Let There Be Light

 March, it’s a month of many events and emotions in our lives. From Jesse’s birthday(35 this year), to the month he got diagnosed and also the two year marker since that diagnosis; to say the least, there’s lots of ups and downs in the month of March for us. If I’m honest we’ve both been in a season of struggle lately. I don’t have words to say and my prayers are few words and more crying out for His help. There is a sense of exhaustion as we come up to the two year mark on March 31st. Don’t get me wrong we’re very grateful for this milestone but in the back of our minds we ask the question, Lord, how long can we keep doing this? The appointments on the calendar, watching Jesse feel terrible every other week, and the everyday grind of life….it can all be a lot. I don’t want to depict a picture of sunshine and strength all the time because it’s just not true . Everyday is a battle to keep abiding in Jesus and some days we don’t. Some days fear and things of this life get the best of...

  The Christmas season is upon us once again and there’s many emotions that take place. It’s a time of joy and giving yet a time of grief and sadness for many. If I’m honest in the past I haven’t been a Christmas lover, it’s always felt commercialized with to many expectations. But this year it feels different as we’ve let go of expectations around the holidays and put our attention towards Jesus. Christmas was never meant to be a crazy stressful time of year, it’s meant to be simple like the birth of our Lord was. In a humble manger surrounded by those shepherds who were the lowest of low in society yet God chose to tell them first. As we watched “The Nativity story” with our kids this year, I was humbled again by the story of Jesus coming to the earth as a baby for the purpose of dying on the cross for our sins. We can get accustomed to the story but to slow down and think about it, what a wonderful story it is!  As Christmas approaches quickly I’m reminded to embrace it ful...

Whoa, how did we even get here? Was it not June 1st yesterday and here we are Thanksgiving weekend. As we started to harvest soybeans this week, it caught me by surprise how fast time goes. It feels like yesterday we planted those little seeds and started to watch them pop up in rows; now here we are starting to harvest them. It's kind of like our life isn't it? We are born full of life, we sway in the wind full of growth and energy but as time passes we see that we aren't so young anymore. We start to change from a young vibrant plant into a brown more brittle plant, time has worn us down and left marks on us. One day we will return to that ground just as that seed will return to the ground. Our life is a vapor "Yet you do not know what your life will be tomorrow. For you are just a vapor that appears for a little while, and then vanishes away. Instead you ought to say, "If the Lord wills, we will live and also do this or that." - James 4:13-15 I don't k...

 Recently we had the privilege of being beside a dear friend as she passed away.  I sat with this friend and we talked about our fears and hopes. She was a mentor and fellow farmer who we dearly loved. After being re-diagnosed with cancer, we watched her body fade and our life perspective was again refocused. That will be us one day , our body fading away from this life into the eternal life with our King.  How quickly we forget what this life is about and jump back on that hamster wheel, just doing the motions of life. I’ll be honest, life has gone back to a somewhat normal state for us and I tend to forget what the Lord has taught me. I can get side tracked with money, our business, the next to do or about myself. I thank God for the opportunity to be beside this dear friend and have our focus narrowed down again to what really matters.  I wonder how often we forget the things that Christ did for us. Thinking back to the initial months after we found out Jesse had ...

God has been teaching me lately about His character of never changing. Our lives are uncertain; whether it’s the economy or our health things are always changing. The only thing that stays the same is God. I may lose my husband to cancer one day, I may lose all that I  own or my country may one day not  be "glorious and free" but one thing remains; God will always  be, He will never leave me nor forsake me (Hebrews 13:5). I’m so thankful for these truths in our lives as we continue to walk the unknowns. We can rest in the immovable Rock and find our strength in His everlasting arms. His grace is sufficient for us each day, one single moment at a time. God doesn’t promise to take our suffering away. He doesn't promise that I’ll  always have a husband but he does promise “my God will meet all your needs according to the riches of his glory in Christ Jesus.” ‭‭Philippians‬ ‭4‬:‭19‬ ‭NIV‬‬ Our circumstances in life will continue to change but they will never alter the un...

  It’s been a year, a whole year since that nasty word “cancer” entered into our lives. I’ll never forget that day of being told that “we” had cancer. I say we because Jesse and I are one and it affects both of us in so many ways. We can both still picture the exact moment of being told it was cancer and it all comes back like it was yesterday. But it’s been a year; a year we didn’t think we would have together at the beginning of this journey, a year we’re both so grateful for.  I see that it was a year full of life. A life giving season, and a brand new start. As we enter into spring, a new season with new beginnings this past year for us was a season of spring. We sprung into things we never imagined would be in our lives. The darkness of our trials has brought us to a place of beautiful blossom like the spring tulips emerging out of the cold ground. The spring like rains are necessary in order for those tulips to bloom. It’s been a season of growth for both of us as we’ve ...

As I sit in front of our wood stove late at night my mind thinks of the word simplicity and what that looks like. Jesse and I have been together for almost 15 years now. We started dating when I was young and I look back at all those sweet memories. Our dating years consisted of milking cows together, field work, chores and the odd dinner out. I’ve always gone to bed early and most evenings I would kick Jesse out by 8 pm to be in bed by 9. I look back on those years and wouldn’t trade them for anything, the word simple comes to mind when I ponder them . How do we get back to a life of simplicity? I was thinking about my sweet Grandma Vis and that generation of parents. The simple yet hard life they lived on the farm. Removed from technology and just the simple life. Canning on hot summer days, tending the garden to feed all those mouths, making sure the straw and hay got in on time....the "good ole days."  As our world advances in all things technology I can’t help but long t...