiking in the Adirondacks with his brother and our oldest 2 kiddos

The kids

The kids are almost to the end of their first quarter of school. They are doing well but I think that Thanksgiving break is much needed.

The older two just finished their soccer season and both of their teams finished very well.

The younger two have just enjoyed life. All four kids are enjoying Youth group at our church and all four are actively serving Sunday morning in our churches kids ministry. It’s so exciting to see them take off on this new journey.

Anticipation

I cannot believe that we only have 4 weeks lefs in this 100 day writing project. As we enter this last month I will be making some decisions about what blogging looks like going forward. I can tell you it won’t be 7 days a week. As much as it has been good it has also been stretching in the schedule department.

I will let somethings go- as I have learned over this last month. I can’t do it all (Oh wait THAT has been something God has been teaching me my WHOLE life!). I don’t quite know what that looks like yet but this updates will be coming soon.

I don’t like catching up- I don’t like feeling like I am so behind. I won’t be “Catching up” on the Joy Dare posts I will just be doing this weeks gratitude prompts.

Thank you for doing me today

Catching up can sometimes be arduous so I hope today wasn’t too long ! I’m so very thankful that you are invested in this journey with me.

What to know what this journey is all about? You can check out this link that takes you all the way back to August!

Hello November -Happy Homemaker Monday

Posted on by Mary
November

Happy first day of November everyone! I am excited to be back to Happy Homemaker Monday! I was hoping to be able to stay with Happy Homemaker Monday through the month of October as well as doing the Write 31 Days writing Challenge (If you missed my series on the Power of Your Influence You can check it out here.) October was a busy month! It was also a very exciting month!!!! (More to come on THAT in the next few months)

Ok Let’s jump into it!

♥♥The Weather♥♥

We have finally reached normal fall weather here in the Northeast. It has been an unusually warm fall (Loving it NOT complaining in the slightest!). This week will be pretty much in the 40’s during the day. We only have one day of rain (Tuesday) which is good because we have had a very rainy year and flooding is a real issue here in NY right now.

♥♥How I am feeling this morning♥♥

I’m feeling really well minus some sneezing (fall allergies- it’s an every morning thing right now!

 ♥♥On my mind♥♥ 

I have a lot to do right now. Homeschooling reports are due next week. I have my second dose of IVIG- it’s going to be a very busy few months for sure

♥♥On the breakfast plate♥♥

Cup of coffee with caramel syrup and almond milk. A banana. And probably some yogurt with granola or egg whites (Honestly it is too early to decide!

♥♥Right now I am♥♥

Working on this post, Listening to the dogs snore and the youngest doing his devotions in the other room.

♥♥On my reading pile♥♥

I will be finishing up James and I will be spending more time in Philippians and Colossians over the next month.

We will start our Nate Saint Biography during our morning basket routine at breakfast today.

I will *hopefully* wrap up Get Out of Your Head, Hello Fears and Practical Dreamer this month as well.

♥♥On today’s to do list♥♥

  • Dishes
  • Table needs to be cleaned off and moved back into place
  • Laundry
  • change our sheets
  • Weekly planning(I really REALLY need to get back into this on Saturdays)

 ♥♥On my tv♥♥

Nothing really at the moment- though we are working to finish Promised land and different Strokes as a family in the evenings

♥♥On the menu this week♥♥

Monday – Pasta Bake and Salad. Tuesday – (Family Night). Make your Own Burger Bar and Fries (this is a pastor’s fault as he mentioned “Supreme Burgers” in his message yesterday)
Wednesday – Chili and Biscuits
Thursday – The kids will have Sandwiches/Subs they can eat on the go and Hubby and I have dinner with our connect group
Friday – Venison BBQ and mashed potatoes
Saturday –  Breakfast for dinner
Sunday –  Loaded Baked potatoes

♥♥From the camera♥♥

Our girl doing what she loves! She loves sports!

♥♥Looking around the house♥♥

Honestly Let’s NOT talk about it (LOL)

♥♥New recipe I tried last week, or one that we really enjoyed♥♥

I didn’t try a new recipe this week .  However I did cook a recipe slightly difeferent than I usually do. I made the kids Chicken Bacon Ranch casserole and instead of making it Sunday morning (Because I would have to get up way to early for that nonsense) I did it Saturday night and let it cook on low til after church on Sunday. It was the best I had ever made.

♥♥To relax this week, I will♥♥

Read and exercise

♥♥On my prayer list♥♥

  • Friends and family with COVID and other sicknesses.
  • Wisdom
  • Friends going through some hard stuff right now
  • my own personal perseverance and patience (On many levels)

Thanks so much for Joining me today for another happy Homemaker post! You can find more Happy Homemaker posts and join in on the fun by visiting Diary of a Stay At Home Mom.