God's Plans vs. Our Dreams

Exodus 13: 17 (NIV)

17 When Pharaoh let the people go, God did not lead them on the road through the Philistine country, though that was shorter. For God said, "If they face war, they might change their minds and return to Egypt."


I will confess that I wonder at times what my life would be like if my path had taken me someplace else. Would I have the same sex and age of children? Would there be other similarities in my life? How would life really be different if (fill in the blank) had (or hadn't) happened? Well, this verse tells me I can wonder all I want but ultimately I'm exactly where I'm supposed to be. How? "For God said, "If they face war, they might change their minds and return to Egypt."" God knew the Israelites better than the Israelites knew the Israelites. This says to me what Garth Brooks says oh so eloquently..."Some of God's greatest gifts are unanswered prayers." He truly knows the path of least resistance...and He knows how to get us where He wants us to go. Our job is to follow Him and trust His hand implicitly.

I wrote the portion above for my other blog: http://tbds.blogspot.com The thoughts have always ravaged me about how vastly different God's ways are than ours. How it seems He takes our dreams...the expectations of what we "know" we'll end up doing in our lives...and He switches them around to the opposite. For example, my best friend growing up knew ~ she KNEW ~ she'd graduate high school, maybe go to cosmetology school, get married and have a gaggle of kids. She absolutely had no doubts about it. I, on the other hand, knew that wherever I went in life it did NOT include a man or kids. Not that I didn't like men ~ ummmm, quite the opposite ~ but I never planned and dreamed of being a wife, and the idea of being a Mom as a career choice? Ludicrous! Sooooooooooooo, guess what God does? Hmmmmm....my friend will be 39 in August. She's never been married and has no kids. She's an upper management career gal with a large jewelry chain store. Yup. Me? I'm a wife and a mom. Give me a G! G! Give me an O! O! Give me a D! D! GOOOOOOO GOD!!! yeah, right.

Sorry, I don't mean to sound so cynical ~ I'm truly, honestly not. To meet my children you'd understand why I love being a Mom! To see my husband and I together, however, you may wonder why I didn't stick with my original plan...let's say we're working on that "dying to self" thing. *grin* Seriously, though, I can see God's crazy mixed up way of doing things. If we always had the easy way of life ~ always getting to do what we think we're good at and never having to learn a different way of life ~ why would we need Him? You see, I realized just this afternoon that God bound me to my husband in an answer to my prayer, "Lord, whatever You do, and wherever You take me...if You have a man in store or not...just never let me get too comfortable in my life that I don't need You." (or something very similar to that...I think it went more like, "when I meet the man You have chosen for me may he only make me want to know more of You in knowing him.") DUH!! Really?! What was I thinking!? It's like the prayers we pray for patience...knowing He will immediately put us in every situation we need to be in to PRACTICE patience! Or the prayers we pray saying "do whatever You need to do to get me fully in Your will...." and that night we end up pregnant because He knows we need to be slapped up alongside the head to get fully into His will. (okay, some of you may not end up pregnant...but I did.)

Tell me God doesn't know what He's doing when He gives us His Opposite Plan instead of our "But, Lord, You said You'd give me the desires of my heart" (whine...whine...snivel...snivel...gag) Plan! He puts us where He needs us to be ~ sometimes it's on the easy path because if we meet soldiers we'll turn back and run away from Him. Then there are the times when He knows we'll need some extra training for the future...or a little dose of compassion and understanding for those who don't think/act like we do...and BAM! We're on His opposite plan. Gotta love a God who never fails to suprise us...yeah, we really gotta.

**side note to those grammatical-nazi types who may read this...I truly wish to apoligize for the use of "....'s" and "gotta." I have had many a job as a proof-reader, and I know the immediate groans that fill my throat when I see such poor grammar. However, in my own personal blog that is not meant for publication, or even proper reading, I lay aside the grammar-busting red pencil and let it flow as it comes to my mind. Please accept my apologies for the number of times you have had to swallow hard to keep reading. Thank you.

Okay, So Jenny "tagged" me a LONG time ago...

Well, as the title says, Jenny, our wonderful first baby-sitter and Sr. High-er extraordinaire, tagged me on her blog a while ago and I just now found out. So here goes...

Four jobs I've had:
-Soda Jerk (Ice cream guru @ B&G Milky Way)
-Radio Disc Jockey (twice - Country station in College ~KGIM~ and Christian station when I met Scott ~KPNO~)
-Music Teacher/9th & 10th Grade Dorm Mom @ St. Scholastica Academy (Private International, College-Prep All-girl's school)
-MOMMY

Four movies I've watched more than once:
-Top Gun (can't count the number of times I've watched that one!)
-Facing the Giants
-Just Write
-GiGi

Four places I've lived:
-Redding, CA
-Walnut, CA (LA Area)
-Canon City, CO
-Sioux Falls, SD

Four places I've been:
-Hawaii
-Colorado
-New York City
-Washington, DC

Four TV shows I watch:
-Army Wives (recent fave)
-American Idol
-Bones
-Battle 360

Four people who email me regularly (doesn’t include blogging comments):
-MOMS LBS Yahoo Group
-My Sister
-Chuck Swindoll (does it count that I have to subscribe to an e-mail friend?)
-Jenny

Four of my favorite foods:
-Smokehouse Almonds
-Salmon
-Haagen Daaz Vanilla Nut Ice Cream Bars
-Trader Joe's Dark Chocolate

Four places I would like to visit:
-Italy
-Australia
-Alaska (in the summer...on a cruise)
-the Czech Republic (I'd love to go with our church next summer)

Four things I'm looking forward to in the coming year:
-Watching my boys grow up
-Seeing Jenny Graduate from High School
-Seeing Sophie and the boys together or a visit again soon
-Seeing where God leads us as a family

(I'm adding this one...)
Four of my favorite Bible Verses:
- Colossians 1:17 (NIV)
- Psalm 26 (all of it)
- James 1: 2-6
- Micah 7: 18-19
(I could list so much more...maybe I should say
-the NIV,
-the NLT,
-the NASB,
-the Message
haha)

Four friends I'm tagging:
- My cousin, David
- My cousin, Dennis
- That's Italian (Amelia)
- 'Stina

So there ya go, Jenny! Enjoy!

Gone are the days...

Today I said goodbye to the times when I could fool myself into thinking I was going to be 24 forever. Today I said goodbye to the idea that I really never grow older...just more mature and wiser. Today I let go of the hope that maybe there's something more than motherhood for me. Well, maybe not all of these were fully-concrete departures, but I feel like they are right now. It's a very simple thing that has done it...my youngest son turned six today.

When I look at Micah I still remember the struggles of accepting that my hopes for my future were not the plans God had for my life. When I watch him running and playing I am reminded of the times I prayed he'd just stop moving for 10 minutes while still in-utero so I could get some rest. I see him with his friends ~ laughing and joking and making them all so happy just in being him ~ and I can feel the tears that ran down my face the day I found out I'd be having a boy...and I experience the deepest, most profound regret.

Micah is a God-send in my life. His laughter is infectious, his smile captivating. He can light up a room with a grin and shut it down with a whine. His hugs and kisses (of which, believe me, there are many) feed my soul on a spiritual level. No, he doesn't fill me up like my time with Jesus does, but having him in my life is a gift beyond measure. To think that I thought a Megan would be a better fit for me is like saying Orville Redenbacher would make a great US President (yes, it's that absurd!)! Micah is a joy-maker. He is stubborn as all get-out, and his decisions have to be HIS decisions, but he is joy incarnate most of the time.

So today I say goodbye to the foolish notions that I have a better idea of how my life should be worked out than the Very One who created me. If having Micah was all His idea ~ and obviously it would be ~ then I trust Him all the more because I couldn't imagine my life without Micah.

Thank You, Lord, for knowing me better than I'll ever know myself. amen.

PS: two really cool prayer moments from last night with the boys...
1) Micah praying and out of the blue saying, "...and I really hope we get to see Sophie again soon..."
2) Caleb praying and saying, "Lord, thank you for my parents because, really, Micah and me have great parents...REALLY GREEEEEAAAAT parents. So thanks for letting us have them as parents."
How can I be anything but thankful?

Memorial ~ to REMEMBER

Okay...I know it's a bit late, but I was away from home over Memorial Day and fighting with a stinky-cheese-man internet connection once I got home. (I HATE wireless networks that don't work!!)

However, I truly admire and am amazingly grateful for those who have fought for our freedoms. There are WAY too FEW bumper stickers to remind us that Freedom Isn't Free, and way too many that forget that very simple fact. So, in that light, and being a Navy Girl by birth...Happy Memorial Day to all of you, and THANK YOU to all of you who serve who might by some strange chance read this.



AND...the following one is cool, but if you don't like a good hard rock turn your speakers down...if you do...TURN IT UP! :)



AND FINALLY...because life's too short not to laugh...





Want more? click the title of this post and type in "US NAVY FUNNY" in the search window...then have fun!

Have a great weekend, everybodeeee!

I will not buy... (revised)

The movie "JUNO."

As a Birth Mother and Mom I hated the movie. Many people gave such rave reviews of the movie ~ that it's the greatest picture of sacrificial love and bunkity, bunkity, bunk. What sacrifice is there when a young woman doesn't want to be pregnant...places a baby for adoption just because she doesn't want to be a mom, and rarely throughout the entire movie shows any connection or affection for the life living in her? It made me rather sick to watch it instead of hopeful for the message being given about what adoption really means. As a Birth Mother who placed her daughter for adoption not because I didn't want to be a Mom, but because I wanted the very best for her ~ out of a heart full of love and an action full of long-term pain knowing she wouldn't be "my" daughter ~ I placed her in the arms of a beautiful couple to be raised as their own. Watching this movie was an insult, a slap in the face, and an offense to Birth Mothers everywhere.

Maybe to someone who hasn't had "the opportunity" to place a child for adoption the movie seems like a great movie ~ afterall (spoiler ahead for those who haven't seen the movie...stop here if you really hate it when someone spoils the end for you.....)






instead of keeping the child and being a young single mother who had to rely on who knows who to help her raise the baby she decides to still go through with the adoption after the couple she chose filed for divorce before the baby was born. Now...to someone who hasn't seen the movie it may seem a logical choice ~ she wanted the baby to be taken care of so why wouldn't she still place it for adoption with a loving and responsible couple? Of course that's a good move! Well, you're right....IF she had chosen another couple. Instead she continued to go through with the placement to the NOW SINGLE woman from the original adoption plan. Can someone explain to me how simply offering an older ...BUT STILL SINGLE...woman a child is any different than a young woman keeping her child and mothering it herself? PLEASE! Explain....

The moral of this movie is "if you get pregnant don't worry about the child's future...worry about your own. If you're a teenager and you get pregnant because you chose to "see what sex was like" you should just find some "good person" and give your baby to them because really, it's the fact that you're a teenager that would make you a hard case for motherhood. So take care of yourself first and just get rid of the kid."

One other thing ~ I was really looking forward to this movie as a possible catalyst for a discussion with my oldest son about his 1/2 sister, Sophie, and why she doesn't live with us. The language alone would have kept me from being able to watch it with him...and the flippant attitude of sex before marriage as a "normal" thing to do and accept would have kept us from watching it if the language didn't first.

I hated this movie...and I won't recommend it to anyone I know. Now or ever.

*note: the original post was written on May 3, 2008...updates made were to the first paragraph, and adding the second to last.