T.G.I.R.

Thank Goodness It's Thursday.

(Yes, R is the abbreviation for Thursday, T for Tuesday.) Today is my Friday. Monday we are closed for MLK and I decided to take off Friday, just because. I love four day weekends!

I've filled my schedule, with things I love of course, and have written them in my 2012 day planner. Over the four days this includes: a one-on-one personal training session in the morning, meeting with a women's shelter to find out more about volunteering/ mentoring, as well as acupuncture. These are things I enjoy- trust me. I also plan on taking bags of clothes to Buffalo Exchange to hopefully get some decent money, if they like what I have to offer. I have a worship planning party tomorrow night (which I highly enjoy and usually look forward to.) These are my friends and it's a wonderful time of not only planning, but community as well. Sunday brings church and maybe some yoga.

I still try to stick with my "rule of threes" even on weekends. Especially on long weekends where it might be easy for me to try too hard to be productive and run all over this city.

I'll visit Java Girl and perhaps Target. It's times like this I feel spoiled to have four days to myself to do whatever it is I'd like to do. No babies. No yard work. No part-time job or ill family member to tend to. No pets. No house to vacuum (no vaccum at all). No car to have the tires rotated on. Nothing.

Just me and God and a brand new Pilot Razor ink pen.

...

There are so many mysteries I'm trying to unravel, and all the while God's like, "just seek me in the mystery and you'll be okay." There is no solution, this is not a puzzle. It's a gift. It's One Thousand Gifts.

Today I read about how Esau gave Jacob his birthright and how later his own mother, Rebekah, convinced Jacob it trick his senile father into giving him Esau's blessing. These are twin brothers. This is family. This is a wife lying to her husband and a mother pitting son against son, playing favorites.

I read this and I think God let that happen. However awful it may seem or even be, God knew it was going to work out that way. And why? Why not just do this whole thing nicer? Less messy? More like I WOULD, GOD?

So, today, I'm reminded again, that His ways are not my ways. He let Lazarus die, he let Moses float down that river, away from his mother, he let the three be throw into the fire (which did not engulf them or even singe a single hair!) he let Abraham take Issac up on that mountain to sacrifice him and he let his son, Jesus, die on a cross. It's not always pretty. BUT- God's will WILL be done.

Placing aside my plans, desires, hope-for's and grandiose dreams for His Purpose is not always easy. I pretty much have to release it all again every single day. But I know ultimately I will be happier finding my purpose and meaning as a servant than as the director of this life I've been given. I want to know "why" and "when" and "what now?"

All he wants is faithfulness. Fullness of Faith.

“Being in a hurry. Getting to the next thing without fully entering the thing in front of me. I cannot think of a single advantage I've ever gained from being in a hurry. But a thousand broken and missed things, tens of thousands, lie in the wake of all the rushing.... Through all that haste I thought I was making up time. It turns out I was throwing it away.”
― Ann Voskamp, One Thousand Gifts: A Dare to Live Fully Right Where You Are