Taste and See that the Lord is Good!!!

Wow! He is so good... there are no words for it, really. Our time is winding to an end now. A week from tomorrow we will leave and head back to the 'ham. Sometimes I get real sad and shed a few tears (i know... not shocking for those of you who know me!) and sometimes I look forward to what God has for us next. Well, not that I really know what all that entails, but I do know that some of our priorities have shifted, or maybe sharpened. We are purposing to spend more time individually and as a family to pray and be in the word. Here it is almost like the feast is laid out for you, and you come, prepare yourself, taste... or feast, i should say... and then you head back to the house where you keep the aftertaste, and then you do that again and again and again... (not that it is easy, sometimes the things are a little hard to swallow and take weeks or longer to digest). Well, now we will have to go back home, and there is still a feast there, but we have to do a lil more to prepare it, to feast on it, etc. I hope that makes sense. But, now I know that it is worth it. i have tasted of the Lord, and I am savoring it. I am learning how to do it for myself, and I am realizing that I knew it all along- I had just forgotten how to do it, or maybe I have been to distracted to do it.

The Martha and Mary story has always been hard for me- I am a doer, and so many times i have been my own accuser, thinking I wish I could just be a Mary but there is so much to do (can you tell I have a mom's heart- haha!). Well, something sunk in this time while I was studying Luke. It wasn't that she was working, maybe- it was that she was distracted by the work... for some reason that part came alive to me this time. The LORD knows I have things to do with my little clan of mighty men... I started thinking...what if Martha had done her dinner preparation unto the Lord, then her heart could have been at his feet even while her hands where busy. Hmmm... I don't know, it just struck me.

It is God's grace that we have been here as a family, because it has retained some reality to it. Jeff is in class, and I am at home with the kids (not all day, but just follow me), and I remember one day (about 3 weeks ago) when I was especially frustrated with "mothering", I started crying on the phone to Jeff. he said do you want me to come home so you can go spend time alone or at the prayer room? And I said, " NO!!!! I need God to show up here for me (i was being a tad bit demanding), not just in the prayer room!!" Well, from there- once I got those words and my true heart out there- I just started pouring my heart out to God. I said this is where I am, this is my life, I need you here so that when I go home, I do not despair, and because I need you here more than anywhere else!!! Well, even though I was being demanding, and even though my heart was not too pure, He met me there... and, wow...He met me!! Since then, he has been gradually doing a lot in my life- freeing me from bondage in my heart, purifying me, and granting me extraordinary peace.
All that to say, he has been working on this lil lady, and I am loving it, even though some of it has been gut-wrenching.

ZOO!!

Today we went to the KC Zoo in Swope Park- it was a really great time, but hot like home!!

Oops!- forgot these from 4th of July

We had a great 4th of July with our Birmingham Prayer Furnace friends and our peeps from home!

Priests

Psalm 141:2
May my prayer be set before you like incense; may the lifting up of my hands be like the evening sacrifice.

that is a priest's job... that is what we are, wherever we are...

Isaiah 61:6
And you will be called priests of the LORD; you will be called ministers of our God.

2 Peter 2:9
But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people belonging to God...

Revelation 5:10
You have made them to be a kingdom and priests to serve our God, and they will reign on the earth.

Wow! We are the holy priesthood... just a thought... what does that mean? Lord, you where the sacrifice, so what is our role as priests...hmmm... ask Him :)