Family Day

Today is my Family Day, the day that my family actually got me from my foster mother. I don't really think about it that often except when the day comes around every year. I am so thankful for them and couldn't imagine being put in any other family. They are amazing

and so wonderful!

My parents are the sweetest. They have been married for 30 years. They love each other more than the day they got married. They are great examples of how a couple with Christ at the center should look like. At night I can hear them praying together and they find things each day to thank Him for. They are patient and have enough experience between the two of them

to truly give great advice. They are compassionate and really seek out those who need an encouraging word. They are hilarious and fun and keep Matt and I rolling. I am so thankful to God for placing me with the two of you!

Matt is the sweetest, funniest, most charming, and loving brother ever! He means the world to me. I love watching him with his friends, at church and just being in his element. He is the most loyal friend and I love that he wants his friends to know about Jesus. He has great faith, charisma and is our social butterfly. He loves God with reckless abandon. I love it when other people tell me how much they love Matt because I know it's not just me that can see how special he is. Even though Matt was a surprise to our family he was the best surprise we could have ever received!

I love y'all so much and am so very blessed to be able to call myself an Atchley! You guys make everything fun and entertaining.

I love traveling with you guys. (Matt I hope one day you can go over seas with Dad because he is completely out of his element but also amazing all at the same time, it is awesome to see!)

I love watching TV shows with y'all. (Psych couldn't get any funnier.)

I love going to Zu's with y'all. I think the pizza tastes better when we are together.

I love going to see Matt play basketball together.

I love getting to hear y'all's stories.

I love doing random things together like going to see the Harry Potter premier at midnight or having Valentine's breakfast one year at IHOP!

I love that y'all go to breakfast together almost every morning.

I love that my mom and dad have invested so much time with Matt's class at church.

I love seeing your smiles and hearing your laughs!

You three make life worth living and make the world a better place just because you are in it!

I love you all. Thank you for making this a wonderful family to be a part of!!!

Sweet You!

Two years ago I went to Africa with a group of people who were complete strangers. We quickly became family. At the end of our six week stay there we each got a sheet of paper, wrote down each person's name and out to the side put down encouraging words about that certain person. A guy in our group compiled each person's, typed them out and gave them to each of us. We all sat in a hotel room and read them aloud. Now what is cool about rereading these words about myself that others wrote about me is that they are things that I don't always see in myself. But these people who I had only known for a month and a half were aware of them and spoke truth into my life through those encouraging words. They were able to see things in me that I couldn't see in myself. I think the reason this is possible is because we lived together, we ate together, we read together, and worked together. We shared life in a place where hope is lost. We questioned some of life's hardest questions. We cried, laughed, and laughed until we cried. We were eager to learn and share adventure. We fought and enjoyed each other's company. We were blessed to be together if only for a short amount of time.

This whole idea made me think about God because God is ALWAYS able to see things in me that I can't always see in myself. Of course that's because He knows all and sees all. What's different about my experience in Africa and with God is that I had to work hard for those people to know me and I tried actively to get to know them. It went both ways. With God, however, he already knows us because he created us. Psalm 139 (MSG) says,

God, investigate my life; get all the facts firsthand.

I'm an open book to you;
even from a distance, you know what I'm thinking.
You know when I leave and when I get back;
I'm never out of your sight.
You know everything I'm going to say
before I start the first sentence.
I look behind me and you're there,
then up ahead and you're there, too—
your reassuring presence, coming and going.
This is too much, too wonderful—
I can't take it all in!
Is there anyplace I can go to avoid your Spirit?
to be out of your sight?
If I climb to the sky, you're there!
If I go underground, you're there!
If I flew on morning's wings
to the far western horizon,
You'd find me in a minute—
you're already there waiting!
Then I said to myself, "Oh, he even sees me in the dark!
At night I'm immersed in the light!"
It's a fact: darkness isn't dark to you;
night and day, darkness and light, they're all the same to you.
Oh yes, you shaped me first inside, then out;
you formed me in my mother's womb.
I thank you, High God—you're breathtaking!
Body and soul, I am marvelously made!
I worship in adoration—what a creation!
You know me inside and out,
you know every bone in my body;
You know exactly how I was made, bit by bit,
how I was sculpted from nothing into something.
Like an open book, you watched me grow from conception to birth;
all the stages of my life were spread out before you,
The days of my life all prepared
before I'd even lived one day.
Your thoughts—how rare, how beautiful!
God, I'll never comprehend them!
I couldn't even begin to count them—
any more than I could count the sand of the sea.
Oh, let me rise in the morning and live always with you!
And please, God, do away with wickedness for good!
And you murderers—out of here!—
all the men and women who belittle you, God,
infatuated with cheap god-imitations.
See how I hate those who hate you, God,
see how I loathe all this godless arrogance;
I hate it with pure, unadulterated hatred.
Your enemies are my enemies!

Investigate my life, O God,
find out everything about me;
Cross-examine and test me,
get a clear picture of what I'm about;
See for yourself whether I've done anything wrong—
then guide me on the road to eternal life.

There are situations that we are put into in order to be patient, kind, caring, loving, generous, friendly, faithful, and forgiving. We have so many gifts and talents that are just waiting to explode out of us. God knows we can be these things. He knows it way before we do. He grows us and has designed us to do things that without him would be impossible.