It's been a while

Let's get this part out of the way, I haven't written in ages. No reason other than I haven't been moved to visit this space, I am sincerely sorry.

I am moved to write today. This is something I've been chewing on for a bit, and then while reading an article about why not to leave the church (completely different topic for another day) there is a quote at the end and boom, I had the itch to write!

Here's the quote: " If the Church is going to continue reforming, it will be because of the ones who stay— not the ones who leave."

Read more at http://www.relevantmagazine.com/god/church/5-reasons-you-shouldnt-give-church#ulXdyqFporAy9Jwt.99

Now, replace the word "church" with "public school" My oh my we've been hearing a lot about public schools! I grew up going to one, but my kids hadn't experienced public schools due to our own family decision to send them to a local private Lutheran school. I didn't feel I had a right to discuss current public school conditions, because we were not seeing it first hand, so it's impossible to get my facts straight about something I don't know personally.

Our dynamic changed last year, when our daughter, the oldest, Acilia began attending a public school. It was not out of distaste for the school she was attending, but for us, we felt it was best to get her into a public school so she can establish friendships that she will carry into high school. You see, the private school we found to be the best fit for us, is a 25 minute drive from our home. This is sad really, I would love to have found one we love that is closer, but it's very slim picking, which is fine, God led us and we went with it and we were blessed. With a 25 minute commute to school, what you have are great friendships, that you never see outside of school, because those friends live all over, and none of them live close.

Over the last two years, I have had my eyes opened to what is going on in public schools. The school my daughter attends is actually the same school *I* attended when I was her age. There is the sentimental value that is sacred. Then you have what appears to be great morals and values. Awesome! Until this year, there are things that I will not detail here, but there are things that have led me to believe without a doubt, that "politics" have gotten to our little school and it's a BIG problem. So big in fact, that the mother in me would love to pull my daughter out and to homeschool or better yet, get her right back in to her Lutheran school that was "home" for years.

I can't do that though. There are two reasons why:
1. Because God led us to be exactly where we are. God's plan is for our daughter to be in public school and this is the exact public school that she is meant to be in. So, biggest reason being I listened to the Holy Spirit.

2. If we pulled her out, there would be no chance to make change. If you don't like something, "then leave" is the common thread mentality in today's society and friends, it's very very dangerous. Pushing people out that disagree with your perspective, is a way to single handedly change things in your favor. That is the "weak man's method" I won't walk away. It's too risky. Schools of today, NEED push back, they need people who are willing to speak up about how negatively these subtle changes are going to play out if they keep up. The squeaky wheel gets the oil right? Well, fellow Christians, I don't know about you, but I've always been taught to be "quiet" about my faith, live my life the way I want, others live their lives the way they want. Yes that's true to an extent, but here's the thing, being quiet is not helping our cause! Again without going into too much detail about what's happening at our particular school, things are changing and our youth is at stake. These are the kids who will raise families someday and to have their schools teaching them to believe one certain way, "Opinion based, not historically based" it will have future consequences for all of us.

The good news is, God is on top of this already! I am comforted knowing, no matter what I do, God will do it better. However, as a Jesus loving child of God, I will be sure God's light is everywhere we are. And pray, we pray daily about our schools, that the teachers have Jesus in their hearts and are willing to set a Godly example in their classrooms. Public school or not, we need God everywhere.

Join me in asking Him to be a strong presence where others are trying to push Him out.

I pledge Allegiance,
to the flag,
of the United States of America.
And to the Republic,
for which is stands.
One Nation,
Under God,
Indivisible
With Liberty
and Justice
For All.

AMEN!

One word 2015; my word

I LOVE this commitment each year. I am still in shock that it's 2015 and, for record keeping sake, my husband entered the hospital on the last day of 2014, so I almost feel as though we are in a time capsule, we completely skipped over our traditional New Year's Eve celebration and instead replaced it with lab work and a visit to the Northwestern Memorial Hospital ER which then led my husband to be admitted on the 11th floor. Organ floor. Yes, looks like kidney failure again. I will try to update when we have some answers, for now we are in the waiting game to decide what the course of action will be.
We are strong, and I have no doubt we will get through this, the love and support of our family and friends that comes with a health crisis never ceases to amaze me and because of my husband's health history, I dare to say these bumps in the road are expected, even though they are never pleasant. God is with us.

My word for 2015 has been pondered and meditated over for the last few weeks. I was truly settled on a word, that I was going to announce a few days ago, but with all that's been going on, I didn't get around to it. Guess what, this morning, a word came BLARING at me, so if I would have announced my other word, I would have had to change it. It was that clear that my word for 2015 is to be:

B-I-B-L-E. 

(In case you were wondering, my word was GOING TO BE "Home", but now, it's not as fitting and maybe I will save it for another year)

So, 2015, my word is BIBLE.

God has been urging me to get more acquainted with my BIBLE. He has been faithfully and quietly urging me to pick it up much more regularly and I am looking forward to this year's journey.

Here is a great excerpt from my daily devotion email from Lutheran Church Charities, if you haven't subscribed to the devotional emails, I encourage you to do so.

"So when Bible reading becomes unrewarding, we quit. As a result we feel guilty and become spiritually weak and discouraged. Your soul can no more thrive without God’s Word than your body can thrive without a daily intake of food. The Bible says, ‘He humbled you, causing you to hunger and then feeding you with manna, which neither you nor your ancestors had known, to teach you that man does not live on bread alone but on every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord’ (Deuteronomy 8:3). One of the dangers of the iPhone and Twitter is that you begin to live on ‘hits’ of information and short messages limited to 140 characters or less. This creates spiritual ADD (attention deficit disorder). God cannot be reduced to a limited word count or a few hurried moments in your day. To prosper, you must meditate day and night on the Scriptures (Psalm 1:1-3). You say, ‘But I don’t have time to read the Bible.’ How much time do you spend each day watching television? Hours? If you find television to be rewarding, but not God’s Word, your soul is in need of intensive care! If you want to change your life, change your habits and start reading the Bible. Job, who had more trouble than any of us will ever see, said, ‘I have not departed from the commands of his lips; I have treasured the words of his mouth more than my daily bread.’

Prayer
Heavenly Father, help me this year to set aside time each day to read Your Word so that in You I can be strengthened to face the various things that life throws at me each day. In Your Precious Name, Amen"

Feel free to share your word for 2015 in the comments!! I would love to hear them!

Instagram is the place to be!

I haven't blogged in ages, it's hard to do when you have your phone in your hands as your source of media, and my typing skills on the phone are sorely lacking!

Well, it's fun to find a few of my favorite bloggers over @ Instagram, and I wanted to extend the invite to find me there as well :)

I can be found at Karriesmilesalot

See you there!

And then it hit me!

Friends, it's been a while since I have been feeling led to write. Today, I have a message. I've been suffering inside. I've been feeling, discontent, sadness, loneliness, anxiety, stress overall, just miserable. I kept moving forward, day by day, keeping that smile on my face and my optimistic perspective, but deep down, it's been less than desirable.

Things in life are getting in my way of happiness, or so that is the mask that I've been allowing myself to believe. Until today. I have some clarity. The enemy wants to pull people away from God. The closer you get to God, the harder the enemy tries to get between you and the TRUTH. Until this moment, I was allowing that to happen, through confusion and chaos, I was leaving a door wide open to allow darkness to come in and steal the relationship I have with the Lord. My guard is up again and I am holding on to my faith. It's a daily choice, lightness or darkness. I have found I can't let my guard down for even a second, because Jesus is the only way for me to see TRUTH in each day. A walk with the Lord is a faith filled walk, but it's a walk that must be committed to with the help of the Holy Spirit.

"The enemy is like the weeds in a garden, if you don't tend to the flowers faithfully, the weeds sneak in and overtake the beauty of the garden. The weeds are always lurking and creeping, if they aren't uprooted they flourish and they overtake what's been planted. But, it's never too late! You can clear the weeds and the beauty of the garden comes back looking better than ever! Just like with God, every day is new." -Karrie Viscogliosi

You see, I wasn't always so close to God. I didn't work to build a relationship with God until about 5 years ago. And, that's when my life changed. I was so enamored with a life that was filled with the Holy Spirit, which has been and continues to be such a blessing! As with everything else though, I go all in and my reality and logic gets cluttered when I am excited about something new and now, the realities of day to day living have once again snuck in.

God is so good about holding my hand through this life and I am so thankful that no matter what I am feeling, I always have Him to lean on. He's been gently urging me to read my Bible and I humbly admit, I have ignored the gentle urges. The Bible has been the missing link. It has all of the answers I need, the answers I have been seeking from places outside of the Word, the Scripture, the Life Book.

No wonder I've been missing a key piece of my happiness, I've been allowing life and all if it's hectic busyness to keep me away from The Word of God. His whispers have turned much more audible and honestly, I finally picked up that Holy Book. One night I wasn't able to sleep, I was filled with anxiety and I just needed some peace. I picked up my book.

Once, a few years back, I was told, if you don't know where to start, when you read the Bible, start with getting to know Jesus. The books Matthew, Mark, Luke and John are a great place to start. So I have.

God is always there for me, he always knows just what to say, and He always knows how to get that loud and clear message to me. I will hold on to that, and trust in the Lord with all of my heart, and with all of my soul and with all of my mind. (Proverbs 3:5)

God moments

I like to think that my heart is open to whatever God needs me to do.

To back up a little bit. One day at the beginning of this school year, I was driving home. I happened to pass a woman I know that was walking her dog. It was raining and I had a spare umbrella. I did what came naturally. I parked my car and walked up to her to offer the spare umbrella. She looked a bit surprised and confused by my presence, and then she refused my umbrella offer. We did stand and talk for a few minutes to catch up and then I went on my way. I left the experience feeling a bit embarrassed. Then, I ran into her last week and she came up to me to say that she had been meaning to tell me how much of an impact on her that little meeting meant to her. She went on to say that she had a lot going on in her life and she was deep in thought and then I showed up. She said, my presence reminded her that God is always there. God used me.

Today I was in the car driving with my family. I noticed an unleashed dog and then a boy and his mom approaching it. The dog had the look in his face like he wasn't going to be an easy catch and as we drove by, I saw him run across the street and then the owners ran after him. I knew I had to stop to help. I pulled around the block and parked my car. I got out and walked towards the side walk. He was running right to me. The boy yelled to me "Can you grab my dog?!" I let out a whistle and he came right to me. I grabbed his collar and praised him for coming to me. The boy and his mom caught up, breathless and shaken. God placed me in that moment to help.

At church tonight, we were walking out. Two girls approached my husband. He sent me and the kids to the car. He stayed with them for a few minutes and then walked to the church with them. When he got in the car, he informed me that one of the girls had run away from her home a few days ago. They were 30 miles from home and they had no place to go. She was scared and didn't know what to do. He said he knew someone that could help, and then he brought them into the church and introduced them to our Pastor. I went in to check on the situation and to see if there was anything else we could do to help. We offered to drive them home. The church is such a great place to bring someone that is feeling lost, they are trained to handle these exact situations and I was honored to see that training unfold.

I love nothing more than to help others. God takes regular every day people like you and me and He uses us. I truly feel if your heart is open to this mission, He will place you in the right place at the right time. Ask Him what you can do to serve Him. He will guide you through His work.

Utterly mortified!

Ouch! I am embarrassed to admit what just unfolded before my very eyes, but in order to own up to it, and perhaps enlighten someone else, I will share what just happened.

The way our house is, the front NEVER gets used. We enter and exit through the back door, and the front is merely there for drive by appeal. There is one person that faithfully visits the front of my house every day except Sunday. That is the mail carrier. We live in a neighborhood that has walking mail people. Just to paint the picture for you.

Our front steps are in bad shape. We weren't going to fix them because our house was up for sale, but guess what, the sale fell through and they have further declined. In fact, word to the wise, don't use them if you are visiting, I question their safety. We are getting this fixed this spring, it's on the top of the priority list. Just waiting for the carpenter to have free time in his schedule to come do the job! To add salt to the wound, I was HORRIBLE about keeping them clear of the snow this winter, and when we received a notice that we must keep them clear or our mail won't be delivered, I took that as my personal challenge to keep them clear. Since then, each time the white stuff has descended upon us, I have made my way outside to sweep my steps and put salt on them to boot!

Now, I must confess, I don't get my mail everyday. Call it pure laziness if you will. In my defense, there is just nothing fun about the junk mail and bills that we receive, so when I notice our box getting full, I get out there and bring it in to weed through and recycle 99% of it because it's all garbage.

Today, today, today. The day that has prompted me to write and share my embarrassment. My dogs barked, and I noticed the mail carrier at the steps, I happened to glance at her and see sheer disgust on her face. Oh no! She left my mail, it didn't fit in the box, so she just put it on the floor underneath the box. I was about to go get it all in, infact, I had unlocked the door and even opened it. Then I was overcome with the fact that she makes her way back up the block when she's done delivering and I was mortified so I figured I would wait 5-10 minutes to let her leave the area. I thought I was so clever. Until a minute or two later, she was back on my porch. And about 30 seconds after that, my mail was gone! Every last piece of junk mail, my box was empty. She TOOK IT ALL! Disbelief took over me! I couldn't believe what just happened! I had put her over the edge, on this cold March day and I don't even know her name.

I am almost positive our mail carrier HATES us and I am the world's biggest JERK!

In true Karrie fashion, I am going to make it all better! I am going to write an apology out to her and try to win her over. Just wait until she sees our brand new steps when the job is complete! Maybe I will name them after her! :)

2014- My word

I really enjoy choosing one word to work as my learning theme throughout each year. It's a tradition that I started a few years ago, when given the idea on KLOVE. Resolutions can be daunting, but ONE WORD is manageable. I am introducing my word for 2014. That word means a lot to me, and it's been showing itself loud and clear to me. I need to be quiet and still and LISTEN to those around me. My family, my friends, my acquaintances. My 2014 word is Listen.

lis·ten

ˈlisən/

verb

1. 1.

   give one's attention to a sound.

   "evidently he was not listening"

   synonyms:

   hear, pay attention, be attentive, attend, concentrate; More

noun

1. 1.

   an act of listening to something.