Shades of Grey

I have learned a lot this year about compassion and circumstance through foster care. On Sunday when we were driving to church the Lord broke my heart for my foster parents mother and the circumstances in her life that have lead her to this place. She has been used and abused and treated like trash her whole life. The Lord convicted my heart about praying for her with an urgency. I mean I have always prayed for her more out of obligation than anything. Because honestly I would love to adopt her children. But the flip side of that is that she would have to fail at getting her children back, and suffer the greatest loss a mother can suffer. As a Christian I should want reconciliation , redemption, and healing for her. I should want her to be justified by Christ and his love and death. I should cheer her on to victory of getting her kids back. So Monday I was reading one of my favorite blogs http://buildingtheblocks.blogspot.com/ and Amy (blog author) told a story about a mother she met at a homeless shelter that had had her children removed and had parental rights terminated by the state. This further impressed the children's mother on my heart. I am so thankful I have a God who truly loves us all right in the midst of our brokenness and teaches us to do the same!
‎"You are a sinner & I am a sinner. I know you are a sinner, you know I am a sinner, but we love each other anyway. When we stop loving each other, the whole thing breaks down." Homer F. Rogers

Update

Ok so here is a quick update. Matt and I still have the little girl and boy that were placed with us in January. We are also currently waiting to hear if we have been chosen to adopt a little girl who is 1 1/2. We have been waiting for 6 weeks and hopefully we will know something in the next two. If we get to adopt this little girl we will continue to foster the children we currently have. We are excited and hopeful about this adoption. Please join us in praying for God's will to be done and that we would be conformed to it.

Ego

Mine is getting dealt with here's how.....As I mentioned before we have recently started attending a different church. This has been hard for a lot of reasons one being vanity. I was someone at Lovers Lane. I was the outreach girl, I helped orchestrate big events that were creative and kind of amazing if I don't say so myself. I was good at this and many people knew this and told me this. First I was flattered, then maybe a little proud, then it turned to pride and even a little bit of self righteousness. I would get frustrated that more people weren't involved then I would think if I don't do this it wont get done ( uhhh not true Lovers Lane has a strong outreach program) then I started to resent it I was tired getting burned out but if I don't do this what will people think and I started doing in for the praise of the people. Yuck huh? Well we left Lovers Lane (not because of this we truly felt our season there was over and I do want to say our time there was amazing and fruitful and the staff and people there are truly amazing and have been an amazing support to us in some difficult times, but leave it to me to get it twisted right?) And I am no one at my new church. I don't mean they have not been welcomed or cared for I have. But on any given Sunday I am probably one of the least knowledgeable Christians at our church. Least experienced in missions and outreach. That is a good place to be in, because it is a place of learning. It is humbling I am learning to focus on God right now and what he is doing instead of what I am doing
I also feel that the Lord has specifically told me to step down from my summer position as Asssitant Director of HEROES camp. This has also been a source of pride in my life because it truly is an amazing camp, and some one who I truly respect in my profession thought enough of me (Josh Schilling) to ask me to help him run it. This is a hard position to leave because it has kinda been my baby the last couple of years and it has been exciting to grow it with the staff. But I truly feel like I am in a season in my life where I am to rest in the Lord and find my identity in Him and not how I perform.

The title of this blog...

When I started this blog I named it shekhinah falling. I first heard the word from a guy who floated in and out of our lifegroup for a very short season and I immediately fell in love with the word and then as I learned about it I fell even more in love with it. It is a word which means glory of the Lord or Spirit of the Lord. The Holy Spirit. The guy grew up penecostal and would talk about shekhinah falling or shekhinah glory in his church and speaking in tongues and people getting healed. And no matter what I think about that I do believe that when the spirit of the Lord comes into a person or a place things shift and the atmosphere changes. The thought of this makes me excited even though I have little or no experience with this. So I decided I was going to go on a Holy Spirit quest but then I was distracted by something shiny and I forgot, this was about a year and a half ago. Let me give you some background I was raised in a pretty conservative liturgical Episcopal church. I learned a lot about God and his character and the church and doctrine during that time. Then I went to college and got plugged into the Wesley Foundation and the Methodist church. Where I have spent roughly the last 10 year learning about Jesus and God and their character. Which brings me to today at Mercy Place. I am learning about the Holy Spirit. I feel like God has brought me here to teach me thing and stretch me in ways that I don't understand. I feel it deep in my gut and heart. Seasons are ending, winds are changing, the atmosphere in my life is shifting. I am being dealt with. It is time for Shekhinah Falling.

The face of Jesus

**Disclaimer- awkward rambling post but thats where I'm at!

Lots has happened recently...we have gotten our second placement a boy almost 4 and a girl almost 2. We have been busy trasitionaing into life as parents again. I asked the Lord to bring me children before Easter and they came the Thursday before! God is so good! The kids are great and this time has definately been an easier adjustment. We have also left our church and have been attending Mercy Place which is very different than Lovers Lane. This has been quit an adjustment. We have felt the call to leave Lovers Lane for quite some time now and have chosen comfort. But two months ago the Lord made it crystal clear that we were to go and we did. It was hard to do, we have been at Lovers Lane for five years and we have some wonderful relationships there. The transition has been uncomfortable because we were so close with Lovers Lane. We have been attending the Sunday service and a small group. It is good, this is a church after the heart of Jesus and I am being challenged in so many ways. But I am out of my comfort zone and still forming relationships and I feel a disconnect from my old friends and from my comfort zone and from God.... I am having a hard time abandoning myself and just worshipping and encountering God because I am too busy watching others and feeling self conscious. All that being said I have watched and experienced som amazing stuff in the last few weeks. This morning we were singing a worship song about seeing the face of God and the face of Jesus and I was praying and and asking to see his face to experince his glory and very quickly almost immediatly like a punch to the gut I saw the face of my foster son, then my foster daughter, then my brother, then the woman that works in my classroom, then Matt, and some of the guys from the shelter and you and you and him and her. And suddenly I didn't feel so disconnected amen....

Rest in You

Well we are back on the open placement list after a two month break. The two months off were spent grieving and processing the experience having then losing the girls. I wish that I could say that I used the time wisely but I mostly shopped and watched TV. This morning I woke up early this morning to spend time with God. I intend to do this many mornings but truly do not most mornings. I listened to some worship music and read and prayed and wrote in my journal. I listened to a Waterdeep song that I have heard many times but never made much of an impact. This morning the words really took root in my heart.

All of my fears and trials Lord All of my doubts All of my shouts All of my fears and trials Lord Rest in You All of my hopes and smiles Lord All of my songs All of my longings All of my hopes and smiles Lord Rest in You You’re loving You’re patient You’re strong and true All goodness All mercy are found in You All of the praises of the Earth Rest in You All of our worries and our shame All of our hiding All of our fighting All of our worries and our shame Rest in You All of our greatest victories Lord All of our passions All that we have Everything we hold back, Oh Lord We rest in You All Praise to the One who loves me All of the nations of the Earth All of our wills All of our idols All of the nations of the EarthThey Rest in You All of the times and seasons Lord All of our griefs All of our All of the times and seasons Lord

Then I read Psalm 27 and the end of it reads
I am still confident of this: I will see the goodness of the LORD in the land of the living.
14 Wait for the LORD; be strong and take heart and wait for the LORD.

Then I rolled over and checked my phone and had a bout 12 missed calls from our caseworker between 10:45 and 11:00 pm and I knew that we had missed a placement. I was so sad and frustrated and angry. But those sweet word of reassurance that He gave me early this morning took the edge off of these feelings. I will wait in the Lord and for the Lord for He is faithful....

Faithful in Prayer

I am doing ok...most days I go along fine. I mean I am trying to be "joyful in hope, and patient in affliction" its the "faithful in prayer" thing that is getting me right now. I mean it is not that I am too angry to talk to God right now. I am not. It's just that when I talk to him I talk to him about the girls and how Panda always climbed in the dishwasher while I was loading it or how Abby could take her socks off with just her feet. Or the thousand other things I remember. Then when I think about those I start crying and I am afraid that I won't be able to stop. I am ready to be at a place where these memories bring joy instead of pain, but that is not where I am right now. So I guess I am asking that you all my amazing cloud of witnesses be faithful in prayer for me until I can be.