Nightly Ponder

I have no idea where to begin.

      I just spent the better part of the night watching old shows that I grew up on, laughing and talking with someone I love dearly. But then the silence came- that silence that I crave all day long. Through the thumping of doors slamming shut and children's calls to each other from room to room, the worry of near empty bank accounts being squeezed of every last penny to appease the bill people , the pouring rain that has overtaken the forecasted sunny day...through all of the chaos and frustration and playtime and teachings I crave this silence; now that it's here, it scares me.

     I'm not sure I like it, especially when I'm the only one awake. I take my sleepy toddler by the hand and guide her back to her warm well blanketed bed, and it feels so good to have someone holding my hand in the darkness. Most nights, I am up and down correcting overwound children, or the ones with the bad dreams or who saw the scary shadows. It is during these times that I hear the silence. The faint snore coming from a distant bedroom; the rush of the wind outside like a train whizzing by; the whimper of our dogs twitching on the couch, dreaming of endless outdoor play. But it is also during these times that the reality of what is my reality hits me like a smack in the face and it doesn't matter that I was laughing and reminiscing just a few hours earlier- I am immediately pulled towards fear and the tears overtake me. It is in this darkness and silence that I see and feel in the physical world exactly what I cannot see but still feel in the spiritual one. 

     I used to feel as though I was so on track with the Lord and I resented my angelic reputation. I hated that the people I just wanted to simply talk to and get to know never wanted to give me a second thought or just a chance at a real friendship because they assumed I would look down from my pedestal at them and make them feel the way I feel people make me feel now. The saddest part is, I never would have. That is not who I am, and I never gave that indication.

     Now I'm stumbling around in darkness, crying out for my Father to hear me, to answer my call, to give me some guidance and direction. I know it is evil to ask for signs, but how else can I really know that something is from the Lord and not the Devil appearing as an Angel of Light? How do I know that everything that I was taught before wasn't wrong or askew or a mistake- based on generational misinformation? The only thing that I cling to is the Word, and even that has been twisted and misinterpreted a thousand ways by both well meaning and evil pastors and elders.I don't want to fall away- not now, not when the end is so very close. It's not fair, that if I was going the right way throughout the race that now I get lost and   lose my sense of direction.My soul can't afford to to be lost.

     And even now, in this evil physical realm I am forced to face utter failure. Fears that I have never once worried about have become my daily torment.There is no money. There is no way to provide for myself and my children without the help that isn't there. There is no emotional comfort- just daily spits in the face, so to speak. Things I craved and begged and asked for-humiliated at having to grovel for- are so freely given to another who has not had to endure what I have, who has not been put through the humiliation I have and who has not been there time and again and again forgiving and being let down in a vicious self destructive cycle. I watch my children try so desperately to get what should just be an honour to give to them, and now I have to dispense it twice as much to fill the void.The fact of the matter is, now I have to continue on in this world with no support or security by my side while others get to go and play like they are air-headed teenagers again.While they put in their paid allotted 8 hours and come home to video games and private giddy phone calls, I put in my thankless,never ending 24 hours of educating, and meal planning and budgeting and bill paying, and smooth talking debtors and fears, and 3am nightmares and 4am potty runs and checking measly online auctions praying to God another memory I have put up for sale has been bought by a stranger so that I can make ends meet and squirrel away for an uncertain and frighteningly lonely  future.

    So there I sit, by my window on the floor looking out at the darkened town. I wonder how many people in the houses that I am looking at are sleeping soundly and how many feel the way I do right now and are being robbed of their only peaceful time? I wonder if my entire life has been set up for something miraculous just before the end, or just a set up? Is all this torment for my eventual good, or will I just die a pathetic creature with a lot of wasted potential and a legacy left behind for someone else to learn from? Will this blog ever reach anyone? Does anyone even read it? No one ever comments. No donations are made. I read these articles of Joe Schmoes who took a risk and put everything out there and their blogs just blew up with fans and readers and people who care. I have never once done anything in order to get rich, but it would be nice to know that my thoughts and feelings are just screams from my heart that echo as whispers into nothingness. It would be a miracle to know that I matter in this world.That there is a chance my pathetic life could touch or entertain people enough to make a difference in their own lives. I want to matter.

     I don't want to walk alone in the dark anymore.

Cry to the Heavens

Lord,
How do these 3 remain- faith,hope and love?
How do you have the faith to continue hoping( or is it how do you hope to continue having faith?) when love has scorned you? How do you not just stop believing in all things good and hopeful, when love doesn't remember you anymore, when love forgets everything you have been put through and endured and sacrificed for it? How do you keep your heart- the very wellspring of your life- from being swallowed up by hatred and malice and letting it freeze over rock hard so that nothing and no one can ever break it again?
God, I don't understand. I don't understand why You allowed me to go through the things I've gone through. Why when I prayed for a father( because my own didn't want me) did You bring a verbally abusive alcoholic into my life to be the representation of what a father is to his children?Why did You take my perfect loving little family of 4 and rip 2 of the most loving people away from me within a mere 5 days? Why was I left to raise myself?
Why, when I saved myself for all those years for that one deserving man(that I was taught to pray for from toddler hood) did You send me a man that already had mentally known hundreds-possibly thousands- of women already? You know how much I've hated my body, my very exterior. How could anyone love me for who I truly am, and not just what I look like? Why did You send me a liar who kept lying to me from the moment he met me; a man, who stood before You and all our friends and all our family and swore vows of allegiance and loyalty to only me in front of You--only to find those vows never meant a thing. Those vows that were so easily pushed aside and forgotten for a stranger who had no intentions of guarding his heart the way I did? Why did You allow his lies to go on, protected and hidden for years, through sickness and health and 3 more innocent lives and family vacations and tears and death?
GOD-I WANT TO KNOW WHY!
I want to know why I searched for help and help wasn't found.I cried out for healing and I remained broken. I fought for my marriage and fought for our life and was struck down with a disease that will eventually rear its silent head again and may rob my sight, or my mobility or my life. Why!? Why, when I sought solitude and peace I found nothing but more pain and scandal? Why did You eventually send me exactly what I've prayed to You for my whole life, but I'm still not allowed to claim it? 
Jesus, why have I been painted as the bad guy, the quitter and the Unfaithful One? Why did You allow someone I trusted and counseled as they counseled me to destroy my entire life's work at building up a good name and a golden reputation? Why do people hate me? Why do people lie about me? Why is there such seething, burning contempt for me? 
JESUS- WHAT HAVE I DONE TO DESERVE ALL THIS PAIN? Why won't You let it end?Why can't I find rest anywhere? How could You send another who has taught me what love truly is- strong, long-suffering, faithful, honest,kind,patient and forgiving- instill all these amazing Heaven sent qualities that can only come from You , giving him eyes only for me....and we can never be together? Why is it that he can endure nearly everything life has thrown at him and us, but he won't even give the future a chance? What are we fighting for? What am I fighting for? Why am I even here?
Father- I can't do this anymore. You said You would never leave or forsake me and that's exactly how I feel. Like every smiling face I see masks hissing lies and encouraging words are oozed out just to find a way to gain access to my pain  so that they can twist it up and tear me apart later. I don't ask for the finer things in life or the impossible extravagant materials of this world. Daddy, I just want to be loved. I want to finish this race with someone beside me. I want to finally find my purpose and my worth. I wanna stop hating those who hate me and feeling like I'm on the ground being kicked and spat upon. Psalm 119:25: My soul clings to the dust- revive me according to your Word. Remind me who I am. Let me feel You again. Please, bring back my hope. I feel like I have no reason to be here- no purpose in this life other than to make others look and feel better than they should. My existence is to be a rug to have people's feet wiped upon me. I am mocked and scorned- I am a cosmic joke. Renew my faith for when my eyes fail me. Allow me to see what is there but can't be seen.Love me again. Regardless of my mistakes, through all of my sorrow and weakness and failures..please don't ever stop loving me. Please don't let me go.
Father God, In Jesus Name....
just hold me.

My Life in a Snow Globe

     I'm beginning to re-grasp the understanding of Faith, walking by it and just how foolish and absurd those who do so look to the rest of the World. Walking by faith and not by sight (2 Corinthians 5:7) comes as completely stupid and delusional to those who are used to planning, organizing and taking great care to do everything in their proper order. 
     By no means am I knocking this way of thinking. In fact, I pretty much relish it. I have always prided myself in being very orderly and organized, but that's just it- I prided myself. Walking by faith usually comes when God decides to shake up your life a bit, and remind you that He is still Lord, not you- that it is by His Spirit and not your power, your might or your doing that all good things come to you. There are few things more troubling in this life than when things are going great, the blessings are flowing and you ignorantly take it for granted or even worse, you take the credit for it. I was guilty of the first. 
     Life hasn't always been easy for me;who am I kidding? Life has NEVER been easy for me,lol.But I have had moments of ease and days where blessings just never seemed to cease. Maybe I got lazy. Maybe I got entitled. I don't know, but either way, as thankful as I was I expected troubles, in those fleeting happy moments, to stay gone and become foreign to me. I got...complacent.

Definition of COMPLACENT 1 : marked by self-satisfaction especially when accompanied by unawareness of actual dangers or deficiencies.      I began to take my blessings and God's ability to give and take away for granted. I definitely got lazy in my spirit- and then all you-know-what broke loose.The Bible says that the complacency of fools will destroy them (Proverbs 1:32). I'm not saying that everything heartbreaking that has happened to me in the past few years has been all my fault. Far from it; but where I can clearly blame others for the physical and emotional things they have done to cause this, I was the spiritual head of my home and I let my watch fall. So I am just as responsible and that burns in my heart to say it.      But what the Devil meant for evil, God has turned around for good. (Genesis 50:20) I praise God that I serve a Master who sees me screw up constantly and patiently  turns me back around to face the right direction and continues to bless me along that path; that though He hears every agonizing cry and raging rant about my feeling left, deserted and forsaken- He forgives, He teaches and He continues to bless me.       We have not had an income since May 2012. Jobs have been near impossible to find. But God has been faithful. For the first time I've had to choose which bills were of the most important to pay (mortgage,electricity) and which to let lapse (Tv cancelled, life insurance late). But God has been faithful. I have felt more fear about the uncertainty of my future, more regret over my past decisions and more sorrow over my current conditions than I have ever felt. But God has been faithful. When I finally stopped reeling out of control emotionally, got myself together and got to that place where you just have to say "Though He slay me, yet will I trust Him" I wrote that deeply personal and heartfelt prayer from December 29th. The next day, I'm telling you- He began to open financial doors. Items began selling, one after another on my eBay site, distant friends and new acquaintances began giving financial gifts, I was given the opportunity( of which there are no words) to prevent an acquaintance from taking their own life and in return have gained a new friend and they have gained a new found desire for life.       I'm not completely at a place of peace yet, but I'm slowly getting there. Where there was only fear and darkness, and the lies that circled me caused my very existence such agony...now there is the slightest glimmer of hope. I am beginning to see so many things that I have prayed for slowly (not without trials and opposition of course) coming to fruition. Walking by faith doesn't mean you know that everything will go back to normal and be honky dory. In fact, many times things will never be as they were. It's like we have become living snow globes- yes, you can see the picture when the glitter and snow stays on the ground, but that's not why we love snow globes, is it? We love them for the beauty of the chaos of shaking them up, watching the glittery snow whirl around the scene and finally, gently fall back into a new orderly place.       I am learning that we can never grow and and have a testimony if we are continuously looking back with sorrow and regret. We were never meant to stay in one place, but to keep moving forward- no matter what, even if we can't see...we walk.  By faith. Not by sight.

My Prayer

" While Jesus was here on earth, he offered prayers and pleadings, with a loud cry and tears, to the one who could rescue him from death. And God heard his prayers because of his deep reverence for God."
 Hebrews 5:7NLT

Father,
I want to start out by apologizing. I want to humbly ask your forgiveness for every sinful thing I have done/said/thought based on this immense pain in my life. Even if the sin was unintentional or unknown at any time, I still ask your forgiveness. There is never any excuse for unrepentant sinning. I ask that you remove the consuming anger  I have towards those who continue to hurt me and  drag my reputation through the mud. Please restore me from having a heart of stone towards some to a heart of flesh towards all. I realize that this means I will continue to feel the sting of rejection and others' pain at times as they lash out at me in their own suffering. Allow my life to be an example,once again, of your never ending love and patience towards an undeserving world.  Please cleanse my heart and mind and renew a right spirit within me.

Jesus I ask that you please cover my children and all who sleep under my roof at any given point with your protecting hand. Cover them with your wing, as a mother bird shelters her fledglings from the storm. Please let my house, no matter where it may be, be a home and feel as such to all who enter it.

God, I know you have seen my suffering.I never questioned where you were in the past- you were always there with me, just as you are with me now and are already with me in the future. Please take away these unbearable and incessant feelings of fear( of what the future holds and what I cannot control), loneliness, depression, heartache,shock and brokeness. God, please restore my peaceful sleep again. Reverse this horrible insomnia that is eating away at my health and whatever shred of peace I am blessed with in my nightly state of unconsciousness. Grant me strength in my body again and protect me from myself. From eating unhealthily, from thoughts of committing crimes of irreversible damage to the temple you have designated to be my body for the time being.

Jesus I'm suffering so much right now. My soul feels like it is dying everyday. I have never felt the weight of my own tears so strongly as they thud rapidly against my hands and run down to the desk into a cooled puddle. It actually startles me. They flow so freely and from such a sense of agony from somewhere within me, it's like what I'm going through and what I know to be the causes of this pain aren't even scratching the surface; it's as if my tears come from a secret reservoir of despair that even I don't know existed. Then again, maybe they just come from almost 2 decades of trying to be strong and carry on in my own strength. Maybe my soul is just plain...weary.

Jesus, I don't know what has happened to the life that I thought was safe and normal. You do. I don't know how I have gotten here to this point.You do. I don't know where I'll be in the future, who, if any, will be standing by my side supporting and loving me.You do.Please let this be enough for me- to know that You do, and You are already there. Let me never be swayed, or give up living this Christian Life.It is SO hard. I am judged not just by the unsaved, but by those who claim to be Yours- and these judgments cut so much further in me....

I praise you for being God. Against this awkward feeling of trying to give thanks when I can't see a thing to be grateful or happy for, I praise you. I praise you for having my life planned out and and I ask you to open my eyes to see and recognize the angels and guides you send into my life that are there to nudge me in the correct narrow direction.Please be with me in all my decisions,actions and words.Guide me as I try to guide my children. Keep us all safe from harm and please don't let my past mistakes and sins affect,scar or sway my babies from the Way Everlasting.
In Jesus' Name.

Question of the Week

What songs do you listen to to get through a rough day?

Who am I?

One of the things I hate most about this new life is that I feel like I've lost my identity.

It's like, my whole life, I have been in training to be a wife and a mother- and not just a wife and mother- but a good one. The Proverbs 31 woman. It's been a long hard journey. There were days that I didn't feel like doing chores,like most teenagers, and learning new "womanly" skills sometimes seemed so demeaning.  had dreams of being a journalist, travelling the world in pursuit of uncovering truth, or a teacher, molding the minds of future generations. Why on earth would I care how to properly fold a fitted sheet or make a succulent roast chicken?

But then as time went on, what started out as a degrading bothersome chore, quickly changed into a ministry. I didn't just want to learn how to do these things, but I wanted to be the best at them. I wanted to marry a wonderful man one day and have him be the envy of all his friends and coworkers. Where other men were lamenting their wives' entitled ways of thinking when it came to frivolous spending, mine would be able to not just leave me a debit card and checkbook, but trust me enough to put me charge of the finances and bill paying. When he would come home and tell these heart breaking tales of run around wives who slept with more men in town then the number of hours their husbands worked, mine always knew exactly where I was and what I was doing. I was keeping home, teaching and rearing children and making sure to have a hot home cooked meal prepared and waiting for him,still hot but not burned, for whenever he returned for dinner. There would never be anything he would want for. I would put aside my exhaustion to fulfil his intimate needs, serve him and his offspring their meal portions first and make sure theirs were the largest before my own. Clothes were dutifully washed in a homemade soap, kitchen sparkling( not always, but I tried) and that was who I was.



I was Donna Reed.

Now I feel like a nobody. Yes, I still get up and carry on. The house will always need to be kept clean and as much in order as a house can be with 4 children and 3 dogs. Meals are still hot and home cooked and clothes still washed in that homemade laundry soap. But there is a void.

There is a void in me.
 
Who am I?

Am I strong for not putting up with less than I deserved?Am I setting a good example for my daughters, to never feel like you must change who you are and what you believe in for acceptance and love? Have I been reduced to being what people have whispered and accused me of being because they think they know everything about me, but really have no idea???

I know who my mother always taught me to be. I am a King's daughter- so that makes me royalty. I am, she would always say,  the head and not the tail. I am the Christian foundation for my children and the voice for them when no one seems to want to listen to their little cries of concern. 

But there are so many days when it just doesn't even seem fair or real or possible. I don't feel beautiful and strong or royal or the head. I feel lost and scared and defeated and like I've let everyone around me down somehow. I feel like a failure.

It's all I can do to barely remember the verses I grew up on. They seem so far away and faded now. I can remember bits and pieces, but references escape me. I try to hold onto what I know to be true, even when it feels like it doesn't apply to me anymore. He will never leave me, nor forsake me. That I am in the palm of His hand, and no one can snatch me out of it. I looked my name up years ago and it means bitter sorrow. LOVELY. I feel as though I've been set up to fulfil that name's meaning, whether I want to or not. I read a few months ago Ruth 1:20, where after being widowed and left childless, Naomi went back to the land of her people with her daughter-in-law Ruth and the people asked if this was really Naomi. I can only guess what the grief of her circumstances and years from home had done to her facially.

  20 “Don’t call me Naomi,” she told them. “Call me Mara, because the Almighty has made my life very bitter. 21 I went away full, but the Lord has brought me back empty. Why call me Naomi? The Lord has afflicted me; the Almighty has brought misfortune upon me.”

Mara is a form of the name Maria. Naomi's grief and environment had worn who she had been away. Look it up: her name means "Beautiful, pleasant, delightful". Life had turned her from beautiful to bitter.
This is what I'm trying to avoid but it is so hard. Beauty just seems so far away. The Light of the Truth of who I am and was meant to be seems so faded. It feels like I'm wandering around alone in the dark chasing this light, and I just can never get close enough to it. So until I can believe I am somebody, let alone somebody that will find happiness again, I choose to hold blindly to the knowledge that I am God's Child, still.

Embracing the Rage

I think one of the biggest misconceptions we as women ( and those sainted men out there) make when going through the decision that what we put up with is not what the Father intended for His daughters is feeling like we owe the world an explanation and the immensity of the guilt we heap on ourselves for "failing" or "being weak". I also think we do ourselves a horrible injustice when we don't admit to and embrace the amount of rage we feel inside. WE feel like we have to go on bravely, all the time- 24/7 with a stiff upper lip...best foot forward attitude. I got a secret for you.

IT'S OK TO EMBRACE THE RAGE.

 
I've spent my whole life being agreeable, non-confrontational and making light of my feelings,worries and fears. In doing what I thought was forgiving the incessant cycle of lies with the "there,there..I forgive you's" and inevitable letdowns, I did exactly what I swore I never would do: I stopped looking out for me. I have tried to dedicate my life to being the most open-minded,honest, loving,sensitive, caring person you could meet; I've heard countless times that so-and-so has never met anyone like me, that I'm an angel...that I'm different. Newsflash: I'm human on top of all that. I've been hurt and scarred, and now- I'm enraged.

I'm enraged that I was bold faced lied to from Day 1.
I'm enraged that starting a family was such a fight. I'm enraged that I saved and wasted my Innocence on one who never seemed to find the time to tell me that there were already hundreds- if not thousands- of unrealistic fantasy girls occupying my space there.

  I'm enraged- Oh GOD! am I full of hurt and pain and anger!! I am infuriated with myself for feeling that my unpaid- barely recognized- 24 hour work schedule as a housewife, mother,maid,accountant,chef,taxi driver, scheduler, judge, referee, teacher, and woman of God could not hold a candle to the 12hr PAID work schedule that protected our things in my own eyes. To think that I apologized for not being a size 2 nymphomaniac with a flat belly that could be bejeweled with one of those stupid dangly navel thingies---OH! I could just slap myself.
And then, to top it all off...when the nearly 5 year long secret...the secret that I most feared but never expected came out,do you know what I did?
It was February 8,2009. It was 12:08am. I was 500 miles and 5 years away from having the privilege of hunting down that vile home-wrecking,life altering serpent. With all the shock and despair and pain and betrayal coursing through my 5½ months pregnant body, I said," I forgive you because if I don't- God won't forgive me."
I thought I was being pretty admirable and that I would be blessed by God. Some days, a lot of days, I wonder. Nights like tonight. I look back and all I see is that I tried. I tried to be what was desired. I tried to be the perfect everything- quite frankly, that's all I've ever tried to be. As perfect as possible. I'm not.

I rage. I cry. I sin. I give up, then give up giving up in order to try again the next day. But it all fell apart. Nights like tonight I wonder why God has allowed me to see what life would have been like had I married a man that could admit to his faults, but still love me unconditionally; who in genuinely seeking the grace and favor of his Father in Heaven daily would fight and conquer the same struggles with routine success. And for what? A tease? A taste at what actually having the answers to my prayers feels like? Why have the desires of my heart been dangled in front of me and ripped away over and over again? Why aren't I allowed to be happy?

I am raging, with every pound of these poor undeserving keys, I release the pent up hurt and fear and disappointments... the disappointments in my life, (forgive me Father) in God, but mostly in myself. I have nothing to blame God for and I know that. He allows the "sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous."(Matthew 5:45) I probably have been blessed more times when I ought not have been. But I'm flesh as well as soul and I am hurting so badly right now. I'm so tired of being told I'm strong when it feels like every day I'm just minutes away from losing it. I'm tired of having so many open ended options to so many of the most frightening problems in my life- yet there are absolutely no solutions at all in sight.I'm tired of being told what I need to do and where I need to go, but no one can help me achieve these things, not in ways that remove the insecurity and fears of failure. I can't afford to fail. Not with my babies counting on me.
 
I need something to give me HOPE. Finding just that small something to give me a reason to keep hoping, a reason to keep trying....something that says "even though its not right now, your joy,your happiness....your storms end.... it will happen someday". I need to know that my life's verse is Jeremiah 29:11 and that it won't always be Psalms 119:25.

Now it is nearly 3am and I'm exhausted. I've gotten some of the poison out of my heart and at least feel like I can collapse in bed and have some kind of sleep, if not actual rest. I was able to embrace the rage, without sinning. I'd like to say I didn't let the sun go down while I was angry, since at sunset I was technically at least appearing ok. The rage didn't come forth until well after midnight...so I'm letting the moon set on my wrath. I know. That's weak, but did you really expect me to crack jokes at 3am after all that?

I probably should have warned you that my life is an open book and I am very VERY real. You should go read my blog The Heart of Ruth to see what I'm like when I'm on my spiritual game ( so to speak) and not so despairing. It goes back quite a bit- and if you get some restriction window that pops up from social iq, just X out of it. I don't know why it keeps popping up, but that should be a temporary fix. With that, I'm off to try and fall asleep without crying, and pray God gives me a word for someone soon. Since tonight was about allowing yourself to be angry, I'm hoping to get the right words together to allow yourself to smile as well.

Good night.