Believe God is Working

This week I was asked to write as a guest blogger for a marriage and family blog. The topic I was asked to write about was giving up my dream job as a high school graphic design/photograph instructor to allow my husband to pursue the path God had been putting on his heart. I was excited to share and as I began rough drafting my thoughts I felt a rush of overwhelming thankfulness at God's provision and active involvement in our lives over the past year. I encourage you to head over to https://marriageandfamilytulsa.org/blog/ to read my story. I hope you find it encouraging and challenging!

At the very end of my article I mentioned very briefly I felt like this was my "Abraham/Isaac" moment. No not to the extreme of laying one of my kids on an alter... don't get crazy ideas of this 35 year lady who moves to the woods and looses her sanity! HA Sometimes I do feel like I have lost my mind though when I think of all we left behind in Centerton, AR... Here is a brief description I used in my other blog to help you picture my life before:

Every day I worked in one of the most prestigious business buildings, in one of the United States top #5 places to live. Working with outstanding businesses like Walmart Home Office, non-profits, fashion designers, and the Arkansas World Trade Center. I was helping these incredible young people learn the skills to achieve their life dreams right out of high school and seeing it happen right before my eyes! I was doing this everyday and still done early enough to pick my kids up from school, be an involved mom, the women's ministry director at my local church, teach weekly women's bible study, and did I mention I was living in my childhood dream home?? Picture it... a yellow victorian style two story home, the huge white front/back porch, beautiful gable trim, picket fence, colorful annuals all over the yard, and garden growing huge sunflowers in late summer.

So you see it was a great life! To the outsider looking in nearly perfect! Everyday I woke up thinking how blessed I was! So how is this my "Abraham/Isaac" moment. I truly feel that God put it on my heart to place all but my husband and children on the alter of sacrifice. Years of waiting to have my dream job, working hard to be successful, making enough money to live in my dream home, spending hours a week preparing studies to share with women... so many things I felt so blessed to have and poured so much of my life into is bound and laying up on my alter of worship to my Savior.

You might be thinking "ok, so where is the scapegoat?" I truly believe I am currently in the place of Abraham's truest moments of faithfulness, just before God's messenger arrived and the goat was provided. No I don't believe I am going to poof be back in my yellow house, back in my former job, and back in Centerton. No, I am there 100% laid it all down and I believe God is working out the details of making a BETTER life for me than the one I had dreamed for myself! I see glimpses of it already!! Here is a peak into my new normal:

The weekend of June 1st we pulled away from the yellow house, and hours later pulled in to a much smaller home, in the middle of one of God's masterpieces (Boston Mountains behind me and farmland all around). My calendar has never been so clear, my most reoccurring response to if I have something going on today is "I am scotch, like the tape!" I am begin nearly every day sitting on the porch reading God's word, drinking coffee, and soaking up the beauty of God's creation around me, our family has had dinner at the table nearly every night, and end most nights looking at the stars with my tall, dark, and handsome. We have less than we have ever had (sold A LOT when we moved), I don't have a job (outside of being a wife and mother) as of yet, I am completely at peace that God is working out all the details... I have never been at such peace with where I am so supposed to be.

While I don't believe God is going to give me descendants as numerous as the stars, thats not my life, I am certainly no Abraham's Sarah. I am however incredibly excited to see how God puts all the new opportunities he has planned for my family in to our lives. Until then I am seeking Him and just enjoying the moments of stillness my heart needs to prepare for what God is working out.

Genesis 22:13-15 (ESV)
And Abraham lifted up his eyes and looked, and behold, behind him was a ram, caught in a thicket by his horns. And Abraham went and took the ram and offered it up as a burnt offering instead of his son. So Abraham called the name of that place, “The Lord will provide”; as it is said to this day, “On the mount of the Lord it shall be provided.”

Friend, what is God asking you to give up? Whatever it is it cannot possibly be worth more than what God desires to give you instead of that job, house, prestigious position... I am living proof everyday, I can honestly say I love my life and the thrill of knowing I am right where God placed me is better than any job or house!!

James 2:23ESV)
and the Scripture was fulfilled that says, “Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him as righteousness”—and he was called a friend of God.

"Friend of God" because Abraham was faithful and believed God would do what he said he would! God extends that same faithfulness to us!!!! He will work out in your life His righteousness if we believe Him!!