God's reminders

Okay so one of my goals for October was to update my blog 3x a week... and it has been a week since I wrote last!  But in my defense, the past 7 days have been absolutely crazy! (but wonderful at the same time because my best friend got married, blog post on that in a few days)

I saw this quote on pinterest a few weeks ago and immediately loved it.  I have had the privilege of hearing John Piper preach twice now and I recommend that if anyone has the chance to hear him to take it!  One of the reasons I love this quote is because it is a nice reminder that I am not in control of my life - God is.  He is constantly doing things for my good and benefit, fighting for me, supporting me, loving me, even when I feel like He is silent and has forgotten me.

 I think God wanted to remind me that He is in control & knows what is best for me yesterday. In the many adventures coming my way with moving to France in January, the one that was at the top of my list was getting my visa.  As I mentioned in an earlier post, in order to get a visa I have to apply in person at the French consulate in Atlanta.  The thing is, there are very few appointments available.  One of my contacts helping me with France told me that there was one appointment available December 10 at 330 and that if I could manage it I needed to go ahead and sign up. If not I should pray that another date opened up.  Not wanting to take a chance I started applying for that day but before I could finish it was gone!  Panic immediately set in, and that added to the stress of my week already, I had a break down.  Thank goodness for my mom who is my number 1 supporter (along with my dad) and she immediately calmed me down and prayed for me and put things into perspective.  I sent out an email to my prayer circle explaining the situation asking them for their prayers as well.  I knew that God has done crazier more miraculous things than open up an appointment and that he would be on my side to help me do everything I needed in order to go to France.  Later that afternoon I checked back on the website just to see if anything opened up.  There were at least 15 appointments available.  If this wasn't a God thing I don't know what is.  You see, December 10 would have worked but it would have been very difficult with my final exam schedule, because I have two on the 11th.  Without praying about it I just jumped on the first date because I was afraid of not having another opportunity!  God knew that this date would have been awful for me so he made me stop and trust him to let a better opportunity present itself.   How quick are we (as humans) to just do something because we don't trust that God has another better solution for us?  I know that I do it all the time.  I am a type A person and I like to be in charge (shocking, I know) and sometimes it is hard to let go & let God.  I now have an appointment with the consulate on December 3rd which is perfect because it is during dead week and I will only have to miss one class!  I will be road tripping to hotlanta with my good friend Jennifer :)

Thank you Lord for knowing me better than I know myself and showing yourself to me once again. 

Wedding details on my next post!

-Mary Beth