I found another book.... Seriously, I think I've become that girl. Anywho...let me first start this post with this... I've heard it before, and I must agree, that it is often scarier when God does answer a prayer than when he doesn't.
Saturday evening Phil and I met with other LifeGroup (small group) leaders from Southbrook in order to check in with our Champions (leaders over the leaders). After some scrumptious dinner, we spent some time talking about our expectations for the year for both our groups and ourselves. I shared with everyone that I truly didn't know what to expect from 2012. If you had asked me one year ago today what I could have expected God to do in my life I never would have answered with any, let alone all, of the following:
Serving at church
Going on 2 international mission trips
Faithful tithing
Joining a LifeGroup
Becoming a member of Southbrook
Seeing Phil get baptized
An eagerness for sacrificial giving
Leading a LifeGroup
Discovering a passion for missions
A complete transformation from fan to follower, and God gets all of the glory. This time last year, Phil and I finally realized that we both had to relinquish all control to our Father and submit our lives and our marriage fully to His plan for us. What happened throughout 2011 was intense, amazing, and something neither one of us could have predicted! So, Saturday night I simply shared that I could only hope and expect to continue this year, just as last, with complete submission of myself to whatever the Lord has in store for us.
On the car ride home, Phil and I confessed to each other that while we are outrageously blown away at all that God has done within our hearts in the past year, we certainly feel as though we could have given more in our relationship with Him. If He could work in such great ways through us then, how much more could we let Him live all out in us this year if we actually came to Him every single day, really read His word EVERYday (truth: we failed at this more often than we'd like to admit), and pressed even more eagerly into a relationship with Him? HUGE! 2012 could be even more mind blowing than the last year!
So that part about God actually answering prayers....sometimes He doesn't waste any time! Yesterday, Phil and I were in Sam's Club and he happened to notice a book with an oddly simple cover. He picked it up, read the back and just smiled. I immediately wanted to be in on the secret, but he wouldn't give me the book right away, simply stating that he knew if I read this book excerpt that things would change. He. Was. Right.
One of the biggest things that sticks out in my mind from being in Haiti is surprisingly not how much we have compared to how little they do. That was blatantly obvious, and I could have told you this fact without ever stepping foot in the country. Instead, it was the experience of finally giving God one full uninterrupted week of my complete devotion and utter dependence. And what I will also never forget is the experience of returning home to a life that simply gets in the way of my life with God. I'm painfully excited to see just how big God becomes in the Rimar household as life get awfully simple in the next 7 months.
Check back later and I'll talk more about what 7 will look like for us.
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