My Voyage on the Dawn Treader...

I realize that I have been absent from blogging, but believe you me, it has not been absent from my mind!

I'm sure that a vast majority of adults have one time or another picked up the long known series of books, "The Chronicles of Narnia". I actually enjoyed reading them during my pregnancies, I'm sure that will be a tradition I maintain assuming the Lord gives us more children. But these past couple of months there is one book in particular that I've found myself most relate-able to and that is 'The Voyage of the Dawn Treader'. There is a character in the book Eustice a cousin of the four main children, Peter, Susan, Edmund and Lucy. He steps on the scene as being a miserable wretch! No one wants to be around him and he doesn't really care to be in Narnia himself. One part of the story has stuck out to me the most though. I'm an analogy person to the hilt! In fact, my husband often teases me about it (nicely of course) and says that he won't ever have to worry about our children understanding anything when they begin homeschooling!
Eustice has found himself turned into a dragon and he's scared because he fears that he might forever remain a dragon (a legitimate fear, right?). So long story short, he runs into Aslan the lion. Now for those who might not know, C.S.Lewis depicts Aslan as the Jesus or God-like character, upon these two meeting, Aslan proceeds to engage Eustice the dragon. Obviously it was quite uncomfortable being an over-sized lizard so Aslan informs Eustice that he must use his claws and scratch some of the top scaling off. So he begins to do so and finds some relief but quickly realizes that this is not a job that he is going to be able to achieve on his own. Then, in steps Aslan, as much as Eustice feared the lions claws and the fact that this was something that was really going to hurt, during the process he found relief in the pain and after it was all done, he was like a brand new boy!

For me, I read that and I'm reminded of how that there are moments in our lives and walks with God that we feel like we've done all that we can do, but of course, even our all is not enough. We are in need of God to come along and claw that other fleshly thinking, behavior etc off of us. It hurts and most often times we are somewhat resistant, but in the end, is it not worth it? This is where I have been the past couple months, in a "cleaning" lesson, if you will. There have been a few situations where its been more than obvious that the Lord's Will was in play, but because of my desire of not wanting change, I was resistant to it. Fighting it, trying to convince myself that this isn't what is supposed to be happening. It was painful, there were tears shed at times, moments of great frustration. But at the end of the day, I felt great relief knowing that even though I'm fighting it and even though I'm resisting the Lord keeps moving forward. Because no matter what I'm doing or not doing, His Will will be done, my actions may cause it to come about in a much more difficult way, but ultimately whatever He wants is accomplished.

One of my favorite verses in the Bible is found in James 1:2-4
"Consider it great joy, my brothers, whenever you experience various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance. But endurance must do its complete work, so that you may be mature and complete, lacking nothing."

I've been so blessed with a husband that has the heart of teacher. He advises, directs, counsels me but he also steps back and allows me to sometimes learn a lesson the hard way. I'm so grateful for that and always will be! He's one of my very special gifts from God and I feel honored and humbled that the Lord chose me to be his helper...

Stay encouraged as you read this and know that no matter how alone you feel in whatever circumstance you are going through, you're not. That really is the truth!