It all belongs to You, God. As Eldredge has taught me ‘I give everything and everyone to You. I give everything and everyone to You.’
Since last summer I have been trying to print out a copy of this blog. At first I paid for an upgrade to get the bulk of it. Then I was just printing from the screen. When I returned to organizing the notebooks there were about six months missing. So I went to print those records. Then ran out of blue ink. Thought oh well, I will just print in black and white until an order of ink can arrive. Then the printer was starting to print in orange/pink stripes instead of black and white. Thought it was a fluke. Nope it was going nuts over there on the printer stand. Why not just black and white when I chose that? Plenty of black ink in there in two separate ‘tanks.’
A long way of saying this project has become a PROJECT. It still seems right to have a hard copy just in case the sun sends some rays that kill the internet or meteor showers destroy cloud storage! I have begun printing two sided and not fretting if I miss one or two dates. The print copies do not show links to YouTube, just big blocks where the link would have been. Guess this might be the reason professional writers and executives have secretaries? Or pay WordPress extra for fancier programs?
Not me. Just the 37 year old woman in her home office trying to reflect her life especially with the Lord of lords. I should have thought to being printing this when I first began writing the blog! Oh. That’s right I am 73 now, not 37. Drats. Just that much closer to home with the Holy One.
No amount of regret changes the past. No amount of anxiety changes the future. Any amount of gratitude changes the present.
Ann Voskamp
Many times I begin my prayer thanking the Father for another day of living and loving. Reflecting upon my recent birthday I thank the Holy One for another year of living and loving.
Best birthday card ever!From my sisterMy sister, PaulaMe
“At our age there are not lots of new friendships, but the ones we experience we hold dear.” Our neighbor, Kathy, has only been known to us a couple of years. Through her first year of struggling to get her brain around what it takes to live with a chronic illness and that illness being also a rare one, we became close. It is difficult to communicate with people who have never suffered from chronic illness. As Kathy says, “They just don’t get it.” Her diagnosis, antisynthetase syndrome, is rare and causes much misery. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antisynthetase_syndrome Fewer than 50,000 people in the US are thought to have this. Together we have re-affirmed Ann Voskamp’s wisdom that ‘any amount of gratitude changes the present.‘ This year when she returned to Florida, as snowbirds have a tendency to do, it was harder than ever to let her go. We have been married the same length of time, we are the same age, we each have a son and a daughter. Both of us have 3 grandchildren! Her wisdom and friendship bless me deeply. We share our faith freely. When I developed scalp psoriasis I told her I was getting tired of being like her! We don’t speak about dandruff, we refer to blizzards of skin cells falling from our heads after we scratch. We both need to vacuum our beds, our chairs and our cars. It is almost impossible to NOT scratch this sort of itching.
As I unwrap this gift of a new year of life I will try to remain present to all that is given. Life is truly a gift.
With another year of aging, I cling more and more to this verse in Corinthians
Therefore we do not lose heart. Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day.
2 Corinthians 4:16 NIV
Less energy, true that. Less flexibility, true that. Undiagnosed hand and foot itching, yep. More renewal, thank the LORD for that! The Scriptures declare He will never leave me or forsake me. And it is true. There are times when I move away from God, but He is ever near and holds me in His nail-scarred hands.
“Can a mother forget the baby at her breast and have no compassion on the child she has borne? Though she may forget, I will not forget you! 16 See, I have engraved you on the palms of my hands; your walls are ever before me.“
Isaiah 49:15-16 NIV
I truly live a varied and pleasing life, rich in adventure and blessings. There is no way I can account for it. One friend tells me I see things others do not when I take a walk. I am blessed to be married to the best man in the world. This year I have continued to work on finding some of the best recipes to cook. (I already miss fresh Ohio tomatoes!) My desk remains stacked about 6 inches deep. If I ever get ‘caught up’ I suppose it will be time to die? Let’s not even discuss how deep the sewing table is with projects.
I have out lived both of my parents. Bob calls it the ‘miracle of modern chemistry.” This year I promise to continue to write this blog as long as I am enabled to come up with new thoughts and inspirations.
May you cling to the One who has you engraved on the palms of His hands. May you rest in the knowledge that the same Holy One is able to renew you day by day. Peace and all blessings to each of you, my dear readers.
Haven Ministries publishes a monthly booklet of devotions entitled “Anchor Devotional.” The month of September, 2023 featured the writings of John Newton, compiled by writer Miller Ferrie, “to celebrate the 250th anniversary of when the hymn “Amazing Grace” was first sung.”
The entry for September 16 reads:
The grace of Jesus Christ humbles us. Hymn-writer John Newton knew this well and wrote the following:
Self-righteousness has had a considerable hand in dictating many of my desires for an increase of comfort and spiritual strength. I have wanted some stock of my own, I have been wearied of being so perpetually beholden to {God}, needing to come to Him always … as a poor miserable sinner, I should have liked to have done something for myself in ordinary circumstances, and to have depended upon Him chiefly on extraordinary occasion.
I have found indeed, that I could do nothing without His assistance, nor anything even with it. I am now learning to glory only in my infirmities, … to be content to be nothing that He may be All in All. But I find this a hard lesson, …Humbled I ought to be, to find I am totally depraved – but not discouraged, since Jesus is appointed to me by God to be wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and redemption; and since I find that … He keeps alive the principle of grace which He has implanted in my heart.
John Newton
What a challenge I have had. In so many ways I feel like Newton. August I was exhausted by life and likely too many activities. September I had a decayed tooth cut out by oral surgeon, with anesthesia, antibiotic, gauze, ice packs and pain pills afterwards. My face was bruised and I was in a lot of pain. I kept hearing the Cory Asbury song lyric “You take good care of me.” And it is true.
A few days later I slammed the car door on two fingers of my left hand. So grateful they were not broken. As the saying goes, I “Could not win for losing!” Scalp psoriasis exploded and I began itching, not just on the scalp. Within a few days I was itching all over and hives developed on one side of my neck. Read about something called opioid itch. Wondered if it was the pain pills? Heard the song below. I love Einaudi’s compositions.
Entitled Monday. Sounds to me like the LORD giving living water into my writing.
Out of my mind with itching I began Benadryl on my own along with my usual dose of Allegra. Kept hearing Brandon Lake lyric, “Praise, give Him praise, give Him praise in the highest; I’ll praise You anywhere.” Rough going, and truly a sacrifice of praise.(Hebrews 13:15) For several days a line I wrote in April, 2013 had been on my mind, “And so misery invited agony who brought along distraction and insomnia.” With all those medications I did not have insomnia though I did wake myself several times while scratching in my sleep. Eventually insatiable itching centered on palms of hands and soles of feet with NO rash, NO blisters, NO nothing, just usual skin. Wondered if I would actually scratch my skin open? Even at times itching the skin web between pointer and middle finger. What is this??
I saw the internist. He put me on steroid tablets with Allegra and Benadryl to continue. My appointment with Dermatologist October 5 was much awaited. I just wanted some answers to why is this happening? Assuming we can get it under control, how can I avoid this in the future? Itching stopped for two days and then returned.
October 5 I wrote:
Here am I naked before You
Clearly bothered by itching and pain
Ankles, shoulders and head all ache
Steroids have surely about gone
Driven to distraction I try to contain my hands
nerve endings igniting continuously
I bring my broken self to You
Naked before Your eyes You see
within, about, and through me
Lord be my comfort I pray
Show me how to cope with this
Lead me in paths where I can write
bring You glory and honor and praise
Here am I naked before You.
Dermatologist too was stumped, concerned but uncertain what caused all of this. Did full body check up while asking questions and pondering my dilemma. She took a biopsy of my right upper arm which mimicked something on my chest.
She put me on Zyrtec in evening and Allegra in morning. New Clobetasol shampoo. Wondered if there might be liver or kidney problems. Even mentioned possibility of lymphoma. Ordered a slew of tests (at least eleven) from both blood and urine.
Eventually itching has tapered off. Certainly not gone, but live-able. The test results have been rolling in through My Chart. They are all normal. Occasional palm itch. Maybe once a day bout of sole itch.
I cannot say with Newton and Paul ‘I glory in my infirmities’. Guess that sounds like a hypochondriac to my ears. (Guess I need to study the commentators to gain a better understanding of the concept.) This is a very long post, but was uncertain how to shorten it. I have been enabled to write and post the blog. I went on a weekend retreat at the Convent where I have been an associate for many years. Life continues, but my body, which loves to play ‘Stump the Doctor” continues to baffle me and the professionals. John Newton was right, the grace of Christ does humble me. John 5:30a is such a powerful truth. “I can do nothing on my own.” By His grace I live and write.
During the retreat I was blessed with this portion of Celtic Compline
In Mad Honey Jodi Picoult wrote, “We aren’t here on earth in order to bend over backward to resemble everybody else. We’re here to be ourselves, in all our gnarly brilliance.”
Another author wrote, “Stop trying to be someone. You are someone.”
Are you willing to live the challenge to be your own authentic specially created self? There is no one else on earth who can be you. At almost 73 years lived I am here to tell you that you are a special creation, loved and cherished by the Father with special tasks in mind for you and you alone.
For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.
Ephesians 2:10 NIV
In Sensible Shoes Sharon G. Brown wrote: “She said, ‘Write what you’re feeling. Tell the truth. Write like nobody’s reading.’ And just like that, I was invited to show up authentically to my grief and pain. It was a simple act but nothing short of a revolution for me. It was this revolution that started in this blank notebook 30 years ago that shaped my life’s work. The secret, silent correspondence with myself. Like a gymnast, I started to move beyond the rigidity of denial into what I’ve now come to call emotional agility.”
Have you tried this practice? Years ago when I began journaling I made Bob promise that he would not read the journal. As far as I know he has absolutely kept that promise. Then later I asked him to promise that if I die before him he would not let the children read my journals. I wrote much in there trying to work out how to parent them. It reflects on my ignorance and searching more than on their behavior and how I truly love them, even when they were on my last nerve.
I sometimes think of this blog as journaling on the screen. Some of what I post comes from my recent journals. Would you take the challenge to be authentic in journal writing? There are no rules in how to do it. At times I write paragraphs with complete sentences. Other times simply a list of words. Phrases that pop up. Prayers, things copied from others, crayon drawings, photographs. Magazine clippings. It is your journal. You can make it any way that you want. The main goal is to be authentic. Having a lousy day? Write that. A great day? Fill the page with sunlit words.
Authentic: genuine, no pretense, transparent. Below is my favorite image of transparent with the Lord.
For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.
Ephesians 2:10 NIV
There is something amazing about putting your thoughts and experiences into words. At times you learn something about yourself that was previously hidden from you. You come across thoughts that were difficult to contact previously. At times, uncovering something you knew earlier in life but then forgot! Sort of like a pen as a steam shovel, excavating a basement, down to a bedrock belief.
The shelf with the open shell and the shelf below it up to the Bible and Harper’s Bible Commentary show my journals minus one or two.
I have had folks tell me they cannot write. I always think to myself, “Well you can think. We all think (unless there is a brain injury of some sort.) Write what you think about.”
“Here to be ourselves…Be the someone we are created to be.” Stop apologizing for who you are. Sharon Brown called journal writing ‘secret, silent correspondence with myself.’ I would expand that thought to include correspondence with the Father. When I write it is often a revelation to me what I am thinking. Many times also, there comes a revelation of what the Father thinks about what I hold as truth. Holding a wrong interpretation, if I am willing to yield, that concept can be corrected.
One of the stories Bob was always glad to read to our children was Mike Mulligan. The story is about Mike and his steam shovel, Mary Anne.
The newer types of shovels took away jobs from the steam shovels.
I think journaling can be a form of self examination. Why not give it a try? You might begin like in a child’s diary just recording events that occur. Given time and prayer and a willingness to go below the surface I believe you can find treasures within your own life experiences.
You will never know unless you give it a try! Use your pen as a steam shovel. You just might come upon treasure you buried a long, long time ago!
During retreat at sunset I went to my car to get a printed notebook of Treasures in Plain Sight to share with Sister Maureen. You sort of have to read some of my postings if you want to get to know me. Walking back to my room 7:12 PM on 23-6-5 I heard the Lord say,
"I want you to sit
Enjoy the breeze
LISTEN to your own writing."
There is a huge patio with picnic tables near the parking lot. It is covered with a roof held by ropes and poles. I had earlier seen a sister who seems to be confined to a motorized wheelchair. She is younger than me. I saw her sitting on the patio enjoying the evening breeze. The patio overlooked a part of the grounds where the trees open and a small meadow is seen.
I told her, “Look at you! You take your chair wherever you go! I had to walk out here and there is not even a back on these picnic benches!” She rewarded me with a huge, lovely smile.
Sister went back in the building when an alarm rang on her wrist. I wondered if she had been waiting to see deer? There was a lovely meadow in the distance with an opening in the trees. Sure enough, at 7:27 two large deer came out from between the trees and began to graze in the meadow. I made note of the time to give to her. (I saw her in the cafeteria at lunch the next day and slipped her the note. She cheerfully thanked me with a BIG smile.)
I sat in the evening breeze and began paging through the notebook with writings I had posted a year ago. It was fun to visit memories and see His hand at work in my life. When I had finished I heard,
“Blog or not
writing IS part of your calling."
You see, during this retreat I was asking what the Lord would have me do in the future. I was exhausted in so many ways. If I was told to stop X-Y-and-Z, believe me, I was willing to obey. I had made a retreat here last autumn. The program was Soul Collage. Participants choose magazine pictures to illustrate their theme or train of thought. I brought my most meaningful collage with me to ponder during the retreat. I prayed repeatedly asking the Lord to direct my ways. The focus of this collage is writing.
When I write I bow my heart to the Lord similar to the nun in the white habit, praying that I can find the words to explain my experiences and bring God glory. One thing that has always fascinated me is the sound the waves make as they recede from the beach back onto the ocean floor. “Susurrus”is the word that describes a murmuring stream. Wonder what describes that sizzling water going through sand sound? Those are the things that keep me writing! The bookshelf tells the story of me researching my writing. The keyboard, my obvious method. The clock reminds me that I am to walk Lucky at about eleven every morning. I have a time limit to my writing session! And the fossilized nautilus. That became a centerpiece for my retreat. More later on that.
Returning to the building I found a book I had never seen before. The author is Edward Hays. It is entitled “The Ladder.” What an eye opener! and soul unfolder! I spent much of the evening reading the first 20 or so pages.
The following song describes what was going on for me. Lyrics show on the video.
It was a quiet, cloudy morning
Stillness embracing early morn
Then I heard a creaking of the siding
A tossing of the saplings
Turned to bending of the decades old trees
As a ‘mighty rushing wind’ passed through
And almost as quickly the trees returned to stillness
A few moments later another gust came
It seemed determined to be a steady blowing
Rain came flying past my window
The wind became a gentle breeze
The music of raindrops overtook the wind
And May 1st was declared by the heavens
The wind, the rain, it all stopped as suddenly as it began
Bird song is heard again
Strange yellow/gray sky as sun rises higher
Wrestling with the spring weather front
Newly emerged maple leaves
Soft in coloring cling to their branch in the breeze
Help me cling to You, Jesus my source of life
We have more mighty wind storms this year than Bob and I can ever remember. Starting to think this too is a result of climate change? Seeing so many fallen trees the last couple months reminded me of this poem. Enjoy!
High in the canopy of the forest
In one of the tallest trees
Four buds set themselves
On the end of a twig.
Sealed tight with scales
They set themselves firmly
Determined to survive the winter’s
Thaw and freeze, thaw and freeze.
Then the unthinkable happened
The unimaginable,
not even remotely pondered, occurred.
In that last big wind storm
When we wondered what
Might be happening in the woods ….
This mighty home of the buds fell.
King of the canopy came tumbling down with a groan
And crash
Many splintering sounds as
The hollow trunk gave way to wind and decay.
The young saplings braced themselves
As branches flew past,
Rubbing trunks
Leaving lost members lodged in other’s forks.
The creak and the crash unsettled
The whole forest as small critters
Ran out of the tumbling parts’ way
Wondering why the canopy
Would want to visit the floor?
With a sigh the mighty giant
Folded into the contours of the forest floor
And lay still in the windy gusts
The four buds, sealed tight,
waiting for the spring sun to call them forth,
cling to the twig at my eye level now.
There’s a strange new light now
As we walk this bend in the forest.
Sunbeams pour in on a cloudless day asking
“Who will next attempt the role of
King of the Canopy? Come forth! Come forth!”
How many other buds of last year’s canopy
have become a white tail’s fodder?
When I was looking for a career in 1968 I was directed to take data entry classes. We did “keypunch cards” and verification for computers that were the size of most offices. I never learned how to write computer language and really was not interested to learn, though my boss wanted me to learn. To this day I am not afraid of my computer, iPhone, tablet or other devices. Especially since kids these days say, “just start pushing the buttons until you get the result you want.” Ha! There is a new item available to the public.
I do not pretend to understand most of the technological leaps we are making, but this one caught my attention. It said you could ask it to write a poem or a term paper and it would. Schools are worried but not caught off guard. What??!?
Have you ever been online with a question and the site asked if you would like an online chat? Then you likely havehad interaction with a ‘chatbot.’ According to Wikipedia, “Chatbot is a software application used to conduct an online conversation via text in lieu of providing direct contact with a live human agent.”
There is a new computer ability that was released for free online called ChatGPT. It is causing quite a stir in the world. It was released November 30, 2022 by a company called OpenAI. (A I is artificial intelligence.)
This system is notable for ‘its detailed responses and articulate answers across many domains of knowledge. “It has the ability,” according to Wikipedia “to write and debug computer programs; to compose music, teleplays, fairy tales, and student essays; to answer test questions (sometimes, depending on the test, at a level above the average human test-taker); to write poetry and song lyrics; to emulate a Linux system; to simulate an entire chat room; to play games like tic-tac-toe; and to simulate an ATM.”
I tried to sign up so I could ask it to write a poem based on a few thoughts I had. Then I wanted to compare its creation to one of my poems. Since every news agency seems to be reporting on ChatGPT the system is too busy to accept new free accounts right now. That is okay. Not certain I want to give them my information or find out how the bot would do with my ideas! Open AI does collect data.
Wikipedia reports that “ChatGPT was met in December 2022 with generally positive reviews; The New York Times labeled it “the best artificial intelligence chatbot ever released to the general public.” Samantha Lock of The Guardian noted that it was able to generate “impressively detailed” and “human-like” text. Technology writer Dan Gillmor used ChatGPT on a student assignment, and found its generated text was on par with what a good student would deliver and opined that “academia has some very serious issues to confront.”
Oh my! Will there be any original human creativity left after the AI world finishes with us? I pray so. I wonder how extensive their knowledge base is of the Christian religion and how access to the inspiration of the Holy Spirit changes human creation? God save us all! And LORD, please help me keep writing to glorify Your name!
Is this beyond the Babel of the Scripture? God knows and time will tell.
Now the whole world had one language and a common speech. 2 As people moved eastward they found a plain in Shinar and settled there.
3 They said to each other, “Come, let’s make bricks and bake them thoroughly.” They used brick instead of stone, and tar for mortar. 4 Then they said, “Come, let us build ourselves a city, with a tower that reaches to the heavens, so that we may make a name for ourselves; otherwise we will be scattered over the face of the whole earth.”
5 But the Lord came down to see the city and the tower the people were building. 6 The Lord said, “If as one people speaking the same language they have begun to do this, then nothing they plan to do will be impossible for them. 7 Come, let us go down and confuse their language so they will not understand each other.”
8 So the Lord scattered them from there over all the earth, and they stopped building the city. 9 That is why it was called Babel —because there the Lord confused the language of the whole world. From there the Lord scattered them over the face of the whole earth.
Genesis 11:1-9 NIV
Yikes what happens when A I starts talking for us? It already talks to us. God knows and I believe He is in charge!
Because of the arthritis in my hands I began to journal on my iPad a few years ago. I have kept the habit of a paper journal by printing out those ideas and pasting them in a spiral bound journal. This involves printing out ones I have not printed, arrange by date, cut and paste, etc. For several years, I have sadly dropped the habit of reviewing my journal. When we got ready to travel this month I decided to take the latest journal and review it. I will read through it. Praise God for how He sees me through situations. Mark poetry I likely did not organize in poetry binder, etc. with marker.
Mitchell Luo
Sometimes this yields themes for this blog. Most times it is just for my comfort and remembrance. We are told to rehearse the works of God and praise Him. But do we? I often fail at that task. I remember some highlights, but I drop the minutia that can change the course of my thoughts and arrange my victories in the daily battle against darkness.
Recently I was pondering that warfare. I am sometimes engaged in small struggles that remind me following Jesus is not “all unicorns and rainbows.” If you examine those times in your own life you will likely see that there are recurring patterns in the attacks. When I can recognize, and say ‘oh no, here comes THAT again’ I am better equipped to defeat it. Putting on my armor, praying, raising high the sword of the Spirit, taking every thought captive to Christ Jesus, doing my part not to surrender by means of apathy. If, however, I have not been paying attention I can get swept under a current of negativity and hopelessness before I realize what hit me.
Have you examined your life by a similar means? Some other method? Many recommend making a timeline of your life with God. Note the occurrences that have impacted you. Reflect on where your awareness of God was at each of those times.
Campfiregrace.com
Yes, look back at what has happened and how you went through each thing. We are not to be permanently looking back, but it is helpful to review our life and His participating Presence at each stage.
Journal before I get hold of it with photos and glue stick!
A Prayer to Thank God for His Sovereign Control
Father, we praise You for the delicate way You powerfully align our lives to Your creation. Thank You for the waters and mountains that remind us of You. Forgive us for overlooking Your presence in every aspect of our lives, and bless us to notice and give glory to You, for You are our healer. In Jesus’ Name, Amen.
Psalm 124 NIV
A song of ascents. Of David.
1 If the Lord had not been on our side—
let Israel say—
2 if the Lord had not been on our side
when people attacked us,
3 they would have swallowed us alive
when their anger flared against us;
4 the flood would have engulfed us,
the torrent would have swept over us,
5 the raging waters
would have swept us away.
6 Praise be to the Lord,
who has not let us be torn by their teeth.
7 We have escaped like a bird
from the fowler’s snare;
the snare has been broken,
and we have escaped.
8 Our help is in the name of the Lord,
the Maker of heaven and earth.
Find a way to review your life with God. No matter your age, no matter how many times you have done it, making a timeline with God is a great exercise.
Well the new computer said I had to restart to install updates. I hit the button and went off to eat breakfast. I really wanted an early start on writing Have had so many interrupted writing days lately. Wanted to get ahead for when we travel next month.
Came back after breakfast and still spinning though it said 100% complete. Started a load of wash. Still spinning. Updated paper journal. Still spinning. By now I was getting aggravated (one of my mom’s favorite words) . Over 45 minutes had passed.
Salvador Dali’s Melting CLock
At Bob’s suggestion asked online what the deal is. Seems Windows 11 is having massive trouble with these updates. Well that does not help me WRITE TODAY!! Turned off computer. When I turned it back on updates started all over. At the moment 63%. So here I am writing on the laptop. Perhaps this is planned practice for when we travel?
“Mann Tracht, Un Gott Lacht” is an old Yiddish adage meaning, “Man Plans, and God Laughs.” Despite our most careful planning, the Road of Life is unpredictable.
Saul Levine, M.D.
Things will have to be cleaned up on this post for certain! And then updates worked and I am back on the desktop. Yikes. I am not in charge of this blog. Each day I give it over to the Lord. I ask Him to bless the content and the readers, that is you!
We all get frustrated and irritable when things do not go our way. My goal is to shorten the time when this happens and get back to putting my attention upon Jesus as quickly as possible. As Thomas R. Kelly wrote,
Lapses and forgettings are so frequent. When you catch yourself again, lose no time in self-recriminations, but breath a silent prayer for forgiveness and begin again, just where you are.
The Light Within
Would you try that right now? Read the quote above and give yourself a moment to do it. Breath a silent prayer and begin again with Him who loves you best.
Offer this broken worship to Him and say: “This is what I am except Thou aid me.”
The Light Within
I usually pray, “Left to myself I will always mess it up.” Jesus said, “Of myself I can do nothing.” John 5:30a
Help me remember, Lord
As lawn guys go thundering past my window I pray you will keep me focused upon You, Lord God. Help me stay in Your Presence regardless of what the day brings or does not bring. I agree with Kelly, “we are owned men and women.” Have Your own way in and through me. Amen.
Treasures in Plain Sight, A Christian Blog 