Is it too early to quit???

O.k....I really don't want to quit, but I do think about it from time to time! It has been a loooong time since I had to study, write papers, and take tests! I have been the one GIVING the tests! I like that better! Sometimes I think I am too old for this and want to bail out....but like my friend Jeff told me, "when God calls you TO something....only He can call you AWAY from it." Yeah, yeah, I know he is right, but sometimes I want to take the easy way out and go back to teaching and not having to pray so much about God providing. Man, that sounds so lacking in faith when I actually write it down. Faith is something I have really had to learn this past year. It takes a lot of prayer and I am constantly praying for forgiveness because my faith is so lacking. I just pray daily God will strengthen my faith. He has, but I still struggle. I have never been wealthy or had "plenty", but I have never had to depend on the Lord from day to day and it is something I am struggling with. My control nature wants to just go get a full time job and go back to work where I "know" I will have enough to pay the bills. But God is telling me to trust Him to provide....and He has. So why do I fear? Why do I worry? Lavonne told me on the phone the other night that faith isn't faith until it is all you are holding on to. I have heard that before. And I know it is all I have now. And God is so trustworthy. When I was whining to Jeff about how hard seminary is and how tough the professors grade (man, they are tough....I got a paper back this week and got a 90 on it and I thought it was very good and so I was bummed...but I later found out the average score was an 80, so I guess I should be happy) but Jeff said he has some wonderful words of advice for me...."suck it up, Princess!!" Yeah, I know, he is right. Pray, pray, pray, study, study, study, and trust, trust, trust.....and QUIT whining!! Good advice! I needed to hear it!

Well, what else has been happening? Austin turned 14 on Thursday. I can't believe I have a 14 year old son!!! I let him pick supper and he picked Mexican food. He loves his Mexican! So I made tacos, these deep fried tortilla things I made up that have sausage and cheese and ground beef and seasoning in them...they are yummy, and a cheese and bean deep with chips. It was good. We later had cake and ice cream, but poor Em didn't hardly eat a thing. She wasn't feeling well. She actually was sick on Friday, too, but I sent her to school, but she came home with a high fever and slept all evening and into Saturday. She barely got out of bed on Saturday and wouldn't eat anything. She woke up this morning and said she felt a little better (her fever was down) but she still hasn't eaten much today. I think she just had the flu. She was puking and coughing and said her head hurt really bad. Poor girl. When she would wake up, she would cry for me and telll me she couldn't sleep without me. Austin felt bad for her so he drew her a picture and it made her smile. Here is his pic.....he loves to draw cartoons!

Emmie got up this morning and drew him one back. Here is her pic back to him.....




















Awww...pretty sweet! I love it when my kids are sweet to each other! (it is so rare!!)

Well, I have a lot of studying to do and I have a big test this week so I better go. Before I do, I was watching tv a bit ago and I happened to see Kurt Warner playing football. I hadn't heard that name in a long time, so I looked him up on the computer. He has a website called First Things First that is a program he and his wife started to help low income and special needs children and to share Jesus. I was reading on there about his testimony and his wife's testimony and it made me smile. I need to be reminded about good men in this world. Sometimes I find myself thinking there aren't any. Now I know there are some o.k. men, some mediocre men, but truly "filled with the love of Jesus" men, you just don't see them very often. Kurt is a man that loves the Lord. He married a woman who had been divorced and not only had children from her previous marriage, but had a severely handicapped son. Yeah, it made me smile. I am so happy for his wife and I don't even know her. She wrote on there how her life was so rough and she lost both her parents in a tornado, experienced her son's brain accident, went through a divorce and then extreme poverty, and how God has blessed her through it all. Amazing. It gives me hope in the God I love. Not for what He can give me or do for me, but just how good He truly is to them that love Him. I an learning to be content where I am right now and I am serving Him now because I love Him, but I can't wait until the Lord joins me with the godly man that He has prepared for me. I have waited a long time and took too many back roads and went my own way too many times, but thank goodness God is patient. Yeah, there are some great men out there still. I am glad I found that website today!