Moxie Memorizers

It’s February 15th which means it’s time to post your second memory verse for the month. I recently skimmed a couple of paragraphs that talked about memorizing verses being a waste of time. Can you imagine my irritation? I can say that if you are just memorizing your verses to look spiritual, or to please someone, or because you don’t want to miss the band wagon than you will definitely NOT get the full benefit. However, I trust the Spirit of God so much that even if your motives are completely skewed, He will be faithful to transform your life through His word that is living and active! I just think the person who wrote that stuff needs to come talk to our Moxie Memorizers so he can see our excitement!

I’m currently in the process of reading books about God’s heart for the fatherless, widows, the poor, and immigrants. One of the books that I’m reading is called Generous Justice by Timothy Keller. In the introduction he said that he had been thinking about social justice continuously since he was in college in the 1950s, so he wrote a book about it and published it in 2010. He had been pondering these deep things for 60 years!? Whoa. I knew I had better sit up and pay attention as I read his words. The book has been rich. God is stirring some interesting things in my heart that I’m not quite ready to talk about yet, but I probably won’t wait 60 years to tell you which means you better read his book so that that you can get his aged and refined wisdom.

Anyway, all that to say, my verses for awhile may be in that general theme. Tim Keller (the author) is fluent in biblical languages and he translates the word alien or foreigner to immigrant. I will be using this word in my verses as well because it conveys the truth in a language that speaks to my heart and my surroundings.

Zechariah 9:9-10 This is what the Lord Almighty says: Administer true justice, show mercy and compassion to one another. Do not oppress the widow or the fatherless, the immigrant or the poor. In your hearts do not think evil of each other. (NIV)

I love that this short passage talks about taking care of one another and the people who are often oppressed or forgotten in our society. Deep pondering going on inside of me...I’m excited and a little nervous to see what God wants to show me through these themes.

Keep up the good memorizing work! I am so looking forward to the stories that will begin to surface on how God is using His word in your every day lives. Can’t wait to see what you are memorizing next!

Morgan Grace and Carah Joy

My sweet twins are nine years old today. I know it is cliche, but I really can't believe it! It is so true that they days are long, but the years are short.

Humor me while I reminisce...

When Chad and I were first married we often dreamed about having five children. We both talked about how fun a large family would be. These crazy talks would even lead us to imagining how many grandchildren we might have someday if we truly ended up with five kids.

Then Esther came into our lives. We thought maybe we were a bit idealistic and decided four kids may be a better fit for us.

Kyle was born a couple of years later. Even though he was a very easy baby and a total joy, he still required so much effort from us as parents. Naturally, Chad and I decided we better just parent three children.

When we found out we were expecting our "third and final" child, we were overjoyed. I had gained waaaay too much weight when I was pregnant with Kyle, so I decided to continue to teach my fitness classes and live as healthy of a lifestyle as I could. I watched my diet, exercised, and kept busy with investing in college women. One of my frustrations during the pregnancy was visiting the doctor. Every time I went to see her, she would bug me about how much weight I was gaining, telling me to be careful, lecturing me about the importance of health and fitness. I cried every time I left her dumb office.

Then came the routine 20 week sonogram...

"I wanted your nurse to be in the room with us when I told you that you are carrying TWO babies!"

Chad instantly started laughing.

Esther kept saying, "Two babies?" over and over and over.

I burst into tears and confessed all the fears I constantly struggled with as a mom.

The crying didn't stop for about two weeks because I was soooo scared.

And then my heart settled down and I began to see the amazing gift I was going to receive in two precious girls.

Nine years old is a big kid. Morgan and Carah do so many things for themselves. We have wonderful conversations. They are inquisitive, smart, funny, beautiful, secure, and growing to be young women who really love Jesus. I'm so so proud of them!

And, I'm so thankful God didn't allow us to have just three kids. I can't imagine life without either one of them! They are so uniquely different from each other. Morgan is artistic and incredibly compassionate. Carah is a leader and loves to help and serve. Carah is so tall. Morgan isn't. Morgan has blue eyes. Carah has brown. They each have their own fashion tastes, senses of humor, and organizational systems.

Even in all of their differences, they are most certainly twins. They hold hands all the time. They can see when the other one has some heartache and are fiercely defensive for each other. It is definitely true that they have their own twin language, a way of communicating. Even as nine year olds when they sleep together in a twin bed, when I wake them up in the morning they are the cutest little cuddle bugs that you could ever imagine.

I'm praying big things for them. I pray they will be consistent in their love for Jesus, that they will never choose to walk away from their faith. I pray that they will be leaders who take Spirit-led risks, that they will consider how their decisions affect others, but not be paralyzed by pleasing people rather than God. I pray that they will live radically obedient lives and that Chad and I will never get in the way of what God has for them. I pray they will live each day with intentionality, joy, love, and obedience to the glory of God.

Happy birthday, sweet Morgan and Carah! I'm incredibly thankful for my beautiful twin girlies!

Nine Years Old

Four Years Old

Three Years Old

So Stinkin' Adorable!

A Million Dollar Smile!

One Year Old

Sweet Babies... No matter where I put them in their crib, they always managed to scoot right up next to each other and lay in the same position. I love these sweet girlies!

A rant from a frustrated prophet

Do you want to know what really bugs me? People who are followers of Jesus that complain about the church but seemingly do nothing to help build the church. It drives me absolutely CRAZY! I get so sick of hearing how the church has failed a believer or how they disagree with the leaders or whatever complaint a person has to proclaim. My question is, "What are you doing to love people, serve Jesus, give to others, discover your passions, help out??"

That is all. :)

A Better Perspective

Expectations are funny things. Many of you know that I had written this post about sending a letter into the Nate Berkus Show back in September. I knew it was a really, really long shot to ever be contacted, and much to my surprise, they actually called last week asking if I could come to the show! What? WHAT?! Chad and I were definitely in awe over the whole thing. In my phone conversation with the show producer she mentioned that it wasn't concrete, that show biz can change. Ok. Expectations needed to stay in check.

I went through the week with my big ole mouth telling people about my potential coming trip. I'm a story teller and this was a great one to tell. Everyone was super excited with me. I continually told everyone that I was keeping my expectations low because I didn't want to be disappointed. I said that I wanted to enjoy any little part of this experience that was given to me. Was I lying or did I really believe the words coming out of my mouth?

Yesterday the producer sent me an email that said they had decided not to fly me to the show. My heart sank when I read the words. One of the areas that I struggle with is feeling stupid. My brain was instantly filled with thoughts of how stupid I am for telling so many people about the show. I was completely disappointed. I sent two mass texts and posted the change of plans on facebook so I wouldn't have to tell everyone. And, then I had a pretty good pity party... for reals. A short, but ugly one. Apparently, my expectations were a little higher than I had anticipated.

I took about 20 minutes by myself in my bedroom. I had intended to go cry a little bit, but I was reminded of the amazing gifts in my life... Chad, my great kids, amazing family and friends, a house that is big enough to host people, a love for hospitality that comforts people when they come over, an awesome community, and the hobby of writing letters to people I've never met about things that are just fun and silly. To be honest the small experience in talking to a producer of the Nate Berkus show was really fun. She told me several times that I'm cute and I'm choosing to believe that is New York City speak for "you are well spoken and witty." It was great and fun and surreal. Why should I discount any of it? I won't.

So, thank you, God, for Chad, my great kids, amazing family and friends, a house that is big enough to host people, the gift of hospitality, an awesome community, the strength of communication, and for the producer of the Nate Berkus show that thinks I'm really cute! And thank you so, so, so much for the things you have planned for me that no one can recount to you!!

Moxie Memorizers

Can you believe it's February?! Time flies when you are memorizing scripture! I hope that each of you had great success in memorizing the verses you committed to take into your heart and mind for January. If it was difficult, don't be discouraged. This is a discipline. It takes time and training. Stay the course and God will richly bless you!

I'm switching things up a bit. From now on I will be posting the Moxie Memorizers posts on the 1st and the 15th. You need to comment with the verse you are focusing on for the next two weeks. This will increase our accountability to one another. Are any of you quoting your verses to your friends out loud? This is also a great way to incorporate help. God knew what he was doing when he made us to live in community.

A couple of tips:

• Be sure you are working to memorize the reference. As I memorize a new verse, I break it into phrases and say the reference before and after each phase, gradually increasing the phrases until I have them down. For instance, "John 3:16. For God so loved John 3:16.... John 3:16 For God so love the world John 3:16" I do that over and over and over until I've got it.
• A verse here and there is a great way to start, but if you would like a little more challenge take a whole section of scripture and memorize it in context. Right now I'm working on James 3:13-18. I wanted the whole section in my heart.
• Don't forget to review what you learn. If you don't, you will probably forget it. I once knew the preamble to the constitution, but never really reviewed it so it's pretty much gone. It only takes a couple of minutes to review what you've learned. Let me know if you need help with a review system.

I've heard from a lot of you how exciting it is to read through everyones verses. There are about 35 of us who are participating publicly in this journey. If we all stay committed (which I'll bug you if you try and drop out) by the end of the year we will have a total of about 800 verse memorized as a group. That's pretty amazing!

This is what I'm working on for the next two weeks:

James 3:17-18 But wisdom that comes from heaven is first of all pure, then peace-love, considerate, submissive, full of mercy and good fruit, impartial and sincere. Peacemakers who sow in peace reap a harvest of righteousness." NIV

I wonder who will be first to post this time...

More Than We Can Ask or Imagine

What a week. What an amazing, difficult, Spirit-filled, prayer-filled, community uniting week. I'm kind of having a little bit of let down today as I process all that happened over the last few days. It is such a strange feeling to be so full of hope, and at the same time sad that the week ended. 1 John 5:14-15 says, "This is the confidence we have in approaching God: that if we ask anything according to his will, he hears us. And if we know that he hears us—whatever we ask—we know that we have what we asked of him." I believe that as a whole we prayed according to God's will... to draw people to himself, to refine our community to be used for his glory, to use us to affect change in Tucson and the world, to cause us to love him more deeply. He will answer our prayers because he is able and willing to do more than we can ask or imagine! I think that is reason to celebrate!

Personally, one of the areas God challenged me in is how I serve him. When I am serving the people I lead out of the obligation of his call on my life in ministry, I burn out. To be honest, it happens like a roller coaster for me. For awhile I serve out of my love for him. Then I start carrying the burdens of others on my own shoulders and quickly, my motives of service are to help others, or to not let people down, or because I can't say no, or just because I know it is what God has asked me to do. Let me tell you, strength does not last long when focus is lost. This week God so lovingly and gently reminded me that I love him deeply. I love spending time with Jesus, singing to him, talking to him. It is sweet. That alone is my motivation for working for him. With my focus on my love for him, his love for me, and his love for others, boundaries fall nicely into place. I take my junk to Jesus and ask others to take their junk to Jesus, too. It works beautifully! His love really does make it worth it all!

As a community, 53 of us met to pray on Friday night. Chad and I have talked that it was probably the most spiritually powerful event that Second Mile has had to date. People showed up ready to pray and worship the Most High. Definitely, the Spirit showed up to guide us in speaking to him and worshipping him. I don't know if I've ever heard a group of people sing, "Your Name is glorious, glorious" more loudly. Completely powerful doesn't do justice to the intensity of the night.

Each time we gather to pray we incorporate times of silence to listen to God. The times are always short, and gradually we will grow in the discipline of sitting quietly as a community, but God speaks to us, even in the couple of minutes that we sit and wait. Through the time of sharing what God may be speaking to us, the theme was rich and God-focused... "He is able to do more than we ask or imagine. Don't limit God! Thank and praise him for what the future work he will do! He has blessed us with many gifts. We should be intentional, out of our comfort zones with discernment!" I'm so thankful that God hears us and responds. He is a personal God even though he is holy, just, and huge.

Whatever it is that God will have us do in this city, I know it will take sacrifice in a way we haven't yet experienced. I believe we are becoming a church who prays which will require a sacrifice of intentionality. I know we are becoming a church who unashamedly worships which will require the sacrifice of self. I hope we are becoming a church who boldly proclaims the gospel which will require the sacrifice of reputation. I pray we are becoming a church who sees change in Tucson which will require a sacrifice of time and money. There is no other way than to be a church who is completely Christ focused which will require the sacrifice of our whole lives. "But whatever was to my profit I now consider loss for the sake of Christ. What is more, I consider everything a loss compared to the surpassing greatness of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them rubbish, that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ—the righteousness that comes from God and is by faith. I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of sharing in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, and so, somehow, to attain to the resurrection from the dead." Phil 3:7-11

"Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen." Eph 3:20-21

If you are willing, please leave a brief comment in response or about what God spoke to your heart over the last week. Let's encourage one another in sharing some ways God teaches us. We give him glory for what he is doing in our community!

Answered Prayer

We are just finishing up day four of the prayer week. I'm so glad Chad moved the day we prayed for our global partnerships to the middle of the week. I would hate for anyone to miss out on praying with a bigger worldview because they petered out by the weekend. The kids and I prayed for our M3 and OtB friends tonight. It was sweet.

I wanted to share a few things that have come to my mind through the fast this time around. Because of my desire for more focused discipline and consistency I felt God calling me into a longer fast this year. Previously, I fasted because I knew I was supposed to, it was a matter of discipline, a matter of obeying that Jesus said, "When you fast..." It has never been my favorite discipline, and if I'm honest, it is probably my least favorite. Because I'm a comparer I would often see Chad fast with a straight face, focused, and prayerful. My fasts were also prayerful, but also internally whiny, counting down the days, ready for it to be over. When God was asking me to extend my fast, I actually got excited about it because I was going to get to obey what he was asking me to do and not just what I knew was the right thing to do.

The first area of understanding that came to me this week is how fasting really demonstrates what it means to be living as an exile. I mean, think about it. How weird is it to go without food for such a long time, especially in our culture? Several times this week I've looked around at the crowd and thought about what a weirdo I am. I've felt strangely out of place, completely different, but also totally engaged in the conversations with whoever I'm with. To me, this is a beautiful picture of living as an exile. I am a weirdo. I do not belong here. I am set apart because I'm a daughter of God. However, I am totally engaged in the people that God has put in my path. I don't tell them I'm fasting. I don't comment on how different I am. I try to live in such a way that honors God and at the same time, allows him to use me to tell others of his gospel message.

The second area that I've been mulling over is being in the world but not of the world. Just because I'm not eating for awhile doesn't mean that I don't have my hands all up in food everyday. I have four beautiful growing hungry kids that I will not allow to eat junk just because I'm not eating. Pb&J everyday just won't cut it. I probably go overboard in cooking for them because I don't want the enemy to have any way to put bitterness in their hearts because their crazy parents fasted for extended times. I've made all kinds of goodness this week... and it has been so hard, especially today. The smells that linger, wondering if things are seasoned right, one of the kids forgetting and accidentally asking if I want a bite... It is so tempting! That's what the world is everyday! So tempting! "Sure, I'll engage in gossip because everyone around me is gossiping. No problem, I'm totally ok eating three times as much as a should. It tastes good! What's the big deal? We're just trying to spice up our marriage. There has to be a good reason porn is the number one money maker." It is seriously just like we are all in the Garden every single day, tempted to take a bite of this or that because we have our hands all up in the food... just like I have all week long. As I've cooked and cleaned I've had to work to maintain a tremendous amount of focus on Jesus so that I don't allow temptation to turn into to desire that gives birth to sin that gives birth to death.

A third area of contemplation is just how I feel physically. I honestly feel completely and totally empty and hollow. I so want this to be true of me all the time. To be totally empty and hollow of myself and filled to the measure of the fullness of God. Oh, that that would be true of my life! I don't want to forget this feeling of emptiness. I pray that the Spirit of God would remind me of it in the times that I am so stinking full of myself that I've completely forgotten him.

There are so many others things I'm pondering, but I'm just going to share one more. The first few days of the fast I felt awakened, on a high, completely focused and aware. It was exhilarating. I even talked to Chad about how much I was enjoying this year of prayer and fasting compared to previous years. Then last night I hit a wall. I walked Esther around the halls of the High School she'll be attending and I felt like everyone I passed piled another brick in my arms, or on my shoulders, or feet, or head. At one point I just told her that I needed to go home. My stomach was aching. I went to bed thinking that it would subside and today would be better. It hasn't been. It has been such a hard day. There has been very little relief in the hunger. And you know what? I've struggled with focus. The high was gone. I've felt broken, emotional, needy. I'm so nervous because there are a few days left of this fast. I'm afraid it's going to be so difficult. But isn't that just the point? Especially after this week of Second Mile corporate prayer and fasting, as a church we are going to be awakened, on a high, completely focused and aware. It will be wonderful! But we live in Tucson, where 90% of people don't go to church anywhere, where Wicca in recent years has been the fastest growing religion, where people at best are cynical about talking to a follower of Jesus, where in the 500 years of recorded history there has never been a movement of God through this valley. We must persevere when we are tempted to quit. When our bodies and spirits are tired, we have to dig deep to rely on Jesus like we never have before. When we aren't seeing fruit or feel like we've been waiting for so long, we must know that he has great plans to draw people to himself. We must be broken, emotional, needy for depths of God that we've yet to discover.

I'm so thankful that he teaches me deep in my guts. I've asked for heavenly wisdom all week. In no way at all would I say that I've arrived and am now wise, but I can definitely say that he's showing me great and unsearchable things that I did not know.