I'm Expecting!

Picture it...Christmas Eve and I'm 8 years old. Grandma's kitchen is full - full of women cooking, stirring, tasting and basting. Laughter rings all throughout the house. It's warm in the house, not from the thermostat, but because the oven is on and all the burners are going. It's also warm from the love of family and togetherness. And oh the smells...turkey, greens, sweet potato pie, pineapple upside down cake. Oh my!

I am standing in the living room in front of a large Christmas tree. The lights dance around the branches, softly glowing behind the angel hair and tinsel. The 5-point star blinks 'hello' on top. And underneath...spread all around are boxes of all shapes and sizes neatly wrapped with colorful paper and sticky bows. Each one of those boxes holds a secret that can't be told until morning. It is the Barbie doll head I wanted? Could this one be the GI Joe with the kung-fu grip for my brother? Rock 'Em Sock 'Em Robot? Baby Alive? Easy Bake Oven? I expect that this is going to be the best Christmas ever. How am I ever going to get to sleep? I hope I fall asleep so Santa will come and bring the big presents that don't get put under the tree, like the bike or the doll house!

If I'm honest, I am still like that little girl today. But now, I have expectations and hopes that extend far beyond what I am going to get for Christmas. We all do.

We hope that we don't lose our jobs so we can pay bills.

We hope our daughter doesn't lose another baby.

We hope our son will get off, and stay off, drugs.

We hope we can pay that mortgage or rent one more month.

I realize that throughout my whole life I have expected a lot from folks. I expected my parents to love me no matter what I did. I expected my brother to fight with me and protect me at the same time. I expected my husband to provide for me and to love me til death did us part. I expected my children to respect me and listen to me and know I was always right. I expected my bosses to support me and to believe that the place would fall apart without me. I expected everyone to accept me for who I was, no questions asked.

Those poor folks. How could they ever live up to my ever-growing expectations? Did they even know that I had these burdens on them? Nope. But God help them if they failed me. And you know what? At some point or another they all did. Not necessarily intentionally but somehow, in some way they did. Because I expected from them that which is impossible.

I have learned, quite the hard way, that there is only one in whom I can expect anything, and receive everything.

"I say to myself 'the Lord is my portion; therefore I will wait for Him.' The Lord is good to those whose hope is in Him, to the one who seeks Him." Lamentations 3:24-25

See, I found that God is the only one who can actually meet my expectations. He cannot fail me. BUT, I can only have one expectation: THAT GOD'S WILL BE DONE. And if that is my hope, then I have to surrender my life and the lives of my loved ones to God's will. Sounds easy doesn't it? Well it ain't! It's a daily prayer...sometimes an hourly prayer. It's often been a minute-by-minute prayer. Lord, let your will be done.

Let your will be done.

Strengthen me to deal with whatever your will is.

Give me peace in my heart for whatever your will is.

Help me find joy in it.

Teach me about myself in it.

Increase my prayer life in it.

Let me be an example in it.

Get all the glory and honor in it.

All of those people in my life...they just got off lucky. Because now I only expect them to be who they are and to only do what they can. Because at the end of the day, I am praying God's will in our lives. And I know that He won't fail.

He said "...as I was with Moses, so I will be with thee; I will not fail thee nor forsake thee."Joshua 1:5. "For I am the Lord, I change not." Malachi 3:6

So every day I am expecting, like a kid on Christmas Eve, waiting for the Glory of the Lord to be revealed. What a gift!

In love,

Mona

Mirror Mirror on the Wall

I'm starting with the man in the mirror. I'm asking him to change his ways. And no message could have been any clearer. If you wanna make the world a better place, take a look at yourself, and then make a change.

~ Man In The Mirror, Michael Jackson

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Mirror (noun): a reflecting surface usually made of glass with a silvery back, used for viewing oneself.

Mirror (verb): to be or give a faithful representation, image or idea of.

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There are 3 types of mirrors in my bathroom. The first is a tabletop mirror that has two sides. One side shows my face in its actual size. The other side is magnified to about 2x the normal size. The third is a HUGE 6'x6' wall mirror. I hate that one. But I'm getting ahead of myself.

The first mirror is good for putting on lipstick or using it with the big mirror to check out the back of my hair. The magnified mirror is pretty bad. It shows every blemish, freckle and pore and my gray hair always looks much grayer on that side. I only use it when I put on mascara.

But that wall mirror....oh God. It shows everything. I'm shaking my head right now just thinking about that mirror. Every pound, every droop, every wrinkle, every thigh and all my behind. I HATE THAT MIRROR! I can't hide anything from myself in that mirror. It shows me just who I am.

I have often complained to God about other people's behavior. I have ranted and raved about this person's bad attitude, her smart mouth, his anger and resentment. I wondered why this one treated me so poorly and why that one talked about me. I wanted God to do something about them. Make them stop! And then one day God held a mirror to my face and showed me me. It wasn't a small hand-held mirror either. It was a 12'x12' double-wide-triple-long-super-deep-space-reflecting mirror. I couldn't hide a thing.

He says to me, "what about you? Are you loving the person with the bad attitude? Are you speaking life to the one with the smart mouth? Are you walking in forgiveness towards the one full of anger and resentment? Are you praying for the one who treats you poorly? Are you acting godly to the one who talks about you? Perhaps, it needs to begin with you..."

O.U.C.H.

And I was speechless. A rare occurence, for those of you who know me. "I, I, I, but, but, but..."

But nothing. It all begins with me. How can I expect to be forgiven unless I first forgive? How can I forget my own past, while I'm all the time reminding other's of theirs? How can I beg to be loved if I am so full of hate? How can I profess God's greatness on Sunday while acting like a devil Monday through Saturday?

"As water reflects a face, so a man's heart reflects the man" Proverbs 27:19

What would you see if you looked in the mirror? If you looked yourself deeply in eyes, what images would reflect back at you? What's in your heart?

It's a bold and scary thing to do, but ask God to show you to yourself. He will teach you so much about you. Some of it will be suprising, especially the good stuff that He'll show you.

Show me, me!

In love,

Mona