God

The slow train to sanity – or is it a runaway train?

Suzy Taylor Oakley accountability, family, friends, God, inspiration, reaching out, reading, religion

Friends, you don’t know how hard it is for me to be sitting here writing this rather than strapping on my seatbelt and pointing the car back toward North Little Rock. It’s 7:45 a.m. as I sit down to write this, and if I left now I could be there by 9:15 (Saturday’s Insane Statement No. 1).

If you’ve read Thursday night’s post (which hit the Internet just before midnight, another sign of my weakened mental condition), you know that I have been battling an “insanity pod” – trying to bring some measure of balance back to my life (if I ever possessed any such thing) – by eliminating things from my schedule, even those things that make me seem even more insane for skipping.

You see, Beth Moore is speaking at Verizon Arena in NLR this weekend, and I had bought my ticket several weeks ago, as soon as I heard about the event.

Beth Moore is, in my opinion, the best women’s Bible study teacher – dare I say women’s teacher, period – of our generation. (Oprah might think she herself is the best teacher of women, but Oprah would be wrong; she may mention “Jesus” every once in a while, but it’s not the same Jesus that Beth Moore talks about.)

I had been looking forward to seeing Beth (yeah, we’re on a first-name basis) live for so long it was killing me. My church here in Batesville had hosted one of her Living Proof Live global simulcasts last summer, and it was amazing (of course). We ladies talked that day of wishing we could attend a live Beth Moore event (several in the gathering that day already had). So when I heard the announcement about this weekend’s event, I wasted no time in registering.

In case you’re unfamiliar with her, in women’s Christian circles the name “Beth Moore” is like the name “Billy Graham” is to the world at large. Most church women you meet, young or old, are gonna know her name and have attended at least one of her Bible studies. Men don’t necessarily “get” her, but women love her.

I became familiar with Beth perhaps 10 years ago when “my other Fellowship” – Fellowship Bible Church of North Little Rock – did one of her studies, Living Free. With the first study, I was hooked. Fellowship North has since hosted many Beth Moore Bible studies, and I could name you my favorites, but I’ll save that for a later conversation.

I believe Beth is so popular for many reasons, but here are the main ones:

  • Her depth of insight into human nature and human character, partly because of where God has brought her from personally.
  • Her depth of study of the Scriptures, including the history of biblical terminology and concepts.
  • Her willingness to share the ugliness of her past with those she teaches. By the same token, she is willing to share the ugliness of her present with us. While there is a temptation to paint her as a saint, she would be the first to tell you she isn’t. She is a sinner saved by grace, just like the rest of us who have called on the name of Jesus for salvation. And we all have ugliness that makes us need Jesus on a minute-by-minute basis. (If you don’t think you do, you’re in denial and we should talk.)
  • She makes the Bible come alive. Her sanguine personality is a big part of that, but I think the more profound reasons are 1) the digging she does into the historical texts, through exhaustive research and study; 2) the fact that she has struggled with so many of the same issues we all struggle with, and then some; and 3) she loves Jesus from the depths of her soul.

It’s that last part that resonates with so many. Beth Moore loves Jesus. If you doubt it, just listen to her for 60 seconds and you’ll likely hear her say it, in so many words. It oozes out her pores.

So I am sitting here on Saturday morning wishing I were back at Verizon Arena, listening to awesome praise music and drinking in Part 2 of her message.

I was there last night for Part 1, knowing I was coming home afterward instead of spending the night with the rest of our group. It killed me to leave, but I was so tired by that point (mentally and physically) it was the only rational thing to do. Or so I thought.

Here is where I confess, and what brings me to tears: My decision not to stay to the end of the conference was based on human logic, not prayerful consideration.

What’s ironic is that human logic is what brought me to this place of imbalance in the first place. Not giving God the time of day, most days, is where my train began running off the tracks.

But let me back up a few days:

Wednesday night I was writing a Suzy & Spice blog post and getting ready to edit the church’s Connect+Scripture blog post before finishing our tax return so I could know how much money we needed to borrow to pay the IRS (our bill is big this year, for a variety of reasons, hence the delay in filing). My mother knocked on the door; she had just gotten out of church and thought she’d swing by to see us.

I didn’t even have time to talk to her. I sort of talked to her, but I was doing “computer things” the whole time she was here. She didn’t stay long, and I felt so guilty. I apologized then, and again the next day, and again yesterday. I also told her to read Thursday’s blog post, which I wrote as a result of this encounter. Or I should say the encounter was the straw that broke the camel’s back.

For it was then that I realized, for sure, that something had to give. And the fact that my mother was the one I had “given up” did not make me happy. When something has to give, your family should not even be on the list.

Mom  and the rest of my family have been the ones to suffer from my imbalanced life for a long time.

My rational self is the one that says things like “I have to go to school because of A, B and C” (those reasons are for another post) or “When we sell the North Little Rock house, X, Y and Z will change and I will have more time” or “I committed to this, and I can’t quit.”

My tendency to overcommit is what will end up killing me someday, if my family doesn’t murder me first.

So in Thursday’s post I talked about the insanity of imbalance. I mentioned needing to take things off my calendar, even things that were seemingly important. (I was thinking specifically of the Beth Moore event.)

My human logic said, “Girl, you’re going to die, or alienate your family, or get fired from your job if you don’t start whittling down your to-do list.”

So the calendar items started dropping like flies, even the one event I had waited so long for. I almost skipped it entirely, but I knew I had to go at least for part of the weekend.

There is another (also stress-related) reason I decided to experience only half of the weekend, and telling you would reveal an unflattering part of me that I’m not ready to share this morning – partly because it’s a long story; you need background info before you judge me too harshly 🙂 and this post is too long already!

A huge irony of this story is that Beth Moore talked about excellence last night – how we need to order our schedules and commitments wisely because “we cannot do a thousand things to the glory of God.” That sentence almost made me weep. It also prompted Kristi to reach across another friend, grab my arm and ask, “Did she consult with you before she wrote this?” (or words to that effect).

Beth’s challenge to us last night was to figure out what God has called us to do (“adopt a succinct life goal”), acquire the appropriate tools to fulfill it (Bible commentaries and concordances, for instance), “endure the hard for the sake of the good” (I’ll expand on that later) and embrace community. (Kristi has been instructed to take good notes for me today so I can hear the rest of the message.)

In the next few days, I’ll share more of what I learned last night, but here’s the challenge I want to leave you to ponder with me, for as long as it takes to discover the answer:

“What would it take to be excellent at what God has called you to do?”

Please share your thoughts by posting a comment.

Stop the insanity (pods)!

Suzy Taylor Oakley accountability, dogs, family, fitness, food, friends, fun, God, health, home, humor, music, reading, work

A giant insanity pod has descended upon me and has taken up residence on top of my head. For the past few days, it’s been trying to make its way through my dense thicket of hair to creep into my cranium and wreak havoc with my internal circuitry. It threatens to annihilate me if something is not done to stop it.

What is an insanity pod, you say? You won’t find the precise definition in any dictionary, but an insanity pod is much like the humidity pods that descend upon Arkansas about this time of year and don’t leave until October or November. It’s a presence you dislike, but you learn to live with it, much like you learn to live with oily skin, or a husband who steals the covers. Until it’s time to cry out, “Enough is enough!” or “Out, out, darn pod!”

But, unlike with the humidity pods, you have some measure of control – within predetermined parameters – over an insanity pod. For instance, you can control how large it gets and how long it stays attached to your brain – or whether it makes it past your scalp in the first place.

In case you have never heard of insanity pods, we offer this helpful Q&A:

How do insanity pods form? No one knows for certain how the first pod came to be, but it grew and spawned other pods (much like Amish friendship bread). They approach the most vulnerable victim first (they can tell who you are). They begin by spotting someone with an overloaded schedule, too much stress from the challenges of life, a poor diet, the inability to sleep through the night and a merely compulsory reading of the Word. To that they pile on more stress, which leads to impulse eating, more insomnia, uncontrollable drooling, chocolate cravings and a worried mother (well, that last one is just a fact of everyday life, but it becomes more obvious as the insanity pod tightens its invisible tentacles around your nerve endings).

How do insanity pods manifest? The list of symptoms is exhaustive, but, among other things, the pods cause forgetfulness, crankiness, night blindness, a messy house and the Scary Mama Voice when the dogs misbehave (which means when they act like themselves).

Who suffers from insanity pods? As mentioned above, the pods attack the most vulnerable members of society first. The most likely victim is female, age 35-55, premenopausal, works full time, goes to school part time, volunteers at church and takes care of children, an aging parent, a chronically ill spouse or at least two pets – or all of the above. (We should mention that the sufferers include not only the victim, but relatives and members of the victim’s work and social circles.)

What can a loved one of an insanity-pod sufferer do to help? Just stay out of the way, baby.

How does one “stop the insanity”? As with an addiction to alcohol, food, shopping, gambling or Dancing with the Stars, the insanity-pod sufferer, or IPS, must admit her affliction. That is the first and most crucial step. (If the malady is caught early enough, there is no need for a formal 12-step program.) Then she must recite the insanity – er, serenity – prayer:

God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and sufficient distance from sharp or heavy objects that can be used as weapons.

The next step is to begin removing obstacles to sanity, starting with items (even seemingly important ones) on her social, business and volunteer calendars, even if others don’t understand why this is happening. Would they rather find out about it in the newspaper or on the 10 o’clock news? (“Disgruntled worker takes out 23 colleagues, then turns the staple gun on herself – coming up after the break!”)

Relief can be immediate, much like when an Alka-Seltzer grants the first gut-relieving belch. In fact, when the first one or two items fall off the calendar, the IPS begins feeling lighter and the furrowed brow begins smoothing out. Then recovery can begin in earnest.

Within weeks (or perhaps days, depending the sufferer’s commitment to the program) a balance has been struck – the schedule is more manageable, school is out for the summer, the sufferer’s mother and the dogs are speaking to her again, the husband has stopped sleeping on the sofa. At this point, it is probably safe to approach, but proceed with caution. There could be a relapse. It is best to monitor the IPS from a distance for a few days to be sure equilibrium has, indeed, been restored.

How can you tell when the insanity pod has left for good? As there is no immunization at this time, there is no way to permanently remove the threat of insanity pods. But you can minimize the risk by remaining vigilant. The sufferer should get adequate sleep and exercise, stay hydrated, restrict caffeine, take long baths, play with the dogs, spend time with her husband, immerse herself in a few pieces of quality literature (no, we’re not talking about People magazine), work/play in the garden, write in her blog, eat 1-2 ounces of dark chocolate daily, watch Saturday morning Food Network and/or HGTV, listen to music, visit her mother more often (this should go without saying), pray and read Scripture regularly, and start reading the Sunday funny pages again.

This way, when the fall semester begins and the cycle threatens to repeat itself, the insanity pod will be less likely to try to park its ugly head on top of this particular victim’s. It will simply move on to the next unsuspecting forty-something woman and try to suck out her brain.

Help researchers find a cure for insanity pods! Contribute your suggestions by leaving a comment below. Or just send me a check.

False gods

Suzy Taylor Oakley accountability, food, God, health, inspiration, reaching out, running

Friends, tonight I had to fill in for one of the writers of my church’s blog, Connect+Scripture. I have to leave the house before daylight in the morning to go to an out-of-town conference, so I can’t stay up and write a separate post for this space.

Therefore, if you’re staying up late, you get a free preview of the C+S post, which will publish at midnight. I hope it speaks to you and challenges you:

[verse]1 Kings 12-15[/verse] – Commentary by Suzy Oakley

Have you ever looked around your little corner of the world, or watched five minutes of the network news, and said to yourself, “How could it get any worse?” How could this world we live in sink any lower into the depths of depravity, self-centeredness and greed?

I think we’ve been saying that for millennia. Each generation is worse than the last, and we think it can’t possibly get any worse than it is now.

Well, my friend, it can. There may be “nothing new under the sun”  (Ecclesiastes 1:9), but there are variations on a theme.

In the days of the Old Testament kings, the theme was false gods. In fact, throughout the history of God’s chosen people, putting other gods before Him was the theme that echoed through the ages.

Can you hear it?

Israel’s worship of false gods was the root of everything that was wrong with the world. Any time we try to be our own boss, to fill a void in our lives that only God can fill, to think we know best, we are worshiping a false god. We may not have the same exact idols the children of Israel had, but anything we put ahead of our Creator is an idol.

We have traded golden calves for golden arches.

I’m speaking for myself here. My personal god is food. This is true for millions of Americans, whether they are fat, skinny or something in between. Some of us eat too much; some of us eat too little. Either way, food has become a god, a way to comfort ourselves, be “in control” or in some other way make ourselves feel better. Food has become an obsession, a god. And any god with a little “g” is a false god.

If you have visited my personal blog in the past week, you know that I have finally “gone public” about my struggles with weight and food. I wanted to throw light on the issue so that it won’t be an ugly, secret sin any longer. A week ago today, I announced my weight (the exact number on the scale) and a commitment to deal with my false god in public, in an effort to help myself and others deal with our heavy burdens (and by “help myself” I mean only by God’s leading – I have to do my share of the hard work, but He is holding my hand).

Tossing out my “golden calf” (and its stinky, insect-infested brothers and sisters) isn’t going to be easy, and I’ve enlisted help. I have hope and joy and a sense of release for finally letting it all hang out, so to speak. I want to stomp that idol to smithereens. But I can do it only by putting God where that big fat cow has been sitting for so long.

I wish I could say that food is my only false god. I also worship at the altar of busyness, bossiness and caring too much what others think of me. (Don’t worry; I’m stopping here. I won’t throw the whole list at you!)

Perhaps your god is money, laziness, workaholism, worry, gossip, the need to be liked. Anything that keeps you from putting the One True God on His rightful throne at the center of your heart is a god with a little “g.”

Let’s keep God on His throne, where He belongs.

What are some gods you would like to work on obliterating?

Sunday – a day of rest

Suzy Taylor Oakley accountability, fitness, food, God, health, inspiration, running

When this semester is over, Sundays will be more restful. Meanwhile, I want to clarify that when I said I was committing to post every day about my journey to health and fitness, I didn’t necessarily means Sundays.

I truly believe Sunday (or whatever day you choose) should be a day reserved for worshiping the Lord and for resting as much as possible. In this modern society, “as much as possible” often means none at all, but over the past few years it has been a goal of mine to make it a priority. I’m not always good at it, especially when my life is as overloaded with activity as it is right now, but it is something I keep in mind every weekend.

So I’m not posting tonight. Really. This doesn’t count.

I do want to share a verse that I recently taped to my bathroom mirror because, for me, food has become an idol:

“Don’t go back to worshiping worthless idols that cannot help or rescue you — they are totally useless!” – 1 Samuel 12:21 (New Living Translation)

I hope this verse encourages you to think prayerfully about any area of your life that might have become like an idol to you. Then ask God to help you honor Him above that thing, whatever it is.

Have a wonderful week, and I’ll talk to you Monday night!

Please post a comment sharing your struggles or a word of encouragement for others.

The weekend ahead

Suzy Taylor Oakley accountability, fitness, God, health, inspiration, running

I’m posting first thing this morning because this is going to be a busy day and I’ll probably be too tired to post when I get home tonight.

In a few minutes, Bruce and I will leave for the women’s running clinic. I’m eating an apple rather than my typical Saturday morning big mug of coffee and bowl of bran flakes to minimize the peepee problem I mentioned in my April 5 post. I try not to consume any liquid for several hours before running. Argh! (I typically prefer to eat a banana before running, but I let the last banana get too ripe and Bruce ate it. I prefer green bananas!)

After the running clinic, we’ll come home and clean up, then leave for the Arkansas Scottish Festival at Lyon College. I love the festival, and Bruce indulges me by going with me when we can. He likes it, too, but I love it!

Then we’ll come home, and I hope I can get a little rest before the next event. I worked hard on my school project last night, from the time I got home from work until just before bedtime, so I wouldn’t have that hanging over my head all weekend. It’s due a week from Monday, but I’ll be out of town next weekend.

Tonight, my friend Lynn is coming to town to attend the Batesville High School production of the musical Camelot, my all-time-favorite stage production. Lynn and I have happy, happy memories of Camelot, which we saw together three times when the Batesville Community Theatre staged it in 1981. Our other best  friend, “Rebecky,” was in the orchestra. I saw Camelot a fourth time when I lived in Southern California. There were bigger stars that time, but the Batesville production was the most memorable.

I try to make Sundays a day of rest, but sometimes I end up doing schoolwork. This weekend I won’t have to worry about that, praise God! I really didn’t think I could finish writing my paper last night because I thought I would get sleepy, but God gave me the energy to persevere. The paper itself is finished, but in the coming week I have to turn it into an oral presentation with visual aids, flashing lights and dancing bears (just kidding about the last two).

I’m very tired this morning, and thinking about the next few days makes me even more tired, so it’s good that I’ll be getting in a good workout this morning.

It’s time to lace up my running shoes! See you in the next chapter.

Post a comment and share your challenges.

 

Going public

Suzy Taylor Oakley books, family, fitness, God, health, inspiration, medical, reaching out, running

It’s time.

As a woman in labor says to her husband while grabbing her overnight bag and the car keys: It’s time.

It’s time for me to get serious about healthy eating, healthy living, this extra 50 pounds of baggage – and go public with my struggle. Public because it’s the only way I will stick with it. (Well, it’s not the only way [more on that later], but it’s a hugely important way, and the one I’ve chosen.)

Many factors have converged to bring me to this point, but tonight was decision time. After more than a year of wishy-washy, excuse-filled thinking, it was time to paint or get off the ladder (my former pastor’s variation on a more colorful and well-known phrase).

As with many of my so-called good decisions, this one came while I was jacked up on too much oxygen – toward the end of a 5-kilometer (3.1-mile) run in a beautiful neighborhood – blue skies, green trees, a slight breeze, low humidity, bicycling kids and dads, jogging moms. A perfect evening.

It was the perfect end to a not-so-perfect day at work – a day of being out of control with my eating. Today was April-birthday-celebration-day at work. Can I tell you all the things I ate without making you sick? It makes me sick (emotionally, mentally, spiritually) to think about it, so maybe I won’t. I will let you imagine. Because, if you are reading this is as a person (especially a woman) who has struggled with food issues for any length of time, you don’t have to know the specifics of my particular brand of food insanity; you have your own specifics and can fill in the blanks using your own food-drug of choice.

I am typically not a binge eater, but I do tend to overdo, and today I pushed the limits of common sense. I ate a lot of junk – so much, in fact, that even though I was no longer full by the time the Women Run Arkansas clinic started at 5:30, I felt heavy. Not body-heavy, but heart-heavy.

I didn’t want to run. For this reason, I knew I had to.

One thing about the running clinic: I always feel better when I’ve pushed myself, made myself persevere. I never want to go; I always am glad I did. It’s kind of like when you’re tired and don’t want to get up and go to church. You’re in a bad mood, don’t want to do it, but you know you’ll receive a blessing if you just go. And you do. And you do.

Tonight, as always, I got to the designated running spot and walked around the parking lot while the other ladies chatted. I don’t like to do the stretches without warming my muscles first. I started off feeling like an elephant (“I can’t do this tonight. Why am I here?”) but slowly began to feel more capable, confident. By the time the group stretching began, I was ready (I had also found a bathroom in the nearby gym – an unexpected, happy bonus: I could pee one last time before jogging! [More on that later, filed under “A Million Excuses”]).

I’m sure they told us the following fact after our last Saturday morning workout, but with the wind blowing, the music blaring and the stretch leader’s head turned in the other direction, I do not always hear all the details: We were going to run a 5k tonight. In a hilly neighborhood. (Saturday workouts are on the high school track. The flat-as-a-pancake high school track.)

Tonight we ran the route of the upcoming 1040 Tax Fun Run/Walk. Sure, we’d been running nearly 3 miles in our thrice-weekly workouts for quite some time, gradually building our endurance with longer jog/shorter walk times, but tonight we took a big leap. Instead of an alternating run-2-minutes/walk-3-minutes workout, we skipped ahead to  a run-3/walk-1 pace. What? Are you trying to kill us? (Really, they’re not. Quite the contrary – they’re trying to save us from ourselves.)

But it was run-3, walk-1, and I was game. I have been building endurance, even though with my respiratory issues (Excuse No. 697) Bruce thinks I may never get the lung capacity I long for. My physical endurance, while not ideal, nevertheless has been improving.

When I finished my 5K (in 41 minutes, 15 seconds!), I walked back to find some other joggers and walkers, mainly because Bruce was with them. (He has been volunteering as a coach at the clinic for a couple of weeks, since the day we both needed the car and he stayed to see if they needed help instead of simply dropping me off.)

Strangely enough, after my run, I felt good. I am sure I won’t be saying this once the humidity pods descend on our city, but tonight it was all good. Especially when I crossed the finish line.

I felt so great, in fact, that I doubled back to jog in with the group behind me, encouraging the ladies as they neared the finish line. And when we reached it, I doubled back again to pick up the next group. “Go, ladies. You’re almost there! You can do it! Finish line just ahead!”

It made me feel good to encourage them. They may not have wanted or needed my two cents’ worth of encouragement, but I felt good giving it to them.

That’s when the crazy idea hit me (remember, my brain was all endorphined up):

“Next year I am going to be in good enough shape to be a leader of one of the running groups.” (We have several groups, starting with Walkers, then Beginner A runners, Beginner B runners, Intermediate …)

“That is my goal, my New Year’s resolution (nevermind this is April). I am going to get serious about this unhealthy, out-of-shape body and be a serious runner! And then I’m going to help others!”

If you have ever made a New Year’s resolution, or gone on a diet, or committed to anything important in the throes of an oxygen high, you know how risky and tricky the next few weeks are going to be. I’m not stupid – I know I will have many obstacles, not the least of which will be the enemy’s attempts to short-circuit my resolve. The evil one will throw in my face every single excuse I’ve ever come up with for quitting.

So let me list a few of them here, just to get them out of the way. I’m sure I’ll think of more later, but here are a few of the Million Excuses:

  • My feet hurt. (I have bone spurs in the bottoms of both of my heels. I’ve seen them in X-rays.)
  • My knee hurts. (I did something to it quite a while back, and it gives me grief sometimes.)
  • I have a heart condition. (But my cardiologist told me 18 months ago that I needed to lose a few pounds.)
  • I have developed a problem with urinary leakage upon exertion. (Don’t make me explain. If you’re a middle-age woman or have been pregnant, you probably know what I’m talking about. Explain it to the other girls.)
  • I don’t have the right apparel. (Solved the most important one recently when I figured out How to buy a sports bra. This was a tongue-in-cheek post; some people didn’t get that – but he was a guy.)
  • I don’t have time. (Haven’t we all used that one? If you don’t have time to take care of your body [and your spirit], you’re too busy!)
  • I’m not very fast. (Solved that one, too, when I read No Need for Speed: A Beginner’s Guide to the Joy of Running.)
  • I have respiratory issues. (So what? See previous item.)
  • It’s too cold/hot/humid. (Since I began running again in November, I have run in below-freezing temperatures and lived to tell about it. In the past, I have run in high temperatures and not died of heat stroke. As for the humidity – well, I’m still talking to myself about that one.)

Those are some of the excuses I’ve used for not exercising. The ones for not eating right are fewer but more ridiculous:

  • My oven is 40 years old and burns everything. (So make a sandwich.)
  • I can’t afford to eat healthy. (But you can afford a cardiologist’s bill?)
  • I don’t have time to cook healthful foods. (Salads do take a relatively long time to prepare, and cutting up the vegetables too many days in advance causes them to spoil faster. But good alternatives exist. Figure them out, and stop whining.)
  • Fresh produce spoils so fast. (So go to the store more often. Or send hubby.)
  • But this tastes so good. (So eat a little of it, savor it, and put your fork away.)
  • The Weight Watchers calculator is out of stock, and I can’t count my points without it! (Good news – I finally got the calculator.)

The excuses pile up like stacks of old newspapers. And the excuses are a lot easier to recycle.

The bottom line is that, left to my own devices, “wisdom” and appetites, I will die young. And I don’t want to leave Bruce and the dogs to fend for themselves. I love them too much for that.

That is why I’m going public:

This morning, my scale said 199. That means my actual weight is 201 (I cannot calibrate my scale to the correct setting, so I trust the one at work, where we are doing a Biggest Loser competition and I’ve been losing the same 2 pounds for about three weeks now).

My weight issue is largely an accountability problem. (At its core it’s a spiritual battle, but that is a post for another day.) And because I need accountability to my friends, my family, and even total strangers, I am choosing to go public.

I’m not going to post my “before picture” tonight because I have to find it first and it’s already two hours past my bedtime, but I am committing to writing something every single day in this space. I do have a busy schedule (job, school, family, volunteer work), but I will at least post a brief thought. Not sure yet how often I will post my weight (at the moment, I’m weighing myself every morning), but I’ll figure out the specifics as I go.

In reading this, you have found out some ugly things about me that you may not have known. I invite you to take this journey with me, whether you have pounds to shed or some other type of heavy weight that is keeping you down. I am doing this not only to help myself but to help others, Lord willing.

This journey will require prayer, commitment, obedience and a lot of listening to God’s voice (the only way this will really and truly work). I am finally ready. Are you?

It’s time to go public. I hope you’ll join me on the journey.

Share your struggles, words of wisdom or a bit of encouragement with me by posting a comment.

The Grace Card

Suzy Taylor Oakley God, movies

My friends in California forwarded an e-mail about a movie that opened around the country today: The Grace Card, made by a church in Memphis. I’ve watched the trailer and read a few reviews, and it is worth checking out. Watch the trailer below, then click this link to read a review from Christianity Today.

Too bad it’s not playing in Batesville this weekend; I’d pay full price and even drag Bruce along to see it with me. For those of you in central Arkansas, it is playing at Lakewood in North Little Rock and at Breckenridge Village and the Rave in Little Rock. Click here for those show times.

Can’t wait to see it!

Connect with Scripture

Suzy Taylor Oakley books, God, inspiration, reading, religion

Friends,

My church has begun a read-the-Bible-in-a-year plan, and we’re blogging about it every weekday. We include links to the day’s passages at BibleGateway.com, and you are welcome to read along, view the day’s commentary (by church members – just laypeople like you and me, plus the pastor once every couple of weeks) and even leave a comment sharing your thoughts, asking a question or issuing a challenge.

It has been rewarding to participate in this community-building exercise, and doing it together keeps us accountable to reading the Bible each day. And can’t we all use a little bit of encouragement in that area every once in a while?

If your interest is piqued, click on Connect+Scripture to join us. I believe you will be inspired.

Merry Christmas to all

Suzy Taylor Oakley God, holiday, religion

“For God loved the world so much that he gave his one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life.” – John 3:16 (New Living Translation)

Today is a day for families … and for celebrating the birth of Jesus Christ, the Savior of all mankind.

If you don’t know Jesus as your Savior, please get in touch with me (at stoakley [at] swbell [dot] net) or someone you know who can tell you how you may invite Him into your life, or click here and read how and why you should make this most important decision.

Or if you already understand your need, you may simply pray this prayer:

“Lord Jesus, I need You. Thank You for dying on the cross for my sins. I open the door of my life and receive You as my Savior and Lord. Thank You for forgiving my sins and giving me eternal life. Take control of the throne of my life. Make me the kind of person You want me to be.”

If you just prayed that prayer, know that heaven is having a party in your honor! And I would like to know about it, too. Please post a comment or e-mail me privately to let me know.

Merry Christmas, and welcome to the family.

Honey, I’m home

Suzy Taylor Oakley Batesville, family, giving thanks, God, holiday, home

People, before it’s over, you’re going to get tired of hearing me say how much I love being back in Batesville, where I grew up.

But two things this morning have made me think that thought all over again!

First, I got an e-mail from Lynn. She told me in a “rambling” (her word, but it wasn’t rambly) e-mail:

I can tell you’re having a lot of fun with your blog. … Moving to Batesville seems to have fufilled you in so many ways.

Then, my cousin Teri posted something on Facebook about making spaghetti, and I told her:

Mom has decided we’re having spaghetti for Christmas dinner this year. 🙂 She makes hers Mexican-spicy, and I haven’t had that in years! She used to make it every year for my birthday.

In all this talk about spaghetti for Christmas dinner (I had told Mom I could make chicken spaghetti – yum!), I had forgotten that she used to make her Mexican-spicy spaghetti for my birthday every year.

What a wonderful thing to remember after all these years!

Yes, Lynn, moving to Batesville has fulfilled me in so many ways I can’t even name them all. But I’m going to keep trying.

I know this euphoria won’t last forever, but in the meantime I’m going to savor every sunrise (pale pink at the moment), every glimpse of the cows in the pasture behind us that drive my furbabies crazy, every dog-walking trip or jog to my brother’s and mom’s houses, every drive down Main Street or up Boswell or College, every new encounter I have with someone I knew way-back-when, every hug from my mom and every visit with my brother and his family.

As I’ve said, God made me wait a long time after Bruce and I decided to move here, and I hope I never forget how gracious He was in finally working it out for us.

Normally I would blame this feeling on the holidays, but I’ve had it bad for seven months now. Bruce has learned to smile and accept it, although he is also happy to be here.

Of course there are things about being here that aren’t perfect (nothing this side of heaven ever will be), but overall it has been very, very good.

Welcome home, Suzy & Spice.