If the Lord wills...

I did it again.
You would think I would learn.
But alas, I apparently have not.
Sigh.

James 4:13-14 says it all...

Come now, you who say, "Today or tomorrow we will go into such and such a town and spend a year there and trade and make a profit" - yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring. What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes.

Over weeks and weeks I thought of ways to tackle my mess of stuff. Stuff we had accumulated through years and years of kids and great intentions, stuff that is no longer our "style", stuff we can't figure out how we accumulated. I knew I needed to purge, but I also needed to do school, help with E's parents, organize events for the upcoming school year, prepare lessons for our little Friday "co-op".

Then, some friends and I set a date for a garage sale. Next, I looked at our schedule and could see a small window of time when we would have a break from school (Hannah was attending a week-long quilting camp). I peered in my garage and my kids rooms and down my hallway and saw huge piles of stuff. And after a little pondering I had a plan.

I am great at making plans.
I sometimes even make cute little charts to go along side my fabulous plans.
But then it happened.
I forget something...

James 4:15 reminds me...

Instead you ought to say, "If the Lord wills, we will live and do this or that."

And that is where I messed up. I forgot to seek the Lord before I made my plans for my super purge party. Not that getting rid of stuff was bad, it was that I did not seek the Lord's will for my use of time. And while my purging has been successful in the area of getting rid of unnecessary things, it has also left my house in a shambles and left me cranky and quick to grow angry with the kids and overwhelmed with the piles.

So, the next couple of days will be one for making repairs... both to the order of my home, but also with the children, seeking their forgiveness for being "snappy Momma", and resuming gentle teaching and guiding, encouraging them to work joyfully on their chores. And they will be days where the children and I can discuss how God's mercies are new every morning.