Rom 8:38-39

This is the first time in a long time where I really wondered how I could call myself a Christian. God brought to light a sin I had been struggling with for a long time - as long as I can remember in fact. He had been telling me to stop and I ignored Him until today when it all blew up in my face. I have been crying off and on all day just because I cant believe what I have been letting myself get away with. On the one hand I'm so sad because I hurt people and I wish I would have stopped before hurting anyone. On the other hand, I'm starting to feel slightly relieved that I'm not going to be able to rationalize this particular temptation as easily as I have in the past. A dear friend and coworker who I confided in about my situation sent me a note and had me read from a couple of places in the Bible. But never has Romans 8:38-39 ever meant more to me:
For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Thank God that no matter how badly I screw up, He will still love me. I dont deserve it, and that's what keeps echoing in my head even as I type this. But whether I deserve it or not, He has given it to me and He's not taking His love back. What an amazing love! I still feel low and I'm really going to have a hard time forgiving myself but God has already forgiven me and ultimately I know that is all that really matters. But I'm praying God will give me some peace about it so that my heart doesnt continue to feel like it weighs 50lbs. I'd like to dwell on this but I wont. I'm thankful to God that hopefully He has shaken me to the point that I wont fall into the same pattern in the future.

Ironically, this past weekend I attended a church conference and it was wonderful. Every speaker and every message I heard was fantastic and applicable. I even heard messages about the sin I have been struggling with. I told myself I was going to fix things but I dont think I was really ready to until today. Maybe I would have handled today's events different if God hadnt prepared me with perspective this past weekend.

This weekend will be busy. We're going to have our cousins and our best friends come over tomorrow. Rebekah's birthday was on Monday - she's three now! We had dinner with our immediate families which means brothers, sisters and parents on Monday and had a great time. Tomorrow we thought we'd use her birthday as another excuse to get the youngens together again. Unfortunately some of our cousins already have plans but hopefully we'll do this again soon. I hope I will be disciplined enough to take pictures. The other thing is we like to get together and play games - be it card games or board games. But we get kinda competitive and I am definitely the chiefest among sinners in that perspective. BUT I am REALLY going to pray hard that God helps me control myself this weekend in light of today. I am already dreading the pain I will surely feel as my teeth bite into my lip when someone starts talking smack. I'm going to let you know how I did on Monday which hopefully will keep me motivated to stay good!

I dont know how people can get through struggles without God in their lives...

Day 1

Watch out, World! Sherry has finally started blogging!!!

First off I will explain the title. I get a devotional in my inbox every day and a few weeks ago I got one that was called Getting Up Again and it was based on Hebrews 12:1 which states: Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us. The author of the devotional goes into describing his son who in a hurdle race fell down and jumped back up again and kept going without hesitating for a second and ended up winning third place and also continued competing for another hour and a half with bandaged injuries. And obviously that ties into how as Christians even when we fall down (usually because of something self inflicted) we have to jump back up again and keep striving towards our goal of finishing the race that God has set out for us. And seeing as how I am CONSTANTLY falling down in every aspect of my life (family, spiritual, work, friendships, you-name-it) I thought I need to make myself focus on the getting up part. Anyway, that's that!

A tiny bit about me: I've been married for about four and a half years. We have one daughter and her name is Rebekah and she will be turning three on June 23rd. She is both a handful and a miracle.

My husband is an elder (like a pastor) at our church so we are obviously very involved there and we also both work full time. We both come from big families and prefer to have them around most of the time. In fact, I'm pretty sure the only reason we are still sane is because of the help we have gotten from our families over the years. Also, three years after giving birth to my daughter I finally decided to lose pregnancy weight mixed in with newlywed weight. Yes, I'm long overdue but I've finally decided to make it a priority thanks to my brother in law and future sister in law who will be getting married in Puerto Rico next January. I decided if I was going to happily go I needed to lose about 60lbs. I've got 40lbs to go and undoubtedly this might be used as a sounding board from time to time. I apologize in advance!!! Lastly, the biggest struggle for me over the past 6 months or so has been trying to develop spiritually and strengthen my fellowship with God. So you will surely read some of that too! I guess that's me in a nutshell...

I'm going to close my first post thanking my friend Aubrey who inspired me to start the blog. I love reading hers and finally decided to commit to one myself. The only problem is that I now feel this overwhelming pressure to make it at least half as interesting as I find hers...If I fail in that arena, please just dont tell me. :)