Faith

"When you criticize or complain, you are acting as if you think you could run the world better than I do" - Jesus Calling Devotional

A few weeks ago I read this to my youth girls small group because it applied to some things that were going on in my life. Little did I know that 2 weeks later it would fit my life so perfectly. Today I went back through my journal and came across the day I read this and had written it down to remember it. I'm in one of those moments right now where a lot is unseen but that is okay because I know God's hand is in it. I love in 2 Corinthians 5:7 where it says "We live by faith and not by sight." Sometimes we don't know what is coming and what the Lord has in His plan but we're not supposed to. We live by FAITH and we stand on HIS PROMISES and that is all we need. What joy that brings us! Thank you God for the unknown because it requires us to draw near to you and truly live by faith.

Seder Meal/Good Shepherd

Last night at church we had Dr. Jim Fleming who is a well known Biblical archaeologist came to our church to teach us as we took part in the Seder Meal. We ate the traditional Seder Meal and learned about what truly happened during Jesus' Last Supper with his Disciples. I might add that this Traditional meal was DELISH!

I knew this one already but hate it for old Leo but this is false...

Instead, Jesus Last Supper would have looked more like this. Yes, I know those people don't have faces.

So among the cool things I learned....

The man in white is Jesus because in traditional biblical times that spot was reserved for the host and Jesus of course was the host for the evening. To his right was the Beloved Disciple, John because to the right would have been your assistant/right hand man/etc. To the left of Jesus would have been Judas Iscariot. This is the spot of the guest of honor. We learned last night that Judas was the guest of honor for many reasons. At this point, Jesus knew that Judas would betray him. Jesus announced this to his Disciples and then told them that it would be the one who he dipped his bread and gave it to him and proceeded to give the bread to Judas. So why of all people would Judas- the one who would betray him be the guest of honor? Because Jesus is LOVE. Jesus was showing Judas that he forgave him. Last night, Dr. Fleming encouraged each of us to take one thing away from the night. We could have taken away a world of new information. I learned all types of things that I could go on and on about. However, what is the most important message that I believe Jesus would want us to understand on this day is love and grace. This weekend, show someone a little grace and forgiveness. If Jesus showed Judas love knowing good and well what he would do shortly then we can go out and show someone a little of Jesus' love and grace. So if you have been hard on someone or been critical or angry- ask Jesus to help you let go of that and to be able to show that person love because 2000+ years ago today Jesus did just that.

It was a perfect sacrifice by a perfect person to perfect some very imperfect people.

Hebrews 10:14 (Message)

Start over?

Do you ever have one of those days where you wish you could start over? I do... and obviously today is that day. Let me just take a recap of my day-

1- Woke up late and woke up frustrated due to a personal situation. UGH!
2- Rushed to work with wet hair to prepare for a presentation I had to do and in-service I was in charge of planning. 
3- The doctor who was supposed to do the Dr.'s In-Service for staff= NO SHOW
4- The presentation I was supposed to have at 10:00= CANCELED
5- Internet on computer= NOT WORKING. Now this is worse than just no internet- this means no e-mail and I cannot connect to the server which means I couldn't even open any documents.
6- Went home to let my sweet puppy Jacks out for lunch= DIARRHEA IN HIS CRATE

So seriously? Well I was expressing some of my concerns about halfway through this rough day to a co-worker and they just said "Jessica- look for the light." So thats what I'm going to do... look for the light.

1- It is Holy Week and nothing I can face in this day can even come close to what Jesus faced this week 2000+ years ago. Even through this I am so blessed that because of what he did, my poor attitude, selfishness, and my not so pretty spirit right now can be forgiven. Whew- just a reminder of how undeserving I am.
2- A group of some of our closest friends are getting together Friday night to celebrate the birthday of a friend who moved away but will be home for Easter. So truly blessed by the friend's God has given me. I couldn't have asked for anything more.
3- I'm only working for a few hours on Friday and going to hang out with a friend and a precious girl from our Youth Group that I love!

So the light definitely shines over the darkness that has been today. Tonight I will go home to my wonderful husband and my precious (although maybe sick) puppy and just have family time. Love.

The unknown...

The unknown can be so scary for us at times... right now I'm finding the unknown a little freaky. Last night our realtor called us and told us that someone is about to/may already have make an offer on the house of our dreams! That is the house of our dreams that is missing one crucial thing... a garage. However, if we had gotten that house for the right price we would build a garage. Of course, none of that matters because as it is we need to sell our house in order to buy another house and our house just went up on the market yesterday.

So here is the unknown... we have no idea where we may live in the next few months. If our house were to sell tomorrow (yes we know it won't) there are ZERO houses on the market right now that have the things on our wish list in our price range. Are we picky or what? Now you must know- Chris and I don't have the same tastes in houses much so this narrows down our search tremendously.

I've heard all the encouragement- thanks friends and husband for your wonderful words that the right house will come along, God will put us where we're supposed to be. I know all of this and I do truly believe it. However, most people could look up houses for sale right now and at least find one other house they would like to live in in their price range. Zero really? Who are we? So we could get a fixer upper and make it into what we want it to be... but nobody seems to have faith that we're fixer upper types of people. This may be because we're so busy doing other things or it may be because Chris' sister and her husband fixed up a house and did a great job with it and they tend to be more handy/decorative than us. Who knows the reason why but either way- the unknown is scary for me right now. SOMEBODY SELL YOUR HOUSE SO I CAN LIVE THERE!

For Sale...

As of today our house is officially listed FOR SALE! So yes come one come all and please buy it! Not that we know exactly where we will be yet. You see we found this house in Old Cloverdale we LOVE... but you shouldn't be surprised that Chris and I are a little picky. And it is missing 1 thing on the want list!

What we both want:
1- Character
2- Not cookie cutter

What Chris wants :
1- Garage

What Jessica wants:
1- Either a 4th bedroom/or office so that the 3 bedrooms can be bedrooms
2- 2 1/2 baths or 3 baths

Well we live in Montgomery and to find all those things is HARD! So we're house hunting right now. This means my website of choice for now is http://www.alamls.com/. I live there lately I feel like. We know the right house will come and God will place us wherever he wants us to be. So we're in a pickle, we want our house to sell quickly but there may be a chance that when it sells we have nowhere to go! Anybody want to welcome us into their home?

40% Off

Some of you may know this... I am slightly addicted to shopping. Chris figured this out the hard way. Well I used to never look at sales... now in my married stage of life I always look at sales. One of my favorite stores is Ann Taylor Loft. My co-worker deals with this on a daily basis with me. It is so perfect for my life.... professional yet trendy enough for work, dressy enough for a contemporary church, comfortable for travel, and fun enough for social activities. I swear- if I woke up one day and was told it was the only store left in existence, I would be okay. So all week I've been getting e-mails about how everything is 40% off. 2 problems with this...
1- I'm on a two month clothing spending freeze. (sort of- I took one small detour on April 1st and bought an outfit) Other than that I have stuck to my freeze to show my husband how much willpower I have.
2- We might be about to buy a new house... aka I have to show how seriously I can stick to a budget.

Because of this I have been having to ignore those enticing 40% off e-mails. But today, just because it is Friday I thought I would indulge myself by picking out what I would purchase if I could.

Feminine but fun and super comfy. This needs to be my lake top for this summer with white shorts, pants, jeans, everything maybe.

Everything about white and linen makes me smile! With Easter being a week away it is officially time to pull out the whites. This would be perfect for work... feeling a casual Sunday at church. Top it work a pretty blouse, to be more casual just throw on a tee, or even pull over a blazer if it is still chilly one day/night. LOVE

 Oh the many things I love about this. 1- I love skirts. 2- You look and you can't really tell whether its animal print or not. 3- Its not as super long as some pencil skirts for short girls like me. Skirts at work make me smile :)

 So those are the things I love at the Loft right now. None of these will make its way to my closet; however, a girl can dream. For now I'll just go look at my overly full closet and remember how extremely blessed I am.

Blah...

To be honest, I'm just having one of those days. I slept way too much yesterday.. 6:30-9:30 then 10:30 to 6:30- bad idea. I'm paying for it today. I haven't been in a good mood, things getting on my nerves, slightly emotional, ya know all those not so fun things. What I'm trying to say is I'm just not myself. So self- come back. I'm 99% of the time bubbly and excited and glowing and looking forward to what is coming up next. But right now I'm blah and a little sad to go on top of that. So to make myself feel better I'm going to list all of the good things that are going on right now...

1- There are only 2 more hours of work left and the last hour will be spent at a meeting.
2- Tomorrow is Thursday which means Friday is soon after...
3- We go to the lake with some friends this weekend YAY!
4- Chris and I will have been married 6 months on Saturday :-)

See... I have so much to be excited about even in just the next few days! So self come back and be happy about it!