Magnifying Christ: A Personal Testimony

According to my earnest expectation and my hope, that in nothing I shall be ashamed, but that with all boldness, as always, so now also Christ shall be magnified in my body, whether it be by life, or by death.

Philippians 1:20

As a teenager, I attended a youth meeting in my hometown. Ron Reily was one of the preachers. He preached on Philippians 1:20 and how magnifying Christ should be the ultimate goal of a Christian’s life. As I remember, he emphasized that anything that God allows in a Christian’s life, even death, would magnify Christ if the Christian trusted God and was surrendered to Him. After that meeting, I chose Philippians 1:20 as my life verse, my creed from the Bible on how I would attempt to live my life with God’s help. Little did I know how God would use this verse to convict and change my life.

In nursing school, this verse helped me through many rough days of clinical, classes, and working in the Dining Services. I had a small sticky note taped to my nursing clipboard that said, “Magnify Christ, Phil. 1:20.” It reminded me of my goal, my life’s purpose to know Christ and to bring Him glory.

August or September 2010. I was driving home from the library, where I had just finished putting in applications for RN positions and creating/updating my Facebook. I had put my life’s verse in the about me section and I think had written something about how I wanted to magnify Christ, no matter what. Well, just outside of the small town in which the library was located, my car sputtered to a stop and would not keep running. This was a frequent occurrence that usually resolved after a few minutes of letting the car just sit. But that day, I was frustrated. I hit my steering wheel as I sat on the shoulder of the road and angrily asked God “Why?!” Why did I have such a stupid car, that shut off randomly? Why couldn’t I find a nursing job, everyone said, “If you had at least one year of experience,” or “If you had a lower level of education.” I think that I may have even asked God why he didn’t allow me to find a husband in college. Then it was as if the Holy Spirit nudged me and said, “What did you just write on Facebook? You said you wanted to magnify Christ no matter what? What if you have this old car because you are to magnify Christ by your reaction when it breaks down? What if you don’t have a nursing job yet because you are to magnify Christ as you wait for Me? You said you wanted to magnify Christ, but you just failed.” I repented right there of my attitude and told God I would accept His will in even the smallest details of my life and with His help, magnify Christ through them. If only I had learned my lesson.

December 2010. On December 7, I woke up early in the morning vomiting. I thought that I had contracted a stomach virus from eating at a buffet for a ladies Christmas party the night before. I had been feeling bad for several weeks. Sometime before Thanksgiving, I had gotten a cold or mild flu and had not been feeling well since. I was tired all the time, had an almost constant headache, a raised rash on my hands and feet, and was drinking a lot of liquid for my “dry throat”.  As the day went on, my vomiting became worse; I was unable to keep anything down. In the evening, I began to have a severe sharp stabbing abdominal pain and I was unable to breath normally. That’s when my mother drove me to the emergency room. At the emergency room, someone checked my blood sugar and it was over 500. I was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes and admitted to the ICU in Diabetic Ketoacidosis. I was in the hospital for almost three days. I thought that I would die very soon; I had never known or heard of a type 1 diabetic who was healthy in their 30’s. I have met many since then. I also knew that I could no longer do what I thought what God had called me to do- be a missionary nurse/linguist in the jungles of Papua New Guinea. That crushed me. I knew in my heart that it must not have been God’s will for me to be a missionary nurse in the jungle, and I wish that I had the attitude that this diagnosis of type 1 diabetes was something that Christ could use to magnify Himself through me… But I did not.

I spent the next several months begging God every day to heal me so that I could go on to do what I desired to do. I knew He was powerful enough. I knew such a miracle would surely glorify God. I wanted to die because I had lost my purpose for living. You see, somewhere I had changed my purpose of living from knowing and magnifying Christ to serving Him on the mission field. I remember wishing someone would crash into my car and send me to heaven where I would no longer be sick or heart broken. I don’t know if others knew that I was struggling so, I tried to hide it. I tried to have a good attitude. I continued serving God in the bus ministry, nursery, teaching Sunday school, and going on soul winning visitation. I eventually accepted my diabetes as God’s will and stopped begging Him to heal me. I tried my hardest to magnify Christ in my life, but something was wrong. I didn’t have joy, sure I was happy sometimes, but what I could have done on the mission field was constantly in the back of my mind. I wasn’t getting much out of my devotions, it was often hard to pray. This continued until July of 2013.

July 2013. The director of the singles ministry at my church was planning a trip to St. Petersburg, FL for a singles conference that was taking place the first week of July. He and his wife asked if I would like to go even though I was not a member of the Singles Sunday School class. I decided that I would, because I knew that I needed some spiritual refreshing. The first day, I was alone in one of the hallways of the church looking at their world missions map. Two girls walked by and I overheard them comment about how they could never be missionaries because they didn’t want to give up the luxuries of living in America. I remember being so angry at them for not wanting to give up the pleasures of American life when so many were dying and going to hell without ever hearing the gospel. That night, I opened up to my singles director’s wife and told her my frustrations of how so many young adults could go to the mission field, to unreached peoples, but didn’t want to. And how I didn’t understand why God would take the ability to go to PNG away from me, who wanted to go so badly. That night I realized that I really wasn’t mad at those girls; I was mad at God because I didn’t understand why He had allowed me to develop type 1 diabetes. Wednesday of that week was July 3, my twenty fifth birthday. The first preacher that night preached a message that was God’s birthday present to me. He preached about how God led them about, from Exodus 13:17-18. God may lead us in ways that make no sense to us, in a way that was about, but it was for our good and we just needed to trust Him. That message led me to repent from my anger and lack of trust in God, and truly trust that He knows best, even when it makes no sense. I got my heart right with God that night, and decided again to trust God with everything in my life.

Have I always completely trusted God since that point? I wish that I could say yes, but I can’t. But God has been so gracious and merciful in forgiving me for my lack of trust in Him. You see, I must trust God in life, death, or anything in between to work through my life to magnify Himself, whether it makes sense or not. Please don’t think I’m sharing this to brag about how much I trust God. If you read this, you know that I can struggle a lot in that department. I share this to show how gracious God is to lead us back to trusting and magnifying Him when we are stubborn and think we know best. If you are a Christian, God can use anything to magnify Himself through you, whether it be a broken down car, a life changing medical diagnosis, the death of a dream, or a job search. You just need to trust Him completely. There is no better place to be than to be exactly where God wants you, Magnifying Christ in life, in death, or anything in between.

Easy Low Glycemic Cajun Beans and Rice

I absolutely love rice! But... sadly, it is really bad for my blood sugars.

I've been trying to eat lower glycemic things recently due to being a Type 1 Diabetic and the horrible effects of high glycemic foods on my blood sugars. So I made this recipe for one of my favorites: Cajun rice and beans.

Typically, I would cook up some dried black beans or pinto beans for this recipe, but this is the easy version, so I used a can. This also makes about 9 cups of finished product, because I like leftovers!

Easy Low Glycemic Cajun Beans and Rice

5 cups water
1 pint salsa
1 can (15.25 oz) black beans, drained (if you cook your own beans this comes to about 1.5 cups)
1 Tbsp (+/- to taste) Cajun seasoning (I like the McCormick brand)
1 Tbsp olive oil (optional)
2 cups uncooked brown rice
1/2 cup quinoa
Salt and pepper to taste

Bring water, salsa, beans, seasoning, and oil to a boil in a large pan on medium heat. Add rice and quinoa stirring immediately after adding to prevent sticking. Cook on medium heat covered, stirring occasionally for about 25 min or until rice is tender. If rice is not tender, and the water appears to be gone add a little bit more water, no more than a cup, and continue cooking. When rice is tender, remove from heat and let the pan sit covered for about 5-10 minutes before serving. As it is this is a vegan meal. I love to eat it with some cheddar cheese and a dollop of plain Greek yogurt, which would still make it a vegetarian option.

Prep time: about 30 min.
Makes about 9 servings at 1 cup per serving

Savouring the Things of God

But He turned, and said unto Peter, “Get thee behind me Satan: thou art an offence unto Me: for thou savourest not the things that be of God, but those that be of men.”   Matthew 16:23

I remember reading this verse almost ten years ago, when I was a student at Pensacola Christian College. I was in the first semester of my senior year of Nursing School. This verse jumped off the page. It comes after Peter telling Jesus about His upcoming suffering, “Be it far from Thee, Lord: this shall not be unto Thee.” It seems like an innocent statement: the disciple loved his Master and didn’t want his Master to suffer. In man’s reasoning, this seems a reasonable wish. Why did Jesus rebuke Peter so harshly, comparing him to Satan and stating that Peter had offended God Himself?

Think about it. If Jesus had not become the sacrifice for our sins, we would be doomed to spend eternity in hell with the devil and his demons. There would be no grace, no mercy, no forgiveness, no love. Peter’s seemingly innocent wish would have changed eternity.

That evening, when I read this verse, the Holy Spirit convicted me with the thought, “Do I offend Jesus?” Do I offend Him by wanting my own desires above what He has planned for me? Am I too focused on what is important in Man’s eyes without loving what is important to Christ? At the time, I was feeling sorry for myself because I did not have a future husband lined up, and all my friends seemed to have boyfriends or were getting engaged. No guys were even interested in me. Having a guy was my desire at the time, not God’s. Through the years, God has taken away other desires such as working among unreached people groups in Papua New Guinea, having my first two children born healthy, having a good vehicle to rely on (it was totaled by fault of another driver), and having excellent health. Through all of these disappointments and trials God has taught me to trust Himself. He has taught me that savouring the things of God, even if hard and full of tears and suffering really is the best. Proverbs 3:5 says, “Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and lean not unto thine own understanding.” Savouring the things of God involves trust that He knows best, and surrender to His desires for your life.

I wrote this poem that night that God worked on my heart. It has been an encouragement to me many times, and I pray that it would be an encouragement to you. Savour the things of God, that you may not offend, but please our amazing Saviour.

The things that be of God:

The things that be of man:

Which do I savour?

When I feed each

To my soul’s tongue,

I find which to have the better flavor?

Do I long for the things

That please and glorify God?

Do I earnestly seek His favour?

Or do I long for good things

That satisfy my own desires,

Not putting first my Saviour?

Lord, help me to taste

The good things of God.

Let those have the better flavor.

That I may long for God’s desires

Above my own desires,

That I completely please my Saviour.

One Pan Cornbread Stuffing and Roast Chicken Breast

Now that it is Fall, cooler temperatures are coming and the time for having warm savory meals is here. (Or at least I’m wishing that it was cooler, haha! I live in the South, so warm weather will be around for a while longer, but a girl can dream, right!?) Something in the warm savory food group that I’ve always wanted to try is cornbread stuffing. I love cornbread, and stuffing/dressing was always my favorite food on Thanksgiving Day. So, one afternoon I decided that I would try making this cornbread stuffing.

I had some corncakes left over from supper earlier in the week, and decided to use those instead of actually making cornbread. (If you don’t know what corncakes are, it is basically cornbread in pancake form. They are delicious! Blog post with recipe coming soon!) I tore the cakes into chunks and had about 4-5 cups of the corncake chunks. I then added half an onion and two stalks of celery chopped, four eggs, and a sprinkle of salt, pepper, and ground sage. I mixed this together with my hands in the cast iron skillet that I was using to bake it.

 I also had some uncooked Aldi chicken breasts in my refrigerator that I had gotten for $1.69/lb. earlier in the week. I took two of these chicken breasts (they were huge!) and cut each into three pieces, placing them in the stuffing mixture. Over this I poured two cups of chicken broth. I then cubed up three tablespoons of butter and placed it around on top of the chicken and stuffing. Lastly, I sprinkled the top of the chicken pieces with salt, pepper, and ground sage. It smelled amazing! I covered with foil and baked at 350⁰F for almost two hours.

Because the oven was already in use, I placed a few potatoes on the oven rack to bake and cooked a few frozen peas adding butter when done. In less than 20 minutes prep time and 2 hours cook time, we had a delicious savory meal that almost tasted like Thanksgiving! And it only used two dishes to cook it, my cast iron skillet and the pan to cook the peas. The only thing that I would change is the weather outside (it was 90⁰F outside the day I cooked this) and I would make some chicken gravy to pour over the stuffing. But I love my gravy and drowning my food in it; it was good without it, but would have been so much better with the gravy.

Cornbread Stuffing with Roast Chicken Breast

ü  4-5 cups cornbread chunks

ü  ½ onion, chopped

ü  2 stalks celery, chopped

ü  4 eggs

ü  ¼ tsp. ground sage

ü  2-3 uncooked chicken breasts, cut in pieces

ü  2 cups chicken broth

ü  3 Tbsp. butter, cut into small cubes

ü  Salt and pepper to taste

Mix cornbread chunks, onion, celery, eggs, sage, salt, and pepper together in a 14in cast iron skillet (or a rectangle baking dish). Cut chicken breasts into 3 pieces each and place on top stuffing mixture, pressing into the mixture to make top of the chicken piece level with the top of the stuffing. Pour chicken broth evenly over the mixture in the pan. Spread cubed butter chunks evenly over the top of the mixture in pan and sprinkle the exposed chicken pieces with sage, salt, and pepper. Cover with foil and bake in a 350⁰F oven for approximately two hours or until chicken is cooked through. Chicken must reach an internal temperature of 165⁰F to be safe to eat. Serve with potatoes, a vegetable, and maybe some gravy and enjoy!

Serves 6 people.

Healthy Banana Apple Oat Muffins

I have always had a little bit of a sweet tooth, and I love pretty much any kind of homemade baked good, especially any kind of muffin, cinnamon roll, etc. This became a little bit of a problem when I developed Type 1 Diabetes in December of 2010. I could no longer eat such yummy breads to my heart’s content, but rather had to be careful about the amount of sugar/ carbohydrates that I ingested. I at first just cut out/ did not eat many baked goods at all, or ate them and gave myself large amounts of insulin to cover my carbohydrate intake. After several years, I decided to try some heathy recipes that I had found. Most just plainly did not taste good. I finally found a few recipes on pintrest that tasted pretty good, but with a little tweeking tasted even better.

This recipe is one that I created, loosely based on a few different pintrest recipes that I have tried. It is sweetened with mashed bananas, apple sauce, and raw sugar or honey. It also uses whole wheat flour which has a much lower glycemic index than white all purpose flour. This muffin is definitely on the not as sweet side, (my husband says it needs more sugar), but with the addition of some chocolate chips he seems to like it better.

Here is the recipe:

Healthy Banana Apple Oat Muffins

o   1 ½ cups mashed bananas

o   ½ cup applesauce

o   1 cup plain greek yogurt

o   1/3 cup raw sugar (can use honey or agave if desired)

o   ½ tsp. salt

o   2 Tbsp. olive oil

o   2 eggs

o   2 Tbsp milk (can use almond or coconut milk as desired)

o   1 Tbsp vanilla flavoring

o   2 cups whole wheat flour

o   1 cup whole rolled oats

o   1 tsp cinnamon

o   2 tsp baking soda

o   Optional: chocolate chips or nuts to taste

Preheat oven to 350⁰ F. Combine bananas, applesauce, yogurt, sugar, salt, oil, eggs, milk, and vanilla until fully incorporated together. Add the remaining ingredients and mix well. If desired, add chocolate chips or nuts to the batter. Grease muffin tins for 24 muffins. DO NOT USE PAPER LINERS- The muffins will stick and be ruined unless you want to eat paper with the muffins. I have unfortunately made this mistake! After filling the muffin tins, I sprinkled some rolled oats on the top of the muffins to make them look pretty.

Bake at 350⁰ F for 20-25 minutes. Let cool for 15 minutes before removing from the muffin tins. 

Enjoy with a cup of tea or coffee.

Hope you enjoy these “healthy” muffins!

DIY Coffee Sugar Scrub

I have been interested in natural hygiene products for several years. To decrease the amount of chemicals in my home and to live a more healthy lifestyle are two main reasons that led me to this interest. One of the natural products that I have tried recently was a coffee sugar scrub. I was excited that I could reuse coffee grounds (I have a lot because I love coffee!) and that it would healthy for my skin. I became even more excited when I found out how easy it was to make and that I already had all the ingredients that I needed in my kitchen! I combined a few different recipes that I found online and made one that worked for me!

First, let’s talk about the ingredients:

Sugar: Since this is a “sugar scrub”, this is the most obvious ingredient. Sugar acts as an exfoliator. I used regular white refined sugar that you can find in any grocery store. You could also use raw sugar if you’re so inclined.

Coffee Grounds: Coffee also acts as an exfoliator. It is also said to provide a natural chemical exfoliation due to the acid in coffee and increase circulation and fat metabolism of the skin. This would definitely cause the skin to be healthier if it is true. I used coffee grounds that were already used to make my delicious drink!

Coconut Oil: The benefits of coconut oil are numerous including being great for skin! It is great for hydrating and decreasing inflammation. My hubby has had great success using it to treat his eczema.

Molasses: In some of the recipes for coffee scrubs that I had found, molasses was an ingredient. This made me curious if molasses was beneficial for skin. In my research, I found that there are several benefits to using molasses for your skin. It promotes healthy tissue growth and can be used to treat burns and wounds. It has also been used to treat acne and as a conditioner for hair. I used unsulfured blackstrap molasses because that’s what I had on hand.

Orange Essential Oil: In using essential oils, its very important to use a pure oil without artificial ingredients. I use DoTerra oils, but I know that there are several other brands that are just as good. Just do your research to be sure that you are using a pure oil. That being said, orange essential oil not only smells good, but its good for your skin as well! It can reduce inflammation, has antibacterial properties, and can be a calming scent for many people.

For my sugar scrub I used these five ingredients and had about two and a half cups of scrub in just a few minutes!

Here is the recipe:

-1 cup sugar (white refined sugar or raw cane sugar can be used)

-1 cup used, dry coffee grounds

-1 cup coconut oil (I partially melted my coconut oil to make it easier to mix)

-1 Tablespoon molasses

-8-10 drops of orange essential oil

I placed all these ingredients in a bowl and mixed them up with a spoon. I stored it in half pint mason jars due to the possibility of essential oils leeching through plastic.

How I use it/like it:

So far I love this scrub. I’ve been using to clean my face every day, and my skin feels so soft! I’ve also used it as a body scrub in the shower with the same results: my skin feels so soft! The orange oil smells really clean and is somewhat calming and invigorating at the same time.

If you try this scrub, let me know what you think. Hopefully, you will love it as much as I do!

Link to an interesting article about molasses: https://www.organicfacts.net/health-benefits/other/health-benefits-of-molasses.html

Back to Blogging

I have not been blogging for over a year, other than my post last November. I thought that I would attempt to explain why in this post. God has led me through much this past year and several months.

I started this blog to minister to others who like myself had suffered pregnancy loss. The name of the blog comes from my two babies in heaven and my prayer for children. In July of 2016, I started a new job in home healthcare. This job took up a lot more of my time with all the charting that needed to be done, but I absolutely loved it. While I was busy learning the new aspects of my job, in August my husband and I found out we were expecting our rainbow baby April 29, 2017. For the first 20 weeks of my pregnancy, I had morning (or all day) sickness. During the pregnancy, I had anxiety that this baby would not make it; I had frequent nightmares of going to my OB office and hearing the awful words, “I’m sorry, we couldn’t find the heartbeat.” Thankfully, I never heard those words. I was in two car accidents, one because I had passed out from low blood sugar levels and the other from someone behind me not stopping at a red light. I lost my job when the company I worked for closed down February 10. February 15, I went into labor and was put on bed rest, and March 4, at 32 weeks, our rainbow baby, Olivia Mae, was born. I struggled after her birth. It felt like I had been robbed of carrying her for 8 more weeks, of taking care of her for the first 6 ½ weeks of her life, of having the experience of birth (I had a c-section because she was breech). Those were dark days in my life.

Fast forward to August 2017. I started getting some pregnancy symptoms and got a test- It was positive! We went for an ultrasound in September and found out that Baby was due March 15, 2018, Just 11 days after Olivia’s first birthday. This pregnancy has been much better than the last. Only 2 days of nausea/sickness, a much better doctor/ midwives, and much less anxiety. I often wonder how I will handle having two babies a year apart. But I am sure God’s grace will prove sufficient. For now I just keep trusting and following Him.

So now you know what I’ve been doing in these months of silence. God’s strength and grace have proved sufficient all the way and He has taught me some things as well. 

Olivia at 10 months old

New Years Eve 2017