Journal ~ school or JESUS?

Hello Sisters!

Now that the neighborhood kids were back in school I thought I'd be getting some relief, but much to my surprise I had kids calling around 5pm to see if they could come over??? I told my children to tell the neighbors, "my mom said no one can come over till the weekend." Then all the neighbors wanted to know "why?"

Around here, the girls did their usual annual "getting ready for fall." Cut flowers in vases spread throughout the home, pulling dead stuff out of the garden, cutting the tree outside the dinning room window to allow more light to enter and cleaning all the windows. My daughter Bekah (11) came up to me and hugged me and said, "mom I love this time of year, it makes me want to cuddle up with blankets, drink hot chocolate and watch a good movie....but it's too hot!" Yes, here in Southern Calif. it's still in the high 80's during the day, the heat of the afternoon takes away from our anticipation of cooler weather as we can't seem to get comfortable anywhere in our home.

I have been for a few years now (although not always consistently) using Managers of Their Home schedule system. IT HELPS SO MUCH TO HAVE THE CHILDREN ON A SCHEDULE, especially when you have a lot of them! :) I really don't want us doing school over 2 hours a day with the rest of the time being spent with each child pursuing what interests them via the internet, books, hands-on, etc... What it vital to me is Jesus, math and English. But somehow I got history and science on my schedule too. I want my children to pursue history and science on their own because something in that area interests them...a war, a hero, weapons, a science experiment, an "i wonder how that works moment" etc... BUT...I'm NOT sure how that can work with many children and a schedule. Another feeling I'm having is that I want my children to study the bible more, I want my children to meet Jesus face to face. I want my children to be ON FIRE for Jesus. And that only comes from spending T I M E at His feet, time from digging into the Word, time from praying and time from praising Him. You could say I'm torn between this stupid thing we're so post to do called "school" and the place where I want to be called "radically walking in the Spirit...healing the sick, raising the dead " Mark 16:17-18....WOW, that's how I want to be! So what do I do? I'm leaning towards no more than 2 hours of school and the rest JESUS!!! I want my children to get up, spend time in the morning and say, "mom the Lord told me to have this guy over, and at 1pm, He told me I need to give so and so a call." So, I'm trying not to struggle in this whole thing, but just keep on looking to Him and speaking His Word and His promises throughout the day.

I've been reading Proverbs 2 over and over. It says if we seek wisdom LIKE A HIDDEN TREASURE, we will FIND IT!!!! If you knew you had millions of dollars worth of treasure in your backyard your yard would look like a minefield! This is a picture of how we SHOULD GO AFTER THE WORD!

My 8 yog just woke and wants some loving on the couch, so here is a good time to stop for now. :)

Kerri, write you back later! :)

Shannon