Today I am full. Exhausted a little, perhaps, but full.
Overflowing. Overwhelmed, even?
To begin, a book is changing my life. At least this year, but I pray that it sticks. One Thousand Gifts by Ann Voskamp.
Oh that I could sum up the entire book in a sentence to claim for each morning! Gratitude is the expression of my faith in God that brings me to His presence moment by moment, remembering His faithfulness, accepting every minute as His gift of grace, finding joy, blessing others.
Remembering, what the Israelites and I fail to do so easily. But last week I had the opportunity to remember corporately in our small group what God has done, how He has called, how we have answered. To hear the stories of others, to recount bits of mine, and to ruminate on all that words will never express was humbling and thrilling all at the same time.
How far He has brought me!
My commute to and from work takes me by a middle school each day. Once each week, sometimes more often, Juliet and I mosey down the street on our way to the park and pass the students outside for lunch time. The girls giggle in circles as they watch the boys throwing rocks at each other. Flashbacks to grade school are frequent and comical.
Playing MASH at midnight with squealing girlfriends. So glad I didn't marry my middle school crush in a peach wedding dress to have five kids living in a shack.
Buying everything with the title Princess on it. Purse. Shirts. Door knockers. Pillows. Antenna balls. (Yes, even when I was old enough to drive.)
Sitting on AIM hoping boys would talk to me. Asking my girl friends to suggest it to them. One word: Nextel.
The sillyness record could go on, I'm sure, but in the midst of all of that, somehow, Jesus was truly grabbing my heart.
He so clearly called me back to public school after a few years in private and Christian.
He so deeply ingrained a desire to be a wife and mom who stays home with her kids.
He gave me a knack for Spanish that, oddly enough, landed me at Georgia Tech. Of course since then I've realized that, academically speaking, I should have pursued writing at a liberal arts school. His timing, so amusing.
He spoke clearly on Pref Night at Alpha Chi, meeting me in the upstairs hallway and Anna Griffith's (now Bolduc's) words. Here. Seek Me here. Find Me here. Bring Me here.
In the disinterest I wrestled with through half the classes in my major He turned my heart away from so many political jobs that were not His plans.
And as I haggled with corporate America and schools and churches for jobs after graduation, He brought me back to the desire for staying home with my children as well as the opportunity to train for that in a very real way.
He interrupted my mourning old flames with the conflagration of love that He had built in Stephen Kump for me over a handful of years, and He moved clear as crystal to bring us to marriage before deployment began.
He brought us in engagement to a community of God-lovers known as the Village Church in Vinings and has knit me into a core group of women who come around me relentlessly in this season. He also set us near families who are several steps ahead of us to learn from and follow.
He is orchestrating the events of this deployment, both at home and across the ocean, so that His name and renown are maximized. Imperfectly on our end, but gloriously on His. More details of that shortly, but for now...
Wonder.
Gratitude.
Amazement.
Awe.
Giggling even.
Jesus has done all of that? And my recounting does not even begin with salvation right now.
But if He has done all of this and more, how can I not be delighted to follow Him? How can I not be tickled by His workings now? How can I not praise Him and move joyfully into each new day?
Remembering. Remembering fosters gratitude.
Because even if none of these things had happened, memory of the cross and the empty tomb would be more than enough to cultivate adoration and enjoyment in all He has for me now.
Resting here. Because "He who began a good work...will bring it to completion." (Philippians 1:6)
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