take that you little red-horned guy

i am sitting here watching my son relish in the fact that he finally figured out how to really play his leapster....not just turn it on and off and think he was playing, but actually comprehend the idea that the leapster does far more than just light up and go off. he's growing up. and my daughter, well, she started kindergarten this year and came home to tell me “sally said she is not my bff today, so I told her that susie was going to be my bff, but then sara needed a bff and so we said she could be our bff, but then sally got mad because she thought sara was her bff, so now we are all bffs” really!? bottom line...she's growing up.

then i look at my husband and myself and decide it's okay to be in denial that we are growing up... hee hee! :)

life changes so fast that often i find myself saying, "what the heck has happened?" and when it's not just one thing that has changed, but many things that change, i find myself saying, "what do i do now?" my mind does tell me, "god knows what he is doing...he has a plan that is far greater than what i could imagine." and it's true, i know it, i have experienced it and i should never doubt it. so why do i? i almost laugh inside my head because i hear that token angel/devil on each side of my brain. that darn little red-horned guy. but he only gets in the way because i let him. and the more i listen to what he says, the more doubt begins to take over. so i have to make a conscious effort to shift my eyes back to that angel....duh!  and wo...that angel had a lot to show me! (I even made a list...and the angel’s side won!) bottom line...rather than focus on the POTENTIAL negatives, focus on the REAL positives.

so here’s to playing leapsters, girl drama, gray hair, flabby skin and whatever comes next...take that you little red-horned guy!

Jeni Barbush

loveSTRONG ministries

Executive Director

www.lovestrongministries.com

if you build it, they will come.

so when you've never started a women's ministry before, naturally, you would know that you wouldn't have all the answers. this can be a scary place, a fearful endeavor and something that may seem quite impossible.... unless of course, god is in the driver's seat.

often, i have felt "over the moon" about all the incredible things happening. you see, i am lucky, i get to see lots of "effects" being in this perspective. and let me tell you...it NEVER gets old. i could spend my days listening and sharing all the ways that god changes us for the better. and for these reasons, i am encouraged.

however, let's be honest...there are other days where i feel inadequate. i feel tired. i feel overwhelmed. i don't have all the answers and it's tough. and then when i think we do have the right answers, sometimes they backfire. lately, i have found myself questioning various decisions that we have already made because i haven't seen the evidence NOW that we made the right decisions and i was getting scared. then, in the midst of these thoughts, (actually, i was doing that 5th load of laundry and going back and forth from room to room dispursing the proper piles) i heard it. ya know, that "voice" that people say they hear. well, i am not sure if this is how others' say they hear it, but this is how i heard it: in the form of a TNT movie marathon from the movie, "field of dreams". while walking back and forth, i heard, "if you build it, they will come." you've heard that, right?! yeah, but at this very moment, when iwas feeling weary, those are the perfect words that i needed to hear. they resonated with me. stuck right in my mind. and for the next few days i found myself visualizing that stream of car headlights as they pulled into UCYC....just tons of them....never ending....(then i got scared again...hee hee)

you see, i have never had the role like the one i have now...being a part of a team of coordinators putting together events and making decisions they will effect others and having NO idea on "how" most of the time (not part of the make-up of an OCD mind, just fyi....ha!) but what has been clear from day one, is that god prompted this endeavor. there are no doubts in that ONE bit.

do you ever feel that way? not sure why you are doing what you are doing, but you know it's right and therefore you move forward? and even when you move forward AND feel defeated AND it gets hard AND sometimes it would be easier to call it quits?but you KEEP going because you KNOW it's right. it's called ABUNDANT faith (i can thank my dear sister-in-law, heather, for her "perfect timing" call today as she shared those words with me). do we have ABUNDANT faith willing to let go of our own insecurities and allow god to be god? i know i don't always, but that's only because that is god again, letting me know how much i need him.

so today, i take heart in knowing that god has this. lovestrong was bourne out of complete surrender to love for women and to help draw them to know our god who is love. so.... i am looking forward to being at UCYC on november 4th and looking out for that stream of cars that will flood the town of prescott, az and when it's all said and done, can look back and say to myself and to god, "WE built it and they came."

Jeni Barbush

loveSTRONG ministries

Executive Director

www.lovestrongministries.com