January 4, 2011

One great reason to be a nurse-you can have off random days during the week. I don't think I was, or ever will be, built for corporate America. I honestly don't understand how most people have to work 5 days a week. Today was my day off, which turned out to be quite rejuvenating.  I woke up without an alarm telling me I had to, for starters. I got to sit down with my husband and have breakfast, and somewhat more importantly, coffee with peppermint creamer. Which technically, I'm not sure if its still called coffee when the color of it is khaki at the end. Even before Chad had to leave for work, I experienced a moment that, although it wasn't photographed, went straight to my heart. If it was the only thing that happened to me all day long, it still would have been a day to re-count. I have no idea how it happened, but yesterday, I pulled a muscle in my back. It was still pretty sore this morning and as Chad was rushing out the door- he stopped and put all of his things down. He came back into the kitchen and said that God told him to stop, and pray over his wife. Even as I write it, it does the same thing for me all over again. The thing is Chad will pray over me every time I am sick, but there is something powerful when you literally STOP, set everything aside, and do what God tells you to do. There is so much power in that. After he left, I listened to a message by Heidi Baker. Heidi and her husband have an organization in Mozambique called Iris Ministries. I went there a few years ago and my life has never been the same since. They have seen unbelievable things happen as they live entirely by faith.  One of the things that Heidi is notorious for preaching about, is stopping for the one person that God puts in front of you. She mentioned it again today in her message, and it made me stop. I always pray and ask God to show me who I can minister to, who I can reach with my voice or my presence, and today, He made sure that Chad stopped for me. I love that he will use everyone that is willing to listen to his quiet promptings. I love that he is teaching me how to listen better, and I love that my husband hears his voice and responds. You can't ask for a greater quality in a husband than that
So, whether it was because of what Chad did this morning, or from hearing Heidi preach, I was thinking about Africa all day long. Before I left to go there, Bob Hazlett, a pastor and longtime family friend, prayed for me. He told me that God told him that while I was there, people would call me by a nickname. He said, when they call you by this name, it is so that you understand God has been with you from the beginning. My "real" name is Rebecca, I rarely ever get called that, and for some reason, everyone seems to have some kind of nickname for me. My mom calls me boodles, boods, scootch, my sister calls me beck-a-la, some call me beckster, beaks, the list goes on and on. I was curious to which one Bob was referring to. There is one nickname, that for some reason, I feel like is personal. If I meet someone and they call me this too quickly, I feel violated, like they jumped all over my bed with shoes on or something. At the same time, when I meet people, who I haven't known long, but love already, if they call me by this name, I feel like we are family. And that name is, BECK.

I was in Africa for one month. I introduced myself as "Becky", every single time. When anyone repeated it back to me, everytime, for ONE month straight, they said "BECK?" I said, yes, BeckY, and they would repeat back, BECK.
oh, Jesus is funny. I thought about that today. I thought about how good he is, that he has always been with me, that he has never left, that he is faithful and that he will always stop for me, for us...and as I was driving today, I was reminded again.