Remembering

Today my mind is on the September 11 tragedy of six years ago. Yesterday afternoon I started watching some shows about it on the History channel, and I could not pull myself away. It is all still so unbelievable that something of this magnitude could actually happen right here in the United States of America. Sometime in the months following the attacks, I wrote a poem after hearing some of the survivor stories. It is not a great poetic work because I know nothing about poetry, but it is more along the lines of a song. It is called "The Light" with the light being Jesus. Tomorrow my post will be this poem.

My thoughts and prayers go out for those who were directly or indirectly affected by the 9/11 attacks on our country, and that includes our soldiers and their families. This is one of those things that we don't understand why God allowed to happen. But not understanding something will not make me turn away from God or be angry with him. We have to trust that his purposes are higher than our ability to understand, and that God does not make mistakes.

On a lighter note, I would like to say that in my seventh year at my job, effective tomorrow, I get a reserved parking spot. I'm so excited! I know that has nothing to do with anything, but now you know.

Many are the plans in a man's heart, but it is the Lord's purpose that prevails. Psalm 19:21

God's Provision

On Sundays we usually eat out for lunch after church. Today we went to a local restaurant that is known for their fried chicken and country cooking. We haven't been there for a long time so it was a nice change from our usual Mexican or chain restaurants. Being there brought back a memory from about 25 years ago.

We were a young married couple and I was very pregnant. My husband was not well and I guess it showed -- this was when he was having many problems from the muscle disease. We went to eat at this same restaurant after church that Sunday and when we finished eating I started looking for money in my purse and was fearful that I didn't have enough to pay for it, then I realized I did have just barely enough. But when the waitress came back to our table she didn't have a bill for us. She told us that someone else who was eating there that day had seen us and wanted to pay for our meal anonymously. Wow! We just couldn't believe that someone who didn't even know us would just pick us out of a crowd and pay for our meal. It was really a great blessing. Our meal was provided for us at just a time when we needed it most.

Isn't this what Jesus has done for us? He does know us, each of us, and he has paid the price that we owe for our sins. Our bill has been paid because God loved us so much that he sent his only begotten son that whosoever believes in him will not perish but have eternal life. We are able to spend eternity in heaven because of this gift of love if we believe.

But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own. Matthew 6:33-34

Lessons learned through parenting

This is something I wrote down a few years ago -- it was written in present tense then, so I 'll have to change it to make it past tense for today.

Things I've learned about God through being a parent:
1. He misses fellowship with His children when His children neglect spending time with Him, or when they become too busy to spend time with Him. I learned this when my son was in college. He didn't call us much because his life was so busy with school, Young Life activities and church activities, etc. I was very happy that he was involved in those good things, but I missed him and would have loved to hear from him more often.

2. God sometimes has special gifts that He is planning to give us at the right time. We don't even know He is planning these special blessings and there's nothing we've done to deserve them, but He just has them ready to give us at His perfect time for a specific reason because He loves us. I learned this years ago after my minivan was totalled in a wreck. When we bought a replacement vehicle (a used Camry), we bought it with our daughter in mind. We bought it with the intention of using it as our family car during the year that she was learning to drive, then letting that car become the car she would drive after getting her license. She did not know our intention for that car, even though it had already been bought. We had to wait until the right time to give it to her -- certain requirements had to first be met.

3. Everything we have belongs to God. He lets us use them so that we can serve Him better. This goes back to the story above about the car. When my daughter did receive the blessing of the car, it still belonged to us (her parents) but was available for her to use in order to help us.

**I guess it's been about four years since I wrote down those lessons learned. Now that the son is finished college and the daughter is in college, I have learned a few more lessons. One is that God is perfectly capable of taking care of my kids so that I don't always have to be there. Also, His Word is sufficient and can speak volumes louder and much more effectively than my words.**

Thank you for reading my blog and have a wonderful weekend!

River breezes and Symphony picnics

I am thankful that the weather here has cooled down a bit, even though we are still having some hot days. But today is really nice with some clouds and a breeze with 83 degrees at noontime. My job is located in an ideal place with direct access to a lovely riverfront. The city has fixed it up so beautifully making it a peaceful place to go during lunch breaks. Today during my lunch I walked down to the river to enjoy the scenery of the placid waters and the cool breezes blowing. It's always fun to look into the water and see turtles, fish and even once a snake. Some of my co-workers like to take bread or fruit and feed the turtles. A few days ago I was reading my book under the gazebo when the breeze blew my bookmark into the river. I chose not to jump in to get it since I had to get back to work. I probably would have made the same choice even if I didn't have to go back to work.

This week I haven't really blogged about anything deeply spiritual or meaningful. I'm just enjoying the little blessings in life. The perfect ending to this day would be if hubby will take me to the park tonight to listen to the symphony and have a picnic. If he doesn't want to go, I'll have to remind him that I went to the baseball game with him last week.

from Psalm 98...
Sing to the Lord a new song, for he has done marvelous things...
Shout for joy to the Lord, all the earth, burst into jubilant song with music...
Let the rivers clap their hands, let the mountains sing together for joy; let them sing before the Lord.

Picture of Aaron

I wrote a few days ago about Aaron cutting his dreadlocks off after growing it for seven years. Here is a picture of him with his shaved head and he is holding the dreadlocks! Isn't he cute??

If you think you're southern...

I got this little quiz in an email and I had fun taking it. I thought some of you might enjoy it also. My result was 91% which means I am so southern that it asked the question "is General Lee your father?" Now, that's pretty southern. So, take the quiz for fun and let me know your score!
Take the quiz now.

Rolling in the Grass

I have two dogs and they are the sweetest animals I've ever known. We inherited both of them at different times during my son's college years. They were both dogs that he got and then wasn't able to keep because he didn't have time to take care of them, so they ended up with us. They are a part of our family now and we love them. Our backyard is divided into two parts and they stay in the fenced back part of the yard. The front part of the yard has a lot of nice, green grass, so every time we let them into the front part of the yard, they love rolling in the grass. I took this video of them because it is so funny looking. Oh well, I can't get the video on here, so I'll just put a link....
Lacy and Emperor