He Is Showing Me Again!!

David is doing it again. Showing me how much he loves me. He hasn't said another word about my mess up. That is him! Sometimes I wish he would yell at me or something, but he says I love you so much all I can do is forgive you. You know that it is like God's love, except God's love is perfect. God's love sent his only son to the cross to die for all our sins. God's love forgives us when we disappointment him, and it comforts us when we are afraid, or hurt. God's love is the beginning and the end, it has always been and will always be. Just think of how you feel about your child, or your spouse, think about that love. Then try to imagine God, who made us, provides for us, died for us, and is preparing a place in Heaven for us where we will never hurt again, never be sad, never have a need for anything. I am amazed at that love, overwhelmed in fact. God will never leave me. I know without a doubt that God sent David to me. My life changed so much when I meet him, and we married. I was running in circles doing that pleasing thing with people, but doing it all in the wrong way. Going to the wrong places, seeing all the wrong people. God sent me a man to love me, to care for me, and show me that I am someone to be loved. If only I had opened my eyes and seen that I was loved by God, just as he loves everyone. Please people look at the miracle of the seasons, the miracle of birth, and the miracles we see all around us. Realize that God is real, and sent his Son to die for you too. He came to give us life, and the Bible says more abundantly.That means a life full of joy, with sorrows, but with joy always returning. That is why I know what a blessed woman I am, not only did Jesus die for me, forgive me of my sins, and saved me. He has a place prepared for me with eternal life. He has also given me an earthly man who loves me, forgives me, and continues to show his love for me even when I mess up so bad. Thank you Lord Jesus for my salvation. Thank you for my David. Thank you for my life!!

Making The Same Mistake Over, and Over!!

I am having a hard time this morning, I messed up our checkbook, and David is very angry, and upset with me. I do not blame him at all. I know how hard he works for me, and I did not think about that when I didn't keep up with everything, and caused a problem. I have a spending problem, I know I do. The said thing is this, why do I do that? I know my joy is in the Lord, I don't need things to make me happy, but I have always done this. I also know I am a woman who thinks she has to please everyone, and that is the main problem. God is who I should please, and by doing so, I would treat everyone as they should be treated anyway. The answer to this problem is found in God, as is everything else. The thing I have not done is listen to him about money for a long, long time. I am afraid if I don't learn from God now about money, it will put a distance between David and I. Other than God, David is the only person who has shown me love like no other. I always felt like I had to please Mom and Dad, and every friend I have had in my life. David has loved me unconditional. He loved me through all the mistakes I have made in our marriage with money. He has loved me through all the times I was not pleasant to be around. He has loved me when I was very much over weight, and not in good health.He has loved me when I spent so much time wrapped up in the computer world. Why Lord do I keep hurting him? Please guide me to stop causing pain for David, and for him feeling like he is working so hard for nothing. I want to give this all to you God, I do not have the answer, or the way to help myself. I know that you can help me, you can tell me how to conquer this problem I have. I spend money at times, in fact a lot of times, trying to make others happy, and thinking if I don't, they wont love me. That is a lie from the devil himself. I do not like myself when I do this, when I hurt the one person who loves me the most, by trying to please others. I think about Sheila, who I thought was my friend for a long, long time. When I lost weight, she did not feel comfortable with me, and you know it did not matter what I had bought for her over the years, and anything. That shows that none of that matters. It is your heart that matters. It is what we do for God that matters. When will I get that through my thick brain or heart or whereever it needs to be? I actually hate money right now. I hate the problems it causes for me. It is the misuse of it that causes it, I realize that. Lord I need your advice, I need your help, and I ask you Lord Jesus to help me. Help me know how to get us out of this mess I have created. David does not deserve this at all. Lord I ask you to forgive me for hurting him, for disappointing you again about money, and for guidance. I ask you to take this problem I have, take it completely, forever, I do not want it back, I want to leave it at the cross with you. Lord you have guided me through other problems in my life, please show me the way with this one forever. I do not want money, pleasing others, and worldly things to control me like this anymore.I do not want this to rob me of my joy, my joy in my heart that I feel from you. Lord I ask this in your Holy name, Amen

Children of the World!

Let me share with you the most touching part of this conference I went to. A group of children from the Children of the World International Children's Choir came to sing for us. There are 3 groups of kids who travel the United States for 10 months each year sharing their Love of God in their hearts. The kids are from several different countries who are socially and economically deprived. Many of the kids have lost their parents due to preventable diseases, and tribal warfare. Some of the kids parents simply cannot afford to take care of their children. These kids have hope, and it is in the Lord Jesus. They travel to raise awareness of the plight of homeless and orphaned children all over the world. The goal of Children of the World is to generate compassion and inspire individuals to get involved in the World Helps Child Sponsorship Program. Our hearts were touched and forever changed after seeing these special kids. The smiles on all their faces when they sang about Jesus was truly a blessing to me. I wanted to hug each one of them and bring them home with me. We, in America, need to open our eyes and see the blessings God has given us. How many of you who are reading this were homeless? How many were without the love of a parent? How many of you go to bed hungry, or ever have? I know God has totally blessed me with Christians parents, always a warm, loving home, and I have never ever been hungry in my life. I thank God there are people out there who care enough, and will take the stand to try and change the lives of children who do not the needs in their lives. If you are interested in learning more, please go to www.worldhelp.net. May God continue to touch people's hearts to help these children all over the world.

Second Day of Conference!

Karen Kingsbury writes Christian novels, and I have read the Redemption series, or I will say I am in the process of reading it. It is about the Baxters, and Karen says her husband thinks she will become of her characters one day. What she wanted to teach us as women is that the story we are writing with our lives is real! How will our family and the other people in our lives read our story? We must as women slow down, enjoy the people while they are still part of our life. Learn to love the characters God has put in our life. We must also remember we have an enemy, which is Satan. He seeks to destroy the story we are writing with our lives. We must also remember there is a hero in our story, that is Jesus Christ. Think about who are the characters in your story, who your life story is writing about, andwho it is for. We all have hope through Jesus, and we are all heading to a happy ending if you have Jesus in your heart as your Lord and Savior. We need to be like children look beyond the clouds and see the sunshine. Remember that we only have one chance to write our life story, What will yours read? Also remember it is never too late to renew your life story in Jesus Christ. Our next speaker was Angela Thomas, who was a single Mom for 7 and a half years, and has a book out about being a single mom which I would advise any single Mom to read. She told us in a million years we could never imagine how much more God has for us. Have you tasted that the Lord is good? Just think about your life as a Christian, and you will realize that you have tasted how good God is. Read about the story of Peter, how once he got it, that is understood Jesus, he had a passion for Christ. Read in 1st Peter all about his story. No matter what season we are in, the Lord is always bringing us to the next place in growing up in our salvation. When life gives you what you never think you will have to go through, Jesus comes to get you, he gets the broken one, redeems and heals. He sent Jesus to do that for us. Angela Thomas wrote another book entitled Do You Think I am Beautiful?, it tells us that we are God's beautiful creation.As a woman we are his beautiful princess and he always wants us to be that. Sin separates us from God, but if we confess, and ask forgiveness for our sins, he will forgive us, and bring us back to his fellowship. Do we really see? Do we even try to really see how much God loves us? Put everything in Jesus hands, ask him to use you to further his kingdom. We must strive to be a true Jesus Woman! I learned so much about who I need to be, and I am discovering God's dream for me. Ms. Thelma Wells was our next speaker, who is better known as Mama T. She wrote a wonderful book entitled God Is Not Through With Me Yet, and I thank God he is not through with me for sure. She told about how her Mother gave her up, and her Grandmother didn't like her at all. When her Mother would take her to her Grandmothers, she would put it in the closet for the entire day, with no food or water. She had gone to church with her Great Grandmother and learned hymns. So she sat there in the closet singing praises to God. She is still singing praises to God today, at the age of 68. Process is a word God clearly spoke to her about. Her phrase was, Process is Progress on the way to Success! She has not had a easy life, not at all, as you can see from the way she was treated as a child. She told us no matter what we are going through, we have to learn to sing in the closets in our life. Sometimes in the progress we wonder what is going on, but God is taking care of us through it all. We need to learn to forgive who hurts us, give it up, and give it to Jesus. We can think anything we want, God gives us us a choice, the way we live determines how high we can fly. We are all special, and need to eliminate negatives in our life. Listen to praise music, it will help you accomplish eliminating the negative. Always have an attitude of gratitude. Always pray with a sincere heart to God. God wants our praise, he wants us to study his word, and wants us to talk to him. What we do for Christ is all that will last, nothing in this world will. When we stand before God we will not be judged for our sins, if you are saved, but we will be judged for our works for God. We should never do things to glorify ourselves, it is all to Glorify God. I want to be all I can for God, he has a Dream for me, and through his word, and my prayer time I will realize that dream, and fulfill his plan for me. I ask this Lord in your Holy name. I want to encourage all who read this to never give up, or give in, Trust God with everything.

EXTRAORDINARY WOMEN!!

I was privileged to attend a conference in Jackson this past Friday night and all day Saturday. The name of it was Extraordinary Women, Discovering God's Dream was the theme.Living God's dream starts with a willing heart. When I or you draw near to God, he draws near to us. God has a dream for all of us, me, my husband, my children, my grandchildren, everyone in the world. He created us, we are his Princesses, each woman in the world. We went to First Baptist Church in Jackson which was built in the 1800's and has a capacity of 3000 people. There were 3000 women in the Sanctuary, with 300 overflow in another area watching it on the big screen. Do you have any idea how it sounds for 3000 women to be talking at one time? It was amazing to hear all the excitement as we waiting for the conference to begin. I was extremely excited because the first speaker was my favorite Christian comedian Chondra Pierce. She had all 3000 of us laughing. She came out singing Heat Wave, with her own words about menopause, not like any of us know about that! I still have my Heat Wave at times. She told us one of the best things for us as women to do is wear PJ's and eat all day. I know I love to do that, I just try not to graze on food all day. She was very funny talking about wearing leather, and having a hot flash, told us only way to get those pants off would have them surgically removed. I am laughing now thinking about her telling all of the stories. She was the daughter of a Preacher, and the middle child. She explains as being the middle child you get blamed for everything, and then left out of a lot. She had us laughing saying that she was a Pentecostal Preachers daughter which meant hair up, and skirt down. She also said first born are control freaks, and the baby of the family is a whiner, which I am afraid I can see in myself. She told us no one has an excuse not to find a place to worship God in America, there are all types of religions, which she called washers and flickers. Let me explain! Washers are like Baptist who believe in immersion for Baptismal, and Flickers are like the Methodist she said, who are afraid of getting their hair wet, and they just flick a little water on you. Since there were people of all denominations we all had a good laugh again. She told us about a dark time in her life when she went through depression, and she has written a book entitled Laughing In The Dark, which I would recommend to anyone who is suffering from depression. She taught us about always being honest about how you are really feeling whether it is to someone, or most important to God. We must learn to focus on others, and think about what is happening in their lives, and not just about ourselves. She lives today remembering to remind herself: God grant me the serenity to accept the things I can not change, to the change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference. It was so refreshing to laugh about things, and remember that God gave us that laughter.She sang a song to close her time with us, and some of the words I wrote down and would like to share with you: It's all in God's hands. Realize that God truly loves me. God loves me, and he is with me, he will see me through. You are not alone. God loves me. She really poured her heart out in that song! Al Denson was out worship leader and he lead us in many praise songs. I could feel the presence of the Lord and see his love in the faces of women all over the sanctuary. He sang a song Take me to the Cross. It was about a little girl who's Father had always taken her to church. He told her if she ever got lost to find her way to the cross. In the song she does get lost, and tells the people who find her, just take me to the church with the big cross on top, and her Daddy is there waiting for her. It was such a beautiful song. We must all remember this line from the song, Daddy taught me about the cross, where Jesus died for all the lost people. Avalon, a very good Christian musical group gave a great concert to close the evening Friday night. I love their song Testify His Love. It goes like this, As long as I shall live I will testify his love. That is what we are here for, God made us to tell others about him, and to show with how we live as Christians that he loves us so much. In fact one of the praise songs says I am amazed by you Lord. How you love me, how deep? how wide? how great? is your love for me! I sit here writing this thinking about my Lord and Savior and how amazed I am he loves me. I know how unworthy I am, and how much of a miracle it is that God loved even me enough to send Jesus it suffer and die for me on that cross. I want all to know that there is room at the cross for everyone, he shed his blood for all.

Taking Life One Day At A Time!

This is what I did today, I slept till 8, then got up, ate a biscuit with cheese in it, that my husband cooked for me, then I got my shower, dressed, and headed to Jackson for a Doctor's appointment. Seems like most days are busy lately. I like mornings to just make me some coffee, sit, sip on it, and talk to God. I need to learn to get up earlier so I can do that everyday. I found myself saying my morning prayer in the shower. I love to write my prayers, it keeps me focused on everything I need to talk to my God about. It has been very hard lately because I had some surgery on my right hand. Typing seems to be easier for me right now. We stopped in Forrest looking for me a winter coat today. I did not find anything I liked there or in Jackson. As I talked to the Doctor today I realized I have not been taking care of myself as I should. My protein was way too low, and one of my vitamin A's. It is very important to keep a good eye on my blood work now that I am 2 years our from my gastric bypass. I was really afraid I had gained some weight but I actually had lost another 8 lbs from the last time I saw my Fibro Dr. I went straight to the Smoothie King and got me a Gladiator which contains 45 grams of protein, and I am suppose to have at least 60 to 80 grams a day. I know I have to really work harder at taking time to eat more meat, and not run in the kitchen and get junk food. When I am in Jackson I am so thankful to know I am coming back home to the country. I could not handle that many people all the time. lol The ride over there and back was really nice today. The sky was bright blue with very few clouds, and the colors of fall were oranges, reds, yellows, and browns. I feel so alive when I take all that nature has to offer! I could think of so many things I need to do at home, but I was reminded by Jesus that I can only live one day at a time, as my Mom so strongly believed and lived by. One day, one minute, one moment, what more do we need? Just thank God for each one of them, and make them count for Him. I am so thankful to have Jesus in my heart, as my Lord and Savior. He is in charge of my days, my minutes, my moments. I would never want to be, I know I would miss them all up. Oh I could be, I could not ask him to guide my day, but I know he knows what is best for me, and I will do all I can to follow him in faith each day he gives me here. Things in America could change, and not for the good. The person in charge on our country does not have the values God has given us to live by, through his word in the Bible, but God controls everything. So as Christians we have to place our faith totally in him, as we should all the time. God gives me each day, so why would I want to trust anyone but him? We got home kinda late, and yes I admit I was very tired. I didn't get to Wed. night service, and I know I missed a blessing. I love to go to church, and learn more, and more about God. You know that is the joy of Christ, no matter how old we get, we never stop learning from his word. I have learned that I must first ready my Bible, then pray, that way God can lead me to pray the right way. I cooked some small steaks on the grill, and we sat down, thanked God for the food, and the day. I now will end my day by reading my Bible and spending some quiet time in prayer with my Heavenly Father. I encourage all who take the time to read my blog to do the same. He has some wonderful to tell you and me!!

Looking Forward to the Rest of the Year!

It is my favorite time of year again. The coolness in the air makes me feel more alive. I love to swim, and love the fun of boating and all in the summer, but when Autumn gets here, the leaves change to their beautiful colors, and three of my favorite holidays come. I was driving through Stonewall the other night when they had Trick or Treating. They had it on Thursday, because football on Friday night is a big deal in this small town in Mississippi. It brought back lots of memories of Halloweens when I was a small girl there walking the sidewalk with my friends, and having so much fun. The sweet thing about a small town is everyone makes it fun for the little kids. There were people taking kids in trailers with hay pulled by trucks and 4-wheelers. The little boys with Spider man suits, of course Batman, and my favorite little cowboys. I even saw a few ghost, and vampires. Little girls with Tinkerbell costumes, Cinderella, and witches. I think I had every one of those costumes when I was small too. I know my two oldest Grandchildren had enough candy to last them the rest of the year, and then some. Now it is time to think about Thanksgiving here. We go to a camp house out in the middle of the woods with all of David's family. There are two lakes there with canoes, and paddle boats. A building with ping pong tables, and lots of hiking trails. Last year it was raining so we all stayed in the big room with a fire, and played games and talked. The funny thing is this, and I have noticed this at family reunions too. You go to see all of your family that you don't see usually but once a year, but when time to eat, and really the majority of all the time you are sitting and talking with your immediate family, the ones you see all the time. I find that really funny, and wonder why we all do that. I know even though tough times have come for my family, we have so much to be thankful for this year, as always. I hope everyone will look beyond their situation and see the entire picture, and realize the blessings we have had this past year. Right after Thanksgiving I get excited to start decorating the house for Christmas. I love it!!! As I open up the box with all my ornaments and place each one on the tree, I remember how I got each one. Some date back to the year David and I got married, while others tell of my kids when they were small. I always place a new one for each child, and Grandchild on my tree each year. In fact I really need to decorate two trees this year. I like to use the traditional colors of red and green because to me that is Christmas. The one thing I love so much is this really beautiful Nativity scene I bought a couple of years ago. I try to always help my kids to see that the real reason we have Christmas is to celebrate Jesus Birthday. To think that our Lord and Savior was born in a stable, which like I tell my Grandchildren it was a barn. He came to this world for us! Well, I could write about Christmas all night, as it is my favorite holiday. Each morning I have been sitting in the dark by the fireplace, drinking a cup of coffee, and remembering I am loved by an amazing family. I am blessed beyond words for having them. I hope you are enjoying this time of the year as I am. Just please take time to make a list of everything you have to be thankful for this year. Maybe share it with your family, or ask them to make one too!! God bless all of you.