Hello again! It has been a while since I posted on this blog.  The break was not planned or intentional. It snuck up out of nowhere and happened.

 

We had gone through a very hectic Christmas and holiday season, I was in the midst of an extremely time-consuming project with work, our family was getting ready to go away on a trip and all of a sudden there were no more posts for the blog.

 

One missed day turned into two, and then a week, then two, and all of a sudden I realized – Hey! Wait a minute! It’s been a couple of months! What happened?

 

As I reflected on what has been happening in my life and what has been occupying my time over these past few weeks, I realized I had allowed other areas of my life to crowd out the time I had previously set aside for writing. Instead of protecting my writing time and making it a priority, I had given it away to other things which seemed more important. And then I realized, I had never claimed back the lost time for writing.

 

It is really not much different than making a commitment to work out regularly, or to read the Bible every day and then after a short time, you’re no longer doing the things you had planned to do.

 

Excuse me for a moment while I give myself a bit of a lecture. No matter what you commit to doing, if the time to do it is not carefully guarded and protected, the time will be lost and the task will not be completed.

 

Learning to say, “No”, to the things that try to steal time already allocated to a specific task is part of the process of learning self-discipline and self-control. Self-control is one of the fruits of the Spirit listed in Galations 5:22-23. Personally, I think maybe self-control is listed last because it’s the hardest.

 

So as I sat reflecting on what had happened to the blog and my writing, the one thing that became clear to me was that I needed to be much more intentional with my time and I need to be saying, “No” to the things that try to sneak into the time I set aside for writing.  The easiest way for me to do this is through prayer asking for help as I attempt to stay the course with writing and then work on being consistent day in and day out.

 

I don’t think I’m the only one who struggles sometimes with keeping up with my commitments – at least I hope I’m not the only one! If nothing else, I hope today’s post helps someone else pick themselves up and start again on a previous commitment.  Today is a new day and with a new day comes a new opportunity to start again.

 

So how about you?  Is there anything you have been neglecting in your life that needs your attention and time?  Why not join me and start again today?

 

 

Prayer. The word just sounds religious and for a lot of people it sounds outdated and possibly foreign. Others think prayer is mysterious, maybe magical or even a complete crock.

And then there are those people who feel the way I do about prayer. Through prayer we have an opportunity to communicate and exchange dialogue with God. It is conversational, not scripted. It involves speaking and listening. It’s not mysterious or magical, but it is supernatural. It does not have to be scheduled, it can be spontaneous. Location does not matter, and physical positioning isn’t integral either.

There are likely people who would disagree with me on what I’ve already said here about prayer, however my intention is not to be controversial or to be offensive on this subject.  Rather my intention is to express what prayer is to me personally and why it is important to me.

As I read the Bible and see a verse like 1 Thessalonians 5:17 which says, “pray continually” I have come to the conclusion that I can pray anywhere and anytime. I don’t see prayer as a religious ceremony; I see it as a conversation style that works in my personal relationship with Jesus Christ.

That’s where I’m coming from. I have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ first and foremost. Not a religion. As I view what I have as a personal relationship, I build that relationship through communication.  Similar, in some ways, to a relationship with another person.

I can’t imagine trying to have a relationship with someone who never spoke to me and would only listen to me if I spoke certain specific words in a pre-determined order at a set time and in a specific location. That kind of a relationship wouldn’t work for me.

If I need to talk to someone, I get in front of them, whether it’s in person, on the phone, through a text or an email, whether it’s verbal, written or digital; I’m going to connect with them.

Obviously I am not able to phone, text, or email God to communicate with Him. I literally just talk to God. Sometimes the conversation is lengthy, other times it is short and to the point.  Sometimes I do most of the talking and other times I’m very, very quiet.

Philippians 4:6 is a favourite verse of mine on prayer. It says, “Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God.”

I love that I can take anything and everything to God; that I can pour out my heart with every care and concern to Him. I am so grateful and thankful that He is interested in all the details of my life.

Here’s the answer to the title of this blog post – Why Prayer is Important to Me – because I know He listens and because He answers prayer. For real.

I could write and write and write some more about all of the answered prayers I’ve had in my life. Has every prayer I’ve made been answered the way I wanted?  Absolutely not. But that doesn’t discourage me in the least because God answers prayer. If we persist in our prayers and we pray according to His will and purposes, He will answer. What the answer will look like is up to Him.

My plan is to share my thoughts on different aspects of prayer over the course of this month and hopefully to encourage others to spend time and effort in building a personal relationship with Jesus Christ.

I continue to pray that God will be glorified each and every day for as long as He gives me breath through what I feel He leads me to do.

Be blessed.

 

I recently read a quote that really struck a chord with me.

“The three hardest tasks in the world are neither physical feats nor intellectual achievements, but moral acts: to return love for hate, to include the excluded, and to say, ‘I was wrong.’” – Sydney Harris

Loving people can, at times, be a glorious experience especially when those people love you back and appreciate you.  However, loving people can also be brutally difficult especially when the people you love don’t like you or even hate you and don’t want to have anything to do with you.

It’s easy to listen to a song like Casting Crown’s “If We Are the Body” and agree with the lyrics in the bridge, “Jesus paid much too high a price for us to pick and choose who should come and we are the body of Christ” and the chorus, “But if we are the body, Why aren’t His arms reaching? Why aren’t His hands healing? Why aren’t His words teaching? And if we are the body, why aren’t His feet going? Why is His love not showing them there is a way?”, but it is much more difficult to live it out in our lives.

When it’s words in a song, or words in a book or on an electronic screen; intellectually we can agree. But what about when the person you don’t get along with suddenly shows up to participate in the small group or Bible study that you’ve been a part of for a long time? I know someone who had that happen, and they were brave enough to be brutally honest with me about how it made them feel. In short, the feeling was that the small group had been a haven, a place to escape some of life’s difficulties, and now that was gone.

Being the sensitive, caring and understanding person that I am, after listening for a while, I responded with something along the lines of; wouldn’t it just be awful if that person started attending regularly and then got saved, because then you’d have to put up with them for all of eternity in Heaven!

I thought it was fairly funny, but apparently not so much! It did help to put a different perspective on the situation though.

Whether it’s through showing love to someone who doesn’t like us, or going out of our way to include the excluded, or apologizing, here is what we need to remember:  When we were enemies of God, in love and at a great price, He gave up His son in the hope that we would one day return that love to Him.

Just as He did this for me, He did this for every single person. He loves you just as much as He loves me. The value that God puts on each one of us as individuals is tremendous. (Read John 3:16)

Once we understand this and can personalize and internalize it in the very core of our souls, then it requires much less effort to extend love to anyone regardless of how they feel about us in return.

In reading through the gospels and studying Jesus life when He was here on earth, one thing that stands out to me is how He went out of His way to demonstrate love to those who were unloved, and to include those who were excluded.  I am absolutely convinced it is because of His great love for each and every person. If God puts that high a value on every person, who are we to think it would ever be alright to exclude or not act in love towards anyone?

It’s a matter of exchanging our heart for His heart and learning to see people as He sees people.

Growing in maturity as a Christian is a process. As we strive to build our relationships with God, we should be able to identify areas that we have grown in and others should be able to see a difference in us as well.

As we are still near the beginning of 2014, one of my prayers is that I will grow in love and compassion for others, that I would see people the way that God sees them and that when they see me, they would catch a glimpse of Him.

 

It’s funny sometimes how things in your past can meet up with you in the present and catch you by surprise.

Just before Christmas this past year, we were invited by a friend to join them on a tour of the recently closed down Kingston Penitentiary. We accepted the invite and found ourselves on a ninety minute tour through the jail and the various facilities within the jail.

I had never been in a jail before and really only had Hollywood ideas of what a jail would be like. I was not prepared for the real thing. When we went through on tour, the jail had only been closed for a little over a month.  At that point, things inside the jail were pretty much the way they had been when the jail was open.  It hadn’t been cleaned which made the gross factor very high.

We took several pictures while we were in the jail, but let me tell you, the pictures DO NOT reflect what the jail was actually like. While the cells are TINY, the security was very tight and it made me wonder how anyone could ever escape. The atmosphere inside the jail was oppressive and depressing.

I recognize and agree that jail should not be luxurious and that the security needs to be vigilant to keep the residents of the jail behind bars, but I was not prepared for how awful jail actually is.

As we were touring the jail, Dan and I were remembering someone who was a friend of ours who is now serving a life sentence behind bars. We believe he was actually in the Kingston jail up until the time it closed. It was awful to think of knowing someone who is actually serving a life sentence in a place like that jail. To look at the cells, to hear the tour guide describing how the inmates would spend their days, and imagine what it would be like to spend 25 years in a place like that was almost more than I could bear.

We lost two friends almost 23 years ago now. The wife died and her husband was charged and convicted with murder and was sent to jail with a life sentence.  One bad decision made by one individual along with the resulting actions of that decision, irreparably changed the lives of a lot of people.

They were a Christian couple, they regularly attended the same church we attended, attended the same bible study group we were a part of and the husband video-taped our wedding with the help of his wife. Both of their extended families also attended the same church.

When we heard that the wife had been killed, we were shocked. I know bad things can happen to good people, but it’s still shocking when it happens.  To learn a short time later that her husband was being charged with her death, left us beyond words.

Both Dan and I were recalling these memories as we walked through the tour of the Kingston Penitentiary.  It made for a very sombre tour as we considered what that husband’s life has been like over the past number of years.

Neither of us felt at the time this happened so many years ago, or feel now, that the result of those actions shouldn’t mean a jail sentence. It’s just that actually walking through the jail and catching a glimpse of how awful life is in jail was very sobering when realizing that what we were walking through is someone’s reality day in and day out.

After the tour we discussed a case that was in the news recently of a senior lady who had refused to complete her census and was going to court. She was quoted in the news as saying she would serve jail time if that was what the judge decided. I wondered if she had any idea what jail was really like and at the same time I was intrigued by her conviction to stick to her beliefs about not completing the census, no matter what the cost to her personally.

As we were driving home from Kingston, I thought about Christians in other countries who are in jail because of their faith and I wondered if I could be like the lady who refused to complete the census and be willing to go to jail rather than bow to the system and do something or be something I didn’t want.

Thankfully, I live in Canada and I don’t have to make that choice. However as I pondered that question, I came to the conclusion that yes I would be willing to go to jail because of my faith if that was the situation I found myself in as I know who goes before me, who goes with me and who sustains me.

I hope that never happens, as it’s not something I would choose for myself, or anyone that I know or love, especially after having seen the conditions of jail and getting a glimpse into life in jail.  There is nothing on this earth that is more important than my personal relationship with Jesus and the same is true for you.

Enjoy the blessing of your freedom and use it wisely. Time is short and life goes by quickly.

Be blessed.

 

I like quiet.  I find I can focus better and can be more productive in a quiet environment than in a noisy setting. As I type this, I have been trying for a good ninety minutes to write today’s post and here we are at sentence number three. It’s been one interruption after another, completely constant with no quiet.

 

I chose this time to write this post on purpose as I knew it would be difficult for me.

 

We live in a world that is full of noise and distractions that makes it difficult and sometimes impossible to be able to pause or reflect, contemplate or meditate on the important things in life.

 

My soul craves quiet. It’s where I find my refuge and where I am able to pray to God and study His word with clarity of thought and an attentive heart.  I often find myself awake at night while my family sleeps, and I read the Bible, or pray, or sometimes write on my tablet.  Other quiet times, include early in the morning before my family wakes up, or sometimes in the evenings I can find some quiet.

 

I like the story of Elijah hearing God’s voice in 1 Kings 19:11-13. God’s voice wasn’t heard in the wind or the earthquake or the fire. God’s voice was heard as a gentle whisper.  If He whispers, then we need to be quiet to hear Him.  A whisper is easily lost in a lot of noise.

 

Prayer is as much about listening as it is about speaking. Actually, I’m going to retract that and instead say this – Prayer is more about listening than it is about speaking. I’m going to be focusing this month on writing about prayer and I thought I would start with quiet times because if prayer includes listening, and God’s voice can be heard as a whisper, then we need to listen carefully and we need to be still and quiet to hear Him.

 

Psalm 46:10, “He says, ‘Be still, and know that I am God;’”. Sometimes it’s difficult to be still. I’ve struggled through prayer times where I have thoughts constantly running through my head about things I need to get done, or challenges I’m trying to figure out.  Times of prayer where I think I’ve spent more time apologizing to God for getting distracted again, than I have in praying the way I intended to.

 

I don’t think God minds me getting distracted during prayer nearly as much as He would mind it if I chose not to pray because it’s just too difficult to be still and quiet.  I think God wants us to try, even when it’s hard for us. I think He wants us to work and put effort into building our relationships with Him. It’s through expending effort that we learn and get better at things.

 

Think about a young child learning to walk. They fall – a lot! The only way a child learns to walk is by trying again, and then again, and then one more time.  Slowly, with many attempts and much effort, each of us learns to walk.  Because of this, I am convinced that the way to a better prayer life and a deeper relationship with God is through persistent and consistent effort on our parts.  God has already done His part to build relationship with us by providing the sacrifice of His one and only Son and He’s waiting for us to accept Him, to reach out to Him, and to build our relationship with Him.

 

As I’ve read through the gospels and about Jesus life while He was here on Earth, I’ve noticed that Jesus frequently withdrew to quiet places to pray.  If Jesus needed quiet, how much more do I need the quiet to hear from God and to pray to God.

 

One of my goals for 2014 includes a more consistent quiet time with God. It’s so easy to get distracted, or to run out of time, or to forget, or, or, or…. Time is short and life is flying by. It’s time for me to be focused on the things that are truly important in this life and one of the things my great-grandmother told me was that there is NOTHING on this earth that is more important than my personal relationship with Jesus. I believe she is absolutely correct!

 

If you’ll excuse me now, I think I’m going to pack up and leave this noisy place and find somewhere nice and quiet! Here I come Lord!

 

Be blessed!

 

Never. I would never have imagined that at almost eleven months after being a part of a horrendous accident with a miraculously good ending (see the about page for details) that I would still be dealing the trauma. Every. Single. Day.

Here’s a glimpse into my real life Narnia.

“Like Narnia, beautiful and scary.” That’s how one of my friends described how things look outside around here in a conversation with me on Christmas Eve. We’d had an ice storm here over the previous weekend and the weather was so severe that my husband cancelled our church services on December 22^nd.  He doesn’t do that easily. In fact, he’s never done that before – ever!

 

In the afternoon on Christmas day, Dan and I went over to the Frankford Island and took some pictures of the ice and snow. Some of those pictures will appear in this post.

 

Winter is hard this year. As I was thinking about writing this particular post, I knew I wanted to include some pictures and so I suggested going for a walk to shoot pictures to Dan.  However, when the time came for the walk, we took the car (at my request) and drove a short distance (easily walked normally), to get to the place to take pictures.  Once we arrived, we got out of the car, walked around for a couple of minutes and then I was back in the car waiting for Dan to finish taking the pictures – that I had asked him to take.

 

On December 22^nd, at the end of the ice storm, after being stuck in the house for a couple of days, Dan suggested we go for a walk. I made it around the outside loop of our subdivision once before retreating home to the warmth and safety of being inside.

 

But the worst day was our first snow fall this year. It happened on a Wednesday. That evening, we headed to church and I put on my blue coat for the first time this winter. I wore my blue coat to church in February on the night of the river accident.  Then, on the way to church, we picked up a friend of our two daughters, Jade. Jade was with us on the night of the river accident. As we drove across the bridge in Frankford, I looked at the church at the edge of the river and I began to panic. I was so close to jumping out of the car. Ok, maybe not literally jumping out of the car while it was moving, but it was the first time in months that being on a bridge in a car had freaked me out, and I really wanted out of the car as quickly as possible.  That one was a bad reaction and it took me quite awhile to calm back down.

 

I am not stuck in the house, unable to get out. I am not afraid of being outside. I like snow and have always enjoyed winter. But right now, I don’t want to be cold and I really don’t want to be more than a moment away from somewhere where I can get warm.

 

While it’s beautiful outside like Narnia, it’s also scary outside like Narnia.

 

On Boxing Day, I was on the verge of tears with a monster sized lump in my throat as we drove on the 401 and went past an overturned vehicle in the ditch. Scary stuff happens in the winter.

 

Logic and reasoning help manage reactions to a point, but the emotions and residual fear that have been a part of my life since February 2013 sometimes have no interest in logic or reason.  I’m learning not to fight with the illogical emotions and unreasonable fear as I have discovered they are incredibly stubborn in that the more logic and reason I employ to counter the illogical emotions and unreasonable fear, the more illogical and unreasonable they become.  Whereas, I have found that if I don’t fight the emotion and fear, and instead just let them be, I can slowly and carefully make my way through them and get back to the place where logic and reason work.

 

At least, that’s what was working until it started snowing.

 

The trips away from logic and reason were getting shorter, were much more manageable and were occurring less and less all the time. However, that changed with the first snowfall this fall and there are now times when strategies and coping methods are simply words with no meaning and while I have learned that struggling and fighting against the emotion and fear is futile, I also don’t want to give in to them too much out of fear of never getting back to the place where logic and reason dwell.

 

Contrary to the fictional place called Narnia, this place where I am is real and there is no magical wardrobe to provide an escape from here.

 

However, there are some similarities.  There’s no lion named Aslan, but there is the Lion of Judah (Revelation 5:5) and just as Aslan gave Peter a sword and a shield as gifts, my lion has given me a sword of His word and a shield of faith (Ephesians 6:16-17). He is always with me, He never leaves me and He fights for me when I’m not able.

 

The stories from Narnia also show that good triumphs over evil and that is true where I am as well. There are lessons and truths to be learned where I am just as there were lessons and truths for the children in Narnia to learn.

 

So yes, outside here in Frankford it is like Narnia, beautiful and scary. But I have got my lion, my sword and my shield and maybe once I have learned whatever it is I’m supposed to learn, and discover all that He has planned for me to discover through this, then the scary will disappear and all that will be left is beautiful.

 

Hopefully, somewhere through the rambling today, someone will be blessed.

Growing up in a Christian home and attending church for as long as I have been alive, I have lost count of the number of times I have heard about God’s love and how He loves me personally. Hearing it is one thing, experiencing it, seeing it, feeling it, and living with it is another thing altogether.

 

It’s only been since I personalized God’s love for me as an individual that I really started to feel like I was gaining an understanding of His love.  I forget where I was or when it was exactly, but I remember being in a service and being told to insert my name into John 3:16 in the place where the verse says the world and then personalize the rest of the verse.  That made the verse say, ‘For God so loved Liane that He gave His only begotten Son, that when she believes in Him, she will have everlasting life.’ For God so loved Liane. Wow! Put your own name in there.

 

John also wrote in 1 John 3:1, “See what great love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God!”  His love is extravagant and He loves to demonstrate His love towards us.

 

This year has been a year of transformation for me personally and spiritually. There’s been way too much going on and happening to possibly cram into one blog post, so I won’t even try.  Please look at my about me page on this blog and watch a video or two about the ice water rescue my husband and I were involved in on February 6, 2013.  It’s a night I will never, ever forget for as long as I live.

 

Our local fire chief John Whelan is quoted in the media reports describing the rescue as miraculous and saying, “It’s a wonder they were not swept down the river.”

 

It’s a miracle that any of the three of us that were in the river that night are alive. It’s God’s love that kept me safe that night.  I know this because of what I found in Psalm 94:18.  It says, “When I felt my feet slipping, you came with your love and kept me steady.”

 

I lost my footing many times while I was in the river and yet every time I went down into the water, I miraculously regained my footing and was not swept away – “you came with your love and kept me steady” – when I read this verse for the first time after the accident in the river, God’s incredible love displayed that night overwhelmed me all over again and I cried for hours and then off and on again for a whole day.  Not tears of sorrow, tears of thankfulness, tears for the reminder of how much God loves us and tears of gratitude for the incredible lengths that God is willing to go to so He can show us His great love.

 

I am so incredibly humbled that God would choose to use me to help a friend who was in danger.  Even more humbling though is experiencing His love for me up close and personal.  Just this one aspect of that night in February has radically changed my life and how I view life.

 

I wish there was a way that I could properly express how much God truly and passionately loves each one of us – to be able to accurately convey His love to those I come into contact with, but the truth is that He is the best one at doing that. I am just trying to be a reflection of Him, and I am far from perfect.

 

I have found that in my attempts to extend love to those I come into contact with, that I have more patience and more compassion than I have ever had before.  Can I do better yet – definitely, I’m still growing and still working on my journey of faith.  I think if we can see spiritual growth in our lives and can see evidence of the Holy Spirit working through us, then we are moving forward in our relationship with Jesus Christ.

 

I don’t think there is any middle ground when it comes to our relationships with God.  I think we’re either moving closer to God or we’re moving away from God. When I think about my relationship with my husband of over 20 years, our relationship today is very different than when we were dating or even 10 years ago.  Our relationship has grown and we are closer together. Unfortunately, there are some marriages where the relationship doesn’t grow closer over time and the people drift apart from each other.

 

Our relationship with God is a matter of our choice. God has already made His choice – He wants to be in relationship with you.  How close you are to God, is your choice.  How quickly you move forward and grow closer to God is also up to you.

 

My great-grandmother once told me that there’s absolutely nothing on this earth that is more important than a personal relationship with Jesus Christ and that a person should never let any circumstance, thing or person come between them and Jesus, because nothing is more important than Jesus.  She was a wise woman of God and I believe what she said is absolutely true. Nothing is more important.

 

God is not a mystery.  He doesn’t hide from us.  Jeremiah 29:13 says, “You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart.” Praying and seeking God will lead to a closer relationship with Him.  I hope you will seek Him for yourself – as my great-grandma said, there’s absolutely nothing on this earth that is more important than your personal relationship with Jesus Christ.

 

Be blessed.

Written July 16, 2013

Growing up, I hated hearing words like, “You need to change your attitude” or “watch your attitude”. I really didn’t like being told things like that.  What would sometimes make it worse, was when the realization would finally click with me that the person who said it had been right.

 

Sometimes it’s just downright hard to have a good attitude about something you don’t like, or don’t want to do.  It’s something I’ve personally had to spend a lot of time working at. Watching what I say, how I react, and I don’t pretend to think that I’ve got it all figured out and have the right attitude at all times in all situations.  There are still things that drive me crazy.

 

But I have learned a lot over the years and am continuing to learn as I continue to grow in Christ. As I’ve tried to make myself more open to the leading of the Holy Spirit and what He has for me to do, I’ve found myself in situations I would never have imagined for myself.

 

I have to admit that awhile ago, I almost messed up and missed a divine appointment because of my attitude.

 

Dan had this dinner that he was to attend and I was asked to go with him. It wasn’t a dinner I was really looking forward to.  Truth be told, I was kind of resentful for having to spend an evening away from my kids. I dragged my feet getting ready to leave and had a grumbling in my heart.  I walked out of our house, put on a smile and tried to put on a good attitude on the outside.

 

We ended up sitting at a table where we knew no one and we politely introduced ourselves to the others at our table.  I was seated with Dan to my left and another gentleman on my right.  It wasn’t long before the Holy Spirit started telling me to change my attitude.  As I talked with the gentleman beside me, I could sense a brokenness in him. He knew that Dan was a pastor, making me a pastor’s wife and he started telling me that he used to attend a couple of Pentecostal churches back in the day.  Then he switched to a couple of Baptist churches.  He went through 5 church splits within a few years before he threw in the towel on church and God out of frustration and the pain of going through so much garbage in the church splits. This was the reason we were to be at this dinner – a divine appointment.  I quickly prayed asking for forgiveness for my rotten attitude and asked for guidance as I continued talking to the man seated on my right.

 

The conversation continued with him telling me his daughter had been praying for him and wanted him to come back to church and God.  His response was to sit down and write a 20+ page letter to his daughter explaining to her all the reasons why he could no longer believe in God or go to church.  His plan was to give the letter to his daughter so she would stop praying for him. But something different happened.  Instead, he went outside of his own community and went to a service at a church he’d never set foot into before.  At the end of the service the pastor was greeting him and he felt that he should show the letter to that pastor.  So he did.  The pastor read the letter and then they talked for a long while.  He told me that since that time, he’s been reading his Bible regularly and praying too.  He’s not attending a church at the moment, because he’s not sure he’s ready for that yet.

 

He had heard the story of the river rescue and was asking me questions about the details of what had happened and what God had done that night.  As I told him the story, I could see a longing in his eyes. God is calling this man back to him and He was working through me that evening as one very small part in His plan to bring this lost sheep back into the pasture.

 

That man was so grateful to hear our story and as he said, “it’s encouraging to know that God is still real and still does miraculous things.” He said he needed our story and was so glad that we were seated at the same table for our divine appointment. I’m not sure which of us came away from that dinner more blessed, but I think it was me for waking up to why I was there and getting a better attitude in place just in the nick of time.

 

The reason for the dinner that night was of little consequence in the light of eternity, missing an evening with my kids was a small price to pay, getting to play a part in a soul in the process of returning to God – that’s what I want my life to be about.  Helping hurting people find God.  And so I found my attitude adjusted and more aligned with what He wants for me.  It was a painful lesson, one I almost messed up by putting a priority on my own selfish desires.  Thank God I went to that dinner, even if I was dragging my feet in the beginning. Thank God for attitude adjustments.

Written July 14, 2013

We’ve lived in Frankford for over 4 years now and I’ve never felt a desire to go swimming in the Trent River even though there’s a beach within walking distance of our house.  I’m a strong swimmer, but I don’t like water with a current in it. My dislike increases with the strength of the current and the size of the obstacles in the water and this river has a pretty swift current with lots of large rocks everywhere. Yet, yesterday, July 13, 2013, marks the second time I’ve gone into the Trent River this year. I do not have any plans to make this a regular event.

 

So why did I choose, on purpose, to go back into the river?  This venture into the river was for no one other than me.  Last time, it was for someone else. This time it was in daylight so I could see what I was walking into and where I was going.  Last time it was very dark and there were moments when I couldn’t see anything. This time the water was cool but refreshing.  Last time it was frigid and deadly. This time I was relaxed and calm.  Last time I was frantic and desperate. This time it was at the beach where it’s pretty safe to be in the water.  Last time it was in a spot that was difficult to enter and exit the water and definitely not a spot to go for a swim.  Are you getting it yet?  It’s the same river, same water, same person, and yet, two completely opposite experiences.

 

I went in this time for myself, mostly symbolic, and a little just to physically show myself that being in a river can be a positive experience – know it mentally and get it mentally, it’s just something I needed to do. I love water and I love swimming, especially in water that’s not full of chlorine.

 

This time I leisurely walked out into the river until it was just above my waist – the same depth as the last time when I wasn’t falling in the water.  As I stood there, I prayed a prayer of thanksgiving.  I thanked God for being with me the last time we were in the river together and for all that He accomplished. I thanked Him for my family and my friends and I once again told Him I was His. I thanked Him for the precious gift of life over and over again.

 

Yesterday’s venture into the river reinforced a few things for me.  As I very carefully picked  where I would step testing before putting my full weight down to make sure the rocks wouldn’t shift too much under my weight, I understood better why the bottoms of both my feet were so bruised back in February. I wore shoes this time, in February I was in sock feet. I couldn’t feel my feet in February because the water was so cold and I had no idea what I was stepping on because it was so dark. When you combine that with fighting against the water to remain standing, while moving as fast as possible to find Megan,  how the bruising happened becomes obvious.

 

What was the same was the feeling of the current against my body and the sound of the water moving around me. I listened closely as I heard two adults at the beach discussing their surprise at how strong the current is even in the beach area of the river and then calling to their children warning them not to go into the water very far and I shuddered. I remembered the first time I took a bath after the accident in February, lying in the bath with my eyes closed relaxing and then moving my arm – just the sound of the water moving shot my heart rate through the roof.  My eyes flew open and it took several minutes to calm down. The first shower, feeling the water running over my body, I had the same reaction – with my heart racing I grabbed the hand rail to steady myself.

 

I didn’t experience fear the night of the accident in February. The only way I’ve been able to explain what happened is that God’s presence literally enveloped me as I was making my way to get into the river and it was like a fear numbing anesthesia was put into place.  Afterwards though, when that anesthesia wore off and the reality of the trauma that we’d been through set in, my fear levels were off the charts.

 

Truth be told, I’m still not over the terror or fear and I’m no longer sure that I will ever be. A few weeks ago now, Dan & I went to see a movie with some friends.  We saw Man of Steel.  The new Superman movie.  I really can’t tell you much about what happened in that movie past the point where the school bus full of children careens off of a highway bridge landing right side up in a river. Seeing the horror on the children’s faces as the bus filled up with water – way too realistic for my liking.  Don’t worry, nobody died. Superman, well actually in that scene he was still a child and not technically Superman yet, pulled the whole bus out of the river and saved everyone. Meanwhile, I began to physically shake – uncontrollably shaking. I spent the rest of the movie trying to look and act calm while trying to stop the shaking.  By the end of the movie, I was still shaking. As we were leaving the theatre, one of my friends asked me if I liked the movie and my response was to burst into tears. Nice, really nice. Inside I was rolling my eyes at myself, telling myself to get a grip it was just a movie. My wonderful husband held my hand through most of the movie and after the movie never left my side or let go of my hand until he knew I was alright.

 

This is what my life looks like right now. Fine one moment, maybe fine for the whole day, and then seemingly out of the blue something or nothing will trigger a reaction in me. I’m not the only one who was there the night of the accident in the river on February 6, 2013 and I’m also not the only one still struggling with the aftermath.

 

So the trip into the river yesterday was and is my way of saying that I’m not giving up and I’m not giving in to fear. God was with us that night in February and He did amazing things to spare three lives that night. Each day is a precious gift and I’m committed more than ever to making each one count for the Kingdom of God.  Am I walking perfectly, no, I’m walking wounded. Am I strong and brave, no I’m weak and terrified. But what I am and what I have, have been given to God for Him to use as He sees fit.

 

I hope this post helps someone today.

 

Be blessed.