Waltzing Leaf

Sitting outside, needing some calm in my heart, the wind picked up and was blowing. As I started watching the leaves being swept from the trees like someone giving the limbs a good shake, I started watching a smaller leaf as it fell. 

Slowly it began to float and flutter, swaying up and down lightly as if in slow motion it seemed to go across the blue sky like a beautiful waltz was playing as it took its last dance toward the ground. It hit me that I just had a special little moment in time to be the one to see that leaf and capture the beauty of its dance in my heart.

How long had that leaf taken to grow back in the early spring? How long had that leaf clung to life through all the rains, summer storms and winds we had over the past months? It had held on…until now and my eyes got to see the wonder of its last dance. I had a special moment that brought a smile to my face as I sat and thought about my life.

God surprises me in the smallest of things. I want to always be aware of them around me and to take notice and not miss out. Just like that leaf, I too have to continue to grow, be strong in the storms as the winds of change in my life will come to buffet against me. I continue to cling to Him daily and one day I will then be like that small leaf and I’ll break free and in that moment of time I will let it all go and just be guided and dance to and fro in a beautiful waltz with my Lord.

“Yet God has made everything beautiful for its own time. He has planted eternity in the human heart, but even so, people cannot see the whole scope of God’s work from beginning to end.” (Ecclesiastes 3:11 NLT)

PSALM DAY

Someday……we all hear that.  Some day we will go here, do this, and do that….someday.  Most of are good at saying it but never follow through.  I decided back in 2012 that I was going to do a different kind of someday.  I call it my PSALMS DAY.  I started taking a Psalms….any of them and I challenged myself to read one verse at a time….re-read and then write my thoughts down as to what I felt God was saying to me.  I love the Psalms.  I started a journal….and it amazed me at how God really spoke to my heart through each one but it amazed me more so that I was really going on a journey and letting it speak deeply to my heart.  Have I finished them all….nope?  I don’t do it daily….but try to keep at it each week and sadly some weeks slip by me, but I look forward to reading my Psalms and seeing what God has in store for me, verse by verse and I break it down and apply it to my life.  As I do this….it’s as if God is opening my eyes to how real He is.

Just like we say “someday” and we have good intentions and we don’t always follow through….I find myself feeling bad that I let a day go by and didn’t do or have my someday.  Funny how if we don’t stick with something each day it can soon be a thing of the past and just another SOMEDAY that we will get back to.  So I make it a habit and I remind myself as I know how it felt as a child to have someone tell me that “someday” we will do this and how much I was let down when I didn’t get to do it.  Same thing with God…..He looks forward to my Psalm Days with me.  I miss it too.  He has those appointments with me when I do take time to read his Word.

 

 ^"I have hidden your word in my heart, that I might not sin against you. (Psalm 119:11 New Living Translation)

Trust

I know each morning that the sun will rise....and each evening the sun will set. I trust it will and don't worry that it won't. Many things we tend to just take for granted and things we trust without even thinking about it. We take in a breath and we blow it out, we get up out of bed and get moving each morning…..well, some of us are a bit slower than others. We make us a cup of coffee and we sit down, trusting that chair will hold us as we do. Many things we just go on and never even stop to understand as it’s familiar and we’ve learned to trust each time we had to do something.

It’s the same with God. I don't always have to understand how He will accomplish His plans....I just know He will. All He asks is that I surrender "my will" to His and TRUST that He will show me the way forward. Just like the sun always comes up each morning and I watch it begin another new day, so does my trust in the Lord. I’ve learned to not worry about things so much as He is there just as solid to me as the day before.

"Trust in the Lord with all your heart. Never rely on what you think you know. Remember the Lord in everything you do, and He will show you the right way." (Proverbs 3:5-6 GNT)

Rule of Business

I had a business owner chat with me, yesterday afternoon, about how he got a little worried at times of keeping his business going. He said he knew I had been doing my wedding cakes for 39 years and wondered how I was able to stay so busy all the time. He was more freaked out about just being in the wedding business for about 4 years now and he noticed more and more starting to do the same thing he was and was worried about staying in business with sinking some $$$ into it. Said he was pretty busy and booking into next year, but worries when he hears of others starting up.

I told him I didn’t have a magic formula for being in business making cakes for 39 years, other than just “keep on keeping on.” My Mother always taught me the Golden Rule….to treat folks the way I wanted to be treated, and it would carry me through. That if I got worked up every time I heard of a new person wanting to make cakes….I’d be worried all the time, but that many who step out into what I do for a living soon find they either can’t cut it, can’t make money at it and drop it after a bit. That I just keep doing what I know best and do the best on each cake order I make. If I treat the customer well, word of mouth is my best advertisement. I no longer really have to run any kind of ads and have more business than I can handle. I told him to think about it….he can’t book every wedding out there. I can’t do every wedding cake or birthday cake in this area….but I am willing to help other decorators by passing on business to them too. It didn’t bother me….as I am busy enough. Stick with it and just keep doing the best for each customer….was my goal.

He said it made him feel better after talking to me and he was not going to give up and that he needed to just STOP and collect his vision again and see that he really was booked and booking into next year, so really he was blessed. I agreed with him and told him I’m not a business person….I hate that part of what I do and to just find his passion and the love he had for when he started up his business…not worry about the other guy.

Come to think about it….we all need to be reminded of that in our lives. Too many look around at what someone else is doing, getting more than they are, buying this and having that….and we need to STOP and see that we really are blessed and have way more than a lot of people. More important to keep treating people the way we want to be treated. It also reminded me after chatting with this guy, that I need to just KEEP ON KEEPING ON and keep fresh the Golden Rule in my life.

“Do to others whatever you would like them to do to you. This is the essence of all that is taught in the law and the prophets.” (Matthew 7:12 NLT)

Senior Age

I get it!!! I know many of you who read things I write….are of let’s say the “senior age” and we’re not talking about High School. We’ve reached that certain criteria of being labeled as old coots by the younger generation. I’m constantly bombarded with emails these days on Medicare sign up, insurance supplement companies all vying for me to sign up before I reach 65!! Hitting 63 a few months ago was bad enough but I don’t need help in being reminded daily that I’M OLDER!!! My knee and hip do a wonderful job of keeping me grounded in knowing I am getting older without the help of daily emails saying I’m hitting closer and closer.

All of us are growing older. Face it…..none of us have the fountain of youth. I joke many times and say I wish I could bottle up half the energy of my 3 Grandkids as they go crazy running all over the yard and want this old Gma to chase them or keep up with them….or climb up in the tree house. Sweet Ella always asks me to try and go down the slide….to which Gma tells her there won’t be a slide anymore if old Gma goes down it. Even as I watch my Grand-kids growing older, it reminds me of my age.

Stuff in commercials all the time sending out messages on things that will keep us younger. Face lifts, creams, potions, you name it try to show us we can look and feel younger, when in reality….we are the age we are. Some of us don’t have to act our age though and then again…..some would do better if they did act their age. Gray hair, reading glasses, larger prints books…..you name it, reminders of age.

My brother and his wife were here over the weekend and we got to talking about what we use to could do and how we don’t have the physical stamina we once had. Our minds still say we can do that….but reality hits us in the stomach of….yeah, try that and you’ll be sorry! I’m not one for throwing in the towel either….and I’ve not called a truce with time and going to just plop in a rocking chair and not do some living, however with my older age does come some wisdom to not be stupid!!!

What matters most to me is not trying to look younger or act younger, but to focus on things that matter most to me. God is number one on my list and then my family and friends. I am the age I am and I can’t change when I was born. I know many who have a fight daily with trying to act or be younger. My motto has become: “Age is mind over matter. I don’t mind my age, so it don’t matter.” Again….what does matters is how I am letting God still be in my life and using me and I don’t have to look a certain way or try to be something I am not.

“So we aren’t depressed. But even if our bodies are breaking down on the outside, the person that we are on the inside is being renewed every day.” (2 Corinthians 4:16 CEB)

The Potter

This early morning as I am moving around and collecting my thoughts from being gone the last 5 days to what is ahead of me this week.  Trying to plan some catching up and as I’m sipping on my cup of coffee I looked over to the corner of my family room and I see some of the pottery my brother, Ron, had made and given to me at different times in my life when he was still alive.

My mind begins to take a nostalgic turn in the road as I start looking at the design of the hand thrown pot.  It brings waves of sadness that pulls and ebbs with each flow as I think upon the hands of my brother as he once made this beautiful piece from just a solid lump of clay.  I am also reminded of another Potter, the ONE who took me from just a lump of clay and has so far molded me into who I am and what He wants me to be. 

The Master Potter is not finished with me yet and though he may have to use his tools to cut away some of the mistakes and situations that cause marks in how I am to become, I have to trust that He is the one who sees the finished design and one day I will be that beautiful piece of pottery that He had in mind all along. I think of the old hymn:

Have Thine own way, Lord! Have Thine own way!
Thou art the Potter, I am the clay.
Mold me and make me after Thy will,
While I am waiting, yielded and still.

Help me to be still and to yield to the Potter's Hands.
"And yet, O LORD, you are our Father. We are the clay, and you are the potter. We all are formed by your hand." (Isaiah 64:8 NLT)

Eclipse

This morning as I was reading a devotion….it jumped out at me, as most of us are preparing to watch the Eclipse later this afternoon, that God’s love continues to shine on us. I was drawn to remember who my Creator is and how His hand in in control of the sun, moon and stars all around me.

As we watch the moon come into place and darken the sun out, God is my LIGHT. There is no darkness in Him at all. We live in a world that seems to continue to be so evil and full of hate and it tries to extinguish or diminish our hope. God in all His brilliance is much brighter than the sun and His Glory will fill you with joy, love and hope.

When things in this world and in your own life try to upset or bring you down, hold on to God’s hand. Refuse to be intimidated and know He is with you. God’s light can break through any darkness we will go through.

Today as I watch the eclipse, I will be praising God, Who is the maker of it all. I will spend some time basking in His holy light and let His Face shine upon me. His love for us never dims!

“For God, who said, “Let there be light in the darkness,” has made this light shine in our hearts so we could know the glory of God that is seen in the face of Jesus Christ.” (2 Corinthians 4:6 NLT)