Yeah...

I don't really know how to describe how different life is now.
I know that he's only been gone for two days.
But in the matter of a couple of hours, it seems life has been turned completely upside down.

When I'm home for too long,
I start thinking that my dad is going to walk through the door.
I miss his laughter.
I miss his silly faces.
I miss his sarcasm.
I miss his hugs.

I just don't know how to keep going.
But I do know that the Lord has been faithful in helping me move and breathe.
He has been faithful to keep my heart focused on Him and trusting in His love and plan.

These past couple of days have been extremely hard, and I know it's just going to get harder.

The memorial service for my dad is on Friday at 11am at Sagebrush Riverside Campus.

Blessings.

Painting

I started painting my room today,
and I must say that it looks pretty awesome so far.
The color grey that I got is just wonderful.
I think it'll turn out to be a good refuge place.
Somewhere I can go to relax and grow.

But while I was painting some of the walls in my room,
I was realizing how painting always comes around seasons of change in my life.
It's not a spectacular realization or anything.
I was just thinking about all the times I've painted rooms that I've lived in--
and they always come around seasons of change and growth.
Always.
When I paint, God tends to send me some circumstances to trust Him through.
This isn't any different.
This season that the Lord has ushered into my life is one that I am going to have to lean hard on Him through.
And I mean hard.

All today I've been talking with the Lord.
We've been having some conversations.
I've been crying out to Him a lot--with questions that He'll probably never answer, except that He already has.
You see, I've been asking a lot of "Why?" questions lately.
And He keeps bringing me back to the Gospel.
Sin has caused so many problems in this world,
but the Cross has redeemed us to a right relationship with God.
And we can now have hope for the future when all things will be made right.
We will one day have justice.
We will one day have glorified bodies in the new heavens and new earth.
We will one day be with the Savior, in unhindered fullness of joy.
He reminds me that even though there are things that happen that I don't understand, that I can still trust in Him. I can still believe that He is good and faithful. In His Sovereignty, all things work for the good of those who love Him. Meaning that there is a reason for everything--and the Lord is able to bring glory to Himself through the things that happen in my life, whether I see them as good or bad things. Ultimately, my life purpose is not to be happy all the time, my life purpose is to bring great glory to the Creator of the universe, the Savior of my soul. And if I can bring Him glory through grieving over news that breaks my heart, then that's what I'll choose to do.

I don't know how to approach the subject of death.
It seems so abnormal.
It seems so wrong.
And that's the way it should be.
We were meant to live. We were meant to enjoy relationship with God.
But instead we chose to go our own way. We chose death.
And it's so hard because no one wants to face something that is inevitable at one point or another.
I don't want to face it.
But the reality of the shortness of life is becoming more and more real to me--and my family.
We truly are like the grass of the field, here today and gone tomorrow.
The psalmist said it right when he asked the Lord to teach him to number his days.
We don't have very much time here on this earth before it's over.
So how do we talk about death?
How should we approach this subject?
I still don't know.
A couple of years ago I could have answered this easily. I would have said that we should be joyful that the loved one (if he/she was a believer) was finally able to go be with the Lord.
But it's just not that simple.
Yes, it should be comforting to know that the loved one isn't in any more pain and is living in the light of the Savior. We will one day be reunited.
But that won't lessen the pain of the loss. Death is a separator. We were meant to have relationship, meaning, we were supposed to be with one another. So, yes. the death of a loved one will hurt.

Painting.
Yes, it reminds me of so many changes in the past.
And there are so many changes yet to come, I'm sure.
Blessings.

Adventures in Dog Walking.

Basically, I looked like a crazy person this morning when I tried to take my dogs on a walk.
Seriously.

Here's the story:
I really wanted to take a walk this morning. And it's been my goal for a little while now to start taking my dogs on a walk a few times a week. So, I thought that we should take a little walk.
So I put on their leashes, and we walked out the front door to begin our adventure in our neighborhood.
*Here's a little bit of background info before I continue.
My dogs may be big, but they are little babies. They are scared of everything in the outside world. I really should have socialized them better when they were puppies, but I didn't.*
So as we were walking down one of the streets a little while away from the house, two little white poodles started chasing us down.
Jake and Homer started freaking out.
And little did I know that I didn't put their choke chains on correctly.
Homer escaped first, then Jake followed suit.
Oh. My. Word.
Talk about chaos.
These two little poodles were freaking my dogs out.
Jake and Homer were dancing awfully close to a busy street.
So naturally,
I was yelling at J&H to sit and stay.
Did they listen?
No.
So I chased them down. And after a little bit of struggle, I got their choke chains on correctly.
And I shooed away the little poodles.
My gracious.
It was nuts.
So we continued our walk.
And Jake decided to be Houdini and escape from his choke chain again.
I just don't know how that dog does it.
So I caught up with him again, and got it back on.
Thankfully, we were able to walk all the way back home without another incident.
I'm telling you, it was so crazy.
But, it was such a joy getting to go on a walk with them again.

Blessings.