He Is Risen

He is Risen Indeed! Yes, here is Easter, the commemoration of our Lord's resurrection. Before I babble about the fun C had with her eggs and gifts and whatnot, I need to mention Pastor Quinn's really powerful sermon from church on Sunday. The title of the sermon: To be, or not to be, that is the resurrection! The English teacher in me loved the literary reference, of course, and the connection between the Hamlet section and the resurrection message was quite poignant. Hamlet's soliloquy at that point in the play indicated his melancholy; he was contemplating suicide. He no longer had any hope. _But_ it it is precisely because of the resurrection that _we_ have hope! Of course, there was more to it than that, but it was a beautiful message of hope and future and life abundant and eternal.

C, however, spent the service in the nursery, so she's still at the "Easter's a celebration" stage of understanding though she doesn't yet understand what it's a celebration of. We decorated eggs on Saturday, and she hunted for them on Sunday morning, as well as for the plastic ones filled with treats. She also got spoiled by her grandparents who were here visiting for the weekend, and got all sorts of neat toys from them. Her favorite by far is the Snow White dressup outfit. Now we can have friends over and have princess gatherings. Mommy's goodies have been ignored thus far. I put together a plastic box filled with a plethora of crafting supplies. (child-safe scissors, gluesticks, construction paper, pipe cleaners, fuzzy balls, rhinestones, glitter, google eyes, ribbon, stickers, paper doilies, paints, fingerpaint, and playdoh) I'm sure they'll be discovered soon. It should be fun to create with her.

In life beyond the holiday, I've discovered the true blessing of hardwood floors: they're a whole lot easier to clean up vomit from than carpet. C got sick yesterday and I spent much less time cleaning up after her than I did back at Irwin. She's better now, and we've got some high school girls from the band performing at our chapel tomorrow staying with us. She was so excited to "get the ladies!" and showed off all her energy for them in the hour before bedtime. She seriously wears me out some days. This would be one of them.

What a privilege

I just have to share this testimony about the working of the Holy Spirit. I didn't manage to check my email on Thursday and Friday, so it wasn't until yesterday that I learned my friend Melissa had her baby. I hadn't even known she was in labor. However, she's been on my prayer list for a week or so, and I've been praying about her birthing process. On Wednesday night I couldn't sleep, so I went through my prayer list. The rest of my list went first, and quickly, but my prayers over Melissa seemed to linger. I felt moved to pray in depth for her and specifically for her labor. Finally, I felt like I could stop praying and could finally sleep, without any effort at all; I just drifted off. It was just after 11:30 pm. On Thursday and Friday I didn't feel the need to pray for her delivery at all, and just dropped that off my list for the moment, intending to pray for it later. Evan was born at 9:37 pm PST, which would have been 11:27 pm, my time. The Holy Spirit had led me to pray for her through her labor and delivery. I feel incredibly blessed to have been allowed the privilege to pray through that time for her, even though she...and I didn't even know it. How sovereign is the Lord our God!

Jehovah-Jireh and then some

A year or so ago, I had the opportunity to engage in a study of the Word based on the names of God. The one I really remember (because, well, I have to confess I didn't keep up on the reading as well as I ought...sorry Nicolle) was Jehovah-Jireh, God the Provider. We discussed this image in depth, and how God provides all good things to His children, who trust in Him, and ask for His provision. I have to testify that God truly does hear the prayers of His children, and He does more than provide, if we trust Him to. He provides more than we need, He blesses! In September, when we found out about this move, I fretted and fumed about housing, and of course started researching all the options. I discovered quickly that if I wanted to live on post, which I did since F's leaving, I had little to no control over what kind of house we would get. I started praying about our house, and asked just about every woman of faith around me to pray too (okay, yes I'm a bit selfish). In December we found out that we might not be allowed to live on post, and I started fretting and fuming again, and tried to take control of the situation myself. After torturing myself for several days, I finally went back to prayer, and the of/on-post issue was resolved. I reached a peace and a sense of trust about our house options, a willingness to take with gratitude what was available. Then, mid-January before leaving, I learned that our only option was going to be a house about 700 square feet smaller than our then-current home. I went to work trying to figure out how to get our furniture into it. It was going to be tight, and perhaps uncomfortable, but I managed, at least with my little to-scale furniture papers. When I called housing on our way to set up a time to meet, I learned that our options had changed! We arrived to find ourselves able to take the option of a LOVELY (approx) 2000 sq. foot home/apt with everything all on one level! There will be NO problems fitting everything (our room might be tight just b/c of the size of the rooms themselves), _and_ we even have space for a guest room in addition to the scrapbook area. The change in availability was a last-minute one, which I am confident the Lord orchestrated. I have to give all the credit for this amazing space to God and God alone. He has done more than provide for our needs. He blessed us with abundance! Our neighbors are also folks we knew at Irwin back about 2 years and across the way is a friend of F's from his years at Hood. Wow...a great space, and friends too. Now we're just waiting on delivery of our household goods. Will let ya'll know how the decorating goes.