I miss Virginia a ridiculous amount. I mean, truly PATHETICALLY miss Virginia...Oh let me just tell you how much...
I miss it so much, at times, in quiet/secret moments, it takes my breath away and I sob. I think I began missing it the moment I knew we were moving while, unknowingly, we still had five more months there! But at that point I'd entered a kind of fog, shock maybe, that's only lifted in the past few months, freeing me to feel the heart/home sickness I'd stowed away. This is completely silly, but I miss it so much I've even tried making up my own Virginia ballads, sonnets or such that would share this bizarre and I must admit inordinate amount of intense emotion, justifying the tears of longing I have for flowering trees, rolling hills, painted valleys, near shorelines and close horizons...
There. I have been wanting to share that for some time...and I did. Without crying, without feeling sorry for myself...as if it were just a fact of my life, one to acknowledge for a point. And what point would that be? I'm so glad you asked!
I was talking with my daughter today, this very day, about missing VA (she misses it too) and while I acknowledge to her how I missed it too, I mentioned the several dozen wondrous "signs" God has given to remind us, he knows, he cares, he sees, he is with us, he is for us and he loves us...more than we love VA. AS I was recounting to her this list, I quoted Philippians 4:6 "Be careful for nothing; but in every thing by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known unto God."
And suddenly, and I mean SUDDENLY, there was a paradigm shift in my understanding of that verse..."With Thanksgiving" caught me by surprise...such surprise, it took my breath away and I began to cry...let me explain:
FOR DECADES I have always thought and prayed to the Lord with that verse in mind...in the midst of certain issues I basically have thought: "I need to come up with some things to be thankful for because, well, otherwise I'm an ingrate and what better way to NOT get my problems solved! So, okay, God, let me think...think, think, think (Winnie the Pooh moment) what can I be thankful for?"
Dear ones, own heart...I feel like I've uncovered a pearl in this truth: The Lord doesn't ask us to come up with random things to thank him for in the midst of a trial, or even to thank him for the trial itself parse (although that shows a measure of faith and is good too). Rather, He wants us to come with thanksgiving, acknowledging the gifts of what HE has already planted in the midst of that trial.
It is an honoring act of faith before the Lord, as in our obedience, we prove HIM our faithful Father by looking for the things that God has placed, in advance, WITHIN our trials, the sole objective first and foremost to be able to thank him. It's not only always simply saying, "Thank you for this trial, I'm sure I'm going to learn something from it at some point." Rather a heart attitude that trusts, like my children trust me, to do good and not evil towards them, not just in the future outcome, but in the present circumstance! To trust that God is who he claims to be to those who have trusted Jesus as both Lord and Savior, that he is our Father and as a Father, he has provided hope in the situation, because he who cautions us, "Do not frustrate your children" does not frustrate us. On that note: if we are frustrated, that originates in us and a heart of unbelief that does not trust He is Good and the giver of Good Gifts and then searches for the One who "satisfies the longing soul and fills the hungry soul with goodness"! ~ Understand context of the frustration of which I'm writing...
It has been only 9 years since my walk of faith began with the Lord. A walk which embraced not only His Salvation by way of the cross, but also His Lordship over my life and all that that entails, and it's like I've been given new eyes, seeing even in the darkest of times in my life the light that was always there, is always there, illuminating moments, circumstances, provision within the times of hurt, failure, disappointment, and sorrow for and to those who know him and those who are of "The Called, according to his purposes."
And in this I begin to get a clearer glimpse of the One who has called me his child and he my Father.
Below is a list of the incredible wonders that God has infused our longing situation with "good things". It is my list, but you are welcome to look and marvel with me! :)
A main road a mile from our house is, I kid you not, Virginia Blvd.
It is an honoring act of faith before the Lord, as in our obedience, we prove HIM our faithful Father by looking for the things that God has placed, in advance, WITHIN our trials, the sole objective first and foremost to be able to thank him. It's not only always simply saying, "Thank you for this trial, I'm sure I'm going to learn something from it at some point." Rather a heart attitude that trusts, like my children trust me, to do good and not evil towards them, not just in the future outcome, but in the present circumstance! To trust that God is who he claims to be to those who have trusted Jesus as both Lord and Savior, that he is our Father and as a Father, he has provided hope in the situation, because he who cautions us, "Do not frustrate your children" does not frustrate us. On that note: if we are frustrated, that originates in us and a heart of unbelief that does not trust He is Good and the giver of Good Gifts and then searches for the One who "satisfies the longing soul and fills the hungry soul with goodness"! ~ Understand context of the frustration of which I'm writing...
It has been only 9 years since my walk of faith began with the Lord. A walk which embraced not only His Salvation by way of the cross, but also His Lordship over my life and all that that entails, and it's like I've been given new eyes, seeing even in the darkest of times in my life the light that was always there, is always there, illuminating moments, circumstances, provision within the times of hurt, failure, disappointment, and sorrow for and to those who know him and those who are of "The Called, according to his purposes."
And in this I begin to get a clearer glimpse of the One who has called me his child and he my Father.
Below is a list of the incredible wonders that God has infused our longing situation with "good things". It is my list, but you are welcome to look and marvel with me! :)
A main road a mile from our house is, I kid you not, Virginia Blvd.
The street that we would take every day in VA because I was too scared to cross over traffic so I'd go down to the traffic light: McKinney!
I lamented the fact that we wouldn't be seeing our beautiful crepe myrtles in bloom again. I even posted a picture on FB of my beautiful tree! McKinney is called: the crepe myrtle capital of TEXAS!
We had such snow, the likes of which haven't been seen in 80 years by some newspaper accounts.
Everywhere we've moved, we have struggled to find a church to belong to...we found one within one month of being here.
I didn't want to do yard work after doing it all myself in Lynchburg for five months. We have like NO yard here!!!
We got into a CC group that accepted us, welcomed us and put absolutely no pressure on us to "perform" because frankly, we didn't have it other than to do the bare essentials!
We can walk everywhere, with trails and paths leading to parks and ponds/lakes...I have high hopes of loosing the weight I packed on while I was juggling everything without Rick in VA, I didn't have time to care about my body, and frankly I just went with it! Already starting to see progress!
(a praise with this: My right heel, that has been giving me excruciating pain for the past 2 years, after a fall down some stairs, seems to be all better! At least my increased gym time attendance hasn't brought it out!)
(a praise with this: My right heel, that has been giving me excruciating pain for the past 2 years, after a fall down some stairs, seems to be all better! At least my increased gym time attendance hasn't brought it out!)
Facebook and email (for you dear friends who have not drunk the fb "Kool Aid"~ private joke) has been a lifeline to friends back home. I'm not on it too much, but it has been just enough to aid me through some difficult, transitional times. I'm blessed by you!
Two weeks before Texas was just a place as far to me as China seems, I saw a news clip on the George W. Bush Presidential library, and I thought, I'd like to visit that! I wonder where it's located...Texas? Whatever! Well...We'll be visiting it in the next month or so!
We got to see the Alamo and the famous River Walk!
I know what it is to long for a land where my heart resides and not know when I shall be called home.
The list does go on...as does His grand benevolence, starting, of course, with Himself...
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