Tag Archives: heart

Learning Not to Charge Ahead

 

I thought I lost my first-born child.

My heart stopped. I watched helpless as he ran without looking – his head never turning this way or that. My son charged straight ahead across the street to the bus stop, racing to beat our neighbor there.

He never saw the car coming. My heart skidded with the car. A rapid thump, thump, thump – THUMP, screeching to a full stop. Thinking only of what he would gain on the other side (first in line for the bus), my child ran full-sped into the street…

Join me today at the Cafe! Click HERE to read the rest of my devotion.

I’ve returned from New Mexico and had a wonderful time. Please pray the Lord will open the doors He wants to open and close the ones that need to be shut. I’ll be telling you more about my time there in the days and months ahead.

Blessings!

 

Carol

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What If…

I couldn’t make any more excuses.

For years I had used the old money-is-just-too-tight-we-barely-have-enough-for-ourselves card. And that was true. Money was tight, and there were many months where we barely had enough to cover the bills, but we ate out every Friday night. And if we missed a Friday, we’d squeeze it in on Saturday or perhaps a Sunday lunch.

For the most part, I was content.

Content knowing at least it was on the list – at the top as a matter of fact. You know the list. The list of things you will do if you ever strike it rich. My list started with:

1. Sponsor a child through World Vision.

 

It was right above: 2. Buy a pair of shoes in every color of the rainbow.

Very spiritual, I know. My heart ached whenever I saw the faces of those children. I knew God was speaking to me, asking me to help, but I kept telling Him I didn’t have enough.

Then one morning, God turned on the loud speakers to my heart. My daughter, Faith, was up early. I heard her crying before I saw her. She stood in the doorway to my room. “Mommy, my tummy hurts. I’m so hungry.”

I rubbed my eyes and blinked. “Well, go grab a granola bar. I’ll be down to fix you something else in a minute,” I told her and moved to put my feet on the floor when I heard Him whisper.

“What if…?”

 

I stopped and listened, knowing God was trying to get my attention.

“What if you had nothing to feed them? What if your pantry was bare? What if even the nearest water was miles away? What if your children lied beside you at night and whimpered from the pain of empty? What if…?”

 

Taken aback, I scurried down the stairs and walked to the pantry. The door stood wide with Faith in the middle, munching a chocolate chip granola bar. She was surrounded by food.

“What if…?”

 

A few weeks later, I was offered the chance to actually go to Bolivia with World Vision and write about it. This was an opportunity to see first hand what a difference a sponsor could make in the life of a child. I knew it was for me. It was my chance, I thought, my chance to make a difference. But the door shut before I could walk through. Eight bloggers went to Bolivia, but none of them were me.

I vowed to follow their trip and pray for their journey. Each day, I read their entries and cried. Each day, God waited patiently.

Until finally one morning I was done making excuses. We had enough money for what was important to us – obviously Chili’s and O’ Charley’s were vital.

But what if we chose to stay home one Friday a month and saved the $35 it costs for sponsorship through World Vision, and we wrote letters that night to our child? The sacrifice of not eating out once a month didn’t seem like much of a sacrifice at all.

God did have plans for me to make a difference in Bolivia, but it wasn’t by blogging about the trip. Not this time. Instead, our family joined hands with a seven-year-old girl named Jhovana, who lives in a hut with a dirt floor and a thatched roof. She likes math and loves to play with dolls.

By staying home one Friday night a month, our family will help provide clean water, medical care, in addition to improved nutrition and hygiene. We will help support her whole community with school supplies and classrooms. Her parents will be given job skills, but most of all they will all be shown the love of God.

“What if…?”

 

So what if the great plan God has for feeding the hungry and filling the thirsty is ME and YOU? What if we do nothing about it?

Won’t you join me by sponsoring a child?

Whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me. Matthew 25:40 NIV

Carol

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Into the Sunset


I painted over my son’s boyhood. With a dip and a roll, I watched with detached sorrow – as if I wasn’t the one doing it – and covered his childish fantasy with a fresh coat of paint. We stood in that exact spot, his father and I, only eight years ago with paint in hand and created a beautiful mural. A cowboy riding into the sunset.

Now it’s gone.

I stood back and took stock of what I’d done. Tears threatened. He was two then and loved cowboys. We decked his room with bandanas and horses. His bed was crafted into an old wagon, complete with red wheels. That, too, was now gone.

My child walked in, his ten-year-old frame almost as tall as me, and smiled. “Almost there,” he grinned. “Not quite,” I told him looking more at him than the wall.

My heart swelled and ached. Mothers have been raising children for thousands of years and survived. But not this mother. And not my child. I took my first-born’s face and pulled his nose to mine.

“Mama,” he squirmed. “Do you know how much I love you?” I insisted. He just smiled in return nodding between my cupped hands. I knew as he did it, that one day he’d give that smile away. Some sweet little girl would be the recipient of my son’s heart.

It’s the way of things. The ebb and flow, the giving and receiving – it’s the way God intended. Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh. Gen. 2:24 ESV


“Hey, check it out! My old spurs!” I watched as my son clipped silver spurs to his high tops and ran out the door to find his sister.

Yes. A man shall leave his father and mother – just not today.













Lord, thank you for allowing me the privilege of raising my three children. As they grow, help me to accept the changes that take place. Prepare my heart for the day you have chosen for them to become one with another. Give me wisdom to always point them to You. Amen.




Carol

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Book Signing


You crown the year with your bounty, and your carts overflow with abundance. Psalm 65:11 NIV

Have you ever had a moment where you stop and think, “How did I get here?” I had one of those moments on Saturday. Getting into the writing and publishing world is a slow process. You don’t just decide to start writing one day and get published the next. It just doesn’t happen that way. (Well, not for most of us anyway.) It’s a process.

For me, it has been a journey. A journey about obedience. God called me to write, and I did. Then He asked if I would be willing to give it up. Begrudgingly, I told Him I would. But it wasn’t the writing He wanted me to walk away from. It was SELF. I had to remove my wishes from the situation. Once my heart was right, doors began to open.

I didn’t always know where He was leading, but I tried (sometimes white knuckled) to follow Him. This past Saturday, I was at Lifeway Christian stores in Buford, GA doing a book signing for the book Daily Guideposts: Your First Year of Motherhood. On the way home, I was talking to God aloud in my car, thanking Him for the opportunity.

And then it hit me. The awesomeness of God and His goodness towards me. If you’d asked me four years ago when I started pouring my heart into writing if I dreamed one day I’d be doing a book signing at Lifeway, I would have most assuredly laughed in your face.

But God…

God is so good! Please share in my joy, and enjoy the pictures of the signing. I love you all!





Carol

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Praise and Paraphrase – Author Interview


From time to time, I like to share people and books with you that I think you’ll enjoy. This is one such occasion.

I’d like to introduce you to a sweet woman of God I met at the Glorieta Christian Writer’s Conference several years ago. Her name is Pamela Sonnenmoser, and she has a newly released book out called Praise & Paraphrase. Here is a little interview to help you get to know Pamela a little more.

PAMELA SONNENMOSER, AUTHOR OF PRAISE & PARAPHRASE

Tell us a little about your background and how you got into the ministry.


“My parents were evangelists and from the time I was a little girl, I thought I wanted to go into some kind of ministry. As I grew up, dreams of reaching people for God took a back seat to reaching for happiness and peace in everything the world had to offer. For six years I wondered in the wilderness of worldly pleasure. When I finally came back to the Lord, I thought he would never be able to use me because I had done too many horrible things. In 1996 God spoke to my heart in such a way that I knew He wanted me to surrender that prideful thinking and submit to His calling on my life. I finally realized it didn’t matter what I’d done before. It only mattered that I gave my life completely to the Lord.”

What was your inspiration for Praise & Paraphrase?


“I have always loved object lessons. I think having parents in ministry helped me to find examples of God’s truth in things we see every day. It seems like no matter what I am doing, the Lord uses the normal things in my life to show me what He is trying to teach me. When I speak, I use a lot of these stories and object lessons. People kept asking me to repeat the stories, so I decided to make them into devotionals. Eventually, Praise & Paraphrase was born.”

What new lessons is the Lord teaching you right now?


“Every day there are new lessons, just like every day there are new mercies. Right now I feel like the Lord is really teaching me what it means to be fully consecrated to Him. I mean, more than committed, more than surrendered, and not just saying we are His, but living that out every moment of every day.”

Now that Praise & Paraphrase is out in bookstores, do you have any projects that you’re currently working on?


“It seems like I am always working on something new. I love it. Right now I am excited about the release of Pamela’s Healthy Pantry at the beginning of March; but this summer the book that is closest to my heart is being released by Beacon Hill. It’s called Beside the Empty Cradle. It’s such a personal book for me, because it’s our story of battling with infertility and the process to becoming content with God’s plan for our lives, even when it wasn’t our plan.”

God is really moving in both areas of your ministry (speaking and writing) – what projects do you have on the horizon?


“It seems like there is always something new going on. God is really opening doors for the speaking ministry right now, and I am working on two more book projects this year. More than anything, projects that I say yes to have to line up with what God is speaking into my life. I love to do a lot of different things, so I am sometimes too willing to say yes, ahead of listening for God’s direction. I used to try to plan the next thing before the current projects were even half finished. I don’t do that anymore. There are a few things I am praying about right now, but until God says, ‘Go,’ I am finishing the current stuff and speaking around the country as He provides opportunities.”

When you’re not speaking and writing, what are you doing?


“I enjoy doing so many things, my favorite way to spend down time in the summertime is with my husband, John, on our boat in the Missouri, River. I am also blessed to have amazing, godly girlfriends in my life, and I love spending time with them. It’s always fun to find things we can do together that might be encouragement, support or help to someone else.”

Where can readers find your book?


“Praise & Paraphrase can be ordered directly from me at www.freshcupministries.com or on Amazon, and from your local bookstores.”

Please share an excerpt from Praise & Paraphrase.


Baked Potatoes


All discipline for the moment seems not to be joyful, but sorrowful; yet to those who have been trained by it, afterwards it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness.- Hebrews 12:11

I love baked potatoes. Not nuked potatoes, but baked in the oven at 350 degrees, for an hour – BAKED potatoes. If you only bake them for 10 minutes they will still be hard. The potato cannot yield to the heat of the oven in just a few minutes. It needs the full baking time to be perfectly done – crispy skin, fluffy on the inside.

Sometimes as Christians we don’t want to stay in the heat very long. We want God to perfect our faith with a microwave instead of the fire. But there is something different about a Christian that tries to take a short cut around the fire. Just like those microwaved potatoes aren’t the same as a REAL baked potato.

What I really love is a great twice-baked potato. To be twice baked the potato spends an hour in the heat, then it is taken out, cut open, its insides are scraped out and crushed. Good things are added to it and finally everything is put back into the shell. That potato has to go back into the oven at that point; back into the heat. Finally it is perfected and ready to serve.

I want to be like a twice-baked potato; perfected by the process God requires, having all of myself removed and having the extra things that come from the Holy Spirit added. I want to be yielded by His refining fire again and again. I long to be ready to serve the glory of God.

Thanks, Pamela! Friends, you have a chance to win a copy of the book over at Pamela’s blog. Visit Fresh Cup Ministries to find out how to enter. I’m definitely looking forward to getting the book and reading more!

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Carol

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