PinkGirl: “Mom, ya know why it’s really good to have a dog?”
Me: “no, why?”
PinkGirl: “cause they can tell when you’re gonna have a seizure.”
Me: “Are you going to have a seizure?”
PinkGirl: “I don’t know. I don’t have a dog.”
Me, laughing: “you crack me UP, girl.”
PinkGirl: “I’ll be here all week. (pause) I’ll be here all life.”
One thing I do when I sense distance between me and God is to beg Him for opportunities to serve him. It never fails to draw me into a more intimate awareness of His presence in my life. The last few weeks, I’ve been begging.
Then, at Tuesday’s yoga class, I was asked to join a few ladies to do “Son” salutations to the Lord’s prayer – during the church services on Sunday.
I was not excited about this opportunity.
Seriously, doing downward facing dog in front of the entire church congregation? Not what I had in mind when I asked God for an opportunity to serve him.
But isn’t that frequently the case?
I ask God for an opportunity to serve him, He provides one and my response is, “but. but. but. I don’t want to do THAT!” I don’t always have specific ideas about how I COULD serve him but I DO have ideas about how I DON’T want to serve him and sticking my badonka donk butt up in the air for a downward facing dog in front of the entire church congregation is firmly on that list.
Was firmly on that list.
Today, I asked the yoga instructor, “After you do yoga during a church service, do you find that someone new comes to class after that? Because they were prompted by seeing it?”
“YES!”
oh.
well.
okay, then.
And I’m reminded. God can use ANYthing for his purposes and glory. Even a downward facing dog.
So, I’m going to take advantage of this opportunity to serve God. With a joyful attitude. I’m sure I will have a joyful attitude, I just haven’t quite gotten there completely. Yet. Right now, I have a positive attitude, which is a long way from where I was this morning.
As I drove away from yoga this morning, I realized this opportunity supports something else I’ve been doing for the last few months. I’ve been posting my fitness goals and my daily progress on my blog, facebook and twitter. I’ve received feedback (on and off the internet) that my fitness updates have been encouraging to more people than I realized. I really thought that I would post these updates for my own personal tracking, but the feedback that I’ve received has been a two-way encouragement. People see me fail and try again and they are encouraged to try again. They see me nick away at fitness goals, a little every day and they are encouraged to do the same.
I’ve made a commitment to be a good steward of this body God has blessed me with and to hold myself accountable by sharing that commitment with others. To stand on the stage this Sunday morning and sing with the praise team – and then, moments later, NOT participate in yoga during the Lord’s prayer after, would NOT be in line with that commitment.
Now I just need to go shopping for church appropriate stretchy pants.
an analogy. no. an allegory.
When I first began recording, the studio I sang in was separated from its control booth. The doors to each room were around a corner from each other and there was no window between the sound studio and the control booth, like you often see on TV. I was completely separated from people – physically, visually and audibly.
It was a little weird, especially because there were long minutes of silence between takes while the guys in the control booth were talking to each other and I couldn’t hear them – or see them.
It was also very, very cold in that room. I remember bringing a jacket and a scarf, even in the spring and summer. I would tuck my fists in my pockets and wrap the scarf around my face because my fingers and my nose would get so cold.
But the weirdest thing about that studio was that the lights were on a motion sensor. After about 15 minutes, the lights would automatically turn off and I would be left in the dark.
pitch dark. There were no windows, remember?
Even more challenging was the fact that I was surrounded by what the sound guys called “trees.” They were actually big fat, foam-like tubes on stick-like stands. I’m not sure exactly why they needed to surround me the way they did – I’m sure it was to enhance the sound and create a “sweet spot” in some way – but the bottom line is that when the lights went out, it was a challenge for me to find my way past the trees and move into the motion sensor’s line of sight to activate the lights again.
The recording sessions were about 3 and a half hours long and, tucked in the middle of the microphone (with all its accoutrements) and these giant trees, there was no place to sit down. At the end of the session, I was tired. I was tired from the singing and I was tired from the standing.
If you’ve read my last “four minutes with God” post, you may already know where I’m going with this. (if you haven’t, go ahead and click the previous link and catch up, I’ll wait. really, go ahead, it makes the rest of this post less confusing)
For a few weeks now, spiritually, I’ve been in the dark. surrounded by trees.
But here’s the thing. When I was in that studio and the lights went out during a take, I didn’t stop singing. I kept going. It didn’t matter that I was in the dark. I knew what I was supposed to be doing whether I could see or not. I didn’t really even need to see the lyrics sheet because I knew the song by heart.
I actually found that I sounded better when I couldn’t see, if you can believe that. The darkness meant there were less distractions.
Singing in the dark helped me focus on what was important while allowing me to abandon myself to God’s leading – at the same time.
Disconcerting at first, but as I grew more dependent on the instincts I believe God provided for me, instead of the tangible, visible microphone, the lyric sheet with its numbered lines, the headphones with the cord that kept overlapping my right arm, the line of masking tape on the floor to mark where I should stand…
I realized I didn’t need all those assurances. They were tiny, irrelevant markers of proof for what I confidently knew:
– the microphone was working and there were people in the sound booth who could hear me
– they were taking the work I was doing and making it even better.
– I didn’t need lyrics if I knew the words by heart.
– it might be cold, but it was temporary and I was equipped for it.
– yeah, I would get tired, but nothing beyond what I could handle and I could rest later, after my work was finished.
– if I started out standing in the right place and didn’t absently step away, I would stay in the center of the sweet spot.
All of that led me to an even greater assurance: that I was where I was supposed to be, doing what I was supposed to be doing, when I was supposed to be doing it and that I was being equipped by someone far more able to help me than all those other things.
When the lights were on, it never occurred to me to abandon all the markers I could see and depend wholly on an “invisible God
Lord, thank you for reminding me of this experience in my life and showing me how it relates to the lessons you’re teaching me right now:
– You are with me whether I can see You or not.
– I can depend on You whether or not you provide me with easily recognizable assurances or ask me to trust You as You lead me through the dark for a while.
– I’m going to keep singing, knowing You can still hear me and knowing that you’ll show me what I need to see, when I need to see it.
This was dual published on my Pragmatic Communion blog.
One of my favorite movies scenes is from Elizabethtown. After Orlando Bloom’s character tells Kirsten Dunst’s character about his colossal career mistake, she replies:
“So you failed. Alright you really failed. You failed, you failed, you failed, you failed, you failed, you failed, you failed, you failed, you failed, you failed, you failed. You failed.”
Harsh, I know. But then she says,
“You think I care about that? I do understand. You wanna be really great? Then have the courage to fail big and stick around. Make them wonder why you’re still smiling.”
My translation? “So you failed. NOW what are you going to do?”
I failed. I didn’t meet my March fitness goals:
Goal – Walk an average of 2.3 miles per day, totaling 71.3 miles.
Actual – Walked 69.2 miles, short 2.1 miles.
Goal – BOSU pushups: average 20 per day, total 620. (originally 10 per day. I doubled this goal – big mistake.
Actual – 410, which is 100 over my original goal and 210 UNDER my modified goal.
Goal – 2 Minute Plank: Average one per day, for a total of 31 times, If I missed a day, I was supposed to make it up.
Actual – 23, 8 short of goal.
Goal – 1 Minute Superman: Average 1 per day for a total of 31 for the month, miss it? Supposed to make it up.
Actual –23, again, 8 short of goal.
NOW what? I’m going to set new goals for April and strive to achieve them.
I’ve taken a look at why I failed and I’ve discovered a few things:
– The daily 1 minute superman and the 2 minute plank were reasonable goals. That’s THREE minutes a day.
– Increasing the walking distance was a waste. I need to walk smarter, not longer. And I need a day off.
– I HATED those BOSU push-ups – because I wasn’t successful. I couldn’t do 20 of them in a row. And they never got easier. I found myself skipping the floor work altogether because of those stupid push-ups. Besides, they only worked isolated muscles. I hate doing that – waste of time when I could be working multiple muscle groups.
So here are my modified fitness goals for April:
1 one minute superman per day, total of 30. (already behind)
1 two minute forearm plank per day, total of 30. (already behind)
Yoga/Strength training: 3 days per week. (this will be a challenge)
Walk an average of 2 miles per day – taking Saturday’s off – for a total of 50 miles – at 6.5 percent incline on the treadmill. (that’s the smarter, not longer part). Any walks in the flat neighborhood with FirstHusband will be bonus miles.
I’m also adding some nutrition goals:
Take my vitamins and supplements every day.
Eat at least one serving of fruit every day. (this may be the most challenging goal of all. not because I don’t like fruit, but because, in general, I often forget to eat much of anything after breakfast)
WHY am I doing this? Because just a few short years ago, I couldn’t. I’ve been given a second chance to take care of this body God has blessed me with and I’m determined to be a good steward of it. Did I mentioned I was DETERMINED?
I’m blogging my daily fitness updates in my exercise log, and posting my daily progress on my Facebook page and my Twitter account, so follow along any way you like:
1. Subscribe to the blog via email or RSS (there are widgets in the sidebar to subscribe)
2. “Like” my Facebook page to see the updates in your news feed or
3. Follow me on Twitter!
I would LOVE it if you would join me in fitness accountability by commenting either here or on the facebook page and letting me know your progress too!
Still lurking around, thinking about the possibility of making small changes in your day to get healthier? I want to encourage you to set a reasonable, sustainable fitness goal for yourself for the month of April and (here’s the key) make yourself accountable to someone! If you do it, let me know how it’s going and I’ll pray for you!
If you currently have an inactive lifestyle, consider exercising 1 minute a day. ONE minute. And (here’s that key again) make yourself accountable to someone who will support and encourage you! (If you exercise for ONE minute per day for a week, tell me and then I’ll tell you why I only challenged you to work out for ONE minute)
FirstHusband to me on the phone: “Your day has changed.”
Me: “How?”
FirstHusband: “You’re going to buy a book. The abridged ‘Count of Monte Cristo'”
Me: “Smack FavoriteSon on the back of the head for me.”
background noise: “HEY!”
FirstHusband, to FavoriteSon: “Just doing what your mom told me to.”
FavoriteSon: “oh.”
I HATE paying retail for a book! FavoriteSon’s known he needed this for a week. I could have gotten it used. online. And considering the entire sophomore class is supposed to bring this book to school tomorrow, I have a feeling it wouldn’t be easy finding it in stock in any brick and mortar store nearby.
Later, when I see FavoriteSon face to face at home…
Me, to FavoriteSon: “Do you get points if you bring this book to class tomorrow?”
FavoriteSon: “No. I have to read the first 9 chapters by tomorrow.”
Me: “Com’ere, so I can smack you on the back of the head.”
FavoriteSon: “No thank you.”
Then, PinkGirl said, “What about Kindle?”
FavoriteSon: “oh yeh! we’re allowed to do that!”
Me to FirstHusband, who was in reach of FavoriteSon: “Smack him again.”
FavoriteSon’s signature grin.
SMART GIRL! We all have ipod touch Kindle apps! $5.99 download. Done.
He better read those nine chapters, or…you guessed it. smack.
I had another mountaintop recording experience last night. So profoundly thankful to the Lord for equipping me to do what I did, from leading me in my song selection to providing me with physical stamina to blessing my voice.
I actually struggled with my song selection, originally deciding to sing “Sweetly Broken.” But I just couldn’t seem to send the confirmation email with the track and lyrics.
Finally, five days past the submission deadline, I changed my mind and decided on Kristian Stanfield’s version of “Jesus Paid It All
Part of me wondered if I was gravitating to Jesus Paid It All
Lord, I pray for the guys at the recording session last night. I only know their names, not their stories. I pray that through the session last night, and the music and lyrics they will be listening to over the next month as they mix the song, you will move in their lives in a deeply personal way.
– If they don’t know you, please use my offering to help draw them to a saving faith in you.
– If they do know you, I pray that they will be encouraged in their faith.
– If they know you, but have forgotten you, please use this song and my voice and witness to remind them of you and give them a relentless passion for your intimate companionship.Lord, I’m so thankful for every opportunity to record. Even if nothing ever comes of these recordings, the studio sessions themselves are such an overwhelming blessing to me. I pray that these sessions would be shared blessings; that the other people involved would be blessed by these experiences too. If your plan is for me to share any of the recordings with others, please lead me to the person who can mix and master them. I trust that you can provide me with compensated work so I can earn the money needed to compensate that person and pay the licensing fees.
Regardless of when or whether that ever happens, I’m going to continue recording until you lead me in another direction. I’m going to continue moving forward until you say stop, rather than sitting still and waiting for you to say GO.
I also prayed yesterday that God would, in some way, bless me with encouragement. As I drafted this post, the mail came and in it, the rough mixes from last month’s recording session of “Glorious Day (Living He Loved Me)
For more beautiful music, check out Then Sings My Soul Saturday every Saturday hosted by Amy at Signs, Miracles and Wonders.
I’ve been known to emulate Robin’s plethora of “HOLY” outbursts. The most recent one one? A status update on Wednesday:
“At Appliance Direct. Holy rows of broken and ugly, Batman. Is this a scratch n dent store?”
Here’s a few more…
Need a few more chuckles today? Check out Friday Funnies hosted by Homesteaders Heart!
If you’ve got time to hang out for a few minutes, check out what else makes me laugh: Pragmatic Compendium’s “laugh!” category.
PinkGirl has a God story – a story of how God weaved together a bunch of things in her life to bring her to a particular place. Here’s how it went:
1. Bye Bye Birdie – and we mean that literally. The performing arts studio that PinkGirl regularly participates in was supposed to be doing Bye Bye Birdie for their spring play. As it turns out, they didn’t get enough boys to audition and had to switch productions at the last minute. Like I said, bye bye Birdie. They’re doing two relatively unknown shows with a heavy emphasis on dancing.
Dancing is PinkGirl’s weakest link.
The rehearsals have been challenging for her but I’ve seen a lot of improvement the last few months. The hardest thing for her? She didn’t get a part she loved. Between the two plays, she’s: “whiny student,” a villager and a pile of snow. You read that right. A pile of snow. One of many. Every day parts were assigned and she didn’t get one, she asked “What is God doing in my life?” She always asks that question when things don’t go the way she hopes they will. I ask myself the same question when I’m faced with disappointment and obstacles. My answer to her is always the same one I tell myself: “I’m not sure, let’s try and figure out what you’re supposed to learn from this experience.” In this case, my strongest theory was that she needed to focus her attention on the dancing – learn as much as she can and strengthen her skills as much as possible. So she threw her energy at the choreography.
She had also signed up to sing special music at church. Singing as herself and not as a character in a play was a very new experience. Another challenge. I suggested that maybe that was another reason she didn’t get a big part in the plays.
2. Theater for kids, by kids. At this same performing arts company, a group of teenagers have started doing their own productions – interactive theater for children. The shows are on Saturdays at 3pm, an hour and a half after PinkGirl’s regular rehearsals which run from 9am to 1:30pm. I took her to see their production of The Princess and the Frog.
She LOVED it. But not just from the audience’s point of view. She wanted to participate. But these were teenagers. She’s only 10. Undaunted, she asked me to ask the owner of the company to ask the teenagers if they would consider allowing her to be in the next production. A few weeks later, we heard the answer. They were sorry, they would be doing The Emporer’s New Clothes and it just wouldn’t work out to use someone so young. Again with the question. “What is God doing in my life?” I don’t know, babe.
She threw herself back into play rehearsals and signed up to sing special music in church again.
3. The cartwheel. Last month, for the first time since I started recording, I needed someone to watch PinkGirl. Both her brother and father were in Jacksonville at a track meet and we weren’t comfortable leaving her at home alone from 4:30pm to 9:30pm while I was gone. She ended up going home with a friend after school and I picked her up at 9:30 after the session was over. Her friend had tumbling class that night from 6pm to 7pm so she got to go and watch.
For the next two days, she was obsessed with learning to do a cartwheel. Surprisingly, I can still do a cartwheel! Not surprisingly, I have no ability to teach someone else how to do a cartwheel. Subsequently, PinkGirl had no confidence in me and was too scared to throw her feet up in the air. Her cartwheels were not pretty to watch.
Long story short, She went to her first tumbling class last Friday night. And LOVED it.
4. The phone call. It’s spring break, FirstHusband is off for the week and we are on staycation. We’re supposed to go mini-golfing on Tuesday night. The phone rings and it’s the owner of the performing arts company. Would PinkGirl be able to play the part of the princess in The Emporer’s New Clothes? They had their first rehearsal the night before and they decided that PinkGirl would be perfect for the part of the princess. Was this an audition or does she actually have the part? This is it. She’s got the part if she wants it and can commit to the rehearsal and performance schedule. And there’s dancing in this show. Which she’s much better at than she was 3 months ago.
We didn’t go mini-golfing last night. PinkGirl was at rehearsal for The Emporer’s New Clothes. And nobody was upset about that. Especially PinkGirl.
5. The question. As PinkGirl was trying on costumes for The Emporer’s New Clothes, the director asked her, “Can you do a cartwheel?”
PinkGirl had an epiphany. THIS is what God was doing in her life! Preparing her for this! With a big grin, she answered: “Not yet, but I just started tumbling classes so I’ll be able to do one VERY SOON!
God can use anything to teach us faith and patience. Even a cartwheel.
And she’s singing “Pray” by Justine Bieber at all three services this Sunday.
“Would you like to save 10% on your purchase today?”
NO THANK YOU!!!!
Need a few more chuckles today? Check out Friday Funnies hosted by Homesteaders Heart!
If you’ve got time to hang out for a few minutes, check out what else makes me laugh: Pragmatic Compendium’s “laugh!” category.
a Quote:
“…understanding ownership was half of my lesson. If God was the owner, I was the manager. I needed to adopt a steward’s mentality toward the assets He had entrusted – not given – to me.
A steward manages assets for the owner’s benefit. The steward carries no sense of entitlement to the assets he manages. It’s his job to find out what the owner wants done with his assets, then carry out his will.”
(from The Treasure Principle: Unlocking the Secret of Joyful Giving by Randy Alcorn)
my Prayer:
Lord, scheduling tithe checks on bill pay is some serious fun! Thank you for the joy we feel in this obedience. THANK YOU for the provision of my husband’s bonus and THANK YOU for the opportunity to give even more than we normally do. The feeling that comes from giving back some of the money you’ve entrusted to us is like an adrenaline high! Thank you that we never regret it or begrudge it. Thank you for giving us an opportunity to serve you this way. We pray that we’ve interpreted your will correctly and sent your money where you wanted it to go. We pray that you will abundantly bless the efforts of those to whom you have sent it and we trust you to work all things for your good and your glory.
Our continuous prayer is that you help us to be good stewards of everything you entrust to us and to help us achieve our goal of becoming debt-free. Thank you for this answer to our prayer. Thank you for providing a means for more debt reduction. We profoundly understand what a blessing this job is and even more the blessing of this bonus. Thank you, Lord.
the Word:
“Every man shall give as he is able, according to the blessing of the LORD your God which He has given you.”
Deuteronomy 16:17 (NAS)
the lyric:
“Rich or poor God I want You more, than anything that glitters in this world. Be my all, all consuming fire.
You can have all my hands can hold, my heart, mind, strength and soul, Be my all, all consuming fire.
All we need, all we need, all we need is You.”
from All We Need (youtube link) by Charlie Hall 
This was dual published on my Pragmatic Communion blog.