A Conversation

Do you ever feel like you just need to have a conversation with the Lord?  or maybe you don't need a conversation but a begging session?  You know like when you were a little kid and you'd stomp your feet then whine until someone gave you what you wanted?  My Mother calls them temper tantrums. Oh you never did that? Well I think I did.  Sometimes as an adult I feel like I want to just scream & cry then stomp my feet until the Lord moves.  I know that is so childish and no one else ever feels that way, right?   HAHAHAHA 

You are just too embarrassed to say it!

Come on...you know you've felt that way too.  You've been patient for what seems like a long time.  Okay, maybe it has only been like 15 minutes or maybe it has been years.  Don't you ever just want the Lord to just move right now?!?  Have you ever prayed and said Lord if you don't move 'right now' then I don't know what I'll do?  Maybe you haven't but I have!

Tonight as Charlie & I are getting all of our last minute things together for a youth retreat this weekend, we received a call from our son.  I could tell by the sound of his voice that something was wrong.  Really it was probably because the first words out of his mouth were something like "Mom, don't panic.". You don't start a phone call like that and then expect me not to panic.  Then he says "I just need you to pray.".  I'm thinking "Oh geez, what now?"  But I was the good Mom and said "Son, what is it?  What has happened?"  He continues to tell me that he has hurt his ankle playing in the last basketball game of the season and they think it is broke.  He has very weak ankles and we've been through this many times but always before we've had health insurance.  Well, without jobs, guess what? You got it.  No health insurance!  Let me say he's only fractured his ankle once and that was last summer.  Always before it was just really bad sprains.

To get to the point...we went over to the school to pick him up.  Of course he had to watch the rest of the game!  I mean you know it was the last & final game of the season...the championship game.  Picture this...my son, the number 2 scorer in the league for the entire season, sitting on the sidelines in a soft splint with his foot propped up in chair. The entire time he is wincing if he barely moves his foot.  But he still cheers on the teams...talking trash from the sidelines.  Oh btw, his team didn't make it to the championship game.  After he hurt his ankle his team lost...Boo!

I guess you are trying to figure out why I started this post out by asking if you've ever had a conversation with the Lord or a begging session.  Well, now that you've pictured my son, picture me...I'm on my way home alone.  Charlie is driving the son home.  I am crying the entire way and talking to the Lord or should I say screaming to the Lord.  My conversation went something like this...  "Why?  Why can't something be easy?  Why do you think I'm so strong?  Can't you tell I'm not?  I'm weak and I really can't take much more.    I don't mean to be ungrateful but I can't do this anymore.  I'm tired.  Please make it all better.  Please put the bones back together again.  Don't let his ankle be broken.  You know where we stand.  You know we don't have the money to do this."  Seriously, no pausing...just me begging the Lord... Next time you see a child pitching a temper tantrum just think of me because that was totally me this evening...I don't know how I even made it home because I surely couldn't see.  A little bit ago I was washing the dishes and I was thinking to myself "Krista, that wasn't a conversation. You weren't listening.  You were the only one talking."  A conversation requires that both people are allowed to talk.

Sometimes I forget to listen for the Lord to talk back to me.  I'm not talking about a supernatural Johnny Cash voice from the sky.  I don't expect that!  But I do think the Lord can 'talk' to you.  Most of the time it is through the preached Word and you'll get a special message.  Then sometimes I'll feel something come to my heart...like the Lord is sending me his spirit to comfort me.  I know he does because many times I'll feel his sweet Holy Ghost just when I need it but tonight I was so intent on telling him how I couldn't make it that I wasn't open to receive his spirit.

Don't get me wrong,  I'm not always begging the Lord for things.  I thank him for his blessings often.  Charlie and I were actually talking about how the Lord has blessed us the last few months when Trevlyn called with the news.  The thing is even when I'm thanking him, or praising him, I'm talking!  I realized tonight that I need to shut-up and listen.  The Lord must have something he needs to say to me and I'm not getting it.   So, from now on I'm going to take more time to shut-up, listen, and try to have conversations with the Lord not begging sessions! Then I can be open to feel him wrap his arms around me and fill me with the comfort that only he can give.

~Blessings
Krista

Praise Him Anyway

Looking at these pictures make my heart hurt; literally!  This is my daughter's car.  She was on her way to school today on a very busy highway and had a wreck.  Road construction had the lanes merging from two lanes to one and the car in front of her came to a dead stop to let other cars merge.  She didn't realize that the car was stopped until too late and she rear ended it.  Her car is totaled.  This was her first car.  We bought it used and only had liability insurance on it.  That's okay though.  She can always get another car.  I couldn't bring myself to even imagine what I would have done if she had been hurt.  Other than a few bumps and bruises she is fine.  She is really really sore.  I know God took care of her.  As you can tell from the pictures the driver's side didn't get pushed into the car only the passenger side.  If the driver side had then it would have surely crushed her legs.

There are a lot of things going on in our life right now that don't seem to be good things.  Sometimes I feel as if the weight of the world is on my shoulders but I have to believe that God is with me.  I'm living my life for him and I fully expect a good outcome.  I've been singing a song the last few weeks and it seems that the words are so appropriate today.

A Miracle Today

Lord, you see the puzzle not the piece

You see the forest not the trees

You know what's best for me

Lord, you have bottled up my tears

You see my questions and my fears

And the way it has to be.

I know that there are others more deserving than I

I know that I'm not worthy but you listen when I cry

So if this cross is mine to bear, I'll praise You anyway.

Lord, I could sure use a miracle today.

Lord, You are faithful more than words

You feed the lilies and the birds

You catch the sparrow when it falls.

You know exactly where I am 

So I'm not questioning Your plan

There's a reason for it all.

You turned the water into wine

You healed the leper and the blind

God I know there's nothing you can't do

You calmed the sea with just one word

and when you spoke the deaf man heard

So, I know this is a little job for you.

~Blessings

Krista

Our Easter in Pictures...

This post won't be very wordy but will be full of pictures.  We started our Easter weekend by hosting a community Easter Family Festival.  I was up at 7 making hot dogs.  We were at the church by 9.

Volunteers sorting thousands of Easter Eggs.

By 11:20 over 100 people.  It only gets better

Dyeing Easter Eggs

Getting prizes for the Easter Egg Toss

Receiving a Bible for choosing the correct ducks

Face Painting

The line never slowed for the 22' Slide

 The old

and the young play hopscotch

 S'mores with Peeps

 are messy

So messy that I don't want to touch

By 12:15 the parking lot and the hill behind the church are full!

At 12:30 the first group ages 0-4 head up the hill to hunt eggs.

By 2 everyone was leaving and we were cleaning & setting up for Easter morning service.

The choir singing Easter morning.

My little family + my sweet nephew Isaac.

I hope you all had a great Easter weekend.  We did!  There is nothing like celebrating our risen Saviour with children.  They are so eager to learn the true meaning behind Easter.  It was a great weekend and just what I needed to make me smile!

~Blessings

Krista

Reminiscing

Lunch

I'm sure most of you are reading this thinking "What in the world does a  plate of tuna, pork & beans, and saltine crackers have to do with reminiscing?"  Well I'm going to tell you!

When I was a child I spent my summers with my grandmother.  I called her Mama.  My Mother has and always will be my Mother, but my grandmother was my Mama!  Yes, I was just a little spoiled.  She would just about give me anything I wanted.  I say just about because she wasn't a rich woman and some things that I wanted were always within her budget.  Anyways back to the point, Many summer afternoons Mama would make lunch.  It would just be the two of us and she'd open a can of pork & beans, a can of tuna, and some saltine crackers.  I always loved that simple little lunch with just the two of us.

I was looking in the pantry for something light to eat and I noticed the can of Van Camp's Pork & Beans.  The memories started flowing in.  I decided this was a perfect lunch for me today.

~Blessings
Krista