Paige's Birthday!

I wanted to leave a little birthday love here for my beautiful friend Paige Knudsen!

I sent her an email this morning with a little birthday top ten list and wanted to share it here as well.

Paige is the author of the inspirational blog "Simple Thoughts." She is a gifted photographer 

as well as a voice for the oppressed by working as an ambassador for Noonday Collection!  

You can view their gorgeous spring collection here. 

I recently spent some time with my precious friend while in Atlanta and it was so wonderful to just catch up and sit and eat Mexican food and talk about every beauty product known to man! I rarely get out of the house with friends and so it was such a gift to me to have that time together with Paige!

Here is my email in part, from earlier today! 

I wanted to send you a list of just a few of the reasons why I adore you …..

1. You wear fringe. Now, I am anti-fringe at all costs. But you.

    Why you can make wearing fringe just about the greatest thing ever. 

2. You have more lipgloss, lipstick, chapstick and lip whathaveyous than Estee Lauder herself. 

    And you know my obsession with beauty products- need I say more?

    We may have been separated at birth.

3. You love Jesus.

    In fact, you not only love Him but you are a very close replica of His heart here on earth- only             

    wearing fringe and lipgloss.

4. You love Mexican food. I rest my case. 

5. You love Dan. And being a wife. And your girls. And being a mother.  And all of the same things 

    that make my heart sing. Basically. You are an inspiration to many. And I do mean many. 

    In a day and age when the popular thing to do is complain and moan about everything that is wrong            

    within the marriage and family-  you choose to see the glory. To see the best. 

    You choose to honor and love.

    You are a godly example to hundreds of women Paige. Hundreds…..

6. You are hilarious. And a girl needs to laugh. Especially after the many serious conversations we      

     have taken down over the years.

7. You have style. 

     Not like housewife style. Or I'm trying too hard style. Or I wish I was a teenager but 

     I'm not- but I'm going to dress like it anyway-style.              

     But just a Godly confidence. 

     An inner glow. 

     A beauty that radiates from the deep well within you.        

     And basically, you have an, I can wear Anthro, J.Crew, running shorts or fringe and just look 

     fabulous- kind of style.

     It makes grown women weep wishing they had the same. I'm telling you what's the truth.

8. You are a gifted photographer. And I do mean gifted. What I love about your photography is that    

     you always capture what love looks like. That is a gift.

     I am fully expecting to watch you rise to the Jasmine Star level of photography. 

     I cannot wait to watch it unfold and watch you do what you love to do and were created to do.        

     Capture love.

9. I haven't witnessed it. Not yet anyway. But I feel it's going to happen soon. I just know you can        

    tear it up on the dance floor. I plan to explore this soon with a full blown dance party

    in a kitchen somewhere. Mine or yours. It matters not.

10. Most of all, you love me in spite of myself. Thank you for this. No words big enough.

Love you precious friend. 

I am celebrating you and rejoicing and giving thanks to God that He created you in all of the many magnificent ways in which He did! 

Love,

Sibi

If you have time today, stop by and wish Paige a Happy Birthday! xoxo

And Peter

I know many of you are preparing to celebrate the gift that is Resurrection Sunday this morning...

But there are some of you who have no desire to celebrate Easter today.

Or maybe you would like to celebrate this glorious day, but you feel too far gone. The space between you and Jesus is as vast as the sea. Too much sorrow. Too much heartache. Too much sin.

Or maybe there are some of you who just feel that there is no way that a Holy God could love a girl like me.....

This post is for you beautiful friend.

Read this...

"But He said to them, "Do not be alarmed. You seek Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified. He is risen! He is not here. See the place where they laid Him. But go, tell His disciples- and Peter- that He is going before you into Galilee; there you will see Him, as He said to you." - Mark 16:6-7

There are two words here for you this morning.

And Peter.

After everything. The betrayal. The denials. Three times Peter denied Jesus. After all the wrong doing and after all of the falling short and all of the everything that just wasn't right at all...

Jesus knew that Peter would be feeling less than. And that He would be feeling really worthless.

I mean. Here the stone has rolled away. The resurrection has happened. Jesus is alive.

And Peter is going to miss the miracle because of the shame of his past mistakes.

But God wanted to make sure He didn't miss it.

He made sure by actually calling for Peter by name....

The scriptures tell us in Mark 16:7 these words...

But go, tell His disciples- and Peter.

This is one of the many miracles that happened on Easter Sunday so many years ago.

The stone was rolled away.

He is risen.

The guards never heard a thing. 

The angels appeared. 

The women arrived first.

The angel spoke and gave directions.

A request was made for Peter, whom they specifically called by name, to hear the news about the miracles.

The one who had denied Jesus. The one who had betrayed Him.

Jesus wanted Him to know about all of this right away.

Why?

Because He loved Peter. Because He was forgiven. Because He wanted Him to know these things. Because He wanted to reassure him and reach out to Him and let Peter know that despite all of it....

Jesus still loved Peter.

And He still loves you.

He walked through that first Easter Sunday for all of us. Not just for the ones who claim to be perfect.

Or the ones who have been raised up in the church all of their life or whatever it may be...

Sweet friend, the work of the cross, the suffering and the glory of it all- is for every, single one of us.

Today, while you are trying to decide if this post may be the Father gently wooing you unto Himself, I want to ask you if you would just repeat these two little words over and over again to yourself today.

And Peter.

And Peter.

And Peter.

He didn't leave Peter out of the miracle.

He doesn't want to leave you out either. There are miracles He wants to do in your life.

And sometimes we know this truth but we just need to be reminded...

I want to encourage you to change Peter's name to your own and repeat this to yourself today over and over again. Anytime any negative thoughts try to fill your heart, just crush those thoughts by saying these two little words...

And Jane.

And Charity.

And Angela.

And Robin.

And Paige.

And Jill.

And Edie.

And Kim.

And Macey.

And Starr.

And Betty.

And Sheral.

And Di'Anna.

And Misty.

And Jenny.

And Sarah.

And Ashley.

And Bridgette.

And Carole.

And Katie.

And Cherish.

And Rachel.

And KK.

And Bevy.

And Nancy.

And Claritza.

And Mel.

And Lizzy.

And Jennine.

And Maria.

And Donna.

And Andrea.

And Jaimeson.

And Jacki.

And Lissa.

And Hastings.

And Jennifer.

And Jenny Beth.

And Michelle

And Sherri.

And Cara.

And JuJu.

And Maggie.

And Vickie.

And Karen.

And Lara.

And Emily.

And Julie.

And Rebecca.

And Ann.

And Amy.

And Danielle.

And Elayne.

And then call on His name....

Because the same God who rolled the stone away over 2,000 years ago is here with us now and has rolled away every sin so that we could walk in forgiveness and love and hope and joy and grace and peace and the freedom to live life and life more abundantly.

Happy Easter to you beautiful friends. 

Whether you are worshiping Him from the pew of a beautiful church or worshiping Him alone in your own home or wondering how to worship Him at all.

Please know this....

He loves you so.

"They shall be Mine, says the Lord of hosts, on the day that I make them My jewels. And I will spare them as a man spares His own son who serves him." Malachi 3:17

Your Reach

This post is dedicated to my beautiful friend, Elayne C.  who changed the course of my destiny forever. I love you Elayne and I will never forget your extraordinary gift to reach. To God be the glory.

I love to sit in the back row in a church service.

Anytime I have a choice in the matter, I will always choose the back row and the very last seat in that row.

The front row is just too presumptuous. I mean, who on earth goes anywhere and just plops right down on the front row? 

I tried it - once. 

And I told the ladies sitting around me how excited I was because this was just so not me and I just couldn't believe that I had the courage to walk all the way up to the very front and pick that end seat and just sit right there on THE front row. Gracious alive. Wouldn't you know it though, the guest speaker came in and after introducing herself she announced that everyone needed to get up and choose a different seat!

I just died laughing and hurried my happy self back to the back row where I belong. Hello.

The middle rows make me a nervous wreck. There are folks everywhere. And I love folks. But they are just all down the front and then folks all behind you and beside you. 

It makes me sweat.

And I don't have very good skin. Seriously. And all of those folks sitting around that middle row make me worry that they can see my adult acne. And they may notice that my hair is about three shades too blonde but I like it and it's a train I don't know how to stop. I just keep going back for more. Well that and the Pro -Active vending machine down at the mall. 

So now you know my beauty secrets.

But I've just never been a middle row kind of person.

But the back row. Oh it's just you and Jesus. It is all kinds of wonderful.

I love it.

I want to share with you today my favorite "back row" story of all time.

And it isn't so much a story as it was and still is, a life changing event that absolutely wrecked me.

It was a special Sunday morning service for Father's Day a good nine and half years ago.  I didn't want to go to church on Father's Day other than to honor my sweet Husband.

There wasn't anything in me that wanted to hear about how wonderful Father's are.

If you've heard my story ~ you know why.

But God has a way of getting to the bottom of things and that is exactly what He did some nine years ago that special Sunday morning.

I was seated on the back row inside our church and our sweet baby was asleep in her car seat carrier at my feet.

Our Pastor was sharing all about how important fathers are ~ especially to little girls. He went on to break down the identity factor as it relates to fathers and daughters.

And with each word the Pastor spoke, the tears started to fall, as I listened to things I had never heard before and so much of my life began to make sense.

I literally felt sick.

I sat down on the floor in that back row and just hovered over our sweet baby girl and wiped away the tears and tried to get through the service.

And then I felt someone reach down for me.

It was our Pastor's wife, Elayne.

She hugged me and said these words...

"Sibi, God wants you to know that He went out of His way to pursue you this morning."

My brain couldn't keep up with my heart. All I could think was, what? Why? He did? Me?

It broke me.

And it broke that thing in me that wouldn't allow me to get close to the Father's heart.

What was so life changing for me in that moment was this....

She reached for me. 

She left her title and her position and her family and her duties and anything and everything all right there on the front row right in the middle of a church service as she heard the Father whisper something special to her for someone else and she went searching the back rows to deliver.

And because she was willing and obedient and because she had a heart of humility, a heart of servitude and wasn't really concerned with keeping with what is usual and customary for a Pastor's wife in the middle of a church service...she demonstrated to me in action and in word this very truth....

God reached for me.

He reached for me right there in the middle of my mess. He knew exactly what was going on with my heart and with my hangups and with my issues and with everything. All of it.

He reached for me through another person.

And it changed my life.

It was one of the very important pieces that changed everything for me. Forever.

But she didn't stop with just reaching once. And this wasn't the first time God had reached out to me through her. And I know that we can't always do this in life, but I wanted to share how overwhelmed I was by God's love for me through this precious woman.

We had a lot of trouble trying to grow our family. We lost a baby just five months after our wedding day in October of 2000.  And then it took a year and a half to get those two gorgeous pink lines again. Only to lose that sweet life again. And it wouldn't be our last time to lose a pregnancy either. But during that season we were just devastated. And the first Sunday we could attend church again after our loss just so happened to be baby dedication Sunday and we had no idea.

 I have no words for the pain that I felt that day.

But Monday morning there was a delivery at my front door. A beautiful flower arrangement and the sweetest card that I still have and will keep forever.

It was from Elayne.

And she didn't stop reaching then.

She invited us to a bible study group in their home where we surrounded by other ministry leaders.

We so did not belong in that group. We barely knew anything.

But God knew.

And Elayne and that incredible group of people just loved on us week after week.

And she didn't stop reaching then.

Later on in the summer of 2004, Elayne invited me to speak and share my testimony on a women's retreat.

I almost fainted.

I had no experience. I had zero credentials. I had never even spoken in public before. Ever.

But she and the Father were up to something and I accepted the request with fear and trembling and did my best to honor God.

During the weekend before my turn to speak, Elayne asked me if it would be okay if she sat in and listened to the session.

I almost fainted.

And I replied with something along the lines of this...there is no way that you can be in there.

She was, to put it lightly, a powerhouse. I had never met a woman so full of God's love and truth and revelation and power.  And the thought of her listening to me stumble through my little testimony that could was enough to make me want to run and hide in my hotel room.

And so that weekend I shared my testimony for the first time ever and at the end of my session, I felt someone reach for me and turn me around to hug me.

It was Elayne.

She had honored my request by simply hiding behind a table and sitting on the floor of the ballroom so that I wouldn't see her. Everyone knew she was in there except me.

And she took the microphone and honored me in front of a room full of women with beautiful words and a life-giving prayer.

And the rest, as they say, is history. I owe much of my walk with the Lord to this precious woman who used her ability to reach, to change a life forever.

You have no idea how powerful your ability to reach others really is. God just needs a willing vessel.

And I'm not talking about just handing out bible tracts, or quoting a scripture or forwarding an email with a nice story. As wonderful as all of that may be at the right time and such.

I'm talking about your reach. 

Your ability to connect with another person- heart to heart. Spirit to spirit. 

What I'm really talking about is reaching for the lady ringing up your Tide and Charmin at Target.

Or the family walking through sorrow right now.

Or the family who may be walking through the pain of separation or divorce this week.

Or the bus driver. Or the school teacher.

Or the couple seated next to you this upcoming Sunday morning~ Easter Sunday.

And it isn't that we need to quote a hundred scriptures. Because honestly if Elayne had done that to me, it would have fallen on deaf ears. I didn't want to hear any scriptures at that time in my life. I was just too broken to be able to receive them.

I needed to feel His love for me. I needed to experience Him reaching for me. 

I needed to experience the God of the universe pursuing me. In all of my brokenness and shortcomings and flaws and desperate need of healing and I needed to know that He could pursue me and find me and reach for me- all the way to the very back row.

I needed to experience the same God who loves all of the people on the front row who had titles and positions and degrees and years of experience and influence- was and is the same God who would prompt a pastor's wife to get up out of her seat in the middle of a service and send her searching the back rows for a very broken and hurting girl without any titles or degrees or influence and who was convinced that God loved everyone else more.

He uses people to do this very thing.

And I love the word of God.  I love the word. But I think, when people are really broken we also want to connect. We don't want to leave that part out. We want to meet a need. We want to demonstrate who God is before they will listen to anything He has to say. We want to be willing to reach out and demonstrate His heart for them, before they will listen to a sermon on the mount- so to speak.

We want to show a vested interest. 

Otherwise we may come off sounding like a clanging symbol. Words without any love- so to speak.

For years people told me this. "Sibi, you need Jesus."  The problem was, for a very long time, no one really showed me who He was- and I really didn't need any more disappointment in my life.

Each and every one of us have what I love to call "a reach."

If God has placed you on the front row in life then I believe and feel that your reach is most likely, the many rows behind you, like Elayne.

If God has placed you in a position of authority or title or stature- then your reach is everyone who looks to you as their employer or their boss. It is also your vendors or clients or customers as well.

If God has given you a position in a family as a Mama-  then your reach is your household and your children and your extended family members and the churches, schools and neighbors and people that you could extend God's love to in your areas of raising a family.

If God has given you a blogging platform of any capacity, then your reach is unlimited in so many ways. With the click of a button, people can feel God reaching for them through the power of His love through the words you type on a single post, or an email response or a even in person through a coffee or lunch date.

People are hurting. They are hungry. There are families in our neighborhoods who have no idea what they are going to do- about any number of things. Or whose marriages are hurting so badly because they have no one they can trust to confide in or who cannot afford counseling.  Or people who are wondering if God cares about them at all, sitting in the church pews beside us, just going through the motions of playing church and never connecting with the God who loves them so much. They have no idea how much they are loved.

No one has ever reached for them.

We have to be willing to get over ourselves.

May we never get to a place where we think He is done reaching for us or that our reach has no affect on anyone else. 

May we be mindful this week as we head into the glory that is Easter weekend, to be intentional to reach for God's people in any way possible.

You have no idea the power you have within you to change hearts and lives in the most amazing ways. Just something so small and simple can turn a heart to Him today. Truly...

Beautiful Easter blessings to each one of you sweet friends.

I hope you know that He sees you no matter where you are seated in this gift called life today.


Love,

Sibi

He Knows

It was the early fall of 2009 and I had just moved across the country with all of my babies and a heart overflowing with gratitude.  A good nine years after our wedding day and the raising of our Macey Girl

in the Northeast. I had waited for this, this answering of many, many prayers for years. 

I was finally going to move home. My babies were finally going to have their Nana.  Just a mere 30 minute drive from door to door. 

For years before this I had prayed and worked on myself. My angry heart. My broken self.

My heart that wanted to undo so much of what had been my childhood and my life as a whole.

I threw myself at the mercy seat daily for the Father to teach me how to forgive and how to love, the way that He loves. I honestly did not have any idea.  It was beyond my human comprehension.

He is so faithful.

He taught me how to forgive on such a level that I experienced a joy I had never known.

Because He knows. 

And that is why He commands it of us. To forgive one another.

And with that forgiveness...

He taught me how to honor. How to serve. How to be a daughter. How to accept the things I could not change. How to walk in love. How to stop wanting to change people and just love them. How to give and prefer others over myself. How to forgive down to the deepest places in my soul.  How to let go of so much that I had spent most of my life holding on to.

And joy came like I had never known.

And with it, more blessing. More creative ways to honor my Mother and bless her and do for her and just love her. He gave me compassion for her. He gave me understanding. He also gave me a love for her and a desire to honor her in ways that I had never known.

I gave her grandchildren. And a relationship with a daughter who truly only wanted to love her in grace, love, forgiveness, understanding and a new beginning.

I spoke only life and blessing to my children about their Nana.

I taught them how to honor her. They taught me what love looks like unfiltered.

Because He knows. 

He knows that children hold the answer to so much in life. He even tells us that to enter in to the kingdom of Heaven we must become like a little child.

And during these years of healing and clinging close to the Father, I saw so many of my own mistakes in clear 20/20 vision.  I saw so much of my parenting and living and learning was doing the very best that I could with what I had. And many years I did not have Him. An automatic deficit.

I was also feasting daily on the truckloads of God's grace offered to me by my oldest daughter Macey who was born into the arms of her 18 year old unwed Mother who loved her greatly but was by no means well equipped.

And I would weep. Because she loved me so much. And she didn't have to.

And I would weep at the years my prideful heart assumed that Macey loved me and we had a special relationship because like so many of us, I believed I was a better mother than my mother had been.

Generally speaking and not including the exceptions where there are horrific things, there aren't any better mothers. There is only a bigger God who offers more grace than we deserve.

And mothers who know this truth and who cling to Him daily for wisdom and guidance.

We all fall short in one way or another. 

God set it up that way.... so that we would need Him.

The grace and kindness and unconditional love Macey offered me daily would break me and humble me and mold me and shape me and keep me so close to the Father that it changed me forever.

Because He knows. 

He knows that when we extend true grace and forgiveness to people that it is a tool that He uses to draw them unto Himself.

I have witnessed this and experienced this in my own life on both sides of relationships again and again.

I have also witnessed how we have to continue to work for the ground we've gained in relationships because the enemy despises unity and relationships where God is the center of it all. 

Especially when that relationship is a Mother- Daughter one filled with mercy and grace and hearts filled with forgiveness and honor.

And I would experience the losing of all gained ground as heartbreak entered into my world that early fall of 2009 and knocked the breath out of me and left me feeling raw and angry and hurt and all of those feelings would come flooding back inside my soul.

Because we are human. We fall short. We make mistakes. We need healing. We need Him.

Just two weeks after moving to my dream place. My answered prayer place. And new dream schools. And new dream everything with the exception of my sweet husband still living and working in another state.  And my babies finally having their Nana...a dream come true for me.

I received a call. A message left on my answering machine from Mom that basically said this.

I'm done. 

And I would shake my fists at the God I loved and I would grip the steering wheel while the tears flowed after dropping my kids off at school and I would weep on the kitchen floor over the top of crushed goldfish and cheerios and babies in my lap asking me why I was crying. 

And I couldn't answer them the truth because I was in so much pain from the heartbreak.

I would hold them and kiss them and rock them and tell them that I loved them and that God did too.

And I would try and sleep at night alone with a husband working in another state and weep from the physical pain that my heart was causing me because life was just too overwhelming and too painful and I would whisper to Him these words..... 

God. How could you allow this.

God. What did I do wrong?

God. Why did you do this to me?

God. How could you? After all I've already walked through?

God. Why would you break my heart like this? Again.

And in the midst of my misplaced blame and overwhelmed and broken heart...

He would tell me how much He loved me and How I was His and belonged to Him and He would tell me to trust Him and stay close to Him and that He had me in the palm of His hand.

He would hover over me while this heartbreak unraveled me to the very core of my being.

Because He knows.

He knows what to allow and what to use for our good and His glory. And He knows how to take the things the enemy meant to use to destroy us and use them to break us so that He can build us back up the way He had intended all along.

Completely and totally and fully connected to Him.

Heart. Spirit. Mind and soul.

So that when people stand on the sidelines of our life and criticize and judge and gossip and whisper about whatever they know nothing about, or about how we do not even talk to our families....without having a clue the price that's been paid or the heartbreak that is going on behind their judgement....

We will not collapse.

Because we are rooted and grounded in Him.

Because when we seek to live a life free from heartbreak or difficulties or lack or loneliness or fill in the blank.....

We only seek to fill ourselves up with more of ourselves.

But when we lose those things and choose to fill ourselves up with Him....

We really gain.

Because He knows.

He knows that we have to be willing to lose our life to find it.

And so in my time of losing I chose to stay close to Him. And because He loves us too much to leave us the same. To leave us unchanged. To leave us stale and stagnant and caught up in our selfishness and He loves us too much to leave us full of hurt and pain and bitterness and resentment and unforgiveness.

He simply will not allow it when we draw near to Him.

And in keeping with that truth, earlier this year He asked me to do something that I did not want to do.

I wrestled. I argued. I stated my case. I justified. I insisted on my own way. For a while.

And then in the midnight hour earlier this year,  He poured into my heart His great love and led and prompted and gently asked me to make a call to my Mother. The first one in three and half years.

He asked me to call and offer forgiveness to her for all of it. For anything and everything.  He asked me to call and also apologize for any wrong doing on my part or any hurt or offense I may have caused over the last 41 years. He asked me to assure her that I did not want anything from her. That I did not expect anything from her and that I was not calling to re-hash anything.

It was not easy. It did not go exactly like I had hoped. 

But I was obedient.

Because He knows.

He knows the blessing is in the obedience.

And He also knows that one day, as a Mother of six precious children, I will need to hear those very words in some form or another, for one thing or another, from one child or another....

And so it went that later that very week, two very flawed people who love God very much and who have survived and overcome a world of hurt, found their way in God's great love and into each other's arms where His glory fell in the likes of mercy, grace, forgiveness, apologies and His immeasurable love.

I love you Mama.

Thank you for choosing to give me life in the midst of incredibly painful circumstances. Thank you for raising me the best that you knew how to do.  Thank you for loving me the best that you could then and the best that you can now. Thank you for your humility. Thank you for your redemptive words. Thank you for trying and for giving to each one of us in special ways. Thank you for asking for forgiveness even though you were already forgiven. Thank you for trying to start again when it would have been easier just to walk away. 

I chose this picture of you Mama, because it is the only one I have of you wearing pearls. And I would be amiss to spend my life telling God's precious daughters that they are His pearl and not ever share that beautiful truth with you....

You are His Pearl Mama. He loves you and so do I.

Love,

Sibi