Four Years of Abishai

We now have a super hero in our household. Everyone might think this is great. After all, they do their best to keep you safe at all times. But there is a side affect to all the hero business: loud crashes, exploding fire balls, flying shoes, impenetrable armour, none stop action, and an arsenal of weapons.

Let us just say, this family's four year old super hero is now stocked up with everything he might ever need to fight the bad guys after his Birthday.

Ode to the wind!

To the wind in Moab last week, a toast!

Enough is enough

What is enough?

I am going to be honest. [I think I start a lot of posts this way.] But I don't get enough of Jesus. And it is my own fault most of the time. Now I know that in some proverbial way we can never get enough of Jesus. But spending time in prayer, reading the bible, meditating on his truths? We don't have to. But if I am loving Jesus I will want to. As a mom I often find myself at a loss. A loss of time. A loss of wakefulness. A loss of...shall I even say sanity sometimes?

Let me explain. This is what my mornings look like. Most of the time.
I sleep.
Until I hear the kids stirring or more than stirring...whipping around their rooms in a flurry of clothing, toys, and giggles.

And the other mornings? I wake early. I want time with God. Time in the quiet. AND... one of the kids hears me get up and they get, and they get up the others. And I ask them to go back to their rooms till I get them. And one of the three ends up needed a little more help obeying...

Or this morning. I woke up at 6:05am. No kids stirring this time. I tip-toed downstairs, grabbed my bible and started some much needed coffee. I sit down in my favorite comfy chair AND I notice a pile of puppy vomit on the carpet two feet in front of me. He ate one of the kids socks again and somehow I missed seeing it in the dim-light of dawn. I cannot ignore the vomit. I get up to clean it. I am amazed once again at the number of things that can thwart my time with God. [I did get some good reading in after that, all tinged with the smell of gross doggy stomach contents.]

So I am wondering this morning, how on earth I get enough of Jesus. Or even a little more of Him. When it sometimes feels as though all of life is making it impossible. Ya know? I would love to hear other Mom's thoughts. I've even begun, somewhere in the deep recesses of my mind, to give up.

But I have been thinking about one thing. As a mom I cannot compartmentalize my walk with God. Meaning, if I believe that praying, reading my Bible, and doing "church things" is the only way to know God more and experience him, then by the end of my grueling years as a mom, there might not be any real love of Jesus left. Cause lets be honest, kids and households and life steals your time as a mom. And it seems that nearly everything involving kids is urgent. I have to learn to see God in and amongst my daily moments. Is Jesus somewhere in the vomit? Well maybe he isn't, but he can certainly redeem it. Can I find Jesus in the mountains on my drive to the store, in the small conversations with my kids, in the cooking of dinner or the packing for vacation. Can I find Jesus in decisions made with my husband, hiking, exercising, or doing laundry? He should be in those things, right? He MADE those things, right?

So that is what I am thinking about this morning, as the sun slowly brightens the Wasatch sky. The Wasatch, those mountains that are slowly becoming mine. And as the vomit smell slowly dissipates.

The kids will start stirring soon. I hope I can help them to see Jesus in ALL of life to.