Our Dwelling Place

This week our Missionary Daughter will be coming "home"  from Brazil for a few months.  I use the term home loosely because home for her has taken on many faces.

 

 The home she grew up in,
       the home she ministered in India for 10 months at the age of 15,
         the home base she trained - lived and was sent out from at YWAM,  Chico,
            the home for the past 2 years in Brazil,

               the home we now dwell in ,
   the one she rests in when she is in the states.

The Lord has taught her many things over the years about the word home.

   that home is more than an address
     that home is our dwelling place
        that home is where your family is
           and we often have more than one family,
               that home is where our heart is,
                  that home is where Jesus is.

She wrote about it here: Wheres your Heart?

I have been pondering that word "home" as we have been preparing for her to arrive.
    Wanting to make a place - some space for her to feel she is home, she is loved, that she belongs.

       a bed that welcomes her, with her own blanket and pillow and invites her to rest,
          a shelf for her to place some of her belongings and makes her feel she belongs,
             a space in the closet that says hang your coat, and stay awhile.


  And while all these things are important, tangible reminders that we care...   I am reminded that the greatest thing I can do is just embrace her, and yet surrender her at the same time:


to the one who holds the keys, to her heart,
       the one who is her dwelling place,
          the one who says "your are mine,
             you are secure, you are home in me."

Psalm 90:1 says, 

"Lord you have been our dwelling place throughout all generations."  

I love how the New Living Testament puts it:

"Lord, through all the generations you have been our home!"

I am looking forward to hugging her deep, to hearing her heart, to mini adventures as a family, to watching her connect with each of her siblings in that special way she does, and above all to just resting in our dwelling place, our home together.

He is our dwelling place, he is our home.
Resting in his love for us, resting in Him,


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A Missionary is Flexible

When our three oldest where younger we were a part of a Children’s Evangelism Team (CET for short).  This was an awesome experience for us as a family and for my missionary daughter it was the beginning of her formal missionary training.  During the training part of the CET program we talked about different qualities of a missionary. (by the way, we are all called to be missionaries – Matthew 28:16-20 )

 
A Missionary sees a need and fills it
A Missionary prays
A Missionary is flexible
A Missionary packs light

The team of children came up with different skits to show these points, they journaled about them, they prayed about them and  they shared testimonies about the ones God was growing and stretching them in.

Three of these points came very easily for this girl.  But one of them was a real challenge.

 I remember my missionary daughter just struggling…

 I mean struggling with flexibility…

This was a girl, who as a child was thrown off if we did not sit down and eat breakfast at the table.  Once a week I attended a ladies Bible study and if we were running late I would throw dry cereal in zip lock bags for my 3 kiddos, at the time, for breakfast (we were not morning people).  My two boys loved this, but for my missionary daughter…  this just threw her off.

This was a girl who loved schedules… but if we were not doing what it said at 9:00 at 9:00, she was thrown off.  I used to tell her, “we are not a slave to our schedule, it is our guide.”  I had to stop putting times on the schedules  for awhile because it was just to frustrating for her. 

This was a girl that was completely thrown off when we used our coach pillows to make pillows for our kitchen chairs.

She was (and still is) organized, detail oriented and  loves schedules.  These were all wonderful qualities and ones that I knew God was using in her and would continue to use.  

But…    

            there was this little issue of flexibility (or should I say – inflexibility)
                                        that she struggled with… 



Her Savior…  the lover of her soul…  met her in that season and began to stretch her and grow her.  He has continued to do so over the years.  

I have been blessed to watch this growth, pray for her during the stretching times and rejoice with her in her triumphs as she has overcome the obstacles of inflexibility…


and…

  today this girl…
this full fledged missionary daughter posted this blog entry…

Glitches? Nah, it’s God again- In the DETAILS  

I should be leaving for Brazil in 3  hours, but alas, I am not. 

What?!  

“Why?” You ask. 

Cause God knows what he’s doing.
 

today this girl is walking into her destiny…
                           as an overcomer…

                As I read her post, my heart was “full.” 

You can read the complete story
                         and follow my missionary daughters journey here:
                                       

 Until Completion

 

“ To him who overcomes I will give to eat from the tree of life,
which is in the midst of the Paradise of God.”       Revelation 2:7

Rejoicing in His love and grace~ Pin It

saying “no” to His blessings

Over the years, during this time of the year…   the harvest season – the pumpkin season

        we have taken out all of our books about autumn, leaves, apples,  and pumpkins

                                and place them in a basket to read or look at.

among this array of books is one called Too Many Pumpkins…

this book is about Rebecca Estelle…

each year in the spring she would plant her garden.  She planted carrots and beans, tomatoes and peas, corn and rutabagas.  She grew a little bit of everything-

                            except pumpkins…   Rebecca Estelle hated pumpkins.

She said “no” to pumpkins. 

You see when Rebecca Estelle was young, money had be tight and for an entire month all they had to eat were pumpkins.  Baked pumpkins, steamed pumpkins, stewed pumpkins, pumpkins for breakfast, lunch and dinner.  So, she decided she would never eat pumpkins again.  She did not want to even look at one…

She said “no” to pumpkins…

One Fall day while she was raking her yard, a huge pumpkin truck passed by.  She heard it coming, so she turned away, not to see it. But a huge pumpkin fell off the truck and broke open all over the edge of her yard.  She shoveled some dirt over the broken pieces and buried all evidence of that reminder of lacking. 

When spring came again the once hidden seeds became a plant of green vines.  She decided to ignore it and not water or tend to it, hoping it would wilt away and die.  But the vines just continued to grow. She cut them down, and dug then out, but week after week they continued to grow. She decided to ignore them and not walk on that side of the yard. 

One autumn day, she had forgotten why she did not go to that side of the house and when she walked around the corner, she saw pumpkins growing everywhere.

She had said “no” to pumpkins…   but her Creator had said “yes”

so she took all those pumpkins and made pumpkin, bread, pumpkin pie, pumpkin cake, pumpkin muffins, pumpkin tarts and pumpkin cookies…

A rich harvest of pumpkin goodness…

hoping to get rid of them all to the people in town.  But when she could not carry all those pumpkin dishes she knew the people would need to come to her.  She made jack o lanterns and lite each one along side the yard and path and the people came.

Young and old… everyone in town came. They enjoyed  fellowship together as they ate the pumpkin delights and as they left she blessed each one of the towns people with the blessing she said “no” to, giving away every baked item, every lantern and a bag of seeds for them to start their own harvest of blessing.  She gave away everything that reminded her of the pumpkins she had always hated…  except a handful of seeds, that she tucked away until next spring…

seeds of healing…

       seeds of restoration…

                 seeds a redemption…

                         seeds of blessing…

        The hubs and I once said no…       to  the Lord…    no to His blessings…

We said “no” to children…

              out of hurts…             out of fear…          out of lacking…

we said “no” - 

Yet, He knew our hearts….          He knew our hurts…              He knew our fears…

and He said “yes”  -

and one by one…

He replaced those seeds of fear with the seeds of love…

      He replaced those seeds of hurt with seeds of healing…

             He replaced those seeds of lacking with seeds of plenty…

     Our “no” to  His blessing…   became our “yes” to all He had for us…

 

and one by one these seeds of blessing are being multiplied for His glory…

Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights.    ~James 1:17

Living in His Blessings~

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Back to School–Student Photo Week

   Student Photo Week

Over the years we have tried to take back to school pictures at the beginning of the school year. 

This past showed the last two years of pictures:

Back to School 2012

Back to School 2011

This year I was able to use pictures taken by my missionary daughter who is also into photography:

 

 

BrittAneyPhotography

 

 

I have 3 students at home this year  and 2 students in public school at our local High School:

   

                                          

and we can’t forget the teachers of this establishment:

Living those “back to school” moments~

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Weekly Wrap up - Week 6

This past weekend hubby and I went to Chico to visit our missionary daughter and attend our friends, Jenna & Sam’s wedding.  

Our beautiful Brittaney was in the wedding, as Jenna is one of her friends, she meet while attending her DTS (discipleship training) last year. 

It was a perfect day for the wedding and a very special celebration of their love.

   


I was able to spend Monday morning in Brittaney’s classroom with her.  What a joy to see her in action with her 5 adorable students.  She is an excellent teacher and her children adore her. I think they enjoyed having a visitor for the morning. 



We came home later Monday so our school week did not start until Tuesday. We are starting our new unit on SOUTH AMERICA.  Some of the books we are reading this week are:

  

We are reading one of the Magic Tree House books each month as a reader for our Biome Series.  This month we will be studying the Rain Forest.
We are reading the YWAM Biography on Jim Elliot.  I am really excited about reading this one.  When I was a newer Christian, the church we were attending had a musical presentation of the the life of the 5 missionaries that lost their lives among the Auca Indians in Ecuador.  The presentation was called “At Any Cost” and it was so moving and pierced my heart for missions way back then.

Wednesday, we celebrated a birthday…  
We had a special birthday party for our special boy, the girls made a sign for him - the “O” is a paw print (Blue’s Clues has beenone of his favorite shows since he was 3)…

We had party hats, and streamers…
Played pin the face on the pumpkin…
  even had prices for the game
Had goodie bags and cupcakes with Toy Story candies on the top. (another of Jonathan’s favorite characters)

The rest of the week we worked on getting back into the swing of things and plugging away at our new unit.     
      
Linking up with:

Wrapping it up~
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Teacher Like You–Part 2

Awhile back I posted about my missionary daughter sharing from a mission trip she was on in Fiji:

“I wore my locket in the village and all the kids wanted to see (and show their friends) my mom, dad, and baby sister... one little girl was asking me about you and dad and asked me what you guys did. I told her that you taught us and later I told her that, before coming to Fiji, I was a teacher. "Oh, you're a teacher like your mother." she said. I thought about it and realized how true it was... I'm a teacher like you.”

You can see that post here:   Teacher Like You

  

This daughter has entered a new season..

                           of teaching…
      of growing….              of being stretched… 

She is teaching at the YWAM based she is serving at…
   teaching K- 2nd grade 

                         … an area she has not formal taught before 

but an area that the greatest teacher – her savior - has prepared her for 

   …by having 6 younger siblings

                 …an area she has helped her Mom teach
         
She is teaching 5 awesome little hearts…
                                                            
                    5 little hearts wide open with wonder…
                                       5 little hearts excited to grow and learn…
and…
            my daughter has the privilege of guiding them…
                         on this glorious journey…
                                 of exploring their creators world…

In this one room classroom… 

more than academics will be taught…
      more than abc’s and 123’s will be recalled…
              more than structure, routine and habits will be formed… 

because these 5 children are blessed…
            to have this one teacher…   

who will challenge them to discover what is not seen…
      who will surround them in creative energy…
               who will see their potential and call it out…
                       who will recognized their weaknesses and gently guide them…
                                 who will see their strengths and help nurture them….
                                          who will embrace them and love them for who they are… 

...because her Savior has done the same for her

I am so excited to see her have this opportunity to be…
              Her Saviors arms and heart to these…
                                   5 children

Things I am thankful for this week:
a new year of school
awesome back to school pictures
celebrating two precious daughter’s birthdays
opportunity to serve with the youth
awesome youth ministry for my kiddos
strength and energy for first week back
joy in seeing my children serve the Lord
seeing new opportunities to trust in our ultimate provider
time with precious friends
noisy birthday parties
friends to celebrate with
friends to encourage
friends who encourage
promotions in Sunday School
New Bibles and new potential
seeing challenges as opportunities to serve

Enjoy the opportunities He brings your way~
 

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