What is going on here?

If you have followed my journal here in the past I know you were not expecting to hear from me again and I was not expecting to journal here again! However, a couple months ago the struggle I had with the temptation to spend too much time on the computer was resolved in a very simple way: Parental Controls - on ME! After giving up the blog I still struggled with being on the computer more than I knew I should and asked my husband if he could do something to help me. That very night he realized he could simply set up the parental controls in a way that I only had an hour a day (during my children's nap/quiet time) that I could access the computer! Although humbling, I knew it was very necessary and oh what a blessing and relief for me! Any additional time on the computer is only possible when my husband is home with him overseeing.
For ANYONE who struggles with wasting precious time on the computer I highly recommend this! If only we had realized how simple this was to do sooner! I likely would have not felt the need to have haul ted blogging here. But, the time away has been healthy.


So, what in the world has happened with me in the last 3 months?? I'm sure those who see me in person - outside the blogger world - have wondered and some have had the courage to express that they were trying to figure out what was going on with me... as they saw me go from 9 months of wearing only dresses to 2 months of hardly wearing them ever and now being quite fond of them again! Thanks to those of you who asked. Here's what has been going on in my world in regards to this topic:

Around the time I closed the blog my wardrobe remained very modest and feminine. I still saw great value in that. But in reflecting on things I became troubled and began to question myself... I realized I'd gone so completely gung ho on preaching the value of wearing dresses but I was lacking in having a sweet and gentle spirit. Had I got completely off track? God made me realize that in getting so wrapped up in speaking up for wearing dresses & modesty I had put the issue of attire before the heart issues. The question before me was "Had my heart truly changed or in the somewhere in the process of what God was trying to teach me had I allowed satan to pull me off course?" Was the whole dresses only thing actually becoming a hindrance for me spiritually? I was a little perplexed.

The following account occurred shortly after these questions surfaced:

I was wearing a long skirt, modest top - dressed all nice, feminine and conservative (as had become usual) and was homeschooling my 3 daughters. One particular daughter was being especially oppositional and defiant that morning. (I see now how much my daughters attitudes were affected by my selfishness for those months). She was pushing my buttons big time and I LOST IT! I slammed both hands down on the table and screamed at her! (uggh!) I went into the bathroom and started balling and crying out to God... Knowing I always am talking to my girls about self-control, responding in love/not anger etc. I had completely blown it and frightened my children. I thought "Lord what is wrong with me? I am failing here... where have I got off track?" As I was crying and praying the Lord spoke to my spirit and said "Joanna, it does not matter how modest & feminine you are dressed today if you do not have the quiet and gentle spirit of a godly woman... then IT MEANS NOTHING!" WOW. Point made. The Lord had my attention.
I then tearfully apologized to each of my daughters (holding the one I'd lost it with) and prayed aloud with them asking God to forgive me for not responding in love and with self control and for not being a good example to them.
As the morning went on and I was thinking of the event just shared the Lord addressed my heart with the following question: "Who do you think honored me more this morning? You in your long skirt screaming at your child OR the woman in short-shorts and a tight tank top who responded to her child with love and grace?"
I was so entirely disgusted with myself! I saw how stuck I had got on the tool God had used rather than the issues of the heart He had been trying change in me. He was desiring that I have a gentle and quiet spirit, a loving and submissive heart, that I be a help to my husband, a loving and nurturing mother to my children, to take care of my home with great care -making it a haven for my family, and to be a warrior in prayer on behalf of my family. I instead was simply being a strong advocate for wearing dresses! I was reminded so loudly through the events of that day that true femininity is much more a thing of the heart than of attire!

I was SO disgusted with how much I had elevated wearing dresses above the changes God was desiring to make in my heart that I walked away from the wearing dresses thing! I had a pretty much complete aversion to wearing dresses for 2 months.

But, after 2 months I realized something; that although I was not wearing dresses anymore I truly still believed it to be valuable, just like I still believed the headcovering to be something of merit. So, I felt confused. If I believe wearing dresses/skirts is of value to me than what am I doing? It is very important to me to live what I believe! I realized that when I was confronted of sin in my heart the day I blew up at my daughter I rashly washed my hands of the whole dresses thing because it represented at that moment a big failure I'd made in not maintaining the right heart. I realized the aversion to dresses those weeks wasn't because I thought it had been something silly and foolish... no I still found it to be something I respected and believed to be of value. Did I make another mistake in forgetting it all?
The day I was sorting out these thoughts and praying about it all to the Lord, I was led to a photo copy someone had made and given me from the book "Transforming Grace" by Gerald Bridges. I do not know where it came from, did not know I had it, and have never seen the book! Pretty neat how God had tucked those pages somehow in my filing cabinet for that very day. I don't know what the rest of the book says but the pages before me were clearly for me that day! It expressed what I was sensing but trying to put into words. What I read talked about the dangers in elevating fences above the heart - which is what I knew I did. However the page read: "Should we scrap our fences, then? Not necessarily. Often they are helpful; sometimes they are necessary. But we have to work at keeping them in perspective..."
In my disgust with myself I rashly walked away from a fence rather than simply getting things back in proper perspective. I needed to realize the serious error I made in elevating the helpful "fence" higher than what God gave it to me for in the first place but, that didn't necessarily mean I should have forsaken the "fence"!

So that is my update for now!
Blessings to you.

Joanna