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Sunday, April 20, 2014

Uncluttering Clutter

I have this Ribbon Board.  Ribbons criss-cross each other so you can place pictures or notes on the board by slipping them under the ribbons.  For me, I placed bible verses that have encouraged me in different moments of my life, but over time I've also placed invitations, business cards, pictures, and ID cards on this as well.  Today, I started taking down invitations that's passed, cards I no longer need, and noticed the verses I had there before.  I forgot about them because of the cluttered papers I put on top of them.  Reading them again, they've encouraged me again.  It's like drinking a pitcher of water, and still thirsty for more.

Isn't that what happens to us in life?  We read the Word, or hear Godly wisdom from friends and family, but we forget them because of our busy lives.  Everything that's whirling in our minds start to clutter our thoughts, and we forget the Word that motivated and encouraged us earlier.  We might even set the bible aside because we're too busy to read it, but we piled our clutter on that too.

When I cleaned up my board, I also found a picture of an iceberg.  I put that picture up the day I put that board up as a reminder of how my relational time SHOULD be spent.  The visible peak represents the time I spend with friends, ministry, and the mission field, but the larger, deeper portion of the iceberg represents my time spent with God. I am guilty of flipping that iceberg upside down.  No wonder I felt like I was drowning...Now that my board is uncluttered, time to start unclutter my life.  Time to flip that iceberg upright again.


Thursday, April 17, 2014

Goodbye 2013, Hello 2014

**yes, this is a late post***
Wow, looking back on my blog posts, I haven't been here all last year.  2013 has not been kind...

2013 has been a tough year…Beginning of the year was difficult, and ended just as painful.  In the beginning of the year I almost lost my father.  He had heart surgery, and I returned home to help my mom get him back on his feet.  At the end of the year, I lost my mom to cancer…parents are precious, but we take them for granted until we lose them, or almost lose them.  It makes you wonder how you can protect them like they protected us when we were kids.  My dad has shown me that no matter how old he gets, he's still looking after his kids, and making sure we make the right choices.  After those 2 events, I don't know if anything else in 2013 was as important…I returned to school for a Masters Degree, but that doesn't seem as important as our loss and near loss.

I pray that 2014 will be filled with blessings, so abundant that 2013 is just a speed bump in life.  2 years ago, I started my blessing list, but I didn't continue it.  I stopped at #87.  Let's see if I can reach to 1000 by the end of this year.  Remind me if you don't see that list growing.