PEW OCCUPANCY

7/10/11 My Utmost for His Highest focused today on attending "church services" together. This morning my brothers* and their wives and hubby and I did just that. Adams pew---last row of center section in the family church where we grew up. Special---because as a 78 year active member of Hopkinsville FUMC, our father was a recognized fixture in that pew. Sad---because through hugs and tears, many familiar folks in the congregation commented how empty it had seemed these last 4 months.

With 6 of us very much occupying that row, we commented that either the pew had gotten shorter or we had gotten wider. It was the general consensus that the pew length had been shortened. How blessed I felt to share this "last" visit with family---Mother and Daddy must have been smiling down on us all.

...let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another,...(Hebrews 10:24-25)

Hopefully the next family that "occupies" that pew will be as blessed by that church as our family has been over these many years. Maybe we should hang a shingle to encourage others to try out this special pew, to do more than just show up and warm the red velvet cushion. Encourage them to "grow" spiritually while opening their heart to God's truth. Rev. Williams quoted John Henry Newman this morning, " Growth is the only evidence of life." Living a spirit-filled life requires more than pew occupancy, though that's a good place to start.

*Clifton T. Adams Jr. occupies the pew where his dad, Clifton Thacker "Brud" Adams, sat for many years.

Packing Up

7/8/11 Walking out the door. Heading to Kentucky. Headed home, as I have known it, for the last time. There will no longer be an Adams resident at 2211 or 2422. I'm meeting family to "pack up" Daddy's things and all the household possessions that will be his no more. That makes me sad. One more step in the grieving and wrapping up of a life of a sweet daddy.

I'm packing my Houston High "Dotsy" quilt to take with me----the one with all the prayers. The one that offered solace for me all those months in Texas. The quilt and the continuing prayers of friends. I'm going to need them both.

Mammography Misery

7/7/11 Sitting in the waiting area of the Methodist Healthcare Breast Center, I was struggling with both fear and dread. "I know~ I know!" "In everything give thanks"(I Thessalonians 5:18) and that would include mammograms. I am grateful for this early detection, possibly life saving procedure. What I'm struggling with is past memories of the pain brought on by that tall, COLD, stainless pancake machine with the acrylic "flattener."

But God....had the receptionist hand me a "pile" of forms to fill out with the important stuff highlighted in pink. Forms to keep me "in the pink." Pink highlights to remind me that I use pink when I want to display text in my reading that has prayer references. I even had my pink highlighter with me, clipped to my "A Praying Life" book---already full of "pink." A gentle tap to remind me to pray.

I entered waiting area #3 (diagnostic side) in a spa-type robe, chosen over the dreaded hospital gown---thankful for a choice. The exam, though not exactly painless only required one "repeat" and was relatively quick for 8 views. I was then relegated to waiting area #4 until results were read and I could leave---depending on said results.

So....then I began to worry because it was done so quickly. Had the tech been thorough? (I forgot my thankful prayer for "speed" in this procedure.)
God covered that and had tech call me back for 2 ultrasounds. Dotsy wants thorough, Dotsy gets thorough! (and wet and time consuming and uncomfortable) Doctor reading results said "the girls" looked okay and she'd see me in a year.

A Germantown fire truck followed by an ambulance arrived as I was heading out the door. There are miseries worse than mammograms and I began to pray for the person that was getting ready to take that ride.

Thought Continuance

7/6/11 A bookmark fell out of my Bible as I was continuing to meditate on Monday's (7/4/11) verse. Continuing....that's what meditation is all about.

“If you continue in My word, then you are truly disciples of Mine; and you will know the truth, and the truth will make you free.” (John 8:31-32)

The Le Passees Children's Rehabilitaion Center bookmark was dated 1/6/91 and my faint pencil markings on the back read, "The truth makes you free by allowing you to live in the light of reality. (boldness mine, because I can't underline on the blog) Illusions are a form of slavery. The truth the world propounds is error."

Continuing in these thoughts.

“P”erfect “P”airing

7/5/11….and I’m not talking golf here. Today I received 2 books that have really piqued my spiritual interest. One by a pastor. One by a pray-er, as in one who prays. Unable to decide which one to read first, I dove into both and began to extract “plums” from each.

A Positive Life is written by Shane Stanford, who is set to become the senior pastor at Christ Methodist this month. It’s basically “his” story of living with HIV (from a transfusion) and how it taught him the simplicity and contentment of a life shared in a community of laughter and love.

• Positive Life plum---God’s healing passes understanding; it gets down on the floor with us and wipes away our tears and holds us, especially when the aches and pains of life seem too much to bear. (Positive Life, p.44)

Paul Miller’s, A Praying Life: connecting with God in a distracted world, is the focus of a 5 week book study that Kathy T. is leading in the east Memphis area for a group of like-minded women. She was drawn to the book on Fellowship Memphis’ pastor, Bryan Loritts recommendation as more than another “how to pray” type book.

• Praying Life plum---What does an unused prayer link look like? ANXIETY. (caps are mine) (A Praying Life p. 70)

With pink highlighter in hand, I’ll keep you posted as I partake of more of these powerful, though personal, plums/treasures.

FREEDOM

7/4/11

Today Americans all across our nation celebrate freedom. How thankful I am to live in a country founded on the freedom to worship. Many “freedom fighters” have laid down their lives for me to have that privilege. For this I am grateful. That freedom has made it easy for me to know truth that really makes me free.

“If you continue in My word, then you are truly disciples of Mine; and you will know the truth, and the truth will make you free.” (John 8:31-32)

Grateful to be able to freely think on this verse today---a verse that sets me free from the bondage of sin.

“That’s for sure”……..

7/3/11 "That's for sure"……..3 words that were a big part of Daddy’s vocabulary. His confident response to so many things. Lately, I find myself confident in very little---second guessing nearly everything. Nothing much seems “for sure.” Circumstances change. People change. Even my mood can change without warning.

But God….He’s for sure. The real deal. His Word is for sure. Truth I can count on.

For the word of God is living and active and sharper than any two-edged sword, and piercing as far as the division of soul and spirit, of both joints and marrow, and able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart. (Hebrews 4:12)

This is my “for sure” verse for today. One that can not only judge my thoughts but wipe away the cobwebs of yesterday and strengthen my heart for today.

Worry Webs

7/2/11 When life, as I had known it for most of my adult years , began to drastically change for me a little over 3 months ago, I had blogged (3/18) that I was in a tangle and worry–webs were about to consume me. 

Just like the spider’s sticky strands, my thoughts would begin with a single strand and then quickly begin to encircle my mind and entrap me. Why is it so hard for me to rid my thought life of this impertinence to God? (Oswald Chambers) 

A note in my Bible marginalia defines worry as a mild form of atheism. I hoped I had once and for all abandoned these cobwebs of anxiety, but for me, it’s a daily battle. Then, as now, I’m using God’s word to clear out this anxiety clutter and once again break down those “worry webs.”

We (I) demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ. (2 Corinthians 10:5)

Be Gone, Worry-Webs! 

Waiting Room Angst

6/30/11 Frustration loomed as I had to ONCE AGAIN, declare my gender, race, SS #, etc. Somethings don't change folks----so why after coming to this same doctor's office for 25+ years do I have to fill it out yet again? Were others as frustrated with this clipboard conundrum? I glanced around the waiting room. Mostly old folks. Only one with a cell phone---how rare is that! Most looking at their toes or a magazine. No one looking up. One coughs, others lean away. All waiting as announcement blares, "patient for Dr. Finn." Each hopeful that they might be "said patient." Nurse appears at the door. Patient's name is called. Others resume their unresponsive waiting posture in the drab chairs of the "waiting" room.

Waiting seems to be hard for all of us, especially when the answer might be "negative"---waiting for the possible pink slip, waiting for the diagnosis, waiting for the RX that will offer us hope, waiting for the Lord, whose voice seems to be faint.
For today, my diagnosis wasn't perfect but nothing out of the "aging ordinary." Steps will be taken. Different paths tried. More waiting will take place as different meds are adjusted, 'til right prescription is found, hopefully without bad side effects.

All of this has me coming to realize that waiting doesn't have to be passive. Action continues. Steps are taken. Different procedures are tried or paths taken while waiting on the best direction.
Sounds like the Christian life to me. Right now I'm still waiting on the Lord for direction in several areas. Maybe some of it will be trial and error while I continue to seek Him.

Wait for the Lord; Be strong, and let your heart take courage; Yes, wait for the Lord. (Psalm 27:14)

Kneeling in God's waiting room, I await more divine information. As it comes, I'll share it. You'll just have to wait along with me.

Friendship

6/29/11 A recent read, The Dead Don't Dance, included an Edith Wharton quote. I don't know if it's from one of her books (Ethan Frome was a 12th grade English assignment) or just her writings but it certainly spoke to my heart.

"There is one friend in the life of each of us who seems not a separate person, however dear and beloved, but an expansion, an interpretation, of one's self, the very meaning of one's soul." (Edith Wharton)

I had to ask myself, "Am I that kind of friend?"

Are you?

I have many great friends---from the workplace and traveling buds to high school chums, spiritual confidants and prayer warriors. Over the last few years, I feel as if I have "bled them dry," sucking the very lifeblood out of them as they gave unselfishly of themselves to me. I don't want to be a "vampire friend"---one who saps your energy and leaves you feeling totally drained. I want to be a Jesus kind of friend. Loving others as He has loved me.

My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. You are my friends if you do what I command....Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you. (John 15.12-15)

Thanks to all who have sacrificially laid down so many aspects of their own lives for me and in so doing have shared that kind of friendship with me.