Robin Thicke has a song out called Blurred Lines and it's so catchy, the tune just makes you want to dance. When you hear it you're automatically sucked into it. So then after you listen to it a few times and actually pay attention to the lyrics some how the catchy tune just doesn't seem to matter. I've heard the song hundreds of times, I do after all live in a house full of young adults and their music fills my home quite often. I'm guilty of dancing and singing along to this song. I even said out loud "this song is just so wrong, but the tune is so catchy." Now however, it just makes me angry.

These "blurred lines" Robin sings about are about whether or not a woman wants sex or not. IMO, these are not lines that are blurred. Anything other than a "YES", means "NO". What's blurry about that? As the mother of a daughter who has been raped, I don't find this as a topic to be taken lightly. Pairing up these so-called "blurred lines" with a catchy tune doesn't make it any more okay.

I'm sure I'm not the popular opinion, as I'm sure his sales indicates, however, I've decided today, this is not a song allowed in my home anymore. Sorry kids!

Wanna make God laugh? Make plans!!

I myself have never been a planner, even if I do make plans, I'm always up for a change in plans if something better comes along. I've always been a big picture person, you know, as long as in the end it all works out, who cares how we got there. I'm sure my lackadaisical way of thinking drives all you planners just insane! I know this because most often I tend to have that reaction to you planners when things don't go "as planned" and you all freak out about it. LOL

Sometimes though, life throws you curve balls, things that you cannot plan or plan for. That's where I feel I have an advantage over all you planners. I can live life from minute to minute, from day to day, from month to month and just go with the flow and see what happens.

Cancer. Cancer is something you cannot plan or plan for. When someone you love gets cancer you have to live each day as it comes and go with the flow of what each day brings. There is no expiration date stamped on a tumor that will tell you the day that it will end. There is no guide book that will tell you the patient will feel crappy this day, and great on this day. You can plan till your little heart is content but in the end it will only bring you frustration because cancer is not a planner. Cancer is a big picture kind of thing, it has an end in mind and just does it's thing until it gets there.

My heart breaks for those that need to be in control, that need to plan, that need to know. There is no knowing, or planning and no amount of questioning doctors or reading internet forums or talking to people who have been through this will tell you exactly what this particular cancer is going to do. This is a time, when you have to surrender all your plans to God, and let Him be the planner, let Him be in control and you just sit next to Him in the passenger seat and quietly wait to see where He takes you. Start each day asking Him what His plans are for the day, is it a good day? is it a bad day? is it THE day?

I think often we only turn over big decisions or troubles, but when something like this happens that affects each and every day, the uncertainty of each moment makes it hard for those that plan. Not that I'm saying I have a greater advantage of getting through this whole "cancer thing" unscathed, cause I don't, however, there's something to be said for not being a planner during all of this. Changing direction is easy for me, I just wish there was a way to make it easier on those that struggle with a hiccup in the plans.

The pain of this journey is palpable, but greater fold I believe for those that need to make plans. My prayer for those is that have to live through all this is that they can learn to find joy in each moment, in each day and just understand that this is one of those unplanned, big picture journeys. God is in control, and we need to just let Him drive and go along for the ride, until we get to the end of it, whenever that may be.

So you know when your kids are small you're pretty much in control of their life experiences? There is a sense of comfort in knowing that you personally are making sure your kids are safe and that any outside influences are, for the most part, controlled by you as a parent.

Then it's time to let them go to school, gulp, and trust that others will keep them safe and watch out for them. However you can no longer control what kinds of worldly experiences your children will encounter in any given day inside the confines of the school. You are thrilled when they come home with great stories of wonderful friendships and adventures. On the flip side though your heart aches when they come home in tears because someone wasn't so kind to them.

As followers of Christ we pray that God will be there because we can't, that God will watch over and protect our children. That He will keep them safe, that the bullies and the mean girls of this world will leave our children alone. That somehow our children will walk through the halls of their schools, grade school on up, unscathed by all the evil that sin has brought into this world.

Rarely though does that happen.....

Often times the travesties are things that can be overcome, talked out or ignored. However, sometimes the evil in the world comes storming through big, and loud and painfully and no matter how hard you try, it can't be over looked or forgotten, you can't wish it away or pretend it didn't happen. How do we deal with this? How do I deal with this??

To back up a bit, when my oldest daughter was a freshman in high school she was raped, at school, during after school hours. She didn't share this information with us until she was a freshman in college, therefore ways we might have dealt with this had we known at the time it happened were not an option for us.

In the past year I have really struggled with why did God allow this to happen? I know He was there with her, He told me so. Yet He did nothing to stop it. I know all the reasons in my head, I know that He can work all things for the good of those who love Him. I know that we have freewill and we make our own choices. I know that she will now have a testimony to share with others and that God can choose to use her experiences to share His glory with others. I'm also now painfully aware how empty those words can seem having to struggle through this personally.

In my search for answers and ways to get past this, because I am not okay with feeling or thinking this way, I found a video tonight by Perry Noble who talks about having a child like faith. Something that can be so hard to achieve. Something he said really resonated with me. You know how when your child gets to be somewhere between 2-3 no matter what answer you give your child or how many times you rephrase it or change your words, no matter what your answer is, the child will look at you and say "why"? Many times our answers are what they are because we can see the bigger picture and the child can't. We see what is ahead or we have experience with the outcome of a particular situation that the child whose never experienced those things has no reference for, therefore, cannot understand why our answer is as it is.

We as Christ followers are referred to as children of God, not adults of God. This makes me think that maybe just maybe when I'm asking why, God is telling me an answer that I cannot completely understand because I cannot see the bigger picture. I don't know what's ahead, I haven't experienced it and I have no point of reference for it.

So thankfully, I have now come to a place that I will no longer question God with my "why", and trust that He knows what the whole picture is, what the greater plan is. It's not going to be easy, and I will have to capture thoughts daily and have to pray through this continually. At least now I have come to a place where I have some peace with this.

yet I will rejoice in the Lord,
I will be joyful in God my Savior. Habakkuk 3:18

I want you to read something, but before you do, I want you to understand that this is not a post about homosexuals in anyway, this is a post about how we are called to love. So many people under the guise of Christianity spew such unkind things about those that they don't feel live the life that they think they should. However, Jesus tells us that is not our place to judge, our calling as children of God is to love, love everyone, not to judge. The pastor that wrote the letter to this woman, did exactly what God tells us to do, he did not judge, he loved her where she was at. I pray that I can be the kind of person that loves without judgement. What a much kinder world we would live in if everyone just did what we were made to do...Love!

Here's the article I'd like you to read, called My Train Wreck Conversion.

The author of this letter has also written a book, I have added it to my "to read" pile called Secret Thoughts of an Unlikely Convert. 

Unforgiveness is a sin. I know this. I also know that unforgiveness keeps me a prisoner, not the person I'm not forgiving. What if the person you're having a hard time forgiving isn't a person......it's God. How can it be God? God doesn't do anything wrong, how could it be He that I need to forgive? It doesn't make sense to me either, but when I think of this pain I have, it always comes back to the fact that God let it happen. I totally understand that we live in a sinful world and that the things that happen are a product of the sin. I also understand that God was there when it happened. I know that God works all things for the good of those who love Him. I know all this stuff. I also know the pain that this has caused my daughter and my family. I also know that my God is a powerful, awesome God that can stop anything, can make anything happen or not happen.

Today as I was reading my book it talked about forgiveness, and this all popped into my head. So I opened my mouth and said I forgive the person that was the cause of all this, and I felt nothing. I've forgiven him long ago, but yet I have all this anger and frustration and bitterness about it and again I find myself asking God why He let it happen.

Maybe this isn't about forgiveness, maybe it's about trust, trusting that God knows what He's doing. That He has a plan for all of this and I'm just not seeing it. Huh; maybe that's what this is about. The problem is, I've no clue how to get to that point. Sigh. This is not an easy journey.....

Horrible things happened on Friday, and it was in the news, it was on the internet, it was in every day conversation by people it didn't personally affect. It is sad the horrible things that happened. However, what is sad is that people seem to be drawn into the media and the sensationalization of it all. The what ifs and the how comes. I just bet that if you asked any of the people that this horrible thing happened to, they'd just want all those cameras to go away, all the news media to leave them alone in their grief. They'd want people to quit talking about it all. At least that is what I would want. When I'm in pain and hurting from horrible things, I don't want people in my face about it. I don't want to have to keep talking about it, rehashing it, reliving it. I just want to be with the people I love and the people that already know all about it. You want to do something for me, pray, pray for me, pray for my family, just pray.

Now the media and people have to hash out the what ifs and the how comes. Instead, why can't we just say it's time to take responsibility for our own actions, that we need to be held accountable for what we do. That it's not this other persons fault because they did this or that, or because they didn't do this or didn't do that, or if we only had better rules or regulations. If only..... How about if everyone quit worrying about what everyone else was doing right or wrong and just became accountable for their own actions and reactions and they made sure they were doing what they were supposed to be doing. Quit looking for things or people to blame everything on.

I'm not cold and heartless, yes I cried, yes it hurts my heart, however, it is not my pain to bear, it is not my business to be part of their very private, personal pain. My business, should I choose to accept it, and I do, is to stand in the gap and pray for those families, that's it, nothing else.

Wanna experience God doing some AMAZING things? Amp up your prayer life!!! I am blessed to belong to a church that believes strongly in the power of prayer. Even more blessed to belong to a women's group that is just starting to realize the power we have in Christ through prayer.

Now I'm not talking your grocery list kinda prayers, I'm talking Holy Spirit lead prayer, the kind of prayer where you're down on your knees getting real with God. The kind of prayer where you don't do all the talking, the kind where you take time to listen as well. That is when God speaks, God leads, God shows up!! I know you're thinking, I don't have TIME for that kind of praying, I'm telling you MAKE time. Once you experience God through prayer you won't want to pray any other way, you will, but you'll LONG for the kind prayer life where God speaks to you.

The book we're studying in our women's group is called Intercessions by Joy Dawson. Here's a list she gives that takes you through some steps for praying. Give it a try!

1. Praise God for who He is.
2. Make sure your heart is clean before God by giving the Holy Spirit time to convict should you have any unconfessed sin.
3. Acknowledge that you cannot really pray affectively without the Holy Spirit's enabling.
4. Deal aggressively with the enemy. Come against him in the all powerful name of the Lord Jesus Christ and the Sword of the Spirit-The Word of God.
5. Die to your own imaginations, desires and burdens for what you feel you should pray for.
6. Praise God now for the remarkable prayer time you're going to have.
7. Wait before God in silent expectancy, listening for His direction.
8. In obedience and faith take action to what God brings to your mind, believing.
9. If possible have your Bible with you in case God wants to give you direction or conformation through His word.
10. When God ceases to bring things to your mind for which to pray, praise Him and thank Him for what He has done.

Now do you have to follow a list every time you sit down and pray, no of course not, however, making your prayer life more than just the grocery list of things that you'd like God to do for you is so powerful. You WILL see things happen and God WILL talk to you, if only you take time to listen!!