Touched by God's Love

This past Sunday morning, I headed to the restroom during the beginning of the church service. I had a wardrobe adjustment to make to the zipper on my dress thanks to Son #2. When I walked into the restroom, I saw two women there. One of them I was acquainted with as she was in my small group at our Fall ladies Bible study. I knew a bit about her life and her situation. As I moved toward a stall, I noticed this lady was crying. I kept moving into the stall to do my business and listened to her speak. She was crying because of something that had been said at the beginning of the service. That we basically come to the table before God empty handed and yet he still loves us. I came out of the stall, the other woman left and I began speaking with my friend. I wanted her to know she didn’t have to be embarrassed about crying. Tears are good. Tears mean that her heart is still soft and God has an entrance to her heart. She’d been touched by God’s Love. 

We come before God wretched—all of us—we have nothing to offer him and yet he still loves us. That’s a wonderful thing! But how many of us hear these kinds of statements in church and it just rolls over us without reaching our hearts? What does that say about us? Those of us who go to church, are we really being ministered to? Are we allowing God into us? Don’t you want to be Touched by God too?  I am reminded of the verse in Ezekiel 36:26 “And I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh.” 

God promises to remove our heart of stone and replace it with a heart of flesh. That is a scary and wonderful thought at the same time. Have we let God soften our hearts? If we have are we moving back to stone? In this day in age it is hard to let people get too close to open our hearts to them because we can so easily be hurt. But in the process we are closing off an important part of us even from God and our loved ones. I thank the Lord that I went into that bathroom Sunday morning and ran into my friend. Through her tears and soft heart, I was ministered to. God reminded me to keep my heart open and allow Him in to me. Maybe the next time I hear a statement like she heard this week, I too will be in tears as I have been Touched by God’s Love.

Surgery Update

Well, it's been over four weeks since I had my surgery and I am finally feeling back to my good old, regular self. My recovery has been slower that I had expected. A couple simple complications that brought pain. It kept me from doing a lot of things around my house. I couldn't even drive or sit up for long periods--and forget sitting in front of computer.

Last week things started to get better and I am feeling pretty close to normal now--whatever that it. I can drive, sit at a desk and I even got in the pool this week. I still get worn out pretty easily and have a little discomfort but other than that I'm good. :)

Well, school will be starting again soon which will take up a good portion of my time, but I hope to get some writing & promotional things accomplished before then so stay tuned. Have a good day.

Visions of Fall

Today I took these pictures of my yard in full autumn form. Our house is absolutely canopied by trees. In the summer, that means we stay cooler but in the fall it means we are inundated by leaves. Talk about 'leaf showers.' This first picture is taken from the back deck of the backyard. You can't even see the grass for all the leaf covering.

Here is the back deck-completely covered. An inch or two thick of leaves. We have some definite clearing out to do this weekend. LOL!

These last two shots were taken from the kitchen porch. As you can see, the leaves are so thick that you can't see where the driveway ends and the yard begins. In the further away picture, my flower bed is so covered that it's even with the driveway and has disappeared.

Leaves, Leaves Everywhere! That's what I get for living in a forest. ;)

Happy Fall to All!!