Lessons from a Garbage Diposal

Mental Note to Self: 

Be EXTRA vigilent when cleaning the fish bowl, to NOT lose any gravel down the sink and into the disposal!!


I decided to have a little mercy on the gold fish and finally clean their bowl yesterday.  The last time I cleaned their bowl, I accidentally dropped a couple of small pieces of gravel down the disposal and temporarily broke it.  I didn't really want to admit any fault to Hubby and make him have to fix ONE MORE thing.  His JOB is fixing things.  He life is dealing with things that are not working correctly.  It gets frustrating to come home and have to deal with other things that are broken again.  After a couple of days, I was able to get it functioning again.

Yesterday...I tried really hard to keep the gravel out of the disposal.  Unfortunately, in my impatience to be done with the task at hand, I got a little careless with my actions, and suddenly about a handful of gravel overflowed and into the disposal.  Sigh.  I shoved my hand down the disposal to try to fish out the gravel.  It was really crammed in there.  I flipped on the switch but I had clearly jammed the disposal.  Again, I didn't want to admit my problem to Hubby, and vainly tried to fix it myself.  Again and again I shoved my hand down the disposal trying to retrieve the tiny pieces of gravel.  Even though I was able to remove a few of the pieces, I still had quite a problem on my hands.  I finally fessed up to Hubby, and he was able to provide a fairly quick fix.  He immediately asked where the special allen wrench that comes with the disposal was.  (I had no idea it even came with one).  We searched for the tool for several minutes before he disappeared into the garage and came in with a different allen wrench.  It wasn't the one that came with the disposal, but it would work.  He explained that we could "back up" the disposal to hopefully unclog it.  With the small size of the gravel that was penetrating every pore of the disposal, this process took us nearly 1/2 an hour, as he would try to back it up past the clog, and I would reach in to remove the gravel.  It does not take a lot of gravel to clog the disposal, in fact, the reason it was so hard to fix, was because the small amount and small size of the gravel allowed it to sink deeply in to the smallest crevices of the disposal and clog it very effectively.  Finally, we were able to get it spinning freely on it's own, so I flipped the switch and off she went!  hooray!!  My poor hand looked like hamburger from being in running water and shoved in and out of the rough opening of the disposal for several hours.  NEVER AGAIN!  I will buy a drain trap or clean the bowl somewhere else before I go through that again!  The whole problem could have been avoided, had I kept on with patient endurance to complete my task, and remained vigilant against the gravel falling in the disposal in the first place! 

How much is this exactly like our daily lives?
What a visual description of our spiritual journeys!

In every day, we must remain vigilant, and not allow worries, troubles, worldliness, and sin to fall into our lives and our spirits!  Once we become impatient, apathetic, and lose our vigilance, then these things sneak into our lives without us noticing.  It does not take a large amount of this sinful gravel to clog up our lives...just a small amount that sinks down in unnoticed, sinking down into every pore, where it goes undetected, but stops up any moving part.   And they jam up, and clog up our life in Christ - often before we notice their presence.  We don't always want to admit that there is a problem.  We try to avoid it and fix it on our own.  We forget that HE has given us the proper tools to remove the clogs in life and to remove the gravel of sin, worry, worldliness, and despair from our spiritual walk with him.  But HE is the only answer.  Only the power of CHRIST JESUS will remove the clogs.  First, we must admit we have made a mess of our lives and there is a big old clog blocking our lives.  THEN, we must ask Christ for help repairing the damage created by our sins.  We must use the proper tools that He has given us: His Word (the Bible), prayer, fellowship with other believers, etc.  After asking Him to remove the sin from our lives, we are able to unclog it, unwind it, repair it - THROUGH HIM ONLY - and He will clean up the garbage disposal of our life and allow us to move forward again in spiritual growth and working towards completing our tasks on this earth.  This does not mean that the scars will not remain.  The damage we have done to our lives, but trying to repair it ourselves, - the consequences of our actions - often remains for a long time - as a reminder that we should have asked for His help and His forgiveness first.  I should not have jammed my hand into the disposal until the skin was raw and tearing...but eventually, with the help of vaseline and proper care, it will be repaired.  Christ and the Holy Spirit can sooth over the raw damage we have created in our lives, and over time, we will be healed through HIM...but some scars might still remain.    

The world we are living in is full of false prophets, evil desires, glorification of earthly pleasures, and rampant, glorified sin.  We are in a spiritual battle, and yet no one is paying attention to the enemy, who is prowling around like a roaring lion, looking for those whom he can devour.  The world, basically, is full of gravel  - gravel that is actively seeking an opportunity to clog up our spiritual journey with Christ.  Gravel (EVIL) that is actively trying to undermine our faith in Christ, infiltrate our pores, and sneak in unnoticed until we face a major jamming up of our life.  We MUST choose to remain vigilant, to be wary, to avoid even the appearance of evil, to keep the tools Christ has given us handy, and to FILTER everything that enters our souls, so that we will NOT be clogged up by the evil of this world.  We must filter the world around us with prayer, daily Bible reading, surrounding ourselves with Christians who will hold us accountable and encourage and uplift us in prayer through struggles, and most of all, filter our lives through the presence of the Holy Spirit and the life of Christ Jesus living in us.  Be WARY of the false prophets and teachings of this world.  Avoid the clogs of life.  Keep Christ first and foremost in your daily life.  

1 Peter 5:8

Stay alert! Watch out for your great enemy, the devil. He prowls around like a roaring lion, looking for someone to devour.

2 Peter 1

New Living Translation (NLT)

Growing in Faith

³ By his divine power, God has given us everything we need for living a godly life. We have received all of this by coming to know him, the one who called us to himself by means of his marvelous glory and excellence. ⁴ And because of his glory and excellence, he has given us great and precious promises. These are the promises that enable you to share his divine nature and escape the world’s corruption caused by human desires.

⁵ In view of all this, make every effort to respond to God’s promises. Supplement your faith with a generous provision of moral excellence, and moral excellence with knowledge, ⁶ and knowledge with self-control, and self-control with patient endurance, and patient endurance with godliness, ⁷ and godliness with brotherly affection, and brotherly affection with love for everyone.

⁸ The more you grow like this, the more productive and useful you will be in your knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. ⁹ But those who fail to develop in this way are shortsighted or blind, forgetting that they have been cleansed from their old sins.

¹⁰ So, dear brothers and sisters,^[c] work hard to prove that you really are among those God has called and chosen. Do these things, and you will never fall away. ¹¹ Then God will give you a grand entrance into the eternal Kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

Paying Attention to Scripture

¹² Therefore, I will always remind you about these things—even though you already know them and are standing firm in the truth you have been taught. ¹³ And it is only right that I should keep on reminding you as long as I live.^{[d] 14} For our Lord Jesus Christ has shown me that I must soon leave this earthly life,^{[e] 15} so I will work hard to make sure you always remember these things after I am gone.

¹⁶ For we were not making up clever stories when we told you about the powerful coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. We saw his majestic splendor with our own eyes ¹⁷ when he received honor and glory from God the Father. The voice from the majestic glory of God said to him, “This is my dearly loved Son, who brings me great joy.”^{[f] 18} We ourselves heard that voice from heaven when we were with him on the holy mountain.

¹⁹ Because of that experience, we have even greater confidence in the message proclaimed by the prophets. You must pay close attention to what they wrote, for their words are like a lamp shining in a dark place—until the Day dawns, and Christ the Morning Star shines^[g] in your hearts. ²⁰ Above all, you must realize that no prophecy in Scripture ever came from the prophet’s own understanding,^{[h] 21} or from human initiative. No, those prophets were moved by the Holy Spirit, and they spoke from God.    

Buy the Man a Squirrel!

Background:
If you've seen the movie "UP", you know about the talking dog...and how his attention span is always brought up short when he sees a squirrel.

Well...my Hubby shouts "squirrel!" every time he sees a dirt bike.  EVERY time. 

He grew up riding dirt bikes, and raced motocross.  He misses having a bike.  His last bike was his favorite out of the 15 or so that he has owned over the years, but that was nearly 15 years ago! 

I've often encouraged him, telling him that we can all ride the four-wheelers, and he can ride his dirt bike, but he always insisted on keeping everything family oriented.

Last summer, when we bought our son a dirt bike, I could see the writing on the wall. 

Last Weekend:

I took the kids hiking - which was a little bit of a mistake, as the majority of the trail was either solid ice or slush...but we just HAD to get out of the house.  Hubby was working.  On the way home, in the car - they were talking about how excited they are to change seasons from snowmobiling to riding wheelers/dirt bikes.  I told them that if Daddy wants a dirt bike, he should just buy one, because we don't know if he will get sick like Auntie or not.  I didn't continue the thought I was having with them.  But - I would HATE for him to get sick and be physically unable to ride in 5 or 6 years, and then regret not riding while he IS able to ride. 

I stopped to fill up with gas, and grabbed a mini-nickel and another used-car-newspaper, just in case Hubby could find a dirt bike in them.

Later that evening when he got home from work, he pulled out a few phone numbers. 
AHA!  THAT explains the evenings I have returned home from 4-H meetings or church night and found the computer on!

I helped him with craigslist, and soon we were looking for his dream bike.

He stopped for a few quiet moments, held my gaze, and explained his reasoning for buying a dirt bike.  He has several "slush funds," and one has been sitting in the safe untouched for years.  Several years ago he sold his dad a custom saddle, and still had the original cash from that.  While it is a good idea to have a slush fund, it is money that is just sitting in the safe.  It would be better to use that money to buy a dirt bike that he can spend time with his family, dirt biking with Cody and us girls on the wheelers.  I wasn't going to argue with him.  Besides, in buying a used bike, the bike has already taken the biggest hit in depreciation, and if we would need the money, then we could sell the bike again.  I agreed with him.  I told him that I would like for him to have a bike while he is able to use one, since "we don't know what could happen." whether he gets hurt at work, or gets in a car accident....I didn't mention HD, but he knew exactly what I was thinking.  I beat around the bush talking about accidents and broken legs.  So while neither one of us didn't name the elephant in the room, we both acknowledged his presence.  Hubby was pleased that we were "on the same page" and I had to wipe away a few tears.  We both knew what the future could hold...and that he should ride while he still could.

It's pretty awesome that we are always on the same page - sometimes without even talking about it.  God sure knew what he was doing when He put the two of us in the same room together those many years ago! 

We found the bike he wanted and it was still available.  The bike had a LOT of extras, but was being sold by an out of work contractor.  He was willing to barter on the price with us.  Hooray. 

Wednesday:
Unloaded the kids sleds off the sled deck...

Thursday:

We asked the kids if they would rather go see stuff in Great Falls, buy the bike and come home, or if they'd like to go riding on the way home.  A resounding, very loud cheer went up for riding four-wheelers and dirt bikes.  So we had them help prep their "toys" - check tire pressure, etc, and then we loaded up Punkin's ATV and the Little Man's dirt bike.

Friday:
Found all our gear and packed snacks...

This Weekend:

Hubby didn't have to work on Saturday, and we headed to Great Falls, MT to check out the bike.  We had a tie strap come loose on the ATV, but managed to tighten it down before we lost it off the sled deck.  I climbed up and straightened all the straps out and thought that I would need to pay closer attention in the future.  I used to leave this up to Hubby to handle...but he might not always be paying attention anymore...so...mental note to self: double check his tie straps!  We found the guy's grain farm and the bike was everything he wanted and more.  We came home with SEVERAL boxes of spare parts.  After purchasing the bike, we quickly grabbed a subway and headed back out of town towards home! 

Hubby is a pretty quiet guy...his sister calls him a "flat liner"...but I knew he was SUPER excited when about every 15-20 minutes he'd say, "well....I'm pretty excited about this..." He also thanked me a couple of times for supporting him...and I choked down my emotions and squeaked out, "I'm just real happy for you to have this bike..."

We pulled into Radersburg (you can't drive past there without stopping to ride!) and unloaded all the toys.  We hardly got out of the truck doors and another rider came over to check out his bike!  Hubby's cousin was there with his family, and Punkin was so excited to ride her wheeler, she didn't even want to say hi before she took off!  I showed her a loop to take and off she went. We got the Little Man lined out to do circles in the parking lot, while I stood there waiting to catch him when he was ready to stop.  (His bike is quite a bit bigger than he is, but he should be able to ride it for many years - when he is ready to upgrade, I think I'll keep this one for me!).  Hubby took off for a few laps to test out the new bike.

His cousin pulled up next to me on his bike and said, "it sure is good to see him on a bike again!"  We agreed that we would HATE for him to have waited 5 or 6 years, and then be sick and physically unable to ride and always regret not riding while he had the chance.  It was so great to watch everyone chase each other around in circles.  I wasn't fast enough to catch Little Man the first time he FINALLY motioned that he wanted to stop, and his bike landed on his ankle.  He toughed it out, though, and kept riding.  We worked out a better system to give me a little more warning and I caught his bike every time he wanted to stop.  He even got it up into 2nd gear and doing a bigger loop after that.  It was just great watching Hubby chase Punkin on her wheeler and take her on a bigger loop, and then come back and follow Little Man around the parking lot.  I cherished the afternoon...and didn't want it to slip away, but time has a way of catching up with us.

It was a great day...we finally loaded up and headed home...anticipating the next chance we have to get out and do some riding.  We have to figure out how to catch the Little Man, so we can head down the trail...everyone is so excited, we can't seem to talk them into any more snowmobiling this year.  hhhmmm...mommy would like to get out on a couple of spring rides still...but I'm being out-voted.  

until our next crazy adventure....God Bless! 

Acknowledge the Elephant...or Keep it in a cage

Someone accused me of having poor communication with Hubby - because I have 3 (a whole 3 - and all of you) - dear dear friends who I can talk to about Hubby and HD; and yet, I allow him to keep the elephant in the room and not discuss it with him.  "It's a sign of a bad marriage if you can't talk to him - he's supposed to be your best friend."

However, we can often talk about something, without actually talking about it.  We can discuss the elephant in the room, without naming him.  We read each other's minds...

So I simply have to say, yes - yes he is - my very best friend...but because I love him and cherish him dearly - I allow him the luxury of protecting his heart and mind from the painful memories...and I throw a blanket over the elephant.  I know Hubby accepts God's will in this matter just as we do with all of life.  But do we NEED to discuss it every day?  Wouldn't that cause us more worry?  In my opinion, worry is simply a lack of trusting in God's will.  HIS GOOD and PERFECT will.  I honestly believe it will bring unnecessary stress into his life if we talk about the elephant in the room constantly.  The devil sends enough flaming darts into our lives - I don't think I need to poor gasoline on the flames!  We do mention the elephant on occasion...but...more than anything, we try to keep it behind a curtain, inside a cage.

Sometimes, I wonder if he notices the twitching and other symptoms.  When he twitches and fidgets with his feet, it bugs me because I do not know if it is habit  or if it is a symptom.  But every time I point it out, he says, "I've always been fidgety."  Okay - so I won't ask anymore - but every single twitch he makes, I wonder, "is he sick?!?"

Sometimes I think that perhaps he sees the symptoms but is trying to protect the kids and I by not acknowledging it.  What good would it do him, if I were to point out every time he flinches?  Let's say I discuss his symptoms with him again...I will only rekindle old, bad, terrible, horrible memories from his childhood, and sadness for his sister and her family, and fears for the future.  He has lived his WHOLE LIFE dealing with the tragic and horrific effects of Huntington's disease on his family.  He SEES the big picture.  Old feelings and tragedies are resurrected when talking about it.  So...by pointing out every symptom when I see it, all I do is rip open the vault full of painful memories.  He does not need me to create more worry and depression, and fears for the future.  He knows the pain of Huntington's - personally and deeply.  We do not need to sit and talk about it every waking moment!

He knows the elephant is in the room, and he doesn't need me to remind him it is there.  So we will both continue our little dance, beating around the bushes, talking of other "what if something happens" - without naming HD - for the most part.  We both know fully well what we are thinking about and talking about....we don't need to get into great details and call the elephant by name.  We are both keeping the elephant carefully locked in a cage, so that we can protect the other one from being squished, trampled, and killed by the elephant. 

We have both fully accepted God's will for us in this matter....we've both discussed that...we've talked about HD...but I don't need to talk about it daily and be a constant reminder, a burr under the saddle (uuummm - that just makes the horse buck!) and a tool for Satan's flaming darts. 

Instead, we pray.  We pray, and we accept God's will.  We pray, we accept God's will, and protect each other by hiding the elephant in a cage behind a very transparent curtain.  That is the best both of us can do.

School Board

In the middle of a very hectic week, I received a letter from the school.  The nominating committee would like to include my name on the ballot for the school board.  I didn't get past the first sentence before I set it on the table.  This will take considerable prayer...but in spite of the pit in my stomach, I already know I won't be able to say "no."

I have many conversations with my Lord about the nomination.  The Hubby and I discuss it a couple of times as well.  Even though I know I will agree to allow my name placed for nomination, I resist.

I allow the flaming darts of Satan to sink in and cause me to worry.  I must have forgotten to put my armor on again.  My greatest concern is the time commitment.  I already leave the house at 7 am, and often do not get home with the kids until 6:30 pm.  That gives me limited time to cram some dinner in them while they do homework, hop in the shower, and off to bed.  Not to mention, that most evenings, we are off and running somewhere - 4-H, sports, church night, school functions, whatever...we have a revolving driveway - always in motion.

I fight it...foolishly.

You know - here I pray, constantly, for the Lord to use me...that I can serve Him somehow; certainly, I should TRUST HIM when He DOES call me to serve Him! 

If I sit and fret about time management and stress levels, then, at the root of it all, I am basically doubting HIM!  If I doubt this nomination, I am doubting my Lord!  WHO, as you recall, I have  asked daily to serve! 

Overwhelming peace comes over me, and calmly I smile and nod. Yes, Lord, I hear you. I will be still and know...YOU ARE MY GOD!

I always accept His will - and I need to accept His will and serve wherever He calls me.  I might not be saving the starving orphans in Africa...but that does not mean I am not serving, and that He hasn't called me to serve HIM, and that He is unable to use me and work through me!

I trust completely, that if it is God's will that I serve on the school board, then HE will create the time, and provide me with strength and peace.  (as in, the opposite of stress).  If it is not His will, I won't get in...and that is fine too.

My dear sister in Christ said, "maybe it is better to be nominated now, before the kids are in high school and we get even busier."  Little does she know my deepest thoughts, for I cannot share them when the kids are listening to my phone call.  You see - I've already considered the timing...what if it is God's will that I serve NOW, because NOW, the Hubby can still help me watch the kids and cover for me on the evenings when I would have to attend meetings.  In 5 years, that may not be the case...in 5 years, he might not be able to help with the kids.  (of course, in 5 years, Punkin will be driving and they can make their own dinner...but still...)

So, I write the nomination acceptance letter with peace and acceptance. 
If it is God's will that I do not get in - then there is still a reason for being nominated...whatever that might be...and whatever that might be, I accept completely.
If it is God's will that I do get in, then I fully accept that it is His will and He not only has a reason for it, but He will see me through it.