Graduation Madness...and Rest.

No telling what this post will be by the time I get to the end of it--but dear friend, this is simply a quick note of news since I can't condure up a worthy post. I've actually written three in the past two weeks, but I wasn't able to finish them or I wasn't satisfied with them. I'd like to be bushy-tailed EVERY time I post, but alas, you have a scattered Jen this evening.

I can't wait til they can brew coffee/tea via internet...so making do, pretend we're sitting on a sunny little window seat, with a cup of creamy chai (or your preference), and we can chat. :-)

If you could see my brain/spirit/functionality, it would be quite hairless thanks to this crazy week. Tomorrow is my sister's graduation party, and we have 112 people on the RSVP list thus far. So we've been cleaning, rearranging, cooking, cleaning some more, decorating, ordering, shopping, cleaning some more...until we just get our next decade's worth of all of it. But...she be worth it, indeed. :-)

My Grandma from San Antonio is visiting and will be with us until the 25th--she and I were able to have a girl day and we went to do some last-minute shopping, and had a good time. I talked myself out of a pair of adorable shoes, but I got lovely bargains on a bunch of books (thank you Lord for thrift store and Christian bookstore!), yay!

Where is your heart my friend?

Unless you would, no need to really say, or comment on that question. :-) I ask to draw you with me to my reflective state (though hazy it is), and share where mine is. Lately, I've prayed to find joy in my journey; not pray for a different journey altogether. I long to be soully beautified by fire--to be refined--and to count it joy when the Lord answers that prayer (regardless of the burn). But I've come to a place where I really pray for rest. Just rest. Just spiritually solitary, quiet, reflective, and...rest. HIS rest. Just to breathe Him in, and sigh Him out. So I pray after this party--and any crack in the time during--to breathe Him in. Breathe His Word, breathe His solitude, breathe in His quiet love. Sound good to you too? Let's do that.

May the God who rejoices over you, be with you. And if His presence is with you, may the peace of it guard your heart and mind against: the enemy, against yourself, and against distraction. Guarding in Christ Jesus--Lover, Quieter, and Rejoicer over your soul. "He will take great delight in you, He will quiet you with His love, He will rejoice over you with singing." Zephaniah 3:17

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I'm just a couple chapters away from finishing Foxe's Book of Martyrs. The past three unpublished posts were potentially my thoughts from reading this, and I pray to share them early next week. But referring to the above thoughts, Elisabeth Elliot noted Lady Jane Grey's (who is mentioned in Foxe's) prayer in Keep a Quiet Heart that she wrote in her prison cell before she was beheaded in 1554. She was only seventeen; it blessed and humbled me very much:

O merciful God, be Thou unto me

A strong tower of defence,

I humbly entreat Thee.

Give me grace to await Thy leisure,

And patiently to bear what Thou doest unto me;

Nothing doubting or mistrusting

Thy goodness towards me,

For Thou knowest what is good for me

Better than I do.

Therefore do with me in all things

What Thou wilt;

Only arm me, I beseech Thee,

With Thine armor

That I may stand fast;

Above all things taking to me

The shield of faith;

Praying always that I may

Refer myself wholly to Thy will,

Abiding Thy pleasure, and comforting myself

In those troubles which it shall please Thee

To send me, seeing such troubles are

Profitable for me; and I am

Assuredly persuaded that all Thou doest

Cannot be but well; and unto Thee

Be all honor and glory. Amen.