A Friend to the End...

John 15:13 Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.

A Friend to the End…

I first met Benning in 2003 during my first F2K class. We were not supposed to wander the rooms but the rebel in me had me wandering and I run into him. He called me ‘toots’ our very first meeting and I’ve liked him ever since.(an endearing name he calls many)

He didn’t chastise me for wandering, instead he said I’d make a good mentor and that is when my mentoring days began and a friendship blossomed! My writing was taking off but I was finding more joy in teaching, helping and learning along the way.

I eventually became a lifetime member of WVU thanks to Mr. Hembree and by this time more and more friendships were just the seeds I needed to add to my flourishing garden. Benning and I were mentor’s on many levels, sharing tips, pointing out each others wrongs and rights but each day, each passing week, our friendship was growing forming a special bond.

Something happened a few years back that I won’t regurgitate, but I was no longer a mentor and instead of Benning just letting me go and wallow in my own self-pity party, he joined me and stood by when it was one of the most difficult times in my writing career. That’s just the kind of guy he is though. I thought I was special but guess what, each and every person who knows him thinks they’re special too, and I bet they are to him, in their own way.

Through PM’s, emails and facebook we never let our friendship go sour. We’ve had bickers and bites, and many food fights, but at the end of the day, we each wished each other well and rose the next day to banter all over again.

I never took him for a ‘bible’ toting kind of guy, but a year or so ago, like me he began posting scripture. I always got on him about before you post it be sure you live it first. You know, a sort of practice what you preach kind of thing? I think this was his way of getting in tune with God. I was really glad to see this growing change in him.

I remember a time when he went almost a year without the internet, did THAT hinder our friendship? No way. He’d go to the library almost everyday, to get a book of course, AND to drop me an email asking me how I was doing and letting me know how he was doing. Yup, our friendship just kept growing and growing.

So here I sit today missing my friend and his banter. You see, he had a heart attack a little over a week ago and it called for immediate surgery. A week after his surgery he is still on oxygen after being incoherent for a week and just yesterday he was taken out of the Critical Care Unit and put into his own room.

Still not running the halls and causing a ruckus, (which I’m sure he’ll be doing soon!) this is a step in the right direction and I await the day I get an update from his family saying, “He walked and talked today.” Or better yet, “He’s out of the hospital and is resting at home.” Well he won’t be resting at HIS home but his folks’ place since he needs SOMEONE to take care of him.

This is a man who always goes out of his way to make everyone else smile, a man who shares happy faces and emoticons as if it was bread for the day’s meal. He’s a happy go lucky guy now in the hands of the Lord who is walking him through a healing journey. One we’ve all taken at some point in our lives but now it is his turn.

After he returns to the virtual world (six weeks or more) and he weeds through the many, many well wishes on his facebook wall, sorts through emails and Get Well cards, he’ll come here and read this blog post and know that I will not give up on him and allow him to wallow in any form of self-pity, I am his best friend and his friend until the end. It’s amazing to see what a little writing journey for me brought into my life for a lifetime. I miss ya, Ben! Get Well Soon!

Thank you Lord.

Mark 5:19 Howbeit Jesus suffered him not, but saith unto him, Go home to thy friends, and tell them how great things the Lord hath done for thee, and hath had compassion on thee.

 

 

Poetry Sunday ~ He's Lost

1 Pet. 2: 25 For ye were as sheep going astray; but are now returned unto the Shepherd and Bishop of your souls.

His eyes, glazed over by

A darkness that crept in

While he slept

His heart full of emptiness

That swallowed him

As he waited.

His nails, filled with the dirt

He clawed from the keyboard

As he surfed.

His bile, morally corroded

By the lust in him

As he fed

His mind, self-absorbed

By a bloated ego and pride

As he’s led astray

His soul, claws and gnaws

Lost to the netherworld

As he dies.

2 Pet. 2: 15 Which have forsaken the right way, and are gone astray, following the way of Balaam the son of Bosor, who loved the wages of unrighteousness;

 

 

Living in Sin

Jer. 50:6 My people hath been lost sheep: their shepherds have caused them to go astray, they have turned them away on the mountains: they have gone from mountain to hill, they have forgotten their restingplace.

People love to read about OTHER people having hard times and struggling with life. Take for example what you read everyday (whether internet or the newspaper) Is the first thing you read about a lost dog whose found its owner? Good things happening in the world? No? You read about the house fire that took lives and a home. You read about all the negative things happening in the world and why? Because humans are wired to relish other people’s pain, it seems to me.

Please don’t give me the bull about it being the only thing that is being reported. That’s just hogwash, it is what you CHOSE to read, isn’t it? Just like my blogging days, you don’t read the Feel-Good posts (some do and I thank you) and my uplifting words, I get amazingly more hits when I talk about everything that goes WRONG in my life. Humans are hard-wired that way.

Now onto me living in sin: Here’s the gist. I am living with a man and am unmarried to this man. Period! Right? WRONG! It is sinful, I know this but it continues? I have been with Steven eleven years now. Sure it would be so easy to just walk away and give up on this friendship entirely but is that what would please Him?

Last year my friend at church encouraged me to get the much needed divorce from my ex to make things right with God. My ex kept saying for years that HE’D file and by last year and still no filing, I took it upon myself and God saw to it that everything went smoothly and the divorce was finalized. My friend also assumed that the divorce would open the door and allow Steven and I to be married, but a proposal never came. Did I weep and stomp my feet demanding marriage? No. Why? Because I really didn’t want ‘marriage’.

I am a female, living with a man. And that’s a sin?  I’m not having adulterated sex, hosting orgies, skipping from man to man, no, I’m a female living with a man who is taking care of me and my son; food, shelter, and the comfort of not being alone. And THAT is a sin? I don’t understand what makes one sin different from any other sin. Sin is sin, I get that.

So my church is against the ‘appearance’ of living as a couple and not being married in a spiritually blessed union. But isn’t judging me by ‘appearance’ a sin also? What makes it okay for them to sin? When mine is wrong ‘in their eyes’.

Last year when we had a ‘meeting’ with the pastor he flat out told me to leave Steven for a few months, date other people, and live life ‘outside of sin’, and if we found our way back to each other, marry, and THEN live together.

WHAT?

First of all, Steven is a caregiver! For eleven years he has taken care of me and we both have struggled through disabilities (his blindness and my arthritis in my back) and yet he STILL takes care of me. He knows I’m not eligible for S.S. or any other means of assistance from the government and yet he STILL takes care of me.

Second of all: Where would I go? No money. No family. Nothing. Just a son who still needs to get his license to get a job and a CAR!

Thirdly: Meet other men? No thank you! I have been with two men in my life and three strikes I’m out! So no, dating another man is not an option for me.

This judgment of ‘living in sin’ has placed enormous guilt on me. I never felt guilty before everyone started saying, “When are you two getting married?” and “Living in sin is a sin not accepted by Christ!”

So are they telling me that if we walked up to Christ, He’d look us in the eye and say, “I can’t help you as long as you are living in sin.”? Really?  Is this the Christ I’m eternally faithful to? Am I disillusioned?

NO I’M NOT!!!

I KNOW what the bible says about marriage. The sanctity of marriage is a spiritual sacred step that two people take in binding themselves together, til death do they part! Steven and I don’t feel that for one another and that is wrong? This is where my confusion creeps in.

I love Steven, he is my best friend who knows every ugly thing about me and I him. We’re roommates and nothing more and I’m being judged for living with my best friend? I have taken this to God and HE doesn’t judge us. HE knows us, our situation and has NEVER put on our hearts to get married so as not to ‘live in sin’. HE knows our sin, sent his Son to DIE for our sin and when people go around judging other people for their sins, I’d like to say, he who is without sin, go ahead, cast the first stone!

When I met my ex, I was 15. I married him at seventeen and we stayed married for twenty years before it fell apart. We knew it was broken and we made the decision to part. He let me down. I was spiritually bound to him for life and he let me down in a big way.

The blossoming friendship online grew to a physical friendship in person with Steven. I knew he didn’t love God the way I did and I thought I could ‘help’ him find God. Not by force, just by happenstance meaning by things that happened, he’d turn to God. And sure enough he did but then this trivial thing with the church happened and he’s giving up on God? How sad to watch his nine years of growth go right down the tubes. I think ego and pride, YouTube, gaming (works of satan) stepped in and snared him.

And now satan wants me to step aside and leave Steven to him? I don’t think so, satan! That is NOT how I roll! I will stay until he tells me to leave. I will be a caring, loving friend for his lifetime if he needs me to be. I will continue to show him how Christ works in MY life and maybe, just maybe one day he’ll be swayed BACK to Christ. Just because he’s giving up on God does NOT mean God is giving up on him!

Prov. 28: 10 Whoso causeth the righteous to go astray in an evil way, he shall fall himself into his own pit: but the upright shall have good things in possession.

Discouraged

Blessed are those whose every instinct, every impulse, and every passion is under the control of God’s Spirit! They will be right with God, self and others and enter the life which God alone can give.

(Dead to Sin, Alive in Christ) Now if we died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him. For we know that since Christ was raised from the dead, he cannot die again; death no longer has mastery over him. The death he died, he died to sin once for all; but the life he lives, he lives to God. In the same way, count yourselves dead to sin but alive to God in Christ Jesus. Romans 6:8-11

It is with great sadness that I write this. I’m feeling a bit discouraged and I feel THAT is what satan wants. How does one of great faith get discouraged?

I attend church on a weekly basis, I am spirit-filled on a daily basis, I spread love, scripture, the Word, light and love every chance I get, so how and WHY am I discouraged?

Let me tell you. People discourage me, recently my very own church has discouraged me and life in general is discouraging. People who share hate and scripture within three posts just about makes me lose faith in all humanity. Seeing people LIKE filling their screens with hate/judgment and watching others in agreement downright scares me.

I’m a sinner and it depresses me that I’m a sinner. No matter how hard I try, no matter how much love I spread, I’m still a sinner. I try NOT to sin but here I am LIVING in sin.

Things have changed at church since Pastor Mike left. We knew it would but didn’t think it would be so drastic as to discourage people from coming to church but here it is, the change that wasn’t for the better.

We’ve attended this church for the five years we’ve been in Nebraska. Whenever we had a need out of desperation we would turn to the church and lovingly they’d reach out and help. It wasn’t like we were sucking the blood out of the church and using them to give, give, give; we were desperate not having anywhere to turn and the church made us feel like helping us was a good thing on THEIR part. And yes, we DID give back to the church, just so you know.

On July first we hit a desperation level. Our propane was critically low, meaning we’d have no hot water, no stove, etc. Steven works and pays the bills but the propane has just been too hard to catch up on and they wouldn’t give us more until the bill was PAID IN FULL. So of course we asked the church, our church, the loving place you turn to in time of need. The place that makes you feel good knowing that God-loving people will reach out to you and lift you up.

That didn’t happen this time. We were asked to come in and fill out a ‘request’ form, stating our need and it would be ‘reviewed’, AND we’d have to meet with one of the pastors. No problem, we’re desperate. We went in and filled out the request.

Steven went in, had the ‘meeting’ with the pastor the next day and he said he’d ‘be in touch’. Five days passed and the pastor called and informed Steven they could only pay HALF and that another ‘meeting’ was needed.

WHAT???

Steven was wearing thin. The ‘meeting’ was set up for the FOLLOWING Tuesday the 15th because we were busy helping his mom after the major storm damage that she had. His sister had damage too, but she has kids to help her so we focused on mom on his day off. Tuesday was his other day off so that was the set meeting.

The meeting? It would be about us living in sin. It wasn’t about the help we needed, our cry out in desperation, any counseling on money management, it was going to be about us, living in sin! After the meeting, the bill would then be ‘partially’ paid.

Steven caved. He was hurt, depressed and angry. He went to church Sunday with some cartoon T-shirt on of the Thundercats? Something he has NEVER done. I saw as he was going down. I have NO CONTROL over his fall.

He cancelled the meeting. Told the pastor we hit a critically desperate point in our propane and would seek another way to get help. Pastor said he’d still like to have ‘the meeting’. Steven said no and that was that. He told me he could care less if we ever went back to that church. “How about another church?” I asked. He adamantly said, “No, I’m done.” He’s giving up on God.

So that’s where I am; lost and confused holding onto my faith and love of Christ. I did find comfort from a dear friend at church. *I* am not in a relationship with my church, I’m in a relationship with MY GOD! THAT should never be discouraged from mere mortals!

I’ve had no posts because my connection to the internet was limited. After a visit from server providers, they told us a few limbs on a tree were keeping our signal at its lowest. We set out yesterday and with teamwork, we removed the limbs and carted them off to the incinerator to be burned. They were too big, so they went beside the incinerator. The internet was back and all was happy!

Happiness is always short-lived. We were relaxing and watching the limbs burn and even put a couple of marshmallows on the fire… until a police officer came, squelching the ‘happy’ feeling with one breath! He said a neighbor must not like us. He called off the fire department, which was deployed, but it was too late, they arrived, fining us $150 bucks for a burn without a permit!

Seething anger filled my body. A hot despicable unleashing of very colorful words left my mouth. Satan was winning. (I did wait for the officer and the fire dept. to leave before I let my anger show at my nosy neighbor who called the police and is extremely jealous of us.) I didn’t confront them I just let off steam in the house and slowly composed myself and let it go.

But now *I’M* discouraged. Too much is happening!!!

Words of comfort from another dear friend:

These things I have spoken to you, so that in Me you may have peace. In the world you have tribulation, but take courage; I have overcome the world.”
John 16:33 NASB

"With all the beauty He surrounds us with daily and with all we get so busily involved doing, perhaps the trials and troubles are good to remind us to stay close to Him because though sometimes it seems to go on forever, this is all temporary."

I’ll hold onto that. I just pray Steven could understand.

Please hold your comments of “Jesus died for your sins, you are forgiven.” Jesus did NOT die so I could LIVE in sin! More later this week…

Is Freedom Free?

Matt. 24: 7 For nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom: and there shall be famines, and pestilences, and earthquakes, in divers places.

Is Freedom Free?

What is freedom? Our forefathers fought for our freedom; Freedom of Religion, Freedom of Speech, etc. etc. But today we live in such a culturally diverse land, exactly which religion is free? We are being overrun with immigrants, and do they get to have the same freedom of THEIR religions or is it jut the Christians?

We have the Jewish who have practiced their religion in America freely, the Catholic’s have had a prominent roll in America, now we’re being bombarded with the Muslim religion and I just have to wonder, what religion is going to be stopped if we are to remain a FREE country? Did our forefathers mean ALL religions? Unfortunately they didn’t have a time machine and the ability to see into the future.

Sometimes I have a hard time loving my country. While some will blame ONE president and continue down a hate-filled non-Christian like path, others will blame the real culprit, the screwed up congress. While some, like myself just scratch my head in wonder. How did we become so messed up?

Eighteen members of the Republican Party have served as president for a total of 88 years, while only fifteen of the Democratic party served for a total of 85 years. Now while many many Americans BLAME the Democratic Party for everything from why they don’t own a home, to why they can’t find a better job, to why their mother is a practicing Atheist, are they really blaming ANY party or just their own misgivings and shortcomings?

People die on a regular basis and now days in America, everyone blames Obamacare. I hate to tell you this but back in 1974 my grandmother died of Lung cancer. She HAD insurance and this year my cousin died of cancer at the age of thirty WITH insurance, so why are hundreds suffering with cancer now saying it is because of there lack of being insured under Obamacare that they are losing the battle with cancer?

I’ll tell you why. NOBODY wants to die and EVERYONE wants a fighting chance with healthcare. I’m going to tell you a little secret, as hurtful as it may be, not everyone will live even if they HAVE healthcare. Hundreds of millions have died with healthcare before all this Obamacare came about so who did they blame then?

I just read of a veteran who died three or four minutes away from the emergency room because the hospital had to wait for an ambulance to transport him, which took thirty minutes to arrive! He died before they arrived. Hospital protocol called for him to be transported via ambulance as opposed to nurses or doctor’s wheeling him over to the emergency room not three or four minutes away.

This is America people! This is the country who sends men and women to war to bravely fight for OUR freedoms while we sit tapping out our hate for the president of the year of your choice, for them only to return home and have that very government turn their backs on THEM?

This is the country thousands flock to seeking FREEDOM, get free meal tickets, free homes, free healthcare, while American veterans suffer?

Yes we have more freedom than say Russia, China, Africa, North Korea but at what expense is this FREEDOM? At the expense of our own men and women? We are a Godless nation. I can’t be proud of that. While everyone else is out celebrating the fourth of July with a family picnic, plentiful food, fireworks and celebrating with alcohol I’m sure, do they realize what we even celebrate fourth of July FOR? Freedom? Tell that to the vet who died!

While I can see hundreds maybe thousands of pictures ‘honoring the men and women’, ‘honoring this country’, I don’t get it, I just don’t get it. Posting a pic doesn’t seem to be honoring them, paying their medical bills is honoring them and that is just what our government should do.

While I’m very happy to be IN America, it is at times like these I’m not very proud to BE an American. And it has nothing to do with any ONE president it has to do with a culmination of bad choices of MANY presidents that makes the U.S.A a laughing stock.

Jer. 17: 17 Therefore thus saith the LORD; Ye have not hearkened unto me, in proclaiming liberty, every one to his brother, and every man to his neighbour: behold, I proclaim a liberty for you, saith the LORD, to the sword, to the pestilence, and to the famine; and I will make you to be removed into all the kingdoms of the earth.

Proof is in the...DNA?

Daniel 2:19-23 (NIV)
During the night the mystery was revealed to Daniel in a vision. Then Daniel praised the God of heaven and said: "Praise be to the name of God for ever and ever; wisdom and power are his. He changes times and seasons; he sets up kings and deposes them. He gives wisdom to the wise and knowledge to the discerning. He reveals deep and hidden things; he knows what lies in darkness, and light dwells with him. I thank and praise you, O God of my fathers: You have given me wisdom and power, you have made known to me what we asked of you, you have made known to us the dream of the king."

Proof is in the...D N A

Deoxyribonucleic acid, also known as DNA, is a scientists dream. He comes into the equation to study it and more times than not we buy what scientist sell us. Humans very readily accepted what Darwin was selling when he sold to the public the theory of Evolution. People all over readily accept some scientist selling some theory that the Earth is only 6000 years or so old, and humans are so easily confused, they don’t know WHAT to believe anymore.

Oh, they give an excellent story, and they even back it with what they deem as facts so humans eager to believe buy the fabricated story, and that’s just what it is, a fabricated story. So to this scientist, geologists are wrong, Paleontologists are wrong but HE is right? And you so readily buy it?

I’m not!

But he has facts you say? Let me ask you, have you SEEN the facts and touched a fossil to be able to say, “I know this to be true?” No? Then it is heresay. So much of that going around these days no one knows what to believe. I read the bible and you might ask me, “Have YOU seen the facts?” And I’d have to tell you in all honesty, yes.

You see, God doesn’t work with the facts in rocks or dinosaur bones, God works in your heart and soul, the very essence of the core of your thoughts. If you find Him there, you don’t need Him to write it on paper or some screen to show you the facts, He’ll give them to you first hand.

Recently I was led to something on the net that had me scratching my head for a second. ‘Proof of God Found’!! Wow! Finally, man has found proof? It’s about time. (I say that because I already had proof but to read that a scientist had finally found proof was kind of interesting.)

It seems WIT (Wyoming Institute of Technology) say that they found God in DNA strands. While studying DNA, junk DNA to be exact, the part of the DNA that didn’t seem to have any function in the human body. I’ll let you read the story, you be the judge.

1 Cor 6:19 “Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own.”

As the story states, God has left a message in our DNA. Why hasn’t this rocked the world? Why hasn’t this been front-page news if they found proof of God. I’ll tell you why. Because people don’t want to believe there IS a God. God could stand right in front of them and breathe in their faces, but they’d shrug it off as a hallucination. Man would rather believe in scientists who study rocks than the scientist who studies DNA.

Now you’re going to ask if I believe all of this to be true? Let me just say this, I’ve ALWAYS known God was in me, within my very DNA. I’ve never had PROOF because I’m not a scientist but I never needed proof or have I had the need to tell the world, for what, them to laugh and scoff? My proof is IN ME. As is any proof YOU need, it is IN YOU. It’s not out here in a scientists lab, it’s not on the web waiting to be discovered, it’s where it has been since the beginning of time!

Now I didn’t stop at the above WIT page, I dug further for this ‘God in DNA’. I found that a similar article was written in 2011. Basically saying the same thing but it had a different ‘message from God’. This is fascinating news and for three years it’s been hidden in the catacombs of the internet? The media is so caught up with movie stars and who shot whom, and some soccer events, and sometimes they report on disasters and stuff, but proof of God? Oh, that’s just silly!

Now let me tell you another fact, from the mind of ME! God left messages in the stars too, he left messages for humans and some thousands of years ago, people WROTE about them and actually made up this thing called ‘The Holy Bible’, but still, you’ll find disbelievers because they have no PROOF! Daniel didn’t need a scientist and neither do I!

For scientist, the proof of God’s existence is out there in the stars, the proof is in our bodies (DNA), to you and me, the PROOF, my friends is right before your eyes everyday in the message God Himself gives YOU! Think about it.