Rambling Out Loud

On my commute I have a lot of time to think, and one of the things that I've been pondering in my car is a slower pace of life. I think about when people would sit on their porches with lemonade and just talk to each other. I imagine a game of Scrabble or checkers or chess while watching the world go by.  No phones. No social media. No marathoning Netflix.  Just friends, family, and conversation.  I used to think that quietly sitting on the porch would be the most boring waste of an afternoon, but now I'm beginning to think they were on to something. Our life is so fast-paced now. Work, school, social events, sporting events, church, lessons, grocery shopping, cleaning, and the list goes on... I long to just sit in silence and companionship.  Oh, I'm good at sitting still with my phone. Sometimes I will lounge on my bed and glance up to realize I've sat there for two hours flipping through Facebook and Pinterest. How much of my life am I wasting on this dev...

I’m forty and have been wondering all my life where I fit into this world.    Never really a social butterfly, yet not quite an outcast…something of a loner who often still longs for the company of a friend…never popular but not really unpopular either…always looking for my niche but never belonging fully to any group… I am a wallflower.   I am a Hazel.   I am an observer in the world.   (If you got both of those references, I love you.   If not, read “Perks of Being a Wallflower” by Stephen Chbosky and “The Fault in Our Stars” by John Green.   Seriously.   Do it.  I don't care that you are an adult and they are technically written for young adults.) But I don’t want to be an observer… I want to be an extrovert, always the life of the party.   I want to be the artistic soul who creates beautiful art and music and poetry. I want to be the intellectual everyone listens to for their sage wisdom. I want to make a mar...

Recently, God has convicted me that I need to spend much more time in His word.   The challenge is that I am not following someone else’s study. There is nothing wrong with studies led by others, and in the future I have no problem doing them.   But I have been convicted that God wants to speak to our hearts sometimes without being colored by another person’s opinion.   So I am praying and letting Him lead me in understanding. Why Ephesians?   I’m not really sure.   It may stem way back to youth camp.   The focus one summer was Ephesians.   It must have been powerful because I remember it, and there are actually very few things I remember vividly:   ·          Dawson (Noswad) McAllister and the snot jokes ·          Bright yellow t-shirts ·          Some cute guy at Devil’s Bathtub (It was a rock basin type thing...

My heart is broken for this world.   There is so much pain and hunger and fear and injustice.   It’s often difficult for me to find a balance between caring and letting it all overwhelm me.   Maybe that is the reason missionaries and the people they serve have been on my mind so much… I’m not sure how many of you know that I felt called to go into missions when I was thirteen.   Over the next few years, I convinced myself that it was just a “church camp high”.   My logic was that there is no way God would ever call ME.   Psh.   Who am I?   Nothing. I have gone back to this over the years.   Sometimes I feel the pull so strongly it threatens to overwhelm me.   I get so frustrated by the fact that I seem stuck where I am.   I cry out to God, “If you want me to go, then show me the way!!!”   At other times it’s a gentle tug…somewhere in the back of my mind I feel His presence urging me on to something.   The closer ...

Sometimes I don't write for weeks at a time.  Then sometimes I post two in one day.  I'm unpredictible like that. So I was talking to a friend on Facebook the other day.  She said something pretty profound that has been making me think a lot.  I tend to think way too much, so this isn't a newsflash...but anyway... She told me she once read a book by a Catholic author I'm not sure of...but he outlined something that changed my friend's life.  He said to maximize our potential we must feed 4 areas daily: spiritual, physical, intellectual, and relational.  Each area is just as important as the others.  My mind was already overcomplicating things, but my friend stressed the importance of keeping it simple.  She even has a backup plan for those days she's just too tired.  If she planned to read her Bible she has the backup of listening to a devotional podcast.  One day relational may be as simple as an encouraging text.  The point is ...

I had this brilliant idea to start a blog about depression and ADHD.  It's great in theory, but I find it difficult to box myself in that way.  Some days I'm overwhelmed and feel the depression strongly.  Other days I'm frustrated in my scatterbrained ADHD ways.  Yet other days I just feel the need to write something fun and silly...or something about faith.  The point is that I'd have to start several different blogs to keep up with all that...and I can't keep up with that many.  So I'm sticking with one....so be it.  I know I should be more focused, but I'm just not.  So I'm remaining faithful to my rambling out loud blog. I'd think it might be a problem...if I had more than like 5 readers anyway... Love you guys!

http://s2.hubimg.com/u/2119845_f520.jpg I have come to a conclusion.  Sometimes God uses us by throwing us into an ocean of nonbelievers.  But how do we shine effectively?  Be a LIGHTHOUSE... I know you've heard that Jesus is like a lighthouse, but guess what?  If Jesus is in us, we should be as well! For so the Lord has commanded us: "I have set you as a light to the Gentiles, that you should be for salvation to the ends of the earth.’”  Acts 13:47 Does a lighthouse make a lot of noise?  No.  It just shines.  We shouldn't hide our light, but we also shouldn't beat people over the head with our beliefs.  We can be open.  We can express our belief.  We can even disagree with someone...in LOVE.  But then we need to drop it and just live...our light should shine with no words.  When sailors would rather face a tsunami than stop to chat, you may be talking too much. Rather, it should b...

I hate being sick. Do you ever feel that brief moment of panic when a co-worker (or friend or family member) coughs, sniffles, and then blows their nose...loudly?  It's generally followed by the groan and "ohhhh ib thick...".  (Translation:  "ohhhhh I'm sick" in stuffy nose-speak) It's at this moment that my adrenaline takes over. I jump back a few feet, throw my hands up, and say, "I don't wanna get it!  Stay away from me!"   I then proceed to saturate everything they may have ever touched with Lysol, run to wash my hands repeatedly with antibacterial soap, and start popping vitamin C. Not very comforting, I must admit...but did I mention that I HATE being sick?   I'm sure I'm not the ONLY germ-a-phobe here either!  I KNOW some of you are with me.  When I'm sick, you return the favor...so we are even.   And sadly, it doesn't always work.  We still end up catching it, but at least we know we have done...