Beautiful Reminder

As summer approaches, I'm getting more and more excited about the beginning of our all-girls book club. I'll be leading it with one of my great friends, Katie, and the book we've chosen has me more than ready to get this thing started! What was supposed to be a "small" gathering of girls quickly expanded, and I'm excited to have around 14 of us who are going to grow together this summer!

We chose to read the book Strong Women, Soft Hearts by Paula Rinehart. I must admit, I was slightly apprehensive to choose this book because I thought it might be for "old" ladies... but then I read part of Paula's blog and a synopsis of the book, and I was in. I immediately bought it off Amazon and started reading when it arrived in my mailbox.

So what has me so pumped about this? Let me share a little snippet from Chapter 2 (the chapter's about desire) that totally hit home:

"'When we are wholly His we will be more ourselves than ever.' What an incredible thought! The more completely we belong to Christ, the more of our real selves we become. Reclaiming my heart in the sense of owning my longings has been like entering a pantry and finally getting the labels on the right jars. To a greater extent, I have God's permission to live out the truth of who I am - to believe that my desires are not an accident, a mistake, or a nuisance. It is the definition of joy to be able to offer back to God the essence of what He's placed in you, be that creativity or a love of ideas or a compassionate heart or the gift of hospitality." (Strong Women, Soft Hearts by Paula Rinehart, p. 24)

Friends, my sweet husband has heard me reiterate this a million times already and I haven't even gotten to discuss it with our book club! This paragraph must have been written FOR ME. Don't you just love it when that happens... when it seems like an author was looking at your picture when she wrote?! It's hard for me to even find the right words to explain why this means so much to me. I think many of us feel like we have to fit a certain "perfect Christian" mold - but this defies that. We are called to be our true selves - and to give that over to God. That's the tricky part - because self-will has a way of creeping in.

I've been so good at putting on the pretty facade and trying to do everything the way I think it should be done, all the while forgetting that I should be first looking to God for direction. So much easier said than done! :-) I've been trying to do this for a couple years now, and sometimes I'll succeed and other times, not so much. I'm looking forward to starting a more intentional shift in life - God first, my plans second.

To those of you in our summer book club, I can't wait to share this book with you!

For a more in depth look at this book, check out the Bloom Book Club here. They're doing video discussion of each chapter - love it!