Promise

I've been having a hard week. Despite that--

I am thankful for...
...this verse's promise

 For I am the Lord you God who takes hold of your 

right hand and says to you, Do not fear; I will help you.

                                                             Isaiah 41:13  

...a dinner date with my husband

Thanking...

I am thankful for...
...books
...a day spent reading my Kindle (totally counts as a book)
...homemade peanut butter
...these words:

No condemnation now I dread;
Jesus, and all in Him, is mine;
Alive in Him, my living Head,
And clothed in righteousness divine,
Bold I approach th’eternal throne,
And claim the crown, through Christ my own.

Leftovers

All the cooking I did the last couple of weeks is paying off this week. Opening the freezer door and choosing a meal is all it takes to fix supper. Well, that, and the microwave or stove top or oven. Tonight's dinner was Corn Chowder with ham, some English Muffin Bread toast and a couple of those yummy little oranges that are for sale at the grocery store this time of year.

I am thankful for...
...leftovers
...these words:

Long my imprisoned spirit lay,
Fast bound in sin and nature’s night;
Thine eye diffused a quickening ray—
I woke, the dungeon flamed with light;
My chains fell off, my heart was free,
I rose, went forth, and followed Thee.

...a husband who comes home every evening for supper
...a warm house ;)

Monday, Monday

I am thankful for...
...being able to see deer wander by in the field next to our house
...the deer family I saw this morning -- mama, baby, and a buck!
...listening to my sweet husband play through hymns to find some to play for my mom
...a warm house

Pie

My sister and brother-in-law took my mom to the chapel service in the home where Mom is staying. I slept in a little and we met Mom in her room when they got back from the service. Dad came shortly after that when he had finished up with some things that their church he needed to do. When Dad took mom to eat her lunch, the rest of us went to a little cafe in another part of the home.

I will just go and say right now that even though the sandwich was very good, the pie was the best part of lunch. Of course. I knew it would be. How? My son-in-law's mother made it. She owns and cooks and bakes at a little tearoom restaurant about 45 minutes away and once a week brings pies to the home where Mom is staying. Such a fun connection.

As always, it was hard to say good-bye to Mom.

I am thankful for...
...Lemon Meringue Pie
...lunch conversations with family
...another frozen yogurt stop on the way home
...a quiet Sunday night at home
...God's never-ending, constant, powerful, life-changing love
...my mom
...my dad

A Saturday With Mom

Hubby and I spent today with my mom. My dad wanted to go to a football game with my sisters, but was very hesitant to leave Mom all alone all day. He has been with her every single day (10-12 hours a day) since she had the stroke on September 6th. Hubby and I volunteered to spend the day with her. It went pretty well, but it was a hard day, too. I could tell Mom missed Dad and I am not very good at reading Mom and what she is trying to communicate. (Dad is amazing at that.) We helped Mom with lunch. I gathered the food for her and she fed herself. She has greatly improved with being able to feed herself. So much so, that earlier this week she had her feeding tube taken out!

We brought a few things with us to occupy Mom. We had a stack of catalogs with us (all the catalogs in the mail are a good indication that Christmas is coming soon). I gave Mom a couple and she paged through them and looked at all the pages. It's good to see she knows what to do with something like that and seemed to be interested in the stuff on the pages. 

I had made my Dad some Swedish Rye Bread (Mom's recipe) and brought a piece for Mom to snack on. I took the baggie it was in out of my purse and she made a noise that indicated she knew what it was and ate half a piece and said something like yum. That was so fun to watch. 

I also brought my laptop and some of our old home movies that we had transferred to DVD several years ago. She and I watched that together. I heard her chuckled a few times at the silliness of my kids and their cousins.

I am thankful for...

...my mom's chuckles

...Mom's version of "Hi" when she first sees me

...my dad being able to get away for the day even if it was hard for him to be away from my mom

...old home movies

...a late night talk with my sister

What I Believe

Whenever there was a Billy Graham special on TV when I was growing up, my mom watched it. When my mom was in college at Iowa State University, she went to a Billy Graham crusade in Des Moines. There she gave her life to Christ. I am so very grateful for that. If she hadn't, would she have married my dad? If she had married my dad but not been a Christian, what kind of a childhood would I have had? I suspect it would be so very different from what how I did grow up.

Yesterday was Billy Graham's 95th birthday. There is a message from him floating around Facebook via YouTube. I embedded it here. Listen to it.



A quote from the video:

The almost overwhelming thing is to think that Jesus became sin and it was my sin and it was things that I've done that held Him on the cross. He hung naked on the cross, bleeding in a shameful way so that I would never have to be ashamed for the things that I have done. The truth is, there is no other way besides Christ and what He did. There is no life outside of that. There is no other way of salvation except through the cross of Christ.

I am thankful for...

...Jesus Christ taking on sin for me

...salvation

...the hope of Eternal Life with God

...the Christian parents that raised me 

...growing up learning about the Bible, about Jesus, about God's love for me