Attention Please (can also be referred to as “A ‘TENSION’ Please”)

How’d we all do with the Thanksgiving festivities (or lack thereof)? This year, like all years (and like most people, I’m pretty sure) looked different. How do you do when different isn’t necessarily what you wanted? Do you resist the change, lament over the past, resent the new normal? I have so many questions this Black Friday morning. I am sans coffee as I type so that’s my disclaimer before I go any further in my post! Read on, if you dare.

I’ll be honest here, my changes for this holiday were not what I wanted. Without going into all the private family details, I will share that key people were missing for me. There was a void – a big one, and amidst all the food prep and sweet moments that did take place, this void loomed so largely that I couldn’t concentrate on anything else for most of the day. It felt like I was in a strange dream scape that I would wake up from at some point, but instead, the whole day passed with this uneasiness and tension in my soul that camped out for good.

By the time the dishes were washed, the clock showed near midnight, I was looking forward to one thing: that tomorrow wouldn’t be today. Before turning out the light I opened up my phone and found this insta post from Jackie Hill Perry (if you don’t know who she is – Google her!!)

This was a profound reminder to me that the tension in our lives demands attention – not for nothing – but, so that we can choose. That’s when I looked up this verse in 1 Thessalonians 5:18
“In everything give thanks; for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus.”

Right there at the end of the day with the new day dawning was this BIG truth: THIS was God’s will for me. He has something going on behind the scenes that I know nothing about, but He does and that’s what matters. I can choose to be thankful in all that I can see is happening, at the same time I can choose to have faith for everything else.

In The Chosen series Mary Magdalene says this line, “I was one way, and now I am completely different, and the thing that happened in between was Him.”

We are in the “in between” and the tension along the way is His will for our lives. The outcome of all of this is that we will be changed, more into the image He created. That’s the sweet spot of tension, CHANGE.

We can be thankful for the GREAT CHANGE. Thanksgiving 2022 taught me so so much, and I am truly grateful because God allowed the tension that got my attention in the very best way. For those of you with those voids too, I am praying for you this morning. Whatever healing you need, God is waiting to bind up. Thank you for reading today. Have a super thankful Black Friday!

With all my heart, Sonia

Happy International Women’s Day ~ 2022

Dedicated to those fighting the good fight, you have been given the gift of setting the world entire on fire with a passionate love that only God could give. Keep fighting.

To the woman at the well: Keep telling people to come see a man who told you everything you ever did and loves you still. (John 4:29,39)

To the single mom/widow/single woman: Keep following Jesus. He’s got you. (Judges 4:9)

To the businesswoman living out your faith: Keep your hand to that plow. He is multiplying all you do. (Acts 16:14)

To the woman in the process of healing: Keep accepting His grace. Go and sin no more. (John 8:1-12)

To the woman making courageous decisions to help her family: Keep breaking those unhealthy cycles. God honors your brave. (Joshua 2)

To the woman working side by side with your husband in ministry: Keep living out that unity. It’s a good, good thing. (1 Corinthians 16:3-4)

To the woman standing up to tyrants all over the world: Keep resisting. Your courage saves. (Exodus 1:17-18)

To the woman stuck in an impossible situation: Keep using the wisdom God gave you. Your voice matters. “And who knows but that you have come to a royal position for such a time as this.” (Esther 4:14)

To the women who wake up tired and go to sleep exhausted, He sees us and He gives us the strength we need to set the world on fire (Proverbs 31:10-31)

Happy Day, Ladies!

With all my heart, Sonia

P.S. (And for those of us married or coupled up – thank you to the godly men (Shout out to mine! MARIO!) who help us become all we are meant to be).

A Dream 12 Years in the Making

TGIF, my friends! We made it! It has been a month since my last blog post and so much has happened. I wish I could tell you every single detail so I will do my best to give you as much of the good stuff as I can remember. First of all, Fiona (our pit bull), is all healed up from her New Years Eve mishap. Thank you for praying for her healing! Secondly, I must start this blog post in saying that I, once again, am in awe of God’s perfect timing.

To kick this off I will share that this past year has been all about seasons ending and huge change. I wonder if anyone else had a 2021 like that? After ten years of serving and attending a certain church we made the difficult decision to head in another direction as God led. After working at my job for almost seven years, I felt the shift and understood it was time to leave that position. So in one year I had two major life changes within months of each other. My whole world felt upside down. In my quiet time with God and on walks with Mario I would be honest about how scared I was and how my identity was so intertwined with those two parts of my life so much so that I didn’t know how to be. I would be encouraged and affirmed during these walks and talks that God was doing something new, I just needed to be patient. Believe me when I say that it was a soul-searching, soul-baring, gut-wrenching process – one in which I will forever be grateful for. I had no other safety net than the Lord and that’s just how He wanted it. I mean, I had my husband and friends and family, for sure – but this was a letting go of all that I thought I was in control of and trusting God for what was next.

At the end of last year I received an email with a job opportunity announcement for an organization that I have admired for years! Back up to twelve years ago when I got saved. I kept saying “I need to work there (at this organization). I know I’m supposed to! I don’t care if it’s just to volunteer, I need to be there.” Instead, the last twelve years I was serving at churches, working full-time and going to school. There just wasn’t time. And, I bet you…I wasn’t ready.

Well, I emailed back about the job opportunity regarding qualifications, minimum requirements and the like. The holidays came and went, and I was still emailing back and forth with the hiring person for the organization. It was a slow process and with each step I would ask Mario to pray that if God didn’t want this for me that the door would be shut, and that I would be okay with it. I was so excited with each step forward. I know you can picture it: sent application (wait), letter/references (wait), phone interview (wait), in-person interview, (wait) tour of facility (wait) and then the wait for their decision. I waited, and they finally called me with the news of the job offer three weeks ago. I started work two weeks ago and my feet still feel like I haven’t touched the ground – I am so stunned, in awe that God put something like this in my heart and here I am living it! I am working in my dream job! This morning I literally cried over my cup of coffee with my heart overflowing with thankfulness for His timing.

I am honored for this opportunity to serve and work in a unique way that gives homage to the road I traveled and the faithful God who has prepared me for such a time as this. I want to encourage you with this: if you are in a season of what seems like mundane, thankless, heartbreaking work – I know how that feels. I think we all have had that in our lives at some point and some are even living it now. Hang in there! God knows what He is doing. I promise you, I finally feel like my feet are locked in place on the path the Lord has prepared for me…my heart and mind are free to fly like never before. It’s like all this time God has been saying, “Hold. Hold. Hold. Wait. Wait. Wait. Ok, now! Time to soar!” So hang in there!

If you are in a Hold/Wait season right now let me be a witness that the Mark Twain saying is true, “The two most important days in your life are the day you are born and the day you find out why.” The seasons of being in a holding pattern and waiting is such perfect preparation for all He has for you and me. It is a beautiful thing to be protected that much against our own ambitions. We all need it. We need Him and His timing.

I can’t wait to see all that the Lord is going to accomplish in and through this new job – please pray for me that I honor and glorify Him and that revival is birthed from this place. I am praying that for you as well. I can’t wait to hear from you how faithful He has shown Himself to be in your life.

Since it’s Friday, here’s a Friday song for you. Put this on blast and drink in the joy, for we are loved. Oh, and Happy Valentine’s weekend! I hope your heart is overflowing with all the love He gives.

With all my heart,

Sonia

Dedicated to the Last Month of 2021

Shout out to my sweet niece’s photography from Thanksgiving last week ❤ Tia loves you!

Hi, my friends and handful of readers! I have been busy working on my second to last semester of school & focused in, simplifying everything – which, if I am honest, has been kind of hard. I am not on social media anymore and although it’s been refreshing in a lot of ways, it’s also been difficult to realize how much of that I have used for connection with people. I am here to tell you that it is good to look at those things in our lives that get in the way of real connection. It is the bravest thing to take inventory and let God highlight that which He wants to change in us. This is a perfect time to do it! The Christmas season should feel like a birth of many things in our lives as believers and my prayer is that we would quiet everything and spend the next 30 days in the Word. Get quiet with the world and connected to God like never before – every day. It is Jesus’ birth month, after all! It will be the best gift you could give Him and yourself. Here is a Psalm to start you off. I pray you are blessed this Christmas season. I am seeking Him with you. With all my heart, Sonia

Psalm 3

O Lord, how many are my foes!

Many are rising against me;

many are saying of my soul,

“There is no salvation for him in God.”

Selah

But you, O Lord, are a shield about me,

my glory, and the lifter of my head.

I cried aloud to the Lord,

and he answered me from his holy hill.

Selah

I lay down and slept;

I woke again, for the Lord sustained me.

I will not be afraid of many thousands of people

who have set themselves against me all around.

Arise, O Lord!

Save me, O my God!

For you strike all my enemies on the cheek;

you break the teeth of the wicked.

Salvation belongs to the Lord; your blessing be on your people!

Selah

May you draw nearer to God this month and may you find comfort in the one who sustains you, who hears your cries, and is a shield about you.

All things PINK

Happy Tuesday, one day closer to Friday. Just a reminder that there are 10 Tuesdays left this year so some quick math will tell you 2022 will be here before we know it. I took the day off from writing yesterday to get to the truly adult task of cleaning out desk drawers and organizing them. We let it go a little too long this time and the necessary mail got mixed in with the junk mail so it was a bigger job than it needed to be. It feels therapeutic to get rid of junk & since there’s no school for me this week I am committed to getting rid of junk. I’ll let you know on Friday how it went 🙂 Stay tuned…

Today’s blog post was going to be called, “The Girl in the Pink Pajamas” because of a story I told a group of friends about getting my first Bible in catechism and how I thought I had to look my most best and most perfect self so I took a shower, put on the fanciest, silk-like pink pajamas I had and opened up to the book of Genesis and got as far as the genealogies and that was it. I couldn’t go on – just didn’t understand it and thought even my fanciest pink pajamas couldn’t do the trick so that was that. My worst seven-year old fears came true in that moment, “I am just not good enough to read the Word of God.” I believed that for almost 35 years until 2009 when everything changed.

Fast forward to my 47 year old self this year, struggling with hormones, insomnia and all the fun things this time of life throws at women, and I was up in the middle of another sleepless night. I decided, instead of tossing and turning for hours on end, I would be productive and go downstairs and do some Bible study homework. It was right in the middle of reading when I looked at my legs underneath the Bible and study book on my lap.

I WAS WEARING PINK PAJAMAS!

It was like a light bulb moment in the middle of the night with God. He made good on that desire in my seven-year old heart to make the words of the Bible come alive. My insomnia moment turned into one of the sweetest moments of my life (insert all the pink heart emojis here ❤ ).

Then today I was reading in Lisa Harper’s book, “LIFE: An Obsessively Grateful, Undone by Jesus, Genuinely Happy, and Not Faking it Through the Hard Stuff Kind of 100- Day Devotional”, when I came to Day 46 called Hurling Love Right Back, a powerful read. Please do yourself a wonderful favor and buy it as a gift to you & then buy a copy for someone else https://www.amazon.com/Lisa-Harper-Book-2/dp/1433691957/ref=sr_1_2?crid=11X8IJV2UJEQ0&dchild=1&keywords=life+lisa+harper+devotional&qid=1634671402&sprefix=life+lisa+har%2Caps%2C234&sr=8-2

How does this tie in? Well the book is PINK ❤ and it reminded me of the lovely grace of God and His faithfulness. The powerful words from today’s devotional based on 1 John 2:9-11 reminding us how to treat one another – the purpose of forgiving and giving grace, to live in the light (and if God colors the light pink for you, all the better):

^9-11 Anyone who claims to live in God’s light and hates a brother or sister is still in the dark. It’s the person who loves brother and sister who dwells in God’s light and doesn’t block the light from others. But whoever hates is still in the dark, stumbles around in the dark, doesn’t know which end is up, blinded by the darkness

My prayer for you today is to have a gentle day, gentle with yourself and with others (as much as it is possible) gentleness, for His gentleness has made you great (Psalm 18:35)

Gentle as we go,

Sonia

I Have a Friend

I know it’s only October but it was 41 degrees this morning

Happy Wednesday! Here we are middle of the week. How was yesterday? If you read Tuesday’s post you know I confessed that I was having a tough day mentally. I texted a friend this asking her to pray for me, “Prayer request for me today. I’m struggling today with just tons of negative thoughts & don’t want to stay there. Got to let go and let God.” I sent that text a little before noon and then drove to Carlsbad to run some errands. As soon as I got in the car I was alone with my thoughts again. I immediately thought who can I call to talk this through or pray this away or just get out of my own head. My mind went through the list of people that would be available to talk at that time when all of a sudden the thought occurred to me, “I should just look to God. I should cry to Him, listen to worship songs and give Him this moment. Focus on Jesus.” So that’s what I did. I just turned on a radio station, I think it was 92.1 and songs were playing that had me just thanking God for that moment. I was thanking Him for the fact that I have a friend in Jesus. It’s not that we don’t need people around us, but sometimes the very best thing to do with our heavy hearts is to worship God and thank Him for the very fact that we are never ever alone. He is with us every second of every day. He loves us.

After a long day I told Mario about my afternoon car worship session with the Lord. I told him I was going to write a blog post about it today and title it, “Don’t Call A Friend, Call God!” He suggested another title, the one I ended up using because it is the lyrics to one of our favorite songs by Chandler Moore called He Understands https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3N97fDmYKrE

The last part of my day was participating in a Womens Bible Study where I was reminded that we are to yield to the separation that God has us in right now. If this season feels like loss to you in any way…loss of the known, the comfort, the friendships, the identity, the job, the place, then this post is for you. We have a Friend, and He understands. Lean in today. Don’t give in to pressure to reach out to the “known comforts/habits” that usually give you the out you want. Lean into the uncomfortable new place where God has you. God knows. He knows how hard it is. He is near and holding you close. This is growth, friend. Let go of the control and lean into His strength.

Leaning in,

Sonia

It’s Tuesday

Happy Tuesday! I am writing the last paper for my Apologetics class today so this will be a short post, aren’t you glad 🙂 The assigned topic for the paper is to create a case for a friend who does not faith in Jesus and does not believe in miracles or the resurrection. The prompt includes some tips such as not using Bible quotes (because my intended audience does not believe in the Bible) so only use quotes from it when it helps with the argument for the historicity off the resurrection. I am going to put a plug in for prayer for me on this one. I have to cite at least five scholarly sources other than our class text. I am glad to do it but the research always takes the most time.

How are you doing this Tuesday, dear reader friend? I am struggling a bit mentally as I get through the first part of the day, some of it hormones – some of it the effects of a recent bout with insomnia – all of it, just being stuck in my own head (bordering on “obsessive introspection” as I recently learned about in Priscilla Shirer’s Elijah Bible Study called “Faith and Fire”). I hope you’re leaning into the truth about you and your purpose because that’s what I need to do right now so I will share these truths:

1. You and I are created in the image of God. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8yV0pu60Uqs
2. He is faithful to complete the work He has started in us. It’s not dependent on us. He is faithful even when we are faithless. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nb9FMg8GFoc
3. Look up, Child. We can focus on Jesus. He is our Friend. We are His. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N90b4O3B-kY
4. No matter what, He is good and His mercy endures forever. Praise Him! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5KiQDoWo5t

I hope you listen to these songs and praise the God who is in control of everything. I hope we can be vessels for His goodness today no matter what is thrown at us. We have an assignment today and that is to know God’s love and to make His love known. Don’t believe the hype. Believe God.

Believing with you,

Sonia

Go and Sin No More

I’m up at 1:20am unable to sleep and this theme keeps rolling around in my head. Since I can’t sleep I came downstairs to write so here we go.

The title of this blog may bring to mind the story of the woman caught in the act of adultery in John chapter 8 or maybe even the woman at the well in John chapter 4.

I was saved on July 30, 2009. I was 35 years old and had lived all my life searching and running and running and searching. I said the sinners prayer around a dinner table that amazing day in 2009, and my life was changed forever in that instant.

I had what some would call a “radical conversion moment” where one minute my life was going the wrong way and the next it was not. What I have found these last 12 years of my Christian life is that everyone’s story is unique. Some people have that “a-ha” moment like I did and for others it is more like a long, slow simmer into their faith life. Either way it is powerful, real, personal and miraculous.

I’ve often wondered about a few women in the Bible, and what their lives looked like after they began to live as Christians. The Bible doesn’t mention the failures and slip ups of either the woman at the well (John 4) nor the woman caught in the act of adultery (John 8) after their moment of coming to faith in Jesus, but you’ve got to know that they weren’t perfect from the get go. They probably struggled with old tendencies, and…NEWSFLASH! They probably did sin even after their miraculous encounters with the Messiah Himself! Oh, but His grace covers!

These were women with extremely broken pasts: the woman at the well who’d had five husbands and then the woman caught in the act of adultery. Let me say that again for the people in the back: a woman who’d had five husbands and another woman caught in the act of adultery. Safe to say, they had issues with men, and they probably had a laundry list of lots of other issues as well. I can relate. Let me let you in on a little secret (or maybe not so little of a secret). I was the woman at the well. Let me also confess that some things in my life changed miraculously on that wonderful July day in 2009, and others… well…let’s just say I am a work in progress and thankful for the Lord’s grace and truth in my life. Oh, but His grace covers!

That’s the thing about God that’s so perfect! He is gracious, and He is truthful. Only He can understand the whole truth and nothing but the truth. The trap for us onlookers sometimes is to think that because someone is saved they need to do A, B and C in a timeline that we perceive to be acceptable to the Lord. We become judge and jury without really knowing the heart of God.

I think the reason this theme, this warning is coming to mind is that we are at a critical time in life when we need to come together as the body of Christ and truly be about our Father’s business. He did not call us to police the lives of other Christians and think ourselves superior. He called us to live lives of love in Him and in service to others. The moment you and I become critical and frustrated with others’ lives not looking as holy as we think ours is, we have stepped outside of being of service to others and have entered the futile realm of merely being a spectator. The Bible has something to say about that. I just looked this passage up in The Message:

A Simple Guide for Behavior

Matthew 7 ^1-5 “Don’t pick on people, jump on their failures, criticize their faults—unless, of course, you want the same treatment. That critical spirit has a way of boomeranging. It’s easy to see a smudge on your neighbor’s face and be oblivious to the ugly sneer on your own. Do you have the nerve to say, ‘Let me wash your face for you,’ when your own face is distorted by contempt? It’s this whole traveling road-show mentality all over again, playing a holier-than-thou part instead of just living your part. Wipe that ugly sneer off your own face, and you might be fit to offer a washcloth to your neighbor.

At this time there are men, women and children in Afghanistan who profess Christ who are not concerned about how someone else’s faith life looks, of this we can be sure. Their reality is a life and death one. We can be certain their focus is the Lord and not the speck in someone else’s eye – the smudge on their neighbor’s face. This should be a sobering thought, a wake up call that we need to get serious and stop sweating the small stuff or we are going to miss the very thing God wants our attention on. We need to deal with the ugly sneer on our own face and pray. Like the verse above says..”that we might be fit to offer a washcloth to our neighbor.”

Thank you for reading this early morning post. It’s a heavy one for sure, but one I think we all need. It’s time. Time to be humble. Time to be prayerful. Time to grow. Time to change. Time to stop judging. Time to come together. Time to love. Time to be about our Father’s business.

With all my heart,

Sonia

P.S. If you have been judged, pushed out, demeaned, bullied, left out, ridiculed, misunderstood and even if you’re the judge and jury…this song is for you and for me:

Don’t Take the Bait

I’m back in school, and this is my second week of the term so my blog writing is taking somewhat of a backseat, but I was up this morning at 4:30am knowing I had to put this right here. I am in two classes this summer – one of them being Theology 330 – Theology of the Family and this introduction is from one of the textbooks:

Your family lives in a war zone. With every exploding shell, the house shakes. Your physical body may never feel the shell shocks, and the plaster on your walls may remain intact—but the impacts are present all around you. Long after your children fall asleep and the chaos of the day fades into the quietness of evening, the shelling continues.

To be sure, when you look out your window and survey a suburban backyard, a busy city block, or the rolling hills of a rural landscape, what you see probably doesn’t look like a war zone. But don’t let such serene scenery fool you! Beyond the doors of your household and mine, a battle rages. The battle is about glory, and who will receive it. The battle is about authority, and who will exercise it. [Randy Stinson (2015). (p. 29). Trained in the Fear of God: Family Ministry in Theological, Historical, and Practical Perspective. Kregel Publications. Retrieved from https://app.wordsearchbible.lifeway.com%5D

I forget this so often, that we are in a daily spiritual battle. With that forgetfulness (or loss of focus) comes the reality that I lose sight of the fact that there is an enemy of my soul and yours that knows our tendencies and triggers and will exploit them in an attempt to steal, kill and destroy (John 10:10a). Sometimes the attack is full on and you know that you are under attack. Sometimes it’s a million little irritations – you feel like it’s a constant drip of a faucet, and you don’t even realize, that this too, is an attack – a subtle one, for sure, but an attack just the same. Can I just say this to you and me this morning…? DON’T TAKE THE BAIT! Wait. Stop. Breathe. Pause. Think. Give it some time. If you’re like me, this is super hard but it is possible if we know that this is what the enemy wants us to do…to take the bait, hook – line – and sinker.

In the last 24 hours I have had several points of engagement where I could just respond a certain way but 75-80% of the time I just waited through it, and what a difference! Mario helped me too in one particular occasion, reminding me to “just wait – give it time”. My friends, that is one of our greatest assets in winning these big and little battles in our lives…WAITING! Waiting for God to bring to reality what is really going on. Waiting for your emotions to subside and rational thought to take over. Waiting for the Holy Spirit to give you the right words and heart. Waiting, waiting, waiting and WINNING!

I guess that’s today’s theme: Don’t take the bait – wait and win! This is why God got me up early this morning to remind me that we don’t have to take the bait anymore because we are not slaves to fear and sin any longer. Like the song below says, “I’m no longer a slave to fear. I am a child of God.” That’s all I’ve got today. May we be those who live out the second part of John 10:10 and live that abundant life God has laid out before us.

Ok, one last thing…here’s this special song from Zach Williams Live from Harding Prison Album, “No Longer Slaves” please watch and listen to this (all the songs and interviews are amazing!!):

With all my heart,

Sonia

Dream Horse Movie

Ok Wednesday, we see you! Good morning! Here is a short post to encourage you to watch the movie, “Dream Horse.” It is rich with beautiful truths and the best part is – it’s a true story.

I haven’t checked Rotten Tomatoes or any other reviews of this movie, but I don’t care. Okay, I admit I just did and look! Yay, they got it right!!

89% TOMATOMETER and 97% AUDIENCE SCORE

I love all the character stories in this movie, but the main character, Jan Vokes, truly inspires me – especially at this point in my life. I will turn 47 in less than a month and have had some big changes this year and have even more big decisions ahead of me so this movie gave me a glimpse at what living out your dream looks like. I needed to see this now.

It is easy to choose the comfortable, familiar and predictable. People would probably look on and say that is reasonable and understandable, but when I started my walk as a Christian I didn’t sign up for safe or predictable. I said yes to life, the life that He created me to live so I have to be brave and wise in my choices, uncomfortable in the unknown and patient in the process. I don’t want this year to just pass me by. I want to live it to the fullest letting God take my hand – pointing to sunrises, broken paths, sunsets, rainbows, valleys, scary roads, and butterflies all along the way. My life is supposed to wave His banner of miracles and so is yours. Our stories are to point to Him, to impossible possibles, so my prayer today is to live that dream because it is a reality. He made it so.

Please listen to this song called Jireh that says we are already loved, we are already chosen. Like the movie says, “Be brave. Be brilliant. You were born for this.”

With all my heart,

Sonia