I'm just trying to seal it...........

So this is my most favorite hymn, I actually had to google it to find the exact name, "Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing". I wanted to include all of the lyrics in case you weren't familiar with the song. Maybe it is just me, but these are the most profound words, I just can't get over the depth to this song! It sounds so old timey for this very modern gal, but the words to this song will never grow old. Recently a friend gave me a CD of redone hymns and this was the first song on the CD (how cool is God). Well, the reason I just had to share is because I was driving recently, kind of praying, probably whining just to be totally honest and the Lord spoke so clearly to my heart, He said, "Kelly, I am just trying to seal it". I was caught off guard at first, trying to seal it..........then smiling from ear to ear, I knew what my awesome Father was saying. He was telling me that He was only answering a prayer I have prayed a million times. See, if you scroll down and notice the bolded verses, you will see a portion of this hymn that I have prayed to God over and over these past few years. If there is one heart on this earth that is prone to wander, it is mine. Every time I hear this song I beg God to seal my heart, seal it for thy courts above, so that satan won't get even an inch in my life again. I got so tickled thinking of me praying that prayer so whole heatedly and then complaining constantly when God simply began to do what I had asked. The hard parts of life are often the best glue. How annoying that I pray prayers like these but am appalled at worst or surprised at best as they are answered.

Come, Thou Fount of every blessing,
Tune my heart to sing Thy grace;
Streams of mercy, never ceasing,
Call for songs of loudest praise.
Teach me some melodious sonnet,
Sung by flaming tongues above.
Praise the mount! I’m fixed upon it,
Mount of Thy redeeming love.

Sorrowing I shall be in spirit,
Till released from flesh and sin,
Yet from what I do inherit,
Here Thy praises I’ll begin;
Here I raise my Ebenezer;
Here by Thy great help I’ve come;
And I hope, by Thy good pleasure,
Safely to arrive at home.

Jesus sought me when a stranger,
Wandering from the fold of God;
He, to rescue me from danger,
Interposed His precious blood;
How His kindness yet pursues me
Mortal tongue can never tell,
Clothed in flesh, till death shall loose me
I cannot proclaim it well.

O to grace how great a debtor
Daily I’m constrained to be!
Let Thy goodness, like a fetter,
Bind my wandering heart to Thee.
Prone to wander, Lord, I feel it,
Prone to leave the God I love;
Here’s my heart, O take and seal it,
Seal it for Thy courts above.

O that day when freed from sinning,
I shall see Thy lovely face;
Clothed then in blood washed linen
How I’ll sing Thy sovereign grace;
Come, my Lord, no longer tarry,
Take my ransomed soul away;
Send thine angels now to carry
Me to realms of endless day.

My flesh would ask me nicely to please stop praying this prayer...........but I am going to refuse. Even knowing that this prayer will come with a price, it is certainly a small one to pay considering the alternative.
I can promise you all that "O to grace how great a debtor daily I'm constrained to be"!
I by all means need "thy goodness like a fetter to bind my wondering heart to Thee"
FYI-a fetter is a chain or shackle to the feet :) google again and man even more appropriate!
But most assuredly, "I'm prone to wonder, Lord I feel it, prone to leave the God I love!"
So for goodness gracious, even if I am kicking and screaming.........................
"Here's my heart Lord take and seal it, seal it for thy COURTS ABOVE!"

My new best friend...............

My new best friend is a funny phrase my mother-in-law and I use for people that we either actually meet in person and love or they can also be fun people that we hear or see (but never officially meet) too. For example, if I find a new Bible teacher that I love and I am telling my mother-in-law about her, we might squeal and say “yes, she is my new best friend” or if she were to meet someone at the park who thought the perfect day was a book and a cup of tea, that person too would qualify for new best friend status.

Well, my most recent new best friend has become more than just a fun phrase. She has really become my new best friend. We actually met a few years back, she was volunteering at the Pregnancy Center, awaiting the arrival of her first child, and I was never so thankful for a God-send in all my life. I am a little on the OCD side which makes it difficult to let someone “take the reigns” as a volunteer, but this gal could run circles around me and her figures would always match to boot. She was the most humble servant. She would do whatever I needed her to do. She would rearrange her own schedule just to come to Hope when I needed her most. She showed me Jesus, showed me the qualities of a true servant.

Well, time passed and we joke now that she actually knew I was pregnant with Cross before Jeremy because she was onsite at the Pregnancy Center when I took the pregnancy test and screamed at the top of my lungs, prayed for Jeremy not to have a complete heart attack (for those of you who didn’t know Jeremy was in his first few months of seminary when we found out we were pregnant with Cross) and hit the door a runnin to go share the news.

Time went on, she left Hope and went to mommy land, her husband deployed and then she moved to her own mommy land to have some help and we moved to good ol’ Elizabeth City, North Carolina. I can’t even honestly remember if the boys ever got to meet before we all dispersed, but anyways, as God would have it, I moved back to Clarksville and she followed a few short months later to prepare for her hubby’s return. We hung out one time and have been together ever since. Hunter is the handsome boy in the pictures who is really Cross’ first friend. Hunter calls Cross, “my buddy Toss” which totally melts our hearts and poor Cross still can’t say anything that resembles Hunter but he screams with excitement when Hunter chases him around the house all the same. Emily has been the greatest friend a person could ask for, she has taken Cross (even while he was sick and could have infected her own son)for me to go on vacation. She has given us food, paid for me a babysitter so we could go volunteer at Hope, joined our small group and a mom’s Bible Study. She has been the pop-in friend that I prayed for. She had the greatest back yard on post that money could buy. It included a fence, no steps (kids insist on climbing steps if you aren’t seeing the big deal with this feature) and a shade tree the size of Oklahoma. She really is my new best friend.

But......... as so many of you have already done to me, she too is moving away. If I thought about it too long I could sit in a puddle of tears. I keep hoping that we will get a job and move too so it won’t feel so lonely in Clarksville, Tennessee without the Feicht family around! I have never been so honored to watch such an AMAZING godly family live out life right in front of my very own eyes. She tries never to offend anyone, they are CRAZY givers, she honors her husband like the Proverbs Queen herself. She is cautious not to waste her time and remove her focus from the Kingdom, she nurtures her son, but isn’t afraid to leave him to go serve at the Center. I could literally go on and on about my new best friend!

So Emily, if you read this, even though you are a Facebook trader, I love you like you will never know! I thank my God for bringing you back here and I can only hope that one day our paths again will cross. You and Ben and Hunter have blessed our family more than you will ever know and I am certain a mighty calling is on your life, no doubt about it. Your humility in never wanting such a fuss only makes me more certain! Go take Missouri by a storm. Love some people for Jesus, even if it is only one! I can for sure say the base will be a better place after you have been there! Thank you seems so small a phrase, but know that I mean it all the same!

And for all my other “new best friends” out there who are reading yet God has separated us by miles as well, let’s pray for replacement BFFs (just in person, not in spirit) to help us get through this often crummy life while awaiting our great Savior!!!!!!!

Lost without my gal!
K

Cross napped so I can serve up some pics too!

Ok, these are all random, but I promise I think of you guys often when I grab the camera and think I have GOT to show the bloggers. For instance, this total reality of spaghetti in the stinkin hair. Cross has an obsession with running his hands through his hair while he is eating and I am usually in the kitchen not properly intervening. Also, he is starting to actually "play" with friends a little so I had to include some friend shots. And then of course him with cousin Ad sporiting the Bullock family tradition of St. B baseball! Lord, help us if we don't live here by the time Cross starts little league.
Love you guys!
K

Strength will rise....................

as we wait upon the Lord, we will wait upon the Lord, we will wait upon the Lord. This is quit possibly one of the oddest sentences, yet most true sentences I have ever heard in my whole life. Today as we were rocking it out at Grace, it hit me, I had a light bulb moment about what on earth this song really means and I just couldn't resist sharing it with you guys.

Ok, for a recap.....this past week has been a hard one! I would have been due with Cade on Tuesday, I had the flu, I had some other news that turned me into a faithless crazy woman..........But thankfully, by Thursday and by God's great and amazing grace I had pulled it back together and I was believing God again! Just to let you know how bad it was, one day this week I even chatted with a woman on the phone who was going through a rough time and I was telling her to basically "trust Jesus" and after we got off, I thought to myself, "what a load of crab, I don't even feel that today, why am I asking someone else to". But our God is a gracious God and His mercies are new EVERY MORNING and slowly as the day went on, the truths that I have tucked in my heart finally caught back up with my reality and I was finally "feeling" what I want others so desperately to believe which is the fact that the answer really is always JESUS! I often think of something Beth Moore says, "don't judge how I worship because you don't know what me and my God have been through". Well today, as I drove home from the store alone in my car with David Crowder's song "Remedy" playing as loud as my ears could bare, I thought to myself, "don't judge how I worship because you don't know what me and my God have been through THIS WEEK". He has rocked my world enough this week alone to make me dance all over Clarksville, Tennessee and repeat David's (Jesse's son and Crowder) phrase, IT IS CERTAINLY GOING TO GET MORE UNDIGNIFIED THAN THIS!

This week I have been at the lowest of lows, those moments where you are so mad at God that you can hardly even breath. So wanting a drink or a cookie or a pill that you feel like you will physically explode. And then other moments I have been on top of the world. I have seen one of the sweetest girls on earth fall madly in love with her Savior and His Word this week and realize that He really IS the comfort for those in need. I received $1,000 in the mail when I had no idea how I was going to buy gas. I have seen my man live out this Jesus thing without one ounce of an intent to wavier. We had an amazing day on the lake with our small group and to top it off, J and I even get a hot date night for Father's Day that we can actually afford to take.

I am so thankful that I didn't cave in the other night, that God gave me the grace to cling to Him and find a way out of the temptation to sin in my pain. I am so thankful today that strength is rising as I wait upon the Lord. You see, the song doesn't go "strength will rise as we get what we want from the Lord, what we want from the Lord, what we want from the Lord". NOPE..........it doesn't say that for a reason and that reason is because it is most certainly not true. Today NOTHING has really changed but my heart really is getting stronger, trusting, KNOWING that my God is going to move in our life, that He can be trusted and believed and that He most certainly DOES have a plan, hope, and a future for my family!

So how bout you? Is God building your strength by the hot iron (not to be confused with the glorious flat iron) of the wait? I know how you feel, TRUST ME. And I so wish it weren't the case, TRUST ME. But at the end of the day, I really do believe that our strength does increase through at least the fruit on the other side of the wait if not just by the wait itself. I have waited on the Lord before and I will wait on Him again but I certainly hope at least after this season I have the biceps to prove it!

Love you guys to death!!!
K

Misc........

Hey guys! I have heard so many things recently either through books or through songs or sermons that I just had to share them with you guys! There is no way I can reference all of them because, well because I have a one year old just to be totally honest! The brain seems to have a very few cells left!

Jesus taught us how to die!

Tis so sweet to trust in Jesus
Just to take Him at His Word
Just to learn to love and trust Him,
Just to know, thus saith the Lord!!!!!!!!!!

I want to be a Christian who happens to be a stay at home mom instead of a stay at home mom who happens to be a Christian!

Jesus the name:
that shuns our fears
that bids our sorrow cease

There are so few words, that never grow old, there are so few words that never grow old…….Jesus, Jesus, Jesus!!!!!!!!!!!!

Jeremy pointed out a mistake I made in a recent blog saying that “Sunset Sushi” by David Crowder was my favorite CD, but it is actually “Remedy” by David Crowder! I just put it in the CD player……….again, few brain cells!

The anointing causes a woman with children to become a developer of Christian soldiers.

When you really get it, when you really know who Jesus is, you are content wherever you are!

We need to live lives that demand an explanation!

2 Peter 1:5-8
Make every effort to add to your faith goodness, and to goodness, knowledge, and to knowledge, self-control; and to self-control, perseverance; and to perseverance, godliness; and to godliness, brotherly kindness; and to brotherly kindness love. For if you possess these qualities in increasing measure, they will keep you from being ineffective and unproductive in your knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ!

What do you need in order to be happy? A message by Francis Chan AWESOME SERMON! Here are a few lines:
God created man in His own image and now man is doing Him the same favor.  We want God to be okay with what we want Him to be okay with instead of reading the Bible! The church has made Jesus a middle class man!  Stop tweaking the Bible and tweak yourself!

Hey Everyone!!!!!!

WEW!!!!!!! I can't tell you how much my shoulders begin to relax when I get to spend some time "blog vegging". That is what I call it, some people veg in front of the TV, I like to veg in front of the computer, scanning down my glorious favorites, reading blogs, and then getting to end by saying hello to you guys! I am at my in-laws, what a blessing having pop-in friends that are your in-laws. My sweet hubby told me to hit the road knowing that this mommy needed a break. I literally can't tell you guys all that I have been through these past few days! Nothing major, all inner stuff, but I really can feel the shoulders finally starting to unwind already! Basically after I blogged last week and said that I was just chilling in the wait, satan either gave me a run for my money or the Lord wanted to make sure I practiced what I preached, but I have had some high highs and some low lows these past few days! I couldn't even begin to share them all, but a lot of stressing over WHEN J is going to get a job and WHEN God is going to take me personally off of this shelf and WHEN we are going to be able to put down some roots........you get the picture! I thought I would share some things God has used to speak to me to encourage this weary pilgrim on her journey towards Heaven! I can't wait to get there! A sweet friend of mine said that today in Bible Study, she said, "maybe the reason I always feel like their should be "more" is because I am wanting Heaven". I think we could all shout an "amen" to that, regardless of our church style! I love you guys! I thank you for reading! I wish that we could go on to Heaven tomorrow, but IF the Lord tarries we will take all that we can get from His Holy Spirit to hold us over! You guys enjoy below and keep me posted on you!

Because of Him-
K
*and yes, I promise, pictures are to come! It is hard to get all that you need to do on the internet for an entire week in one short hour so soon..........very soon!

*I am reading an awesome book by Joyce Meyer "Knowing God Intimately". It is an older book, but I PROMISE not one word is outdated! She poses two questions that cut me like a knife, it was almost as if she had put into words some things that I have pondered this past year. One of my dearest friends who loves the Lord just about as much as any one person could called me and said "I am sending you this book, it is changing my life" and I thought, well, anything that is changing your life, by all means, let it change mine! She was right! It is for sure an underline book! Here are the two questions she states (and I am certainly paraphrasing):
1. I had been in church for years and I just kept feeling like something was missing!
2. Why are some Christians victorious and some aren't?

Ok, I could write for hours on just the one chapter I read, but I'll refrain and just include a few more quotes:

"We spend time and money, we make careful plans and elaborate provisions to feed ourselves each day. Sometimes we even know today where and what we're going to be eating tomorrow! Just as our physical body must be fed, our spirit man must also be fed." Joyce

"Dang was that convicting!" Kelly

"I believe that the only thing that truly satisfies the longing within us is to know God more intimately today than we did yesterday." Joyce

"Why can't I get that through my thing skull?" Kelly

"Ok, no need to rewrite the whole book, just go get it!" Kelly :)

*The other thing that God really used to smack me over the head this week in the way that only He can do (the truth really does set you free) was in my Bible Study "Anointed Transformed Redeemed". Priscilla Shirer wrote on how we should never get so busy with the program that we forget about the people. She said, "His goal is that through your full obedience to His call specific people in your generations will be blessed and encouraged to follow Him more fully." I knew God was saying to me, "Kelly, today you are supposed to encourage your generation in Clarksville, Tennessee and that for now is all you need to know." Alrighty then, can't really argue with that! People, please pray for me to stay focused on you instead of my hopes and dreams of a cute house and baby girl sometime in the future!

Ok, must get off now, I could write to you for hours!!!!!!!!

ok, a few short random tidbits to at least say hello

1. Miss you guys like crazy, mad about the lack of interent, but worse things could have to be cut from the budget so trying not to complain!

2. Jon and Kate.............PRAY sweet friends, every time you hear a rumor or check out at the grocery store spend every second of that praying for our sweet brother and sister in Christ who are dealing with life on this stinky earth! Come Jesus Come!!!!!!!!!

3. J's job search............pray...........that is all I will say for now......pray lots!

4. A summer Bible Study! I just couldn't stand the thought of one gal out there who wasn't going to fill her sweet soul this summer with the Word so I wanted to get you a link to a Bible Study Beth Moore is doing online this summer! Come on all you savvy people and put this internet to good use!

http://livingproofministries.blogspot.com/2009/05/whats-up-for-summertime-study-siestas.html

5. Cross is the cutest darn thing you have ever seen in your life and he is finally talking more! Going for 18 month check-up today so I'll hopefully send some pics sooner than later!

6. When you can't control something you wished you could, control what you can and serve like mad where you are today! That is my "country" version of the serenity prayer! I am doing the laundry, cooking dinner, and volunteering at the Pregnancy Center in this wait and I am loving life, for real, not just saying that!!!!!!!

7. Today I started a Bible Study at a friend's church and Beth Moore opened her mouth and I started crying! She really almost yelled, "If you are obedient to God, you will be blessed!" I felt as if HE were screaming that to me and that finally someone knew what my heart needed to hear, that God, he is just SO smart and right on time!

8. My Dad, last, but certainly not least, please continue to pray for my Dad! He has an infection, but the doctors seem to think they have it under control! God has done miracle after miracle in this situation! Thank you so much for being our awesome prayer warriors!


Ok, Cross is up so I am off!
K