Dig Deep

I saw this man. He was tall, strong and had a great sense of pride when you looked at him.

As I walked in this unfamiliar place I felt like I didn't belong there.  What was I doing I told myself.  It took you an hour to get here and then you work Saturday and the run is the next day. Your going to be tired.  Why did you sign up for this run?

The competitiveness then sank in my soul, then my confidence was destroyed.  I managed to look around the shop, find my way to the booth to where I would pick up my packet and then headed over to look at the shops merchandise.

There was Gilbert.  I didn't know who this Gilbert was or what he went through.  Somewhere online I saw a video of him and a group of  Burundi children walking to get water.  No shoes. They would walk several miles each day to get contaminated water for their families.  It made me cry.  As a mother you would feel the same way.  I couldn't imagine my little Emily walking miles to get us water.  And not clean water so it would be worth the effort, but dirty water filled with bacteria that the kids often get sick and die.  My entry into the race guaranteed one Burundi person with clean water.  They dig wells. We run.  It's called Run For the Water and is hosted by the Gazelle Foundation.  Easy enough. I do 10 miles all the time.  Racing has never been a competition for me.  I run to Live. I run to Pray. 

 Every ounce of my soul wanted to meet this person.  I even asked the volunteer there as I pointed to him if that was indeed Gilbert.  Of course I knew it was him.  My boldness shrunk, I felt so intimidated, so mundane compared to this magnificent person.  I rehearsed in my head what I would say to him.  It went something corny like, I think your doing a wonderful job.  I even thought about sharing my faith with him.  Little did I know, he is a devout Christian. God tugged at my heart several times, but I failed to approach him.  Till this day, I'm still disappointed in myself.   I think  it might not have mattered what I had to say that day, but I do know that tomorrow that my presence alone says it all.

"For I will gather you up from all the nations and bring you home again to your land." Ezekiel 36:24

I did a little research and found out Gilbert wrote a book about the Genocide he survived (in fact he was the only one to survive).  I won't go into detail about what happened.  You can read it for yourself.

Pick up a copy of his book at Amazon.com, I know I'm going to .

Until Next Time,
Eat Organic!
Eat Gluten-Free!

Jennifer  ( I will be eating Pizza and Whataburger Tacitos tomorrow. Yummy!!!!)

A Tree Climbing Kinda Day

Waited till 5:30 am to get the "Cancel you for today" phone call.  I was told yesterday my nursing services were not needed, so at least I was prepared.  They tell you this and then say, "Well, we can't actually cancel you before 5 am." This is just in case they get call ins.  But nope, no call ins. Just cancelled for the day.

So, What's a Girl to do?

Not in the mood to run at 5:30am.  I took a beating at work yesterday. Heavy, demanding patients with very little help.  Frustrating? Yup!!
Frustrating as it seems I still give my patients hugs and tell them that they are not a bother.  It bothers me when I go in to help them and they say, "Honey, I don't want to be a bother."  No Mam I reply, you are not a bother, this is my job and I'm here to help you get better.  I guess they see us running around like chickens with our heads chopped off.  100 mph we go for 12 hours straight, taking care of patients, bathing them, feeding them, giving them their medications and attending to their every need.  Which believe me, is more than you can handle sometimes.  I pray every minute of my day for the Love of Christ to enter my heart. Sometimes I want to scream at the top of my lungs, but I save that when I'm in my car driving home. I tend to have a little Pity Party with a  Why me Lord? as I'm driving home.

So, What's a Girl to do?

• Give Up?
• Cry?
• Get Mad?
• Ask God Why Me?
• Have a Pity Party?

Give up?  Nope. If  your facing a difficult time with your job or career, Pray about it.  Maybe it's time for a change. I've been doing the same type of Nursing for over 5 years now. I've been a nurse for 12 years, almost half of my nursing career I've spent in rehab.  Time for a change? Maybe so. 

Cry?  Yes. I cry probably 2-3 times a week. There's nothing wrong with crying. I'm not depressed and I'm very happy with my life. Crying helps release our natural emotions that we tend to keep "bottled" up inside.  

Get Mad?  No. Not really, but we tend to get mad anyways. That's okay too. Just don't get mad in front of people or at other people. If your mad, walk away from the situation and pray. 

Ask God, Why me?  Not always. But out of frustration sometimes we tend to do this. Replace the "Why Me"? with "Why not me?"  We pray for blessing but when trials and tribulations come we want to dig our own graves.  It's time to take the hard situations in life and see them as something God is trying to work out in us.  Maybe it's to learn that we are not perfect and we need a Savior.  

Have a Pity Party?  Nope, instead have a "Tree Climbing Party." One where you get your whole family together to celebrate the day and go visit  a local park where you all try to climb trees. 

I felt alive today.  No Pity Party for me!!!

 Yoga Poses in the trees.
 If you haven't noticed, that's a JennieBand I have on.
 My new slogan, "You can do anything with a
 JennieBand on,
 Even Climb Trees!!!" Ha!! Ha!!!

Emily

DJ

Zachary

DJ and David

Until Next Time,

Eat Organic!!

Eat Gluten-Free!!

Jennifer

A New Heart

Emily never likes to Smile!!!  

Church was uplifting today.  Woke up with a desire for church and no desire to run.

Again, I missed my 10 mile run.  I'm still trying to get back on track.  I learned last week that schedules are unnecessary for homeschooling and that I don't have to do everything at the exact time every single day.  It was fun doing things when we felt like it. Now, we still did all our 7 subjects, but we did them sporadically throughout the day.  #1, I was sick and #2, the kids loved it!
 Kinda gets boring after a while doing Math at exactly 10:30 am everyday.
 So, as I struggled to get moving last week after being in bed for 6 plus days, I learned that I need to take life less seriously. I need to just sit back and relax.

 Have a little more faith.  

We worry. We stress. We accomplish too much with so little time.  We try on our own.  We set out to conquer. 

 Kinda reminds me of the Roman Empire.  But then again, we just studied about the Great Wall of China and it's first ruler who wanted it all, even in death.  Also reminds me of Prince Siddhartha who formed the basis of Buddhism.   
 So, it just confirms that we as human beings want more.  

• We want to be Successful.  
• We want to be Loved. 
• We want to be Beautiful. 
• We want More
• We want More
• We want More. (Give me, give me, give me some more.(Black Flag))  

You see, in each culture, each person in history wanted to have a Purpose in Life.  Some went to great extremes as the kids and I learned with China.  They great ruler (Shi Huangdi), built the Great Wall of China to keep the monguls out.  All the monguls wanted was to have trade relations to stay alive, (the people were dying) but he (Shi Huangdi) wanted no association with the Monguls. He was too proud. Too stubborn.  Even in death he was buried with all the things he loved.  Things he possessed.  Even a heart of stone.

Prince Siddhartha on the other hand was given all the pleasures of this world.  He was forbidden to go outside by his parents who tried to keep him away from the seeing the sufferings of their world.   He had over 1,000 servants at his feet day and night.  One day he became curious of the outside world and begged his father to go outside.  During his encounter with the world he saw the sufferings of his people.  He felt sorrow and pain.  He went out into the wilderness to find peace and found that if we remove the need for desire, we ultimately will stop wanting.  He reached enlightenment and founded Buddhism.

In our search to be the Greatest, we miss out on our one true calling in Life.

You know the one where we excel in a particular field or career or opportunity.  We work more. We stress more. In the end we make life more complicated.  When Jesus spoke to the Teachers and the Pharisees, he explained that even with all the education they had, they missed the single most important thing in life.  They missed out on having Love in their hearts.  They had no compassion. No Love for God, but love for the Law.
My friend,  Love covers over a multitude of sins.  It gives us compassion.  It helps us to forgive. It gives us, most importantly, the opportunity to begin a true relationship with Jesus.

 No degree, no talent, not even having a bank account full of money will guarantee us happiness.   Man made religion teaches us to be good, give once in a while to others less fortunate than us and it says to be successful in everything.   

With God's religion, all that is required is to Believe.  Then comes Faith, then Love and ultimately we then have Hope. 

• Faith to believe Jesus is the son of God.
• Faith to believe that Jesus died for our Sins.
• Faith to believe God will work everything out for his purpose. (You see it says His Purpose, Not Ours) 
• Faith to believe that with God all things are possible. Not some things. But all things. 

Christianity is not about following any rules. It's about giving all our man made rules to God so that in return he can give us a new heart to follow him.

Ezekiel 36:26

I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you. I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. 

That's his promise. Believe it today. 

Until Next Time, 

Eat Gluten-Freee

Eat Organic!

Jennifer

Blah, blah, blah!

I promised myself I would wake up today feeling better. Just a little better than yesterday. This week, starting last Wednesday has been a pure black hole for me. I got sucked into getting the flu shot (no ones fault except myself) and then I disappointed a friend.
I just want to get better. Having flu like symptoms every day of your life is a curse. Or is it? David, my husband, wonderful, I should say lives with an autoimmune disease where he feels like he has the flu 24/7. Yup. He feels crappy 99% of the time, 1% of feeling good is used to to make me coffee every morning. I love him for this!!! As I cry every night since I've been sick, my cries are to the Lord to make me feel better. I need healing. I need prayer. One thing I realized is that I need to be more understanding with David. When you feel sick, you don't want to go anywhere. Your one piece of comfort is your bed. It's been mine for 6 days now. No running. No cooking. No work. Nothing. The only one thing I can continue is the kids school. That I can't stop even if I'm half dead explaining lessons. Ha!
Pray for me.

Until Next Time,
Eat Organic!!! (eat for me!!)
Eat Gluten-Free (cook for me!!!)
Jennifer