The Fall Of Perfection

Well, okay ~ the fall of the illusion of perfection. Since my husband left for Iraq, my life had been in a spiral of controlled chaos. We have been blessed so abundantly in our lives, and with those blessings have come many responsibilities. As time passed with my husband gone, it became increasingly clear that it was too much for me to handle on my own.(sprained ankles and debilitating colds didn't help) Add to that my ministries and various opportunities to do something besides a paying job and things started to slip. I began forgetting appointments, tasks, names ~ even every day words. Praise the Lord my husband came home! Right? Well yes, of course. And with the blessing of him coming home safe and sound, came some certain realities. I am not perfect. And now, my husband knows. Along with the failings that he was aware of while he was gone (see my financial disaster post), he has now become aware that I did not care for our property in a way that he would have liked and he is now paying the consequences because he has six months of catch-up to do. This is not because I didn't care, or was complacent about what needed to be done. It was simply too much for me to do. Also with the blessing of him being home, came the challenge of re-integration. He is having some issues related to the war which are affecting me. Sleep has been such a challenge and I have become exhausted to the point of not even feeling enough energy to go to worship practice. And I have become rather jumpy and agitated at unexpected noises. Then there's the fact that my regular weekly Bible study adjourned for the summer and thus ended my regular attendance to my Bible.(fault mine) And then ~ just to make things fun ~ we dove right into a major reconstruction in our home (not sorry about that at all, just pointing out the chaos.)
SO ~ last night, I shoved some box out of my path and got into the car and went to worship practice. There was no one there. Why? I don't even know. That's how bad it has gotten in the world of S4J. So - anyone that may have had illusions about my perfection or 'being all together', should be pretty clear that they were incorrect. I'm certain that I owe apologies for missed appointments and responsibilities and perhaps at some point, I will become aware of what those are and make the appropriate sorries.
I have been waiting on God to tell me what would be my tasks in the coming season, and I believe He has made it abundantly clear to me at this point.

* My family and my home are a ministry that God has given me and after Him they must be given priority.
* My body is a temple and it must be cared for with the love and respect of the guest whom I have invited to live in it which is Jesus Christ.
* After these priorities have been seen to, I am to care for women whose husbands are deployed and to care for my friendship relationships.
*This one is just me :) I love photography and I have a God-given talent for taking lovely pictures. I want to be a photographer who gets paid. More to the point, I want to be a photographer worthy of getting paid. So I am going to try to take a picture every day to post. Maybe I will start a photoblog just for accountability. It is also my desire to improve on the talent that God has given me and so I would like to take a photography course. Perhaps when the kids go back to school.

In the interest of priority one - I have revamped my home maintenance schedule so that jobs that need to get done are more likely to get done because I know they need to get done. There are daily, weekly, monthly and other frequency-oriented tasks. I have broken them down into manageable segments and have delegated more of the work to capable members of the family ~ although the majority of the indoor work to maintain the home is mine because I am the full-time household manager which was agreed upon by myself and my husband at the beginning of our marriage. This will be a daily Hamper Scamper post. And I will let you know if I completed the tasks or not. You can work along with me, or just hold me accountable ~ or even just ignore the whole thing. After all, this blog is really about me for me (and also to help others keep up on me) and the beauty of visiting friends on blogs is that you can visit with the freedom to read or not read, do or not do, comment or not comment.

Oh ~ and btw ~ my laptop hard drive died and so I am still working from another computer. The new (refurbished) one came today and my husband has promised to help me install it. Hopefully I'll be up and running again soon.

I don't have the Hamper Scamper button on this computer so for now, you'll have to imagine it.

Today's Tasks:
Make beds(each their own)
Sweep common area floors (12 year-old daughter)
Check and adjust guest bathroom (12 year-old daughter)
Change bathroom hand towel (12 year-old daughter)
Vacuum common areas
Mop common areas
Set table for dinner
Clear table table from dinner (12 year-old son)
Wipe table and chairs
Wash dishes
Take out all trashes (12 year-old son)
Curb trash cans (12 year-old son)

Letters To God

Dear God,

Thank You for giving me a hand to hold.

Yours Always,

Yehudit

This Just In!

My Man!! I may be scarce for a bit.

<:)>

Kimpo Is A Curse Word In Our House

In January of 1999, my husband left for his first unaccompanied tour to Korea. That means that he goes for a year and his family stays behind. Our children were 7,6,4 and 4. The children and I packed up to California and stayed with my parents. He was due home for mid-tour leave on August 1, 1999(which meant that he got to come home for 30 days and then go back). I lived EVERY day telling myself that if I could JUST make it to that day in August that he came home, everything would be fine. That I would be fine. I pinned my very survival on that man and his homecoming. Every day as I became more and more weighed down from the heavy load, I was still somehow, breathing a teeny bit easier because I was one day closer to relief and wholeness. The day before he was due to get on his flight, the area around the border between North and South Korea was stricken by a monsoon. My husband was able to call and tell me that he was okay, but the base was on lock-down. No one was allowed to leave. Therefore, he would not be getting to Kimpo airport, or getting on his flight to come home. This was devastating to me. Do you know that screen that comes on the TV in the middle of the night when there is no more programming? That snowy/fuzzy screen? That is what I saw and heard on the edges of my mind. I couldn't think. I couldn't know how to function. I was able to get myself into the bathroom and start a bath. I sat down next to the tub and sat and sat. The tub filled and filled. And I sat and sat. Not thinking, not planning, not meditating. NOTHING. Just sitting. The snowy place grew bigger and I couldn't remember what one does after turning ON the bath. So I just sat there. I had no thought to my children or to my parents or even to my very breath. It was as though I was absent from my own mind. I remember my Mom coming in and shutting off the bathwater as it was about to flood the bathroom. I don't remember if I ever even got in it. I spent the next two days living just on the outskirts of the snowy place. I don't know if I ate, went to the bathroom, slept, changed my clothes, tended to my children AT ALL - I'm pretty sure my Mom did that. At some point she told me that I had to pull it together. Yes. Thank you. I have to pull it together. I couldn't think of that. I could only hear the soft sound of the snowy place.

This instruction, coupled with my man coming home (only one day late), helped me to get the programming back on and disconnect the snowy place.

To this day I cannot say or read the word Kimpo without cringing.

This was an extraordinarily painful lesson to learn. I cannot rely on my husband for my health, safety, or survival. People fail. The only true, unfailing, infallible thing I can rely on is my God. The God. The Creator of heaven and earth. Only He will never fail me.

Jeremiah relayed this message, "This is what the Lord says: 'Cursed is the one who trusts in man, who depends on flesh for his strength and whose heart turns away from the Lord. He will be like a bush in the wastelands; he will not see prosperity when it comes. He will dwell in the parched places of the desert, in a salt land where no one lives.'"

Wow. That is what I felt like when my husband didn't come home on time. How did Jeremiah know this? Oh, that's right - he was a prophet ~ and as he says, 'the Lord said.'

Jeremiah went on to say, "But blessed is the man who trusts in the Lord, whose confidence is in Him. He will be like a tree planted by the water that sends out its roots by the stream. It does not fear when heat comes; its leaves are always green. It has no worries in a year of drought and never fails to bear fruit." (Jeremiah 17:5-8)

Wow. I have been watching for another day in recent months...the day my husband returns from Iraq. He was supposed to be on his way home yesterday. They were weathered out and were unable to get out as scheduled. I truly am blessed. There is Someone who is ALWAYS with me. I have put my trust in Him, and I did not fear when the heat came. I did not fall down. I did not run a never-ending bath. I did not abandon my children to the snowy place. Not because of my strength - but because of His.

"The Lord is my strength and my shield; My heart trusted in Him, and I am helped; Therefore my heart greatly rejoices, and with my song I will praise Him." (Psalm 28:7)

Tomorrow I will be singing the offertory. I will be singing these words with the utmost conviction and a peace that passes all understanding....

If all I had was one last breath, I'd spend it just to sing Your praise...just to say Your name.
If all I had was one last prayer, I'd pray it 'cause I know You're always listening.
If all I had was one more song to sing, I would raise my voice to make the heavens ring!
If all I had was one last chance, I'd take it, I would stake it all on You!
I know You're there. I know You see me.
You're the air I breathe, You are the ground beneath me.
I know You're there, I know You hear me.
I can find You anywhere. I know You're there....

(you can hear the song in its entirety here)