Uncluttered

Today’s post is just short and sweet, but I wanted to share this quick story and encourage someone’s heart.

I was driving by these wildflowers and just admiring their beauty and said to the Lord:
“Father I don’t think I’ve ever seen wildflowers like that before.”  Immediately He spoke to my heart and said: “Honey, they’ve always been there. You’re just not as cluttered as you used to be, so you’re able to see and enjoy the beautiful details.”   I then later drove back to take a picture of them.          

                                     
You see when I gave God permission to come in and clear out the clutter, and to clean up my heart, my mind and just my life in general, He actually started doing it.  I was telling someone the other day that the more you allow God into the secret places of your heart and mind and begin experiencing the freedom that comes with that, the more you love being known so intimately. And when you realize that you’re known that intimately and that detailed (with the clutter and all) and yet still loved so deeply, you feel no reason to hide yourself because the love of God washes away all the hurts and wounds, and any embarrassment; the Love pulls you up out of a pit (of hurt, anger, broken trust, shame, disappointment, despair, grief, or whatever else) and sets you on a firm foundation. It’s a very gentle process. Step by step, layer after layer as He unfolds healing and restoration in your life. You just have to ask Him and He says yes! He truly cares for His children and I’m so grateful for what He’s done, and what He continues to do in me!  

“Walk into the fields and look at the wildflowers. They don’t fuss with their appearance—but have you ever seen color and design quite like it? The ten best-dressed men and women in the country look shabby alongside them. If God gives such attention to the wildflowers, most of them never even seen, don’t you think he’ll attend to you, take pride in you, do his best for you?” //Luke 12:25-28//.                                        

Love you,

Kristin 

A New House is Built

Several months ago, my friend and I were driving through Royal Oak, Michigan, the city I was born in and then later lived in for a couple of years as a child.  I decided to take her through my old neighborhood and look at my old house on Golf Ave.  When we drove down the street, I immediately noticed that hardly anything looked the same.  Much of the old houses were replaced with new builds and it didn't look like the street I lived on as a kid nearly 25 years ago.  When we came to a stop in front of the place where my old house stood, it looked completely different.  In its place, a new house was built.  The tiny red box of a house with no garage was replaced with a huge new house with a garage and everything! It looked odd in that space because it barely fit, and looked like it was about to touch the houses on either side of it.  As we drove out of town I was telling my friend of the memories there, and suddenly the Lord whispered to my heart that the new house on that street represented my life. He said, "Kristin the old life is gone, it doesn't even exist anymore and has been replaced with a new life in Me. One that's complete and full, lacking nothing."

You see, in that house on Golf Ave. in the summer of 1993, my parents made the decision to get divorced.  Everything I had always known suddenly changed and my whole life took on a whole new direction. That's pretty intense for a 9 year old to handle and so I dealt with it the only way I  knew how: by burying deep down and going with the flow; a flow I had no control over.

When I asked the Lord for healing 5 years ago, I had no idea it would include ALL healing: physically, emotionally, mentally and relationally.  He began addressing things that I thought I had gotten over.  But in reality, I was just far removed on the outside, distanced through years, changes of cities, growing up; marriage.  But not far removed on the inside.  He began addressing the fear, anxiety and obsessive thinking and behavior I had been dealing with and managing since I was a little girl. He started dealing with wounds from my past, bitterness, disappointments, hurts, unforgiveness; everything that holds people back from true freedom. I thought I was free, but in the past 5 years I've begun experiencing and seeing what freedom really looks like.  And I've experienced His love in new and profound ways.

I knew I needed this freedom because when I turned 30, the pains from the past suddenly burst forth unexpectedly and I was not by any means prepared to handle the onslaught.  I was caught off guard emotionally. Suddenly everything I probably felt at 9 but didn't know how to express, awoke in me all at once and with tidal wave force. And all the time before that, I thought I was fine.  It wasn't until after the birth of my daughter when I dealt with a little postpartum depression and then later encountered some other emotionally jarring things that really shook me, things that most people would have thought wasn't a big deal. But the way I responded to it made me realize that I needed some serious emotional healing.  And through it, I also realized that I needed to forgive my parents and heal from the divorce.  I had never properly mourned the dissolution of their marriage and while I loved (and still love) both of them, the emotional trauma caused some serious problems in my relationship with my dad (most intensely) and some with my mom too.  All of this came forward to the surface suddenly and unexpectedly.

It's been a little wild for me, because when I asked for healing I didn't expect the kind of process that the Lord decided to guide me through. In this process it's been at times very painful.  Mostly the letting go of my protective walls, bad emotional and thinking habits, and learning to live free. The best thing I can compare it to is the pain of childbirth, where it hurts, but once the process starts, it can't stop,  you can't ever go back.  It's an inevitable force where your body literally takes over and you have to keep pushing forward.  But after the labor comes the delivery and then the holding of the gift you've been waiting for, the sweet life that's been growing inside of you.  And having just birthed the promise, you sit in the place where suddenly all the pain fades away.  If you try to go back, you'll only cause injury to yourself and miss out on the gift. In this case, I asked the Lord to take over, and once you ask the Father to come in and heal you and birth your freedom, going back would never feel the same.  Most people don't know my story, and through this healing process (which I'm still in, but progressing forward victoriously), the Lord has shown me that people need to know it now. I've said so often to Him in our times together "Father how can I put into words the wonderful things you've done?" And consistently He's said, "You'll know when it's time."  

There have been so many victories along the way. There also have been many unexpected things in this journey. Beautiful things I never thought would ever happen, have happened; prayers of my heart that God heard and knew I needed, but perhaps didn't know how to put it into words.  But as soon as I saw those amazing things, it made me ask for more! There has even been healing in my family that I didn't even know was possible. Things my parents have said to me in kindness about each other after years of hearing negative things back and forth, have taken me by complete surprise! The blaming has turned into a mutual understanding of each other.  It's been quite miraculous! But those things have truly been healing to my heart and have been clear confirmation of God's hand in it all.  For the first time since I was a little girl, I've even started to see my dad the way a daughter should see her daddy, when there were many years that it was very difficult for me to see that. For much of my growing up and into my adulthood there was an enormous physical and emotional chasm that separated us. Years that we barely spoke to each other (or didn't speak at all) have turned into normal healthy conversations with no tension, random sweet text messages and just the simplicity of being happy to hear from each other.  I've truly begun to see things differently because of this restoration.  These things can only happen by the hand and help of a very loving and very real God who loves His children and cares about their well-being. I'm crying as I write this because this is just HOW GOD IS! IT'S WHAT HE'S LIKE! THIS IS HOW HE WORKS!

As I said before, things I never even knew I wanted, He's made come to pass.  But also, He would put some unexpected wonderful desire on my heart, and I would ask Him for it and He would then do it.  He's still doing that, and I know He will continue to do that.  The healing has happened differently than I thought it would. You see, He knows the perfect order so it's done completely and entirely, not half-way.  That's been a challenge for me at times, someone who has had to be in control of everything all the time to protect myself. But it's been so wonderfully good for me too.

I just want you all to know that my healing is coming to pass! It's not just a fantasy! It's beautifully and wonderfully miraculous and only started when I came to the Father and asked for help. When you come into relationship with God through Jesus, you get to experience this and so much more. HE HEALS ALL THINGS! When you give God permission to set you free, He really and unquestionably sets you free. One of the main things I've noticed in this process is that He is so gentle and so patient. Every step He's had me take, He's prepared and made me ready for. I mean, I'm talking about things that I never would have ever done had I not partnered with Him in this.  So I've found there's no reason to be afraid of letting Him in and letting Him handle things because His way is THE BEST.

Everyone's process is different. There are no comparisons. God loves you and knows you inside and out.  Only He knows the best way and the perfect order to bring the restoration you need. But I can tell you that it's worth it in every way!

Talk to you soon :) 

XOXO
Kristin

For a song that truly has been my experience, click this link: Defender

 "When I thought I lost me, you knew where I left me. You reintroduced me to Your love. 

  You picked all my pieces and put me back together. You are the defender of my heart." -Defender

A Beautiful Marriage in Process

Hi Friends! 

I am super excited about the book that I started this week called: Praying for Your Husband from Head to Toe.

At the beginning of 2018, God put it on my heart to shift my focus to my mind and my marriage.  

Dave and I have a really good marriage-he's my best friend! But I'd been super distracted for a long time with some other things and the Lord wanted me to give those distractions to Him, let Him handle them, and focus on my amazing husband. 

Honeymoon 2004

Dave and I have been married for almost 14 years and have been through many ups and downs in our relationship. It has not always been easy. I know this is hard to believe, but Dave is not a perfect husband and I am not the perfect wife. Say what?! LOL! But I can honestly say that I love him more now than I did when we were first married! This is because along time ago, two really imperfect, immature, inexperienced, (and might I mention) incredibly stubborn first-borns named Kristin & Dave, decided together that they'd stick it out, do the hard work and cooperate with God to have a thriving marriage. There is always room for growth and improvement so that's why I got this book.  I wanted to be intentional toward Dave and our marriage. And honestly I need a little help and direction in praying for my husband. So that's ALSO why I got this book.  It's packed with wisdom from a long time married woman and has 30 days of specific prayers for your hubby, so it's easy to follow and do each day of the month! A husband could even pray these over his wife too. What a great privilege! God actually created us as wives to be our husband's helper. To be his teammate. To be a warrior for him in our prayer time. God created marriage, and He made it to be AWESOME! But it doesn't come naturally any more than riding a bike or driving a car and it certainly won't grow without nurturing it and making it a priority. You have to put the time and effort into it, not be afraid to seek help when needed and humble enough to go to our Heavenly Father and say "I need You to show me how to do this right!".  And a little side note: it really does change when you have kids. That's not said to scare anyone! It's just that, at least in our experience, you have to discipline yourself to make it a priority even more then. But I think it's really good for all of us. For Dave and I, it's added weights to the barbell of our marriage, making it stronger and more toned and refined. 

Dave and I had an intense conversation recently (aka argument) where both of us felt the need to be heard and validated (SHOCKER!) During which point I felt the need to declare that I was really good at being patient, kind and careful with feelings when it came to our children. To which he very seriously responded: "well, treat ME that way." That's when my eyes were opened and the Lord spoke to my heart about shifting my focus. I realized I gave Dave what was leftover rather than what was the main course. In all reality, my hubby is who I should be the nicest to! He's my number one, just under God. He was there from the beginning. We were just Us first before we became all of us. And I think it's normal when you're in the season of raising children because your focus is diverted in so many directions, and you fall into a habit. But the temperature and tone of your marriage will affect everything in your household, including your kids. I actually thought to myself "how can I have time to nurture my marriage AND be a good momma. But I realized that by taking the time to treat each other with love, honor and respect, it actually overflows in how we parent. Kind of like a trickle effect. By keeping things in proper order, it actually makes room for you to parent really well. I know that might not make sense, but that's just how God works. Everything is a seed or investment, including time. And what an honor and privilege to give our children the gift of two parents who really love each other, who really like each other and honor and respect each other. What a wonderful and powerful return that truly affects the generations to come. I'm so excited about this new prayer journey for the man God gave me and I pray that it becomes a part of my normal day to day life.  I say that, because intercessory prayer has not always come easy for me. It's also a discipline that takes time to develop.  
But anyway,  I really like our marriage and our story. I like the person that God is creating me to be through being married to Dave. Its been both a gentle and aggressive refining of he and I. It's been really good, that's for sure. Dave and I have an amazing story of how God has restored and redeemed many things through our marriage, that I'll share another time. Dave once told me years ago, most likely after one of our many heated arguments in the first few years of marriage, that we can either be happily married or miserably married but either way we're staying married! And I'm thrilled to say we chose happily. I'm a very wordy person, so this was a long digression from "I am so excited about this book I started this week." But that's just how I roll. (Literally I can tell when I've said too many words to Dave and I have to take a pause for him to process, LOL!) There's a quote from the author that sums up how the adventure of marriage has been for us so far:

"I don't have a big bad story of how God took our terrible tumultuous  marriage and miraculously transformed it into a storybook romance filled with white knight rescues, relentless romance, and rides into the sunset as we left all danger and darkness behind. Even though we've had our share of both tumult and romance, our relationship is no fairytale. Our marriage reads more like a daily journal, one page after another, one day after another. Some entries are smudged with tears; some are dogeared as favorites. Some pages of our story are marred by unsuccessful erasures that wouldn't quite rub away the words said; others are finger worn by reading of precious events time and time again." 

Oh the words that have been said! And the "I'm so sorry, please forgive me's" that have followed. Thank God for forgiveness and grace. Thank God for prayer and answers to prayer! Our own personal journey of marriage is becoming a beautiful symphony year by year; an ebb and flow; a writing and rewriting and editing process complete with a Master Collaborator Who is so passionately faithful.  And you know what? The BEST is yet to come!

You see, real success starts in the home. And I've been learning that oftentimes it starts on our knees in prayer for our spouses. There are few things more powerful than that!

So here's to realizing we can't do it on our own and for praying for our husbands (or wives if men are reading this) and reaping rewards from our Heavenly Father beyond our wildest dreams! 

Love, Kristin