This just came up today from my Facebook Memories from 6 years ago today upon the approach of hurricane Harvey! Praise you God! I am thankful for your goodness toward me that day. Only he knew I was a single mom of 3 sons with an empty nest, with no family around me. He did not want me to feel alone!

 

YOU don't HAVE to read this BUT, I have to write it!!!

hurricane Harvey snuck-up on us around here today. If you took your lunch break from work to do a water and non perishables run the lines were way down the aisles! So by getting off time and back to the store by 5PM and it seemed like most of Huntsville was getting emergency supplies... just in case. There was NO bottled water to be found, much less a shopping basket. Everyone was friendly and courteous. I did look down on floor level shelves and discovered about 7 boxes of 3 gallons each at the very back where no one looked..a blesing for me and the few around when I made the discovery. Someone found me a basket so I could carry my 2 boxes. Then the gas lines!! Wow! But people were again so friendly and considerate of each other. At another store a lady at the checkout wanted me to have a 6 pack of her waters! At Kroger the employee at the pharmacy checked out my $50. worth of just in case items, even though I bought no pharmacy items. At a gas station the attendant gave me $5.00 worth of free gasoline due to some mistake a customer made. He said he had to cash it out. Then to top it off someone gave me dried cranberries (which I love), some Planters peanuts, and two big cans of whiskey rubbed baked beans which I have never tried! All that sweetness and caring just astonished me. It's the little things that are the big things in life!

 

 I Have to say thank you again these 6 years later to God for stirring people up with love for me! Total strangers moved to do random things so that I see, feel, and rejoice in his precious love.  I am amazed.

 

Love All, Hate Unrighteousness

The Lord God loves all. It is sin he hates. You can expect sin from the unsaved, and even then it can be a struggle to call on the Holy Spirit inside to love the sinner, and hate the sin no matter who they are. Further, when those who are the people called by his name who are follower's of Christ Jesus, who don't get that God himself has commanded to love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, and mind, and your neighbor as yourself is his greatest commandment given, and realize yes! my neighbor is my fellow man and woman. And yes, those I don't like, I am commanded to love! This is not easy! If you really believe your bible don't be so immature as to think he means for you to love only the ones you choose. Not so. Dear one, you must understand that the only way this can be possible for mankind is by calling on the power of the Holy Spirit that resides in blood bought children of the most High, God. You have to realize that the Lord God says, If you LOVE ME, you will keep my commandments. And with this we have come full circle. We cannot escape the Law of Love. Love the Lord your God To love as God requires us we must understand God's definition of love, and to grow in love. Hatred is not love! Return good for evil. Bless those who curse you. Love is made clear, if we WANT to be obedient to God and it is important we remember, If you love me you will keep my commandments. This means to grow in love. Here you find God's definition of love. I pray we all grow in love. What is impossible for man is possible with God. Heaven help us through the Holy Spirit which is in you if you have been born again. If not, call on the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, God's only begotten son who came to flesh through miraculous conception through the Holy Spirit of God and was born of a virgin and grew to be a man without sin who willingly withstood great humiliation, great suffering, and death by crucifixion to die in our place for your sin and mine that entered the world through one man, Adam. Behold the sacrificial Lamb, without spot or blemish, that takes away the sin of the world. For God as his great act of love gave of himself, his only begotten son that whosoever believes in him shall not perish, but have eternal life!
1st Corinthians Chapter 13. The love of God is the subject of the following:
13 If I speak in the tongues of men or of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. 2 If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. 3 If I give all I possess to the poor and give over my body to ( be burned that I may boast,[b] but do not have love, I gain nothing.

4 Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. 5 It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. 6 Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. 7 It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.

8 Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away. 9 For we know in part and we prophesy in part, 10 but when completeness comes, what is in part disappears. 11 When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put the ways of childhood behind me. 12 For now we see only a reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.

13 And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.
Footnotes

1 Corinthians 13:1 Or languages
* 1 Corinthians 13:3 Some manuscripts body to the flames

Holy Spirit of God our Father, Help us all to die to ourselves and live to you, and love you by loving our fellow man in their sin as Jesus did for us, and willingly, in obedience to you. For Lord how can we not be sold out to such a Savior?

Gypsy Soul. This world is not my home. Jan 05 2023

 Yesterday at the end of a yoga class after stretching and relaxing we were instructed to simply relax and to quietly go to our happy place wherever that was. As I began to search in my heart for my happy place,  I saw you, big as life! My little boy. There, out in the area where we always went to launch your homemade rockets. It was a chilly day, and I saw you. Precious, about 8 years old. You were such an amazing child. Full of the brightness of life, and happy. Your dad and I were there and together we all watched as the homemade rocket took flight. You were a beautiful boy. The total outdoor, trying everything, and excelling type. You had the wind in your hair and sunshine in your soul.  You never gave up when learning some new activity. You always mastered it. You were the only one I actually saw. You my dear were my happy place.

There we were, the three of us enjoying you as you enjoyed the rocket and being with your mom and dad. Already he was leaving us. We just didn't understand the signs. I knew how wrong things were, the not coming home from work till late into the night and drunk, always drunk. But, you were a little boy. and you hadn't noticed yet. Our lives were on terrible jagged rocks. If I could, I would go back to that time and grab you up and whisk you away. You would not have had to endure the years ahead when he totally and irreparably  turned his back on you. It doesn't matter anymore what he did where I'm concerned. Just what he did to you. And your brothers to come. How can a man let something control him until he destroys the people he should love and protect and nurture.Instead giving in to outrageous anger in his drunken state, became a monster not a man. Only a woman stood between. And she stood!

He hurt you terribly, emotionally and mentally.  He was your first heart break He left you before he was even gone. 

 Now you have left this earth full of pain and sorrow. A grown man with sons of your own. I can't speak openly of those things I saw that utterly destroyed you. 

God help all the little boys that are abandoned by their daddies,who grow up to be grown men with that echoing hurt of abandonment. The broken promises, the lies, the not showing up.  I am certain they carry such great shame and false guilt that they did something wrong that made them unworthy  of a father's love. Even though they were innocent and amazing children that any man in his right mind would have clung to and loved rightly, and cherished. 

You have been gone 3 years 2 months.(2 years and 3 months after your wife left this earth) Your sons, truly amazing sons, are 18 and 19 years old. (born 16 months apart) 

I was a careful mother to you and your brothers, to never speak ill of your dad to you. I knew you got your identity from the same sex parent. The awful thing is that you had to see as you became young teen, and came to understand and to be ashamed of your own father. You loved him yet hated him for what he was doing. He kept crushing you.

God help the children. So many experience this. It is a shameful thing when fathers leave their children to the wolves.

When I saw you in my happy place so beautiful. Innocent. Loving. At first I didnt want to look at you because it hurt so, and then I realized what a precious thing to see, to remember that little boy.

If only I could have looked in your huge blue eyes and said, 'You are enough. Daddies make terrible mistakes sometimes,and terrible choices that cause them to  lose control of their behavior. 

Enticed by a high, an alcohol addiction, a drug addiction, a sexual addiction, even illicit affairs become something that they love more, to their great shame. And to their children's great hurt, and harm to their psyche.

I believe you are in that place where there is no more sorrow. You are with a Father who always loves, and has your best interest at heart. You are home. I will see you again. This wandering gypsy soul has yet another reason to look forward to going home.

AMAZING THINGS

"Blessed is the one who stays awake/alert and remains clothed, so as not to go naked and be shamefully exposed.”

If you are worried about how you look in the physical think how awful it is to lose your Coach bag or Michael Kors shoes, your Calvin Klein pants SPIRITUALY. 

My favorite dress is a luscious navy blue Calvin Klein with gold buttons. I love it. It fits right and I feel right wearing it. We learn about fashion and feel it is important to us, however we need to learn to feel right living in the spirit realm successfully. (The spirit is the realm we will live in eternally.) So very important to put on Godly behavior. Unless of course you want to go through the agony of losing your pants!

Ephesians 4;22-24  Strip yourself of your former nature,--
You were taught, with regard to your former way of life, to put off your old self, which is being corrupted by its deceitful desires; 23 to be made new in the attitude of your minds;

24 and to put on the new self, created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness. 

When you were born again you inherited the nature of God. Live out of your spirit, not out of your soulish realm! By cooperating with the Holy Spirit you will renew your soul; what you think, what you feel, what you want.

Revelations 16:15  “Look, I come like a thief! Blessed is the one who stays awake/alert and remains clothed, so as not to go naked and be shamefully exposed.”

Stay awake, alert, aggressive and guard your clothes so that your nakedness not be shamefully exposed. Nakedness is vulnerability. 

No matter what style clothing you put on your body physically you are NAKED if you do not put on your guard, your best spiritually. Just like you purposely dress for success and with intention, you MUST put on your spiritual clothing intentionally! 

The bible says put on Jesus Christ : I belong to God, when I arise I am to deal in life as a representative of Jesus Christ with those in my household as importantly as those outside it. I will not be lackadaisical or given to my fleshly attitudes.

 I put on Jesus Christ and His attitudes. Col 3:12 ...

Put on behavior. Decide ahead of time to have behavior pleasing to God. Pray when you get up in the morning that your behavior be pleasing to God in all situations and he will help you to succeed.

You must stay spiritually dressed for battle for the mind is the battlefield. Unrelenting attacks on our minds...unrelenting worry, fear, concern about something are attacks that you mustn't be passive in. You must quote something out of the word like Jesus did in Luke chapter 4. Learn how Jesus did spiritual warfare. The enemy is a spirit that must be fought in the spirit. Not by physical acts. Don't let the enemy slide in your soulish realm in treatment of others, even in your thinking toward others, 

Have God thoughts. God has given us weapons and armor. Assault/aggressive spiritual acts and armor for protection.

Stop being passive and not really acting like a soldier.  We are soldiers in the army of God. Jesus is the Captain of the Host. He has given us his Name, and his Word, and God has given us weapons and he has given us armor. We need to know how to fight and win the war.

Peace--put on peace. walk in peace. 

Peace will protect your feet. The shoes of peace.

You are given self control according to Galatians 5 given last as a fruit of the Spirit of God. It is there to use! Put off the old nature. Put on the new nature. And remember, you are a soldier. As such you must not be lazy in this or discouraged. When you wake up in the morning you can do your own thinking not just what the enemy drops into your mind. Think what God thinks. He is for you and not against you. The enemy will sabotage you every time, defeating the purpose of God for you which is most certainly greatness!

Thoughts to pursue in next blog time:

The spirit of God clothed Gideon with Himself. Judges

Job 29 I put on righteousness. Walk out that righteousness.

Doing the right thing. Do not be weary in well doing for in due season you will reap.

  

As you dress in your No Name label or your Designer of choice realize the more important/most valuable, is to: 

Put on Love

Put on Mercy

Put on Kindness
Put on Peace
Put on Jesus Christ,  .. more later

Posting this for you because I Love YOU - Fear ...

An online study will quickly reveal that if you count words conveying, Fear not, Don't be afraid, Be of good courage, and the like are found 365 times in the Book of Books, the Bible. Fear comes to us in unfathomable ways if we can recognize it. The lyrics of this song reveal some we may not realize. God loves us a lot. He has been telling us down thru the ages to not be afraid, but rather trust in him. Genesis 15:1 After these things the word of the Lord came unto Abram in a vision, saying, Fear not, Abram: I am thy shield, and thy exceeding great reward. --Life will be better if we recognize the many faces of fear, and trust God instead of walking in fear. This is an ongoing lesson for me.

I

REMNANTS OF EDEN

Who hasn't  been soothed by the rain in a quiet moment? And who hasn't walked through the woods and absorbed the sounds the creatures make? Or noted the different birds who surely carol their story down through the ages from one generation to the next?

Who hasn't marveled at the sound of waterfalls, and rivers? It may be possible that there is someone who has not witnessed the constant surge of the ocean, the swooping seagull's  haunting screech awakening a lone shoreline.  How is it we identify?

Is there anyone who has not viewed the uncanny diversity of what the photographer's eye has witnessed? From the patterns of outer garments, the colors, and the textures in the many species of animal populations of the land, sea and sky? Not to mention, the multitued of shapes and sizes...Not to mention, the same overwhelming diversity in the whole botanical world as well, in the leaves, and flowers, the trees, the barks...Not to mention dragonflies, butterfly wings, and fireflies! I could go on and on from one mystifying anomaly to another from the depths of the ocean to the majesty of the heavens and heavenly bodies. 
I’ll

If you lend yourself it is mind boggling. Maybe you're too busy to be boggled.
Some say there is no purposeful, intelligent creative force and mind within all this.

How unfathomable this kind of creative mind is. Created free and gifted to us. It doesn't cost a cent. Oh we can landscape, garden, and capture, but that creative force is joyfully free in its' own self supporting cosmos. Created in a, self sustaining pattern from the beginning. There is no doubt  that the beauty and wonder that remains is only a glimpse of, as I penned before, a truly unfathomable creation. What we enjoy now is only a Remnant of Eden.

Every aspect of the natural world is taken care of.  The lilies of the field, the feathered zealots of freedom singing a matchless song down through the ages, remembering instinctively a time before the fall. Nary a one that plummets to the earth is overlooked by that creative mind.

All that and this poses a question, My Heavenly Father, Creator of mankind, and Maker of heaven and earth cares much more for you than these as it is written.  SO, believer, Where is your faith?