Crave

I love my church family!  Finding a new church home can be one of the most daunting tasks of any move.  It is like replacing your family.  People who love and minister to you, encourage and teach, forgive and shower you with grace when you are human – people who are quite simply genuine are hard to find these days.  Friendship, the kind that takes deep root and grows forever, that is what I long for here at my new home here in North Carolina.

It is true what they say, “You don’t know what you have until it is gone.”  When I moved, I suddenly found myself friendless.  Not fun, but God used sudden stillness to take me alongside Him so He could show me a few things – like the value in sharing myself with others.  One of the most priceless things He showed me recently is the value in extending grace to everyone from the pesky telemarketers to little boys tracking Carolina red clay all over my new carpet. I can’t think of anyone who has extended more grace to me over the years than my sisters, especially Kim.

Let me first begin with a sincere confession. I was an evil child. I am still apologizing for things I did to Kim when we were toddlers. I should probably tell you a little about my sister. She is tall, beautiful and a mother of 6 (5 of which are boys.) She home schools the whole lot of them ranging in age from 2-17.  She is the peacemaker type, but she has always been bigger than me and can easily kick my tail when deserving. I on the other hand don’t mind confrontation.  In fact, at certain times of the month I may actually seek it out.  This story takes place during one of those special times.

To preface this story you need to be aware that when you have six kids, housekeeping is reduced to maintenance only.  Just try to maintain the status quo, don’t let things get out of hand, keep the piles of laundry down to knee height and we’re good. Wiping baseboards and ceiling fans have about the same priority as shaving your legs in the winter.  As well it should be.

Visiting Kim one day, I noticed a significant accumulation of dust on the ceiling fan in the living area. You know on television how they sometimes show the little good angel on one shoulder and the little bad angel on the other? Well, my good angel had apparently taken off to Bass Pro shop for the afternoon to escape little Miss PMS, because I didn’t hear a peep out of him.  But the evil little guy on my shoulder pipes up, “Hey, I wonder what would happen if you reverse the direction on the fan.  I bet it would be funny.”  Now, I like funny. So I agreed.  My sister walks in, flips the switch and suddenly dust bunnies were dive bombing the living room. My sister glares at me with little grey fluffs crowning her head like a matronly tiara.

Immediately I get “the look.” Maybe you know “the look.” The one that says, “I am so going to wipe you off the face of this planet!”

I should probably add to my timely confession that I also have no filter between the brain and the mouth during certain times of the month. So as you would expect, I don’t take a hint from just “the look.”  I notice a plump bunny floating down and resting at Kim’s feet, and I pop off, “Hey, if we take a cross section of that one and count the rings, maybe we can tell how old it is.”  I thought that was hilarious!  I was wrong.

I am one of those Extra Grace Required people.  And my sisters have showered me with more than my share of grace.  My sisters are my best friends.  We have history. Moving across the country from my best friends has been hard.  But God went before me to North Carolina and hand picked a wonderful group of women who have made my transition here one of my greatest blessings.  We share our lives with each other, carry each others burdens and together we sit at the feet of Jesus every week to hear God’s voice. This Blog is for them, for us. My hope is that you will find Christ in these pages as we share our hearts with you.