Busy Thursday, Doped Saturday, Smart Sunday

I'm getting overwhelmed with all the things I have to do in my every day life sometimes... Like keeping up with this blog, and taking care of my child, and my other child - Emerson, not the one inside.

So, to wrap his up... Thursday was a busy day because we went walking with Cory and Merrith, after taking Daddy to work, of course, and then we came back and bla, bla, and got ready for Jennifer's Birthday Party and Baptism.

I had forgotten how important baptisms are for the the Latino population. It's not that I don't care about other people's beliefs, but somehow I just forgot that baptism is a big deal if you are Catholic, so big a deal that I was under-dressed to this party. I felt like an idiot... Everybody was dressed for a wedding kind of party, and I was wearing shorts.

Lupita, Jennifer, Libby and me.

Being silly

We had fun, the food was really good, but it was a little bit greasy, and Elizabeth enjoyed Winnie The Pooh. I don't know if the fact that she watched it over an hour before going to the party helped. Could you believe there's no Winnie's shows on Netflix?? Unbelievable!! (I'm so getting like these American people, like everything is a right...I'm kidding, I know I don't get to have everything for granted, not even Winnie on Netflix)

Introducing Winnie to Libby

Posing with her balloon 

Daddy and Pingocha

There's this weird connection you get to have with women if you happen to either be pregnant at the same time, or just happen to have children around the same age. 

Lupita is Jennifer's mom. She invited me out of the blue, and it made me feel special, like, I don't know, just special. I guess because of the same thing with Merrith, the fact that I don't have any friends (This is the part where Emerson begins to play the violin, ha ha ha!!)

Lupita and I were pregnant at the same time, Jennifer is only 5 weeks older than Elizabeth. I met her at Canino's where I buy the fruit from her. I stopped seeing her, and then when she returned to work, in her own space now, we saw each other again, and it's like we never stopped seeing each other. The next week after we saw each other again, she invited me to the party. 

On Friday, however, things didn't look very good to Emerson because he got his wisdom teeth out. When I saw him he was just talking and talking, saying a lot of gibberish about he being the king of the home-brewing community. He looked funny, but more conscious than I was when I left the office when they had mine taken out. 

He even sent some emails to his mom, I guess, and was texting Mr.Bob and sent him his picture. Later that night he said he didn't remember sending Mr. Bob his picture. How would he? He was on drugs, plus he slept the whole afternoon.

He was poking me the whole time I was driving, and he said in his own sign language that his teeth were strong, ha, ha, ha,!! I was mad because he was talking a lot, and they had told him not to talk for at least the first hour, but he looked so funny and cute being an idiot that I was just laughing with him. 

Home-brewing King

Saturday afternoon

Friday afternoon

I know it hurts because I didn't take pain medicine, and I know talking hurts because I made the mistake of assuming everything was okay, and even gave Jeff his class, where I had to talk for two hours non-stop. 

But I heard the other day at BSF that God will never give you a trial that He didn't know you were ready for. In all this, God knew that even though the pain of childbirth was a curse for women, we were ready and more physically capable of bearing it than men. 

I don't even want to imagine how Emerson would've felt with, let's forget about pushing Libby out, just say the contractions I was having the last half an hour before starting to push.  

Finally, and this is what according to Emerson makes my blog unique, today I spoke wisdom to my child in our morning walk. 

We are walking in Coles Crossing lately, the neighborhood in front of our apartment complex. This morning we were talking to God, and we realized we had stopped praying for the house Daddy liked as soon as someone rented it. But then, it came out to the market again, and although it's pending, I realized that sometimes we stop praying too soon for the things we care about.

I'm not saying that we should keep praying for that house, or maybe we should, what I'm saying is that sometimes it takes a long time for God to answer a prayer, not because God is not capable of giving you an answer right away, but just because that's the way it is, but that doesn't mean the answer will be no. 

God hears you as soon as you offer the prayer, but the time for you to get the answer varies according to different circumstances that God only knows. For example, Linda Files prayed for Glenn to be a Christian for more than 20 years. She could have quit praying for her husband, and the fact that Glenn became a Christian 20 years later doesn't mean that God wasn't working in his life, am I making sense?

I mean, God wasn't like just lying around having margaritas in heaven, I guess He was at work, but Glenn got to experience something in those 20 years probably that eventually changed his mind about Jesus. But I mean,  I sometimes just don't understand at all what I think I already know. Because it's just weird, God wasn't gonna make Glenn being a Christian against his will, no matter how faithful Linda was in praying.

So how do you know? How do you know if you should be persistent in prayer or just stop praying knowing, or thinking you know, that God's answer is no. I have no freaking idea. 

The Bible says we should be persistent in prayer, that's all I know, and if you really want something really bad, then I guess you won't stop, because you know that there is power when you talk to God.

Like the other day I was praying for another Spanish student so that I could have more income and be able to save more money. I prayed for a month, but after a month I stopped. God didn't send me anyone, and I kind of felt bad that I stopped, because I felt that I was setting a time for God to answer me. But I felt peace about it. I felt that I wanted another student because I want more money, not because I really need it, you know what I mean?

And if God knows that I don't need it, He probably won't give it to me. God has given me many students in a week when I really needed the money, so stopping my prayers didn't feel like a big deal. I haven't stopped praying though for my safety, or for more important stuff. But I also have to keep in mind that if the answer isn't coming, there might be others reasons, not necessarily that God wants to say no. 

The answer might take very long because God may want to develop my character thru the process of praying for my sister's salvation, or just simply because she just doesn't care about Jesus. And although God wants to save her, if she doesn't want to get saved, He will let her choose her own eternal destiny. 

Well, I hope the point is clear. 

All this was because we realized that we stopped praying for the house, but then we kept on praying for different things we pray about daily.

On our way back, I had a thought that went like this, "Oh, God, I so wish I could live in this neighborhood one day, because when that happens...", but I didn't continue thinking.

I stopped. And the reason I stopped is, I guess, that I was able to take captive every thought and make it obedient to Christ. I was tempted to think like I used to think before, and so the wisdom from God came, and I will try to retell you exactly what I told Elizabeth. 

"You know what Sweety, I was just about to say one big stupid thing. I was telling God that I so wish one day we would live in this neighborhood, because when that happens I would be very happy. But that is a lie, Libby.

You know, even after I became a Christian I used to think that having material things was going to make me happy. When we didn't have a car, I thought that the day we had a car was going to be the best day of my life, and that I would be happy then. But when we had the car, Libby, I was very happy, yes, but only for a couple of days. After that, Mommy was still empty. Even though the way we got our first car was an amazing thing God did, I wasn't content nor joyful.

I used to think, Libby, that there was something that was going to make me happy. But that isn't true. Material things don't satisfy you, baby, the only person that completes you is God.

And even though God is the only one that can fill the void in your heart, Elizabeth, it takes time for you to learn to walk with Him, Sweety.

It's like when you are a baby, and you know this because you are a baby... When you become a Christian, imagine God gives you a pair of legs. But you don't know how to use them. You are a baby, you were born with a pair of legs, but you didn't have any idea what to do with them. But with time, and practice, and help, you began crawling, and now you are standing up, and you will soon be walking, and then running, maybe we will run a marathon together.

It is the same thing with your spiritual life, Honey. When you are born again, God gives you your spiritual legs, but it takes time talking to Him, getting to know Him by reading your Bible, it takes time and practice so that you can start crawling spiritually, and then standing up, and then running. You can't expect that just because you are born again with two spiritual legs, you can run your Christian marathon. No, Paul said that we should train like an athlete does. 

Can you imagine how much more difficult is to run a spiritual marathon, because life is a marathon according to Paul, how much more difficult is to run a a spiritual marathon, than a physical one?? It has to be more difficult, right? Because the spiritual life is much more complex than the physical one...

I don't know, Sweety, I guess this was from God, this was God speaking thru me, to you. And I have no idea if you understood any of this. All I want you to know is that if we never live here, I won't be sad, I know God has a plan for us. My joy doesn't depend on where we live. 

You and Daddy and baby, and Dori, are my life. I love you so much."  

And then we got home.

THE END