Wednesday, June 9, 2010

Always Needing More Grace

...being confident of this, that He who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus. Philippians 1:6

And we, who with unveiled faces all reflect the Lord's glory, are being transformed into His likeness with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit. 2 Corinthians 3:18


Well, I have a little chunk of time in which to write tonight, but I'm not finding much brain-power at my disposal. It's the end of a long, good, hard, happy day - and the little-bitty-baby inside of me, well, he/she manages to lay claim to most of my end-of-day energy of late...

As I put supper together tonight, I started praying about some things that were on my mind. I could see in myself that while I wanted to be freely saying to the Lord "Your will be done in this," the truth is I was struggling. In that particular moment of prayer I could tell my heart wasn't in the right place: truly desiring His will over my own in our waiting time. And then I felt myself trying very hard to get in that right place. Trying very hard, eh?

This is when the Spirit gave me a little flood of Truth-relief: admit you can't do it, that you're not doing well at it, ask Him for help, for heavy grace so that you can please Him in the waiting, in the wondering, in the unknown. In the end, He reminds me in the harder moments, this is about His glory, our sanctification, and the drawing of souls to Himself for salvation - all things should really be about these core goals, anyway.


So, I started over in my talking to God, relieved to admit that my efforts weren't enough - that I want to please Him terribly and that He must carry on to completion the good work He began in me when He saved me. 

Lord, give me grace to please you in the waiting...

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Many Mercies:

210 LC at lunch today: "Holy Mack-a-walls!" (Holy Mackerel!) I think she got this from Veggie Tales. It cracked me up, though, to hear her say it.

211 swim lessons that went on today in spite of the rain - good for the girls, who badly need all the practice they can get in the water

212 rainy swim lessons = a break from the heat, halleluia (CA and I sit out in folding chairs in the shade, normally, but it is still quite hot)

213 a good parking space at lessons today

214 that I had an umbrella in the car

215 CA's non-stop chatter in the truck today while we waited on the big girls' lessons to finish

216 getting to take MK out for some mother/daughter time - a rare one on one evening for us: a treat, lookng at swingy skirts at Old Navy, browsing books together, her choosing a few to buy with her own money for her sisters

217 MK: "When I swallow it, it goes bzzzzzz in my throat" (she had a fizzy juice drink on our date)

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Photos: pegs from two different very old Discovery Learning Toys we were given as hand-me-downs years ago...the girls are always putting the two sets together in colorful combinations...asked me over and over take a picture of this arrangement they'd made

2 comments:

  1. oh Beth, this is so good. Thank you for reminding us of what He reminded you of. Kelly

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  2. You've got some nice depth of field action going on in these photos, and I love the color.

    What you shared, about simply telling God, honestly, where your heart is at that moment so resonates with what I've been contemplating the past few days about articulating to Him my desires/failings/idols when I'm not making Him my first desire. Only He can change my heart.

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