Day Seventeen into a Year of Discipline....
Day Seventeen of doing devotions regularly.
At first it was wonderful. I felt disciplined and excited that I was getting a handle on my spiritual life. I was being very good at making sure that my devotions were done early in the day. But then the inevitable thing happened . . . I put off doing them until later on in the day. I had things to do until late in the evening. I was tired. So tired.
At that point, I had a choice. I could go to bed and throw away my discipline, or I could do it. What did I do, I'm sure you are all asking with bated breath. Well, I sat down, and I did them, with much help from my husband Luke. I kept falling asleep and jerking awake as I read my Bible. I kept falling asleep while I was trying to pray, but I kept waking myself up (with help from my hubby). And we both did it. We finished our devotions and we did our couple devotions as well.
As I was thinking about it, I realized something. I knew I didn't get much out of my devotions that night (or the few nights were things like that have happened), but it wasn't so much about what I was getting out of, but rather what I was putting into it. It was more important that I did my devotions and continued in the habit of it, then it was to get something amazing out of it. Now, every night shouldn't be me falling asleep and jerking awake, but when that is what it takes to get it done, then I should do that. It is better to continue in the habit than to just give up. Putting the effort into the discipline is part of the discipline.
As Rhonda H. Kelley says "Self-control is definitely a behavior - a deliberate action, the ability to act . . . Behaviors including self-control are learned responses . . . Remember, recommitment to divine discipline is an ongoing process, a daily decisions." (Kelley, Personal Discipline 21, 26).
Not only that but, "He stresses the truth that 'self-discipline is doing something even if you hate it or don't feel like doing it.' In other words, discipline is not needed to do things you like. It is necessary to do the difficult things in life. You must discipline yourself to do those things that are difficult for you!" (Kelley, Personal Discipline 27).
As day seventeen comes to a close, I am reminded that I need to continue to press forward towards the goal. I need to make time for God. I need to make it a priority. And when I am so tired I can barely keep my eyes open, I still need to do the hard things and continue on towards discipline.
Tuesday, January 17, 2012
Monday, January 2, 2012
A Year of Discipline: Day One/Two
I walked across the parking lot yesterday as the wind swirled around me. December 31 seemed determined to bluster and blow away the old year and usher in a new, gloriously clean year. My thoughts were on the idea of the new year. I've always liked the idea of newness. Of starting over. Of having no mistakes behind you. That is why I always love starting new things on Sundays (the start of a new week), first days of the months, and things like that. But January 1 on a Sunday has to be the ultimate new, fresh, beginning. A new, blank slate with no mistakes in it, or so Anne might say. But as I felt the jerking of the wind against my sweater, I felt the jerking of my heart. It didn't feel like a new start. The sickness that had sneaked upon me on Christmas still lingering, I felt sick and exhausted. My house had been a construction site for the past weeks, and the dust was still lingering. I felt utterly and completely unmotivated. Less than unmotivated, I felt like giving up entirely on everything. Not the best way to start off the new year.
However, Luke and I had a plan. Early in December we had decided that 2012 was going to be a Year of Discipline for us. We both know that we struggle with discipline, and lately, we have decided that we want to change that. Since I had become disillusioned with new year's resolutions many years ago, I had started trying to do monthly goals. This, along with some inspiration from other sources such as The Happiness Project, led to The Year of Discipline.
The plan is simple. Every month we have a category to work on. Within that category we will make about three specific goals to work on that month. However, it is also accumulative. So, in February we have to do both January and February's goals. So by December we should (hopefully) be a little disciplined in many areas of our life.
We shall see how it progresses.
Our January Category is Spiritual.
Our goals:
1. 30 minutes of personal devotion time (with 10 minutes specifically for prayer) every day.
2. 15 minutes of couple devotion time (with 5 minutes specifically for prayer) every day.
3. Going to church every weekend.
So begins the Year of Discipline...
The plan is simple. Every month we have a category to work on. Within that category we will make about three specific goals to work on that month. However, it is also accumulative. So, in February we have to do both January and February's goals. So by December we should (hopefully) be a little disciplined in many areas of our life.
We shall see how it progresses.
Our January Category is Spiritual.
Our goals:
1. 30 minutes of personal devotion time (with 10 minutes specifically for prayer) every day.
2. 15 minutes of couple devotion time (with 5 minutes specifically for prayer) every day.
3. Going to church every weekend.
So begins the Year of Discipline...
Sunday, August 28, 2011
Parsnips?
A good housewife should cook well. Right? I mean if you can't serve your man a gloriously home cooked meal, then you must not measure up very high on the housewifely list of good housewives. Or something like that. Well, I, unfortunately, do not feel very adept at the whole cooking thing. Therefore, I decided that I should make a stab at cooking. Not that I can't follow a recipe. I can. I just can't cook you know. I can't instinctively cook. I always make the same two meals - when I make meals, that is (which, of course, I shouldn't admit. However, I shall admit to you...I don't cook very often at all.)
Due to my faults in the cooking department, including, but not limited to, my lack of ability to really cook, my cooking redundancy, as well as my lack of cooking meals during a week, I decided that I needed to start cooking.
The first thing I did was to pick out new recipes - that I would actually eat. (I never knew there were so many recipes out there that I would not eat...) Then, outfitted with a shopping list (and Daviah) I stopped by Sprouts to do some of my produce shopping.
Everything was going swimmingly. Until I looked at my shopping list. There staring me in the face was PARSNIP. Parsnips. I began wandering around the store. Parsnips? What on earth did parsnips look like? What were they? They were a vegetable, right? I thought so. Maybe. So I decided that the vegetables would be a good place to look. I moved purposefully towards the vegetables all the while thinking, "Should I ask someone? What would I say? 'Excuse me, but I have no idea what a parsnip is. Could you perhaps show me?'" I looked at the row of vegetables. I looked up at the row of labels. Slowly I began reading them.
Collared greens. Parsnips. Some other vegetables I don't even remember what they were called. Oh wait! Parsnips! I was elated. I had found them. Then I looked down. There were many unrecognizable vegetables under the label. I didn't know what to do. I had come too close to be thwarted now. I looked again. Were they those white ones? What shape were they?
Then I made an amazing discovery. Next to the label was a picture! A picture. What brilliance. Whoever had thought of that should be knighted (not that that would do much good in the U.S. I suppose). However, the picture was drawn, and, as the parsnips were nestled in among other root-like vegetables, I was a little concerned. After much pondering, I decided that since the picture was white and looked vaguely like the white, root-looking vegetable, it must be a parsnip. I picked up a few and placed them in the plastic bag and headed over the Daviah (who had been getting fruit for the whole ordeal) and the shopping cart.
Daviah looked at me and looked at the bag.
"What are you getting parsnips for?" she asked.
The moral of this story is: when you do not know what a parsnip is - ask your younger sister. She will know!
Due to my faults in the cooking department, including, but not limited to, my lack of ability to really cook, my cooking redundancy, as well as my lack of cooking meals during a week, I decided that I needed to start cooking.
The first thing I did was to pick out new recipes - that I would actually eat. (I never knew there were so many recipes out there that I would not eat...) Then, outfitted with a shopping list (and Daviah) I stopped by Sprouts to do some of my produce shopping.
Everything was going swimmingly. Until I looked at my shopping list. There staring me in the face was PARSNIP. Parsnips. I began wandering around the store. Parsnips? What on earth did parsnips look like? What were they? They were a vegetable, right? I thought so. Maybe. So I decided that the vegetables would be a good place to look. I moved purposefully towards the vegetables all the while thinking, "Should I ask someone? What would I say? 'Excuse me, but I have no idea what a parsnip is. Could you perhaps show me?'" I looked at the row of vegetables. I looked up at the row of labels. Slowly I began reading them.
Collared greens. Parsnips. Some other vegetables I don't even remember what they were called. Oh wait! Parsnips! I was elated. I had found them. Then I looked down. There were many unrecognizable vegetables under the label. I didn't know what to do. I had come too close to be thwarted now. I looked again. Were they those white ones? What shape were they?
Then I made an amazing discovery. Next to the label was a picture! A picture. What brilliance. Whoever had thought of that should be knighted (not that that would do much good in the U.S. I suppose). However, the picture was drawn, and, as the parsnips were nestled in among other root-like vegetables, I was a little concerned. After much pondering, I decided that since the picture was white and looked vaguely like the white, root-looking vegetable, it must be a parsnip. I picked up a few and placed them in the plastic bag and headed over the Daviah (who had been getting fruit for the whole ordeal) and the shopping cart.
Daviah looked at me and looked at the bag.
"What are you getting parsnips for?" she asked.
The moral of this story is: when you do not know what a parsnip is - ask your younger sister. She will know!
Thursday, July 21, 2011
A Tale of Mushrooms in the Wall
Our little house is full of its own personality and quirks. And for the most part we love them. The door into the garage doesn't hang right, the screen door doesn't close, unless you slam it shut, as if you were in such a temper, the light switch in the bedroom has to be on or the lights in the office and the guest bedroom won't work, and so on. Mostly we smile lovingly at them and sometimes mutter a cross word under our breath when the light switch gets turned off. Mostly we look at them as George Bailey does his knob on his banister (after he comes back from never-being born, of course). We look at it that way because it is ours. The house is ours. The light switch is ours. The lamp on the ceiling which doesn't work because we pulled the string on it right off. They all are ours. (Or God's, I should say, since everything belongs to Him).
However, sometimes we live in blissful ignorance of what is happening to our little house. I suppose I shouldn't say in blissful ignorance, because we weren't ignorant exactly, but maybe we were a little too blissful.
A few months ago, (it was so long ago, we aren't even sure exactly when it started), we noticed that the floor in the bathroom was damp. Alright, it wasn't damp - it was wet. This didn't strike too much fear in us, because, of course, we always get water on the floor when we get in and out of the shower or splash in the bathtub. It just seems to be one of the things that us Porters do quite well - get water on the floor. So for the first little while we didn't think anything of it. Finally, I realized that there was water puddled all over our bathroom floor. I thought that if I put some towels on it and mopped it up it would solve the problem. So I did. However, when I checked the towels later, they were sopping. Completely sopping. I tried again. The more towels I put on, the more wet they seemed to be. I soon realized that we had a problem. For several days, perhaps weeks (as I said, our timeline on when it all happened and how long it took is a bit foggy, perhaps it is waterlogged.......Alright, bad joke) the water remained there until we decided to so something about it. And, as always, whenever we have a problem with our house, we call my dear father-in-law.
Father-in-law came along, and he and Luke dutifully went to work to figure out what it was. My father-in-law thought it was the toilet. So the toilet was fixed and the floor was torn up. We were left with instructions to let the sub floor dry out and then we could put a new floor in (a bit of a dilemma when you have no money, but that is irrelevant at the moment). Excited that the problem was finally in hand, we dutifully waited for the few days. We watched each day as it got dry, and then we watched each day as it returned to being a pond. Perhaps we could have imported some fish and let them swim around in it, and perhaps, we should have gotten some water lilies and tried to be reminiscent of a Monet. But we didn't. We let it become a little pond. We told the father-in-law that it was not drying, and indeed, more water was coming in, but that was all we did. We simply left our not-quite-Monet pond on the bathroom floor. For a few months. Oh, it wasn't always pond-like. It would go in spurts of being very dry - and then it would be very wet. And then it would be wet, and then dry. It did so in random succession, with no apparent cause. Nothing we seemed to do in the bathroom seemed to have any affect on when it was dry or when it was wet. So we simply lived with our sometimes dry/mostly wet bathroom quite nicely for a few months. Every once in awhile we would reference getting it fixed or seeing if the father-in-law could come and fix it, but mostly we contently went on our way. It didn't bother us that we only had a wet sub floor. It became one of the quirks of our little house. It caused occasional annoyance, and mostly placid ignoring.
However, today, Luke was at my parent's house where a friend from church was working on fixing a few things there. Apparently our bathroom came up, because said friend came over determined to look at our bathroom and fix it. I can't tell you the outcome, as Luke and he are still busily working trying to find out where that trying leak is coming from.
But, as the friend was working, he pulled off a lot of rotting drywall and such, he said "Look, there are mushrooms growing in the wall."
Sure enough, there were mushrooms growing in the wall.
There is also mold in our crawlspace.
The moral of this tale, which I don't entirely know the outcome, seems to me to be clear.
Lesson I'm not sure what number is: It is a good thing to be content, but sometimes it is also good to be a little more proactive and not let water sit around your house so that mushrooms grow in your walls.
However, sometimes we live in blissful ignorance of what is happening to our little house. I suppose I shouldn't say in blissful ignorance, because we weren't ignorant exactly, but maybe we were a little too blissful.
A few months ago, (it was so long ago, we aren't even sure exactly when it started), we noticed that the floor in the bathroom was damp. Alright, it wasn't damp - it was wet. This didn't strike too much fear in us, because, of course, we always get water on the floor when we get in and out of the shower or splash in the bathtub. It just seems to be one of the things that us Porters do quite well - get water on the floor. So for the first little while we didn't think anything of it. Finally, I realized that there was water puddled all over our bathroom floor. I thought that if I put some towels on it and mopped it up it would solve the problem. So I did. However, when I checked the towels later, they were sopping. Completely sopping. I tried again. The more towels I put on, the more wet they seemed to be. I soon realized that we had a problem. For several days, perhaps weeks (as I said, our timeline on when it all happened and how long it took is a bit foggy, perhaps it is waterlogged.......Alright, bad joke) the water remained there until we decided to so something about it. And, as always, whenever we have a problem with our house, we call my dear father-in-law.
Father-in-law came along, and he and Luke dutifully went to work to figure out what it was. My father-in-law thought it was the toilet. So the toilet was fixed and the floor was torn up. We were left with instructions to let the sub floor dry out and then we could put a new floor in (a bit of a dilemma when you have no money, but that is irrelevant at the moment). Excited that the problem was finally in hand, we dutifully waited for the few days. We watched each day as it got dry, and then we watched each day as it returned to being a pond. Perhaps we could have imported some fish and let them swim around in it, and perhaps, we should have gotten some water lilies and tried to be reminiscent of a Monet. But we didn't. We let it become a little pond. We told the father-in-law that it was not drying, and indeed, more water was coming in, but that was all we did. We simply left our not-quite-Monet pond on the bathroom floor. For a few months. Oh, it wasn't always pond-like. It would go in spurts of being very dry - and then it would be very wet. And then it would be wet, and then dry. It did so in random succession, with no apparent cause. Nothing we seemed to do in the bathroom seemed to have any affect on when it was dry or when it was wet. So we simply lived with our sometimes dry/mostly wet bathroom quite nicely for a few months. Every once in awhile we would reference getting it fixed or seeing if the father-in-law could come and fix it, but mostly we contently went on our way. It didn't bother us that we only had a wet sub floor. It became one of the quirks of our little house. It caused occasional annoyance, and mostly placid ignoring.
However, today, Luke was at my parent's house where a friend from church was working on fixing a few things there. Apparently our bathroom came up, because said friend came over determined to look at our bathroom and fix it. I can't tell you the outcome, as Luke and he are still busily working trying to find out where that trying leak is coming from.
But, as the friend was working, he pulled off a lot of rotting drywall and such, he said "Look, there are mushrooms growing in the wall."
Sure enough, there were mushrooms growing in the wall.
There is also mold in our crawlspace.
The moral of this tale, which I don't entirely know the outcome, seems to me to be clear.
Lesson I'm not sure what number is: It is a good thing to be content, but sometimes it is also good to be a little more proactive and not let water sit around your house so that mushrooms grow in your walls.
Monday, June 20, 2011
Ah, the joys of post-graduation...
So many people wait and wait and wait to get their college degree, and I must say that I am no exception. Ever since that first college class (College Algebra, no less) at 16 years of age, I had been waiting for that day when I would be done with my education. Although during those first few years I didn't think too much about finishing, because it was so far in the future, as the years and semesters drug on, I became more and more ready to be done. To put Metro far from my mind, as well as my physical being. Amazingly, after six years in college, the day finally arrived. It was fitting that the day I would say goodbye to Metro was a cold, rainy day - and the graduation was outside. As I sat in my seat in the freezing cold, the realization that I was done did not really hit me. I don't know that it hit me for awhile. In fact, I don't suppose it hit me until I realized that with the passing of the educational torch, I must hoist a different torch - a vocational one.
Oh that great job hunt of post-graduation is on. Of course, I do have some jobs, but I need to find one that A) fits my schedule (a very difficult thing to do) and B) one that pays decently (which is difficult to find). As I peruse many job openings and such, I am afraid despair and overwhelmedness overcame me. And still overcome me. The sea of jobs is overpowering, and trying to find one that fits is incredibly difficult. I want to throw up my hands and say "Enough!" However, persevere I must. And so I have decided to give my despair and overwhelmedness to God, and trust that He will guide me to and provide a job for me. Because we serve an awesome God.
So I will continue to look and be faithful while I wait on my awesome God to show me the way!
Oh that great job hunt of post-graduation is on. Of course, I do have some jobs, but I need to find one that A) fits my schedule (a very difficult thing to do) and B) one that pays decently (which is difficult to find). As I peruse many job openings and such, I am afraid despair and overwhelmedness overcame me. And still overcome me. The sea of jobs is overpowering, and trying to find one that fits is incredibly difficult. I want to throw up my hands and say "Enough!" However, persevere I must. And so I have decided to give my despair and overwhelmedness to God, and trust that He will guide me to and provide a job for me. Because we serve an awesome God.
So I will continue to look and be faithful while I wait on my awesome God to show me the way!
Saturday, January 1, 2011
1-1-11 or God is faithful!
January 1.
The time to make resolutions.
The time to reflect on life.
The time to decide who you are and where you are going.
The time to look back and see where you have come from.
The time to see your mistakes and grow from them.
The time to change.
Why January 1 carries with it such a load of hope, change, freshness, and possibility is, I'm sure, tied to the fact that it opens up a whole new year - fresh, beautiful - with no mistakes in it. It is stretching out before you like a road that has never been traveled. One that has no footprints. Not a road less traveled, but a road not traveled at all. And next January 1, you will be able to look back on the traveled road and look ahead to the untraveled one. But we, of course, should look to the past and learn from what God has taught us through our trials and through our joys. And looking ahead, we rejoice in the things that will transpire to bring us closer to our glorious Savior. But knowing, too, that we are destined to have trouble, but our Jesus has overcome this world.
Today I was reflecting, via a conversation with my mother, about the last few weeks and some things that have been going on for all of the last year. It was hard, sad, and yet refreshing because my mother reminded me over and over again that God is faithful. He is. Always. His character is good. His character is love. He always works in everything for the good of me. That is what my God is. He is faithful through the good and the bad. He is Lord over all. He knows what has happened, what is happening, and what will happen. I may not like all of it. I may not understand any of it. But He knows. He works it all for His glory. He is faithful.
In the last year, my Luke and I have had our share of troubles. But we have also had our share of joys. And thinking back over all of those days - 365 to be exact - I can see God's hand and His faithfulness.
In the last year, my Luke and I celebrated one beautiful year of marriage. Oh what a glorious gift to be married to my best friend - to the man who loves me more than I can even imagine - to the man who puts me first, who protects me, defends me, cherishes me, shows me a picture of Christ. That alone is enough for me to say "God, You are awesome!" And even in the midst of hardship, God has provided me with the best partner, the best leader to get me through it all.
God is faithful. May that be the cry of my heart this coming year. As I look back at those footprints behind me - the two sets - I will say "God, You are faithful!" And looking ahead at the fresh, clean, beautiful road stretching before me, with no mistakes or problems - yet - and with no knowledge of where that road, with God as the guide, will take my Luke and me, I will cry "God, You are faithful!"
May the cry of my heart continue to be "God is faithful" through the big and the small. Through the thick and the thin. Through the snow and the shine. Through everything. I will choose to say "God is faithful."
I'm excited to see God prove that He is faithful through this next year. And I'd love to take you all along for the ride!
God is faithful!
P.S. Oh - and back to resolutions:
I resolve to blog more.
Betcha didn't see that one coming!
The time to make resolutions.
The time to reflect on life.
The time to decide who you are and where you are going.
The time to look back and see where you have come from.
The time to see your mistakes and grow from them.
The time to change.
Why January 1 carries with it such a load of hope, change, freshness, and possibility is, I'm sure, tied to the fact that it opens up a whole new year - fresh, beautiful - with no mistakes in it. It is stretching out before you like a road that has never been traveled. One that has no footprints. Not a road less traveled, but a road not traveled at all. And next January 1, you will be able to look back on the traveled road and look ahead to the untraveled one. But we, of course, should look to the past and learn from what God has taught us through our trials and through our joys. And looking ahead, we rejoice in the things that will transpire to bring us closer to our glorious Savior. But knowing, too, that we are destined to have trouble, but our Jesus has overcome this world.
Today I was reflecting, via a conversation with my mother, about the last few weeks and some things that have been going on for all of the last year. It was hard, sad, and yet refreshing because my mother reminded me over and over again that God is faithful. He is. Always. His character is good. His character is love. He always works in everything for the good of me. That is what my God is. He is faithful through the good and the bad. He is Lord over all. He knows what has happened, what is happening, and what will happen. I may not like all of it. I may not understand any of it. But He knows. He works it all for His glory. He is faithful.
In the last year, my Luke and I have had our share of troubles. But we have also had our share of joys. And thinking back over all of those days - 365 to be exact - I can see God's hand and His faithfulness.
In the last year, my Luke and I celebrated one beautiful year of marriage. Oh what a glorious gift to be married to my best friend - to the man who loves me more than I can even imagine - to the man who puts me first, who protects me, defends me, cherishes me, shows me a picture of Christ. That alone is enough for me to say "God, You are awesome!" And even in the midst of hardship, God has provided me with the best partner, the best leader to get me through it all.
God is faithful. May that be the cry of my heart this coming year. As I look back at those footprints behind me - the two sets - I will say "God, You are faithful!" And looking ahead at the fresh, clean, beautiful road stretching before me, with no mistakes or problems - yet - and with no knowledge of where that road, with God as the guide, will take my Luke and me, I will cry "God, You are faithful!"
May the cry of my heart continue to be "God is faithful" through the big and the small. Through the thick and the thin. Through the snow and the shine. Through everything. I will choose to say "God is faithful."
I'm excited to see God prove that He is faithful through this next year. And I'd love to take you all along for the ride!
God is faithful!
P.S. Oh - and back to resolutions:
I resolve to blog more.
Betcha didn't see that one coming!
Thursday, October 14, 2010
52 Dates in a Year: The Cheap Way
I just wanted to introduce a new section of my blog, which will be called "52 Dates in a Year: The Cheap Way".
Luke and I bought this married couples date book that has 52 dates in it. We are determined to do one a week for the next month. So, you will be regailed with parts of our dates. And some pictures.
Hope you enjoy!
Luke and I bought this married couples date book that has 52 dates in it. We are determined to do one a week for the next month. So, you will be regailed with parts of our dates. And some pictures.
Hope you enjoy!
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