wait

You know last New Year I didn't make any "real" resolutions. I'm not against them by any means, but there was just so much yucky stuff my heart was dealing with and many struggles I was overcoming that adding anything to my list of things I wanted to accomplish or be better at would've made me feel less than and at the time wasn't strong enough to deal with what I would've viewed as more failure. 
I shared how that I had been burdened by the bricks that once laid across my chest which left me heavy laden for far too long. I thought by letting God lift those bricks from me I was abandoning all. My past. My failures. My insecurities. But realized I was so so wrong. Though I had felt lighter from the load being lifted I held onto those bricks and one by one stacked them up to build a wall. That wall was built up by lies I had been feeding myself. I prayed for God to transform my heart in 2012 and He truly did. 
I chose an "anchor" word for the year and that word for 2012 was TRUTH.

I wanted to be grounded in Truth. 

God's truth. 

To not let words tangled in lies steal my joy or get me down. 

I wanted to fill my heart. home. blog. with these truths. 

God's Truth's truly set me free last year and can look back and see a work he started that He is still continuing to complete. 

I had been praying for a new word. An anchor word for 2013.

Something I could cling to and make my focus this year.

I had been searching scriptures and toying with so many words that I thought were what I needed to grow and gleam from, but nothing seemed quite right.

I will be completely honest. As we rang in the New Year my heart sank a little because I didn't feel I was quite prepared for what is to come. 

Especially without a particular scripture or word to wave as my banner. 

I may have even started to stress about it...just a little. 

Then last night when I sat down to try and force a word to come through prayer and the bible's concordance, God basically was holding a megaphone to my ear and was yelling at me, "I already gave you a word to focus on you just didn't like it!"

Now here I was forcing something instead of just accepting the one I was given.

See there are a lot of big changes happening this year for our family, one being Micah is starting his Masters Program and will be very VERY busy this year. There are quite a few big trips and traveling plans we have made and lots of different possible opportunities for us and so I have started to become anxious.

Anxious of the unknown. Of what's going to happen. What is our new family schedule going to look like with Micah working and going to school full time? 

There have been so many question marks + so many things I have been trying to plan and work out on my own even when I know God has been asking me to wait.

And of course foolish me, I even tried to force a word to cling to instead of just wait on Him.

Even this past month I was so stressed about a particular thing and tried to get a handle on it myself but you know what, with time, God worked it all out for me. I felt so silly for not waiting on the Lord. For not trusting fully on Him to help me out with what I was dealing with. 

I mean come on now, He's got my back and always has, why did I try and push for something so hard instead of just wait on Him. 

I know He was using that to prepare me for what's to come. To show me that I need to wait on Him because in doing so I am truly trusting in Him. 

One very important command addressed in the Bible is the call to “wait on the Lord.” Even though God promises special blessings for waiting, waiting is one of the most difficult commands of Scripture. Why is it so hard? Because, we are so prone to take matters into our own hands, to design our own lives. Yet, over and over again we are told in Scripture to “wait on the Lord.”
So this year, even with all the uncertainty in my heart or the fear of the unknown I know that I must wait on my Lord.

This year the word wait will not be only my anchor word but my challenge word. To fully practice Waiting and Trusting in Him. Not just to cling to this word in times of need but to use it when my wretched heart and weak flesh need some work, this command to Wait on Him is what I will be praying for today and the rest of my life. 

oh and P to the S, I am still not over these photos from our family shoot last month which is why I have been saturating the blog with them. I promise I will lay off soon...maybe;)