I see a pattern happening here.

Faith to Sit

Faith to Say Good-bye

Faith to say No

Logically, I think it should be the reverse.

Faith to Say Yes

Faith to Stand

Faith to say Hello

Before October, I thought the latter set of statements required more faith. God continues to teach me more about faith as we take a 360 degree panorama view of this subject. Apparently my view was only one-sided.

I’ve talked briefly about wanting to say yes more. Especially yes to my children, and those things that are most important to me. But did you know that you actually have to say no to say yes?

To say yes to the important things means I need to say no to the many other not-as-important things. If I don’t, those not-so-important things crowd around the very-important-things until they totally cover it up. Then I’m left with a bunch of good intentions, but no real fruit. Yes, this is Boundaries 101.

I’m working on this.

I desperately want to say yes to people. I want to say yes to doing things…for people. But I also need to say yes to my family and (shhh), even to me.

Yesterday, I had a break-through. I finally said yes to something important, which also meant I had to say no to something also important.

I had to be somewhere at 1:15, which meant I needed to leave my house by 12:45.

Two days ago I began the much dreaded task of changing out clothes for fall (read yesterday’s post for more on that!). Piles of clothes gathered everywhere! A pile to give away. A pile to save for later. A pile to throw away. Finally, the keep & wash pile.

For a while, those piles neighbored the various other piles out of place due to our remodeling. Oh how I wanted to leave the house just so these piles would leave me alone.

But, I knew, if I left, they wouldn’t disappear. They would grow and growl at me even louder when I got home.

So, I had a decision to make. I had to say yes to something and no to something else. Which would win? What was more important?

My choice? Stay home and deal with the piles. Everyday some errand calls me away from home and I don’t have time to actually work at home.

My sweet husband has been gently hinting about other chores (like the inch of dust on his night stand) that he would love done, if and when I can get around to it.

So, I said yes to him and my house.

For the entire afternoon, I vacuumed fan blades, behind the couch, along the baseboards, on top of the refrigerator, the cabinets, the picture frame shelf, the dresser, the night stand, clocks, books – you name it, we (my kids caught the hint) dusted it! We threw away stacks of magazines, and attacked like mad those piles of clothes.

In the end, our house looked amazing! I wanted to stay home and enjoy it. It smelled better, shined brighter and looked straighter. When Adam walked in, the smile on his face confirmed I made the right choice. He was so honored for us to do those little things for him.

So, sometimes it seems like everything else is more important than taking care of stuff at home. But it’s not.

Faith to stand. Faith to say Hello. Faith to Say Yes. They are nowhere on my 31 day journey exploring faith. But, for me, saying no is an act of faith. I feel like I’m letting someone down. But, I’m learning to do it anyway! I want to say no, so I can say yes to the better option.

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I hope your faith is growing along with mine as we explore this topic of faith every day for 31 days. If you’re just now joining me, you can catch up on all my posts HERE.

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