The Discipline of Dismay

I am not a great writer due to my grammar skills or lack-thereof, but I am excited either way about this blog.

But, the whole reason for this post is to (yes, start blogging) but to encourage and share something that put a new perspective on what I have been going through, a few weeks ago...sometimes we need to be told we are allowed to feel a certain way.  Its crazy how the "christian" bubble, if we listen to the lies, tells us we shouldn't feel things...cause my BIG God knows all the feelings I have before I have them and HE has never allowed me to fall from his hands.


My Utmost For His Highest (Updated Graduate Edition)
By Oswald Chambers

March 15
 "As the followed they were afraid" (Mark 10:32).


       At the beginning of our life with Jesus Christ, we were sure we knew all there was to know about following Him.  It was a delight to forsake everything else and to throw ourselves before Him in a fearless statement of love.  But now we are not quite so sure.  Jesus is far ahead of us and is beginning to seem different and unfamiliar--"Jesus was going before them; and they were amazed" (10:32).
      There is an aspect of Jesus that chills even a disciple's heart to its depth and makes his entire spiritual life gasp for air.  This unusual Person with His face set "like a flint" (Isaiah 50:7) us walking with great determination ahead of me.  He no longer seems to be my Counselor and Friend and has a point of view about which I know nothing.  All I can do is stand and stare at him in amazement.  At first I was confident that I understood him, but now I am not so sure.  I began realizing that there is a distance between Jesus and me and I can no longer be intimate with Him.  I have no idea where He is going, and the goal has become strangely distant.
       Jesus Christ had to understand fully every sin and sorrow that human being could experience, and that is what makes Him seem unfamiliar.  When we see this aspect of Him, we realize we really don't know Him.  We don't recognize even one characteristic of His Life, and we don't know how to begin to follow Him.
      The Discipline of dismay is an essential lesson which a disciple must learn.  The danger is that we tend to look back on our times of obedience and on our past sacrifices to God in effort to keep our enthusiasm for Him strong (see Isaiah 1:10-11).  But when the darkness of dismay comes, endure until it is over, because out of it will come the ability to follow Jesus truly, which brings inexpressibly wonderful joy.

JOY! oh how I desire to be joyful...I am not depressed and my life is not awful but I do not have Joy.  It is discouraging and hard to know what you have been made to do and know what God has called your life to, but be in a place of waiting.  This last year and continuing on into 2011 has been waiting in the desert. I have no idea and I can not fathom what God has in store for me but I am not very patient when it comes to waiting.

Recently I heard the song "Desert" by Hillsong.  I really like the words...

"All of my life
In every season
You are still God
I have a reason to sing
I have a reason to worship"

 That is just it. It is a season. And God is still God.  And "...he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus." (Philippians 1:6)

The craziness....

Finishing school and transitioning into a new stage of life and moving far away from everything and anything you know is kind of challenging to say the least.  God did a lot in my move from Phx to Colorado but he has stretched and challenged me 100 times more this time around.


Some great books I have read along the way: 
A Million Miles in A Thousand Years By: Donald Miller
Don't Waste Your Life By: John Piper
(Side Note: whether or not you like these authors just with anything in life you take what you can from the ideas portrayed and leave the rest)

I think these books touched a part of me and spoke to my heart because I kind of feel like I have been wasting my life.  I think anyone who has ever worked in a field they were not made for or just had a job that they disliked would agree that it is very unsatisfying.  Not to be a person who complains a lot but it is just what happens.  These books challenge you to live fully within your current place in life.  Something God calls us to, "to have life and life to the full". John 10:10  Take the rut I was feeling (and trying to be proactive by taking my attitude captive and being content in Christ) and add my mom passing away suddenly and you get a mess of person who is still very much loved by Christ.

My mom is one of the many avenues Jesus used to bring me to himself.  God had been planting the seed for many years prior to my freshman year of high school but it was only when I saw that God was not a God in the sky, simply looking down on us, but a God who is alive, living, and moving among us (through how he was working and changing my mom's life) did I realize who he was and who Jesus was for me.  Because God used her life to bring me to himself it has been hard to come to him because there is an ache and pain that lingers.  Christ and my mom for me were very intertwined.  I don't really know if this is making any sense but it has been interesting.  God is still good. God is still loving, faithful, and provides more than I even know, but it causes me to weep when I worship him.  Accepting my mom's death is a very hard thing to do.  I know it happened (not in denial), but out of stubbornness and dislike for it I do not want to accept it.  So when I go to worship and sing "holy, holy, holy..."  I cant keep the tears back because I know that these words are true but my heart is breaking at the same time...

(Music is one way the Lord has used, in the last 8 years I have known him, to speak to the deepest parts of who I am and to be words for emotions I do not know how to express.  It doesn't always have to be "cheesy" Christian Music.  It doesn't make you less cool either if you do listen to Christian Music.)

RIP Kathy Hoover 1/30/2011

This was the last picture I took with my mom.  It was at my graduation ceremony May 2010.  I went and visited over Labor Day weekend 2010 and then about 5 months later she passed away from Coronary Artery Disease (which was not known by those she left behind).

Katherine Joan Hoover, loving wife, mother, sister, and friend, age 42, was born November 8, 1968. She peacefully passed away Sunday January 30, 2011 in her sleep.

        Kathy leaves behind her husband Alan; children Ashlyn, Megan, Chelsea, Lauren, and AJ; brothers Tommy, Stewart, Gary, Donnie, and Jimmy; sisters Patty, Karen, Denny, and Sherri; several nieces and nephews; her two kitties and dog Tilly.

There are no words to express how amazing Kathy was and how much she will be missed. She was greatly loved by all. Everyone who knew Kathy enjoyed being in her presence. She enjoyed fishing, working, cooking, eating, and anything that had to do with family.

Kathy had been with her husband Alan for 18 wonderful years. They met in Phoenix, Arizona and moved to Houston, Missouri in Spring of 2004. The love they had for each other was everlasting and grew every day that they were together.

Kathy was an incredible mother. She was always involved in her childrens’ lives and would never miss any of their sporting events. Her children could go to her for anything; she always knew just what they needed. She was loving, nurturing, and could always put a smile on their faces.

             Kathy is an unforgettable person and will be forever missed by all.

Nov 2010

Nov 2008

Beginning...

I am not 100% sure why I am starting to blog.  I think it is for a number of reasons; my mom passing away, being bored at work has increased my blog reading time and writing one would not only be a great way to pass time but it would also be a great time of reflection and focus. So we will see what happens.