RSS

Considering a New Transition

I am considering making a transition from this blogsite to a new self hosted blog name- one that is my name. As silly as it sounds, I am nervous and hesitant. Here I have shared my heart, but not much of my face, or my name. And you know what? I kind of like it that way.

I have never seen the need for my name to be known, or my face to be seen. I want HIS name to be known. HIS face to be seen. That is what matters most to me.

I am a just a vessel. Sometimes I am broken, at other times, I am restored and sparkling bright. I have no power, apart from Him, to lead, or encourage, or fix your broken heart. Only HE can do that. He resides in vessels, but his vessels cannot satisfy a thirsty heart. I cannot even satisfy my own heart. That is why I need Him.

Still, there is something about seeing a face and knowing a name, that brings us closer to the heart and life of one we desire to know. It is an intimate revealing, and one that we often take for granted.

I write those words, marveling at the wonder that the Creator of the Universe desires for us to know HIM and to see HIS face. What kind of love is that?

I am continuing to pray on my blogging transition. I am also praying for each of my readers as I do:

I pray that you would desire to follow Jesus and see HIS face. I pray you would come to know the power in HIS name.

And if today you are one of the thirsty- searching for a word- reading post after post from every encouraging blogger, preacher, and evangelist you know, just trying to taste a drop of hope, remember- We are all just vessels.

You may find a drop here or there, but in His Word you will find a spring of untainted, beautiful, hopeful, convicting and encouraging, relentless truth.

I pray that you seek His Word first. I pray that tomorrow you will awake with a greater awareness of just how much YOU matter most to HIM, because you do. You matter most to Jesus.

God bless you, reader. Know that you are deeply and relentlessly loved.

- Charity

 
6 Comments

Posted by on May 22, 2013 in What Matters Most

 

Tags: , , , , ,

Large-Family, Make-Ahead Recipes Wanted

20130519-134726.jpg

Sometimes I forget just how practical the Bible really is. I forget that not every lesson has to be some deep, super-spiritual lesson.

For example: Today a guest minister taught on just how important it for us to set aside a day of rest. He referenced how God created the universe in six days and rested on the seventh, and how God instructed the Israelites to gather twice the amount of food that they would usually gather each day on the day before the Sabbath.

Which really got me thinking. I often find myself thinking I have way too much work to rest. But truly, it’s not like I am making Saturn and star consellations over here! If He could make an entire universe and still set aside time to rest what excuse do I have?

Perhaps, like the Israelites, I need to just start making bigger meals and setting the extras aside so I don’t have to prepare food everyday.

With that being said, if you have any large-family, make-ahead, meal recipes, please do share! There is only so much last-minute fish sticks and baked chicken a momma can take!

 
Leave a comment

Posted by on May 19, 2013 in What Matters Most

 

Tags: , , , ,

Filter My Heart

20130507-141454.jpg

We recently changed out our water filter on our refrigerator. We went so long without changing it that the filter literally began to overflow, creating quite a mess. For weeks before that, the water pressure was so low that the flow of water was ridiculously slow. It was a testing of patience just to fill a glass with water. After realizing the condition of the filter, I began to consider just how poor the condition of the water we had been drinking had become. Gross really to think of it. But you know what is worse than a gunked up water filter? What is worse is a gunked up heart.

Our heart can get so gunked up from life. When it does we may not recognize it but the evidence will be there- in our words, our thoughts, and our actions. This is a good prayer to pray in those gunky moments: “Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me.” (Psalm 51:10)

God can clean up our heart and allow us to think clearly, speak wisely and act in a way that brings him glory. Allow His Spirit to be your filter. Slow your flow and avoid a mess.

 
 

Tags: , , , , ,

Thought for the Day

We need not beat ourselves up over our imperfections. We also need not settle for them. Where is the hope in that? We can improve. We can do better. We can do it. He will help.

Philippians 4:13
For I can do everything through Christ, who gives me strength.

 
2 Comments

Posted by on May 4, 2013 in Encouraging Quotes

 

Tags: , , , , ,

You’re too Big for That!

20130502-092517.jpg

Walking around with Band-aids on my heels today because I insisted on walking around in shoes that were too small for me yesterday. I knew they were too small from the moment I put them on but they looked so good I figured I would put up with the pain. (It’s a girl thing and unfortunately, so is this:)

Us ladies tend to get ourselves in relationships that do not fit us, but we stay in them because we think it makes us look better or simply because those “shoes” just look so good! Wrong choice ladies. If a man hurts you from the moment you get to know him, chances are he is going to keep hurting you. You are not going to “break him in.” It is more likely the case that he is going to break your heart. Leave him on the shelf. Don’t buy into his lies. Do not bring him home! You’re too “big” for that.

And should you have walked in the wrong relationship, or perhaps a few wrong ones, and it has left blisters on your heart, there is still hope. Jesus can heal those blisters and guard your heart, much better than any band-aid. Hand him your heart and allow him to show you just where you should be placing your feet and heart.

 
2 Comments

Posted by on May 2, 2013 in Dating

 

Tags: , , , , , ,

Their Grade is Not Your Grade- Encouragement for Parents

20130423-152432.jpg

Our three year-old daughter scribbled all over her brother’s math test earlier today. Frustrated, he said to me, “I am going to fail! She scribbled all over it!” I tried to reassure him, “You can write over her answers. I will be able to see your writing. I am not grading her. I am grading you.”

In that moment, God made clear a similiar concept that I have struggled with for some time. As a mom, when my kids misbehave it is easy to feel like I am a failure. Indeed, there will be others who will judge me for their mistakes. But the truth is my “grade” is not based on my children’s mistakes. My grade is based on how I perform in the midst of their mistakes. God is able to clearly see me in the midst of the mess. Their mistakes are not equivalent to my failure.

Perhaps you need to hear that today too. Your grade is not based on your children’s mistakes. Your grade is based on how you perform in the midst of their mistakes. God is able to clearly see you in the midst of the mess. Their mistakes are not equivalent to your failure. Have no fear. If you continue to walk in love, you will pass any test.

 
Leave a comment

Posted by on April 23, 2013 in Hope, Parenting

 

Tags: , , , , , ,

When I Consider Abortion

Abortion. The very word stirs up a tidal wave of emotions, crashing against the hearts of those both for and against the practice. I have seen the many posts on my Facebook feed from those on each side of the argument. But today, I do not desire to take a side. I simply desire to share my heart.

I am the mother of six young children. Our first did not come according to our plan. As a matter of fact, we found out we were expecting in the same month that my husband told me, “We just need to make sure you do not get pregnant” and in the same week that I told our family, “We do not want any children right now. We are going to wait five years.” Our son was not planned. At least not by us.

I will never forget that day. I stood in our bathroom, stomach twisting and fear rising as I saw two pink lines appearing where I only wanted to see one. My husband sat in our living room at his desk trying to balance our finances and study for school, waiting for the result. There I was, hands holding the proof of the very thing he had said he did not want to happen.

Shaky, sickened, nervous, I walked to him and handed him the result. He looked at it, tears flooded his eyes, and he began to weep. And then he did something I wasn’t expecting. He began to thank God. Nine months later our oldest son was born, forever changing the course of our plans.

Over the past ten years we have had six children. After our second, I vowed I would never have more. I said the same after our third, and fourth, and fifth. (Lack of sleep can cause you to say many things you will later take back.)

In fact, I was so convinced after our third son, my husband was all set up for a vasectomy. He went to his first appointment but then was forced to miss his second. He rescheduled and then was forced to miss again due to a work schedule that was absolutely out of his control. After the second sudden change in his work schedule, we considered it as a clear sign that it was not the right time to proceed. I say all this because the truth of the matter is, our children were not our plan.

Nearly every day I consider what blessings I would have missed out on had life gone according to my plans. I look at our two little girls and I cannot imagine life without them, but that is what I wanted. I had no idea just how deeply tiny, curly, messy locks of hair would suddenly make me wonderfully aware of the beauty found in my own messy locks. I could not have imagined how the sounds of their little feet clomping around in my shoes would inspire me to walk in bigger shoes. I did not foresee how one little girl’s carefree dancing and spinning around on dirty kitchen floors would challenge me to look past the dirt in my own life and dare to dance. I just could not see it.

Neither could I have imagined the joy that would fill my heart watching a little boy, who looks like me, run in the mud. I had no idea just how much I would learn to trust God when I let go of his red rocket bicycle that no longer had training wheels. I did not imagine how watching our son’s hands place together Legos scattered across the floor would comfort my heart and cause me to consider just how possible it is for the scattered and broken parts of my life to come beautifully together. Lesson upon lesson and love upon love, that I just could not see.

When I thought of a child I did not see a blessing. I saw a burden. I saw crying and messes and need upon need. But through choosing to take on the seemingly impossible I gained what I truly needed. I gained the perspective of how The Lord sees me.

I am not a burden. My cries and my needs do not go unnoticed. They are heard. They are felt. My pains grieve my Maker and my joys are His joys. I had heard this before, but only by having children of my own could I truly believe. Through the process of choosing to love and make sacrifices for beings of seemingly less worth, have I come to understand just how much God loves me and just how great of a reward I am to Him.

So when I consider abortion, when I tuck our children in bed and imagine for a short moment the picture of what could have been, their tiny bodies in bags or jars to be discarded, my heart breaks at a loss that many women will one day come to understand.

She will feel it in glimpses. She will go out to eat with her girlfriends and feel an ache in her stomach at the sight of a newborn in a carrier sitting at the table beside her. She will go to for a walk to clear her mind only to be reminded of what could have been when a mother with her young daughter passes by riding bicycles. And every year when the day comes around that should have been replaced with a birthday, she will feel it as she considers once again what could have been.

I don’t write this for those who are looking to argue. I don’t write this for those who want to debate. I write this with the hope that maybe, just maybe, one woman who is on the line, because her life didn’t go “as planned” will let hope be born.

And should a woman read this who made the choice to abort and is now feeling the loss, I want you to know that there is still hope. There is forgiveness. Their is love, because in all of this, you are still a child of God. He loves you. Hope may have died but hope can be reborn. I pray your hope be reborn today. I pray that you cast any and all guilt aside. I pray that every possibility that has been hidden in your heart, including those that people have told you will never work, will once again begin to take shape and that you may see the wonderful plans that God has for you born and lived out to their fullest from this day forward.

This is what I think of when I consider abortion.


“Children are a gift from the Lord;
they are a reward from him.”
– Psalm 127:3

 
4 Comments

Posted by on April 17, 2013 in Hope, Loving Others, News and Trends, Parenting

 

Tags: , , ,

 
Charity Gutierrez- Mercy in the Messes

Mercy in the Messes, Meaning in the Madness, Giggles, Grace and Glory Divine

Sam's Online Journal

a daily work in progress

What Matters Most

A Mother's Devotional

Mom and Boys

Figuring it out one day at a time.

barrentoblessed

a little bit of hope, joy, love, grace, life and all things in between

THIS DIVA'S DAILY DEVOTIONAL

Devoted Inspired Victorious Adored

Be Face to Face

Writing about Faith, Love, Life and all that I can fit in-between!

Joe Quatrone, Jr.

Proclaiming relevant Bible truth and building up the Body of Christ

A Story By Me

as I'm learning to see

Choose to be free.

Freedom is a gift, to be received and given.

Faith4TheJourney

Walk in a manner worthy of the calling with which you have been called

The John 15 Life

Exploring life connected to the True Vine

The Masquerade

{attempting authenticity}

emilyvictorious

Just another WordPress.com site

micahmaisel

My job as an intercessory missionary

A Homeschool Mom

Inspirations for Learning

Bible Verses for Women

Practical ways for living a godly life

Deuceology

Making Much Of What Matters Most

My Resting Place...

STEADY SHE GROWS.

My Second Chance

Change is what you make it; Learn to embrace it <3

nextgenhomeschool

Homeschooled Moms Homeschooling Our Next Generation

justinecirullo

my life, my love, my hopes, my dreams

THE CRUNCHY CHRISTIAN

"But far be it from me to boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world." - Galatians 6:14

I am. Because of You.

Perseverance in living through God's words

overflow

write life, share life, love God, repeat

greenlightlady

As a still lake reflects creation, so may our hearts reflect the Creator's glory.

MarieHermannWrites

Inspirational and Christ-Centered Writer

Motherhood Is An Art

Motherhood takes a lot of creativity and humor!

Holly Michael's Writing Straight

Connecting and Inspiring Along Life's Crooked Lines by Author & Freelance Writer Holly Michael

Second Wind

Spirit Empowered Living for the Last Mile

balanceandlove

Smile! You’re at the best WordPress.com site ever

4thlink's Blog

Reaching every soul with the word of life.

RJ Da Warrior's Blog

Day By Day Hep-C Treatment

life of a female bible warrior

daily journey in spirituality

thornblanket

Living, or just breathing

Everyone Has A Story...

Finding my own joy in the journey...

justalilly

Things pertaining to life in Jesus Christ.........

yalandarose

Just another WordPress.com site

mamacravings

everything a mama could want

Set Apart Teens

Christian Teen Talk

The tempo of my heart

All Filled Up

“He will yet fill your mouth with laughter and your lips with shouts of joy.” - Job 8:21

kellyhartland

Aphorist / Visual Artist

The1savedbygrace's Blog

Learning to give the same grace I have received.

hannahs7bananas

A blog about bunches of blessings, 7 days a week!

Follow

Get every new post delivered to your Inbox.

Join 305 other followers