Twenty-eight years ago, Keith and I were renting a home in the northwest part of Houston hoping to buy something we could raise our family in. Neither of us had sophisticated taste nor did we particularly trust those who did. I write those words with a grin. My grandmother never trusted people of means. She had endured the Great Depression and was just certain (inaccurately, of course) that anyone who lived this side of it with money most assuredly possessed ill-gotten gain. A permanent, living fixture in my home of origin throughout my childhood, you can imagine that my beloved grandmother, Minnie Ola Rountree, had a great influence on me and, bless God, in so many positive ways. She did, however, leave my thinking somewhat distorted regarding possessions. It has taken most of my adulthood to shake the bone-deep belief that having anything beyond the merest essentials roused the terrible displeasure of God. And, since we Westerners all have more than the merest essentials, Iāve spent much of my life confessing what I possessed as sinful (and, make no mistake, appropriately at times). Of course, thereās balance in all of that and few of us would argue that the prosperity gospel so prevalent among us in this era isnāt cause for earnest repentance. Ā But thatās a discussion for another time and another post and, come to think of it, one we have in fair depth in James: Mercy Triumphs.
In 1983, Keith and I were mostly a one-income family unless you call the pocket change I made teaching aerobics at my church a viable profession. My man was a residential plumber and a pretty new one at that. We had a four year-old and a one year-old that I utterly adored and so desired to stay home with that, prior to my hire at the church gym, I took on a paper route for a whole day. We very much liked the house we were renting but it wasnāt for sale. One day driving around a suburban neighborhood, we passed a French Provincial up for sale that nearly put us in a spell. It was beyond our means and well beyond our personalities. Still, we were mesmerized. Keith said, āBaby, I can get this house for you but only by the skin of my teeth. We wonāt be able to buy a single new piece of furniture for it. Are you good with that?ā I promised that I was and we put money down on it. We were beside ourselves. A few weeks later, just before we were to close on it, Keith walked in our rent house and sat me down at our kitchen table. āHoney, I withdrew our offer on the house.ā
āWhat?? But we put money down on it!ā
āYep, we did. Money we couldnāt spare and wonāt get back but weād have had to spend nearly that same amount of money every single month on a house payment. Itās beyond us. Itās not our house.ā
I cried for about 45 seconds and then was so relieved I could have done a freedom dance. I knew he was right and I was pained but so very thankful he pulled the plug. A number of months later as the bottom dropped out of the oil industry, leaving Houston in one of the biggest buyerās markets of its history, we came upon a house going into foreclosure. It was still a lot for us to spend but we bought it.
And lived in it, fought in it, made up in it, prayed in it, swore in it, ate in it, sobbed in it, laughed in it and tucked children into bed in it for the next 27 years. We were deliriously happy in it. We were woefully miserable in it. You donāt live that long anywhere just one way. Long life happened there, meaning that those walls saw all manner of good, bad, and really ugly. But it snuggled us and hid us and harbored us for nearly thirty years. I hung my childrenās baby pictures on those walls, then their school pictures with no front teeth. Then pictures with mouths full of braces, then pictures in their volleyball uniforms, then, be still my heart, their wedding portraits. Then I hung frames on those brittle walls with grandbabiesā pictures captured within.
For years I planted petunias in the flowerbeds in late Spring and, when I needed an emotional outlet, pulled up weeds with a fiery vengeance. Keith or I one dragged big ugly trashcans to the end of the driveway every Monday and Thursday then back to the garage when they were empty.
I parked a brown and beige station wagon on the broken concrete beside that house when we moved in and didnāt replace it until the wheels and doors threatened to come off.
And I loved it. It was home. As one who has nursed a lifelong aversion to change, I declared over and over again that I would never leave that house and that, when I died, Keith would have to dig a hole in the small back yard and bury me in it. At that very front curb, I waited for the school bus to pick up my girls in the morning and bring them home in the afternoon. At that very curb, my daughtersā boyfriends drove up to get them and a few hours later kissed them goodnight with me peeking through the mini-blinds. At that very curb, the postman dropped decades of utility bills ā many overdue ā and credit card bills that Keith Moore insisted we pay off in full every month no matter how little we had left. And now Iām so glad but then it seemed a tad restrictive for a mom who loved to take her girls to the mall.
That same house could tell terrible tales on me. Oh, what grace God has lavished on us. What mercy and forgiveness! But, amid the roller coaster that has always been Keith and me, and the tears and regrets, oh my word, the prayers that have been prayed in that house are too many to estimate. And certainly not just my own. Many of my girlfriends remember the years when we had monthly prayer breakfasts in that simple home. Weād all meet first in the den where Iād share a devotional then weād break up in small groups and invade every room in the house and intercede for our loved ones and pray for our own needy hearts, all too often crushed by this or that hurt. I am convinced down to my marrow that God used prayer to spare my marriage and family. Keith believes it, too. I was a wreck in so many ways ā still am in certain respects ā but Jesus had convinced me early on in my adulthood that Iād have to have Him to survive with any sanity or life satisfaction. Any victim of early childhood abuse at the hand of a trusted family member will either have copious doses of Jesus or defeat. Plain and simple. No gray for folks like me.
I held stacks of journals in my lap two weeks ago and flipped through some of them and found a number of entries so painful that I could not even read them. I tore out numerous pages and wept before the Lord and thanked Him for His faithfulness and repented again, but wouldnāt have needed to, for such waves of stupidity and faithlessness. I also reminded myself to buy a shredder. Grin. Tucked into many of those journals were pages that also made me smile. Sometimes even laugh out loud. And then Iād cry again for the pure joy of Him.
Jesus has carried me in His own two everlasting arms. Me. Keith Moore. Amanda Moore Jones. Melissa Moore Fitzpatrick. He has carried us and His rock-solid biceps often took the form of brick, mortar and wood there on Blazey Drive in Houston, Texas. Weād think weād come against something we couldnāt overcome, then Heād scoop us up and carry us kicking and screaming to the next season. Not fast enough to suit us, mind you, but eventually. Keith and I would look up and another year had come and gone and we were still married. Only once can I remember us coming to an anniversary where we did not so much as speak. And it was such a short time ago that youād find it shocking. But, once again, Jesus took a needle and thread and sewed us loop by painful loop back together again. Weāre so glad He did.
Then three years ago, I asked Keith if I could tell him something just once and heād never remind me of it again because I was sure Iād change my mind. He said yes but he lied and we both knew it.
āI might someday consider moving.ā
Keithās eyebrows shot up to his hairline and he grinned ear to ear. Heād wanted to get off that busy highway near us for years.
āI said I might. But probably not.ā
There were a number of things that brought me to that willingness. Keith had retired from the plumbing business and the ministry had moved to the very north edge of Houston. Our house was no longer close to our places of work. Our center had shifted. The biggest thing that changed was something unexplainable and almost irrational that finally just unraveled. The less sappy of you will need to skip to the next paragraph. Or maybe just end your reading right here. Goodness knows itās gone on long enough. For those of you enduring this epitaph, I had this thing deep inside of me that insisted we stay in the same house so that the boy weād had for seven years could find his way home and weād all live happily ever after and all that confusion would be explained. Please understand that I knew it was unrealistic at the time but I couldnāt shake the idealism that it had to all work out some way ā my way – and that weād have to get a second chance so we could do a better job.
Iām so happy to tell you that I am in touch with that young man. He is darling just like he was the first time I laid eyes on him. But the fog began to clear several years ago and I was finally able to accept that the picture I had in my head was pretend. It was from a storybook etched in the mind of a romantic. Not real life. He was an adult and God had different plans for him and for us. Plans that I have to believe are for the good. We see him on occasion and Iām so thankful for the open door but we seem not to be meant to reestablish those same exact bonds.
Keith took that one tiny confession ā āI might someday consider movingā ā and jumped on it with both size 13 wides. It would be several years before weād get his parents settled in the country and make arrangements to join them.
On December 14th ā just 12 days ago ā a moving van pulled up to my house of 27 years. Amanda, Annabeth, Melissa and I watched them empty those busy, busy rooms one box at a time. By the time that abode was back to the hollow shell weād seen all those years ago when we first walked through it, Amanda had gone home to pick up Jackson from school and only Melissa and I were left. It was the breakfast room that got us. We stared at the spot where our dining table used to be and both burst into tears. Then each of us (crying audibly, mind you) went around the house and closed the shutters one by one and then we turned out the lights. Melissa walked on out the front door and I lagged behind for just a moment and got on that floor one last time. Face down. For the 15 thousandth time.
And I thanked God.
He did not abandon us there. Not for one minute.
We are happy out here in the country. This morning two deer were in our back yardā¦and lived to boast about it. Keith has promised not to kill anything here but roaches and rodents and I intend to hold him to it even though we did find wild hog tracks not far from our front door. That husband of mine has labored with all his might for months on end to make this a home for his wife. He is not a man who finds it easy to express his love with words. He expresses his love through works. And I receive this new season of our lives together with joy and with tears drying. But the thing is, I didnāt want to rush right in and start jabbering to you about the new. Not until I paid proper tribute to the old. It wouldnāt have been fitting. It deserves the dignity of a decent good-bye. It cradled a half-crazy family for nearly thirty years like it was happy to have us. Thank you for offering me the space and patience to pen so long a so long. I needed it in the worst way.
By the way, Iāve already told Keith that this is the last time Iām ever moving and that he might as well dig his boots in this dirt. After all, Iām no math-wizard, but in 27 more years Iāll be, letās see, 81 years old. That is, if the Lord has withheld me a glimpse of His face.
And Iāll let you know how I feel about moving then.
By way of benediction, and just in case somebodyās heart needs to hear it, this place doesnāt completely do it for me any more than the one I drove away from on December 14th. One of my new appliances is already broken and the dogs get ticks out here. It’s so wonderful out in these sticks but it’s a long shot from perfect. I have a longing for something I still havenāt found. My guess is that you do, too.
These all died in faith, not having received the things promised, but having seen them and greeted them from afar, and having acknowledged that they were strangers and exiles on the earth. For people who speak thus make it clear that they are seeking a homeland.Ā If they had been thinking of that land from which they had gone out, they would have had opportunity to return. But as it is, they desire a better country, that is, a heavenly one. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for He has prepared for them a city.
Ā
Hebrews 11:13-16
aw, what a lovely good bye. i always have to do the same before leaving a place–even if it was only home for 4 months. š thanks for reminding me of God’s faithfulness–our lives change, but God’s promises do not.
Dear Beth,
Thank you for sharing the update about Michael. I know that as time goes on you’ll see more and more fruit from the time he spent with your family. I hang on to what you included in one of your studies (Living Beyond Yourself?) that agape love is never without effect.
We’ve made several moves along the way that were not by choice. Your situation is different I’m sure but for me moving made me feel like a plant that had been dug up – my roots were exposed… But like plants that need to be moved, new locations have provided us with room to grow in ways we couldn’t otherwise. Psalm 90:1 has certainly been true for us and my goal has been to be able to say like a dear older missionary who visited us -“Home is where the Lord wants me”. Enjoy your new home and I know it will soon be filled with family and friends making all kinds of wonderful memories!
God bless you dear Sister –
MommaBeth…
So so sooo many times the Lord brought you and your man to mind and into my prayers over the last few weeks. Thanks for sharing this heart-ful post. You have done a wonderful job honoring your old homestead!
“He did not abandon us there. Not for one minute.”
I read your words and imagined what it would feel like leaving this house of mine. We’re here 10 years now. Our kids are still small and our marriage sounds a LOT like yours. If these walls could talk I’d probably duct tape their lips shut. But I could SO see me on my face AGAIN before Him as a last goodbye to these bricks and sticks.
So I’m praying for your JOY in the new home! I know you’ll have us laughing and crying with you in the country as well. Julianna (AnnaBeth’s age) is decorating me with Buzz Lightyear playing cards as I type. They’re in my pockets… sliding over my lap… I have no bizniss spending this much time in Siestaville but I love you and all these ladies so much! Thanks again for sharing your heart with us.
Still praying I can be there in January. Please, Abba? š
Having lived as a married Mom in the home I grew up in myself, it was quite an emotional upheaval when we finally sold the place and moved on. There were many bad childhood memories there, but also some very good memories of my husband and I and our 5 children. What brought our time there to a close was a major crisis marriage-wise. God is so wise and caring. He slowly detached my fingers and heart from it (think of the Israelites wandering) – my 5 children and I stayed in 4 different places over the next 2 years. We were loved on and taken care of like Elijah at Cherith. Many prayers for restoration went before the throne of our Heavenly Father. God worked miraculously! My husband and I are together and we began in a new home that only God could have provided considering our financial circumstances.
Thank you for sharing your heart and being REAL! I was moved to tears also as I read your entry. May God bless you in many ways this new year 2012!
Dear Sweet Beth & Keith,
My heart and prayers are with you!
Lovingly and living in hope with you,
Wanda
What a beautiful story, Beth. My husband and i are in our early twenties with our first little munchkin, only 7 months old. I pray that God will tell our story inside the walls of a beloved home. My journey of building a family is only beginning and it seems like it will last forever but i know that not too long from now it will be just my husband and i again, with a whole lot of life behind us. Oh the joy to try and treasure every moment.
Enjoy this new season!
I guess I am on the other end of the spectrum. We are in the process of purchasing our first home. We have lived in a 2 br apartment for 11 years. Yes, thats right, 11 years. We have a 6 yr old boy and 9 mth old little girl so we are growing out of it. I told my husband that I will be sad when we do leave because this is where I brought my children home to and there are so many memories here. I work only part time so I can be home with my children. We have been looking for a house for years but have a limited income. The house we are buying is a plain and simple home but I am already looking foward to new memories being made. I just pray that we are in the Lord’s will and everything will go smoothly.
Oh, Beth! I never really comment, although I read your blog and pray and enjoy others’ comments.
I had. To comment on this one though! Ever since you first told me about your boy, my heart has been waiting to hear this news! And that he would know his way home well enough for you to move on, house wise, I love seeing examples of God’s faithfulness!
Secondly, because we are praying about putting our house up for sale and it is hard to move on, so this came at the perfect time!
And lastly, I had to tell what I got for Christmas…..tickets to LPL in Long Beach in October! Woot, woot!
(Oh, and seriously lastly, that I bought me some cute gray boots from Burlington Coat Factory at someone’s recommendation!)
“You will be blessed in the city and blessed in the country.” Deuteronomy 28:3
Thanks for sharing, Beth! I am a freshmen in college. I remember the fear of packing up and moving in the dorm. The night before I moved in our livingroom was filled with my belongings. I sat in my slightly naked bedroom wondering what the heck was going to happen. I thought about how this was home throughout all of the trials of middle school and high school. Too many issues to count. Ironically I sat in my very naked dorm a little less than a month ago trying to finish up a paper before heading home for break, feeling similar feelings. God showed me that my home was not a place, it was in Him.
Enjoy the new home! Look forward to hearing all about it!
I cried and rejoiced with you. We are due to hear of our next assignment any day….we’ll be in boxes before long, too- possibly for the last time in my husband’s military career…exciting and a little unsettling all at the same time.
I am sitting in a hotel lobby catching up on those things most important…and I have tears in my eyes, having read every word of the “epitaph.” Every word resonated, every single one. I guess that is the blessing of age…experiencing the tangled and watching God untangle, experiencing the long lows long enough to get to the other side, and even the children we have for a while and it’s hard to process what happened…
Oh, Beth, thank you for your ministry. Your efforts have been used to change my life. Years now, and God still uses you and your teaching and your style.
Happy New Year in your new home until we arrive to our real home.
Laurie
I cried with you.
My ten year old told me the other day that we could never move because “this is our family.” I told him that walls nor sticks make a family but only arms and love. He said he would still cry if we ever moved.
There is a time for every purpose under heaven and honestly, there is something about being in the country that makes you remember the God who made nature on a daily basis. When we move, I want it to be into the country where we can have a ton of dogs and adopt every stray anything put out on the country roads around here.
But that will happen in God’s timing as it has in yours.
Enjoy your new home. I just started the James bible study today and just want to thank you for making your studies available on tape.I’ve done every one of your studies and asked for James for Christmas. My dad and first born son are both named “James” (I have a son named John as well. š
I know it is easy to assume that everyone has a church that does Bible studies for women but that isn’t the case. Because you put your videos on tape, I can do the studies at home and cry and learn along with you.
I was going to write you an email but I thought when I read this moving post that this belonged as part of the post for this reason:
God has a purpose for our places. There are sights and sounds and scenes that God has for you but it is more than just about you because you have a profound impact on the world.
There are many of us who hold our babies a bit tighter, work a bit harder at our mission, and who wash our dishes and wring out our hands just long enough to fill in the blanks on the discussion guide before we dive back into the hot water of the sink and life.
Thank you, Beth Moore, for having such a profound impact on my own life and for caring enough to have your Bible studies on CD as well as on video. For those of us in lonely places and small towns, I just want to say thank you.
Enjoy your morning cup of coffee and thank you for finding God’s purpose for your life. Just this morning, the first session of James was what I needed to hear just this morning.
Thank you!
Oh Beth. So often I find myself frustrated with our little home in Eastern NC. It isn’t clean enough, it isn’t big enough, it isn’t new enough, it isn’t decorated top dollar, etc. But the other day my 10 year old daughter was getting out of the car and simply said “I love being home.” And it is our home! And I love it. And I only hope to spend 30 years there before we consider moving. Thank you for the reality check. Love you!
Tracy L.
Richlands, NC
Hi Beth, I melted into every word of the tribute to your former home. It helps me to view our less-than-perfect home, with our less-than-perfect family, in a more tender way. I am so thankful God doesn’t require an address to live in us. May God’s blessings rest in every square inch of your new home.
One of the best things you’ve ever written Beth. Made me cry. Oh, the fact that it made me cry isn’t what made it so wonderful though. It was the pure honesty of your heart shining through the words. I could so much identify with what you were saying about your family. We live even more simply. Sometimes I fret about it but I always have more than I need. We’ve done the “pay the credit card off every month” thing ever since we got our first one back in 1995. We live out in the country. I get attached to my surroundings and “things” and hate change. But I know sometimes change is good and even necessary. Thank you for trusting us with your thoughts and ponderings about your life!
Love you so much and can’t wait until we start on your James Bible study at Sav-A-Life in January!
Marilyn…in Mississippi
What a gift you have given us – sharing your life!! Thank you.
Dear Beth,
I read your post this morning, and right after, read the devo below. It reminded me so much of what you said. I pray the Lord blesses you in your new home, and I am so thankful for the way He has uses you in my life and the lives of many others.
http://www.spurgeon.org/fcb/fcb.cgi
Oh, what a lovely “so long” you have written! And just think of all the memories to be made in your new residence.
Your post reminds me of something I wrote two years ago about my childhood home: http://starlightwriter.wordpress.com/2009/12/19/home-for-christmas/
Blessings to you and your family in 2012!
I so enjoyed the update and the memories you shared with us Beth. I laughed and cried as I read through the past 27 years. Thank you for the update on Michael. Oh, our God is so good!
I look forward to the next chapter of the “Keith and Beth Moore Saga”, as well as pictures, pictures and more pictures. I know God will bless your “country” home with, love, laughter, tears and unlimited memories.
God’s many blessings for this new chapter!
Oh yes the season of home for so many years the place our children grew up. The place home for us 28 years after our son of 20 years old went to those streets of gold his heavenly home my dear man could not be restful in that home any longer the memories to great. We had already purchased a place in the country to be a rent house, but to my unknowing at the time it would become the new place to be called home. I told my man give me a year to adjust my thinking and we to would one day move. The best decision, God brought me to has brought much healing to my man and with
God all is grace he provides. Been in our new and I can truly today call home for ten years.
A year ago I had gone to my babies resting place of that flesh and became very overwhelmed. I left and went straight to our old homestead to receive comfort of the place where my children had grown up. God showed me and taught me through this that I have comfort only in the place where my man child resides on those streets of gold not a house made by mans hands. This year as I was talking with a friend a pastors wife who I have prayed with for the past two years she asked me a question if I thought she was wrong to not be visiting her sons resting place of his flesh I shared with her what had happened to me a year earlier and shared I havenāt been back since. After I got off the phone may man asked how she was and how our confersation went I shared with him the question she asked. He asked what I though, DI said I donāt know. About thirty minutes from that time God brought the verse of Luk 9:60 Jesus said unto him, Let the dead bury their dead: but go thou and preach the kingdom of God.. What a blessing to see for our sons are not dead but only in there heavenly home much alive faith now sight. I called her back to share Gods goodness. He never fails us we sorrow but not as the world sorrows.
You I count as a dear friend have had a big part of my healing started with Believing God study. I know pass it on to one living the hurt that only God in his time teachs us to live with. Tahnk you dear one for all the hurts you have walk to give us strength to walk on pressing into the one who carries us till the day our faith becomes sight. Much love Celie
I love your honesty. The way you put things into words is just beautiful. God has given you such a wonderful ability to write. It truly blesses me and encourages me. I can’t wait to start the study on James…January 23rd, Ladies bible study starts here! I need a study right now and am super excited about James.
I honestly have to say, I think country life will make for some beautiful writing. I live in the country and I find nature is where I connect most with God (and with myself for that matter). I look forward to the stories =)
WOW how fitting a tribute to your family and home of so long. It makes me cry and laugh. we have lived in the same home for 35 years and are contemplating a move, don’t know if I can do it BUT your words gave me hope. GOD IS SO GOOD ALL THE TIME!!!!!!!
thank you Beth you are always a breath of fresh air!
GOD BLESS
Ginny
Oh how I needed to hear that post this morning! My husband and I built a new house this summer and 5 months later, I still haven’t quite settled in. I picked everything out, so everyone thinks that we are “perfectly happy” and are to live ever after that way, but I just can’t quite shake the feeling that its not “home.” Thank you for the reminder that it never will be my perfect home. Maybe now I can settle in a little bit. Thank you! God bless you in your new adventure! Hopefully your home doesn’t have the mosquitoes like our new one does. Mercy!
Beth, thanks for posting. I get it! I have only moved three times in my entire life (all 42 of them!!!) And I told my husband I don’t want to move again either…ever! But you know I will if the Lord wants us too. May God richly bless you…. as you, Keith and the girls and their families make NEW precious memories!!! God is good!
Your post comes on a day that I just found out our house needs numerous piers in order to stop some foundational shifting. I am so frustrated over the money that we’ve sunk into this house, but now I realize my frustration is due to trying to create a perfect home in an imperfect world. I can really look around my house today and realize how special it is to have two small children and one overweight dog running around here – piers or not š
My mother died 10 years ago and Daddy died in May. My parents had lived in the same house for 40 years. Nearly killed me to close it out and sell it. Soon after I picked up my car keys and there was the house key that had been on my key chain for 38 of those years. I never realized the security that one key held. I knew I always had somewhere I could go to if things got bad. Then on Dec. 22 a fedex envelope was delivered that had the check for the settlement of my parents estate. It was like one last final “Merry Christmas To: JAN From: Mom and Dad. I put it in a red envelope with a gold ribbon and put it on my tree along with their picture in it. I miss them so and that house as well.
I always appreciate your open and honest discussions of your life, Beth. You share the good, the bad and the ugly without giving away too much information, but enough to let us know that what we are experiencing in our lives is no different than yours. The struggles and the joys. It’s that common ground which you’ve always cultivated that makes it easy to trust you when you teach. I’m glad you use this blog to share about your every day life as well as some things God prompts you to “teach” us.
My nephew is going to Passion for the first time. He’s excited and so am I for him. He names off all of the male speakers, but I’ve told him what a fabulous teacher you are. I can’t wait for him to hear you!
I’m so happy that your boy is back in your life in some fashion!
Just one question – do they have that new fangled invention called the internet out in the country where you live now?????? Hahaha
I cried all the way through this with you, Beth. I’m only 23, and my husband purchased our first home a year before we were even married. I’ve lived here only 18 months, and yet I have often caught myself thinking about how hard it will be if we ever leave this place where we started our lives and our family together, and watched the Lord do mighty things in our midst here. Your words were beautiful and a huge blessing to my heart.
I really enjoyed this post, it was a very sweet goodbye. I hate change, even good ones, so I can identify with the need to give it a voice. You said something in this post, maybe just in passing, that has really resonated with me. You see, I am a victim of childhood abuse by a trusted family member. I have struggled all my life with the affects of this abuse. I’ve never shared it with anyone but my husband. I felt like I had mental problems because there is no gray for folks like me. I have to also have copious doses of Jesus or I am in defeat.
Just reading that statement has helped me to see, I’m not alone. I’m not crazy, or maybe we both are. Whatever, thanks for sharing. That has put into words something I’ve been needing to hear. I’ve never understood why, if I don’t keep my feet firmly planted in Jesus, I go hurling off into defeat. It makes sense now. God bless you and hope the new place brings another lifetime of good memories.
Dear Janet,
I just wanted you to know that your other comment is posted. I came across it while reading through all the comments, something which I love to do. I love all of the siesta’s here in Siestaville!
Praying for you.
In His love,
michelle
Thank you for sharing this and your memories. It touches me to think of someone living in the same place for so long. I like many of the siesta’s who posted have moved many times in my life, up to 23 and soon to be 24. I have come to know that home is where the heart is and that this time here on earth is just my temporary home anyway!
Much blessings and love in your new home!
In His love,
michelle in VT
Oh, the sweetest of posts…
And Beth, I cannot count how many times you have brought out the “ugly cry” in me! From no where, it comes, as I read your words! I suppose it’s because you always touch my heart. š
Beth when you did the simulcast this September , God said pray for your big sister Beth her heart is busy as she processes all the change ” ( I wrote it down in my journal . And son I was not surprise to see all the changes from church home etc . So bravo and many blessings . Praying now that you are rooted and grow in his love .
For Christmas my beloved husband brought mr the mercy guide book . Bible study #9 of yours . But the big surprise is that he loaded the video on to my ipad. So its you and me on the couch .
Good to see Kelly and Mellisa .. I am going for all 5 levels . Will say so far in week 1 it’s the most ambitious one so far . And tell mellisa I am with her .. Love to be fed from head heart soul to toes .
Many blessings
Oh Beth, there’s so much here…thank you so much for sharing with us. A lot of livin went on in that house. A lot of seasons of happy and sad and everywhere in between…your heart, I can see in what you write. A bunch of prayer permeated that house, and I’m sure, just as much prayer will be offered up in your new home. I was praying that your house would begin to feel like a home to you and Keith…Hebrews 11:13-16, scriptures like that really motivate me to live life with a heavenly mindset…I so needed encouragement today, and I think that Lord has used you to encourage me. There’s a whole lot I need to wrestle through in my life too, a whole lot of copious amounts of Jesus is the only thing that will do, because there’s no gray for people like me either, too much that needs fixing. If He can carry you all these years from being a young mother until now even after everything that happened to you, I know He can carry and change me too. I really could cry over that thought,I have had some rough coming in my walk. You are such a blessing to me, Beth…I wanted to wish you and LPM a happy New Year. I think that the Lord has the best in store to come. ((HUGS))
Some glad morning we shall see Jesus in the air,
Coming after you and me, oh what joy to share.
That is our real home. Thanks for the reminder.
I love you Beth Moore.
Sue
Please let me know what I need to do to join the Siestas for the scripture memorization. I would very much like to participate this coming year. Thanks!
I loved your tribute Beth~I wish I could have said goodbye to my childhood home that way. I was a single mom for years and years, rented an apartment for half those years and a house for the other half. It’s never really felt like home and I thought it was because I was only a renter but I quess it’s more than that. Thank you for your posts you don’t know how much the Lord uses you in lives like mine : )
Love, Dayna
I love how you share your heart, how you share the real struggles of this non perfect life, how I feel understood by you in soooo many areas and one of them this….(as I too grapple with some “off” things taught by my mother who lived through the depression), and your very real marriage………. When you share from your heart, and don’t fear being judged by others….. You cause me to want to grow closer to The Lord, and share with others the things he is doing in my life as I walk with Him. Thank you for being so vulnerable. I love The Lord more because of it.
momma beth, i’m sitting in the living room of my first home with my sweet husband of seven years. right now our two baby girls (3 and 10 mos) are sleeping in their bedrooms upstairs, while our two dogs are out taking a walk with “dad”. while i’m here on earth, i’m so blessed to call this place home. but i do understand the ties of leaving a place behind. when my dad left my mom 6 years ago, she was forced to sell the house where i grew up. its only about a 1/2 hour from where i live now (and i still have friends that live around there) so occasionally i wind up driving down that street. i park across the street from that house almost every time i’m in the area and (i can’t help it – even as i type) i cry. there’s just something about a place you have lived so long – and i think that might even be the way God intends it to be- (acts 17:26). one last thing, if you get a chance, you should download the song “the house the built me” by miranda lambert. its a great song to listen to now and then – whenever you want to remember… <3
Wow.
Janet, how do you know her new home is bigger??
Umm….I don’t understand this comment. My guess is Janet, negative comments aren’t posted because there aren’t any. I am so thankful for the issues that Beth writes about, such as leaving a home that she lived in for so long. I could relate! When I moved from one home to another, I took paper and marked where I had measured the growth of my boys on the back of door and transferred it to the back of a door at the new house, I love hearing about what is going on in Beth’s life. I relate to so much of it. It is nice to have a Christian network where we can come together as believers and share day to day happenings. Bless you!
Oh Beth!! I am so delighted for you and so appreciate your openess and tenderness. Gives me strength. Funny, the other night I read a tweet and told my husband that you had moved. Felt like my BFF had moved without letting me know! Goofy, huh. Thank you for being family home away from Home.
Love you so!
I know this isn’t relative to this post. But I am sure hoping you do the Siesta Scripture Memory again. I started out with a bang, and then blew it last year š I have been thinking about it a lot today. I would be so excited for you to do it again, and want to do it with a steadfastness. The Lord has been helping me learn the meaning of that word these past months. God Bless, and Happy New Year.
Janet, your other comment is also posted, they just don’t post immediately. If you scroll back through the comments, you will find it ( page 5, Dec 27th at 4:48 pm, I believe).
Oh Beth, how I cried as you described your ‘leaving’. I have done so much leaving.
A quote came to my mind that goes something like this, ”It isnt the walls that make a home but the life lived within them”. I had hoped and dreamed of one home for my family, but here we are in our 7th, and fourth country, and how the Lord has also taught me that He is my home. A truth that I know, you know.
Many blessings to you in this new place, new season. I speak the love and comfort of Jesus over you and your new walls xx
You are just the bestest of story tellers and I love this story! Eyes full of tears, I feel your “stuff”. Change, so dislike it, but where would we be if the “change” from our precious Savior had never happened? I always try to remember…change is good, even when we don’t really want it. His plan continues…may we march on accordingly. May the Blessings, Joy, Peace, Tears, Laughter, Lessons and Memories continue for the Moore family in your new home. xo
” I long to put the experience of fifty years at once into your young lives. to give you at once the key of that treasure chamber every gem of which has cost me tears and struggles and prayers, but you must work for these inward treasures yourselves.” Harriet Beecher Stowe
I think you need to read this again. i don’t think Beth was “praising” herself, nor was the message all positive. She is sharing her life — the good, the bad, and the ugly, which most of us can identify with on some level. I don’t know if this is the only post you have read, but Beth and her staff always point others to Christ and repeat over and over about what Jesus has saved her from and brought her through. I appreciate her honesty about the struggles in her family & marriage. We want always agree with her decisions any more than the whole world would agree with ours. I hope you will look at this again, and maybe see it in a different light.
Girlfriends, Thanks for the memories of ssmt 2011, what a celebration it will be, when we all see Jesus we’ll sing and praise the victory! and as Jennifer the Pastor’s wife and Women’s word share leader of our Living Beyond Yourself The Fruit of the Spirit noted what a void would exist if our Beth & LPM did not exist! as another siesta posted, oh Beth please just don’t get a new blog site, say the only way I leave Siestaville is feet first! WE love you, we like you, we miss you! so until next time you all Fair winds and following Seas, xoxo cb