Tag: Answers to Prayer (Page 10 of 12)

Perfect Mix Match

January 10, 2010 / Jennifer Coleman / 2 Comments

We’ve been collecting furniture for quite a while now.

My bedroom furniture is a rainbow of colors.

My sweet mother-in-love gave me this hope chest that belonged to her mother.

We bought the set of chest of drawers when Judi was a baby.

We found the bookshelves for a deal at Pier 1 Imports.

The sewing machine cabinet belonged to my Mamalene.

We replaced our waterbed with this cast iron bed when we moved to Texas.

Each piece bears battle scars from the many moves.

I never owned a nightstand until today.

I am very excited because not only does it blend in perfectly with my rainbow

of battle scared furniture but it has a twin!

Don’t they match perfectly with my bed spread? I love the birds.

We went to several furniture stores.

Have you seen how much furniture cost new?

I was just about ready to buy some Wall Mart build-it-yourself furniture

when I decided to check Craig’s List and found this set of nightstands

at an antique store down the road.

They’re made of REAL wood.

They came assembled and a little distressed to match the rest of my room.

And they were less than half the price of new.

(Big smile.) Yay! And Thank You Jesus.

Beautiful Poem/Hymn

December 11, 2009 / Jennifer Coleman / 2 Comments

I finally got some real unpacking done yesterday. I was motivated by the fact that Mike has off today and I knew he’d be bugging me to find his surround sound speakers. We’d found the subwoofer and two of them but couldn’t find the other two.

I needed a clue, so I asked him when the last time he saw them was. His answer: “The kitchen table in Montgomery.” So James and I unpacked two more large “dish packs.” They weren’t there. I unpacked all the bathroom boxes looking for shower curtain rings. I know I have at least 5 sets. I have to buy new sets every move because I can never find them. No speakers; no curtain rings. I unpacked all the flower/nicknack boxes thinking maybe the speakers were put in with the living room flowers. Then Joel and I unpacked all the picture boxes. Judi finished unpacking the game room. Still no speakers.

Next, I decided to unpack the drums. “Maybe,” I thought, “they were wrapped in some padding in a drum.” Judi and I unpacked all the linens. After 7 hours of unpacking, in the last box marked, “Master bedroom items” Judi found a little box with the speakers in side. I was so glad she found them that I gave her a big kiss. I would have never opened the random little box inside the big box.

Basically the only boxes that haven’t been emptied out are the garage boxes, school/book boxes and fabric boxes. I have lots of random stuff sitting around that are not put away and kitchen and bathroom cabinets and closets that need to be organized and curtains to make and hang…

Today’s plan is to take it easy and go to Birmingham to pick up our cuddler recliner.

Here are two gems from my e-mail devotions:

Prayer for December 11

Rest

Father, I come to you in the name of Jesus, and find rest for my weary soul. Thank you for easing, relieving and refreshing me. Your yoke is wholesome—not harsh, hard, sharp or pressing, but comfortable, gracious and pleasant; your burden is light and easy to be borne. I cast my burden on you [releasing the weight of it] and you sustain me. You will never allow me to be moved—made to slip or fail, in the name of Jesus. Amen. (Strength to Overcome Cares and Burdens, Daily Prayers That Avail Much Commemorative Edition)

Matthew 11:28-30; Psalm 55:22; I Peter 5:9

My Goal Is God Himself

Frederick Brook

My goal is God Himself; not joy, nor peace,
Nor even blessing, but Himself, my God;
’Tis His to lead me there, not mine, but His—
“At any cost, dear Lord, by any road!”

So faith bounds forward to its goal in God,
And love can trust her Lord to lead her there;
Upheld by Him, my soul is following hard,
Till God hath full fulfilled my deepest prayer.

No matter if the way be sometimes dark,
No matter though the cost be oft times great,
He knoweth how I best shall reach the mark;
The way that leads to Him must needs be strait.

One thing I know—I cannot say Him nay;
On thing I do—I press toward my Lord,
My God, my glory here from day to day,
And in the glory there my Great Reward.

Here’s a link to a nice MP3 of the hymn.

Hymn: My goal is God Himself

Love,
Jenny

Defining Unpacking

December 9, 2009 / Jennifer Coleman / 2 Comments

I have a garage full of boxes and I didn’t unpack a thing the last two days. Crazy. Right?

I built Josh and Joel’s beds when we moved to Montgomery because I was tired of the store bought ones breaking. After one of their bigger friends decided to jump on top of them on Joel’s bed, I had to improve my design. How many twin sized beds do you know of that are designed to hold 500 lbs plus force? I live by the adage “If it’s not broke, don’t fix it,” so I never redid Josh’s bed. It didn’t survive the move, so I had to make a trip to the hardware store, get out the drill, and spend most of Monday fixing it.

Joel found a great way to arrange their room. It’s the smallest room that they have ever had to share, so we weren’t sure that all their stuff would fit. They had to relinquish their red chair to Judi, but now it looks like a regular room.. not too crowed.

The only other things I did on Monday were write Christmas cards, rearrange the video cabinet Judi and Joel unpacked and my pots and pans. None of it shows since they were all in cabinets before. :-}

Yesterday, I planed out what curtain rods to buy, how to use the ones I already have, and went to buy them. I remembered my coupon and everything.

Then Josh called… he locked his keys in his car so I had to unpack a part of my suitcase to find his key and go rescue him. Since we were already on that side of town, Judi and I went to Costco and got a few things including some of those fancy fuzzy hangers for her. We had to look all over the store to find them. I bought her some earlier this year and she decided she needed more. They come in packs of 50 so I asked her “Don’t you think 50 clothing items is enough?” She said, “No.” If you need some, they are around $15 at Costco.

It took me all afternoon to hang up curtains in just my and Judi’s rooms. At first, I hung the brackets upside down in my room. Didn’t realize it until I was hanging the same brackets in Judi’s, so I had to totally redo mine. 🙂 It’s a pain because they are designed so that you have to remove the finial to take out the rod before you can flip it all over. I am glad I discovered my mistake though, because my curtains were dragging the floor when they were hung the wrong way. I thought I had measured them so they just touched the floor. When I flipped the bracket, they hung just right.

I did accomplish one other thing yesterday. I bought a cuddler recliner over the phone. Mike decided that he wanted to get a cuddler recliner to share with me. He says our couch is uncomfortable. We’ve been looking all over for weeks for a recliner that will look good with our couch. Our couch has very straight modern lines most recliners are big and pouffy, not to mention the whole color and type of leather thing.

We finally found one that we thought would work on sale on line at Macy’s. The only thing was that when we were finally in the house and ready to buy it, Mike called and found out that they don’t ship to our area. There are no Macy’s in our area and they ‘don’t ship to the stores either’ and the data base we looked in said there were no stores within 300 miles that carried the one we wanted.

So yesterday, I called prepared with several friend’s zip codes; one in Birmingham, one in Montgomery, and one in GA. The one in Birmingham was a winner.. but then she checked and they were all out. It had been discontinued. She looked to see if there was a floor model somewhere ‘near by’ and there was one in Birmingham.

I got the number to the store and they actually had one and it was even cheeper than the on line sale price (I hope it’s the right one). She said she couldn’t hold it until the weekend for us.. so I bought it over the phone. Yay! We get to make a trip to Jim and Nick’s Barbeque and pick up our cuddler recliner this weekend. Won’t be unpacking that day either. 😀

Judi decorated the Christmas tree for me yesterday afternoon to make it look a little more like we had unpacked. Today, I need to put the angel on the top of the tree, take Judi to gymnastics and grocery shopping. I have curtains rods to hang in 5 more rooms, I only have curtains for 2 of those rooms, so one of these days I’ll probably have to make some curtains. Have you seen how expensive and cheaply made curtains are these days?

Maybe I’ll unpack some boxes on Thursday.

Packers, Movers, and Birthday Celebrations

October 2, 2009 / Jennifer Coleman / 3 Comments

Steps to getting ready for the movers

Pray.
Schedule packers and truck pick up.
Pray.
Schedule house inspection.
Pray some more.
Have packers over to count how many boxes they need. Try to remember everything that you put in storage so they can plan on that too. Call to tell them the things you forgot.

Pray.
Find something to do with your dog and kids in the middle of the summer heat while inspectors are inspecting.
Pray harder.
Try not to hyperventilate over the results.
Pray.
Check out the water meter to see if what they said is true.
Pray that there is not a plumbing leak in the foundation of your house.
Schedule repairs.
Pray things will go OK.

Call realtor when her plumbers don’t show up.
Pray for patience because she is at the beach.
Ask realtor repeatedly when she is going schedule the appraiser so you can get your stuff out of storage.
Pray again.

Ask all your friends and relatives what colors you should choose for your new house.
Pray.
Try not to be frustrated with your limited number of choices.
Pray for wisdom and peace.
Then pick what your husband wanted to begin with and ignore all your friends and family.
Breathe.

Judi’s friend, Sarah, went with us to Huntsville to pick out colors and take Josh to orientation.

We went to see “Aliens in the Attic” This photo was taken at Rosie’s Cantina.

Call the storage facility and find out that you’re a couple of days too late to tell them you’ll be out before the end of the month and that you’ll still have to pay for it even though you’ll be out.
Pray for grace.
Drive your oldest to Huntsville for college orientation. Pick your colors while you’re there.
Pray you’ll be content with the choices you made.
Decide what is the absolutely last day that you can wait for the appraisal before you have to start taking apart your house.
Pray that God will give you wisdom about what to do while you’re waiting for the appraiser.
Find out that your four kids are going to be sharing two queen sized beds in the apartment.
Pray for favor.
Ask temporary housing for twin beds for the kids.
Praise God for answered prayers.

Take apart your closet. Decide what you will need for the rest of Summer, Fall and the beginning of Winter.. just incase it takes that long to build your house.
Thank God that the appraiser is finally coming tomorrow.
Cram everything that you decided you didn’t need into the coat closet.
Pray for grace to make the house sparkle for the appraiser.
Let appraiser in. Try not to say too much so that God gets the glory.
Try to believe God that your house will appraise high enough.

Borrow a friend’s truck to unpack the storage facility that same day.
Pray that your kids will survive the move.
Tell your kids they have to pack only the essentials.
Pray.
Explain what the word essentials means.
Pray that they will eventually realize that we really are moving and that they have to start packing.

Take the kids to a church outing that they are dying to go to.
Trust God that everything will be ready for the packers when they get there.
Let your husband drag on an inter-tube at 45 mph.
Pray that you’ll eventually be able to sit again.
Try not to laugh when he falls off the jet ski.
Pray that you aren’t forgetting to pack something important.
Go through boxes from storage and find school books.
Pray that you won’t be sore from all the lifting forever.

Packing day finally came. It normally only takes our packers one day to pack then one day to load the truck. Our packers were on Montgomery time though and took three whole days. On the 3rd day I realized that the shipping bolts for the washing machine were missing. I had left them on top of the washing machine so they wouldn’t get lost (at the time it sounded like a good idea). Two different people had worked on packing the laundry room which was located right off the kitchen. The bolts could have been packed in any of the kitchen boxes.

The head packer told me that one time she was on a job where the packing bolts were packed somewhere in the garage and that they spent a whole day unpacking the garage and still didn’t find them.

We called to see if the person installing the bolts had any extra. He said It would take 3 weeks to get in a new set of bolts. I had less than one day.

Early that morning before the packers arrived, James realized that he had forgotten to save out his check book. The two of us prayed and he found it in the first box he opened.

About the time I was ready to start looking, Mike came home for lunch. I explained to him in front of the head packer what was up and asked him to pray with me for God to show us which box it was in so we could find it easily the way James had found his check book. We prayed. Mike walked around looking at boxes. He found a box in the music room marked “wash room”. He thought wash room meant bathroom. I remembered that the day before that our main packer was calling our laundry room the “wash room” and said, “That’s the box!” We opened it and found the bolts.

Our head packer was so impressed that we found them in the first box that she told all her helpers the story. Glory!

Truck loading day went pretty well. There was a little confusion at the beginning of the day but we were able to get it worked out and the crew chief told me not to worry that all he does everyday is pray and move. He watched part of a Joseph Prince message with us on his break and was a joy to be around. We were super blessed to have Christians helping us get everything moved out of the house into a government warehouse.

The next day we picked up the U-hall trailer and were able to fit everything in and get it safely to Huntsville in time to eat good Mexican food for James’ Birthday dinner at Rosie’s Cantina.

Happy 19th!

God’s Favor

September 18, 2009 / Jennifer Coleman / 0 Comments

A few more details before the house hunting story…

Before telling Josh that we were moving, I knew I needed to arm myself with information on the colleges there. I jumped on the computer and looked up Huntsville colleges. I found one (UAH) that offers a graduate program in Josh’s favorite field of study: Bio-genetics. It looks like a very good program. Also just recently a large Biotechnology Institute called Hudson Alpha moved to Huntsville (a possible place of future employment). They are currently working on a swine flu vaccine among other things.

Josh responded to the news with just one sentence “When are ya’ll leaving?” First I swelled with pride at my Texan offspring using the word “ya’ll” so aptly. Then I was quickly over taken with fear that Josh wouldn’t make this one last (I hope) move with us. I asked him to at least prayerfully think about moving with us and to look over the information I found.

I forgot to mention in my first moving post that a few days after Mike was offered the job in Huntsville everything fell apart at his job in Montgomery. Some higher ups decided that his office was redundant and to cut all the leadership positions (including Mike’s and his two bosses). Only a few people there were going to actually be able to relocate to another office in Montgomery.. everyone else was going to have to find a new job, house, life… We were so relieved to have the Huntsville offer and praying all the more that the job would workout.

The move began feeling more like God was yanking us out of the pit.. and thrusting us into “Rocket City” than normal gentle leading. The office in Huntsville was anxious to have Mike start and got the initial paper work done at lightening speed. We had three buyers in just one week. Josh was granted favor and was able to transfer to UAH even though he was one credit short. Mike just happened to have scheduled months before a 2 week class in Huntsville. He was able to get some preliminary house hunting done in the evenings after class and keep me up dated via the internet on our choices.

It takes a while to get acclimated to a new city and find out where what is, how long it takes to get from here to there, and where a good area to live is. Mike worked really hard to study the situation and to try to decide what was most important to us in finding a house. Location is always key. This time we needed to not only to be a reasonable commute from work but also from Josh’s college. Together we cut his list down from 60 to 10 houses for me to chose from.

I drove up for the weekend in between week one and two of his class. We went to see Mike’s top 10 or so houses and in the end didn’t have peace about any of the houses. They were either too run down, not in a good location or too expensive. We were very discouraged and very apprehensive about making a bid on a house that would eat up most of Mike’s new raise.

Sunday was our last chance.. Mike had to start back to class on Monday and I needed to get home and get ready for the movers. We decided to check into building as a last resort. We had seen a new home on the opposite side of town from where we wanted to live that we liked and decided to try searching on line for other neighborhoods by that builder. We found a neighborhood that was about a mile West of where Mike had decided was as far as he wanted to commute. We drove to the model home after lunch, but they weren’t scheduled to open for another hour. So we drove by our top three houses one last time; one that was too expensive, one in a bad location and one that was a steal but that would need more repairs and upgrades than we could afford (the master bedroom had a mauve bath tub, tile, countertops etc… and the kid’s bathroom hunter green).

We’ve never built before and it was a scary thought. We knew nothing about building a house. We were afraid that the price would start out looking good but then rise over our heads in hidden cost. We sat down in a model home with the builder’s representative and asked all kinds of questions. Cheryl was very kind, patient, and helpful with all our questions. She had been working with the builder for many years and had a house in the neighborhood herself. So much info to cover in so little time. We left with our heads swimming to go look at the lot we thought we might like by the “lake”.

Mike at peace on our land.

As we stood on the lot I felt peace and joy over take me. All of Mike’s concerns about the commute, money, temporary housing and storage disappeared. He was like a whole new person. I wasn’t sure what to think about the sudden change .. but we had finally found the peace we were looking for. We fell in love with a piece of land. We called Cheryl and asked her to hold the lot for us and made an appointment for the next day for me to work out the details.

That afternoon Mike and I took the mini sketch of the house and all our notes back to the hotel and studied all our options and prices and made an incredible number of decisions from where and how big we wanted the master shower to be located to how to work out parking for a family of six.

Mike had to go to class the next day and I had to go with our realtor, my notes and our price limit in mind to communicate and get in writing everything we wanted in the house and to iron out all the details. I was so nervous. I prayed for God’s favor and a confirmation. First thing out of Cheryl’s mouth was that she had talked to the builder and that they were going to wave the $6000 lake lot premium because it was too small for the promised side entry garage and they would need to put in a front entry garage instead. God is so good!

We went one thousand dollars over our budget and it won’t be ready until Thanksgiving, but it won’t need a bunch of repairs and will be 30 or so thousand cheeper than everything else we were looking at and it will be on the piece of land where we found peace. Mike said that God has so orchestrated this move that He even picked out the exact piece of land He wants us on. 😀

Neighborhood Gazebo.. one lot over from ours.

Timing

September 18, 2009 / Jennifer Coleman / 2 Comments

It may be hard to believe but there is more to the story. 🙂 And you wonder why I don’t blog more..

We put our house on the market just in time for the July 4 holiday weekend thinking that we wouldn’t have offers for weeks and not actually having moving orders wouldn’t be a problem. Getting an offer the first day on the market made us anxious that we might loose our buyers to another house before we got the paper work and made us wonder if or not we should just sell it and forget about the home-sell buy-out program Mike had fought for and won. I know… there we go again not trusting God.

We were expecting our papers on Friday and had told the buyers so on Wednesday. Then after many phone calls, we discovered that it would be weeks after we got the orders before we could sell the house with the buy-out program. Uhrugg!

After much deliberation, we decided to trust God with the buyers and not give up our buy-out program. It would have cost us thousands of dollars more to sell the house with out it. The buyers would have to decide if or not our house was worth waiting for and we would have to trust God to bring us another buyer if they walked. We basically had to put them off indefinitely… they might very well not be able to move in until after school started. That was hard..

To add to our fears, on Friday, our air conditioner stopped working. We tried a couple of things to fix it and hoped it would work better the next day after a nights rest. It didn’t and we suffered through Saturday unwilling to call out a repair man on holiday pay. Finally, on Sunday it still was not working and we had to call someone. Thankfully we had had them come out before the summer season for a check up (sound judgment and wisdom) and got a reasonable price on the repair. Funny how we spent that weekend hoping no one would come see the house while the air wasn’t working after working so hard to get it on the market in time for that weekend.

Friday, Monday and Tuesday dragged on endlessly and there were still no orders in sight. It turned out that the lady that was in charge of putting our orders together was on vacation (how dare she take a summer vacation) and her replacement was not returning our calls and e-mails.

On Tuesday, I watched an episode where Joseph Prince was teaching on the story of Ruth. It was really good. Do you remember how Ruth’s closer relative chose not to redeem her because it would ruin his inheritance? Ruth was a Mobite and by law couldn’t receive an inheritance from God (Israel) so their children would not have received an inheritance.

Boaz was the son of Rahab the harlot from Jericho so he had already experienced God’s grace and favor and become very rich. He experienced what the law could not and through grace and God’s favor Boaz redeemed Ruth.

The part of the story really spoke to me was where the closer relative had to give his shoe to Boaz. It’s a picture of him giving up his rights to take possession. Everywhere our foot steps we are to take possession of the land. The closer relative was a picture of the law. He couldn’t bend to redeem her and still be the law. Jesus redeemed us just like Boaz redeemed Ruth and now the law has no rights over us.

Joseph Prince talked through the Bible about shoes and feet to confirm the idea. Moses is also a picture of the law. The first thing God spoke to him was to take off his shoes…

One of the shoe examples was in the story of the prodigal son. He was given shoes to possess the land when he returned to his father. The shoe thread through the Bible was very beautiful.

God told me to put on my shoes and take possession of the land He was giving me. So, I put on my shoes and took possession of the paper work. We’d already had over a weeks delay and were being promised even a longer delay.

The next morning, the orders came through and after Mike made one phone call letting the person in charge of the buy-out program know that we had a buyer the papers were all expedited and completed in one day instead of the promised weeks. God is so good!

The delay in paper work only worked for our good in that it gave the opportunity for two more people to make bids on the house!

God worked everything to our good! He made it so that the first bank appraiser couldn’t come but so that the second appraiser came right before I started taking apart my house to pack it and helped our realtor help him by finding good comps so that it would actually appraise for the great offer we received instead of the Zillow appraisal price.

Next I’ll tell you about buying a house..

God and Moving

September 18, 2009 / Jennifer Coleman / 0 Comments

Early in January of this year, I heard the Lord say to me something like, “You are going to move. I am telling you now so you won’t be surprised when it happens.” I wasn’t sure what to think. Was it my mind playing tricks on me?

Then one of our pastors said that God was going bless His people with good sound judgement. Mike caught it in his Spirit and held on to it. Soon after, he felt an urgency to start looking for jobs. I think at one point there were 9 different jobs that he had applied for that he could hear back from at any moment.

It’s kinda fun to dream about where you might get to live next.. but at the same time it’s hard to live the life you have at that moment. Should you spend money on this or save it for the move? Should you plan a vacation when you might be moving that same week? Should you invest in a new friendship when you might have to move just as you’re getting to know that person?

We’ve lived many months.. years in reality.. with things on hold because we might move. I didn’t want to live that way this time. I asked Mike, “Are you sure you really want to do this: you have a nice job, you get to come home for lunch everyday, and I like our life here???” I know. I know. That’s the devil’s line. “Did God really say..?” He kept applying while I worked really hard to ignore the possibility of moving so that I could enjoy where I was.

Mike normally only looks for Air Force jobs because he’s been with them for a long time and it makes the transition easier. One day, he heard God say to look in Huntsville for a job. When he looked, he found a job that he was really interested in and applied. If he had waited one day before obeying God, he would have missed his chance because it was the last day that they were taking applications. He interviewed for the job before our TX trip. We didn’t hear anything for a long time.

I started the summer looking forward to a relaxing time of catching up on school work, painting a couple of rooms in our house, and spending a lot of time in the pool. My plan was to ignore the whole moving thing and enjoy my summer. Mike gave up the Huntsville job and started bugging me with the idea that a job in D.C. was more likely to work out and was I OK with moving to DC?

Do you know what it feels like to have so many things on your heart that if you prayed for them all that you would explode? I was trying to ignore my heart and the possibility of moving, when God opened a little window into my soul and showed me that I really wanted to move to Huntsville and I was not OK with moving to D.C. any longer.

I said, “OK, God.. I wanted to be OK with moving to DC, I was OK at one point, but I am not any more. You made me want to move to Huntsville. Now I want to move to Huntsville. Give me the desire of my heart and quit playing around with me. Are we moving or not? Did you say we were going to move or was that my mind playing tricks on me? I am tired of playing around. You need to show me one way or the other!”

That day Mike was offered the job in Huntsville and all my plans for a nice relaxing summer slipped away. I was shocked. I jumped up and down for joy. I think we both walked around in disbelief for a couple of days. Mike was offered the highest dollar amount that they were legally able to offer him in the promotion, then when he asked they also enrolled him in the home-sale buy-out program which was not originally part of the deal. God is so good!

We gave ourselves 2 weeks to get the house ready to sell. We didn’t want to wait and miss the people who wanted to move in before school started in early August. Our last house took months to sell because we weren’t able to put it on the market until October. The difficulty of having to live in two separate states for three months the last move was still fresh on our mind as it was only a year and a half later.

I wasn’t sure if or not we could actually get the house ready in two weeks. I rented and filled a 10 x 10 storage room with all our books and extra furniture, Mike replaced two sinks and refinished our bath tub, we paid someone to power wash all our moldy concrete, and I painted inside and out: our kitchen cabinets needed a new coat of paint, the sun room was pretty bad, some touching up here and there, and the outside trim was long over due. I am sure I forgetting things. Oh, yeah.. I had to repair the kitchen ceiling. Funny what you discover is unacceptable about your house when you start thinking about selling.

Getting everything done was a stressful but I kept meditating on the verse in Psalm 127 that says, “Unless the LORD builds the house, its builders labor in vain.” and kept praying that God would do the work through me and give me peace. I’ve failed at enough things on my own to know to ask for help and rely on God’s strength.

After Mike refinished the tub, I took on the job of caulking it. I hate caulking.. it always takes me forever and turns out so messy, but less messy than when Mike does it. The Lord reminded me of the story of the people he chose to build the temple and how he gave them the wisdom and ability to do all kinds of creative, crafty things. I thought, “Yeah, God, that’s a good story.” Then I prayed, “HELP ME like that.” And you know what? He did! I caulked the whole tub area in about 15 minutes and it looked great. No huge mess. Praise God!!!

All through this time Mike was watching our house value plummet on Zillow.com. I was feeling a little frustrated with him as he became more and more worried about being able to buy a new house after selling our house for almost nothing. I really felt bad for him. I am usually the one that worries.. even though we both believe it’s a sin. Trust God! Don’t be afraid! Don’t look at the world’s report. Listen to God’s!

The week before Mike got the job I was watching Joseph Prince (my new favorite TV preacher) and he was talking about using anointing oil for more than anointing people for ministry. He had spent some time with a church in Asia that anoints everything from their cars to their businesses with oil, asking and claiming God’s blessing, favor and protection over them, and then receives what they ask for… sometimes in miraculous ways.

Joseph said that he was praying about the teaching and decided to try it out by anointing his house to sell and it sold for top dollar in just three days. I thought.. “If we ever move again (ha ha), I am going to try that.” It was one of those God thoughts.

So we prayed and anointed our house with oil and in the midst of the biggest housing crisis ever we received three bids on our house the first week we had it up for sale. The first bid came on the first day it was for sale. We were unable to accept it because we were waiting on government paper work. While we were anxiously waiting, the competition got stiffer and we ended up with a thousand dollars above our asking price. Our realtor said that there was something about our house that the buyers couldn’t resist. We knew it was the anointing of God.

To be continued….

Valentine’s Day Talk

February 14, 2009 / Jennifer Coleman / 2 Comments

I was asked to share a short devotion at a Women’s Meeting at our church last Friday. I was so thankful for the opportunity to have God minister through me to the ladies at our church.. but extremely nervous.

I never could imagine a crowd in their underwear. Whoever thought of that anyway? You’re supposed to turn your head if you ever see anyone in their underwear. Instead, I tried imagining what they were like as kids. I’ve worked long enough in children’s church to be comfortable speaking to kids.. even on a mic. It helped me relax a little.

Just before going to speak, I tried out my speech on Mike. It didn’t go well. I’d read it a hundred times but still couldn’t say what I wanted to say with out reading it word for word. Mike encouraged me to ad lib it. When I actually gave my speech, I tried to and ended up just telling the stories.

Looking back, I wish I had read the part at the end to them and played the song I found to go with it.

Here’s my little talk…

I love holidays. I’ve always seen them as a gift from God; a time set a side from you’re daily routine to remember who God is and what He has done, and a time to enjoy being with your family.

I love all the holidays except Valentine’s day. I never could get into Valentines Day ever since I was in grade school and learned that it was the day you might be teased about who might or might not like you. That’s not the ideal kinda day for a shy girl like me.

My husband, who enjoys making fun of Mother’s Day by saying that it was invented by the greeting card companies, absolutely LOVES Valentines Day. He loves being in love ..with me and showering me with gifts, and cards, and surprises on Valentines Day.

You’d think when for one our first Valentines Day’s together I received this jumbo card in the mail that I would have figured this out and joined in the fun, but it took me a while.

(I pulled the card out of a large shopping bag.)

A few Valentines Days ago (just before our 20th anniversary), the Lord had a talk with me. He said something like.. “Look at what you’re missing out on. Your husband loves to delight in you on Valentines Day and you keep pushing him away. It’s time to get over it.”

Looking back now, I see that it was pretty retarded of me to allow 20 plus years of Valentines Days pass me by and not use them as an opportunity to build more love and joy into our relationship. There was only one thing standing in my way all those years: surrendering that part of my heart to the Lord and allowing Him to heal my past hurts and fears.

The Lord has only spoken to me that sternly only a few times. Many times just hearing the truth has set me free. I worked really hard that year to bless my husband and since to delight in his delight in me …but to tell the truth I am still not totally sold on Valentines day. I am still journeying though that surrendering and healing.

This Valentine’s Day, the Lord encouraged me to make these fabric fortune cookies for you.. At first I thought that it might have been my own idea and that it was a pretty corny one.. But then He sent me three confirmations that I was supposed to make them for you.

So I googled the words “fortune cookie” and “Bible” to try to figure out where God was going with the fortune cookie idea… and every blog and sermon that I could find said the same thing, “Fortune cookies are bad.” So I obeyed God, made the corny fortune cookies and God shocked me with a fourth confirmation. Those are rare for me.

The google preachers may think all fortune cookies are bad but these fortune cookies have a purpose.. You see, the same way that a fortune cookie has to be broken before you can see it’s message and enjoy it’s sweet flavor sometimes we have to be broken before we can be the message of His love to the world and that sweet tasting sacrifice to our Lord.

These cookies are to remind us of how blessed, fortunate and to be envied we are because… in Christ everyday can be a holy day. Everyday is a day to delight in His delight in us. Everyday is a day to surrender our whole heart to Him and allow him to turn our brokenness into joy. Every day His mercies are made new. Everyday we have an opportunity to turn our thoughts towards Him and to allow Him to build more love and joy into our relationship with Him. This fortune cookie is to remind you this Valentines Day that *The Desire of the Nations desires you and wants you delight in His love.

I wasn’t sure how to end my little talk but I had these scriptures ready..

Philippians 4:4 It says.. Rejoice in the Lord always [delight, gladden yourselves in Him]; again I say, Rejoice!

In Song of Songs 4:9-10 He says..

You have stolen my heart, my sister, my bride;

you have stolen my heart

with one glance of your eyes,

with one jewel of your necklace.

How delightful is your love, my sister, my bride!

How much more pleasing is your love than wine,

and the fragrance of your perfume than any spice!

Ps 147:11 says He delights in those who fear him, in those who put their hope in His unfailing love.

Ps 139 says He thinks about us constantly

It’s impossible to count how many times a day His thoughts turn towards us.

Ps 103 says He crowns us with love and tender mercies.

He fills our life with good things.

His love is as great as the height of the heavens above the earth.

He has removed our sins as far from us as the east is from the west.

Zephaniah 3:17 says The Lord your God is in your midst.

He is a mighty savior, a victorious warrior.

He celebrates and sings because of you!

He will take great delight in you.

He will quiet and refresh you with His love.

He will rejoice over you with shouts of joy

and delight you with His songs.

The scripture I put in the fortune cookies was…

Song of Songs 7:10 I am my beloved’s and his desire is toward me.

Here’s where I learned to how to make the fortune cookies…

Here’s a YouTube video of the song the I thought went with my message…

Happy Birthday to Me

January 10, 2009 / Jennifer Coleman / 3 Comments

Moving this past year caused me to discover all kinds of stuff about myself.. for instance when I looked back at my FL house and saw all the different colors I used to paint it I realized that I am a very colorful person.

Once we settled in a little, I started worrying that I was going to have a very lonely birthday. I was turning 40 and had to choose between keeping it a secret so that I wouldn’t have to share it with well meaning strangers and arranging something so I could celebrate it big with people I know and love.. who lived very far away.

My birthday is in mid-September.. and although I think it’s the perfect time of year and love that I was born on my Dad’s birthday, it’s turned out to be a bad time of year for celebrating…

In Mike’s field of work, fiscal close out is Oct. 1 which often means from mid-September on he is working long hours trying to spend millions of dollars so that his budget doesn’t get cut the following year. He is usually not a lot of fun during that time of year .

The very first year he was able to work it out to take me for a date on my birthday was the year the twin towers were hit by terrorist.. ever since then the week of my birthday has been a national week of mourning the anniversary of 9/11.

So this year when Mike agreed to take me to see the cherry blossoms for his birthday I decided that I needed more time than just a night or a weekend to celebrate my birthday and that I would celebrate all year. So every trip we took, every time we went on a date, in my heart we were celebrating my birthday.

One night, in July, we drove the kids to a concert near Birmingham and went into Birmingham for dinner. I shared with Mike my silly idea of celebrating my birthday all year. And guess what was waiting for me in the bushes out side the restaurant? This birthday balloon. I took it as a sign that my Heavenly Father was celebrating with me.

I will have to keep it in a scrapbook to remind me of His tender love for me.

My generous mom and mil sent me money for my birthday and I bought myself these candle pillars to light when it’s too warm to light the fire place. We enjoy the atmosphere. I looked all over town and on line for candle pillars and couldn’t find any… until I heard the Lord tell me to wait one more week and found that the next week Hobby Lobby had hundreds of candle pillars on sale 50% off.

They turned out even more beautiful than I imagined.

I found this leather jacket at Kohl’s. It was a little more money than I wanted to spend so Mike took me all over town to see if we could find a better deal. None of them were as nice as this one. I waited to see if it would be cheeper on Black Friday.. it wasn’t and they had run out of my size. I looked for it on line on the following Monday and discovered they were having 15% off everything Cyber Monday. I forgot all about Cyber Monday.

I also got to buy several winter tops on sale. I didn’t have many after all those years in FL. I bought three for less than $10 with tax at one sale.

God planned a birthday surprise for me on my actual birthday weekend. A friend from Huntsville invited me to go on a field trip with her. We got to go on a tour of the Capital building with a man that was a member of Martin Luther King’s church and actually marched in the Bloody Sunday march from Selma to Montgomery. He is considered the AL Historian and has his masters in history. He was fascinating to listen to.

We got to look at some beautiful art. I love art.

Here is my friend Lee Ann and her son with our docent, Aroine Irby.

Here our our kids hanging outside the governors mansion.

Isn’t this charming?

And I love this arrangement with the angel.

This is a prayer garden in the back yard of the mansion. It’s cool to know that they have a place to pray.

This is a sculpture of Jesus that was donated to the Department of Archives and History. I love it. It looks very much like my visions of Jesus.

So the other thing that I learned about myself is that I am big on birthdays and think that they should be celebrated big. I was so blessed by all the trips I got to take this year to celebrate my birthday, for the great sales I found, and for the time I got to spend with my friend Lee Ann and her son.

Biology

December 27, 2008 / Jennifer Coleman / 2 Comments

I still haven’t gotten my family photos printed or my Christmas cards sent out. I planned to work on them this morning but my teens did something to my computer and I can’t get my new photos to upload.

These photos are from a few months back. I was so excited when Mike brought home this hummingbird feeder for me.

Months went by and no hummingbirds came to visit; my princess suggested that maybe hummingbirds don’t live here.

The general reasoning was that if they had feeders for sale here they must have hummingbirds. I wasn’t too sure about that. Obviously ‘some’ people would buy them not knowing if or not they had hummingbirds here. So I looked in my trusty bird guide book… no hummingbirds were listed for our part of the country. Then I googled them… still couldn’t find any.

Months later during our biology lab one appeared at my feeder.. I googled again and found that there were several types of hummingbirds in our area.. Hurray!

It was a couple of weeks before I actually got a picture of her. I think she is a ruby-throated hummingbird.

A few weeks later I went to visit a friend who had 5-6 feeders and over 20 hummingbirds buzzing around them. So much fun.

The three youngest and I are doing Apologia Biology together this year. The vocabulary words in the first module were pretty rough.. but we’re getting the hang of it.

We found these mushrooms/funguses in our yard the day we needed them. Isn’t God good?

Most of the time I love seeing stuff in the microscope. Recently we looked at some banana cells. They were so beautiful!

Seven or eight years ago when we first got our microscope we looked at some leaves from a tomato plant we had growing in the back yard and found tiny little spiders and things living on our tomatoes. That tomato plant didn’t live much longer and I’ve never tried to grow anything else to eat. I haven’t admitted it out loud but some were deep inside I believe pesticides are good.

🙂