A lot on my mind

There's an analogy that likens our layers of healing with the layers of an onion. The more you peel the fresher and stronger you are. However, just like with an onion, there will be tears as the layers come off.

I am in a place where I am completely surrendering myself before the Lord. I used to hold on to ideas and false comforts so much more. Now, I feel my hands opening up and all the junk I was holding tightly onto just falls to the floor. Scary at first, but now I'm realizing that I can hold His hand much tighter now. But He's shown me that there will always be more layers. One is not very smart to think that He won't be calling us closer and closer to Him and asking us to lay down more and more to follow His ways. It's never ending.

So, now I find myself in a new community. My husband is overseas in a warzone. I have two small children. I am living with my parents. I started a new small group. Let me just say that a few layers have become extremely obvious when you have 1) moved, 2) transitioned into deployment mode, 3) are trying very hard to raise two little ones yourself, 4) and have put yourself out there hoping to make a deep, lasting connection in a community.

I feel vulnerable.

But God in His love for me didn't let me just stand there without His support. His arm is around me and my head is on His chest. I can feel Him becoming the true center of my life. My reliance on Him for peace, for joy, for my worth and my belonging have all grown so much in the last few weeks. He wants to be the center of my life.

I did some inner healing classes with Marie Lebow and really took away a lot of awesome tools to help other people. I hope to be able to walk others through this amazing experience someday. But first, God made sure I really knew the impact of inner healing as I was deeply touched and healed over the course of the class. Amazing and precious experiences.

Now, I'm doing a deliverance class and it seems He is having me draw even closer to Him here as well.

Even though the process of peeling back the layers has been potent and caused tears, I can stand and truthfully say that He fills all my needs with Himself. I have had no lack, no baggage, no issues, no problems too big that He can't take them and fill me up with Himself. I long for nothing more than to really know Him. It's like, with Sean gone, that I am able to let Him truly show me who He is. Not who He is through Sean. Not who I thought He was, but who He truly is...and has always been.

That's it. I can't stand it anymore.

This blog is ugly. No, don't even try to argue with me. (Although if you're a smart and aesthetic individual you are not arguing at all...just looking to the side to avoid eye contact with my hideous blog.)

So, here is how my mind works: if the blog I have is ugly, I don't want to look at it either. So, therefore I don't write any entries on said ugly blog. And this circular conflict is becoming a problem. I love to write. It helps my brain and it helps get things out of me that, if left inside and begin to spin, start to cause me oodles of frustration. It's so helpful for me to get things out and written down. I gain perspective and clarity. I laugh at myself. I cry, if needed. The only other thing that helps is art and I'm working on that, too. But again, the aesthetic is key here.

So, now I am seeking out a new look. I am also going to be asking for help in this area as any design on a computer is quite foreign to me. I simply don't have the time to figure out design/coding for my blog. (Did you see the phrase "no patience for that particular endeavor" in between those lines? Yeah, that's the real reason.)

The next time you read an entry on my blog you can rest assured that it will be more fresh and clean and colorful. That's my hope. Because honestly, would you read or write in a room that made your skin crawl with it's odd colors and strangely framed pictures? Nope. Nor would you write on a blog that did such things.

That's it. I'm off to find a friend to help me!!

So Many Goodbyes

I'm not exactly sure how many more goodbyes my heart can take right now. It's wonderful to see Sean so often, but also hard when our short hello's come to a close. I know God has a plan for this many goodbyes and wants to make good of all things, so I'm open to His sovereignty. It's just hard. And I know that's okay, so I'm not complaining. The big and final "see you in 11 months" is in less than two weeks....

I'm not so sure I'm ready for that one.

He's Amazing

It's starting to sink in. I'm starting to realize that there will be times that Daddy will be irreplaceable. I'm a great Mom...but I'm not a Dad. I'm not here to replace him. That's not a requirement - for me to fill his shoes. So, I will turn to my Dad, my Father-in Law, my brother, and my male friends to help fill in and bring a Godly male presence to our family. But let's face it, no one can be Sean. He's the best. The absolute best.

So, I will rely on my Heavenly Father to fulfill us when that absence is too strong. When no one can do it "just like Daddy" I will look to my sweet and patient Heavenly Father. He can not only fill his shoes, he ordains all of the steps that Daddy (and his ladies) take. I will do my best to rest in that promise.

I guess I should blog, huh?

The other night a sweet friend came over to get help with her computer (not from me, obviously) and as we talked it was brought up that I have a blog I haven't touched in a while. Hmm. I felt, at that moment, very justified in not blogging. I mean, hello? I am living at my parent's house. I'm just doing the daily thing of taking Lily to school, playing with Mirah, keeping our stuff picked up and coming up with a dinner plan. That's it. Nothing really impressive or awe-inspiring. But, as I realized today, my blog is about me and my family, so if what we are doing is a tad mundane, well then so be it. You can deal with my fluctuations in excitement, right?

I know many of you right now are going, "Hey, wait a sec! You have a LOT going on right now. There's a whole lot of new stuff on your horizon!" You would be right about that, but apparently it's not the best idea to blog about soldiers right now. I have been asked to keep things on the DL while you-know-who is you-know-where. It's just a smart rule of thumb on the interwebs. Don't get me wrong, I WANT to blog about it. It's what's filling my mind with chaos right now. It's what makes me blankly stare out the window with large, Windows Impact font question marks over my head.

Suffice it to say I'm feeling less droll, increasingly tired and a little overwhelmed. On the flip side, I know that our family can do this. We will do it. I have no idea what it looks like to succeed in this journey yet, but God will show us. We aren't worried about failure or giving-up. This is just one chapter among many other chapters for our family. It's just a harder one. Right now it feels a lot like walking through sand. I start out each day with "I can do this!" and then it ends up feeling difficult to lift them out as they sink in with each step. I guess I'll just have a very well defined prayer muscle as I lift my feet out of the sand each day to walk the walk He planned for us.

Lighter Fare

I feel like the Lord is letting me move on from Jefferson City now. Not just because of my posts, but for a lot of reasons that have been revealed. I felt a new background was due, one that looks up. It's a good reminder to keep my eyes on Him in this new season. I want Him to have all the glory and honor for what lies ahead. I know He will do infinitely more than I could ever ask or imagine.

Plus, the sky is blue...and blue just happens to be the color used by my favorite team in MLB. Go Royals!

Stones 48 through 52

These five stones are big for me.

First, like I said before, I was pregnant with our second girl, Mirah Grace. I had her, and Praise the Lord I did not have the depression or the post-partum blues. Things were looking pretty great in a lot of ways. Sean and I felt so blessed. Lily loved her little baby sister. We were looking for a house. Things just seemed lighter and freer. And Mirah, well, she was an amazing baby.

This is Mirah at about 6 mo. ALL smiles.

This little girl was a small testimony that I COULD walk through motherhood successfully and without feeling totally lost. God really had dished out a ton of grace for me and that's why we named her Mirah Grace. We had received so much. Sean's new job was great and he was back to feeling like himself again, and we were looking for a house. Our first home. We finally found this one and decided it was a perfect fit.

This is how it looked when we bought it in 2009

Like I said, I was feeling pretty okay overall. I mean, there were still issues I was dealing with. I had gone back on medication after having Mirah. I was taking something for anxiety because Sean had been gone for three months at a military school in Arkansas. I was left alone with two kids and a house to pack and move. I thought I for sure needed help with anxiety. Dr. Breidenstein was leery to give me the meds I sought. He had seen me get off of them and successfully handle an entire pregnancy without them. He heard my cry for help and handed me what I thought I needed. However, after seeing him a few times he put his foot down. He really didn't think I needed them anymore. Plus, I was nursing. I didn't want that kind of chemical in Mirah's body anyway, right? I mean, it was "safe" for nursing, but I really wanted to be free of them. The side effects were frustrating anyway. Could I live without them? They had become a safe place for me, and that's exactly when the Lord intervened. And Sam. Well, the Lord through Sam, I guess you could say. Funny thing is, I don't think he ever thought he was doing an intervention. It was only one statement, but it rocked me to the core. And it was from someone I respected. Someone I knew loved me and had seen me at my worst growing up. Someone who had tasted freedom and knew it was attainable in THIS life.

Let me give a little back story for this guy.

Sam, July 4th weekend, 2010

So, a little back story on why this guy is so special to me...besides the fact that he's my bro. When I was 5 I was in the middle of some nasty abuse experiences. The man that I fell victim to knew that my Mom was sick at the time. He basically told me that if I told her what was happening then it would kill her. It shut me up quick. See, that was a possibility off and on - that she might not make it. I was NOT going to be the one to make her die. Eventually the Lord, with help from doctors, healed her, but that was further down the road and at 5 I wasn't able to judge the situation properly. So, God intervened. As I was playing in my little walk-in closet one day I remember hearing a man's voice say, "You will have a brother" clear as day. I remember going into my room and into the hallway, asking my Mom if Dad was home. No he wasn't. But the voice was real, I knew it was. A peace settled over me. I was going to have a brother? I knew it was true. I had accepted Jesus into my heart at church and this was the same feeling I got when He came into my heart. I knew it was real, and I knew this statement was real. And I was a smart cookie. If I was going to have a brother, then that meant that my Mom was going to be okay. If my Mom was going to be okay, then I could just stop the abuse that was happening. I could say no. A few months later - probably 6 or so, my Mom had surgery that really helped her. She later became pregnant with my brother and sat me down to tell me. You can ask her, this is what I said, "I know and it's a boy." So, as you can see, Samuel was my ticket out of a lot of pain. He symbolized hope for me and safety. He was very wanted, by all of us.

So, when Sam looked at me and said, "Carlye, you don't have to live this way anymore." I was listening. God had spoken through Sam many times - whether Sam knew it or not. I was going to give what he said a fighting chance.

But when he said to me, "Read this book", I was kind of taken aback. They Shall Expel Demons? Really? Did he think I was that bad? I had actually tried to read the book about a year before and I could just never get past the first few pages. Hmm..wonder why? This time I gave it a chance to speak to me. I gave God a chance to speak through the pages that Derek Prince wrote.

I think what held me back during the reading of the book was fear. If fear can tighten it's grip around you, then you have a super hard time getting to the parts of the book that call for you to speak at demons and tell them to flee. Really hard. Fear was such a huge part of my life. I couldn't remember a day without it. To live without it? That seemed almost impossible. But I was DONE with the way I was living. I remember telling someone that I was tired of talking about my issues and I was ready to talk to them. Well, it took a lot of praying. God started laying things on my heart to pray about, things hidden in the dark recesses of my spirit and mind. Ugly things. But Praise His Glorious Name that He shed His light on me!!! Dark is always afraid of light and when I finally was able to push fear away and draw a line in the sand, I was able to look at stuff "in the eye" and command it to leave in Jesus' Name. The Name that is above every other Name. The Name to which every knee shall bow and tongue confess that HE is LORD! Oh the power that surged through me during those times. I had this feeling like Jesus had just finally found me in an old abandoned room, tied up and gagged. He had been searching for me for so long and He finally found me. He was so excited. The enemy was being defeated and He was excitedly tearing off my chains and releasing me as I continued to call out his Name and speak against the powers of darkness. He could have just "poof" done it for me years ago, but then I would never have had this amazing experience WITH Him. Together, side by side, arm in arm, back to back, doing battle. Now, it's a daily experience. Daily I can tell what might try to set itself up against what Jesus has done in me. I bear His mark now. I am in HIS army. I am unafraid to battle against whatever may come...because of what's in me? NO WAY. Because of who He is IN me.

A lot happened during this time. I had some dreams that helped urge me on into further battle with a principality. Lily actually had some dreams that gave me insight into what was attacking us as a family. Sean and I prayed a lot. Sometimes together, sometimes alone, but always unified in the belief that God is mighty to save. We did some of the hardest praying in our lives. Some of it seeming very ugly and scary, but it was one of the most freeing times of our lives. We really started to understand what it meant in the Bible when it talked about being "pulled up out of the mire." It's a dirty process, but well worth the sweat and tears.

Me, my little dreamer and my free spirit

My sweet husband and prayer partner

This brings us almost up to present day. I will add more stones over the next few days if I remember something I left out. As we near the day we move, I am daily reminded what a wilderness experience this has been for us. I will leave you with this passage that Tom Blake spoke over me one of the first times I ever visited Kingdom Living. I never thought what he was saying would be possible...but God did.

Isaiah 12

Thanksgiving Expressed

¹ Then you will say on that day, “I will give thanks to You, O LORD; For although You were angry with me, Your anger is turned away, And You comfort me. ² “Behold, God is my salvation, I will trust and not be afraid; For the LORD GOD is my strength and song, And He has become my salvation.” ³ Therefore you will joyously draw water From the springs of salvation. ⁴ And in that day you will say, “Give thanks to the LORD, call on His name. Make known His deeds among the peoples; ^[a]Make them remember that His name is exalted.” ⁵ Praise the LORD in song, for He has done ^[b]excellent things; Let this be known throughout the earth. ⁶ Cry aloud and shout for joy, O inhabitant of Zion, For great in your midst is the Holy One of Israel.