New Beginnings!

I felt compelled this morning to begin a new blog. There's no way that I could continue with "Mama Raquel's Cocina" which focused on my marriage and ministry here in Southern Mexico. Yet, as a writer I am very drawn to express my journey through the written word, so here I sit after a 5 month break from blogging ready to begin with fresh insight and focus.

This is not going to be a blog focused on grief although it will include sorrowful moments as I am still in the grieving process. The purpose and goal of this season of my life is to focus on what God has for me in my future, to be conformed more and more to the image of Christ and to follow him completely with body, soul and spirit.
The verse that God has been laying on my heart is:
“Remember not the former things, nor consider the things of old. Behold, I am doing a new thing; now it springs forth, do you not perceive it? I will make a way in the wilderness and rivers in the desert” Is. 43:18-19

I haven't even begun to wrap my head and heart around what God might be up to in my life but as His plans unfold I will be writing about the glory of His ways that His name might be praised!

Two weeks from right now we will be inflight to Denver. My hope is not in Colorado but in my savior that has led us back to Colorado. The changes in our life right now are astronomical. I was pondering yesterday the process of getting curtain material for Bethany to make curtains for our new home in Colorado Springs. I was thinking of how to ask for the specific measurements in SPANISH! And then I realized that I won't need to do this in Spanish at Joann Fabric!!! dah! I'm realizing that reverse culture shock is as real as regular culture shock. Our family is going to be in a whirlwind of change for awhile. Yet, God is faithful and good and he will carry us through.

I took a long walk this morning and had time "alone" (on the busy streets of Taxco) to think and pray. There's so much to process in the packing up our lives and leaving Mexico. There's so much to think about in our returning to Loveland without Gary. Yet, for every moment of sadness that comes into my life there is an equal amount of hope and joy. I never anticipated the end of my marriage in 2012. Gary and I never imagined that he would die so young. Having married a man who was 18 years older than myself, I thought a lot about being a widow but never at 46! We just did not anticipate this journey through grief so quickly and early in our marriage.

Yet God came for my beloved that July afternoon and what am I left with? I have two amazing children, a wonderful network of friends and family, and as many years left on this earth to serve God as he deems well and good.

 It was wonderful to honor Gary because he was an honorable person! Praying for him, praising him, and enjoying my beloved has always been the delight of my life. But Gary is no longer with me and it is not good to take up permanent residency in the past. In all reality I can no longer honor him, praise him or enjoy him. So I must move onward and press into what God has for me in the present and future because despite man's desire for time travel, none of us can jump in a Delorean and savor the years gone by! So in my memory I honor Gary but in the day to day of life it's really impossible to walk in the role that I have enjoyed for so many years.

Actually, pressing on into God's plan for the future is exactly what Gary would have wanted me to do. I know that he would not have wanted me to dwell in the past. He was a visionary, a prophet, and one who would press into following God deeply which always involves the future and not the past. If he were here he would grab my hand and say, "Rachel, get goin into what God has for you! and don't look back, even if I'm back there, don't keep looking at me but look into the eyes of Jesus in front of you pressing onward." I know this is what he would say to me and so it is honoring to my husband to press onward through grief and rest in the healing hand of God!

And so I have been launched into this journey of "New Beginnings" and discovering how to grow deeper in Jesus and fuller in my fellowship with him.

 “Remember not the former things, nor consider the things of old. Behold, I am doing a new thing; now it springs forth, do you not perceive it? I will make a way in the wilderness and rivers in the desert” Is. 43:18-19