I Fell in Love

1 Cor. 2:9 “But as it is written, Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him.”

I fell in love...all over again…

I’ve been in a relationship my entire adult life. I’ve known love, lived love and loved love. I’ve been with Steven for thirteen years now and though we didn’t instantly fall in love when we first met we were instant friends via the internet.

We had both just come off of bad relationships so you can see why we never decided to get married for many years after we met face to face. Our idea of love was tainted by what we had been through in our past and we were damned if we were going to make the same mistake twice. 

He never really knew love because lust is what drove him in previous relationships, and that’s all they were, relationships. He hadn’t known love, true love. As for me I was a child of circumstance. I yearned for love and would take anyone who dared to show me love and it is what kept me married for 20 years, until I became a woman and realized love wasn’t about a man controlling and obsessing over you, it is the feeling that two people share in becoming one complete unit. 

When I made my way to Texas, I wasn’t ‘in love’, I loved him dearly but in love meant something totally different. The years passed and I fell ‘in love’ to the extent that we both fell and knew a union was the difference. We married last year because we knew that this was the final road for us. It wasn’t the beginning and it wasn’t an ending it was the communion of love spreading over us that we knew had to be completed in the form of marriage.

This is the instance where definitely two worlds collided, farm boy meets city girl. Opposite ends of the world meeting in the middle and hitting it off like the Fourth of July firework displays. We’ve had our ups and downs but more times than not we’ve relished many more ups. We complete each other and yesterday it hit me (not for the first time) that he’s my husband in every sense of the word. 

When we first met he inundated me with lyrics, lyrics that spoke to me better than the songs themselves. When we met face to face the lyrics stopped, he then began playing melodies on the saxophone and well, city girl just melted like a snowman holding a candle I’ll have you know!

It was kind of beautiful watching from the inside, the love growing in leaps and bounds. We went from lyrics, to melodies to movies; all of which we had in common and we now share our lives as if we only live for one another. 

We’ve never been a couple who celebrates Valentine’s Day, not because we don’t love each other but because we DO love each other, every single day and Valentine’s is just another holiday that is over commercialized and I might be the first woman he’s ever met that said, “No thanks” to chocolates, to diamonds, to gifts, to the mushy froo froo for Valentines day that so many other women EXPECT.

I’ve always written him a poem because well that’s what I do; I’m a writer. This year was no different except for the fact that it was our very first Valentine’s Day as man and wife. It felt different too, especially when he made me a video with clips of all of our favorite movies (that we watch over and over again).

It started off:  

Groundhog Day - “Whatever happens tomorrow or for the rest of my life, I’m happy now because I love you” 

School of Rock - “You’re the cats pajamas, you’re the bees knees!”

Mr. Deeds - “Hard to breathe, feels like floating, so full of love, my heart’s exploding.
Mouth is dry, hands are shaking, my heart is yours for the taking. 
Acting weird, not myself, dancing around like the Keebler elf.
Finally time for this poor schlub, to know how it feels to fall in lub.”

E. T. “I’ll be right here.” 

A Beautiful Mind – “I’m only here tonight because of you. You are the reason I am. You’re all my reasons.”

Lord of the Rings – Smeagol – “My PRECIOUS!”

Casper- “Kat? Can I keep you?”

A movie with Andrew Lincoln, Rick from The Walking Dead – Showing sign boards to his love – “To me, you are perfect. And my wasted heart will love you
Until you look like… A ZOMBIE?” lol

Forrest Gump – “I’m not a smart man, but I KNOW what love is.”

Wall-E – Eve hugs Wall-e upon seeing him alive out there floating in space. She squeals and kisses him. He drifts off in orbit dazed by love!

Then we cut to “You’ve Got Mail” ending scene that looks a little like when Steven and I met. (Well they’re a lot better looking (not much) but you get the point. I was so glad to see him and meet him for the first time in REAL life, not from behind a screen. And the REST is History! 
The scene comes alive with the song – Somewhere Over the Rainbow!

I love my honey! More today than yesterday but half as much as tomorrow. 
And he TRULY loves me!!!

You Can't Force Love

“The price of anything is the amount of life you exchange for it.”

~ Henry David Thoreau

You Can’t Force Love

Can you imagine a heavenly Father forcing himself on us and making us love Him? Or trying to guilt us into loving him unconditionally? No, I can’t imagine that either. That is why we have a thing called free-will, we have a CHOICE to love the Lord or not to. We can love Him from afar or have an up close and personal relationship; the choice is ours. 

Relationships, whether earthly or spiritual, work two ways. Let’s say a person gives love but the receiver doesn’t return that love, but expects more and more love from the giver without ever acknowledging the heartfelt sentiment from the giver. Does that sound like love of any kind?

Take for example God. He gives you love, you receive it but never ever thank Him for all the love He has given, then when you’re down that’s the first thing you want is your Heavenly Father. 

Do you have a relationship with God where you do all the giving and He does all the taking? I myself cannot see a God that doesn’t reciprocate the love you give to Him. I can however see mothers and fathers and children with earthly choices choosing to do all the taking without ever an ounce of giving. I can see children growing up in the ‘me generation’ making love all about them without ever giving the love that it takes to get some in return. 

The children today are all about what THEY need, what THEY want and never thinking far enough ahead of what was given to get to this point of wanting and needing. Children today are very selfish and always worrying about their wants and not focusing on Him. It’s a hard realization when we come to terms that life is not about US, it is about Him and the sacrifices we must make to be at peace and have a relationship in a clogged-drain world. Kids today don’t realize the severity of not having Him first and foremost but they’ll learn, one day. 

True stories:
I have a niece born out of wedlock, an illegitimate child. Her mother forced child support, while bio-dad forced visitation rights. A compromise was made and thirty years later all involved has a mutual love-filled relationship; all because of CHOICES made in FORMING the relationship.

I have other nieces born out of love but torn apart by divorce. The choices of the mother and father to have relationships and be involved in their lives make the world of difference between bitter or self-absorbed. 

I have a son, who was born out of love who was torn apart by divorce, never seeing or knowing his dad since he was seven and as an adult now makes the CHOICE in whether he seeks out or has ANY relationship with his father. He chooses not to have one and I won’t FORCE him to do anything different because he’s an adult now. 

Some parents build a fantasy world for their children like telling them Santa exists and will bring you presents only for the kids to grow and realize their parents lied to them. If they lied about Santa, Easter Bunny and Tooth Fairy what other lies were told that you, as an unknowing child, bought into? I’ve seen over the years so many kids torn apart by lies and deception only to find out later the truth. I never lied to my son about Santa, he never knew him whereas I tried to FORCE my God and all of MY opinions on him and it backfired. I didn’t lie to him about God, but I tried to FORCE him to love God.

God will never FORCE himself upon you. He gives you truth as a gift and it is up to you to wrap your mind around the giver or let it blow in the breeze like a self-entitled receiver. When we lie to our children by giving them what we think they want to hear, it is going to backfire and hurt the children in the long run and in the end FORCE them into making decisions as the adult they’ve become. We can no longer make decisions for our adult children because they have already formed an opinion. Either from what we forced on them, lied to them, or tried shaping them into.

I always told my son the truth about his father and our relationship and it is now up to him as an adult, to shape whatever if any relationship will be had later in life. The choice is now his, I can’t make it for him. God gives us the CHOICE to have a relationship with Him. My son now knows it is up to him to have a relationship with God and as an adult, he makes his own choices. Mom can’t save him now, only God can do that.

The CHOICE is always yours!

“A perfect relationship is two imperfect people who refused to give up on each other.”

A Different God?

Philippians 4:6-7 (NIV) “Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.”

I have a question. Do any of you feel that you are worshipping, having faith and following a different God than the God Moses, Noah and Abraham followed and listened to? Did they have a ‘different’ relationship than the one you and I have?  Someone said, that Moses and Noah had “Faith and a very personal relationship of actual communication on which to rely.”

This statement befuddled me. ‘Different’? ‘Personal’? ‘Actual communication’? He went on to say, “We have 66 books to search, read, take into our hearts, and ponder. Our Faith in Him may be rock-solid, but we base it on His Word.” But does that mean we have a different God? In no way does it mean that. The God of Abraham is the One and only True LIVING God. In no way shape or form is He different now from way back then!

While the statement of Him being different might be true to those still searching for Him. The readers and believers of the Word, it is not true of me and MY experience with God. For one, we have to trust that man dictated the WORD in its entirety. We have to trust man through many translations in knowing what God Himself was saying. We are left to ponder His Word, not drink it in and bathe in it; there IS a difference.

Well I’m telling you right up front, if you don’t have a very REAL and PERSONAL relationship with GOD, (yes the same God of Noah, Moses, Isaac and Abraham) then you my friend will be tossed about in utter confusion and caught up in every wind of doctrine. God did not always speak to Moses via the burning bush. If you read and believe, you’ll know this to be true.

We humans are extremely limited in our vision, that is that we can only see that which is material. God is not material. To have an up front personal relationship with God, you must embrace the spirit and I don’t just mean the Holy Spirit sent to us in the New Testament, I mean the God Spirit walking with us from the beginning of time!

I very clearly understand that God does not speak to me as He spoke to Adam and Eve, or to Moses (via a burning bush) and the many others He spoke to, but my faith is not built on just the Word of God put forth in scripture. My faith is built on the Word’s of God spoken to ME.

A few months ago, January to be exact our minister who had been serving our church for 14 years left. Why did he leave? He said God placed on his heart to go and tend this other church that was weakening. He was called by God to go and tend that church and try to assist in reviving it.

Is that any different than God telling Noah to build an ark? Moses to free His people? I sincerely don’t feel it is much different, and yesterday’s service physically showed that to me. Pastor Dave had a break and Pastor Tim was told to give a sermon of what God placed on his heart.

When you attend church, you will physically SEE God working in the heart, mind and soul of a follower. If you don’t attend church you more than likely will only see what you want to see, read and believe from the scriptures. 

Pastor Tim made it clear. If you are an intellectual Christian, your faith is based on intellect, knowledge of the Word. Christians the world over have to give themselves completely to God. There is a balance of the will, the mind and the heart that takes place and in that relationship you’ve formed with God, He speaks to you! Yes, the same God of Abraham, Isaac, Noah and Moses. You balance the intellect (head), the Word (will) with God Himself  (heart) and are SHOWN the TRUTH of His Word via Him, placed on your heart, not man’s interpretation of what God places on your heart. (I’ll touch more on the balance later in the week)

Acts 2: 17 And it shall come to pass in the last days, saith God,I will pour out of my Spirit upon all flesh: and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, and your young men shall see visions, and your old men shall dream dreams:

From Pastor Ron of the Titus Institute: “We see that man forfeited at the fall, direct communication with God on a personal basis. He then only received direct revelation through intermediaries. God communicated infrequently and only as He deemed necessary to fulfill His redemptive plan.

When we get to heaven we will have direct communication with God again. That is part of the blessing of redemption.

2 Cor.5:8 "absent from the body present with the Lord."
1 Cor.13:12 "For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then I shall know even as also I am known."
Praise the Lord!

Then how does God communicate to His people today?

Through His Word, the Scriptures.”

I understand the ‘personal’ relationship between God and Moses, Jacob, Abraham and Noah and the others. I understand the relationship of the trinity God (OT), Son (NT) and the Holy Spirit (NT), yes, via the scriptures, and with that knowledge I balance my servitude to the Lord and have a whole and entirely DIFFERENT relationship with God than say the intellectual Christian. < (the man who only seeks knowledge of God)

I have a very personal relationship of actual communication on which to rely. Just because mine appears different than theirs, it is essentially no different at all.

Thanks my friend, for stirring my mind and giving me more to ponder. And thank you God, for placing a very meaningful sermon on Pastor Tim’s heart.

More to come later this week…
 

Isa. 43:10 Ye are my witnesses, saith the LORD, and my servant whom I have chosen: that ye may know and believe me, and understand that I am he: before me there was no God formed, neither shall there be after me.

Commit to Writing

As we begin our writing journey, oftentimes we lose sight of our obligations and fall prey to the things that are important in our life. We find ourselves distracted and get carried away with everything else BUT writing. That is not a writer.

Writer’s need to learn commitment to the craft. So many times do I see writers, old and new, (admit it) lose interest in writing over and over again. Even I myself have lost interest a few times but when I commit to a course I see it through to the end, just to satisfy myself and no one else.

I recently signed up for a five-week course that I had wanted to take but fear of so many no-shows kept me away. This one showed promise as about six people all signed up for the course. Sure the first week people conversed, by the second week it had slowed and by the third week I was alone, losing interest myself from the inactivity.

Week four I went in and asked if everyone had bailed. I got a response a few days later. There you have it, I bailed on the course too. I see this all too often at the free seven-week writing course. People saying they have always wanted to write, can’t wait to get started, and soon afterwards, the site is left with a few determined hangers on.

So you want to be a writer, but you are not willing to commit to the craft? When you decide to become a writer, it is a relationship not much different from a committed relationship you’re in with a man/woman.

It takes dedication, commitment, sacrifice, and work, lots of hard work, if ever you expect the payoff in the end. This day and age people are so ready to just throw in the towel and give up. I think this generation has the highest divorce rate ever. Why? Because people think giving up is easier than hanging on and suffering a little to reap the rewards!

If you want to be a writer, fight for it! Commit to the craft, the lessons, the learning and the growth.

1. Walk the walk and talk the talk – When you say it out loud and to others that you want to be a writer, DO IT! Do everything in your power to BECOME a writer.
2. Stick it out – There will come times when you feel like bailing, but look at quitting as a non-option! There is no quitting. You either go full steam ahead or do nothing.
3. Commit – I know it is hard; I’ve been there! But commit to seeing it through.
4. Dedicate – Dedicate time out of your day to commit to the writing course you signed up for. If you’re going to be an absentee student, don’t sign up for the course.
5. Don’t give up – I know sickness happens but whatever you do, DON’T GIVE UP! People are depending on you, and YOU are counting on you to see this writing bug through!

This is the time to take the bull by the horns and stay in this relationship you’ve committed yourself to. This is not the time to give up and run away. This is the time to commit! Persistence pays off!