End of the Year: Part III

Rom. 13:13-14 “Let us walk honestly, as in the day; not in rioting and drunkenness, not in chambering and wantonness, not in strife and envying.

But put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make not provision for the flesh, to fulfil the lusts thereof.”

End of the Year: Part III

Polar opposites. That is the only term I can come up with when I think of my family and my hubby’s family. My hubby’s dad passed away when he was twenty-five and he basically didn’t have a dad for many of those years because of a divorce of his mom and dad, but let me tell you, his family is simply amazing in their endurance of togetherness.

His great-grandparents and grandparents (on his mother’s side) were the pillars that set the stage for the future generations to come. They were deeply rooted in the love of the Lord and handed down that passion for ages to come. No not all of the family watered and nurtured the seed that was planted so long ago, but when I came into the family I could FEEL a difference in our polar opposites.

My great grandparents handed down alcoholism to the generations. Now while my hubby’s dad was a drinker, alcoholism never had a chance to define the children because the mother was so rooted in her dedication to the Lord. What the children do with the seed is totally up to them, they have free will to pick and choose where the next generation will take the family.

My family on the other hand, for generations, was defined by alcohol. I’m not talking about casual drinkers now; I’m talking about generations of alcoholics. My great-grandmother, my grandparents (on both sides from what I can tell) were very heavy drinkers, and all their kids and their kids' kids, all became drinkers or alcoholics. That was and IS my family except for the scarce few who peeled themselves AWAY from the family to become what they could on their own, like myself. I’m a survivor from way back.

Drugs and alcohol defined my life when I was very young and it was only the Hand of God that guided me in a different direction. Not my mother or father or my sister or brothers showed me a different way to live but I was determined to NOT  be like them or raise my child to grow and be a drinker. I would give him a window into the past but offer him a promise of a future, away from alcoholics.

Now many people wonder where I get my strength to battle this disease without the aid and assistance of a doctor and I can honestly tell you it is once again by the Hand of God that guides me. Live or die, my God is the guide on this long journey; always has been and always will be! I was not raised in a family that loved the Lord, we kids were basically tossed into a Catholic school and made to defend ourselves and find what we could on our own. I found God waiting to cradle me daily in life. I can’t say other members of my family were as lucky. I converted from (religious) Catholicism to (spiritual) Christianity very easily and it is the seed of the Lord that defines who I am and who I am yet to become.

You might be wondering why this is my End of the Year post? Well because on Christmas Day, the family embraced me, hugged me, allowed me to feel the love that carried them all of their lives. I feel nothing but love shining from this family. They are not perfect but to me, this is as close to perfect that I will ever see. The Mid-West farmland, the Bible belt is definitely a different place than an industrialized smoggy city like the one where I came from. Pure love is the best love here! With no ulterior motive behind the love, it becomes a blanket not much unlike the snow-covered ground. It’s a barrier of protection to the seeds below.

My blood family, on the other hand, is still continuing on the path of lies and deception. I can’t elaborate because it's not my story to tell. On Christmas Eve I went to my family FB account and wished them all a Merry Christmas, I went back the day after Christmas and not one Merry Christmas back. My family is so consumed with their selfishness, their money, their blindness that they cannot see any real love right in front of their faces except for the false products of the fabricated family that they built.

Pss. 4:2 “O ye sons of men, how long will ye turn my glory into shame? how long will ye love vanity, and seek after leasing? Selah.”

Christmas morning I called my mother to wish her a Merry Christmas and to have a good day. Later that evening I called to see how her day went. All she could talk about was how she had a good meal at my brother’s beautiful house and how she went to my sister’s and there sat my meth-head brother who is now taking advantage of my sister’s kindness in keeping him out of the frigid cold and how my other brother didn’t even send her a card and blah blah blah. Yeah, she didn’t ask how my day was and probably doesn’t want to hear how great of a family I have found and been a part of for fifteen years. 

While I sometimes miss back home, all that I really miss are the memories and to be blunt, I have them, and my story safely tucked inside my head; I don’t miss the love because my family does not know what genuine love is. I pray for them, that is all I can do. I journey on into my future that awaits me, in a polar opposite world surrounded by the path of where I was led and that is the path of LOVE! THAT, my friends, is where I find my strength! 

Pss. 18:1 “I will love thee, O LORD, my strength.” 

Quotation Saturday ~ Healing Through Grief

Prov. 18: 24 “A man that hath friends must shew himself friendly: and there is a friend that sticketh closer than a brother.”

Quotation Saturday will be a little different this week. Since I lost my father last week and he was put to rest this week. My emotions have run the gamut; I wasn’t there and that is tearing me apart. I will find healing in my grief.

HURT

“Some old wounds never truly heal, and bleed again at the slightest word.”

― George R.R. Martin

~ This is so true! I realized what kind of family I have when old wounds to my soul resurfaced this week.

“I have learned now that while those who speak about one's miseries usually hurt, those who keep silence hurt more.”

― C.S. Lewis

“Pain is a pesky part of being human, I've learned it feels like a stab wound to the heart, something I wish we could all do without, in our lives here. Pain is a sudden hurt that can't be escaped. But then I have also learned that because of pain, I can feel the beauty, tenderness, and freedom of healing. Pain feels like a fast stab wound to the heart. But then healing feels like the wind against your face when you are spreading your wings and flying through the air! We may not have wings growing out of our backs, but healing is the closest thing that will give us that wind against our faces.”

― C. JoyBell C.

~ Hurt equals pain and this week the pain hasn’t ceased. I’m working on it though and I’ll find that wind in my face called healing!

EMOTIONAL

“There are some things in this world you rely on, like a sure bet. And when they let you down, shifting from where you've carefully placed them, it shakes your faith, right where you stand.”

― Sarah Dessen

~ I relied on my family to actually care for my pain. Knowing I had no means of seeing my father in his last weeks or as he was laid to rest, no one cared, except friends that I’ve never met! My spiritual online family got me through what would turn out to be one of the hardest things in my life.

“So the fact that I’m me and no one else is one of my greatest assets. Emotional hurt is the price a person has to pay in order to be independent.”

― Haruki Murakami

~ I’m paying for my independence and my freedom but I WILL heal!

ANGRY

“There are two things a person should never be angry at, what they can help, and what they cannot.”

― Plato

~ I cannot help that I have a selfish family. My heart and prayers are with them. 

“Do not allow yourself to be blinded by fear and anger. Everything is only as it is.”

― Yuki Urushibara

~ I’m going to remember this every single day!

“Speak when you are angry, and you'll make the best speech you'll ever regret.”

― Laurence J. Peter

~ This is why I write. My writing has healing properties.

“If you're angry at stupid people, you're tempted to join them.”

― Toba Beta

~ I’m sure not going to allow myself to go there!

GRIEF

“You will lose someone you can’t live without and your heart will be badly broken, and the bad news is that you never completely get over the loss of your beloved. But this is also the good news. They live forever in your broken heart that doesn’t seal back up and you come through. It’s like having a broken leg that never heals perfectly—that still hurts when the weather gets cold, but you learn to dance with the limp.”

― Anne Lamott

~ This is true. It might hurt for a little while but my heart is filled with the love I carry for my dad, so he will be a part of my healing too. I may walk with a limp, but I’ll dance like a pro for my dad!

“Tears shed for another person are not a sign of weakness. They are a sign of a pure heart.”

― José N. Harris

“The darker the night, the brighter the stars,

The deeper the grief, the closer is God!”

― Fyodor Dostoyevsky

~ I can attest, I’ve never felt closer to God than this week with my unusual amount of shooting stars. Thanks Dad.

“Only people who are capable of loving strongly can also suffer great sorrow, but this same necessity of loving serves to counteract their grief and heals them.”

― Leo Tolstoy

~ AMEN!

HEALING

“The wound is the place where the Light enters you.”

― Rumi

“It has been said, 'time heals all wounds.' I do not agree. The wounds remain. In time, the mind, protecting its sanity, covers them with scar tissue and the pain lessens. But it is never gone.”

― Rose Kennedy

~ I feel as though I am one big scar but the only good thing is the beauty of my light will shine through and no one will see the scar, they’ll only see the Light that I emit.

“Scars have the strange power to remind us that our past is real.”

― Cormac McCarthy

“As my sufferings mounted I soon realized that there were two ways in which I could respond to my situation -- either to react with bitterness or seek to transform the suffering into a creative force. I decided to follow the latter course.”

― Martin Luther King Jr.

~ I choose to transform! I’ll use writing to help in the healing process.

I’d like to thank all of my spiritual online friends who are there for me, helping me and honestly doing all they can for me. They’ve lost a mother or father and understand the pain that I’m enduring and it is only with their love and support that I’ll find the healing transformation that I need. God has truly blessed me!

Acts 4:22 “For the man was above forty years old, on whom this miracle of healing was shewed.”

The Ebola Scare

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Philippians 4:8 "Finally, brethren, whatever things are true, whatever things are noble, whatever things are just, whatever things are pure, whatever things are lovely, whatever things are of good report, if there is any virtue and if there is anything praiseworthy--meditate on these things."

The Ebola Scare

Does even the name make you cringe? Here in recent news this is all you ever hear about, Ebola. I think people get scared because as in anything we don’t know a thing about and what we do know is all spoon fed to us via media outlets who are often one sided.

Are you the kind of person that when something serious happens, you want to know all the information you can about the event? You sit sometimes for hours seeking out news, listening to people, digging through fact-finding websites just so you can get some kind of handle on the situation?

It’s been an interesting month in the Ebola crisis. It began with U.S. missionaries flown here for treatment over the past summer, they were treating Ebola patients and came down with the disease and were brought back to America to be treated, then it went to a man Thomas Eric Duncan who came into the country with Ebola, and now two nurses are fighting the disease because they took care of Mr. Duncan.

Here’s what we know about the Ebola scare:

According to the World Health Organization, the Ebola outbreak in West Africa has sickened 8,399 people since March, killing 4,033 of them -- making it one of the worst outbreaks of the virus in history.

We know that two nurses that had close contact with Duncan have now been diagnosed with Ebola and finally after two and a half weeks of exposure to the outside world, the 75 or more attendants of Duncan are being asked to have limited contact with the outside world.

Due to the lackadaisical attitude of the CDC and of the nurses who treated Duncan, Americans are now fearful of where the disease will show up next. I say fearful because the illness knows no bounds and I feel the Center for Disease Control is not as in control as they would like us to believe.

They are the people who didn’t restrict the nurses from boarding planes, jumping on a Cruise ship and exposing possibly hundreds of people to the disease. Why wasn’t after every single worker that came into contact with Duncan told they had to restrict contact with others for 21 days? Because of the inconvenience to this very selfish society? To me, it’s a very ignorant response to a lethal killing machine.

Then there is the lying factor. First, Duncan did not tell anyone he had come in close contact with a woman who died from Ebola. He exposed everyone on the plane but because he didn’t have symptoms, he ignorantly thought he was exempt from spreading the disease. He told the hospital the very first time he came in with a fever that he had just come back from the infected Liberia, but they sent him home.

He goes home and comes in contact with three residents living in the house, whom we’ve not heard a peep about since they were put in isolation. He is rushed back to the hospital, VERY sick, and is in contact with unprotected nurses and doctors again, who then finally diagnose him. He’s carted off to isolation and later dies.

We know the Dallas Texas hospital was not capable of handling such an infectious disease and instead of notifying a more capable hospital, only FOUR in the country, the ego won out and the hospital sat on a high horse claiming, “We got this handled!”

They DID NOT have the sources to care for the disease and because of their ignorance many are coming down with the disease. The country is blaming Obama for letting people into this country, pointing fingers at people for this and for that all the while the Ebola scare is becoming a real possible epidemic.

I blame the selfish ignorant people who sat on a high horse thinking they were exempt from such a disease even though they KNEW full well that they had been in contact with a contagious man, therefore possibly sharing their disease with hundreds of others. The spoon-fed smiling faces of the infected do not fool me into thinking I’m exempt!

Satan has got us in his hands. People are fearing, lying, ashamed, hiding facts, being selfish and thinking of only themselves and their pleasure. They are killing, raping, beating and devouring the very essence of morality in record proportions.

I have a funny feeling that people are going to be turning to their faith, any faith, flocking to the churches and finding peace while hiding from pain and fear of this retribution. These are the times I read about and the times I’ve prepared my soul for in the grand scheme of things. May the Lord God be with you all.

Isa. 52:10 The LORD hath made bare his holy arm in the eyes of all the nations; and all the ends of the earth shall see the salvation of our God.