Forgive my inability to embed a video properly...good thing there's nothing to watch on the video!

"Soaking" is not a concept I'm super familiar with, but I know that if I want to find some really good meditative music that brings me near to God then I can count on soaking room music. I hope you enjoyed the video, and hope that it encouraged you.

I think that it is vital to remind ourselves of how God views us. Too many people in our lives are disappointed in us, frustrated with us, or just take advantage of us. God, however, made us in His image, so His view of us is much different. Yet, I see one slight problem with living a life that is solely focused on how God views me. If all I ever think about is how much God loves me, then I lose sight of how much he loves those around me. God is not surrounding me with love, patience, and mercy just for my sake. He's teaching me, through His actions toward me, how to do the same to others. Who better to learn from how to treat people than the one who treats me better than anyone I know? Just a thought.

A few thoughts

I have not had any big thoughts lately, just a lot of getting things done...and yet having moments and days of total immobility! Here are a few things I've been thinking about lately.

I got sick last week; really, really sick. It was the meaner, uglier version of the stomach virus I got a few weeks earlier. Besides making me want to curl up in a ball and die, it made me think about a lot of things. The first thing it brought to my attention was how much I need my husband. Those of you who know me might be gasping right now, because I generally give the impression that I don't need anyone. Although I think giving the impression of total independence is not healthy (mainly because it's not true), I've come to realize that I do it quite often! I've always tried to put myself in a position where I could take care of myself with no one's help should it come down to it. I'm sure I've missed out on a lot of depth in relationships because of this, but I guess acknowledging that it's a problem is the first step to fixing it. I'll be sure to work on that on my own, not asking anyone for help. :) Anyway, Tuesday night as I lay writhing in pain and crying like a baby I thought, "Man, I really need Matt right now!" Let me explain; he was out of town the entire week. Fantastic week for him to be gone, right? I'm kind of thinking that was part of God's point...putting me in a position where I really needed God's love and mercy shown through my husband when he wasn't there. It made me realize how much I needed it.

Another thing this horrific virus made me aware of is that there are many aspects to thankfulness. By Saturday the first round of prescriptions had not helped, and the Immodium had not helped. The doctor was finally willing to give me something else, so I got a new prescription on Saturday. With that prescription came the command, "Thou shalt not consume dairy for two days". No dairy for two days! I love food, and love all things dairy. Being lactose intolerant fro two days was absolutely horrible. I barely made it two days...talk about lack of self control! I know people who are lactose intolerant for good, and I have much more respect for them now. I was totally willing to get incredibly sick just to eat cheese or ice cream...how ridiculous is that? Okay, back to the point. I think of myself as very thankful for the food God has blessed our family with. We always have much more than enough, and can always make something tasty and delicious from the things in our pantry and fridge. Not everyone has that luxury, and I thank God often for it. However, I don't very often thank God that I have intestines and kidneys that generally function on a healthy level. Not everyone has that luxury either, and it affects them at least three times a day when meal time comes around. I need to be thankful for all the aspects of the eating experience that God has blessed me with, and visiting the bathroom every fifteen minutes for almost a week made that a little more clear.

Legend of the Guardians

Last night Matt and I watched "Legend of the Guardians: The Owls of Ga'Hoole". It was beautiful, it was mystical, it was magical, it was good versus evil, and it was Australian! As the owls began to speak in the movie I said to Matt, "They sound Australian". The next animal they ran into was a Tasmanian Devil! The movie takes place in Tasmania, who knew! I've really wanted to see this movie for a while, but I was even more excited when I found out where they were.

I absolutely loved this movie, and encourage you to watch it. There were so many fantastic parts in the movie, but one quote in particular stuck out to me. There is an old owl talking to the young, lead owl about being a hero (in a sense). He says, "This is what it looks like when you've actually fought in battle; it's not glorious or beautiful, or even heroic. It's merely doing what's right, and doing it again and again". He's talking about the good owls fighting against the bad owls, but in the grander scheme he's talking about the fight between what's good and what's evil. In one sense, this could not be truer. Fighting against injustice for the cause of good in this world is not glamorous, it's a dirty and never ending job. You're often not thanked, and you often feel like you're working in vain. Satan is tricky, and is quite good at making things seem hopeless at times. However, I do believe that good will always triumph over evil (when it's all said and done). The journey to get there might not be glittering with all things wonderful, but the the end result will be awesome.

However, I see another aspect to this whole "fighting in battle" thing. I firmly believe that God has exceptional, exciting, fantastic things in store for every single person who seeks them. The problem is, our world has disillusioned us to what is in fact exceptional, exciting, and fantastic. We think life is boring unless we've made it onto a reality television show. Don't believe me? Then why do you watch them? Something or someone has led us to believe that the people on those shows have something spectacular happening in their lives because they're on television. I hate to break it to you, but that's just not the case. Now I won't deny that I think the fact that I'm moving to Australia is a pretty stinking cool adventure. Although we're making a lot of sacrifices and this journey is going to be heart breaking and horrible at times, I can honestly say that I think this is an exceptional call that God has given my husband and me. However, I look around and see how other people are doing exceptional things all the time and might not realize it. Take, for example, my husband. On Saturday we took our dog to the dog park, only for him to be called out to a grass fire a few moments after. Since I was with him, we drove to the fire together. I sat in the car for about thirty minutes while he helped put out a fire that had taken over a portion of land very near to someone's house. From the outside his job did not look spectacular, he was pointing water at the ground to put out a fire and spent time talking with the owner of the land who was trying to dump buckets of water on the ground to put the fire out. However, the job my husband and his fellow firefighters did was exceptional. It was dirty, hot, and slow, but it kept a man's house from burning down. Had they not come, the fire could have spread to other houses and destroyed other people's lives. I don't tell my husband enough, but his job as a volunteer firefighter is exceptional. Or how about this? I know a girl who was convicted that young adults in Africa deserved a decent education. She and her friends carried change cans around and collected money for months, until they had enough to send at least one young adult to school. That might not seem like much in the grand scheme of things, but they changed a person's life in another country that they've never met. That is exceptional.

I think sometimes people give up on trying to do the right thing because they just can't see it making a difference. I would like to encourage you to do what's right, do it again and again, and trust that what you're doing is exceptional.

Flooding in Australia

Many individuals have asked us about the floodwaters that are overtaking areas of Australia at this time. Matt's family lives in Brisbane, and we have friends in Ipswich and Toowoomba. So far, the individuals we know are safe. However, to date ten people have lost their lives due to the flooding, and many more have had to evacuate their homes. A third of Ipswich, the city we'll be moving to, is expected to be under water by today. We encourage you to visit the link below to learn more about the flooding in Australia. Please keep the people there in your prayers as you learn more.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/

A Day Without Work

Today I am working through the second day of "not working" as some people are calling it. I don't know if I would call it "not working" so much as "changing jobs". As some might know, I quit working with the state of Texas so that I can do some of the things that we've had a hard time doing both working full time jobs. Although I had much better health insurance costs, I did not have better pay, so Matt won the "stay at your job" game. I am now working 16-20 hours a week at the martial arts school I attend, and the rest of my time is spent working on that ever growing, probably never ending list that I've started. Here's a run down of my first day away from the state, which was yesterday.

I woke up at 7am (my goal for wake up time)...then really got out of bed at 7:30am. Okay, not too bad a time to wake up given that I could have probably slept until about noon. I then took Bane for his routine morning walk. My step mom has this uncanny way of spoiling our dog. A few years ago when she came to visit she took Bane for a walk every morning. After she left he expected it, so that led to our daily walks to the mailbox. We have a community mailbox; I'm not so lame that I just walk him down to the end of the driveway! Anyway, when she came this time she took him for these incredibly long walks above and beyond the old distance! Needless to say, Bane and I could both use it. Therefore, I'm now walking him a little further than I was.

After the walk I got ready as if it was a normal work day. I cleaned up, changed, and put on make-up. I figure I could get in the habit of staying in my pajamas all day, but that would probably lead to some bad habits. After getting ready, I had some quiet time before starting the rest of the day. After that, I started the to do list on the iPod. So far it consists of:

finish visa application

get Bane ready

call possible financial partners for an update

change our bank

iron a stack of clothes the size of Rhode Island

clean out our family filing cabinet

put up Christmas decorations

do my scrap book

get overseas bank accounts sorted out (not Swiss, don't worry)

rake up the leaves and clean out the flower bed

clean out the front closet

Besides the things on this list, I've tried to make a commitment to keeping the kitchen clean, keeping up with the clothes washing, etc. It's amazing how far you get behind in life when you and your spouse both work full time jobs, and you don't have older kids to enslave to house chores.

Okay, so after making the list I got my visa application and Matt's citizenship stuff in order. Matt received his citizenship last year, but we just kind of threw papers together when they all came in instead of organizing them. I got all that and my application better organized so that I can finish my application before the end of the month. Sometime during the course of the day I cooked a few small meals for Matt and me (we eat five meals a day on our eating plan). I also cleaned up a few emails and folded a little laundry.

After that I got ready to go to my other job (see, I'm not sitting around eating bon bons). I taught classes and helped out around the martial arts school from 3-8pm, then ran to the grocery store to pick up a few things. I don't know what happened from there, but between getting groceries, putting them up, enjoying a little ice cream snack (don't tell anyone), and taking a shower, I didn't get into bed until after 11pm! It's not exactly my plan to be up late every night, because I tend to get rather grumpy late at night. I'll have to work on that.

I have a few kinks to work out on the daily schedule. One is multi-tasking. I hate to brag, but at my state job I was awesome at doing seventeen things at once. I might have been working on what I needed to be doing, but then I'd be asked by many people to do random things at any given time. I think I'm still in that mode, and I need to focus on one thing at a time. I'm sure there will be many more changes to the new work plan as I go, and I look forward to figuring out the best way to spend my time. I also look forward to continuing to enjoy sleeping until at least 7am every morning. :)

Fine Line

Have you ever heard someone say, "There's a fine line between this and that"? I've definitely had a hard time staying on the good side of the fine line between a few things lately. Let's look at fine line #1: standing up against injustice versus judgment and anger. Here's what happens with me...I like to think of myself as an honest person who tries to do the right thing and help others. I will generally go out of my way to do something that will help someone else. What I easily forget is that I live in a world where a lot of people don't care much for God or their fellow man. Therefore, when I try to do the right thing and I'm only judged, unappreciated, or looked down upon it really ticks me off! It seems like Jesus might have talked about that at one point....
Anyway, I feel like I've been attacked, lied to, and generally mistreated at work the past few weeks. Most people would immediately say, "Now Tish, you have to forgive!" Well, this is not really a matter of forgiveness. You see, I think I have forgiven them. I don't feel hatred against any of these people. I've just realized that I can't trust what they say anymore, or that they won't have any respect for me no matter how well I prove my abilities. Maybe I'm wrong, but I see a big difference between those attitudes.
So, what am I supposed to do? Am I supposed to stand up and say, "I'm sorry, but perhaps no one ever told you that you're supposed to treat people with dignity and respect", or is that judgment? After all, I don't know the reasoning behind why people have treated me so poorly. To be honest, I don't think I would ever get the chance to learn why even if I wanted to.
I find myself stuck on the fine line between something Jesus stands for (standing up against the mistreatment of people), and something he stands against (judging others). I am reminded of something Jesus said when he walked on the earth, "I am sending you out like sheep surrounded by wolves, so be wise as serpents and innocent as doves". Jesus was saying this to the people he was sending out to tell others about him! He knew that his followers were going to come into contact with people who did not care much about who He was or those sharing His story. So what did he tell them? Essentially, he told them to watch their backs but treat everyone with love and compassion. I'll try to stay on the Jesus side of this fine line that I find myself facing, and will continue to watch my back but will try to love everyone around me regardless of how they treat me.

November Update

I can't really think of anything better by which to title this post, since an update is exactly what it will be. No bells or whistles, just a way to catch you up on the life that I can barely seem to catch up with myself.

On October 31 we had our FSFA fund raiser. If you know us at all I'm sure you knew about the fund raiser, we plastered info about it on every form of electronic media we could find! We had a good turn out, raising $6,140. Granted, it was not the $80,000 we were shooting for, but we knew that was a very high expectation! We are grateful to those who helped us out, and were very surprised by some very large gifts from some unexpected people. God always uses the extraordinary to bless us. If you would like to be counted in the FSFA tally, it's not too late! Let us know you're interested in giving, and we'll be more than happy to help you do that!

If I can remember correctly, we were supposed to paint the exterior of our house the first weekend of November. However, it rained cats and dogs in Abilene so that plan was debunked. However, I still put Matt to work and we painted quite a bit of the interior of our house. Bane helped too, rubbing paint into the walls and catching drips of white paint on his back before they could hit the floor! To be honest we might not have even painted that weekend...but who's really keeping track?!? We painted sometime, so it might as well have been then.

The next weekend we traveled down to Halletsville to visit the land that my dad and stepmom own. We worked on the land, and got to hang out with my middle nephew Andrew. I am always amazed at how God is very real in his life. It's really exciting to have conversations about God with him! On that Sunday we traveled to Bastrop to enjoy about an hour of my oldest nephew's eighth birthday party. We got to watch him play with his friends, and enjoyed seeing my youngest nephew for a little while. My sister and brother in law gave us a lot of stuff to sell in our next garage sale, which was a total blessing. My sister also loaded us down with queso and chips for the road. Queso and chips in the car...not the cleanest snack!

This past weekend Matt and I planned to replace the facia on the front of our house so that we could start to paint the exterior (start counting how many times I've mentioned painting the exterior of the house). For those of you who, like me until this weekend, don't know what facia is, it's the wood that hangs down vertically from the roof of the house. It's kind of an accent piece. Anyway, we pulled off the facia, and low and behold, half the succotash behind it came off. It's not really called succotash, but it does begin with an s and I can't ever remember the name! Anyway, that meant a second trip to Lowe's and more time pulling down bad wood and trying to replace it with good wood. Matt said we were doing Jesus work (carpentry). I'm glad Jesus loves me no matter how bad I mess things up, because I am no carpenter! By Sunday night we'd gotten about half done of what we needed to on the wood, and had not painted. Maybe next time. Today an awesome guy from our house church came and spent a good bit of the day with Matt helping him finish up the job. Travis, I owe you one!

A lot more has happened in the past few weeks, but I'll save that for another time. For now, I just wanted to let you know why I've been off the radar.