Hello my friends! It sure got cooler out fast compared to yesterday - my fingers got cold picking just the few raspberries and beans out there, I think I'll skip a day now. Everything is coming to a close. Soon Linus will pull out what's left in the garden and put in the compost until next spring. I praise and thank God for the food we canned and froze. Kinda funky day for me today - I'm thinking it's the afer-effects of all that walking Sunday and I'm not used to it. Still the day is full of God's blessings all over! After work, we went out to eat the chicken special at the restaurant where the waitress, Chandra, works. Remember I asked for prayers for her back? I sent her over to Dr. Mike, and she's going there every Monday, and is feeling so much better - she sure likes him. I'm so glad he can help her - another answer to prayer, she says to keep the prayers going yet, it's helping alot! Gosh! I wrote much more than I thought I would, not feeling like writing etc. but know you all are being prayed for all your needs!
Our time here is short and there is still so much to be done. Lord, please
let me do a little more for You today so that the world may be a little
better because of me.
Scripture for the day:
"Teach me to do your will, for you are my God. Let your good spirit
lead me on a level path. For your name's sake, O LORD, preserve my
life. In your righteousness bring me out of trouble. In your
steadfast love cut off my enemies, and destroy all my adversaries,
for I am your servant." ~Psalm 143:10-12
Meditation for the day:
When we are honestly trying to live the way we believe Gods wants
us to live, we can get guidance from God in times of quiet
communion. We can direct our thoughts toward God's will and all
good thing. The attitude of "Your will be done" leads to clear
guidance. We can act on this guidance and we can be led to better
things. Our impulses can seem to become less our own and more the
leading of God's spirit acting through our thoughts. Obeyed, they
can bring us the answers to our prayers.
Prayer for the day:
I pray that I may try to think God's thoughts after God. I pray
that my thoughts maybe guided by God's thoughts.
Here's some food for thought:
TRAPPED
By Sally I. Kennedy
You, dear children, are from God and have overcome them, because the
one who is in you is greater than the one who is in the world. (1 John
4:4) Who is it that overcomes the world? Only he who believes that
Jesus is the Son of God. (1 John 5:5) To him who overcomes, I will
give the right to eat from the tree of life. (Revelation 2:7)
It was irresistable. Too warm and sunny, too lovely an afternoon to
not take a few minutes to sit outside on the back porch where we were
staying. I moved the rocker over to get a better view of the moss-
covered towering oaks.
A cat crawled into a space under the house. Bees busied themselves
around a clematis vine. I heard a faint buzzing. Another mosquito?
Thought I'd cleared out the corner of the porch of those pesky
critters.
The hum persisted. Turning around, I spied a glint of green. Near the
sliding door was a glass bottle. It looked antique-y. The glass
stopper had a green bee, or fly perched on top.
I picked it up, an saw that there were legs about ½ inch high to keep
the bottle barely off the ground. It also had a fake bottom - a large
hole with a lip around the inside of it. Inside were a couple dead
flies, and another flying frantically around the top trying to get
out.
Apparently the insects entered from underneath. They could leave the
same way they came in, but it looked as if for some reason they didn't
do that. They would continue towards the stopper, which was a dead
end.
Sometimes we feel trapped. We try and escape pressures of the world,
panic or just give up from the stress, yet sometimes the way out is
available. Jesus overcame the world and all its trappings (John 16:33)
and He has told us that we can too.
We are more than conquerors in Christ (Romans 8:37). Our Savior rose
from the dead and transcended circumstances; we can too b/c our lives
are hidden IN Him (Colossians 3:1-3).
Let's start living out the truth, above our circumstances. We are not
trapped. We are more than conquerors in Him who gave His life for us
and saved us.
This is good news!
The Difference
I got up early one morning
and rushed right into the day.
I had so much to accomplish
that I didn't have time to pray.
Problems just tumbled about me,
and heavier came each task.
I wondered "Why doesn't God help me?"
He answered, "You didn't ask."
I wanted to see joy and beauty,
but the day toiled gray and bleak;
I wondered why God didn't show me.
He said, "But you didn't seek."
I tried to come into God´s presence;
I used all my keys at the lock.
God gently and lovingly chided,
"My child, you didn't knock."
I woke early this morning,
and paused before entering the day;
I had so much to accomplish
that I had to take time to pray.
The Dress of Love
================
"Do you like my dress?" she asked of a passing stranger.
"My mommy made it just for me." She said with a tear in her eye.
"Well, I think it's very pretty, so tell me little one, why are you crying?"
With a quiver in her voice the little girl answered. "After Mommy made me
this dress, she had to go away."
"Well, now," said the lady, "with a little girl like you waiting for her,
I'm sure she'll be right back."
"No ma'am, you don't understand," said the child through her tears, "my
Daddy said that she's up in heaven now with Grandfather."
Finally the woman realized what the child meant, and why she was crying.
Kneeling down she gently cradled the child in her arms and together they
cried for the mommy that was gone.
Then suddenly the little girl did something that the woman thought was a
bit strange.
She stopped crying, stepped back from the woman and began to sing. She
sang so softly that it was almost a whisper. It was the sweetest sound the
woman had ever heard, almost like the song of a very small bird.
After the child stopped singing she explained to the lady, "My mommy used
to sing that song to me before she went away, and she made me promise to
sing it whenever I started crying and it would make me stop." "See," she
exclaimed, "it did, and now my eyes are dry!"
As the woman turned to go, the little girl grabbed her sleeve, "Lady, can
you stay just a minute? I want to show you something."
"Of course," she answered, "what do you want me to see?"
Pointing to a spot on her dress, she said, "Right here is where my Mommy
kissed my dress, and here," pointing to another spot, "and here is another
kiss, and here, and here, Mommy said that she put all those kisses on my
dress so that I would have her kisses for every boo-boo that made me cry."
Then the lady realized that she wasn't just looking at a dress, no, she
was looking at a Mother who knew that she was going away and would not be
there to kiss away the hurts that she knew her daughter would get. So she
took all the love she had for her beautiful little girl and put them into
this
dress, that her child now so proudly wore. She no longer saw a little girl
in a
simple dress, she saw a child wrapped in her Mother's love.
To Give the Special Blessing
The Special Blessing may be passed on by anyone
to others in person or at a distance in prayer.
If in person, place your hands on the person's head
with your right thumb on his/her forehead. If at a
distance, hold your hands over, or in the direction of,
the person or group and pray:
May the Reign of Jesus King of All Nations be
recognized in your heart;
May the Reign of Jesus King of All Nations be lived
in your heart;
May the Reign of Jesus King of All Nations be
given through your heart to other hearts;
So that the Reign of Jesus King of All Nations
may be lived in every heart all over the world.
I ask this Special Blessing through Our Lady,
Mediatrix of All Graces, who as Queen and Mother
of All Nations, has obtained it for you as a
tremendous grace from the Sacred Heart of her
Divine Son, in the name of the Father and of the Son
and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
Make the sign of the cross on the person's forehead
with your thumb, or make the sign of the cross with
your hand in his/her direction.
The gifts of the Special Blessing are the gift of
receiving, understanding, and living Jesus' Word
in Scripture; the gifts of intimacy with Jesus, Mary,
and souls as partners in the Body of Christ; and
the gift of knowing the secrets of God's love. The
blessing also grants healing and brings unity to
the Body of Christ.
Jesus wants everyone to receive the graces of this
kingly Special Blessing. Pray for it for your family,
your friends, your priests, the lost, the sick,
the dying ---- everyone who is in need of God's mercy.
You are My God
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aJ4tEFPuhYI
Prayer to Our Lady, Health of the Sick
Virgin, most holy, Mother of the Word Incarnate, Treasurer of graces, and
Refuge of sinners, I fly to your motherly affection with lively faith, and
I beg of you the grace ever to do the will of God.
Into your most holy hands I commit the keeping of my heart, asking you for
health of soul and body, in the certain hope that you, my most loving
Mother, will hear my prayer.
Into the bosom of your tender mercy, this day, every day of my life, and at
the hour of my death, I commend my soul and body.
To you I entrust all my hopes and consolations, all my trials and miseries,
my life and the end of my life, that all my actions may be ordered and
disposed according to your will and that of your Divine Son. Amen.
It's A Wonderful World
By: Helen Steiner Rice
In spite of the fact this being a wonderful world, we complain and lament
and view this old world with much discontent, and grumbling because there's
so much injustice and so many flaws. It's a wonderful world, and it's people
like you who make it that way by the things that you do.
For a warm and ready smile, or a kind thoughtful deed, or a hand
outstretched in an hour of need can change our whole outlook and make this
world bright. Where just a minute before nothing seemed right.
It's a wonderful world and it always will be, if we keep our eyes open and
focused to see the wonderful things we are capable of when we open our
hearts to God and His love.
Blogs & Forums
