Temporary Absence

Hello my friends. I wanted to let you know that I’m feeling a bit poorly just now. It started last Thursday and we think I could have gastroenteritis. It seems to be getting worse instead of better, but maybe that’s the way of it. I’ll try to look in and read your posts, but that’s about as much as I can manage for now. I hope to be back properly before too long. Best wishes to you all.

For the Brokenhearted

O Lord my God, I come to You bereft in spirit with a heart that is breaking. My mind is in turmoil and I just do not understand all the anguish that seems to be hitting me from all sides. You know Lord exactly the pain that is in my heart and the sadness and grief that I am going through and I come to You, my God, seeking Your blessed peace in my heart.

Heal my hurting heart and bind up the lacerations that have penetrated so deeply into my soul, for You alone are my hope, You alone are my strength and stay. I have nothing and no one left but You Lord.

Bind up my fragmented heart I pray, as You have promised. It says in Your Word that You came to heal the broken hearted and to free those that were entrapped in the emotional suffering of their lives. Lord, that is my position now and I trust in You alone.

I give You my fragmented heart and pray for Your blessed peace, Your gracious peace, Your perfect peace that passes all human comprehension. Take me as I am Lord and fill me anew with your love and grace, for only through You can I be renewed in spirit, only in You can I rest in safety.

Thank You O Lord my God,

In Jesus’ name, Amen.

Dear Heavenly Father, You are the Creator of all things and You sustain all of life. I come to you, acknowledging that your will is best and that your plan is far greater than any I could ever ask for or imagine. Lord, I come to you with troubles that are weighing on my heart and the hearts of many believers. God, I know that you carry all burdens, and I ask that you share your yoke with us now during this difficult time. In Jesus’ name, Amen.

God, I want to be a person who stands firm and trusts You wholeheartedly. I want to be unshakable and resilient, but that can only happen by depending on You and trusting You. Develop that deeper trust in me, God I desperately need it and want to trust you more. In Jesus’ name, Amen. 

I waited patiently for the Lord;

he turned to me and heard my cry.

He lifted me out of the slimy pit,

out of the mud and mire;

he set my feet on a rock

and gave me a firm place to stand.

Psalm 40:1-2 NIV

You will go out in joy

and be led forth in peace;

the mountains and hills

will burst into song before you,

and all the trees of the field

will clap their hands.

Isaiah 55:12 NIV

Tranquillity

Drop Thy still dews of quietness

Till all our strivings cease;

Take from our souls the strain and stress,

And let our ordered lives confess

The beauty of Thy peace.

John Greenleaf Whittier (1807-1892)

Let us kneel

before the stream

of our lives

mining for those

golden moments when

we see right through

to the real: kindness,

laughter, innocence,

the light of all things

Then, slowly

release all the rest

allow it to flow

the way life will when

we learn what to hold,

what to let go.

Arlene Gay Levine

It was so simple. So average . . .

how could he find perfection

in such an

ordinary day . . . I realized

this was the

whole point.

Mitch Albom

The Prayer Box

Summary from Amazon

“When Iola Anne Poole, an old-timer on Hatteras Island, passes away in her bed at ninety-one, the struggling young mother in her rental cottage, Tandi Jo Reese, finds herself charged with the task of cleaning out Iola’s rambling Victorian house.

Running from a messy, dangerous past, Tandi never expects to find more than a temporary hiding place within Iola’s walls, but everything changes with the discovery of eighty-one carefully decorated prayer boxes, one for each year, spanning from Iola’s youth to her last days. Hidden in the boxes is the story of a lifetime, written on random bits of paper–the hopes and wishes, fears and thoughts of an unassuming but complex woman passing through the seasons of an extraordinary, unsung life filled with journeys of faith, observations on love, and one final lesson that could change everything for Tandi.”

I wasn’t far into the story when I wondered if I had downloaded the correct book. Was this really Christian fiction? The following extract, to me, has all the delicious eeriness of a Stephen King novel.

“. . . as I stood on Iola Anne Poole’s porch. It was my first indication of a knowing, an undeniable sense that something inside the house had gone very wrong.

I pushed the door inward cautiously, admitting a slice of early sun and a whiff of breeze off Pamlico Sound. The entryway was old, tall the walls white with heavy gold-leafed trim around rectangular panels. A fresh breeze skirted the shadows on mouse feet, too slight to displace the stale, musty smell of the house. The scent of a forgotten place. Instinct told me what I would find inside. You don’t forget the feeling of stepping through a door and understanding in some unexplainable way that death has walked in before you.

I hesitated on the threshold . . .”

After I finished reading the book, the story has stayed in my thoughts – the mark of a book well-written. The characters are realistic, struggling with believable problems. With her troubled background, could Tandi ever become a ‘good’ mother? Could she ever have the confidence in herself to even try? Would she ever trust other people? Could she trust God?

Extract

“I’d wanted to earn my own way, to do this myself, to form a new life on my own, but instead, this had been given to me. This life. This place. These letters.

This revelation. Prayers are answered in ways we don’t choose. The river of grace bubbles up in unexpected places.

I closed my eyes, and tears pressed hard, seeped through, traced hot and sweet over my cheeks. I tasted their salt, like the tip of an ocean.

“Thank you,” I whispered. “Thank you for this.” Zoey and J.T. could be sitting in a foster shelter right now, in a home with strangers. I could be in jail, caught up in Trammel’s mess, or dead beside a bottle of pills, gone just like my mama, while my kids still needed me. I could be living in Trammel’s house, existing in a fog, in the prison of believing everything he told me about myself.

Instead, I was here.

Thank you. I wanted to write it on paper and fold it up in a box to remind myself, the next time I couldn’t see anything but mountains ahead, that where there’s a mountain, there’s always a river flowing nearby.

Ultimately the river is the more powerful of the two.”

LISA WINGATE

Lisa Wingate is the #1 New York Times bestselling author of over thirty novels, including the instant NYT bestseller The Book of Lost Friends and Before We Were Yours, which remained on the NYT list for over two years and has sold over three million copies. She is a Goodreads Choice award winner for historical fiction and a Southern Book Prize winner. She lives with her husband in Texas.

www.lisawingate.com

Miracles

FIREFLY BY JEAN VADAL SMITH

The following is an excerpt from the book MY FATHER MY KING by Rabbi Zelig Pliskin

Hear your Father your King, the Creator and Sustainer of the entire universe saying to you:

The world in which you live is full of miracles so that you will have constant reminders of My presence.

There are miracles of history. There are miracles of biology and botany. There are miracles of chemistry and physics and of anatomy and astronomy. There are miracles of events that are mathematically improbable. There are major miracles and there are minor miracles miracles that are easily recognizable and miracles subtle and hidden.

What you refer to as “nature” is the manifestation of My will in the world. All of nature is ultimately a miracle. Don’t allow familiarity to blind you to the magnitude of the miracles that appear commonplace.

Every heartbeat is a miracle. Every cough and sneeze is a miracle. Every step you take is a miracle.

Keep your eyes open for the myriad miracles in your life. Seeing those miracles will add a spiritual dimension wherever you are and wherever you go, and your entire life will be filled with joy and gratitude.

Prayers for Mental Wellness

Heavenly Father, I come to You today seeking guidance. I strive to be your strongest soldier, but I cannot do so without acknowledging my own weaknesses first. Lord, help me to overcome these battles my mind has challenged me with. I know You are always with me, and any hurdles I face can be conquered with Your grace. My mental health is not at its best, but I know this suffering is not permanent. This too shall pass, and I pray that You will continue to watch over me as I fight my own personal demons. Amen.

Dearest Lord, thank You for always being there for me – both for all the good times, and the bad. I know my mental illness does not define me, for who I really am is a child of Christ. I may trip and fall every now and then, and it will hurt, but no pain is as eternal as Your everlasting love for me. Please continue to guide me as I get back on my feet. I shall not be defeated by my mental illness, for your healing hand will save me in my darkest hours. Amen.

Lord, the shining light of my life and my guide. You are the one who guides me through everything. Through these difficult times, help me soar like an eagle and fly. Help me to rise above and overcome my challenges, just as an eagle that soars in the sky. May I gain strength from Your word and from my prayers. I know that one day I will be free as an eagle. There will be no more shackles and not be held down by these weights called mental illness. I trust in You Mighty God who frees me. So give me the strength and renew me every day, till You come again. I ask these in Jesus’ name, Amen. 

Source: Christian.net

My Beautiful Day

My Beautiful Day by Marion Schoeberlein

I borrowed a poem from the sky,

and music from a bird,

I stole a chime out of the wind,

and from the rose a word.

I borrowed a song from the hills,

a psalm from the silver rain,

I took the footsteps of angels

out of a cobbled lane.

From each little thing I fashioned

something in my own way.

With God’s help, I put in my heart

a beautiful, wonderful day!

The Contemplation of Things That Fly

From The Book Of Idle Pleasures edited by Dan Kieran and Tom Hodgkinson

Because we can’t fly we are fascinated by the sight of things that can. I have always loved watching things that appear to be weightless in the air, not just birds and insects, but floating thistledown, autumn leaves, scraps of windblown paper, clouds, balloons and bubbles. Airborn creatures had the same kind of appeal to each of my children. Even when they were babies, lying in their prams, they were very quick to notice a bee or a butterfly or a passing bird, and their suddenly focused eyes would search for whatever it was a long time after it had flown out of sight. When they were older, say, three or four, they tried to emulate the birds by holding bunches of feathers, flapping their arms and jumping up in the air; and a few years later they copied them again by making paper planes in their image and tossing them off the hill behind our house. If one of these caught the updraught and floated away over the trees there was huge excitement, as if a bird’s own magic had got into it. Then the children would flap their arms again and run, leaping, down the hill.

Yes To Life In Spite Of Everything

I’m just about to begin reading Yes To Life In Spite of Everything by Viktor E. Frankl and, on reading the Introduction by Daniel Goleman, I had to share this:

“There are three main ways people find fulfillment of their life meaning, in Frankl’s view. First, there is action, such as creating a work, whether art or a labor of love – something that outlasts us and continues to have an impact. Second, he says, meaning can be found in appreciating nature, works of art, or simply loving people; Frankl cites Kierkegaard, that the door to happiness always opens outward. The third lies in how a person adapts and reacts to unavoidable limits on their life possibilities, such as facing their own death or enduring a dreadful fate like the concentration camps. In short, our lives take on meaning through our actions, through loving, and through suffering.

Here I’m reminded of life advice from the Dalai Lama on the occasion of his eightieth birthday, when I wrote A Force for Good: The Dalai Lama’s Vision for Our World. First, he recommended, gain some internal control over your own mind and how you react to life’s difficulties. Then, adopt an ethic of compassion and altruism, the urge to help others. Finally, act on that outlook in whatever ways your life offers.”

Autumn

Shades of Gold

So many shades of gold
Autumn
Another miracle we take for granted
Another expression of the artist’s vision
The blending of the autumn hues
with the setting sun
Warm
Comforting
Perfect
Thank you for autumn, Lord.

– Author Unknown

Golden Leaves

We see signs of summer’s passing in golden leaves,
shortening days, misty mornings, autumn glow.
We sense its passing in rain that dampens,
winds that chill, Harvest’s bounty placed on show.
Creator God, who brings forth
both green shoot and hoar frost,
sunrise and sunset,
we bring our thanks
for seeds that have grown,
harvests gathered,
storehouses filled,
mouths fed.
And, as your good earth rests
through winter’s cold embrace,
we look forward to its re-awakening
when kissed by Spring’s first touch.

– Author Unknown

For Those Whose Harvest is Poor

Creator God, for daily bread
and all who work
to bring your harvest home
we bring our thanks today.

Forgive our ingratitude
we who have so much
yet waste what you have given.

For those whose harvest is poor,
whose crops have withered,
water tainted, children starve,
help those who bring relief
and bestow on us
an unaccustomed generosity,
that all might share from your garden
and all might sing your praise.

Creator God, provider of all
we bring our thanks today.

– Author Unknown

JesuitResource.org