Autumn Update : She is visiting and being visited. Has several good days, followed by some not so good days. The morphine makes her nauseated, without it she is in pain. A bit of a cycle, but she is a trooper. We are all grateful for each day. Still keeping my eyes peeled for that miracle.

July 4th

I woke up this morning with an urge to go to the cometary and say “Thank you” to my favorite VET for loving and serving America.

I think the state of our country at this moment would make him both mad, and sad.

Regardless, he would stand up proudly and push his big walker right down the middle of main street to have an opportunity to join his fellow veterans in the pledge and salute to it’s flag. I think maybe it is hard to stand for a nation and it’s freedoms in quite the same way ,as one who has fought for them both.

What is in the heart of a young soldier that was sent to a far away land to fight on a battlefield @ age 18, to get shot at, sprinkled with poison, then spit at, AND YET stand on their shaky old legs, and again salute with their shaky old hands that same old flag 50 years later.

No greater love has a man than one that would lay down his life for a friend and/or a brother. Sargent James Neil Bennett ..THANK YOU!!

The Falls

           Chapter 9

October 6^th, 2002. About 3 p.m. I picked up the phone and spoke

Honey please come home and take me back to the hospital.   

I can’t believe these words even came out of my mouth!

         He was with our son in-law fixing something. I had been curled up into a ball for almost 2 hrs. The horrible pain that had been coming and going, came back, but it wasn’t going away.

         For the seventh time since The fourth of July, I was going back to the hospital. I was in pain, I was afraid, and angry. I didn’t know what was going on. It sure didn’t feel like my kidneys, but that was admittedly, my biggest fear.      

         Wednesday, and Thursday I was at the woman’s conference.  I felt so good spiritually. I thought if I just pressed a little harder toward God. If I did, said or prayed all the right things; my physical body would all fall in line.

 It was that mindset that drove me to get out of bed and use all my strength to dress myself for church. My husband was protesting. He could see I was better, he felt I shouldn’t use every ounce of strength I had gained. He was right. However, he loaded me into the car. Off to church we went. My honey, the wheelchair and me.

Remember the Cheers theme song Sometimes you want to go where everybody knows your name. That was probably my biggest motivator. It was October 6, and this would be my first time back to church since surgery in July. I just missed my church family. I had visits, but it wasn’t the same.

         I wanted to go in quietly, drawing no attention to myself. That wasn’t one of my most thought out plans 🙂 Remember I hadn’t seen most of them for three months. Well, they hadn’t seen me either, 75 of them. To top it off I ran out of steam in the middle of the service. I couldn’t sit up; a precious sister in the Lord came and held me close with her arm. She didn’t know at the time; I would have literally fallen over had she not sat there.

         We had prayer for the sick and I was taken forward. There was an overwhelming sense of love. I know many people were a bit shocked. I felt like I had to get better to die, and I think I looked the same. Of course, the devil kept saying things like, you are making a fool of yourself, you are disrupting the service, and you aren’t going to get healed this time either. The Lord had you come just to say good-bye.

That is what the devil said BUT the word says I will live and not die, and then I will declare the word of the Lord. If you had been in our church 10 years earlier, you might remember the course Whose report will you believe. Well, I will believe the report of the Lord. Some time you just have to speak above the voices. Everything around you seem to say you are nuts, and God isn’t real and then of course healing would be impossible. But way down deep in my knower, I knew in Who I have believed in, and I was persuaded that He was able. One day we will realize, it will be was worth it all to see my Jesus, one glimpse of his dear face all sorrow will erase. So, let’s continue to run our race until then.

 Sorry to those of you that don’t know my old songs😊

When I was wheeled out of the church right after the prayer time, pastor had every one move toward the center aisle and hold their hands out toward me as he prayed a blessing over me. It was one of those things that you maybe couldn’t understand from the outside in, and I couldn’t begin to explain its impact from the inside out. It was like a hug from heaven. God knows just when to send those special touches. Five hours later I was once again in an emergency room, knowing good and well I would be admitted again and that it once again wasn’t something simple.

This trip would be both the best of times and the worst of times. I was upset and I was angry. I thought the worst was behind me. I thought about lots of things. I called my pastor AGAIN and whined and cried. He assured me, of what I of course already knew, that God was still faithful, and his promises are all still true.

I’ll be honest though part of me wanted to rejoice, another part of me didn’t want to be encouraged. I wanted to have a temper tantrum and continue to feel mad and rotten. I didn’t care if God was real, and I most definitely didn’t care for his plan. Not that I was sure of what it was, but I didn’t know, and I didn’t care. I told my husband to tell everyone that I didn’t want any visitors. The Lord let me complain a short period of time, then in His mercy and grace He faithfully took my hand and walked with me as I entered another chapter in the life of Humpty Dumpty. I found myself right back to needing to depend on him for each moment.

Soon the lab worker walked in, began their thumping and poking, sighing and apologies. They poked the back of my hands, the side of my thumb, my wrist, my forearm and then they headed for my feet. I said oh Jesus that hurts so much in my feet. Almost in an audible voice I heard him say. “I know my feet were tender too!”

 It is at those times you realize He is big enough to rule this mighty universe. He, the same God responsible for the grandeur of the mountains in Honduras, and yet he cares about a fallen sparrow. This same God is here and near. We grow in him during the weeks, months and years. But we get to know him in the moments. And in that moment, he gave me the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness. My most faithful God.

After Jesus went through the temptations brought to him by a face-to-face encounter with the devil *the Bibles says God sent angels to minister to him. I think until recently I thought of the temptations of Christ as the annoyances of Christ. But He was tempted, like I get tempted , and you get tempted. The Bible says he was tempted, so he was tempted. He was struggling. He saw the ease of a now kingdom. A pain-free kingdom, a kingdom where he would be popular, loved and honored. He knew what was ahead if he stayed with the Fathers plan. He would be hated, rejected and mocked as King. But just like us Jesus had to reach for the word. That also is our way of escape. We can say a million words, preach the most popular sermon and the devil doesn’t budge. But He spoke the word and the Bible says the devil left. Now he does come back, oh yes, he don’t quit, just retreats to strategize his next attack. BUT THE WORD makes the evil of hell retreat.

The word is a lamp unto my feet, a light unto my path. It is settled in heaven. It gives life. We don’t need to run the country sides, going from one church to another looking for a word. Mans words are only as solid as human frailty. God’s word stands firm forever. The blessed old hymn Standing on the promises of God. The problem isn’t not having enough faith to stand, it is in not having enough promise to stand.

 We can resight the super bowl scores. Know the names and faces of the American idols, the Grammy award winners or even politicians, and world evangelists. But we don’t know the word of God. I remember when I was a kid the entire Sunday school lesson was built around the Word. Now I think we spend most of our energy on the presentation. Should we use videos, puppets, music? As long as we don’t forget the He is the present in the presentation. I do understand in this day of electronic everything, chalk talks and flannels may not be big attention grabbers. We must change our methods BUT let’s not ever change the message. We must remember it is His word that will not go void. It is the word that will stand firm forever. The word is what gives us our hope and our future.

Blessings! Thanks for Reading