THANKFUL THURSDAY...I am so lucky to be married

Yesterday, I joined my husband for lunch with an older gentleman that my husband has been reaching out to. Joe is 90 years old. He enjoys our company because he is lonely and has nobody else. Joe lost his bride of over 35 years a few years ago, and he is simply lonely.

After lunch, Joe gave me the tour of his home. The thing that struck me is that everything that his wife had decorated their home with was still intact. As he showed me around, he pointed out all of the things that his precious wife had bought. Afterwards, the 3 of us sat in his living room and talked. We listened and Joe talked, mostly about his precious wife, whom he missed so much.

I have been thinking about Joe and his wife and the precious memories that they shared and how even after her passing, Joe still thinks about her. And loves her and cherishes everything about her. This kind of love is priceless and sometimes only comes around once in a lifetime.

When life is hectic and we wonder what it would be like on the other side, may we never forget how good we have it. When I pull up to a stoplight in my run down, unwashed, litter filled vehicle, it is easy to glance over and be envious of the tan faced, blonde haired, single woman sitting in her shiny, bright red convertible with the top down. It may look like others have a better life than you, but the truth is many people are lonely and live a fast-paced life because they are looking for something. Fast cars, money and fame is just a way to fill a void they feel in their life.

I am so lucky to be married and to be loved and cherished! We (my husband and I) may not have much, but what we have is simply priceless. No money or fame can replace what we have. Someday, when I am 90 years old and someone sits in my living room, I will be able to sayto them, "I am so lucky to have had the journey with the man of my dreams!"

PROVERBS 5:18, 19 "Rejoice in the wife of your youth...May you always be captivated by her love."

I am thankful for the memories and the love. Marriage is not being confined to the corral; it is being saddled up for one of life's greatest rides!

Today, I am linking up over at THANKFUL THURSDAY, where grateful hearts are joined together each Thursday. IRIS is our host this week! Come join us!

WEDNESDAY WEEKLY WORD ...is it a wonderful life?

One of my favorite Christmas movies is It's a Wonderful Life. A story about a man who hates his life and hates his daily failures. George looks back on his life, but all that he sees is his failure. Failure at being successful, his failure of being a good husband, and even his failure of being a good provider for his family. But then an angel gives George a chance to see life without his "failures."

Instead of seeing his failures, he sees a life without his successes.

At the end of the movie, George realizes he had made some great impacts in people's life's. And with each life that he touched, the love and encouragement just spread like wildfire, from one to another, like ripples in the water.  Even though he saw himself a failure, his friends and family saw him as a success!

 

Isn't that like us to focus on our failures instead of our successes? All of us think we have failed at something, and most of us have failed at something. But instead of focusing on the bad, why not set our eyes on the good?

 

In last week's YOUR OPINION MATTERS POLL, I polled the readers to finish the following sentence, "Sometimes I feel like I have failed..." The top 3 responses were:

 

1. 66% of those voting said they feel like they have failed God!

2. 44% voted and said they feel like they have failed their children!

3. 33% responded and said they feel like they have failed themselves!

 

These are all some pretty major failures that we feel. The pressure of doing good, being accepted and striving for excellence is great! But when it is all said and done, when we fail the ones that we love, there is still one thing left...

 

LOVE! George discovered this one thing and we must see it as well....love never fails!

 

1 Corinthians 13:8 "Love never fails."

Love that comes from God is unending and unstoppable. This love is extended to us not only in our successes in life but also in our failures. His love will never fail us, it will never let us down, it will never cease. There is no "up"or "down" in your life that will change the Word of God. It is unchangeable, there is nothing that can happen that will stamp an expiration date on God or His love for us. His love never fails.

 

Our love for one another also has this same substance. Loving others is unconditional. It is not dependent upon if someone lets you down or fails you. Peter denied Jesus 3 times, even after he swore he would NEVER deny Him. (Matthew 26:33-35) Even though Peter failed Him, Jesus never stopped loving him.

 

You will fail. You will fail others and others will fail you. But in the end...love will oversee the failures, because love never fails...it is truly a WONDERFUL life when we realize that love cannot fail!

   

A PIECE OF MY HEART...everyone is afraid of something!

Do you have fears? I think all of us are afraid of something. I only have a few fears: I am afraid of drowning, I am afraid of heights and I am afraid of mice. I am not only afraid of mice, but I am afraid of small mice, large mice, pet mice, and dead mice. All of them ... if it answers to "mice", I fear it!

All mice to me is just... creepy. It may be a little thing, but those little, creepy things just "creep" me out! I remember one time (and my family remembers it well too, as they laugh out loud) when I reached for the saltine cracker box from the pantry. As I reached into the box to pull a sleeve of saltine crackers out, a little mouse jumped out of the box. I threw the box, screamed hysterically and started jumping up and down! It literally scared the heevy jeevies out of me! Meanwhile, as I was having a complete meltdown with a total cardiac arrest, my family stood across the room laughing hysterically at me.

Wrong decision. For my family, that is. My fear was NOT a laughing matter. They laughed, I did not. They claim that my hysteria scared the little rodent so badly, he probably dropped dead of his own type of cardiac arrest.

Fears...it can really stop us in our tracks. If not rodents, I dare say that each of us have a fear of our own. Possibly it is the fear of failing or the fear of letting someone down. None of us like the feeling of fear, but sometimes God uses our fears to get our attention. Fears can alert us to danger and it can even motivate us to get out and do whatever needs to be done.

DEUTERONOMY 3:8 "The LORD is the one who goes ahead of you; He will be with you. He will not fail you or forsake you. Do not fear or be dismayed."

God always provides a way of escape for us. Give your fears to Him; watch and see how He will bring calm and comfort to your life. He will not poke fun at your fear, but He will help you to overcome it!

Broken Alabaster

Mark 14:3 "and being in Bethany at the house of Simon the leper, as He sat at the table, a woman came having an alabaster flask of very costly oil of spikenard. Then she broke the flask and poured it on His head."

Have you ever felt broken? So broken that you were dependent on God's power to fill in the empty cracks?

After reading this passage in Mark, where the woman anointed Jesus with oil, I could not get my mind off of that broken flask. Often times, when I come to a low place and feel broken, I want to hang my head. But I realize now that being broken, if broken before the Lord, it is not something to be ashamed of.

The oil that covered Jesus came from a broken vessel. In order for His anointing to be poured out upon us, we sometimes have to be broken before Him. It is in these times, we depend upon His power to bring us to the place He needs us to be.

When is the last time that you allowed Him to break you? Are you overdue for a pouring of His cleansing, healing Holy Spirit?

May today be a day of healing, as we saturate ourselves with an outpouring of His Spirit!

My Beloved

It is almost hard for me to believe that over 30 years ago, I met my husband. We were just teenagers when we met. Often times, people ask us how we met and they are always surprised when we say, "church". We were in the same youth group and our families attended the same church.

After a year and half of dating, we married at the young age of 17 (me) and 20 (him).

Fast forward now...

That was 29 years ago. This weekend as we celebrate the hand of God bringing our lives together into one, I am amazed at how God has always been with us. Through the good times (births of our babies, watching our kids grow up, taking vacations, laughing and loving each other) and yes, even in the bad times (deaths of loved ones, loss of jobs, financial hardship, saying goodbye to grown children) - through ALL of it, God has remained at our side. And we have remained with Him and each other.

One of the things needed for longevity in marriage is commitment. Not only do you need to be committed to your marriage, but also committed to serving one another, loving one another, cherishing one another, adoring one another, listening to one another, and understanding one another. When commitment no longer lives in a marriage, it is easier to give it up than to work at it.

The same is true of our relationship with Christ. To be a thriving, growing Christian...we have to be committed! Committed to loving Him, praising Him, adoring Him, honoring Him, pleasing Him ... committed to serve Him in the good times and the bad.

Today, I choose to be committed to my beloved. Not just my beloved whom I married 29 years ago but also my Beloved Lord, Who knows everything about me and still accepts me as I am!

I love you!

THANKFUL THURSDAY...youth and prayer

Yesterday was the annual See Ya At The Pole (SYATP) at many schools around the country. This once a year event marks a time that christian students can rally around their school flagpole and pray for their schools.

This event is student-led and it always brings joy to my heart to see youth praying for the battlefield that they must enter each day. The older generation many times just does not understand the younger generation. They don't understand their music, their culture, and how they do things. Times have changed. The style of music has changed. The style of clothes has changed. Even the style of worship has changed. But the one thing that has stayed the same and will never change is the power of prayer!

I am so thankful that the younger generation is joining the older generation in this belief. Prayer can move mountains, and I believe it can also move some young people to make an impact on their generation!

I am thankful for my daughter who led her class at her high school yesterday morning in prayer and for ALL of the students who boldly made a statement around their school flagpole yesterday. May their schools catch on fire ... with the Holy Ghost fire, that is!

(that's my daughter, in the center, leading the sophomores in prayer)

What are you thankful for today. Join your grateful heart with ours over at GRACE ALONE, Iris is our hostess for THANKFUL THURSDAY this month!

WEDNESDAY WEEKLY WORD...living in a dream world

Common sense tells us that we cannot give our loved ones everything that they might like. Our pocketbooks probably keep us from doing that! But even if we could afford giving the world to them, would we? Would it be good for them or even good for us?

Sometimes it is easier to just say "no" to things that seem impossible. What if instead of dismissing the thought of giving someone the world, we did our best to honor them by attempting to make their dream come true. Instead of saying "I could never do that!", we turned around and attempted to make it happen?

Maybe some dreams are out of our hands to fulfill, but isn't love extravagant at times? To love someone is to go all out. To love, sometimes, means putting YOUR desires aside and bless someone else just because that is what love does.

This extravagant kind of love is the kind of love that God has for each of us. His kind of love meets the needs of our heart. While we were yet sinners, it seemed impossible to have love, joy and forgiveness, but yet God reached down, touched our hearts and blessed us with His gift of love and forgiveness.

EPHESIANS 2:4,5 "God, being rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in our transgressions, made us alive together with Christ."

In last week's YOUR OPINION MATTERS POLL, I polled the readers the following question, "Do you have a dream that is still unfulfilled?" The top 3 answers were:

1. 28% voted and said that they have a dream to travel.
2. Another 28% responded and said they are still dreaming of writing a book.
3. 14% voted that they dream of getting married.

Some of our dreams take money to fulfill, some dreams take alot of money. But yet, other dreams just cannot be bought with money. Dreams like finding Mr right and settling down, or dreams like having more time with your loved ones. These kind of dreams are what I call dreams of the heart.

Dreams and desires come in all sorts of shapes and sizes. But no dream is too big. We serve a BIG God and He cares about the desires of our hearts. His love is extravagant and He will make a way for your dreams to come true.

So, go ahead and keep living in your dream world, your Father owns a Kingdom and His resources are unlimited. Dreams are made to come true!