Life Is What It Is!

It’s been a while since I have written on this blog… lots of things have happened since the last time I wrote. First of all, my computer crashed and I had only my phone to communicate with on the internet. I am back now, though!

Another thing that has happened… my daughter was diagnosed with lymphoma, so I have made the trip from Oklahoma to Illinois to help her through her chemo and help with my grandchildren.

Staying in the city is a change from living in the country!  The city noises are strange compared to the quietness of our rural home, and it’s not easy sleeping with the different noises.

Ashley, Cooper, and I put up the Christmas tree last week, and together we decorated it. We also have crafted some nice decorations, too.

My daughter Mirandy and I thought it would be a wonderful thing if we did Random Acts of Christmas Kindness (RACK) this holiday season with Ashley (9)  and Cooper (4), to give them something positive to think about. We wrote twenty-four kindnesses on a sheet of paper, one for every day until Christmas.

Ashley rewrote them on gift size cards I had previously cut from construction paper. She decorated the fronts of the cards with stencils and colored pens, enjoying every minute of it!

When we awake in the mornings, we take turns drawing out of the big holiday bowl, which holds the cards for our kindness of the day! RACK has been a big conversational topic in this house, and my grand children are feeling good about doing these little things for others.

I didn’t realize just how much Cooper thought about these acts until Saturday evening while he and Ashley were in the bedroom watching a movie. Paul, Mandy, and I were in the living room getting ready to watch bedlam, (OSU vs OU).

All of a sudden Cooper comes running into the living room crying, “Grandma, Ashley is in here doing random acts of meanness!”

I nearly fell to the floor laughing! Well, he’s been told to use his words! 🙂

Have a great day, God bless you, and don’t forget RACK!

Catch you later, Evie! ❤

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Life Is Full Of Joy!

...and full of glory!

Joy is a word we use to describe our happiness as we go through our daily walk of life. Some have more than others. People who suffer from depression or other emotional strife find it hard to get this feeling in their hearts.

There are times some of us can’t seem to find joy in anything. Our lives get overwhelmed by our needs; family, financial, and emotional. Our health may affect our mood. One day we are upbeat, the next, we want to just pull the covers back over us and sleep the day away, forgetting our problems.

We can’t find anything happy to talk about, and seem to only find things to complain about.

Merriam Webster defines joy as the emotion evoked by well-being, success, or good fortune or by the prospect of possessing what one desires. (and more)

Joy abounds in a lot of different areas of our life. It could be that new car we have eyed for months, finally  parked in the garage or that newly acquired piece of jewelry. Maybe you got a promotion at work, or landed a new job.

These things bring happiness to a point.  Sometimes after the new wears off, these material things don’t really matter so much. Many times we strive to find more happiness by acquiring more stuff. Soon we have an overflowing home and garage full of things.

If there was a major disaster, these items could “poof” be gone.

If our loved ones bring us joy, even after they are gone, we still have the wonderful memories of laughter we shared in our lives. Those joys are never-ending.

And yes, material things do bring us joy, to a point. An email brought me joy last week, and an electric stove that I desperately needed brought me much delight!

Yesterday I found it in getting our  water well repaired, because now I have plenty of water! I can give my plants a drink and do those dirty dishes that always seem to pile up in the kitchen sink. (Again, dirty dishes are a joyful blessing, means we have food to eat!)

This morning it was the many various birds at the bird feeders and the squirrels’ silly antics; then a relaxing phone call from my good friend glorifying God!

My latest joy was hearing my phone ring, and my daughter being on the other end of the line… just to chat!

Tomorrow, well, I am anticipating whatever life’s delightful surprises will bring! All of God’s blessings bring us joy!

Right now, I am going to find some making a batch of cupcakes! Want one? I will share!

Just what brings you joy? Tell us!

 

Don’t forget to share some joy with someone else. It may be the only happiness in that person’s day!

Hitherto have ye asked nothing in my name: ask, and ye shall receive, that your joy may be full. John 16:24 (Blue Letter Bible)

Charity And Love, What It Really Means!

Fruit of the spirit, yeah, that's love!

Just what does love mean to you? Is it only your family and your friends that you care about? Or do you love all the people in the world? I love my God, I love Jesus! I love my children, my grandchildren, my family! I love my friends and my pets! But do I love my neighbor?

One of God‘s commandments is to love your neighbor as yourself!

Do you really know your neighbor? Can you really love that person if you don’t? And then, that being said, who is your neighbor?

Many people think they know just what is right, and judge others for their (in our minds) wrongdoings. Often we think we are the ones that know best, and we put others behind our opinions. Do we stand in judgement for this?

Sometimes people do things that really tick us off, make us angry! We have a tendency to not like some people, and really think others are special. It could be we don’t like the way someone dresses, their form of self-expression, or their shortcomings that make us feel this way.

Taught all through all my life to love the sinner, hate the sin; sometimes, it is hard to see past what you think others are doing wrong, and not love them for those particular reasons. As I have said before, He is still working on me, and will be until the day I die.

At times people are just a thorn in your side. Ever have one of those? Someone that just really irritates you, one that you just don’t get? Unfortunately, I do. But I try to see past all that, and I am sure some people feel the same way about me.

It could be the teenager at the grocery store with the cell phone in her ear or the foreigner at phone company that really gets to you and makes you not feel very lovable at that minute and want to just hang up on them.

Love is the most beautiful word in the English language, don’t you think? It compasses all the good about everything, none of the negative. It is the feeling of joy, hope, compassion, and peace. We never feel anything better. No money can buy it, no possessions can own it. Love is happiness, security, and contentment. So why is it sometimes we don’t feel love?

Is it knowing that God loves us, and has sacrificed His own for us?

Do we have that love in our hearts? Love is charity! Not the kind you write off on your taxes; but true charity, giving of yourself, and not expecting something in return. You have to give love to receive love! That simple.

So… what do you think?

When writing this blog, I am not writing at you, but to you. Therefore, I would appreciate your comments to let me know how you feel. All response on these topics can only broaden our views, our thinking, and our outlook on life. I need your advice. What do you do when someone is a thorn in your side, and you don’t understand?

Have a blessed day! Evie

The word “love” occurs 311 times in 281 verses in the KJV of the Bible. According to the dictionary in the BLB, Christian love is the fruit of His Spirit in the Christian. Gal 5:22. See below.

But the fruit of the spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance: against such there is no law. Gal 5:22-23

Fruit of the Spirit

There's peace and contentment in serving the Lord!

It’s three o’clock in the morning, and I can’t sleep. I did get a few hours before I woke up, coughing my head off, and now I just can’t seem to get back there. It makes for such a long day, when I don’t get my beauty sleep! 🙂

I can’t shake this thought of the “hate mail” I received yesterday from someone who doesn’t know me, and hasn’t a clue about life in the first place. This person pretty much said to me that our whole nation is a bunch of imbeciles and that the gods are going to make us pay for believing in Christ. Being a Christian, it saddens my heart that there are people in this world that are so totally off the mark… crude, rude, and totally ignorant of what life really is about.

My husband wanted to fire a response back to this person and give him/her a piece of his mind. I don’t think that is the way to handle situations like this. It isn’t the Christian way. I am really praying for this person to have understanding, because it will be a sad day when he/she meets the real God and stands in judgement for what has came forth from his/her mouth and heart.

That being said, I wonder where or if compassion ever enters the picture in a person’s mind that thinks that way. I realize there are people in this world so full of anger and hate that their life is miserable. I am glad that I have peace and contentment in my life, and that I have a Saviour to call upon, to keep me steady and walking on solid ground. It is a blessing to have love in my life, family and friends to enjoy along the way, and hope and faith to carry me through.

Sadly for many people, one day they will meet their maker. It is sad, too, that people live in such a closed world that they can’t enjoy the life God has given them, and feel the need to bring others down with them.

The one thing this has brought to my mind is… I am going to write more, share goodness with as many people who will read what I write and not let the devil have a foot in my door! To all the non believers in this world, I pray one day your eyes pop open and you can feel the love!

To all my believing peeps, keep spreading the word, living the word, loving your life and all the blessings God gives you!

God bless you. Evie

Pretty Is As Pretty Does!

A beautiful Spellbound Rose that grows in my Sisterhood Memory Garden that my friend gave me in memory of my Mother, the most beautiful lady.

Mom always said that. Pretty is as pretty does.

So I am wondering today, just what do you consider pretty? Where does beauty come from? Is it in the gene pool? I think about my family and what people have said about us through the years, about our appearance. God pretty much blessed us with good looks, or so they say.

The media is full of airbrushed models who spend their days making themselves look beautiful. In the cosmetic industry, there are big bucks spent; from makeup, to anti-aging cream, liposuction, plastic surgery, and on and on.

Merriam Webster defines pretty as pleasing by delicacy or grace, having conventionally accepted elements of beauty, and more. What do we, as people, consider delicate and gracefully pleasing? What are the conventionally accepted elements? Do you think it is pretty on the outside, or is it pretty on the inside that makes a person beautiful?

Have you ever feasted your eyes on someone and saw beautiful? Well, I just did on a profile picture on Facebook. Every time I have looked at this person from the time she was a child and now a woman, I have thought she was beautiful. That conjured up more images in my mind of people who I think are pretty. When I pondered on this, I wondered what it is that makes a person pleasing to the eye of others.

Not taking away from family genes, but is it the outward appearance that makes you beautiful?

I realised that the people I think are beautiful are the ones that are full of goodness on the inside, filled with  joy, happiness, kindness, and compassion. They laugh a lot. You don’t hear them complaining and whining about insignificant things. In a nutshell, they have substance within themselves.

People who walk around with a scowl on their faces aren’t pleasing to the eye. Discontented people aren’t pretty to me. There is no smile on their face, no twinkle in their eyes, no joy for life.

Do you consider yourself pretty? On the outside, I never have thought I was. We see our flaws every time we look in the mirror. But are you pretty on the inside? Are you filled with those God-given gifts that I mentioned before? Are you filled with the fruit of the spirit?

But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance… Galatians 5:22-23

This to me, is what makes a person beautiful. The first time you see someone you see their outward appearance, they might look good, but are they on the inside? Just asking!

To the inspiration for this post, Happy Birthday, my beautiful niece, De. I am not telling your age, because it only makes me feel older! To my daughter(s) granddaughters, sisters, all my cousins and friends, my nieces, great nieces, and great, great-niece, you are all beautiful, too. (Because I know you inside and that makes you delicately graceful and pleasing to the eyes!)

May your day be filled with the fruit of the spirit, for tomorrow you will be even better looking.

Love you biggest! Evie!