Children

Matthew 18:
3 And said, Truly I say to you, unless you repent (change, turn about) and become like little children [trusting, lowly, loving, forgiving], you can never enter the kingdom of heaven [at all].

36 And He took a little child and put him in the center of their group; and taking him in [His] arms, He said to them,
37 Whoever in My name and for My sake accepts and receives and welcomes one such child also accepts and receives and welcomes Me; and whoever so receives Me receives not only Me but Him Who sent Me......
42 And whoever causes one of these little ones to stumble and sin, it would be better (more profitable and wholesome) for him if a [huge] millstone were hung about his neck, and he were thrown into the sea.

Search yourself and remember being a child that did not yet know how to interact in the world. See yourself smiling and reaching out to all you met. Remember the shock at hurts done to you.

Remember the first time your cry for help went unheard. Think about getting up and going on when no help came.

I am not exempt from causing heart hurts to even my own children. I have always been very aware of the damage I did. When I was not able to be there for them another adult cared for them in my stead. I'm so grateful for that care. It's not the same as having your parent there, it's still better than dealing with life alone.

If not for grace I would have never escaped the due punishment for those acts. If not for grace my children would not have survived the harm done to their ability to love and trust.

We have made it through. I was being so hard on myself for so many years over it that it scarred my own heart twice; once in the doing and again in the regret and shame I carried.

But I remembered I was a child, too, who's needs were not always met by those that might have. Not that they would NOT meet them but that I was where they COULD NOT meet them. It was my final step from childhood and my first step to being an adult.

I was hurt. No one came to help. I had to make it to where I could be helped. I made it. But I had to get there alone.

How my heart burns for the children hurting today. I owe so much for the grace I was given that I reach out to each child I see in pain or confusion. I can't heal their hurts, all I can do is try to let them know that someone cares they were hurt and send them on to where they can be helped.

I pray them into His arms. I pray the ones that could not or are not there for the child into His arms. And I offer my hand until they can grow past the time of being too young to understand.

I don't understand so many things in this world but harming or failing to love and care for those small ones is still the part I don't know how I could fail at or how anyone could and live with themselves.

But we do. Amen for Grace and may healing, love, and comfort come to each sad child today - even you.

We may feel that we are old, worn out, usless; we are only children. We are each only a loving child making it's way as best it can.

Be kind to each other today. Pray for the children in this sad world. Reach out to one yourself and find the love in you growing again.

Hear Him

John 14
13 And I will do [I Myself will grant] whatever you ask in My Name [as presenting all that I AM], so that the Father may be glorified and extolled in (through) the Son.

14 [Yes] I will grant [I Myself will do for you] whatever you shall ask in My Name [as presenting all that I AM].

Why did Jesus repeat himself here?

Sometimes we are just dense. He knows us well. Even saying it twice in the same conversation somehow we don't hear what He is saying.

Just ask. Remember he heard you the first time. We may be slow or dense but He is johnny on the spot. And he doesn't say "Maybe" or "you can't ask for that" - He says whatever, anything we ask He will do that we may see God's power and glory is real, loving, unlimited.

Know He said "I will" and thank Him as you ask, because you may as well consider it done.

He said he would - twice.

Out of the blues

A chance meeting one day led to another the next. A song sent out ot the blue, played for the first time out of the blue, to one met out of the blue, led to a new friend. Thank you.

I won't forget that, with You, good can come out of the blues.

Please continue to show me how you even use the blues to make it a better world. The struggle to reach the light in each of us breaks the trail a little for the next one. When we learn what we reached for so hard in our hurt, we are a little quicker to give it to one we see that needs a hand. It softens our sad, sore hearts; teaches us to care better, I think.

Thank you for all the things You've brought to me, seemingly out of the blue. Thank you for leading me out of the blues again. Thank you Lord for the friends in my life. Thank you for their gentle ways. May the friendships we build between us bring You glory some way.

To U, my thanks

Thank you that my heart hurt me. It showed me I can feel. Thank you that I cried. It showed me that I can love and grieve the loss. Thank you that I was sad. I knew I could be happy again if I can be sad. Thank you that I can care still, though it seems one did not show a care for me. I care. That is the important part. Not that anyone else cares. I can not change that, but that I care past the confusion and the hurt. I still care and love.

Thank you that there are those that care. Let me always find them here. Let me always see past what my eyes see to let the eyes of my heart find their light. Thank you for those that can see the light in me and let me shine as I am for you. They are rare and precious to me. Thank you that I see the many diverse ways we all shine and love.

Thank you for the joy that came to drive away the tears. That I can feel joy in my spirit again after the struggle of my year. Thank you for the comfort of knowing that I have been blessed to be a blessing, not a burden or a trial to those I have loved.

I loved that phrase. I read it today somewhere. Blessed to be a blessing. I have been a bane, a goad, a trial, a burden, an irritant, a motivator, a judge, a sad, bad and miserable story in some of the lives I've touched. But there are those that I am a good story in their lives. I have been blessed with being a blessing to many this year. I like it.

So many of them do not see the blessing they have been to me. My companions, confidants, encouragers and cheerleaders - all of them have lifted me up and kept me going. I do not like to think about the story I would have without them in my life.

Thank you for the ones who care and that I see I am one of them still. I care again. It means I hurt again. So thank you for the hurt I feel.

I feel. I hurt. I love. Thank you.

Just a hand along the way

16 At this, Daniel went to the king and asked for time, so that he might interpret the dream for him.
17 Then Daniel returned to his house and explained the matter to his friends Hananiah, Mishael and Azariah.
18 He urged them to plead for mercy from the God of heaven concerning this mystery, so that he and his friends might not be executed with the rest of the wise men of Babylon.
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Job 6:14 "A despairing man should have the devotion of his friends, even though he forsakes the fear of the Almighty.
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Luke 6 So Jesus went with them. He was not far from the house when the centurion sent friends to say to him: "Lord, don't trouble yourself, for I do not deserve to have you come under my roof.
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Acts 27:3 The next day we landed at Sidon; and Julius, in kindness to Paul, allowed him to go to his friends so they might provide for his needs.
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Daniel was afraid for his life and the life of others. He asked his friends for prayer. Job felt friends should stick even through the hard times, the centurion felt unworthy and asked his friends to make a journey and speak for him, Paul's friends gave him what he needed. Simon carried the cross for Jesus.

There is more but that is enough for now to say you don't have to do it yourself. There is more than one human on the planet for a reason. We are supposed to be together. Joined in ways I can't explain, I know we are all interconnected. What grieves one, hurts one or helps one, does the same for us all.

We are alone inside ourselves when we can't share the truth of our thoughts, fears and feelings. It's the most lonely I have ever been, with no one to know and love all of me. To grant the freedom to another to be all that they are, good and bad, is the gift only a true friend can give.

If you have friends and are a friend life is good. Afraid, down on your luck, ashamed, without a way to get what you need yourself - that's life for all of us on one day or another.

Taking care of our friends as they care for us is helping one another live on and love.

On either side, the needy or the giving, you are what you need to be for Love to show on this earth. As the needy you receive the gift of the love that comes to you. As the giving you give the gift of showing love is real. Both are needed.

You can't show the love if there is no one that needs the love to be shown. We all need to see the love is real. Even a casual passer by may see the love in some one pulled over and changing a tire on the road. That person may be reminded to help when they next see a hand is needed and you never saw them drive by because you were busy with what you were doing.

God bless all my friends today. I love my family deeply, but they had to keep me, I was theirs. My friends have chosen me. I am so blessed.

No good choice

Sometimes none of your choices is good.

A new friend gave me that sentence to think about and it has been showing me the truth of itself for several days. We were talking about the few regrets we had in our lives and how it seemed some of them couldn't be avoided, then they said that. It rang in my heart as truth.

The obvious came to me easily. A burning building, a child in your arms on the third floor, flames up the stair case, a window nearby; neither choice is good, both have elements of harm when you are trying to provide safety. You don't get long to debate it with yourself. Can you carry the child down three flights, hold your breath and make it before the stairs collapse or can you pass the child out the window and drop it or do you jump holding the child. Decide. Now.

You can only work with what you have at hand. Sometimes you really do have nothing to work with and you have to make the call anyway.

If all the choices are bad, you still have to pick one and go with it. Then you deal with what results come from it.

You jump, holding the child to cushion the fall because there is no one to catch if you toss it. Broken ankles, arms, legs, feet, back, concussion, death; it's all there to discover in the next few seconds. Maybe you get lucky and the ground is soft, you just knock the wind out of both of you. You can't know until you jump.

But there is no good way to go. That is how it will seem to you. Hold still and wait isn't an option in that kind of situation. You have to make a decision.

Life brings us to places where we may have no good choice to make sometimes. It's down and dirty, low and hard. It is what it is.

Feed the kids, get gas for work, buy a beer, pay the rent all with the same dollar you don't have. You choose. You work with what that choice brings you.

Pay half the rent, get the kids a pound of burger, skip the beer, siphon gas from a neighbor or borrow to get some. It can be done. But none of them are really good choices to have to make. They are made in a million homes everyday.

If you are standing in a place with no good choices, there are no words I can give you to ease your decision. I have looked at it in my life, done the best I could figure out and lived to move on.

But I am feeling a little more forgiving of myself when I look at what I decided and what was available to choose from. There was no good way to go, but I kept going. Everyone made it. Not easily, not always happy about it, but we made it and we still love.

I didn't do so bad after all. I'm still living and loving. I'm going on.

Thank you friend, for the thought that in a place with no good choices the ones I made worked good enough.

And this thought comes from yours. When you have no good choices you are blessed if you have friends who will help you through them and love you whatever you choose.

By helping one another even the darkest day can hold love in it's gloom. Keep reaching out and caring and sharing and the choices will get better for those you have helped. Together we can do it, alone we can all stumble to a stop.

Holding a hand and moving on with a friend is what love is all about. The divine unity is when the last takes the hand of the first and the circle contains all of us.

Again, with the judgement calls

It was a strange weekend with MUCH music and fun. It also included much prayer and a blessing on me by a man I had just met who asked if he could pray with me. It was ending with a drive home about 4:30 in the almost morning. The stars were beautiful.

I was coming into the first of the last two curves before home when I just said to my self, "It's, for crying out loud, 4 in the morning and I am going to be BAD! I'm taking this (poorly banked and almost dangerous) curve on the wrong side of the road - fast and low!"

I'm such an outlaw! Sometimes, when I have been so good it hurts, and there are times that is just the truth, it hurts to be good. I feel like I have to do something bad to feel human again. I thought this was one of those times.

I dropped down to the left, where the banking is good and edged the pedal down to speed up. Yup I was fast AND bad!

At least, I thought I was being bad....

Then, to my right, in the proper lane - where I should have been - I saw the big (emphasis on big!) carcass of the poor deer that didn't make it across the road. I would have hit it with just my left tires doing 45 (the posted speed) just past dead center of the curve.

I don't even want to do the math on it. I think it ends up with trees and ditches and upside down, like in the movies when they launch just two tires on the same side of a car.....So I thought I was yearning to be bad, but maybe I had just heard an angel whisper to me.

It was wrong to be in that lane by our rules. Breaking them kept me here again.

I give up. Coincidence is going OUT of my vocabulary. When even being bad is good who's to say what's bad or good? I can't anymore.

If you figure it out, let me know.... But I made it home safe with a smile on my face and watched for a car pulled over that overheated. I saw it and said a prayer for them, they were already rescued.

Life just gets too strange sometimes even for me. But I am grateful for the prayers that day and the smile I have when I think on this.

Do what is right for you, don't harm another, love where you can, pray where you can't love.

You can't call the shot good or bad until you see what you hit and you may never even know you were shooting. Sometimes just a smile at the right time can lift another heart up and save it and you were just hearing a good tune on the radio.

Dear Lord, aim it for me. I've got both eyes shut waiting for the boom!

H2O

I watched the rain on my snow banks today. The contrast amused me. The snow was becoming smaller. It was becoming invisible as it transformed. I could see it changing.

I realized that rain and snow are both water. It's like the snow was learning from the rain what it truely is. Snow and ice are just water too cold to run or move. The snow that feels the falling rain is warmed by it. Then the snow begins to change and move.

Once it feels the warmth touch it, then the snow can change to water, too. It's free to seep into the ground. Running past it's frozen friends, it seeks the ground below.

Does one little snow flake show the next one, " Like this, see? Then you can run, too!" Or is it the raindrops that teach each flake to melt?

First the ones on the top roll down, and, as they move, the ones beneath them are freed. I see the free water from above teaching the snow it doesn't have to be frozen anymore.

Water for the earth or snow for the earth or rain for the earth; All the same, all are needed for the earth.

We are mostly water, they say. Are we, like snow, just another form, too hard and solid to seep into the ground? What shows us how to change and flow? What warms us so we can see the path to take to move?

Is love the rain for the hardness that is us? By seeing love flow by do we find the way to lose the hardness in ourselves and live? Can we show others how to love and change or do they each need to recieve it from above?

Rain drummed on the roof, drowning out other comforting sounds.The sound of rain on tin echoed in my ears. The tempo picked up, the force increased. It was all I could hear. But underneath, almost silenced, the wind spoke. The power of its voice changed the path of the rain. Easing it to where it's needed even as it falls freely.

Snow must flow from where it lays, rain can move where the wind carries it. Can the wind of love direct where we land or do we love from where we are?

The last of the banks that still decorate my yard are the snow that was compressed by the weight of all the snow of winter. It's more dense and compressed from the weight of the snow that was above it. It takes more warmth and more rain to thaw those hardened banks. Those preserved remains of the first snow to stay are the last to be freed to flow.

Some of those we see as harder to love may be the ones that carried the most weight in their lives. It's presses on them and makes them more dense and resistant to love. It takes more love to warm them and more love to show them how to flow freeling again. It's not that they are bad or stupid, it's that life itself made them doubt love could be theirs.

If we are the love and warmth to each other that frees the ones that are cold and hard we have to remember to spread it thick where those are hurt and hardened from the loads they carry here.

The rain became too loud. I coudn't hear myself think. I felt confused. With thoughts like this who wouldn't be confused?

Rain dripped from the trees, aimed right down my neck, as I left for work. I added my tears, unseen in the rain, to the flow of water toward the earth. I change yet again. There is a thaw coming inside me where a hardness has been wedged.

Thank you for the good day

I was thinking that the warm, sunny days are supposed to be good. But they are what thaws the earth. When the rain comes, like today, that thaw is bad. Our perspective changes.

It was good to walk in the warm and sun of that day but now it's results might be seen as bad if you have to get through the mud or have seed to plant.

Rainy days are supposed to be bad; Gray and gloomy inside days of chilly damp lower our mood. But we have time as a family that we don't have in good weather when we all scatter to our fun and chores.

Rain gives us water to drink, baths and showers. The crops will need it soon, to sprout strong roots. That makes a rainy day good.

When the earth is too wet to plant in and mud is too deep to walk through that's bad.

When we swim and drink and eat the grains and food that grew that rainy day is good.

It was bad when it rained but it's good later. It was good it the warm sunshine but thawed the earth. Neither day was good or bad, both are needed for different things.

The day itself, whatever it brings at the time, is only good in the long run. It's that we can only see a little way that makes us think them good or bad as they come. When you see the years of them behind us, the crops, the trees, the lakes and rivers you can see even snow and ice have been nessesary to life here.

It's a good day. Thank you. It took me awhile to see how to say this and mean it.

Today I might have no one to talk to. That might seem bad at the time. Tomorrow I might be too busy to write. That would be what I did when I had no one to talk to. The day I am in and what it brings it good, if I can remember to see it that way. I can stop whining that it's not the day I would have planned for me and just appreciate what I have in each one.

Not good, not bad, but all needed for my life to be grown and nourished. I can debate it with Him but I have to say I am learning to trust Him to grow me better everyday. I just had to learn to see it. It took a lot of days behind me to understand they all brought me to this one as I am now.

It's a good day. I am good with today. I know it seems an obvious thought all the way through but some of us don't see what may be obvious to others. I thought I put it out here. It will help me to remember to thank Him for the day and my part in it, whatever it may be, and mean it.