Thursday Reflection...LATE

HI!  Well, for some of you it is already Friday (depending on your timezone)...I firmly apologize for not getting my post up earlier today!  Did you all have a chance to reflect on "James 1:26-27"  The synopsis for me was simply this....


"Stay surrendered to Him so He can USE our hands and feet"


After honestly reflecting on this and taking some time to think about what makes me "tick...I've come to the conclusion that I'm not so sure anymore....WEIRD RIGHT??  Well, I'm just being honest.  I'm passionate about my husband, passionate about being a great momma to my kiddos, passionate about THE CHURCH, passionate about living out God's destiny, passionate about His word, passionate about women, passionate about JUSTICE, passionate about encouraging and empowering others, passionate about listening, passionate about cleaning my house...OKAY, well that may be taking it too far, but I kind of am....HA! I'm in a season of pursuing Him like never before, believing that the discipline and determination would bear fruit for HIS GLORY!  I'm committed to His plan and purpose and know that the journey has just begun!  I fully believe with all of my heart that me "living it out" in this current season of life is me simply ministering to my family!  My husband and children.  I'm also learning that the Lord is very good at revealing what He wants me to do next and who He wants me to reach out to...IF I WILL JUST COOPERATE!!!!!!  Christine Caine (founder of the A21 Campaign) says it so well...when God is at the center of our life, then all of the other areas that we naturally feel have to be numbered and ordered (God, spouse, children, church, job, etc) will completely work the way God intended for them to.  God knows me best and knows what's best for me!  He knows how He has wired me and what I'm passionate about....He knows what makes me tick better than I even do!  I'm learning that LIVING it out is staying surrendered to Him and dying to myself daily to do His work. 


You can read my beautiful, pastor wife, friend Kim's blog over at mauneyland.blogspot.com Her words today are INSPIRING to say the least!  Oh and if you scroll down a little you can see the sweetest faces EVER of her darling kiddos from their vacation last week =)  


Again, we'd love to hear from you in the comment section below if any of these topics are speaking to you!  Please don't hesitate to share your thoughts with us.  You can simply leave your site as the comment.  

For next week Kim writes:

I can't help but still be shaken up by the events that happened in Aurora, CO this past weekend.  I of course am saddened to my core for the victims and their families, but I am also so very troubled by the shooter.  What must he have been going through to get there?  But even more than that, I have to wonder why nobody saw this coming.  Did he have no friends?  Did nobody know him well enough to see that he was going off of the deep end?  And clearly nobody had been to his apartment since it was filled with explosives.  We'll of course never know the full story and we'll never understand.  In fact, I don't think we'resupposed to understand, but he clearly did not have anyone in his life who truly knew him, could reach out to him, worry about him, or potentially prevent this horrible tragedy.

The Bible speaks a lot about accountability and being relational.  In fact, God's only true commandments to us were to love God and love people:

Jesus replied: "'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.' This is the first and greatest commandment.And the second is like it: 'Love your neighbor as yourself.'(Matthew 22:37-39)

Not only this, but we should also surround ourselves with people who can build us up and hold us accountable, making sure we are living it out and encouraging one another in Christ:

"As iron sharpens iron, so one person sharpens another." (Proverbs 27:17)

This week I want us to praise the people in our lives that "sharpen" us- who continuously challenge us to be better versions of ourselves and hold us accountable.  I hope that we all having someone (or many someones) in our lives who do this.  If you don't want to be specific with names you don't have to be... or you can maybe share a story from your life when someone challenged you and led you away from temptation.  This verse is the heartbeat behind these weekly "Reflections" posts and Brittany and I started them as a way to (from a distance) continue to sharpen one another and encourage others to join us to do the same.  I hope you'll post on this next week!