A thank you goes a long way

So on my mission through homemaking I am learning something so simple. It's amazing that when you ask God to teach you through the little things He always does. After running down my list and trying to be the proverbs 31 woman I was feeling pretty accomplished. After standing there proudly I was awaiting for someone to say great job, your awesome thank you. That is when reality hit me and I was saddened to think how many times we have not said thank you to our Heavenly Father! Gasp! What a reality. I all of a sudden knew that I needed to spend time thanking God instead of looking for thanks. I did what I was suppose to do. I did the things my  ministry of homemaking called me to do. And you know what just knowing God has smiled on me melted my heart. I was reminded of the verse

"Let us not grow weary for doing good, for in due season we will reap if we do not lose heart"

And I intend to live my life not losing heart. Have you ever felt unappreciated?

I am Yours

Have you ever been too hard on yourself? Well me and this problem have known each other for too long. Often in my life I have set myself aside because I never found myself good enough. I would almost be the best at what I was doing and because it felt uncomfortable I would allow myself to fail at it and then tell myself I was not good enough. It was a lie from the enemy that I believed for a long time. 

We always have to be so cautious of what and who we are letting into our lives, because somehow this lie that I can't do it has tried to remake an appearance into my life. Being the mother of a fifteen month old and a 5 year old, plus I am watching my 4 month old nephew three days a week and I have taken in my dad, his wife and my little 4 year old brother into our home. Needless to say it is a very full house all of the time. When we first moved here to Orlando in January, I knew God had brought us here for a purpose. We were going through a lot as a family and we knew for a couple of years now that God's will was for us to move to Orlando. 

Everything was going great, I was seeking Him earnestly, I was working out, I was taking care of our home and loving my husband and children. I even had our family on a path to getting healthy with healthy cooking and living a more natural lifestyle. My dad and his family were looking to move from North Carolina to Orlando to be closer to us and we let them into our home wholeheartedness. Soon after they moved in I became really ill. I was not able to move my body, I could not walk, I could not do anything. I was exhausted all the time. I suffered sleep insomnia at night because of all the pain I was in during the night. I would lie there awake and think that I must be dying. The doctors did not know what was wrong with me. In my faintness cries out to God I would hear Him telling me to fight, to fight like never before daughter. My response was I don't want to Abba I'm too tired. 

I was not able to do anything in my home. I could not even change my daughters pamper because of the pain in my fingers and hands. I could not lift my own child. I would sit on the sofa and see all the crumbs on the floor and cry because I did not have the energy to get up and sweep the floor. A good friend of mine whom I asked to pray for me was given a word from God for me. It was all confirmation of things in my life. But that is a different story. I feel like I lost everything in my home. My dad's wife was doing all the cooking and cleaning and I had no control over it. They are not believers either so the whole mood of my home had changed. I really struggled with this, but was also very appreciative for the help. 

Fast forward a bit, my God is a God who is true to His Word. After being diagnosed with RA and Lupus and being given tons of harmful medicines, I chose the natural route and within a month and half I was on my way back to restoration. God taught me a lot through this time in my life. I am still trying to regain my home and it has not been without lots of tears and broken hearts. I thank God for my God fearing husband and for his understanding and love, though it was a hard time in our marriage, we knew without a doubt that if we each individually seeked God's face and together as a couple that we would get to the place we needed to be in order to restore our home. 

My problem I am having now is trying to get a hold of everything at one time. There is so much to do and most days I don't feel I have the energy to do any of it. I have started with the basics again by seeking the Kingdom of God first early in the morning, and now I need to incorporate working out to keep my body strong, and I purchased the e-book 31 days to clean http://31daystoclean.com/ to start regaining order in my house. I still have a long journey ahead of me to becoming the homemaker God wants me to be. 

All I can do is throw up my hands and surrender myself, my family and my all to God. I am Yours!

Tired of being on the offensive

Most of my life I lived a life where I felt the need to constantly be defending myself. I was verbally abused since a young age. I would  be told to make a list of different words like hard headed, stupid etc... write down the definition and tell me to study it because that is what we were. It was not till the past couple of months in my 4 year marriage that I realized that my husband could not tell me anything without me jumping at him in my defense mode without getting his heart torn out of his chest. You see when you learn from a young age how powerful words are and how they can affect someone they become like a sword. The thing is the words I was using were not a double edge sword with words of wisdom or encouragement but dare I say it a quarrelsome wife. 

When this reality hit that my husband may feel safer on the corner of our roof then in our home, I knew something had to give. I started to search for forgiveness and prayed against this spirit of offense that was ever so clearly running my flesh. First things first, I Recognized what the cause was, I Repented from it, I Renounced it from my life, and I Replaced it with was is True, the Word of God. Let me tell you I felt so free! I asked God to help me exude the Fruits of the Holy Spirit starting with Humility and Love. Since that day it feels that everyone around me is taking turns trying to destroy my character and personality. At first my thought was Oh no they ain't! I'm going to show them the plank in their eye, I'm going to show them who there messing with. oops! Then I remembered my prayer, my deliverance and the promise that came with it. I took a deep breath wiped away the tears and looked at my hands and thought to myself there are no nails in my hands. 

Even then I can hear my flesh screaming are you going to allow this, they are insulting you, your worthless, your everything they are saying you are. Then out of my mouth the scriptures in my heart flowed ever so gracefully. "For the Lord God is a sun and a shield. He bestows His grace and glory, no good thing does He withhold from those whose walk is upright." "My soul waits silently for God alone for my expectation is from Him". I felt released once again from my flesh. 

God knows my heart, He knows my deep desperate desire to be more like Him, to love my husband the way He loves him, to love my kids the way He loves them. Today I was reminded of that when once again a negative comment came my way and I felt heavy burdened with sadness. I asked God did Jesus feel this way? Then God told me that even today with the actions and choices that we make still hurt Him and make him sad, but He will always love us just the same. What helps me too is when I think that He poured Himself out and seeded into Judas just like the rest w/ the knowledge that He was going to betray Him. That's crazy to me! He knew and still gave all He had to him. Even Peter, He knew he was going to deny Him. I can't imagine how Jesus knew that still loved the way He did. But I want to do the same! 

Be Blessed 

Stephanie

My everyday struggle

"Create in me a pure heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me."


Every morning I have a decision to make. I have to decide whether I am going to feed my flesh or I'm going to feed my spirit. Most of the time my flesh wants to take total control and scream out feed me, feel sorry for me, poor me, what about me, then I am reminded of the simple verse that is one of my life verses. Create in me a pure heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me. The Holy Spirit is such a gentleman that He reminds me of this every time I want to feel sorry that I'm the first one awake at the crack of dawn while everyone else is  sound asleep. My flesh is weak but my spirit is willing. 


In this season of my life, I am learning in order to get my home and family not where I want them to be, but where God wants us to be as a family I need to be the intercessor creating that altar and place in my home. I have struggled with this for the past four years. I became a mother by Grace when my husband and I got married.My son's name is Jonathan which means a "Gift from God" and to me that is what he is to me.  I did not know how to juggle being a wife and a new mother all at the same time. Even though I was now a mother to a 16 month old beautiful little boy, he was not always in my care. It was not until I became pregnant with my baby girl Raquel Sofia is when I realized that being a mother full time was going to change my life. You see with Jonathan he was with us four days throughout the week and I believe I never took on to fully be his mother until I had my little girl. I was always afraid, afraid of failing him, failing my husband, failing my God. 


I realized I was not fully trusting in God and with whom God entrusted me with. Throughout my pregnancy it was just God and I. My husband was off to war and I was alone in my city. God taught me about the husband He is to me, the Father He is to me and the most faithful friend I have ever had. When days would go by without hearing from my husband, and I needed to talk to him, I would hear God cry out speak to me, I'm here, I will teach you, I will show you, I will guide you. 


My prayer is to become the wife and mother that God has created to be. To Draw closer to God, and in the early mornings when the day breaks and all in the house is asleep I can be reminded that I want for God to create a pure heart in me, and renew a steadfast spirit within me. That I may be the mother that my children need me to be in their life. In Jesus name I pray. 


So here I am almost two years later and I'm ready to take this challenge head on. Do you ever struggle in the mornings, feeling bad for yourself? I encourage you as I have been encourage to daily ask God for a pure heart and a steadfast spirit. 

A new season.

I always have loved to write and for a couple of years now, I have had felt suppressed and not have been able to write. I know God is allowing me in this new season of my life to start writing again and I am super excited about it. Since having my baby girl in March 2010, she has brought a new joy, a new light, a new outlook into my life. Daily I have to die to my own selfish ways in order to be the mother that God has called me to be for my daughter.


I have been a married woman now for three years. There has been up's and down's, happiness and sadness, laughter and tears, but the one constant that has been in our lives has been God being in the center of it all. No matter what we have been through, He has never left us. We had been trying to conceive for three years. After seeing a specialist, we were told that neither of us can have children. I have two step sons, a 23 year old and a 4 year old.The doctor said that the only way that we might have a chance of having children was to do Invitro Fertilization. I felt in my heart that God had other plans for us. A couple of months later came the promise. God told me that He was going to give me a little girl and a little boy. That is all I needed. A year later my husband and I volunteered to go to Iraq, after a month of being gone in training, I found out that I was already 8 weeks pregnant! It was hard to swallow being that my husband still had to go forward. I felt torn with being pregnant something I had been praying for persistently and my husband, my best friend leaving off to war....

After being sent back home, I was scared. I new nothing about nothing about being pregnant. We had given up our home and sold our car. I had to start from scratch. The only thing that kept me was God. I knew that if He had blessed my womb and entrusted me with this gift that He was not going to leave me or forsake me. He gave me the strength to go on through this pregnancy just me and Him.

Stay tuned to find out how my journey through pregnancy went.... Be blessed!