Bring the Rain

Bring the Rain is the name of a blog that I've been reading. It has been following the story of a family who just recently lost their baby shortly after giving birth to her. They knew that she wouldn't be long on this earth. This video is a song they wrote with a slideshow of pictures of their family as they prepared for her birth and their short time with her. Her name is Audrey. Dad is a singer in the Christian group, Selah.
Get a hanky ready!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J2CnUtVY35o

Healing

It's taking me a long time to get to writing this post. I experienced God in a very powerful way this last weekend and I'm not sure how to exactly put into words, but I feel very strongly that I need to tell you about it. Maybe it's just to take a step in obedience for my own sake or maybe it's because someone else needs to hear it.

I invited myself to join the women of Hope Community Church on their women's retreat last weekend. I had talked with Mom about going last year, but for some reason, I decided not to go. I was nursing Audrey and it would have been a bit of a hassle. I saw the dates marked on the calendar when we were at Dad's a couple of weeks ago. I believe it may be the last thing on the calendar on my mom's handwriting. I decided to ask Vivian if it was still on and if I could go.

Half of the women at the retreat, I did not know personally. The other half I have known for most of my life. I wasn't sure what to expect. If I had known what was planned, I probably wouldn't have gone. The speaker for the retreat, Bobbi, stood in front of us on Friday night and said that the theme for the weekend was "Taste and See". She said that to "taste" something meant to "try it out". She wanted to introduce to us, the process of healing prayer. As soon as she said that, I started to cry.

The fact that I was crying isn't that remarkable. From time to time, I have been known to be pretty emotional. But I had come to this weekend with a sense of expectancy. I was ready for something big to happen. I didn't know how or what that meant or how the weekend would play into that, but I was ready for something. After Bobbi introduced the theme, the tears came for a couple of reasons. They came because I knew that I needed healing and they also came because it's one thing I had been known to roll my eyes over or be fearful of when my mom talked about it. "Healing prayer" seemed sort of "out there" to me. I told myself that maybe it was too charismatic for my taste and that I could work through my stuff with God by myself. I am much more comfortable standing up and giving testimony of things that are in the past. I'm scared to death of saying out loud, "This is what I'm dealing with right now. This is where I'm failing".

At the end of one of the sessions, Bobbi said that the women's council had been praying for each of us in anticipation of this time. They specifically prayed that God would stir things up in our lives and bring things to the surface that we needed to address. As soon as she said that, a women near me started weeping. I knew how she felt. So many of us could see clearly how God was working preparing our hearts for this time. We broke up into small groups and our leader asked us if we wanted to share how God was working. Woman after woman shared an area where they were feeling they needed healing. Then the leader would pray for them and with them, praying truth straight from Scripture and encouraging the women to respond in prayer in whatever way the Lord was speaking to them. It included confessing sin and asking for forgiveness for specific things as well as admitting and saying out loud what things we were handing over to the Lord for him to work His healing and asking Him to redeem those past situations and to ask Him to help us believe the truth about our situations and ourselves.

A part of me still feels a little apprehensive of talking about this because I'm afraid that some of you will think that I'm weird. What if you're skeptical about what I'm saying? There truly wasn't anything mystical about it. It was powerful because it was God's truth being poured over our wounds and it was done in community. God showed me that some times there are issues that He wants to work on with me while I'm with other believers and not just in my room by myself.

There were two specific areas that I felt like I needed to open up myself and tell the Lord that I was ready to give up my own control. It had to do with my choices as a mom and my relationships with my girl friends. Some of it had to do with past hurts and some of it had to do with my own poor choices. I'll talk about that more later. For now, I just wanted to tell you that I "tried it out". I took a taste. The Lord did a work in my heart and I know I'm not the same.

Dear Mom (Ethan's turning 3)

Dear Mom,

Do you have internet access in Heaven?
If so, and you haven't already seen them, you should really check out the new photos of Ethan on thefritzes.net site. You could even leave a comment if you like!

Can you believe Ethan turns 3 tomorrow? I'm at such a loss when it comes to planning birthdays without you. I have a lot of things to do for his party that I keep putting off. Help! We're celebrating in Cottage Grove on Saturday even though tomorrow is the official day.

Ethan has been worried about how you're getting around. We borrowed the van from Dad the other day and Ethan started asking me how far away Heaven was. I think he was concerned about your lack of transportation! He also informed us yesterday that he asked Jesus into his heart on "Tuesday". He likes to use "Tuesday" as the day he says he does anything. He kept saying over and over again, "Jesus in my heart". I think he misses you and was hoping for a quick trip to Heaven. I told him that we had to wait until Jesus said it was time for us to go. I'm not sure how to explain this to a toddler.

And, BTW, the kids have fresh haircuts. Jill is making sure that Audrey's bangs stay out of her eyes in honor of you. See? The mother-daughter hair wars will go on and on. . . .

We'll miss you on Ethan's birthday. I wish we could all be celebrating in Heaven because I wouldn't wish you away from where you are. I love you and miss you!

Amy

Further clarification of my previous post

Here is a link to some notes on a similar sermon. This blog author explains it better than I did.

The author of that blog had this to say about the message:

He shared one of his deepest, sweetest discoveries of the past two or three years. He discovered from Scripture that Christ and His work are a means to something: justification, forgiveness, propitiation, sanctification, eternal life. But here’s the catch. In Paul and in Hebrews and elsewhere, in the very moment of His supreme “means” work, He at that very moment became and displayed the supreme beauty of the glory of the grace of God which the universe was designed to display for our everlasting enjoyment. Christ in His means work becomes, at that moment, the clearest focus of the end for which we are made. We are made to praise the glory of the grace of God. The glory of God reaches its apex in the display of free grace and free grace reaches its apex in the display of the blood of Christ so sinners could be freed from their love affair with the world. This is why we will spend eternity singing about horrible things—slaughter of the Son of God will be our song forever. We won’t put behind us gross horrible events. The worst event of history will be the center of our song forever and the supreme expression of His glory and the supreme experience of satisfaction forever. In Christ’s means work He becomes our end. All of the pictures of the supremacy of Christ in Hebrews are not only to fit Him for His means work but they are also presented so that in the means work we would see our treasure, our reward. The ticket becomes the treasure.

Every glory of the Savior, every facet of His majesty, is poured into the little word “him” in 13:13. “Let us go to him outside the camp.” Jesus is not standing back and saying, “Go back!” He is saying, “I am out here! You are in there where it is so safe. But I am out here. Come to me…” The sweetest fellowship with your Savior and your treasure that you will ever know is the fellowship of His sufferings. It doesn’t get sweeter. The supremacy of Christ is not just His perfect fitness to bear our sins and not just the supremely valuable reward He will be at the end, but it is also present, personal, precious treasure. “Come to me, I’m out here,” he says. He won’t ask us to go where He won’t be with us. We will know Him in depths and ways in radical Christian sacrifice where we would never have known Him any other place.

Treasuring Christ and the Call to Suffer, Part 2

I just finished listening to part 2 of this measage given by John Piper at the New World Alive Conference. You can find it at desiringgod.com/blog and searching for the title of the sermon. If I get around to it, I'll post a direct link!

I wont to it justice here, but I'll share some things that stood out to me. You really need to listen to the whole thing yourself.

• Our suffering is never wrath, condemnation or judgment. It's never punishment- always purifying. Romans 8:1.
• In God's judment of sin through suffering, He is doing more than "responding" to sin. There is always a design and purpose. He permits what He permits for a reason. He subjected creation to futility so that the revelation of His glory could be seen in Christ in showing his grace ultimately in His death.
• God's design is that His glory would be praised. Eph 1:6
• In Christ's dying, He magnifies His glory by purchasing our deliverance (by His wounds we are healed) and He enables us to having a faith that perseveres. There is victory.

Here is what stood out to me the most-

God's gets glory when we ask for physical healing. It honors Him when we ask and it honors Him when He heals. However, in this imperfect world that we live in, physical healing will be exceptional and grace will be normative. Does that make sense? He always gives us grace to sustain us, but He doesn't always choose to give physical healing on this earth.

Physical healing often brings an "immediate outcry" of praise to God's glory. It doesn't tend to last. Are we giving more glory to God or saying, "I love health"?

I write more later. . .

Roger Counihan

Today was the Memorial Service for Roger Counihan.
Here are some pictures his family put together.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S5QXtSSPrgQ

Learning

I'm learning (or starting to, anyway) so many things right now. . .
I have a lot on my heart so this will be random and I'll post it on both sites. Sorry for the redundancy, but I'm not sure where to put it.

I have an ugly tendency to get myself worked up about things that I have no control over. Most of it has to do with my expectations of other people. While it's true that other people's actions and decisions can hurt me, the fact is, that in most situations, I may be able to do nothing about it. And the best thing I can do it just work on my own attitude. I've been convicted lately, that, instead of being frustrated about other people's choices in regards to their marriages, finances, and family relationships, I need to pray about my own life and work on these issues in my life.

I have had some very ugly "mommy" moments lately. Sometimes when Ethan refuses to obey, I completely lose my temper. This isn't behavior that my parent's taught me, it's something I seem to have picked up on my own. I need to stop and I need your prayers and encouragement so that I can. We had a situation that just happened today at lunchtime and I really messed up.
I didn't know that being a mom would be so difficult. I didn't know that I would feel so alone.

Treasuring Christ and the Call to Suffer

The link in my previous post isn't working. How is this?

Please pray for the Roger Counihan family. Roger is with Jesus now. He passed away last evening. His wife, Joyce, and his children and their spouses were with him.

Suffering

I linked to this through the Desiring God website. Some notes on a sermon on suffering. In all honesty, I have to admit I haven't read through the whole thing in detail yet or listened to it, but I plan to soon. When I do, I'll have lots to discuss with all of you.

So.... dig in! Or I wont have anyone to talk to about this!

Planning Ethan's 3rd Birthday Celebration

Ethan turns 3 this month. In planning to celebrate his birthday, we decided to have it in a more easily accessible location and to invite a few more family members than I normally would have. I knew it would be hard with Mom gone and having some extra family around for support seemed like a good idea. Not to mention that it will only be a couple more years before he really just wants to celebrate with his friends! Anyway, I'm making the most of it while this season of life lasts.
Watching Ethan is a great reminder of how much joy life can hold. I love that he is so innocent and that he really has no comprehension that there will be people in the world that wont be his "best friend". He loves life. And I'm understanding him a little more every day. The way to my son's heart is to get down on the floor and play with him and to participate in his little made-up games. Tonight, he was making up some nonsense song that he wanted to sing before bed. Nathan and I surprised him by singing it back to him (the best we could), instead of just telling him it wasn't a song and that he needed to come up with a new one. He laughed and laughed at our silliness. I think he fell over because he was giggling so hard!
Just a reminder that in this season of loss, I have this perfect picture of life living in my house with me.

More questions on prayer

The current sermon series is on prayer. The topic is timely for me. I was looking at the church website to see how the sermons in next few weeks would address this issue. I didn't see anything that would lead me to think my current questions would be addressed (of course I don't really know everything that will be covered so I could be wrong).

This is what I've been wondering:
Is there some rhyme or reason to why certain people get their prayers answered the way they request?

Why does God choose not to intervene sometimes?

I guess my main question about prayer right now is, "Why does God say "no" to some of our prayers?" How do we deal with that in a Biblical way?

BTW, my husband reminded me of something today. He was talking about how amplified things can seem when someone puts it in a post on a blog or website. He wasn't talking about me in particular, but I took it to heart. So, I was thinking about my last post and thought I should clarify that last week was REALLY hard for me. On the one hand, I want you all to understand how extremely difficult this journey is, but on the other, I hope you understand that I'm not renouncing my faith or turning my back on God or that I have nothing to be thankful for. I just have a lot of questions. I think I know the basic answers, but, for some reason, they don't really satisfy me right now. Maybe I come off like I think everything in life is bad. It's not. I have many things that I'm thankful for. I think it's a combination of things that are making me blue.

Convenience prayers

I read a lot of blogs every day. I subscribe to Google Reader and just add the ones I always check and I can see all the the new posts from all the blogs in one place. It's pretty cool. Anyway, based on the blogs I visit, Google also recommends ones they think would interest me. I've found some interesting ones through their recommendations. One of them today was praising God because they had prayed for the rain to stay away so they could film some outside scenes for a video.

I think it's great that they rain stayed away and maybe it would have even if they hadn't prayed. I'm just really struggling with accepting the way prayers are answered. I don't wish bad things on anyone or that they wont have their prayers answered, but the issues like not wanting it to rain because you're going to be outside, or for a free plane ticket or something that isn't going to cause you major pain or trauma if it doesn't happen- those are the things that frustrate me when I wonder why God chose allow my mom to die.

I'm not frustrated with the people who pray for these things. It just hurts when I think about not getting the outcome I desired. I know all the Christian answers about God having a plan and being able to use this situation for his glory. I believe it's true. I'm just not at the place where I understand.

I think I've mentioned some of this thinking before, but it's in my head again today so I thought I would share it.

Thanks for reading!

Depressed and annoyed

I've been missing Mom a lot as I look forward to planning Ethan's birthday. She always made birthday's special. It just really reminds me of how much relationships mattered to her. Don't get me wrong. She accomplished a lot of things, but she spent the majority of her time and energy on things that would matter in eternity.

On to what has been annoying me-
1) Please let me talk about my mom. She's only been gone for 2 months. You can ask me about her, but, if you do, it would mean a lot to me if you actually would listen to my response and not try to change the subject as quickly as possible.

2) If I'm talking about the details of mom's passing, please don't question me on the details like I can't possibly be right. So what if I am wrong or my doctors told me something you disagree with? Do you feel better for pointing it out? I certainly don't.

3) If I tell you I'm feeling sad, please don't try to talk me out of my feelings.

4) Please don't assume that, because I have my kids with me during the day, that I don't need someone to talk to. I'm lonely.