New Year, New Me :)

I realize that it's March and that most people are giving up resolutions right now, not making them.  But I've always like to be different ;)

This past week month has been terribly frustrating for me.  God has been revealing things to me that I am NOT comfortable with and things that I have tried with all my might to rationalize away.  It's not working...is anyone surprised?  It's not the first time that God has pushed me out of my comfort zone.  There was a trip in high school that my church took to Myrtle Beach, SC...I wasn't planning on going as I had two jobs at the time.  Little did I know that God had a very different plan.  I think it may have only been a week or two before the trip that I felt so convicted to go that I quit one of my jobs and had to beg and plead to get off work at my other job.  My mom was unhappy, I was broke, and the wonderful leadership at our church helped me get everything together money-wise.  It wasn't a great trip for me...but it was a GREAT trip for God's glory in my life!  I was pushed that week...to befriend people I had been hesitant of, to step out of my comfort zone and speak to strangers, to learn so much about God's calling for me and about leadership, and most of all to realize God's nagging guidance about some portions of my life that were HORRIBLY out of whack and defiant.  It hurt...it was tough...it didn't stop hurting for almost 2 years!  Not what I thought I had signed up for in this Christianity thing.  But with the help of my youth minister, his wife, and some great friends I made it through.  The things I was being pushed to change didn't completely change for a while and it took some more major intervening from God, but when they did change...my life was so much better!  I met my husband and was able to feel God's leading in my life once again.  I was also so much more grown up spiritually for having gone through this tough time. 

So that brings us to 2005, but in 2011 there are some new challenges God has been weaving into my consciousness.  Not so say that there haven't been growth periods, pruning, and difficulties between then and now...but that's a whole string of posts for another time (or a book).  Though the things I'm dealing with now aren't as pressing as what I dealt with back then, they are still tough for me.  Is it ever easy to listen to God tell you that you've not been doing well and he has some major changes in store?

One thing he has convicted me about is my use of the computer.  I love reading other people's blogs.  Mostly on food, parenting, and living a Christian life.  I feel that it is very uplifting to me, most of the time, and helps give me ideas on how to be engaged with my family better.  But that's only true when I'm doing my main job which is caring for the family and lives that God has entrusted to me.

Titus 2:4-5 has been on my heart lately:
"Then they can urge the younger women to love their husbands and children, ⁵ to be self-controlled and pure, to be busy at home, to be kind, and to be subject to their husbands, so that no one will malign the word of God."


My ministry right now, is my family and that's how it should be.  Though I know that...I've not been living that.  So, in an effort to change, I have made some decisions--with God's guidance and much prayer.  I am shutting down my Facebook page (not because it's evil, but because it is not uplifting to me the way it should be and it is a time waster for me) and I'm majorly scaling back on the number of blogs I read.  So that is my resolution for this time in my life.  To get my priorities in order and begin to prune all activities that aren't leading me toward my goal of being a Titus 2 woman!