Living To Carry The Cross, Learning To Live The Hard Eucharisteo

A few Sunday's ago, While I was worshipping Him with both arms raised high, He prompted me to stand in my chair and continue to worship Him from my chair!                                                  I tried to explain to Him that this was not something that normally happens in our time of worship. I tried to explain how Security might escort me out! I told him that maybe next time I would stand in my chair for him, thinking He would let it go and let me out of doing this. I was more than wrong in this way of thinking. Does God ever let us out of anything? Does he ever let us get away with thinking he will not accomplish His divine plan in each of us?       The answer is no! He will still accomplish His purpose and divine plan to continue to shape us and mold us into the perfect image of His beautiful Son. This past Sunday was Baptism Sunday. This service is an energetic time of worship. They open the Baptistry up for the entire service and our pastor teaches just a

S he has not laughed like this in years. She is a Mother of three. A Wife of only one Husband. A Farmer's Wife.   A Preacher's Daughter, and she has lots of health issues. Just to list a few. Multiple Sclerosis, Neuropathy from the M.S.. A fatty liver with 40% damage done to it by all the medications she has been on for the last 25 years. She deals with depression. All of this can make a person's heart sink deep into despair.     My beautiful Mother has been delt alot of suffering in the latter years of her life. She is a Lady who loves Jesus. She will testify on his behalf on any given day. Sh has walked down a long, winding, road of unknowns and has come through each one with her Faith still intact and solid. But this one thing I have noticed of her, she has not laughed in many years. The contagiousness of her laughter has not been heard in my eardrums in many years. I had began to wonder if she would ever laugh again. I took my good and perfect gift to my hometown over

  w e had started on our daily journey and as we were traveling down the road, my good and perfect gift says to me, "Mommy, the clouds look all bumpy."                                    I just love this about my good and perfect gift. God uses him so many times a day to cause me to stop in my busyness and reflect on the beauty that the Creator has for me to see. I agree with him from the front seat of my vehicle. This reflecting moment was not finished. God had more gifts for me this morning, gifts that I would need to later add to my gift list, to thank him for.        My good and perfect gift had began saying how he was so glad that God had created him to be the very special little one that he is. He was so happy to be a part of our wonderful family. He was glad that God created him to be in our world!                                                What a tearful moment this was for me! If he had seen the multitude of salty drops coming from my eyes this moment

I t has been 3 months since He ascended to His new home. We watched Him wither away as the flowers and grass do at the end of every summer, bowing,  bending and dying to their Creator.                                              She is left to go through clothes, empty out closets, pack things up and give them away, call their monthly billings and tell them of the news, change Her bank account information, her billing address. She has lost the love of this life to a rare cancer that would not be stopped. Could God not heal it? Was it to powerful for even Him? No! We had prayed for healing. It came and all the scans were clear for a couple more years. We praised our good Healer for giving us more time with Him. We had just gotten to know them from Church.                                                                                   It had all started as greeting each other weekly, quickly turned into Saturday afternoon dinners. We would take turns hosting one another.

T he more I read the book of Nehemiah the more I become encouraged in the daily building of my life. While we were worshipping, God had already began preparing me for the discouraging news I would receive when I went home from my mountain top experience with the believers in my community. You see God had used our pastor to speak on discouragement. He talked about how Nehemiah delt with discouragement when rebuilding the walls of the Jerusalem city that had be been torn down completely to smashed pieces of burnt smokey rubble. He talked about the opposition that came from the enemy of our soul. The enemy came in the form of Sanballat. "When he had heard that we were rebuilding the wall , he became angry and was greatly incensed." ( Nehemiah 4:1). The Enemy of our soul does the same with us. His Tactics have never changed since this time in history. Just when we begin to rise out of the smokey ashes, he becomes angry.  He begins to try to tear us down with discouraging words.

M y sweet hubby's birthday is coming up. I took my good and perfect gift with me to go birthday shopping for his Daddy's birthday. We ended up buying some really nice shirts for his Daddy that would show off his crisp blue eyes.                                                         His Daddy is one you must realize, never buys anything for himself. The item will have to be completely worn out in order for him to buy another. For his Daddy to just go out and buy new shirts would be a foreign thing to him. I was doing pretty good. I headed right passed all of the women's rows of pretty clothing that were tempting me to come have a look- see. I found the Men's clothing isle. Looked through the shirts, found some really nice ones on sale. "He would be so proud of me," I said to myself.  Sweet Hubby is quite a bargain shopper. God created him to be very frugal. I have always admired this quality about him.     I headed on to find just the right card,

C hildren can really change your life. You now have this little one that you must care for, feed , change, loose sleep over. Above all fill completely full with your love.         The drifting in our marriage began shortly after our good and perfect gift was born.  I had some complications after giving birth that it knocked out almost completely the intimate part of our life. The next four years of our marriage took a great hit. The day came when we realized that our good and perfect gift had lots going on inside his little body and we mustered up the strength to do this together. To raise him as best as we can and to grow our knowledge of handling a child who has these issues. Our marriage still took more hits. We had failed each other. We took one another for granted countless times. Because of the anger I was dealing with inside myself, I had began talking to my Sweet Hubby with words of disrespect and ingrattitude. We were constantly at war with one another over What is bes

I Think we tend to forget that grace does not always come in a pretty little box with a bow wrapped neatly around it.                                           We look to God and love him immensly when he gives us good things. We praise him, we raise holy hands to him in church. We thank him over and over.                                         But the truth is, Grace does not always come in pretty little packages with a bow tied neatly around it. If you will take a walk with me down into history, some two thousand years ago. Grace came in a form that was not so beautiful. Isaiah 53: 2 says, "He had no beauty or majesty to attract us to him, nothing in his appearance that we should desire him." Then Grace became even more ugly. Grace died upon a tree.                                             Isaiah goes onto say in the 52nd chapter verse 14, his appearance was so disfigured beyond that of any man and his form marred beyond human likeness. Jesus came to turn

It was a typical day for us. My good and perfect gift had been doing so well at going to the park and not having a meltdown when we left that I had been enjoying it so much. We went to the park to have a playday. It was springtime and it was about 75 or so outside. A gorgeous day.                                   I had done all the right things to help my good and perfect gift transition well. We had talked about expected behavior at the park, expected behavior leaving the park. " Yes Mommy", "Yes, Mommy", would come his reply. I had my reward for him in my pocket. We had made 10 little stickmen out of tongue depressors. He collects these little stickmen when doing tasks that are hard for him to do. When he gets all 10 of them we go to the dollar store and he gets to pick something out with his own money that he earns for helping me at home with daily chores. It was all flowing so smoothly. I had given him his fifteen minute warning. His 10 minute warning,"

As I look in the mirror, All I can see is a worn out Mother, A wife who longs to love ,truly love her husband as she once did at first. A child of God who never spends enough time with her Father, sometimes doubting if  He really will come through in my circumstances.                                     Do I believe the lies that the enemy of my soul wants me to believe? That lie of old that he began in the beginning of time? I want to scream, because I know I will never be, on my own the way that I really want to be. Mirrors don't always give an accurate view. There is something missing. It can't see into your soul. There is only One mirror that can see into your soul. God's perfect word!                         Too often we look to our own resources to see who we are, what we look like, and what we must be doing. How well we are doing it. We never stop to look into His beautifully inspired word to see who we really are. What I would like to do for today is to show

It was Easter Sunday when we had been invited to spend the day at my sisters home. There has always been much tention between the two of us since my birth. She being adopted when she was 3 days old into our family. She is firstborn in the dynamic of this family. I have never really seen her as being adopted because she has always been there since the day God placed me second in line. She has always allowed a wall between herself and the rest of the family. Oh The emotional baggage she must carry around with her daily. The weight of it all must be so hard to carry.                                                  We were sitting outside around her beautifully constructed hand made Octgon shaped picnic table, that my brother-in-Law had built and was so proud of. This picture below is not the one but the one he built looks just like it. It was so nice to sit around the table looking and talking with each person about their week and what had taken place. My niece had bought an Easter E

While our summer is winding down, I took my good and perfect gift for a funfilled afternoon at the pool.                                             He taught me so much as he went through this day. He had been doing swimming lessons for the very first time this year and I watched him as he began to get more and more brave. I could feel the cord that once attached us in the depths of my womb begin to get longer and longer. His one and only question he had was, "When do I get to go off the slide and the diving board?" While  it was just fine for me to have  him begin with the beginner's class, all he wanted to do was jump ahead and go unpepared. Is this really a swimming class or is this a spiritual lesson for me? How often Have I gone ahead without God and was not prepared for the task at hand. Each task that God has for us takes training, patience, and a wilingness to wait for His Holy and perfect timing. Had my good and perfect gift gone and done either of these two