What are you looking for?

What are you looking for? That was the title of my Lenten reflection for today. It's a wonderful question to ponder and it leads me to think back on my Lenten journey so far and on where I am today.

Before lent began, I had decided on a book called, "Give Up Worry for Lent." I wasn't exactly sure what I was looking for in choosing this devotional. For some reason though, the book was just really calling my name. So I ordered it and waited for lent to begin.

On February 26th lent began with Ash Wednesday. Today I looked back in my journal and my entry for Ash Wednesday says this: "I need to break myself from the things of this world so that I can grow in virtue and grow to love You more, Jesus." (Boy, did I get my opportunity!) I also remember sitting on my bed on that same Ash Wednesday, with my new book in hand, looking at it and thinking proudly (first mistake!), "I'm really going to do well with this!" I vividly remember thinking to myself, "We've been through a lot in the past 18 months. The devil is really going to have to work hard to make me worry. If I've made it through the loss of a baby and not one, but TWO layoffs in 18th months time, then not much can cause me worry now." I'm not lying to you...these are real thoughts I had! I thought we had really been through the trenches and I thought that through it all my faith had been strengthened to an unshakable degree and my tendency to worry had been mostly squashed.

And then....Covid 19. I was suddenly thrown some pretty unexpected ways to break myself from the ways of the world! I found myself unprepared to deal with something so new and blinded to the opportunity I was given. This pandemic was so unexpected. So unpredictable. So unknown. I was shaken and I didn't know how to handle myself in this new situation. I began to worry. A lot.

I've never once doubted that God would bring good from this. I've never once doubted God's existence. I've even taken opportunities to lift my struggles (fear) up to Jesus and have asked Him to unite myself to His cross so that I can grow to love Him more through this. In fact, one thing I've learned through our past losses is that through suffering we can grow closer to Jesus! I have experienced that and I know it to be true! But still, I have found myself recently failing. I have let that fear take hold of me, more often than I care to admit. I have fell victim to the devil and his sneaky ways. I have been pondering lent and the suffering that Jesus went through and I realize that the devil is using this fear to try to keep me away from the love of Christ. I asked for God to help me break myself from the things of this world. I was given a chance to really ponder God's desire for me in this time of quarantine and I nearly missed it! I didn't see this as a way to achieve the desires He had placed on my heart. Now I see it and I will be certain to use the rest of the time at home to continue to pray about this. I've also come to know that my journey with my weaknesses will never truly be over. I must be ready to battle fear with God so that I don't fall into old tendencies.

Today's reflection of "What are you looking for" is one that can help us all right now. What are we all looking for...When we turn on the news? When we read articles on social media? When we discuss the events with our friends? When we turn on a movie to hide from our thoughts? When we eat a cookie because it brings us temporary joy? What are we all looking for?

I can't speak for everyone but today I realized what I am looking for. I am looking for peace. I am looking for someone to say, "this was exaggerated and everything is just fine." I'm looking for comfort and assurance. Reading scripture today and the reflection to follow led me to realize, I'm looking for peace and I'm looking in all the wrong places. I'm looking for something that only God can give. Stay close to His word so that you don't lose sight of that like I did! Praise God for opening my eyes to this truth.

Here I am nearing the end of lent in very much a different place than I was when I started. Most days, I'm fighting more anxiety than I did when I started this devotional. Part of that due to the circumstances, but I'm certain the bulk of that is due to the fact that the closer I try grow to God, the harder the devil is working to take me down. Each day though, I make time for prayer and silence and God always shows up in big ways. He is battling this anxiety with me. I continue to be amazed at His ability to give me peace through the scriptures and through the events going on around me. Whatever I need, when I take it to prayer, God answers me. It's not always the immediate answer to my problem. In fact, rarely do I get an answer like that. I find comfort in the words He speaks to me though. I never understood prayer like this until about a year ago. I've learned God will really talk to me if I give Him the chance to do so! (He might also tell me to do seemingly crazy things like homeschool my kids! Ha! Speaking of, what an unexpected blessing that has been for our family! If you want to hear that story, you'll need to read prior posts.) I know that whatever God asks of me, no matter how difficult or how hard to understand, He is there beside me just waiting for me to ask for His assistance. He wants to console me. He wants to help me! I only have to ask. Only God can give me the peace I desire. I realize I am blessed in this situation and I pray for all of those who are working on the front lines and for those who find themselves unexpectedly battling this disease. I pray everyone will find the peace of Christ through their sufferings.


"As a deer longs for flowing streams, so longs my soul for you, O God." Psalm 42:1

    "Praise the Lord! Praise, O servants of the Lord; praise the name of the Lord. Blessed be the name of the Lord from this time on and forevermore. From the rising of the sun to its setting the name of the Lord is to be praised. The Lord is high above all nations, and His glory above the heavens.
      Who is like the Lord our God who is seated on high, who looks far down on the heavens and the earth? He raises the poor from the dust, and lifts the needy from the ash heap, to make them sit with princes, with the princes of his people. He gives the barren woman a home, making her the joyous mother of children. Praise the Lord!" Psalm 113

Ayla's painting, March 31, 2020

A Child's Takeaway from the SOTU

There is so much in the news this week to have an opinion about. The Impeachment, the State of the Union Address, the Super Bowl Halftime Show, and about 1,000 other topics of division. I've been holding back my thoughts all week, but something happened today that was a bit enlightening for me and I thought I'd share.

Last night, as a family, we sat down to watch the State of the Union Address. Being a homeschooling family, bedtimes are often tossed aside for the sake of learning or bonding. So our "happy to stay up past bedtime" kids watched and their little minds were full of all sorts of questions. We answered all the questions as they came and felt rather accomplished by the end of the evening. Our kids had a great civics lesson.

We didn't discuss people or didn't waste time interjecting our political beliefs. Instead, we taught our kids that those in attendance had differing opinions and that's why not everyone stood together. We taught them that that it's okay to disagree.

We discussed respect and told them that the president was to be referred to as Mr. President Trump. We taught them that the man behind our president was named Mr. Vice President Pence and he ran for office with President Trump. Together they were elected. We taught them that the woman behind the president was named Mrs. Nancy Pelosi and that she is the Speaker of the House. Then we answered all of the questions they had pertaining to those three positions.

As the night unfolded, they watched and listened. We answered all of their questions truthfully and honestly. Again, we did our very best to teach them the facts and leave it at that! I was proud at how attentive they were and encouraged by their interest in our great nation. We put them to bed and woke up today to a new day of education.

Fast forward to our afternoon math lesson. It's very important to me that our children know their basic math facts and we drill them daily. Today, our oldest child improved his time, yet he missed one problem. He was upset about it. Daily, daily we do these math sheets. Nearly everyday he misses one problem. Or he's just a bit slower than he was the day before. Every day he faces a struggle and every day we talk through it and we look at the progress he is making. I help him to focus on the good. But today, I watched him begin to RIP HIS PAPER IN HALF! He began to rip his paper in half, stopping himself before the deed was completely done. I couldn't believe what I was seeing and I thought, "oh, that's just a strange coincidence." I gave him the time he needed to calm down, and then later in the day, very casually, I asked him why he did that. He said, "well because of last night mom!"

wow.

People, our kids are watching and they are learning. Now, whether or not you believe what Mrs. Pelosi did was justified, or whether you believe it wasn't, that isn't the point. My kids watched an important evening last night and what did they take away from it? They saw the division in our country. They saw people using anger against one another. They saw out of control politicians disrespecting one another.

We need to teach our kids how to respect one another and how to work together. Our children are not getting a great example from the leaders of our nation. This was such a wake up call to me. We have a big job as parents in today's world and we face a lot of challenges that parents of past generations didn't face. The biggest issue I think we face is a common lack of respect for others. What do they hear you saying at home about our leaders? What do you call these people when your kids are within ear shot? What we say... It really, really matters. Be an example. Teach your kids respect for our nation's leaders, whether you like them or not. Teach them to accept differences as the opportunities that they are, that differences can lead to growth. Our children are going to change this country and this world.

What kind of change do you want your child to be a part of?

Detachment

I went into prayer today asking God to calm my heart, help me to still my voice, and to remain quiet so that I could hear what he was asking of me today. That's the eloquent way of saying it. What I was really asking him for was permission to shut myself in my home and forget the rest of the world. lol. But what was the resolution in my reflections asking me to do today? It said "Do something to share my faith with others today".  So despite my intense desire to hole up in my home (quite easy to do as a homeschooling family with no job, lol), here I am sharing my faith with all of you.

"Only detachment leads to true joy. There is no room for God in a heart already full of the things of this world. May my faith see the good side of things, seeing all in my life as an opportunity to love you."

As I was concluding my time in prayer this morning, I decided to read back through my prayer journal. I happened on the above sentences that I wrote on March 4th, 2019. Oh, how it spoke to me! With news of Steven's recent layoff, even though my faith hasn't been shaken, I have been in a place of deep frustration and sadness. It's just a bit painful to look back on our past year and wonder what it was for. What was the point of it all? But I'm so thankful for happening upon the words above and for inspiration from the Holy Spirit. It has changed my attitude today!

God has provided another opportunity for detachment from the things of this world. Where we feel broken and detached from our worldly gains, God will mend; Not only will He mend, but He will make us stronger. I do truly believe that and today I can finally say that I'm thankful for that. I know we have struggles but I'm not afraid of them. We all have sufferings! Nobody is immune to struggle...even Jesus (who is God himself!) came to earth to suffer (for us)! Suffering with Jesus makes this whole thing a lot easier. Knowing that God forgives us our worries, doubts, impatience, frustrations, and anger is a comfort too. I'm definitely thankful to be able to give that all to Him and ask for Him to forgive me and to help me do better. Aren't we lucky to serve such a loving and merciful Father?

I do not know the plans that God has for us. However, we are so blessed to know God and to have scripture to refresh our souls! HE is our constant. I ask you to pray for all of those affected by the recent layoffs but most especially for those who don't have God to lean on. I really pray for them and I ask God to keep them hopeful. And as I have done for the past month, pray for the CEO and all of those people who are having to make decisions that affect so many families. What a weight and burden they must feel from all of this. We hope that they will let God guide them in this difficult time.

Pieced Together by God

It was a normal Thursday morning for me until my phone rang. Pushing a shopping cart around the store with our 2 year old and a large, overflowing cart of groceries, I answered the phone. Steven answered with, “I’ve been laid off.” Instantly I remember feeling an overwhelming sense of panic and calm all at the same time. My first instinct was to leave the shopping cart of groceries because we could no longer afford it. Yes, I admit, I panicked just a little bit at first. On the one hand, we were down to a pretty small income now (my piano business and part time job at church), no health insurance, 3 children to feed, and Christmas only 3 weeks away. But on the other hand, I knew Steven wasn’t living to his full potential with this job and that he desired something different. All of the feelings encompassing those two thoughts were a lot to try to sort through. 

All of a sudden our comfy life was halted and we had a decision to make. Actually, we had a lot of decisions to make! However, the first and most important decision we had to make was about our attitudes. Sure, we felt like we could crumple to the ground and lose all hope. Afterall, that seemed the most natural thing to do. It felt like a year of loss to us. We had lost our baby in a miscarriage at 12 weeks just 8 months prior to the lay off. We felt a lot of emptiness, fear, loss, and anger. The lay off only added to those feelings. However, we knew this sense of despair that we felt wasn’t what we wanted to control our lives. So, we made a conscious decision to remain upbeat, lean on our faith, and make the best decisions that we could to help us out of this situation.

Looking back on this experience we can see God’s hands all over everything. Four months before Steven was laid off we began a new spiritual journey at a neighboring church. When we received our new priest assignment at our home parish that summer before his lay off, mass schedules at our church changed and we no longer had a Wednesday evening mass to go to. Attending mass as a family on Wednesday evenings was an important part of our week and we didn’t want it to end due to scheduling conflicts. We decided to go to a church nearby and join them for their Wednesday evening mass. Shortly after we started attending, we noticed these little business card type papers in the pews. I picked one up, read it, and immediately told Steven this was something I wanted to do. The program was called ChristLife and they met weekly on a Sunday evening, provided free childcare, dinner, and a night of spiritual formation. It was exactly what I needed because I felt a gaping hole in my heart after our miscarriage. A hole that I knew only God could fill but I couldn’t seem to get there on my own. Steven agreed and we began the course in August.

Little did we know, this new relationship we were building with God as a result of ChristLife was about to shake up our lives in ways we couldn’t have dreamed about! To explain it simply, it feels a bit like God shook the dice and rolled a new life for us. All of it seemed random, made no sense, and wasn’t what I wanted. Of course, God isn’t a gambling man so each and every move was purposely made in His perfect ways. But let me tell you something friends. If you don’t want your life to change, then don’t pray. Because when you get your prayer life in order and you start to build a relationship with Christ, your life is going to change. That’s exactly what happened to us. Four months after beginning our ChristLife journey, Steven was laid off. Imagine putting together a puzzle. A puzzle is created whole but broken, shipped and delivered to us to be completed. There are so many pieces and they just don’t seem to fit. One by one though, the pieces begin to join together, forming portions of image. For a moment you can visualize what the final picture will look like. But it is incomplete. Unfinished. Nagging at you to keep adding pieces. So, you keep working hard until the puzzle is done. Then, in that moment of completion, you step back and look with joy at the puzzle you just completed. This is much how our lives have felt these past eight months. God made us whole, but He gives us pieces of our puzzle and with His guidance we do our best to put our puzzle together.

Our journey's began at our birth and we are constantly adding more of those puzzle pieces.  God giving us the ChristLife program was a crucial piece of the puzzle. ChristLife was extremely important to this part of our journey and has changed our lives forever. God knew we needed some fine tuning in our relationship with Him and so He opened our hearts to attending this program. There were 3 retreats available to us during this program. Those retreats were so instrumental in forming our hearts and minds to the plan God was about to set before us. One night after attending a retreat, God spoke directly to me. He said, “You should home school your children.” Now, of course, I didn’t know what to think of this new and seemingly crazy idea! However, I felt immediately like MAYBE it was coming from God. I wanted to cry because I didn’t want to do this. But I couldn’t. Not a tear fell. Then, I decided I’d tell Steven. Surely he’d squash this crazy idea. Nope. His response to me? “Yah, maybe you should!” So again, my second attempt to scare myself out of this had failed. You see, my faith wasn’t quite there yet. I wanted to follow God’s plan for us but I never in my wildest dreams thought that this is where it was going and I didn't have a clue what to think of it. Not only that, but I questioned God. It didn’t make sense to me. Why would God be asking me to homeschool? Right now of all times! We didn’t even have a steady income. Surely He was mistaken. As we all know though, God doesn’t make mistakes so I decided maybe I was the one making a mistake.  Maybe this wasn’t from God afterall. I needed proof. A sign. I wasn’t about to jump into this new world without 100% certainty that this was from God.

We gave it time. We gave it prayer. We gave it to our new friends at ChristLife and our family and asked them to pray with us and for us. Time went on and I felt less convicted about it. I really started to doubt that this was from God and I shared those feelings with my friend, Nicole. Her response to me was to persevere. She told me I’d made it through a lot and that I needed to persevere, keep praying and persevere. She said that word “persevere” so many times that I decided I would make it my word to pray with and meditate on. Later that same night she sent me a screenshot of her daughter’s math homework. One of the story problems was titled “Perseverance”. I was still a hard headed, stubborn lady at this point and I shrugged it off as a crazy coincidence. Then I read the problem. The two girls referenced in the problem were Nicole, her name, and Molly, my name. That was not a coincidence. You see, things like this don’t just happen. God has his Hands in everything and again, a piece of our puzzle was connected. He gave her those words to share with me that morning knowing that the point would be driven home later. In that moment, I knew that homeschooling was exactly what God wanted us to do. It still didn’t make any sense to me but I was glad to be doing my best to follow God’s plan for our family.

Time went on and we still had just this one piece of our puzzle figured out. I was going to homeschool our kids, we still had limited income, no insurance, and no real plan. People would ask how things were going and I would feel a bit foolish because our “plan” sounded stupid to me so I didn’t share it.  I knew in my heart we were where we needed to be in our faith journey and so I leaned on that. God was taking the pieces of our puzzle and slowly fitting them all together. I mentioned earlier that we had made a conscious decision to have a good attitude, full of hope and we weren’t going to let despair in. That was something I felt like God took control of by using the people in our lives. We had people bringing us cash at Christmas time, gift cards were sent, people took Steven’s resume and shared it at their places of employment, they sent constant emails about job openings, people brought us food. The support was everywhere. We couldn’t escape it if we tried. As soon as I would start to let despair in, God would send the right person to help us with our immediate need. I am forever grateful to everyone who answered that call that God gave them to help us. They probably didn’t even realize it, but God sent them to us to lift us up when we were down. There isn’t one doubt in my mind that they received Holy Whispers (that’s what I call them) to help the Weiss family and to know that they answered that call for us is the most humbling experience. I pray I will always stay humbled by this experience.

At this point in our journey, Steven had sent out hundreds of job applications but received nothing in return.  After his severance ran out, he decided it was time to get a job anywhere. He would take anything. He interviewed for a part time job at Academy Sports and was offered a job on the spot. It wasn’t a huge income, but it was something and I was happy for him to have something to get up for every day again. It takes a toll for the provider of the family to go through a lay off and I was genuinely worried about him. Not to mention that he had lost the baby in February and then his mom was diagnosed with colon cancer shortly after his job loss. That’s a lot for one guy to handle. I was excited to see him working at the gun bar at Academy doing something he loved to get his mind off of all of the stress. He continued applying for other jobs but nothing was a great fit. In the pit of my stomach, I had this sinking feeling that we were going to be moving. It seemed to be the only reason God would be calling me to homeschool our kids in the midst of such a mess. The thought of moving made me sick. We love our home, our community, our friends, our church. Everything. We felt so at home and I didn’t want to move. I tried not to think about it. I never even told anyone about it. I hated that it might be a reality and I tried to hide from it as best I could.

Finally, we heard about a scholarship program through WSU Tech. We decided to check into it and right away we felt like it was the perfect answer to our problems. The programs were a much better fit for Steven than his Accounting degree, the scholarship would pay 100% tuition, and he would most likely be hired by a local company before completion of the program. Finally, we felt like we had a vision for our future. In May, he started classes for an eight week program at WSU Tech. He enjoyed what he was learning about and I was so excited to see him with a new goal that made him happy. He was working so hard! He would leave the house at 6:30 a.m. for work at Academy. He would go straight from work to evening classes. He usually got home around 10:30 p.m. and would wake up and do the same thing the next day. It was a long, yet quick, 8 weeks. The kids missed their daddy, I missed my husband, he missed all of their summer baseball games, he missed seeing his kids in the morning and helping to tuck them in at night. We were all just getting by but we kept that hope and faith that God was going to take care of us. Afterall, we made a promise to ourselves that we were going to stay optimistic and trust in God. We also knew we weren’t the first to experience this and that there were others in much greater need than us. Knowing that we weren’t alone is what helped us through.  I never once heard Steven complain. He worked so hard for our family and I am so proud of him! Before he completed the courses, he had job offers from two companies. All of a sudden we went from nothing to two incredible offers! Praise the Lord we were so excited to have these offers! We now had our final piece of the puzzle. Well, the final piece of this puzzle. We know God has much more in place for us but the end of this particular journey is about over. Our prayers were answered.

On August 9^th, 2019, Steven begins a new career at Spirit Aerosystems and on September 3^rd the kids and I begin our new journey with homeschooling. So where did homeschooling fit into all of this? Turns out, Steven was offered a second shift job. That means he will go to work at two o’clock in the afternoon and will get home around midnight. That crazy, homeschool idea? Well, it ended up being the perfect piece of our puzzle. If the kids were attending school as they’d done in the past, they would never see their daddy and he would have never seen them. I’m not sure we would have been able to accept the job offer without the security of homeschool. God’s hands? ALL. OVER. THIS. We are now looking back on this past year and we see how the pieces of our puzzle gently fell in place while we were busy living in our life. Our puzzle is complete and we are looking at it with joy, happiness, humility, love and hope.

"...My grace is sufficient for you, for power is made perfect in weakness. So I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may dwell in me. Therefore I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities for the sake of Christ, for whenever i am weak, I am strong." 2 Conrinthians 12:8-10