break over! :)

Today [I started this blog on Saturday and finished it on Sunday] we're just sitting around hanging out as we rest after a very busy week! I feel like my blog "fast" can be over now. The Lord had convicted me several times since Piper's birth that I was spending too much time on the internet and so it was good to have a little break.

Christmas this year was an experiment for us. We believed God was leading us to stay at our house and we are thankful for all that He did. We really missed all of our family in Midland and enjoyed trying to imagine what they must have been doing on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day! We're so thankful for grandparents and cousins who we love spending time with! We were also excited to see how God's hand was on our week here! It was definitely faith-building for us and our kids to see Him answer lots of prayers. The first one I think of is last Saturday. McKenna was sick with the stomach bug that attacked everyone in our family except me, Piper, and Malachi, and after hours of stomach pain and severe nausea she was very frustrated and discouraged. The kids and I gathered around her and prayed for rest and healing - within 15 minutes, she was asleep and never got sick again! Thank you, Jesus! Another HUGE answer to prayer was SNOW. This may not seem like a big deal to you, but my kids had prayed for 2 weeks that it would snow on Christmas Eve or Day and that it would be deep. 2 days before C Eve there was still NO chance of any precipitation on C Eve! On Wednesday p.m. they were still praying that it would snow and I almost wanted to defend God because I just knew that their little hearts were going to be disappointed. What did Jesus say about having faith like a child??!! They kept telling me that the weathermen were not God and God could do whatever He wanted! It snowed almost the whole day on C Eve and when it wasn't sticking to the ground, they and their friends started praying that it would stick...and it STUCK! By that night, it was DEEP in our backyard, and my kids woke up on December 25th to a white Christmas. A friend of ours whose parents have lived in FW forever said that there hasn't been a white Christmas here in over 50 years!! Thank you Jesus for this gift to my kids! Okay, one more answered prayer. We have a homeless friend who built our bookcases in our library and who has been doing more work around the house for us lately. We invited him to eat with us on Christmas, but he just asked if he could take a plate with him because he didn't want to intrude. He has never sat down to a meal with us - always refuses. We prayed that he would stay and eat. He was the first to arrive and stayed all afternoon - he ate with us. Thank you Jesus!!

As I looked around our makeshift long tables set up in our living room yesterday I was overwhelmed with what God has done in my family and in my own heart and with what He continues to do. It almost felt like an out-of-body experience because it didn't seem like I would be living in this "story". The orphan, the widow, and the homeless were at our table. Different races were at our table. Dear friends were at our table. For a few seconds, it was "everything made right" and was a little taste of heaven on earth. We are anticipating Him working and moving in BIG ways in 2010!

One more story. On Christmas Eve, we had three of the Mighty Men over and had a little "party" for Jesus. Everyone brought a gift for Jesus and had to share it with the family. D'Leeland didn't watch tv at all during the month of December, Alphonzo wrote a poem, Corey danced, Isaac colored a heart, Moriah drew a picture of our family loving each other, Luke read 77 Psalms over the last several weeks, Josiah memorized I Corinthians 13, McKenna wrote a poem, I made a list of 100 characteristics of God, and Randy memorized John 14-16 (and dressed up as he recited it!!). It was encouraging to see how each person expressed worship to Him! McKenna gave me permission to share her poem here - it made me cry because it was so real and beautiful! May it bless those who read it (we've ALL been in this place with Jesus before):

Choppy Prayers

My life is an open door.

Come and fill it, O Lord.

You are my supply. Come and steal away

The cup of my despair.

My prayers are choppy.

Uneven.

Do You remain satisfied?

Answer me, O God.

From You I am far.

The distance between You and I is unbearable.

Be near me, Jesus!

Come save me, Daddy!

I am in a far and desolate land.

I thirst for Your mercy, for it is far from me.

But You are not.

Now You race towards me,

Like a Father who misses His daughter

After an endless journey.

You lift me.

You swing me around

In Your thick, soft arms.

You cradle me

And begin to hum a song.

The song.

Your song.

A peaceful lullaby of love. You rock me, gently, sing me to sleep in Your arms.

the beautiful view from our front porch!

Malachi's gift to Jesus??

Christmas Day pics

During the month of December, all of the Baby Jesus figures from all our nativity scenes had mysteriously disappeared! When we woke up on Christmas a.m., there He was and all the wise men, shepherds, and even the animals were bowing down to Him!

Ready to open presents!

Thanks for the gifts, Nana and Papa!! :)

The only gifts our sweet Piper received were from her Nana and Papa - LOL! She loved her soft bunny!

This little baby is SO sweet - she had a wonderful first Christmas! We are so blessed to have her here.

We didn't know it, but Grandma and Grandpa had secretly sent our family's Christmas present to my friend, Charlotte, who brought it over yesterday morning. All the kids received a Mickey or Minnie Mouse doll and a recorded message from their grandparents announcing that their Christmas gift is a trip to Disney World!!

Isaac and Moriah were a lot more excited once we tried to explain what Disney World is!! :)

I really didn't take very many pictures and the ones I did take aren't that great, but I wish there had been some way to capture what 27 people crammed into my small house looked like on Christmas Day! In this pic: Ami, McKenna, Catherine, our neighbor Ms. Murray, and Richard. We had two families, 4 boys with no where else to be, our homeless friend, and our neighbor!
When you asked Moriah what she wanted for Christmas, she always said 100 stuffed animals. Randy decided to check on Craig's list a few days before Christmas and there happened to be a lady selling over 100 Beanie Babies for a good price! Her face was priceless and she had SO much fun with them all day.

blogging break

I'm thinking that it's time to take a little break from the internet for a while. So just FYI, I'll probably pick up blogging again after the first of the year! Have a blessed holiday season! :)

the first four members of the Brown Tree Decorating Crew

the rest of the Marvelous Seven!

the Brown 2009 Christmas tree

'Bethlehem Revisited' in Waxahachie

my frozen babies

we made a memory!!

Malachi and Laura Beth.

Malachi didn't move the whole night! Too many layers (we should try this technique at home)!

Two couples and 12 children - we didn't move quickly, but we had LOTS of FUN!!!!!!

Advent

Still reading Ann Voskamp's blog and loving it! Randy and I have been talking/praying seriously now for a couple of months about what we want Christmas to be this year for our family. Every year we say that we want to do "this or that" differently, but somehow we never do. But this year is already different. We really are not rushing around and we really are reading the Word more and we really are thinking about giving more than we have in the past. I guess if I could summarize what we are seeking, I would say it like Ann Voskamp said it:

The Christ Child in the manger, He takes on the garment of fragile flesh to release us from being beasts of burden.

I think of this often, when I feel Christmas as a weight, burden that I'm sagging under for weeks. Whenever Christmas begins to burden, it's a sign that I've taken on something of the world and not of Christ.

Christmas comes to us like the Cross -- asking nothing of us but embrace. So I lay down the expectations and the efforts, the perfectionism and performance, and I simply wait for His coming. His blood does all the work. He shed it to release us from burden -- so we embrace a peaceful Advent...

My favorite line is "Whenever Christmas begins to burden, it's a sign that I've taken on something of the world and not of Christ." My goal this year is to actually enjoy the One who Christmas is about and to stop feeling the dissatisfaction that comes when I envision some idealized Christmas that never happens. So my favorite memories so far (here on Dec 5th): last Friday p.m. we celebrated the upcoming season by watching a Christmas movie and decorating slice and bake cookies. It was a huge mess with lots of laughter and sweetness! Haven't seen every person in our family that content at the same time in a long time! :) Last night we went to a "hands-on" Bethlehem in Waxahachie. We walked through the "Bethlehem" marketplace, etc. with the Roman soldiers, Mary and Joseph, live animals, the wise men with their REAL camels. Very cool (literally - it was in the 20's. What kind of mother takes her 3-week-old outside in THAT kind of weather. A really tired and delirious one who doesn't want to be a stick-in-the-mud)! I wouldn't have gone last p.m., but we went with some friends and as I was waffling about whether or not to go, Ami says to me that we need to go and make a memory. Well, Ami and I ended up staying in this beautiful little church sanctuary most of the night with our babies, but our kids loved it! Glad I didn't procrastinate, waiting for the perfect non-20-degree-night to go. I'm slowly starting to figure out that the "perfect" moment is the one I'm in. And every moment IS enjoyable because He is in every one. May you enjoy the only One who is able to bring you joy and may you experience His weightless grace and not bow under the burden that the world would try and tell you is "normal" for this time of year.

Don't drink the water

I have to confess that for the first time ever I attempted to go shopping on Black Friday. It was 11:30 Thanksgiving night, and I had made the mistake of reading the store ads in the paper that day. Toys R Us had a great deal on a gift that I hadn't even known I needed until I read the ad. The sale started at midnight, so I decided to go check it out. It took me 15 minutes to exit the highway because the cars were so backed up. When I got there, there was a line stretching behind the store down through the parking lots of the next few stores for at least half a mile. It was 12:15 am. It was cold. The line was moving slowly because the store was already full and we had to wait for people to leave before more people could go in. I know there were people there, because I remember seeing bodies, but I never really looked at anyone. I looked through the window at the toys, then down the road at the line, then walked back to my car thinking what fools these people were for waiting in that long, cold line in the middle of the night. I went home and went to bed, then went back to the store at 7 am only to find that the toy I was seeking was sold out. So many people were in the aisles that I could barely move, but I didn't love any of them. I actually thought about loving them, but decided to look for my toy instead. I finally left empty-handed.

Jesus was thirsty from a long, hard day. He sat at a well, but had nothing to draw water with. He asked a woman for water. You probably know the story. She was shocked that he was breaking all cultural rules to speak to her. He struck up a conversation about living water, and before long he had convinced her and the whole town to believe that he had come from heaven to save them.

Tonight as I read that story to my kids I had to stop. I only got a few verses into it when I was overcome. Jesus was really thirsty. He really wanted water. He wasn't just trying to find a way to start a conversation about himself. He wanted a drink. As far as we can tell from the Bible, the woman never did get Jesus that cup of water. He talked and talked to this woman, and eventually even talked to her friends, and never again asked for a drink. If I had been in the role of Jesus in that situation, I would probably have cut her off after the first question and said something like, "How about you get me a drink, then I'll tell you why I'm not afraid to talk to a Samaritan woman."

Lately, more than usual, I have been mission-minded. Not the good kind of mission-minded where I spend my life trying to love people to Jesus, but the bad kind of mission-minded--the kind of mission where I want what I want and I won't slow down until I get it. The silly thing is that it doesn't seem to matter what the mission is. Sometimes it's getting my work done so I can get home to the family. Other times it's searching the store shelves looking for the toy or gadget or Christmas lights that I want to buy. Often it's obsessively searching the internet to find the lowest price in the universe on some gift that I'm sure must be a dollar or two cheaper somewhere out there. Lately I've even been analyzing coupons at the checkout stand, so that I don't even notice the person I'm standing in front of. Saving 40 cents on a loaf of bread instead of saving a lost soul from an eternity in hell. Yikes! If it had been up to me, the woman at the well would probably be on her 7th or 8th husband, and I'd still be trying to get her to give me a bigger cup of water.

Jesus, help me. I deeply admire you. Please make me like you. Cause me to love people so much that I'm willing to go without my cup of water--to leave my "mission" unaccomplished. Please change my mission to make it the same as your mission, no matter where I am. Especially during this season that seems to pull me so strongly toward wanting and getting, please open my eyes to the people right in front of me. You know I love a good deal. Please overcome my love for a good deal with your love for people. I want to honor you this month.