"Let us not love with words or speech, but with actions and deeds." ~ 1 John 3:18

Friday, June 17, 2011

Fully Live

" All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us."
~ J.R.R Tolkien
As I sit in Miami airport getting ready to leave for Haiti, after just celebrating my birthday ; I have some time to reflect and pray about my life. Have I and am I spending my time the way the Lord would want me to. Am I doing what God created me to do. Many days I look around my house and see dishes piled high in the sink, crumbs and stickiness on the kitchen floor, hand prints and speckles on mirrors, splatters of toothpaste on sinks, broken crayons & toys in the floor and the sound of Mooooommm!!! This is code for "I'm getting ready to tell on somebody!" I would like to say that in these moments I look around and thank the Lord for another day. I have to be honest and say many times I ask, "God, is this really what you want me to be doing?" Scrubbing toilets, floors, & smudges off mirrors?! Is this what you created me for? Don't get me wrong, I absolutely love being a mom & wife, but there are just days that it gets to me. The feeling of invisibleness & doing the same things over and over. How do we fully live everyday?
The Lord is teaching me that life is truly a gift and that I need to be fully present and give thanks all the time, even in the small things. Even in the scrubbing toilets and washing mirrors. Jesus calls us to give thanks in all circumstances. Is this the secret to a full
life? When we are fully present, giving thanks in all things, this is what makes our life full.
"The greatest thing is to give thanks for everything. He who has learned this knows what it means to live." Ann Voskamp
Is that what it means to fully live? To live in the present? To be thankful for every minute,
every second because it is a gift of God's grace?
Isn't it amazing when you travel to third world countries and you see the poverty, but what
you also see is joy and thankfulness. Many of us Americans would say that those things just don't go together, joy and poverty. That just doesnt make sense to us who live in abundance. Could it be that they have found the fullest
life? The life that God wants us to have? That they are truly thankful for what they do have because they know what it means to go without? That they have found Jesus in the mundane, in the dirty, in the everyday ordinary tasks? Is it possible to find joy and thankfulness in everything knowing that it's a gift from God? The good, the hard, the ordinary?

And so I begin to keep a gratitude journal as I sit in the airport, thanks to Ann Voskamp, and her wonderful book "One Thousand Gifts". I begin to intentionally give thanks in every situation, in the small stuff that I have for too long taken for granted, so that I may fully
live and be fully present in every moment.

#1. The chatter of people talking in different languages.
2. The giggle of a baby.
3. The taste of chocolate.
4. The smile of a stranger.
5. Holding hands of an elderly couple.
6. The amazingness of being able to fly on a plane.
7. The glare of airplane lights.
8. The joy of watching someone fly for first time.
9. Slap happy laughs!
10. Conversation with friends.
11. A midnight snack
All this to be thankful for in a few minutes of sitting in an airport!
Is this what it means to fully live in every moment?!

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