Tancy Talks

For several weeks, my thoughts have been on friendship.  It seems that God has felt the need to bring it to my mind repeatedly.

I was raised to value a friendship.  My parents had good friends that they were very close to when I was a child, and they demonstrated the power and importance of friendship.  I have always taken true friendship seriously.

I am blessed at this time in my life to have a small core group of friends whom I value as priceless.  Our friendship has built over the years through common life experience and love for each other.

What I love most about my dearest friends is that over the years we have developed a true “Iron sharpeneth iron” relationship.  I love that when I am out of line, but friends will tell me, and I can love them more because of it.  I value you that so highly.

In recent days, I have had a friendship that has been greatly hurt, and I am doubtful that it will ever recover.  I have shed many tears over this.  I am still trying to fix things. I am still praying for them and me and our relationship.  I know I serve a God that is bigger than any human rift.

I am so glad that God had  been reminding me about the strength of true friendship long before any crisis happened.  I am also thankful for the constant reminders about friendship that God has brought before my mind.

I am grateful that I have the opportunity to teach my children about true friendship, and I have the example that my dear friends have given me.  They have heard my friends give me the “What for” when I have needed it, and they have seen our friendship preserved.

I was thinking about this very subject last night.  I was thinking about our children and the influences in their lives, and praying that they find some of the amazing “Iron” friends.  They need that!  This Christian walk is hard, and it so much easier when you have the kind of friends that hold you up, drag you along, or cheer along the way. We have to have them!

Today when we went to The Call-Rockford, I had the opportunity to read in I Corinthians.  Before I read today, I was truly hesitant to write about this subject, but this was the last verse that I got to read.

I Corinthians 15:33
Do not be misled: “Bad company corrupts good character.”

Another reminder about friendship.  I am so thankful God has blessed me with GOOD company. 

My heart hurts today.  Honestly, that is about all that is on my mind.  My heart just hurts.

I find it so crazy that just yesterday God was working on me about loving people and within a few short hours I am faced with an opportunity to put this faith into action.  Loving someone like Jesus means I have to love them through all their faults AND no matter how much I am hurting.

Yesterday was a day of roller coaster emotions.  We had a long day in court with mixed emotions.  I came home to find my dear friend had worked hard in my house just to help me!   I am so thankful for my dear friend.  I thank God for my dear friend. We then went to the Rescue Mission which is such a spiritual shot in the arm.   There is JOY in serving Jesus!  We had dinner with dear friends and then I came home and had an incredible time of personal worship.   Then, turmoil.  I went to bed full of love, joy, confusion, hurt, and tension.

But I KNOW.

God was still God throughout EVERY moment of my day yesterday.  Every single moment.  My God is sovereign and sits on His throne when my heart is heavy and my mind is jumbled, and God is sovereign and sits on His throne when I am at ease.

He wants me to have peace. He wants me to obey and trust that He is in control.  He has got this.  He has every little trouble running through my mind.  He knows the result that I am already worrying about, and that is wrong! Oh Lord, help me remember you are in control!

I need to be leave it in His hands because He has the answer.

 

I know that this may be a shock to some, but not to those close to me.

I don’t like people.

What?  How can a person like me NOT like people?

Well, I don’t.

I have an incredibly low tolerance for stupidity (not unintelligent… pure stupidity)  and a bunch of other stuff.   I have really been struggling with this in my life.  As I get older I feel myself becoming more and more intolerant of people around me that I feel do not measure up  to my standard.

Lately, the Lord has been really working on me about  this.  He has told me that I need to LOVE people.  REALLY TRULY LOVE people.

The song that has been running through my head repeatedly is Love Them Like Jesus by Casting Crowns.  I want to love people like Jesus, but I have not been doing my job!

Now, I know people will say, “Well, look at what you two do?  Well, You see… I can love certain kinds of people.  I can easily love the childless, the poor, the hurting, the sick, the orphan, the dirty person… but that is not enough.

If I am to LOVE people like Jesus that means I have to love every person…. The annoying. The mean. The intolerant.  The person who makes the same mistake repeatedly.  The person who keeps hurting me. The person who seems to rub me the wrong way every time I see them.  All the people that I in my own strength CAN NOT love.

You see, I have been loving people in my own strength.  The people that I can easily love.  But, I haven’t been loving every person that God puts in my path.

A while ago, Pastor Mike Cooper preached a sermon he called, “God loves the smelly people.”  I sat there and felt like I could love the smelly people.  I was pretty good at that… but then I reserved a whole group of people I felt I could remain intolerant of.

Oh, could you imagine if Jesus loved people the way that I have?

I hurt him continually.

I grieve His Spirit with MY STUPIDITY.

I do this repeatedly.

And yet He loves me.  UNCONDITIONALLY. 

Oh Thank you my dear sweet Savior.  I need to love people. Truly LOVE people.

I want to love them the way that Jesus loves ME.

Our 17th wedding anniversary will be this Saturday. I can not believe it has been that long! We were married on the first Saturday in May seventeen years ago. I was looking at the calendar and realized that since our anniversary is on a Saturday, that the things that happened the previous week will fall on the same day of the week that they did back in 1998.

On the Tuesday before our wedding, my aunt was diagnosed with luekemia. My mom and aunts were going to prepare the food for the 400-plus people who were expected on that day. My aunt worked in a catering kitchen, and that was where were about to make about a million pans of lasagna. But, she was sick, and we got the news that day.

We found out that day she wouldn’t be out of the hospital for a long time. Treatment needed to start immediately.

As it was, Pat talked them into waiting until Saturday at 7:00 to start the Chemo. She wanted to at least attend the wedding, and she did.  She then returned to the hospital, and started treatment that evening.  We stopped by after the wedding for a visit.

It seems like it was another lifetime ago. So much has happened in these last seventeen years including her beating that cancer only to have another one kill her five years ago.
Seventeen years ago today. Everything changed. Every year as our anniversary approaches, I think of this day.
I thnk of the time we spent sitting in her hospital room making the wedding favors and rolling programs and tying each with navy ribbon. That was precious and scary time.

I am thankful for the twelve years she fought it off. I am thankful for the time she loved on our kids. She loved them and she was good to them.

It reminds me how precious the time is with my family now.

Our kids have two incredible sets of grandparents who adore them and do whatever they can to help.

Our kids get to enjoy my aunt and uncle that live nearby who treat them amazingly as well. They love them dearly, and I am so thankful for that.

Family is so important. It is important for children, but it is important for adults too. We need it. I need it. I love the
comfort that comes from knowing that they will be there if you fall apart. So this is my seventeenth year of being reminded of what is important.

Cherish the time. YOu just never know.
Life is a vapor!!!

I have heard that I am the most Type A, non-Type A person that  a person could ever known.

I prefer to think I am quirky. I like the things the way that they are supposed to be… but I am not like crazy OCD…  it is a weird mix of perfectionism and crazy.

One of the things that I tend to be… well…a little overboard about is laundry.  I like drawers and closets perfect even if the room around them is falling apart. (That is a whole other psychology post)  I can relax if the closet is clean and the drawers are orderly.  I like things folded a certain way and I am working hard on making all the kids learn the “RIGHT” way to fold things.

It has been a lesson in self control to not refold EVERYTHING that is folded by little hands.

This afternoon, one of my final requests upon leaving was that the girls get some laundry hung on the line and the boys get the kitchen cleaned up.  I was gone much longer than expected, but was pleased when I pulled up to see the britches blowing in the breeze.

Then I walked up.

Panic.  The boys laundry isn’t on the boys’ line…the girls’ laundry isn’t on the girls’ line… the pants aren’t held perfectly on the waist with evenly formed fold lines over the top.  Pot Holders… Jeans… socks!!!!!

Deep breaths…

But then we took it down, and you know what… IT DID NOT MATTER that they weren’t in MY order this time!  So, it didn’t come down in perfect order that makes sending it to different rooms faster, but it is DONE.  And I survived.

My kids still learned a lesson in working for your family, and I survived the haphazard placement of clothes on the line.

Housework done imperfectly really DOES still bless your family and I think that is a perfect lesson to teach my kids.

And this mom.