My Dream Last Night

Jer. 17:14 "Heal me, LORD, and I will be healed; save me and I will be saved, for you are the one I praise." 

My Dream

Last night I dreamt I went inside my body. It was a machine with all the rusted wheels and cogs but my machine had stopped moving; my insides were clogged. I needed to find the source of why the machine wasn't working. 

I floated around and saw how rusty my insides were, I guess from toxins I ate all of my life. But then something caught my eye, something hard and round that looked like a leftover mint, it was just perfectly round, clogging the mechanism so it couldn't move.

I floated over to it and with a dentist-pick, I popped that little bugger right out of place! I held it in my hand, and floated around with my oil can oiling my system and I exited my body, taking the white lump of something with me. My body (the mechanisms) churned to life and began moving again like a well-oiled machine should. 

I woke in the morning, honestly thinking it was a middle-of-the-night pee, but the clock said 5:29, meaning I slept a full eight hours with only one romp to the bathroom at twelve. Haha, very funny the things we talk about as we get older.

As I always do, I thanked the Lord for another day to be alive and may I be used to do His will. Okay, now I have to put my jammies back on meaning I have to bend over. After an extremely bad day yesterday where my meds didn't seem to be working I did not think it possible. I put them on no problem, reached for my cane, and was on my way out the door and headed to the bathroom. I felt really eerily good after last nights fiasco.

I started the coffee and headed to my emails. I felt good, wow. I opened my Gmail to see twelve emails, an assortment of Crosswalk, Bible Gateway and such. Immediately God compelled me to open a certain one, A Prayer of Healing For Sick Family and Friends. I was thinking, 'Oh, God must want me to pray for family and friends'. After opening the email I realized, the message was for ME! Thank you, Lord! 

Now, remember that weird dream I had was still fresh in my mind and remains fresh as I write this. Last night at nine o'clock the pain was so intense, I rubbed lavender essential oil on my neck pain. Just one drop helped me feel relief. I thought no way, one drop? Off to bed I went to relieve the pain of a stress-filled day.

This morning I woke feeling refreshed and like I could tackle the day, so much different than these entire two weeks, with the ER and doctor visit. I felt that little pain trying to surface in my neck and I grabbed the oil. One drop-- the pain subsided, I continued on my day.

Here I am typing on a new document thing my hubby downloaded for me because MS Word does not work anymore. I'm writing for my blog, not writhing in pain! Thank you, Jesus!

Let me not forget the other email I received from Bible Gateway, titled Band-Aids Can't Fix Everything-- lead in scripture? Check it out “For You, O Eternal One, have come to my aid and offered me relief.” Ps. 86:17b (VOICE) 

What do you make of that stuff? Coincidence? Seriously? There is NO SUCH THING as coincidence! Mark my word, everything happens for a reason. My dream, the emails, they are the everything that makes me so strong and hanging on with the Grace of God. He loves me and will NEVER let me down! I had to share this with you to let you know, I prayed for all my friends this morning and an extra prayer went out for the sick. 

Keep the faith! God is alive!

Ps. 107:20 (NIV) “He sent out his word and healed them; he rescued them from the grave.” 

Beauty ~ To Each His Own

Pss. 36:2 “For he flattereth himself in his own eyes, until his iniquity be found to be hateful.”

As some of you may know, I attended a Catholic school from first to eighth grades. Daily I wore the uniform of the plaid jumpers with a white collared shirt for five years, to the plaid skirt and white shirt for another three. 

I never had to worry about competing with looking good to the other girls. Each passing year the time came for me to receive my hand-me-down jumpers from my shorter sister. Yeah, I was taller than my sister by second grade and even with the awkward unleashing of the hem the length was still too short, for me. 

All the other girls had new pristine jumpers every year obviously from a wealthier family but me and my little jumpers, we made it through five years, and the skirts lasted for three. Only on weekends and after school did I wear different, more comfortable clothes and I always decided that this was when I was defiantly going to show my body in a way the nuns would scoff.

I suffered from low self-esteem as a child always trying to be different and I would dress to where I would be noticed, whether it was in butt bearing shorts, halter tops or painted on jeans. I was being noticed; icy blue/gray eyes, long flowing blonde hair, a perfect size zero. It didn’t take me long to figure out that men (yes grown men) were not looking at me (a child) because I was cute, they were looking at me like I was a raw steak being fired up on the grill and they couldn’t wait to stick a fork in me! Certainly not the attention I was seeking.

As I grew, I matured and realized I didn’t need that sort of attention; my tastes in clothing grew, as did my self-esteem. Sure I was now a perfect size six, still long flowing blonde hair and icy blue/gray eyes but something had changed within me; I found God. No longer was I dressing for beastly men, I was now dressing for God! I wanted Him to notice the beauty within me and I longed to please Him in every way.

The problem with that was I was still being noticed in my modestly covered up body but no longer seen as a steak on a grill, I was being admired as a beautiful woman. People saw something in me and I’m most certain it was God shining through me; I had finally become the modest young lady my father could be proud of and the person my heavenly Father didn’t have to turn His head away from.

It saddens me today to look around and see the young girls dressing like they want to work the strip in their hot-pants and boob bearing shirts but I also see that men have not changed over my lifetime. Since the beginning of time man has lusted after the female gender, sadly young or old. Women have always wanted to be looked at and some of us will go to great measure to see our esteem lifted. I would never go to the lengths women do today with all of the plastic surgery from their noses all the way down to their butts. They NEED to be seen and men NEED to look. 

How can I help these young girls? Do I judge them? Do I laugh at their foolishness or do I show compassion and understanding knowing I was much like them once?

Besides pray, I’ll write. The only way to look beautiful and I mean REALLY beautiful is when you have self-confidence. You don’t need tattoos and to be pierced in every orifice to feel confident; you don’t need to dress in slutty attire to attract a man. A real man is attracted to inner beauty that exudes from you whether you’re dowdy or absolutely gorgeous. The beauty you carry inside is what finds the real men to marry, not the false bravado you traipse around and taunt men with. You need to know you’re worth something to YOU not just an object for men to be their eye candy!

I’ve seen many young girls walk into church looking like they were going out to a nightclub and yes, I would think what on EARTH possessed them to wear THAT? Then I remember…I was once like that too; in time they’ll realize it is only for God they should look good for, not for the MAN beast or the WOMAN competitor. Build confidence in YOURSELF, dress for YOU, see your beauty as God sees your beauty! He doesn’t see you with dyed hair, tons of make-up – He sees you naked and bare and what He sees is BEAUTY!

For the non-believers please know, if you’re dressed as a lady of the evening and you’re attracting men and boys, know that they’re not worth the air you breathe if sleaze is what they’re interested in. Maybe it IS what you’re interested in; a life with no breath. 

The Year Ends

1 Thess. 5:4-6  But ye, brethren, are not in darkness, that that day should overtake you as a thief.
Ye are all the children of light, and the children of the day: we are not of the night, nor of darkness.
Therefore let us not sleep, as do others; but let us watch and be sober.

Well another year has come and gone. I posted more this year than last year but less than the year before. Just in case you were interested. Has my year been great? Not really, it’s been about the same as the other years.

I am happy to report that my son graduated high school this year and that was a highlight I’ll not soon forget! The rest of this year whooshed by so quick I can’t remember too much excitement. But I’m okay with that, I’m a quiet gal that doesn’t like the outside world barging into my life, and I’m okay with that too.

While many people are out making resolutions before the New Year begins, I save my new beginnings for the reflective Lenten season that *I* celebrate that culminates in MY New Year.

I know you’re thinking that I reflect a lot and you’re right. You can’t expect God to move you to change if you don’t reflect on what might need changing now, can you? I’m still enjoying the Essay course that I’m taking and I’m still enjoying my position at WVU as a handy-dandy-help mate.

The next couple of months I’ll be reflecting on life, truth and me. Not some truth that man begs for or a truth that man tries shoving down my throat but truth and what it means to me. I’m not going to seek out this truth online or in some storage place that man has formed for himself and wants others to believe in his opinion. No, truth cannot be found in some book of the month. Yes I read the Bible but my faith is not based on just the bible or anything some scientist throws at me as fact. My faith is based on Him and Him who dwells within ME.

Mark 8:18 Having eyes, see ye not? and having ears, hear ye not? and do ye not remember?

I understand opinions are like eyeballs, everybody has them but not everyone uses them (and some can’t) but I like to use my inner eyes for my opinions, not a man made opinion accepted because that’s the flavor the month. Nope, my inner eyes are solely my opinions and rarely accepted or believed as anything BUT my opinion.

I’m very vocal with my opinion because I like to write, so I write my opinion down. I understand that people are human and that they base their opinions on what they SEE and read, can touch and feel but my opinion comes from something greater than what I see with my naked eye. My opinion is grounded in faith and what I FEEL. Maybe this is what God meant with the sleeping man will wake. Maybe he’ll begin seeing with his inner eyes instead of clinging to all the false opinions (not facts) of what others say or write.

Rom. 13:11 And that, knowing the time, that now it is high time to awake out of sleep: for now is our salvation nearer than when we believed.

Imagine a world where people are not so opinionated because of something they read whether in a book, in the news, the entertainment section, on some website, social or otherwise. We would need our inner eyes to see what was right in front of us. Our opinions would then be based on a reality of all we see with our inner eyes manifested into the physical world. I know I’m a rarity and I know this could never happen to ALL men. We just have to all hold on and wait for the day we’re called off this planet into a realm unknown to us. Our opinions won’t matter, all that we read won’t matter and all our human ways won’t be a part of what we become.

Maybe my New Year will be looking inside towards Heaven, because God knows, there is no Heaven here on earth. Earth is but a place for opinions to be formed not a place to shape a soul. A soul can only be formed from the INSIDE.

So while you’re here basking in all the prosperity, in all that you acquired or didn’t acquire, running barefoot and blind through the fields of life, remember it will all be gone in an instant and all you have to hold onto is your soul!

1 Cor. 15: 51 Behold, I shew you a mystery; We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed,

 

 

 

Are You There God?

James 2: 26 For as the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without works is dead also.

Are you there God?

I put a call out to God. Does He hear me? Does He know what’s going on down here? With all of the overused technology today, you’d think God would just answer his cell phone when I call on Him.

We’re in an era of overuse of technological gadgets. Our food cooks quicker, our phones need no land lines, our TV is much clearer and rarely do you ever get a rolling screen, we wash and dry clothes in machines and we sit on computers to spend hours of our precious time. It isn’t only the insane who have turned their back on God we sane folk are just as guilty.

Did you ever wonder why with all this technology God doesn’t use a cell phone? Like when I pray, why can’t I just dial Him up and have Him answer? Why? Because as much as WE’VE changed, God has NOT changed. He doesn’t need YouTube to reach you, He doesn’t need mechanical skills to wave His hand to have you prosper, all He needs is YOU, to turn your attention on Him. That’s it.

Since mass shootings are occurring more frequently, we tend to get the feeling God has turned His back on us and left us to dangle here without any help. It’s not true. God is here. The only way we hear Him is through SHOCK to our technological nation. You see, we’re so wrapped up in instant gratification, having everything here and now, we don’t have the patience NEEDED to wait on God, we don’t HEAR God’s calling out to us.

I asked God, “Are you here?” Ironically, He didn’t take days to answer just mere seconds. I HEARD even through all the humming coming from behind me through the computer, even with all the *dings* of notifications, the beep of the microwave, the churning of the washer; I HEARD!

I have an innate way of turning off the world. I didn’t have techno gadgets distracting me all my life so I knew what I was listening for. I had a phone with a cord that didn’t reach very far. I had a TV with a few stations, not hundreds, I hung clothes on the line and we used the stove to actually cook. Things like that is what keeps one focused on the here and now. I didn’t get my first computer and cell phone until eleven years ago, so really I have NOT allowed technology to taint me like it has so many millions of people.

There’s a video on YouTube (another idol distraction to the world). It shows kids seeing a corded phone for the first time. They only know texting and cells so this phone was so foreign they didn’t know what it was. When told, they laughed, “No way! You had to PAY to make a long distance call? No way!” They were kind of shocked. They couldn’t imagine living life this way.

Kids are so spoiled by technology they didn’t even know what dial-up was. When they were showed, they became confused. But when given their iPad, iPod, cell, laptop; they knew right away how to text and use the silly gadgets and how to easily get to the instantaneous internet.

Steven texted me one day and I didn’t even know that the odd ring on my phone MEANT a text call. What do I do? Respond? HOW? I see letters next to the numbers so I hit “k”. REPLY, wow, I did it. And suddenly I felt like throwing my phone out the window!

While Steven has been a techno freak for twenty-five years or so, I myself to this day can not fathom the fascination. I wrapped myself up so much with God, I didn’t see technology rising around me. I saw it as a distraction FROM God not a way to get CLOSER to God.

Now people can hand me the malarkey that technology, or better yet, the internet has a lot of GOOD in it, I tend to agree, to an extent. But within a good thing, there dwells evil always one step ahead ready to sway you away from the good. You CAN become addicted to the net no different than being addicted to alcohol. It will eat you alive, trust me I know, I’m still waiting for it to spit a few people I know back out.

So again, I ask, “Are you there God?” And quite quickly He responds,

“Yes, I kiss the earth every morning with the rising of the sun. I tuck it into bed with the setting of the sun. I sing to you daily in the chiming of the birds. I whisper to you softly with the breath of winds words. I wrap my arms tightly around you in your time of need. I fill you with abundance when it’s time to feed. I’m there right beside you in the simplest of tasks. I’m waiting for your response to everything I ask. Am I there in devastation, when no one thinks to care? I’m with you always, if you look, I’M RIGHT THERE!”

Wow! Who knew God was a poet? Me. How did I know? Because I use all six of my God given senses: I SEE Him. I HEAR Him. I TASTE Him. I SMELL Him. I TOUCH Him. And most importantly, I FEEL Him, because He’s been here inside, ALL ALONG!

Luke 2: 40And the child grew, and waxed strong in spirit, filled with wisdom: and the grace of God was upon him.