Abide.

As I sat on the couch with our tired and restless, almost eight month old, daughter, I was filled with an overwhelming sense that this was utter bliss.  Perfection brought in the form of a child; that is, when she would sit still.  She fought the urge to cry and wiggle, only to cry more when I would put her down.  We finally put the toys away and I firmly hugged her against my chest and rubbed her back.  Comfort was found when she popped her thumb in her mouth and began sucking.  It took no more than five minutes before I was cuddling the cutest and sweetest, sleeping baby. 

I sat and held her for about twenty minutes, soaking in the moment; as this child now spends her moments crawling, standing, playing, and moving, moving, moving.  I was reminded of how the Father holds me and comforts me so often these days.  Time and time again, He has proven Himself faithful though He has no obligation to do so.  He must long for the moments that I will just rest in His presence and fully trust, allowing no room for doubt or fear to creep in.  All the while, waiting for me to stop fighting my insecurities and just believe. 

The God who created the universe is the same God; He has not changed.  He is just as faithful and just as able.  Yet, how easy it is to forget or let my fears cause me to doubt the Savior who just wants me to abide.  I realized I was just like the Isrealites I read about yesterday, that continuously saw God's hand at work and so quickly forgot who their Savior was when times got hard.

"Therefore, as the Holy Spirit says, 'Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion on the day of testing in the wilderness, where your fathers put me to the test and saw my works for forty years.  Therefore I was provoked with that generation, and said, "They always go astray in their hearts; they have not known my ways.'  As I swore in my wrath, They shall not enter my rest.'"  Take care, brothers, lest there be in any of you an evil, unbelieving heart, leading you to fall away from the living God."  Hebrews 3:7-12 (ESV)

Sitting, holding our daughter, I pondered these things.  Two words spoke softly in my mind.  The first was to abide.  I thought, "How true."  The Lord just wants me to choose to "abide" putting all else aside and choosing to remain in Him. 

And then the word, held reminded me I was wrapped in the Father's loving embrace.  I also was being "held".  I first thought how different the words were, that I did not give Riley the choice to be held but I could choose to abide in the Father.  And then I realized how alike they were.  The Father does not force us to be held.  And, Riley, fought her way out of my arms so many times.  Utter perfection only came when she chose to be comforted by my loving arms. 

Wondering if I just thought of these words on my own, I looked them up in Strong's Concordance. In reference to place, abide means, "to be held, kept, continually" and in reference to time it means, "to continue to be, not to perish, to last, endure".  How beautiful and perfect.  The Father wants us to abide in Him as he tells us in the book of John, "abide in me"; meaning stay with me always so that I can hold you.  We never need to leave the Father's arms; it is our choice when we become anxious.

Abiding in our Savior does mean to remain in Him.  But it also means choosing to be held in His steadfast arms at all times, trusting in His sovereign plan even when you want to question His plan, curse Him, doubt He is able, or weep in angry bitterness.  Choose the Father today.  Let the Him hold His child in utter bliss by choosing to abide in Him.

This is Who I Am (Shane & Shane)

"This is who I am

I've been born again
the Cross is my defense, my hope secured
now my life is in Your Hand
on Your every word I stand
Lord I’m finding who I am in all you are"

These lyrics in particular play over and over in my mind when I hear this song.  The whole piece is perfection; it is all for the glory of the Lord.  God we ask that you receive all glory and honor and praise.  You are everything!

Riley's New Pass Time

Rummaging through her toy basket!

Monumental

"Mama."

I am a mom and loving every minute of it!  This very minute I am watching the new version of "Charlotte's Web" and Wilbur is reminding me of Bentley.  Oh how I miss my buddy!  Riley is in bed and we are watching a kids movie.  We have turned a new corner in life; it is different and perfect.

Today after nap time, Riley did her usual cry and babbled her new words, "Mama mama mama bam ba ba ma" beckoning me to come and get her from her prison.  I walked in to find her standing in her crib for the first time!  Earlier last week I was amazed and giddy to find her sitting in her crib, and in between the two monumental moments was her first word, "Mama".  And what a sweet whispering to my soul.  Knowing she favors the sound "ba" I don't think she first associated the meaning with the word, but we have been working on the meaning and who "Mama" and "Dada" are.  As of today, we have heard both.  I truly think she knows who "Mama" is, but that could be debatable.  We are working on signing that deal soon. 

Last night I had a dream that Riley was Brenton's and my baby but for whatever reason we could not have her.  How wonderful to wake up to our baby waiting for me, saying my name and ready for a poopy diaper change. 

My cup overflows.

Summer's Up and School is Back, or at Least Will Be Soon!

"Hello!" After 3 weeks of traveling and transition, we are back home again.  However, coming up this time was to a clean townhome rather than our mouse happy rental in the country.  Thank you Jesus for a sanitary place now that Riley has taken to crawling, rolling, sitting, and standing, though varied versions of each.  Brenton calls is crawling, I call it lazy.  Two knees forward, bobble and a lunge; that's all it takes for our sweet girl to get to her toys.  Sometimes she throws in a leg kick or a roll before taking on her crawling stance to move both knees again before lunging to the next victim.

Only one time has she pulled herself up on the ottoman to standing position, though she frequently tries to use me as her steadying pole.  And we woke up this morning to find her in sitting position, leaning all the way forward and, yet, still fast a sleep.  Sitting is like crawling.  She has sat up on her own, though she prefers to lean forward and tumble into a role rather than exert the energy to sit and play.  Really, Riley is far from lazy as every minute awake is spent moving, and if she has help trying to stand.  I think the little girl wants to walk rather than crawl. 

As you can tell, Riley's swirl of hair on top of her head has grown tremendously.  The gel mohawk is from trying to remove her cradle's cap.  Think we got it!

So the reason we have been MIA for the past month...

The first week of July, we were enjoyed the fireworks from our neighbors house and the 4th of July celebration in small town Jellico, an even smaller town than Williamsburg... which is small.  We found out that we were going to get campus housing so Brenton can now walk to work.  Perfect timing as we were about to head out on vacation and return just in time for Brenton to prep for pre-season with the University of the Cumberlands Men's Soccer team.

The next week, my family picked me up as the whole Dongell crew headed to Nana's farm in North Carolina.  Brenton, ever so sweet, headed up a soccer camp in Kentucky and hurried back for a New Student Orientation for the college, missing the time at the farm.  Third week of July, the Dongell crew drove to the beach for the better part of the week and Brenton meet up with us.  Riley loved the wind and the water, as if the tongue is not a good enough indicator of that!  She is a girl after her daddy's heart as she was sad to depart from the daily water outings.

And the fourth week, we were able to visit Brenton's parents and family in Texas as we had two airline tickets expiring the month of July.  We flew standby, amazed that Riley did as well as she did and loving the business right outside of Dallas, Texas.  Brenton was in heaven as he had all his favorites; Chipotle, Jamba Juice, Starbucks, In-N-Out, and QT.

The weather was amazingly HOT and Riley sported a heat rash our whole time there but we loved visiting the Benwares and the Fords.

And the last few days of the month, we hurried back to have our country rental cleaned out and get our campus housing all settled.  I think we are about there.  We got internet just yesterday, so forgive my month of blogging negligence.  We are now back in session!

Riley is napping and Brenton is hard at work as his second assistant just made his way into town.  The boys arrive for pre-season soon and NAIA is delaying in decisions regarding international players.  So you can watch with us as we see how the Cumberland's Men's Soccer team shapes up this season!  Just make sure you follow University of the Cumberlands in Kentucky as there is another university similar in name that makes it easy to get confused.  Until next time!