Posts Tagged With: Kelly

Day 3 of my Spiritual Stay-cation

Posted on December 8, 2011 by Mrs Knochel

Well folks, the time “off” has been helping. I can honestly say that I am doing better today. Yesterday afternoon when I went to go pick up Gabe from Good News Club at school I stopped by the grocery store to pick up another two dozen eggs to replace the ones that went missing. And hey! I was in luck and they had the 18 packs that I really wanted the day before. SCORE! So I bought two, because ya know, with Christmas baking and all I would need more right?

Then when we got back home I had the kids start picking up their toys and cleaning the house while I worked on the dishes in the kitchen and got the counters almost completely cleared back off again. Hallelujah! I had some broken Christmas tree ornaments drying on one counter so I went to hang them up on the tree and I didn’t even cry when the whole tree fell over!!! I *almost* lost it, but I didn’t! YAY! That’s a sure sign that my stress levels are going down! Time with God alone really does help! Amazing!

Gabe and I decided that we should just have egg sandwiches for dinner so that we would have more time to clean the house up, that and we had lots of eggs now! Then Sean called, he had stopped on his way home and bought two dozen eggs! I about fell on the floor laughing (for real)! Now we had FIVE dozen eggs! Thank You Lord… I think. Looks like I’ll be making a LOT of divinity this year for Christmas. 🙂

Last night we decided to let the cat sleep on the end of the bed, big mistake! She scratched and scratched all night long until Sean finally kicked her out of our room, then Anna woke up at 4 AM! Why???? But you know what, it was OK, because I had taken several naps during the day while I was camped out on the couch writing so it didn’t bother me a bit and I was still able to get up at 5 bright and chipper and ready to praise the Lord. And I’ve been going strong ever since.

I have to admit that I haven’t really spent so much time in the word today as yesterday, but instead I’ve been working on getting a new blog site together. The original one at www.TamarMinistries.net wasn’t able to provide a “subscribe” feature and this new one does! I’ve been praying about that since MAY! Hallelujah! So all day today I’ve been working on moving things over and getting settled into my new home here at http://www.tamarknochel.wordpress.com

God has really been showing me a lot lately how He’s been setting all these things into place for me so that when His timing is right everything will line up and the promises He has made will come to fruition. In His timing and in His way. And I trust that. I don’t want anything that isn’t in His timing and His way, because then it’s at best still only second best. And I want His BEST for me and my family, I want His dream for us. I want His goal for us. I want His blessings and favor for us, no matter what they look like. I know that He loves me and I trust that any decision He makes will be made completely out of love for me. Period.

Have you been wondering what my Spiritual Stay-cation has looked like? Day 1 looked like shopping with my friend Kelly, Day 2 looked like sitting on the couch the whole time Gabe was at school, Day 3 has looked like sitting on the computer all day, all three days have been cutting out absolutely all things that don’t entail feeding my family (which I have made as minimalistic as possible). I called off Bible study today and Monday night, and volunteering at the school too. I have made myself and my stress-level a priority, if something starts to frustrate me I stop it and walk away. I have turned the ringer off of my phone, it’s still on and I’m checking it periodically, but it’s amazing to me how the lack of those message tones has been so amazingly peaceful! I’ve come to realize that they’re like little voices saying “Pay attention to ME! I need your immediate attention!” No, they DON’T need my immediate attention, my family and my God need my immediate attention everyone else will just have to wait until I get around to answering your messages! God bless a silent phone! Basically I have set these seven days aside as a Sabbath rest week. My own little vacation with God on the mountain of Shalom peace. Lord, thank You for strongly suggesting that I do this, I can’t thank You enough for the rest I have been finding in letting these things go by the wayside for a time! I pray that next Monday come slowly! I am really enjoying this private time with You!!! I LOVE YOU LORD!!!!

Categories: The Crazy Mom Blog | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

One Seed

Posted on December 2, 2011 by Mrs Knochel

Last night I had an opportunity, one I pray no one EVER passes up.

I was going into a public restroom after Anna’s dance recital and saw Mackenzie, the daughter of one of our Tamar Ministries Sisters. So I greeted her warmly and continued ahead into the stall. “Oh, HI Miss Tyra!” she said with a big smile that I could hear through the door. Immediately my Spirit perked up and said “You really need to explain to her about your new name. She’ll understand.” Then I thought about the verse in 1 Corinthians 2 where Paul talks about laying aside the grace in his tongue and knowing nothing but Jesus and Him crucified. Little did I know that that’s precisely what I was about to do! When I came out Mackenzie was still in the restroom drying her hands under the dryers so I said “Hey Mackenzie, can you do me a favor? Can you call me Tamar now? God gave me a new name and it’s Tamar.” Because of the noise of the dryers she kept asking me to repeat myself… over and over. And just as they stopped and I was saying “God gave me a new name” for the umpteenth time, her little friend Dylan walked back into the room because she had forgotten her coat. She looked at me wide-eyed and asked “You believe in God?”

I emphatically answered “Yup! Sure do!”

“Why do you believe in God?” Dylan asked.

“Because I can’t not believe, He loves me too much.” (Now I have to interrupt myself here for a minute to explain to you that NONE of this conversation had been thought out on my part. I can 100% honestly tell you that when I walked into the restroom the Holy Spirit took over the entire thing. Every word from my mouth was completely from Him. My answers to her questions were not my own, there was zero thinking about them involved, they just came out on their own. Straight from Him.)

“Well, we believe in the Big Bang.” said Dylan.

“Oh” I said, as if to mean “OK”.

“Do you know about the Big Bang?” Dylan asked as we started walking out of the restroom and toward the girls’ mothers.

I nodded my head, “Uh huh”

“We believe that the Big Bang created us.”

“Mmmmmm… well we” I put my arm around my friend Mackenzie, “believe that God made the Big Bang.”

At this point the conversation between Dylan and myself ended as I joined the mother’s conversation, but the two girls continued talking between themselves. Now, I have no idea what was said between the two of them but the look on Mackenzie’s face was an interesting one to be sure. Kelly, Mackenzie’s mom, asked her what was wrong and neither girl said anything to her. And then Dylan’s mom started walking toward the door to leave for the night. Kelly turned and looked at me with one eyebrow sky-high, “WHAT was that all about???” Now, I don’t know what my own face looked like at that moment, but it had to have been beaming! I was about to explode with excitement! I’ve never gotten to do that before!

I’ve heard that it takes an average of twenty-five “God-touches” in a person’s life to save them, and I had just gotten to be one of those!!! All because I didn’t question the Spirit when He prompted me to ask Mackenzie to call me Tamar.

What could be really mind-blowing is what the fruit of that one tiny seed may turn out to be! One tiny apple seed, when planted and well-tended, will grow into an apple tree filled with bushels and bushels of apples filled with more seeds of their own!

Lord Jesus, Creator of heaven and earth, gardener extraordinaire, please tend that tiny seed well. I pray that it fell on fertile soil (which judging by the pure curiosity in her eyes it did) and not the rocky path. I pray that You Holy Spirit will guard her heart and her mind in Christ Jesus and keep the weeds from choking the life from it or the birds of the air from snatching it up! Lord, I pray that this little seed grow and take root in her heart that You love HER because You created HER in her mother’s womb. Father, I thank You for providing this opportunity of response ability by giving me the ability to respond when the opportunity arose. And I ask that You will always bless me with an open mouth when it comes to opportunities like these!!! Because I know that we can always choose not to take them, so I pray that I don’t ever  make the choice to pass the opportunity up.

AMEN!

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