Avoiding an unavoidable God

I haven't written in awhile.  It hasn't been because I've been too busy.  It hasn't been because I have nothing to say. And it isn't because our computer's keyboard is broke. (Even though it is, and we currently have our iMac keyboard hooked up to our Chromebook. Classy I know :) ) If I'm being honest and real it's simply because I've felt stuck or even more candidly: distant from God.  Now I'm deep enough in my faith to know that if I start to feel like God has moved, He wasn't the one who moved, I was.  And I'm not angry at God for anything.  I'm not bitter or holding something against Him.  Our life isn't so over the top awful and hard that I feel like He's forgotten about us.  I know He hasn't and we see Him in our everyday life when we truly look at our days.  I know I haven't been spending near enough time with Him lately.  And it's not because I feel like I have more important things to do.  Because frankly He is THEE most important person for us to spend time with.  All our other relationships are better off when we are on a firm rock solid foundation with Him.  And yet I choose to spend my down time instead doing mindless non-thinking things.

And as I sit here and type out those words, it has dawned on me.  I don't not want to spend time with Him just because I forget or time gets away for me.  Or because I just want those quiet moments I do have to be spent doing mindless things because HELLO!! Mommy of a 4 year old and 1 year old, quiet time doesn't come far too often! And moms I think we can all admit when we get some down time, we really just want to be doing this: Sitting down coffee in hand, even with the mess around us.  We just want to SIT in the quiet and do nothing....

But let's get real here:

2 1/2 years ago our house went on the market and my hubby rode off to start living in another town without us.  Since that time we have had so much happen...from blessings to heartbreaks.  And God has been in the midst of it all.  Cheering us on, holding us up when we needed to crumble, pouring out His blessings and His truth.  It has been a wild wild ride for those 2 1/2 years.  So much life and craziness packed into such a short time.  And here we are  28 some months later and we are in a TOTALLY different place than we expected with a TOTALLY different job than we first originally moved for.  God truly did have something BIGGER and BETTER in mind for us.  And I am beyond grateful to Him for that....

And yet, today, as I was driving home from taking our 4 year old to preschool, I drove through a cute neighborhood full of adorable houses.  Houses that people all clearly own.  Houses where memories have been made for years.  When we first moved to Canton I vowed deep in my heart that I would be content in this house.  That even if it wasn't truly ours and we were just renting, I would treat it as if it were our own. I would unpack everything and decorate it as if we would be here forever.  Well friends, it's getting harder and harder to do.  The longing in my heart is building up faster than I wanted.  I want our house to sell and I want us to be able to settle down and create a life in a home that is ours. I want to be able to plant firm roots down. 

And so why have I been 'avoiding' time with Him? Because I don't want to have that begging and pleaded with Him to come back even faster than it already has.  And yet the truth is? Even if we kneel before Him and cry out our desires before Him, He's ok with that.  He already knows where our heart is and what we long for.  So instead of trying to avoid someone who is unavoidable, we should instead just be in His presence.  Let Him speak truth and love into the roots of our souls.  Let Him heal those broken and hurting places that we don't understand.  When He calls us to keep waiting on things there are reasons.  We have proof of that friends.  Our house didn't sell right away because God had a bigger better job for Travis. If it would have sold we would have bought a house and it would have been that much harder on us again.  But my goodness that waiting and longing is hard.  We don't always have to have it all together.  We won't always have all the joy in our hearts that the bible calls us to have.  We are human.  So I say when we don't have all that joy in our trials that everyone so often reminds us to have, or when we are just so sick of waiting and hearing people say "All in God's time", let us go to the cross and lay that hurt and longing and sick of waiting feeling down and say "God I don't get this.  I don't like this.  But I love you and I know you love me.  Please God help me to remember that I don't have to like waiting, but I do need you always.  Even when I want to avoid you when you are unavoidable."

Have you been 'ducking' God? Is there a reason deep in your heart that you don't want to admit? Do you feel far from His arms and you aren't sure why? He is there friend, we just have to find our way back to Him somehow.  We need to admit in our hearts the true issue that we just don't want to tackle.  He already knows, so why not just sit in His presence and let it all out....

And oh friends pray for us as we are in this really yucky middle time.  Our house officially went off the market at the end of the year and we have NO clue what the next step is gonna be.  Thanks be to God for amazing renters but oh how we are praying for this chapter to officially close.