Influence Meet & Greet

First things first...my real name is Sarah James, wife, & mamma of 4 kids.

Things you should know about me:
1. I get a HUGE thrill out of getting organized (or organizing someone else)! I mean HUGE people...these are the things that could keep me up at night...thinking through organizing strategies!

2. I am a miracle walking. A few years ago, God spared my life. I'm a walking medical miracle. Doctor's saw the hand of God.  I am amazed when I think of it. (More to come on the blog soon...once I get my new "brand" up.)

3. I read your blogs, but I don't comment...ever really. So I'm really working on "getting my voice on". Ha! I'm just a bit timid about putting it out here online...I need help with this!

Things I'm looking forward to at Influence:
1. I'm SO VERY EXCITED to get a handle on blogging well and re-branding my voice online. I very much despise the look of my blog. I had it at prettied up, but I wasn't on it for a while and when I went back all the pretty was gone. Now, I can't get the ugly off to start anew. I have tons of ideas for getting my voice out, but looking forward to the encouragement to "JUST DO IT!" :)

2. I love meeting new people, so I am looking forward to meeting the blogger's I follow face to face and being encouraged in person by their spirit.

One thing I can't leave home without:
ACCESSORIES! :) I know, that wouldn't surprise my 'in real life' friends at all. Accessories are what pull the outfit together for me, so I don't leave home without them! Scarves, necklaces, bracelets, rings, earrings, belts, etc...the whole 9 yards of bling goes with me each time I leave the house!

in(RL) was amazing!

I wasn't sure what to expect, but WOW! I loved everything in(RL) this weekend!!! First on Friday, I watched the initial video. I laughed and cried and knew that I was in the right place at that moment...my heart being poored over by these passionate women who don't even know me...who didn't even know the little me was watching. I want to be a passionate woman again. I was...once. I think I still am...sometimes. I just don't live every day with passion for God, my family and friends. The in(RL) video on Friday brought tears for many reasons...I was touched. I want to be Jesus to my friends and I want them to be Jesus to me. I have a few friends who are truely this and then so many others that are just a surface level "thing". Those surface level things are okay, but they are not what draws me to Jesus in the way that I need. So I was encouraged to "heart up" with my Jesus with skin on friends! Since I learned so much on Friday, I'm going to just list some random thoughts below and you can sort them out! Ha! :)

• Write openly & live openly & God will use that to touch others lives!
• Make people's hearts my intent!!!  Make people my priority, make them feel valued, give them 100% of me at the moment they need me...don't be too distracted in conversation to be used.
• CHOOSE JOY!
• Refuse to be defined. Get faith, get perspective...God's perspective.
• Acknowledge the "real" but keep the eternal perspective in clear focus.
• I am able to keep the JOY if I send it out.
• LOVE WELL! LOVE FULLY! DIVE INTO REAL RELATIONSHIPS!

I'm ready to "live out these things in love". I'm ready for friends who are ready too...not just a surface "thing". I'm ready...are you ready? Do you want to be my friend...my Jesus with skin on? I'll be yours!!!  Let's be real together!!!  Are you with me? I'd love to hear from you...

PS. More on the meet up, the real in(RL) people meetup, soon. And I have more to share about the other (in)courage videos too. Come back to read more later.

Good Day!

Today is a good day and I just had to share! It was too much to post on twitter and I don't like posting facebook status' anymore. So, I'll share here.

We've been dealing with a LOT of spiritual warfare here everyday, or just about everyday, for a while now. I will just say this about it...it's completely exhausting! For whatever reason it wears a person out to pray a prayer for spiritual warfare to be fought and for God to win. Crazy I know and maybe another day I'll share more about what exactly it is that is going on in my house and with my family. But back to today...I've been exhausted. Tired beyond belief. So I've needed more rest than usual and as a result my husband has been good to let me sleep. I've also felt the need to have "restful" days...just sitting, not doing much.

Well, today Gerrad kissed me goodbye as I barely opened my eyes. :) I love when he wakes me with a kiss! Anyway, I eventually got up. Before I got out of my room I was greeted by all four of my kids. A couple of them were in bed with me. :) I love that too...sometimes! I rolled out of bed and told my little Deja to go get me a baby wipe and panties (yes, she's potty training and doing a fantastic job!). I'm waiting on her and I remember it's trash day. I text Gerrad to see if he remembered or if I have to go out in the rain to put the trash can at the street. He remembered, shew. Then he proceeds to tell me that not only did he put the trash at the street, but he did the dishes from last night AND changed over a load of laundry for me!!!!!!!! Isn't that AWESOME! :) He did it all in efforts to give me a restful, better day. How sweet! But the story of my good day doesn't end there...

I changed Deja to her panties and head downstairs. I hear clatter in the kitchen and I see my two older ones climbing to get down cereal, bowls and spoons to serve everyone breakfast! WOW! My kids are doing this themselves!?!?! I take a second look around to make sure I'm in the right house! Ha! They did it all themselves...they served everyone breakfast AND worked together with no arguing! Another amazing blessing!!! I pored my coffee and sat down...wow, how nice is this day?

One more thing that has made today a good day... To give some background, we've been struggling with rebellion and stubbornness and defiance from our eldest son. It's been tough. Making parenting decisions and praying you grow fruit out of it. I've been praying that God would break Austin's will on these subjects so that we can see some fruit to know that we are "parenting" in the right way. Anyway, yesterday we ran into those heart issues again and again they surfaced this morning early...and continuously through the first several hours. So I called Gerrad to discuss just how I should be handling it. Between the two of us we came up with some punishments for direct actions, but felt led to head to scripture for correcting those heart issues. A while ago I picked up a book called, For Instruction in Righteousness. It's an amazing book. It divides up sin issues and compiles all the scripture and definitions in one place. God reminded me of this book and I pulled it out....praying that Austin hearing scripture would break. As I read scripture to him and explained briefly the meanings, I watched his face change, his heart was softening, he was breaking! Praise God. We prayed and I saw repentance! That just topped it and made this a GREAT DAY! :)

So now it's lunch and I wonder what else God will have in store to add to this day. :) Thank you God for blessing me in such wonderful ways today. I pray that if you are reading this God will bless you today and that you will see it....even if they are "small" blessings. :) Have a good day everyone!

Ps. Oh wait! There's one more thing! My two year old is standing beside me playing and singing, "Ha-A-oo-ah" (Hallelujah!). :)

Praise!

So I asked prayer for a few things last week. Here are the prayer requests and praise updates...

Old prayer requests--If you want to pray for me:

1. Pray I'd get caught up on my reading.

2. Pray that I'd spend time EVERY day so that I don't have "catch up" to do.

3. Pray that God would speak to me like never before.

4. Pray that when God speaks, I will listen and obey.

I just wanted to check in real fast. I did get caught up on my reading last week and it wasn't as daunting of a task as I'd imagined. :) Thank you for praying. I have also (God willing) been faithful to spend time is His Word every "week day", but I'm struggling with the "week-end" days. I guess it's because our schedule is different on those days and the "routine" is off. I don't know, but I don't want to make excuses. I WANT to be in God's Word EVERY DAY...and that means faithful on weekends too. God has been speaking to me and so far I have been praying about how to obey. Please continue to pray for my faithfulness in reading EVERYDAY, that God will speak in a mighty way to me, that I will listen and obey. Thanks again for praying with me! It's encouraging to have you praying for me!!!

Have a good weekend everyone!

Sarah

A New Challenge

Today I started a new challenge with Hello mornings. I'm in #HMC10 via twitter. I was encouraged this morning in the Word, but also to see others in the Word alongside me. It was an awesome experience! My kids were up before I even got started, but I sent them back to bed for an hour so that I could have some uninterrupted time...alone with God, listening to Him speak to me. I'm reading through the Bible in a YEAR! I've never finished this task before, so I'm excited to do it this year...at least God willing and if my flesh of laziness doesn't get in the way. I thought I was right on target and doing well until this morning during my time read/listening (I listen via YouVersion Bible reading...and read along)...anyway, I realized that there is evening reading too! ACK! I have some catching up to do now!!! I was thinking it seemed easy without much trouble getting it done...now I know why...I wasn't reading it all! I am slightly discouraged at the moment because now I'm not up to speed like I thought, but I will get there. I'm also reading Experiencing God by Henry Blackaby. I've heard it's a life changing book. I'm excited! Gerrad and I started reading it a few years ago, but then life got in the way (the flesh of some sort) and we stopped. So now I downloaded the audible version and I'm listening as I read along. I've figured out that's the best way for me...listening and reading along. And with the new IPhone my husband just bought me (I love him!!!), I can listen at different speeds to "hurry" or if the reader is slow I can "hurry him/her up". :) I really LOVE it! Just give me a few days to do it.

If you want to pray for me:
1. Pray I'd get caught up on my reading
2. Pray that I'd spend time EVERY day so that I don't have "catch up" to do.
3. Pray that God would speak to me like never before
4. Pray that when God speaks, I will listen and obey.

Today I was challenged by Matthew 6:33-34. "But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you. Therefore do not be anxious about tomorrow, for tomorrow will be anxious for itself. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble." God wants us to enter each day seeking Him. Out of that relationship, we will experience Him guiding our lives. (Blackaby) It was a good morning in the Word and walking with my Lord.

Have a blessed day with God!
Sarah

Well, here I am again... I realize I haven't written in a long time, but things have been busy...REALLY busy. Our family has been on a journey to change what we do and how we do it. We have been overhauling our ENTIRE lively hood. I'll admit, it's been nuts, crazy, chaos, insane and somewhat peaceful in the midst of all that! I know those two sound like contradictions, but they really aren't. Because Jesus has been in the midst of the leading what we do everyday. You see, we have these four little blessings in our house...Denae (8 yrs.), Austin (6 yrs.), Avery (3 yrs.), and Deja (will be 2 yrs in a couple wks). Our blessings have "issues". Some is just our inborn sin nature. Some is our degenerated genetics passed down. Some is how we were eating. Some is how we disciplined. And the rest is the lack of discipline with how we were living our lives. Well, we are on a journey to change...BIG CHANGES ARE HAPPENING HERE! We have one blessing with Dyslexia, one blessing has ADD, and one blessing has Autism. Our house feels very crazy a lot of the time. BUT GOD... Those two words say a lot to me... BUT GOD...

God started working in my heart to figure out exactly why my kids were acting like heathens and why I was loosing my sanity! As I prayed, He lead. We have changed our diet, changed our discipline system, changed our ways of curing our illnesses, changed our way of schooling, changed our thinking, changed our time spent with God and HE (yes, God) has changed our lives!!! He has given my husband and I strength, wisdom, patience and understanding. No, not every day is perfect or even good for that matter, but every day is from Him. We strive to do every day WITH Him and He provides what we need for each moment.

So as I was saying we have changed how we spend time with God...well, I'll tell you that that has been a huge part of making our family mesh. The goal is this:

At least once a day we set everything down. The kids and I crank up the worship music and jam. Yes, we rock it! (No mental pictures allowed here. lol.) We sing our hearts out and dance until we are out of breath...all while we are laughing and praising the Lord together. :) I LOVE this time everyday. After our worship time we sometimes just have book time (this is when I pull out my Beth Moore Bible study or just get in the Word for a minute), sometimes I read scripture or a devo book to the kids, and other times my three younger kids go play again while I get in the Word and our mommy/daughter devo book (Dannah Gresh's tween study...I highly recommend this! It creates an amazing connected relationship with your daughter. I thought I had one, but nope I really didn't. Maybe I'll write about this another day). Anyway, if the day is crazy book time doesn't work, so that nixes quiet time too, but our worship..."rock it out"...time is always able to happen. It's fun and active (and a good workout for this outta shape mommy).

Things have changed here and I am thankful. For a few weeks, I would have rathered give up or disappear. I am SOOOO glad that those weeks are behind us. Though we do still have many rough days, I am very thankful to have Jesus to call on. (For those of you that hear me complain on my bad days please remind me to call on Jesus! Thanks! :))

I may not be able to write for a long time again and I may write tomorrow...I don't know! That's the "schedule" we are on in the house...day by day, moment by moment. :) Thanks Jesus for helping me, our family, through this journey. I look forward to watching you continue to change us to be better used for YOU!!!

I'm SOOO EXCITED!!!

So, what to know why? I got a Christmas present early! :) Gerrad and I haven't exchanged presents in a L.O.N.G. time, but this year we are! He presented mine the other night so that I would have time to "learn" before I really wanted to use it. Okay, wanna know what it was..is? A CANON REBEL! I've been asking for one for, um let's just say years! I finally have one! Thank you GERRAD!

I always said if I ever were to own such a thing I would learn how to use it...I mean, REALLY learn. Like as in learn how to be a professional (or at least somewhat of) photographer. So, now I'm on a mission...I have a hobby once again with my newest addition! Yes, it will be my baby for a while at least until I really learn it. :)

So friends of you out there with tips to share or wisdom to pass along...I'm all ears!!! I am looking to see if I can find some good blogs to follow with good photography tips too. Hopefully someday soon I can put my acquired skills to work as a small little side business...that would be a dream come true! :)

Well, everyone have a very Merry Christmas! And don't worry, if you happen to be at my family gatherings this year you WILL have my camera in your face...I'm learning, remember!? Have a good day everyone!