How Many Miracles?

How many miracles can we ask God for? 

Is there a limit to His mercy

and His grace?

If we ask do we expect to receive what

our minds think is best or what God thinks is best?

These are the questions I have been thinking

a lot about in the past few months and 

especially tonight as our church

faces another night of prayer.

Our Pastor has gone into surgery

for a liver transplant...and we wait

with anxious hearts and prayers for 

just one more miracle!

In his family we have prayed for a 

miracle of release from drug addiction

and his son has been clean over 2 years...

in his family we prayed for his other son

to survive leukemia, pancreatitis,

pain med withdrawal, broken tibia,

ongoing healing...

He has made it 2 years in remission despite

all the complications.

For our pastor we prayed that his liver cancer 

would be healed,

and tonight he gets a new liver...

if God wills it to be so and all goes well.

How many miracles can we ask for

 in one family? 

I don't know-- but what I do know is that there

are no limits set for us in His Word.

He makes it plain that we ought to pray and

ask without ceasing, with faith and in His will.

We should pray even if our faith is as small 

as a mustard seed and He will do

as we ask...according to His will.

So tonight I ask He who knows best for

 just one MORE miracle,

for this family that I have come to know 

and love in such a special way.

I love you Pastor H and Family

May

"May is the tender promise we know will come true.

If in the earlier months any of us has doubted that

God loves his children, every one, we doubt no longer.

The sun has come back and rises north of the mountain,

gently flooding the windows of the east chamber

 as it comes up, and casting a soft light

 on the brown kitchen wall

behind the supper table as it goes down.

The grass is green and growing and the cattle are out.

One night at milking time a 

new calf is brought up from the pasture.

The seed is in and the long rows of twin leaves rise from the earth.

The apple trees are in rosy bloom, the blossoms of 

wild pear and cherry like white torches 

against the dark woods and the stone wall.

Day and night the air is bright and sweet 

with the scent of budding fruit, 

the flash of wings, and the song

of birds building nests among the flowers.

The whistle of the whippoorwill is a bugle call to summer."

Gladys Hasty Carroll

2 Years

Today was a hard day-again.

It was Logan's funeral day.

And it is a day that stands alone in the halls

of pain in my own life.

2 years ago today my husband left for rehab

in CA and from that point on we have 

been separated.

He chose to live in bondage to a substance

and I chose to remove myself from the daily pain

and chaos that had been my life for 10 years

before that day.

This was before...trying so hard to make life

better and easier so he could maintain

sobriety and live a happy life.

This is now...living alone and trying so hard to make 

life better and easier for myself

so I can maintain joy filled, godly living

and be content.

Did I make the right decision?

Did I do enough?

Do I know what the future holds?

Will addiction rob me and my children of 

the man we all love?

These are the hard and unanswerable questions

that I face each and every day.

When I think I am okay and things are better

then something comes along that brings it

all into sharp focus again and I realize

afresh that the pain still hurts just as much,

the tears are just as bitter

and the wound still is not healed.

But...

Gods faithfulness and grace meets me

every day fresh and real,

His love tenderly pours the Balm of Gilead

into my wounded heart and it IS enough

to face each day, not the future with

it's fears and sorrows, but for today.

I will trust that He who says He came to bring 

life abundant means what He says!

Silent Sorrow

This is an extremely difficult subject

that I am addressing in this post.

My heart is full of tears.

Another dear and precious friend lost

her 24 year old son this week-

but he did not go from joy to joy.

He was on a silent and sorrowful path and 

it ended in a silent and sorrowful 

passing-suicide.

The reason I know this friend in such 

a deep and personal way was that we

share the terrible path of watching someone we love

fall ever further into addiction.

I tried to walk the journey along side her as they tried 

to save him from the slide downwards.

There were many times that I hugged her

and felt her shaking with tears and many

times she hugged me and let me cry.

We didn't do things the same, it was her son 

and I am dealing with a spouse, but we

understood how the other felt, the fear

and the pain and the anger and the rage and 

the fierce love and the aching misery.

We walked silently together many times in sorrow.

I look back and think was there ANYTHING I could have

done differently or better to help him,

but it never pays to look back unless we

can learn from it in some way.

This is what I know-

Logan believed in Jesus

he was in terrible bondage to a substance

he couldn't bear the pain

he is Home.

Beyond that I cannot say anything that

I know for sure.

And when I saw her that terrible morning

not one word came from my mouth,

I could only sit by her and hold her hand 

and weep in silent sorrow.

I love you family of Logan

From Joy to Joy

It has been a difficult week to find

the words or interest to write anything here.

My dear friend, since my single days,

lost her first grand child

in a tragic farming accident.

Her daughter posts at 

Whispers of Joy

He was 5.

His life was joy,

each day was full of all the special

delights of childhood.

He didn't get a terrible sickness

that brought him to this place.

He simply went from joy here

to joy there.

That is not the way it feels,

the pain all who love him feel

is incomprehensible.

But for him he never had to know

that life is hard and people hurt you 

and loved ones don't love Jesus,

and the world can be a bad and scary place.

He just passed from joy

to JOY.

and that is amazing.

I love you, family of Skyler.