Christian walk..my lonely journey

Background to those new to my blog (or me)..   August 2015,  I left my church of 30 years and joined a much smaller church. When I left my church, I  admitted to myself that I had slipped in my walk for several years and wasn't sure what I believed anymore and I was determined not to be a fake Christian at my new church. I was honest and transparent and met with several women, a pastor,  and ultimately renewed my relationship with Christ and started again with an eagerness and love for Christ that I forgot I knew existed. 

So what happened? I don't know, I got out of habit of reading my Bible, I got out of habit of praying which I will admit has never been one of my strong points anyway.  I got distracted with life and things started going downhill for me. I am ready to begin again and I don't really know how. But last time, I just started reading my Bible again and everything started clicking for me. 

So why is this a lonely journey?  Because as I started becoming more comfortable in my church, it was easy for me to go back to being fake. It was easy for me to not ask for help. And you have to ask for help because spiritual issues and Jesus and personal walks with Christ are not things that are often spoken of.  And I have a handful of close friends but the rest of church gets a "hi how are you?" Five minutes before the service.  Do these people in my church not care about me? Yes.. They inquire after me..  How are you?  How is your school? how is your back? 

But the questions I never get (or ask of others)... How is your walk with Jesus? What are you reading in your Bible right now? Do you have any questions about your reading?   For those that know I deal with depression, no one ever asks about that either. Are these questions confrontional? are they too inquisitive of our brothers and sisters of Christ? Are we scared of the answers? Do we not really care?  We pour into the lives of our young people. Who pours into the lives of adults? 

I did have one person in the last couple of months ask me "What are you reading in your Bible right now?"  My response .. I don't read my Bible.  Her response.. Silence. That was the end of the conversation.  It was awkward. 

I know the answer to this.. I have to ask for help. I will be honest about two things 1) this blog post is not a passive aggressive cry for help and 2) I don't plan for asking for help.  And if I have a bunch of people talking to me now..after I have written this..while that will be awkward too. 

This blog post is to raise awareness...how many people are in our church and  need a relationship with Christ? We talk about talking about Jesus outside of the church. Who is talking to people about Jesus to those inside the church?  I am not an outlier here. There are church members all around you each Sunday who have stepped away from the faith, are hurting and need someone to talk to and they are not going to ask for help.  So take my challenge.. How are you going to reach them?  How are you going to show that you care about their spiritual needs?

And I am ready to fall in love with Jesus all over again and when I do, these are questions that I will ask myself too because I know I am not the only one.  If you are one of the ones like me, don't be discouraged.  I promise that all the help you need is right there in the Bible. Just open and read it and He will be there for you when it may seem like others aren't. And you also don't have to be like me..ask for help. People don't know what you need if you don't tell them. They really do care. I know they do. 

Dare to be Different and Enjoy it!

If you are a Christian homeschooler, I would like to encourage you to believe two things ..1) God has called me to do this and 2) God has equipped me to do this.   (Note.. that doesn't mean that you won't ever put your kids back in school. It may only be for a season. )

In your homeschooling journey, I would also say that you will be judged by the choices you make.. either openly (usually family members) or passively aggressively (anyone) or gossiply or just in people's heads.  It does not matter which path you choose. You will be judged. You can be judged because you unschool and don't believe that school should be in a classroom. You can be judged because you are trying to emulate public school at home. You can be judged because you do an online public school. You can be judged because you do school for 8 hours a day. You can be judged because you don't do a co-op. You can be judged because you do more than one co-op. You get my point..

Here's my next point... You do NOT need to worry about people judging you (see my first paragraph).  Judging other people is between the person who is judging and God. Yes, it can be hurtful and yes, it can hurt your pride but earnestly pray and let God be the center of your homeschool and your judge.  There may be sinful areas in your homeschool.. let God convict you of those areas.. not other people who are judging you.

Do allow others to encourage you if they are trying to encourage you in a manner that is uplifting. They may see a fault in you that you may have too much pride to see but boy that's a fine line and that better be a good friend and even when their intentions and their heart may seem pure, it may not be from God.

Words from my friend who read my blog post that are worth repeating and she said it so beautifully that I am cutting and pasting.
We shouldn't be too quick to label all criticism (constructive or otherwise) as judgment and dismiss it outright without evaluating it, even if briefly. For instance, Person A, B, and C, who don't know each other, all make the same observation .(about my homeschooling or something else). I should probably take time to consider what they are saying, pray, run it by my husband or a very close friend, even if ultimately I determine that the Lord is leading me in a different way. One person's random statement probably wouldn't deserve such consideration, but if I'm hearing something over and over again, I feel that I should probably give it a closer look. 

So here's the thing..   YOU know your children.  YOU know your children's struggles. YOU know your own struggles. YOU know your own abilities and talents.  God has created us all uniquely and our ways are going to be different.  The world might see glimpses of you but there is no way that they could know the whole story.  They may not know the hours and tears  that have been spent before they say something careless like "She's 10 and still can't read".   They may not know what it's like to have cancer and homeschool kids at the same time.  They may not know what it's like to have a mental illness and homeschool.  They may not know all the things you have in your life to juggle and still homeschool.  They may not know the trauma your child has experienced and now just needs a year of mental rest.  But you know and you need not be afraid of them. Stand tall in your decisions because you know!

But here's the other thing..  You got to fight the good fight.. Yes, homeschooling can be a fight. You have to earnestly seek God.  You have to stay right in the middle of His strength.  You have to rest in His peace.  Ask for His guidance.  Let Him convict you. Let Him encourage you.  If you don't know what this looks like in a practical sense, seek counsel from a good Christian friend. They may not have all the answers but they can share what their journey in the Lord and homeschooling looks like and give you practical advice on how to implement more of God in your homeschool.  If your homeschool is a mess and you are at your wit's end,  it's okay to ASK FOR HELP.. Don't let yourself believe that veteran moms have it all put together and have the perfect homeschool and have from the very beginning. Remember you only see glimpses of their life.  And take their advice for what it is.. advice.. not a dictation on how you should do your homeschool.

I am realizing that my blog post has more of a negative tone than I intended and I want you to know it is because I have had 4 years of dealing with hurt and disappointment of  friends and strangers judging me and the way that I do homeschool.  And years of comparing myself to other homeschools and not trusting my own decisions and my own intuition on things.  I am finally at a place of peace with where I am with my homeschool.  My ways are not your ways. And that's okay!

Here are some Bible verses that I hope can encourage you in your journey

Galatians 6:9  Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up

Colossians 3:17  And whatever you do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.

Psalm 121:1-2  I lift my eyes to the mountains - where does my help come from?  My help comes from the Lord, the Maker of Heaven and earth

Philipians 4:13 - I can do all things through Christ who gives me strength

A good friend shared this amazing song with me. May it encourage you in your homeschooling journey. (Thanks, M :))

Why I could never really give up FB

I am a sensitive person so it comes as no surprise to me that a FB post that had nothing to do with me upset me greatly. It hurt me. I cried for hours.  I moaned that life wasn't supposed to be this way and it wasn't supposed to hurt this much. And then I unjustly blamed FB.. If I had not read that on FB, I probably never would have known. And I wouldn't be hurt right now. Forget it. Forget you FB.. I am outta of here. It's not worth it.

But then there's you. If you are bothering to read my blog post, chances are you care about me.  And chances are pretty good that we probably don't have a friendship outside of FB. Because truth be told, if I did actually give up FB and you are not in my path of school or church or scouts, only a handful of you would actually have an email relationship with me. And that's just the way life is.

For a moment last night and for the last week really as I have been dealing with negative thoughts about some of the friendships in my life,  I thought this would be better. Maybe less contact with people would be better. Maybe I need less friends. Maybe my kids need less friends.  Maybe we could all avoid some of the hurt that we are all feeling right now by stepping away and sticking tight to each other and not the rest of the world.

But I can't do that. You are my people. And I love you. And the good times don't always outweigh the bad but I can't give up on you. And I can't be a good friend if I disappear into the non-Facebook world.  Maybe the people I know that don't use Facebook have other ways of connecting with friends. Maybe they are extremely introverted. Maybe they clean their house all day...I have no idea.  But it's not me.

I am going to put on my big girl panties and I am going to fight the good fight because it's worth it. You are worth it.  There will always be the party that I am not invited to. There will always be the friend who values other friends more than me. There will always be the rejection. There will always be the hurt.  There will always be the laughter. There will always be the hope. There will always be the encouragement on a bad day. It's just the way FB is.  So for the millionth time, I have said I am giving up on Facebook and I am not. And I will say it again and not do it again. And thank you for just being my friend and not calling my bluff.  I need you to remember how much I care about all of you.

You are my people.  My cute little Facebook people.  And I love you.

What I wish I could say to my teenage self

I have a lot of regrets from high school and some of them cause me to wake up in the middle of the night. And some of them I will regret forever and this is one of them...

What I wish I could tell my teenage self...

Sexual harassment from teachers is never okay...
Teachers should never touch students of the opposite sex...in any way.
And teachers should not be touched by their students.
Teachers should never flirt with their students...know what flirting is.
What you wear should never determine your grade.
Don't be scared of your peers.. do the right thing.
If you see someone being sexually harassed, you should tell someone.  Pick the right someone...
Sexual harassment is never okay...


20 years later and I talk to a teenager about something their teacher said. I respond with "That is not acceptable".  The teenager rolls her eyes.  I want to cry. Don't let grown men get away with this crap!

20 years later.. I am mad and ashamed that I did not say something.  Was any physical harm done during my teenage years? Maybe..maybe not.  I hope not. What if my saying something when I should have said something could have prevented an actual sexual assault?  I will never know. And I am thankful for that. I already have enough regret...

I did speak up..once.  I got severely reprimanded..practically yelled at..that I shouldn't make such accusations lightly.  I never spoke of it again.. until now.

And honestly, I can still see some of my peers at 38 year olds rolling their eyes at me. It's okay.  I get that to you it might have seemed harmless at the time and maybe it is still harmless to you but it's not to me.

And now I am a parent.  And that changes perspective on everything. I don't have a daughter but if I did, the thought of a an adult man rubbing her shoulders.  The thought that she got the grade she did because she rolled up her skirt a little higher and the man swiped his finger across her knee while she went by.  The thought of grown men and their leering eyes..looking at my daughter.. makes me want to THROW UP  and I don't even have a daughter.  And the above are all true stories but I am not the "she" in all of them and not all of them happened at my school.  But they did happen when I was a teenager.

And I said nothing. And I wish I could change that.  Because all of those men should have been fired. And they weren't. Because no one said anything because none of us cared enough to do the right thing. Or we ignored it. Or we were ignorant that it was even wrong. I don't know...

I don't even know how I would broach this subject with my children. They are too young now. But one day, I will send them off to school and we will have a talk and they will know. And they will know that they can talk to me.  And if they ever see these actions to themselves or to a fellow classmate, I hope they will talk to me.

I wish I had...


Note:  I did not mention the name of my high school in this post. Please do not mention it here or on FB as it doesn't really matter at this point. The stories and people I refer to are long gone. I have no desire to talk about specific stories or  specific men 20 years later.

Jesus in a game of Hide and Seek

Hi again,

I haven't been blogging because I only blog when I have insomnia and the Lord healed me from that. Yea! But I did have insomnia last night so while I didn't get up from my nice warm bed, I did have thoughts swirling around so here they are..

To catch up any newcomers.. I re-dedicated my life to the Lord in November 2014. And then I started on a roller coaster of life being awesome and plunging down into depression in December and ending the year on a high note.  Well my life is and always will be a roller coaster. In January, the sun DID NOT SHINE!  This was a horrible thing for me and once again I plunged down into darkness. I mean there were other things going on but I like to blame the sun. This week's weather has me on the upswing again.

When you are in the darkness, do you ever wonder where Jesus is?  It's really dark and you don't see Him.  I know for some they are crying out to Him and in so much despair and pain and grief that they just feel so alone. Intellectually, they may know that God is there but it doesn't feel that way.

Well that's not my story.  I am Peter walking on the water.  I ended my post about re-dedicating my life in November with "Do not take your eyes off Jesus.. not even for a second"   Here comes January.. SPLASH! Fell right in the water.. swirling around drowning.. my Saviour is right there but I like an idiot decide that if I keep flailing my arms around, I will be okay. That didn't work for me.

Okay so the title of my blog.. Jesus in a game of Hide and Seek. This was my middle of the night musings.   We close our eyes and we count to 100. We feel like Jesus is hiding from us. All we see is darkness. We keep counting. We stop counting. And we just stand there. Stand there with our eyes closed and say "Where's Jesus?"   When we turn around and SEEK Him, we discover that He doesn't play Hide and Seek. He was standing right behind us the whole entire time waiting for us to open our eyes and seek Him. He's right there. He's waiting.

So here is how this looks like in my life. I will admit that sometimes I am in the depths of despair where I am bawling and all I do is cry out to Jesus. And yes, He hears my cries and we are told that the Holy Spirit intercedes for us.  But my story revolves around being Peter walking on water.  I ended 2014 with the Bible in my hand in which I would read it for sometimes hours each day.  I started 2015 and it slipped away.  And as my soaking in the Word and my seeking out Jesus slipped away.. so did everything else.  Jesus.. where are you????

And the still small voice..  I am right here. I always have been. Just come back.

Jesus didn't come to Earth to solve all our problems. But Jesus is there for us through our problems. We have to seek Him.  So I am back now and ending another post and will keep ending the posts until it is ingrained in my silly little human head.

DO NOT TAKE YOUR EYES OFF JESUS.. not even for a second.

Homeschool filled with grace

My homeschool filled with grace is not me walking around gracefully schooling my children. My homeschool filled with grace is God's grace.  His grace and His promises and His faithfulness is what is going to get me through this journey. Holding to the promise that He who began a good work in me (and my children) will carry it to completion.  

The one PERFECT thing in my homeschool is Christ and the one thing that I would NOT change about my homeschool is having a Christ centered homeschool. And some days, that means not doing school at all.  Some days it is about showing my children grace and forgiveness. Some days it is more about character building and less about fractions.  Is every day like this? No, of course not. I still have academics that I have to get done but I rely on God to show me what is most important each day.  I also rely on God to convict me of my sinful ways that so easily trap me and whisper to me that it would be better to watch Netflix.  I rely on God to help me recognize when the Enemy is deceiving me and telling me that I can't do this. That I am a failure. That my kids are better off in school. I don't believe everyone should homeschool but I do believe that God has called me to homeschool. And through His strength and power, I am able to make it through the journey as I trust Him to guide me through it. I could not do it without Him. I know that other people do it without Him but I know that I could not. 

So here are the top things I have learned in my homeschool journey in the last 4.5 years.  And I know that I don't have it all figured it out. And I know I have a lot more to learn. 

1. It is not going to look like school.   While some people succeed in making their homeschool look like school, I found so much freedom when I freed myself that not only was my homeshool not going to look like school but that it wasn't supposed to look like school. Sometimes it looks all crazy but as long as I don't stress and just let it flows its natural path, the kids and I are quite happy with our system. And amazingly our system is somehow getting them educated. Yea! 

2. My role is Mom first, Teacher second.  And one of the reasons why it can't look like school is because you can't separate out those roles. I can't start school at 9 AM and have my children call me Mrs. Teacher and expect everything to go well. It won't.  Being the mom is going to look different than having a different teacher. But what a tremendous opportunity it is as well to influence them and guide them in their education, life choices, walk with God. The opportunities and therefore the responsibility is huge. But so worth it. 

3. My deepest desires for my children have nothing to do with education.  I would not even say that I want them to go to college. I would honestly say that I don't have any clear cut aspirations for them after my short time with them. My deepest desires for children are for them to develop their own relationship with Jesus Christ and have their own desire to passionately follow Him. I want them to seek His will for their life. If after all my homeschool endeavors, they come to me and they have prayed about it and they feel like the Lord is leading them to become a garbage man, then they will have my blessing.  For our identity is not in the career or the job that we do, our identity is in Christ. And I want my children to be so attuned with Him that they desire to follow where He leads them whether it be college or missions or a garbage man.  Would life be easier for them if they went to a great school and got a great job? Maybe. Maybe not. Would it make them more happy? Maybe.. Maybe not.  God didn't it call us to a happy easy life with a 6 figure salary. God called us to holiness. And it is my desire that my children pursue that with all their heart. 

I take each year at a time but right now, I can say that I am not opposed to the idea of homeschooling them all the way through high school. Could that change? Sure.  But I don't really have a desire to put them in school unless some amazing opportunity comes up that I just couldn't pass up.  And while we have good schools in our area, none of them are screaming "amazing opportunity" to me right now. But you know what IS an amazing opportunity that I don't want to trade for anything right now... having them right here in my home, teaching them about God's love and how they can become followers of Christ and men after God's own heart.  And that is why I love homeschooling and love spending each and every day with them.  

A day in the life of an imperfect homeschool

You probably have heard it, said it or thought it... How do you do it? You must have a lot of patience. What about socialization?  I could never homeschool.  Don't you have to be qualified?  Some of these questions and statements come from the truly curious and some come from people with a true disdain for homeschool.

Here are my truths about my homeschool
1.  It's crazy hard (and overwhelming)
2.  It gets harder with each kid I add
3.  I don't worry about socialization a single bit
4. But I do worry about their education
5. Patience would be nice but not a requirement
6. I could never do this alone and thank goodness I don't have to

So I have read blog post after blog post of people posting their homeschool schedules with their 8 kids.  Usually they begin at 5 AM with a cup of coffee, time with God and a run. And breakfast starting  at 7:30 with dressed kids and beds made and then they outline their cute school schedule promptly ending at 1:00 pm.  Not all homeschools look like that and since I am a master of open and honest.. Let's check out a typical day of mine.

Disclaimer:  Kid#1 and Kid #2 and Kid #3 are not an indication of birth order.

Insomnia the night before so I don't roll out of bed until 9 am. Thank goodness the kids have been playing quietly.  Where's my coffee?

 10 AM rolls around. I assume the kids have eaten. I call the first kid to do his math. He yells "Noooo. I don't want to do school today!"   Every.single.day...  I guide him to the breakfast room table anyway and attempt to get him started even though the breakfast room table looks like this..

Get Kid #2 started on Math. Kid #1 is still screaming.    Kid#2 starts screaming because he has to have complete silence in order to do his math. Every.single.day.  Move Kid#1 to a different room and beg him to please be more quiet. Dash back to breakfast room to save Kid#2 from Kid#3 who is singing "lalalalala" as annoyingly as he can because he discovered that Kid #2 is trying to do his math. Lock Kid#3  in his room. Ever play the game Diner Dash? It feels sort of like that.

Okay all kids doing math.  Drink more coffee. Check email. Check Facebook. An hour and half goes back. Wait? What? How did that happen? Oh yeah I clicked on 3 articles on Facebook and responded to 5 emails. Sigh.  Text message comes in from best friend "Lunch?"   Lunch already? Well the kids got Math done.. so why not?

3 hours later... We eat slow.  Or err umm..yeah who we are kidding..we pick places with playgrounds and drink several refills of tea.

3 PM Quick history lesson and then a You Tube video on Henry Hudson.  Mom falls asleep "like she always does" - quote from the 10 year old. What can I say? Insomnia is a killer.  

4 PM .. School work not done. Send the older ones off to do something educational on the computer while I try to teach the younger one how to read.  Now where did I put his phonics book? Oh yeah I last saw it in the school room.   Oh hmm.  Humm.. Oh dear.. okay skip phonics.. maybe I should clean up and start again tomorrow?

6 PM rolls in. Husband comes home. Kids and I are busy doing some spelling tests.  He thinks "Oh wow. What a great wife! She's been schooling all day"   "Night school again? I bet she went out to lunch, took a nap and got distracted with email and Facebook"  (note: while he may think this because he knows me well, he is my #1 cheerleader in my homeschooling endeavors).  Yep.. that pretty much sums it up.  Bedtime is not until 9PM so I still have 3 hours left of good solid school time!  

This is NOT AT ALL what I thought homeschooling would look like when I started. But it's a reality. Not for all days but a lot of days. Add in sick kids, sick mom, errands, extracurricular activities.. homeschooling can look crazy!

Now before you judge me or call the truancy officer or quiz my kids to see if they really do know how to read, let me tell you that there is a PART TWO of this homeschooling journey.  There is a lot that I have learned about homeschooling in the last 4 years. There is one part of my homeschool that is absolutely PERFECT.   There are things in my homeschool that I wouldn't change or trade for the world.  There is beauty in this mess!   So if you are curious.. stay tuned!!!