My heart, which is so full to overflowing, has often been solaced and refreshed by music when sick and weary.

- Martin Luther

Just a thought for the day.  

My identity.

First, I need to say that this year's retreat theme could not have been more appropriate. "Identity: the truest thing about you." Needless to say I had been struggling with my identity, which by the end of the weekend, was exactly who I have been since the day I met Jesus: a child of God.

Galatians 2:20
²⁰ I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.

It's easy to define myself by my size, my job as mom or my life as a wife. It's also easy to define myself by what I'm not. That's where we can really get screwed up.
I am so thankful to the women at my church, they are honest, loving and real. For every fault or problem I think is only mine to have, they remind me humbly that they too have struggles and difficulties. It was the perfect environment to be a "weight watcher". I never felt embarrassed to tell someone that I was counting points and I never felt pressure to just eat whatever. Thank you girls!

I'll blog more about retreat later, I just wanted to preface my weekly progress with my experience at Women's Retreat.

Drum roll: I've lost 2 pounds!
I have more energy, food isn't calling my name at night. I'm drinking tons of water (I drank half a gallon yesterday). I don't forget to take my vitamins and I am not going back for seconds (unless it's veggies or fruit).
I'll share this verse that's a huge (and humbling) help to me.

Philipians 2:13
for it is God who works in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure

My Special Little Guy

Leigh Berry was always the "good kid". The little girl who kept herself in order, was nice to others & quite honestly, was a bit of a "narc" when it came to the behavior of my peers. I expected others to pull it together and act like decent human beings. I made my first bit of spending money babysitting (at homes and church functions). As the care-taker I once again had expectations about behavior. If those expectations weren't met, I judged. I JUDGED HARD. Your parenting sucked a big toe if your kid couldn't tow the line or acted strangely. As a teen and young adult, I didn't understand why parents couldn't teach their kids basic manners.
Then I had kids and because God likes to show us our own ugliness & sin, God gave me the kid that doesn't always listen in public places like say, Sunday School.

Ahhh, yes. This is about what I looked like.

Josiah Andrew Brewer came into this world after a 14 hour labor and then C-Section (that's a blog for another time). He was a surprise to begin with and a difficult baby, taking 3 weeks (and a couple of helpers in my mom and Cameron)  to learn how to properly breastfeed. He didn't sleep through the night unless he was beside me (I hated when people asked me if he was. NEWSFLASH: BABIES AREN'T MEANT TO SLEEP THROUGH THE NIGHT). He wasn't easy by any stretch of the imagination. The first couple months of his little life, I slept sleeping straight up in bed, Boppy pillow around my now stretch marked belly, one boob hanging out. The dang kid had enough piss and vinegar in him to walk at 7 1/2 months. Have you bever seen a baby that size walk? It's a little freaky. I once had a fellow Target shopper ask if I had given birth to a dwarf. Awkward for all parties involved.

See, it just looks weird. 

 Josiah is passionate. This is a one word term for me to say that he's full of it. Whether it's good or bad. Example: When Josiah was 18 months old, he was staying with my parents and saw one of those awful/effective Sarah McLaughlin ASPCA commercials. Her turned to my mom, eyes full of tears and started bawling for all of those abused animals. He did not stop crying for thirty minutes. Another example: Josiah, at about 3, distraught after leaving Disneyland (because you know, we never go back. Actually, we're there all the time) decided to unbuckle himself and attempt to open the car door. On the freeway.

See, he's passionate. Like Van Gogh with an ear to spare.

Pictured: PASSION.
He's about 2 months old in this photo.

A few Sundays ago, we went to retrieve our children from Sunday school. We were greeted by a friend who happens to be one of the children's ministry volunteers. She let us know that Josiah was difficult kid this particular Sunday. He had fallen in with a couple of boys who just started attending church and were rough housing. She even mentioned that we should have been called because he wasn't listening. In my own head I felt things exploding, walls crumbling, me falling to my knees. In my brain, at that moment, every other parent was doing a better job than me. Their kids sat quietly, had the maturity of an 18 year old honor student and never got in trouble. Not only was my son acting like a turd in CHURCH, he was doing so while some of our friends watched him. Jesus shook his head at me. "Tsk, tsk perfect attendance at AWANAs girl." To add insult to injury, Cameron had tear down duty. We sat in the hallway of shame as many friends walked by. I'm sure they were all judging my own personal parenting skills. I'm sure. I was embarrassed. FAILURE stamped my heart. I made Josiah wait in the hallway, then I made him go out and look at the prom set for Glee. That should be enough of a punishment for any little boy.

"Look at it boy and know the depth of human depravity! Repent of
your Sunday school sin!" 

 Earlier in the month, I found out that Josiah had really bad cavities. That's obviously not my son's fault, but damn if I wasn't feeling like a nominee for Courtney Love Mother of the Year Award at that point. I started to unravel. I stopped blogging. I stopped updating my Facebook with cute little quotes I gathered. THERE WAS NOTHING CUTE HERE TO KNOW ABOUT.  I had a difficult child with a black tooth and cavities. I looked at other blogs and Facebook pictures, cute moms who weren't overweight like me, kids in perfect outfits, kids winning awards in activities. Here I was, the mom without a driver's license with the terrible kid who would rather talk Doctor Who than play baseball. It's just been a rough couple of months with my passionate child.

Josiah Brewer, future Bill Haverchuck.

I tossed around the idea of a blog entry about my experiences with Damien from The Omen child. The longer I kept it to myself, the bigger the problem. I started stressing about Kindergarten, I dreamt of  a Ms. Krappable calling me about my own Bart Simpson. I have in fact called Josiah "My special little guy" since the day he was born. If you know anything of The Simpsons, you know this is what Marge Simpson calls Bart. I was the harbinger of my own doom. Tonight, with my Motown spotify blaring, I dug in. I blogged about the ugly side of parenting.

The only difference is that he's not a wanted criminal in Australia...yet.

Blogging can become this lens to see other's parenting skills. Often, that lens can be smeared with Vaseline to erase the wrinkles and ugliness. Tonight I had to let down my guard, let everyone know that I'm aware of my son's behavior. In that I have to let go of my own pride, desire forgiveness for my judgement of others and ask Jesus to take complete control of parenting. I'm going to lay my hopes and needs bare. I want my children to be good. Not because of morals, not because you get extra points for being the kid with all the answers in Sunday school, but because they love Jesus. That's a tightrope to walk. Raising your kids to love Jesus, not to love rules.

  I would like to sum this all up nicely. Have a bird write with ribbon in cursive "...and they lived happily ever after...". That's not going to happen. Parenting is every day. It's different, it's gut wrenching and it's joy. I'll let you know in about 15 years how it all turns out with my special little guy.

Ain't nothin' but a G-thang.

"...they shall run and not be weary."

I believe God made me for a purpose, but he also made me fast. And when I run I feel His pleasure. 

-Chariots of Fire, 1981

"We are all missionaries. Wherever we go we either bring people nearer to Christ or we repel them from Christ." - Eric Liddell

Cue the epic music. We all know it. The theme from Chariots of Fire. It's become a bit of a cliche, a bit of pop culture fodder if you will. Listen to it again like you've never listened to it before. It's so good, right?

(You can go here to listen to it.)

I'm not going to write about the music, I wanted to write about Eric Liddell. I recently re-watched Chariots of Fire (henceforth notated as CoF) and started to research about him. First I have to tell you that as a kid, CoF was one of those movies that I saw multiple times and have a vague recollection of the story. It would come on TV, and just like Breaking Away, we had to watch it. My Dad would get really excited and we'd sit in the living room on Sunday afternoon. I've always known it was about a fast Christian runner ( it's also about Harold Abrahams, a Jewish runner who experienced anti-Semitism in college as well as the running world). Yesterday I decided to watch CoF again. I started researching Mr. Liddell, or the "Flying Scotsman" as he was called. Aside from his already fantastic story of staying true to his beliefs and running like a madman, I found a great missionary who ended up losing his life while serving the people he loved. 

If you've seen the movie you know that he gave up running in the 100-metres race because of his belief in keeping the Sabbath. The 100-metres race was his best event. He ended up training for the 400-metres race, where he wasn't expected to win. An American Olympic masseur slipped a piece of paper into his hand with 1 Samuel 2:30 written on it. He won the gold medal. 

The movie doesn't go into Liddell's missionary service in China, where he served for nearly 20 years. He was a teacher at an Anglo-Chinese school, he coached boys in several sports, was a superintend of the Sunday School where his father was pastor and helped build Minyuan Stadium . He was ordained while on furlough in 1932. He returned to China and married his wife, Florence Makenzie who had also grown up in a missionary family.

It became dangerous in 1941 for the British missionaries to live in China as Japan became more aggressive. Florence and the children moved to Canada while Eric stayed in China to run a rural mission. In 1943, Eric was interned at the Weifang Internment camp. Eric became a leader among the others who were there. He helped to divide the scarce supplies of food and medicine. He was referred to as "Uncle Eric" while he helped the elderly, led Bible study and taught science to the children. 

Eric died on February 21, 1945, 5 months before the camp was liberated. He died from an inoperable brain tumor. His last words were "It's complete surrender." 

He had lived his whole life in service to the God he loved. 

In 2008, Chinese authorities revealed that Eric had given up an opportunity to be freed. He gave his spot to a pregnant woman.

This man carved his name on hearts. Christ was in everything he did, whether it was running or serving people in China.  While he is well known for his running (which was very unorthodox, he threw his head back and held his mouth open), I want to draw attention to his later life. He died serving people he loved because Jesus loved him. 

There is now an Eric Liddell Center in Edinburgh, England where his legacy carries on. 

Rather than leave a fancy tombstone behind, I want to leave a legacy. Not to promote myself, but only to share Jesus and to make a difference in the lives of others. I can only hope that I make a fraction of a difference that Eric Liddell did. I pray that my heart is open to everything Jesus gives me in the same way the "Flying Scotsman" was. 

Doesn't that theme song seem so much more epic now? 

**Information was found on Wikipedia & The Eric Liddell Center's Website**