Strong Enough

Matthew West sings a song called 'Stong Enough'

"You must. You must think I'm strong, to give me what I'm going through..."

My friend received a heavy blow yesterday and my heart is heavy knowing what his heart is carrying. I am praying that he will be strong enough.

Love is hard.

It's not the first time he has had to bear this weight, and those days were hard. I took some words from him during those days and used them when I had to carry the same heavy, heavy weight. Those words gave me strength and now I give them back to him...

"Grief is an expression of love,

for if you love someone you will always grieve their absence

and for that reason,

grief is never a burden,

nor does it end

but it becomes a part of your life's rhythm...

as regular as breathing, eating, sleeping and loving."

Love is hard.

"Hands of mercy won't you cover me...Lord right now I'm asking You to be strong enough.

Strong Enough."

Andrew...my heart to yours.

Remembering

This morning in church Rob asked a question, "What has God done for you that you are thankful for?"

My husband was raised in a good christian home, but life there wasn't always good. He ran away from home when he was 16 and I am pretty sure he stopped going to church before that. When he was 14 his parents gave him a bible, he brought it with him through out his travels, packed in a box with other things that he never looked at.

Yet, it was because of his prompting that I started going to church. It was because of his encouragement that our children and I have been faithful to an awesome God...

God promised me that John would come back to the faith of his youth and for over 30 years I held on to that promise.

When he got sick it was an honor for my children and for me to witness the grace of God in his life, to see the peace and strength that God gave him, he took it and held on to it, he did not let go and neither did we.

After God took John home, I found myself paging through his bible. I found it unmarked except for one place, near the very end, 1 Peter 1:3 , underlined in the scrawling hand of a boy...

"Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! In His great mercy He has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead and into an inheritance that can never perish, spoil or fade - kept in heaven for you, who through faith are shielded by God's power until the coming of the salvation that is ready to be revealed...for you are receiving the goal of your faith, the salvation of your soul."

...the received promise held on to by a 14 year old boy.

I will never stop thanking God for remembering His promises.

Remind me

A song came on the radio and as I took it in, it was clear that it was a love song. It was a duet with Brad Paisley and Carrie Underwood, powerful singers who can sing the words with meaning! "Remind Me", it is a song about two people who have become comfortable in their life who want to be reminded of their passion. But what stands out to me are the words 'remind me'.

Remind me.

They remind me of some boys I used to teach in sunday school, they were a challenge! I had to come up with interesting ways to teach them, to say the least! The particular lesson I am remembering is about ebenezers. The story of when God had the Isrealites set up ebenezers by the river to remind them of how far God had brought them. The boys and I had collected stones and brought them inside to stack them up, one on top of the other, stuck with glue. They learned the idea of making markers to remind them of the times God had helped them.

God has filled His Holy book with reminders like this, reminders of His word, His promises... put them on your door, remember them when you get up, when you lie down, tie them around your neck, leave them by the river, stack them in the river...and remember.

Remind me.

This reminds me of The Beautiful Ache, a book written by Leigh Mcleroy, she writes,

"...and His Life-infusing presence makes my remembering a blessing not a curse. So I'll stack my memories like stones, the way the children of Isreal did as they crossed into the Jordon...some in the water covered over by the river never to be seen again and some on the brand new shore that waits for me. And I'll remember..."

Remind me.

...and I'll remember how far You've brought me.

Being Personal

I watched a favorite movie this past week, You've Got Mail. I love this movie, I'll watch it everytime it comes on TV. Among other things that I love about it, there is a quote in it that stands out to me, I wait for it.

"...and what's so wrong with being personal anyway? Whatever else anything is, it ought to begin by being personal."

I agree, how can anything have any real meaning if we are not personal, we ought to begin this way.

I've been reading through the Old Testament (the Message) and I've just started Chronicles. In his intro to this book Eugene Peterson writes,

"Names launch this story, hundreds and hundreds of names, lists of names, page after page of names. There is no true story telling without names...holy history is not constructed from impersonal forces or abstract ideas, it is woven with names...personal names that add up to a people of God, a holy congregation."

I have taken on a whole new consideration of reading these names, these were real people and they are a personal part of the story, they are true. God knew them.

On Sunday morning Rob talked about God knowing us, before we were knit together in our mothers womb, before our thoughts become words, no matter where we are, even in the dark. He knows us.

Rob used an example of David's conversation with God in Psalm 139 and we see how David knows God and talks to Him in a real way, Rob says "...his words are harsh, they are personal."

I love that. Knowing God, it ought to begin by being personal.

Choosing Life

I've been volunteering at the Abbotsford Hospital in the Cancer wing, it has proved to be a very fulfilling job.

This last Friday was an emotional day, from the moment that a woman came off the elevator, saying through tears "this has been a bad day"…to the six ladies that I helped in the wig room, we laughed and hugged and cried.

Then as my shift came to an end, a lady approached my desk, she was looking for Christin or Kate. Hmmm, I didn’t know Kate but Christin ...did you mean Kristen, Kirsten, Christina or Christine?

She was late. She was supposed to meet for 10:30.

I walked her down to Kirsten’s office even though I was quite sure she wasn’t there. While we walked down the hall, I asked her what she wanted from Kirsten. She wanted to pick up some papers that had been promised to her. When I asked her what they were about , she began to cry… It was to be her husbands ‘celebration of life’ the next day and she was expecting to pick up the foundation information and donation tracts.

Ahh, the Foundation.

So now we were looking for Christina who would help us find Christine who had the key to Kate’s office at the Foundation.

Yes, here they are, the papers and tracts in a purple file folder, she held them. Now she told more of her story. She wasn’t much older, in fact maybe younger than me. She lost her husband to cancer, just like me. She donated his eyes, so someone else could see, just like me. She was a widow, just like me.

There was a difference though, she has been a widow twice…life, death, death…

But this is what she told me “I choose to live with joy” she said “we have two ways to go, to be sad and bitter, grumbling, low with no hope or... looking for the good and going on with a smile, choosing life. I choose life...”

then she said, “…the trouble is, both come with tears.”

True, so true.

But even in our tears this is our hope...

"They will be His people, and God Himself will be with them and be their God. He will wipe away every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away." Revelation 21:4

The Truth will set you free

Our sermon on Sunday was on injustice, it was thought provoking and compelling.

I'm reading a book that speaks to this same theme of injustice. It is interesting how God speaks through people, sermons and books. I love that. He is telling me something.

I downloaded this book to my sony reader, it was offered for free and I thought I would try it.

The Swan House, a story of injustice, but also a story of faith and freedom. It's told by a young teenage girl and is set in the 60's, it speaks to the injustices done to blacks, to jews, to the poor and to the mentally ill and it speaks to death. It speaks to faith and standing by it.

Injustice, loss and faith.

We all have our sufferings our losses and what we see as injustices, we find ourselves calling out to God as Habakkuk did "How long Lord?" and "Can't You do something?" "Save him" "Save me..."

What I love knowing is that God loves to hear our hearts that cry out to Him...it speaks to our faith. Faith in Him. We all see or feel injustices, some of us everyday.

We can't all do everything, but we can do something... Pray, understand, search for Truth, have Faith.

Hope...besides, our Lord witnessed suffering ...He suffered too.

"No wound. No

scar?

Yet as the Master

shall the servant be.

And pierced are

the feet that follow

Me.

But

thine are whole.

Can he have followed far

who

has no wound,

No scar?"

"Our suffering will be used by God to help someone else who is suffering...it is never wasted...

God's Word is incredibly rich. His Bible provides us with all we need to know to live in this hard hard world."

Miss Abigale, The Swan House

Summer Thoughts

LTO is taking a break until the fall, for now I'll be posting a few thoughts through summer.

Well, my thoughts will be coming, as for summer, I'm not so sure...here's hoping : )

I hope you all enjoyed Canada Day!