Addendum

This is the conclusion of my post yesterday about the challenge of raising children. It is really two examples about how life changes and how often we have to adjust our attitudes, either good or bad.

#1 - During the time my two daughters were very young I had a very dear friend, Bev, who had a little boy, Larry, 1 year younger than my girls. As stated in the original post my two little girls were usually very well behaved and obedient. Larry, on the other hand, was a typical, rambunctious little boy. The type that was always getting into some type of adventure that usually ended up with his getting in trouble.

Fast forward about 10 years...... my David is the age Larry use to be. One day Bev and I were shopping. David was doing the usual: peeking under the dressing room doors, hiding under the clothes rack, just being his normal rambunctious self. Suddenly my dear friend said, "Susan this does my heart good!" I said "What do you mean?" She related how when Larry was that age and we'd be out together and I would act like I didn't even know her. I said, "I DID not". To which she replied: "Oh yes! For example, I remember once in a furniture store when Larry was jumping on the furniture and you, with your 2 girls, just walked about 20 feet ahead of me and pretended like you didn't know me". I didn't specifically remember doing that but I probably did!!! The moral of this one......be careful of your judgements on other people the circumstances can change and you'll be "eating your words" or in this case, my actions.

#2 - I had the 4 children. Their ages were about 2, 7, 15 & 16. David's friend, Rodney, (who I spoke about in the previous post) was an only child. His mother, Mary, and I became friends. Rodney's father was a lawyer and they lived in a much bigger home down the street from us. When I would visit at Mary's everything was always in perfect shape. Everything clean, shiny and in its place. Not a speck of dust on the Ethan Allen Furniture. Mary would come to my home and it always seemed like I was in the middle of folding a large pile of laundry, toys would be strung out across the living room, the girls school books would be all over the kitchen table. You get the picture. Seems like I would begin each visit apologizing for how messy everything was.

Fast forward about 6 years.........Mary had 3 more sons in a space of about 5 years! Right after the birth of her 4th son I went down to visit and see the newest baby. Her mother had come in from another city to help out, there were wet clothes hanging all over the living room, the other 2 infants were banging items or rolling cars on the Ethan Allen Furniture. You get the picture. I said to Mary and her mother, "This does my heart good!". They said, "What do you mean?" and I relayed the story of how I would feel years before when Mary, with her only child, would come into my disheveled home of 4 children. The moral of this story.......times and circumstances do not remain the same and I've learned not to be so harsh, critical or judgmental of either myself or others.

The Challenge of Raising Children

I was blessed this morning to begin my day seeing this beautiful sunrise compliments of Seeds From My Garden. Next to seeing it with my own two eyes was getting to view this beautiful shot:-)

Ginger has once again inspired me to write in an entirely different direction than I had on my mind. Go over and read her lovely post about the child in the Dr. office and then the comments relating to that post, especially hers about her third daughter Jenna. Hence my story!

I had two little girls born 1 year and 9 days apart. I use to say it was like having twins the hard way. Suzette and Jacque were basically very obedient and docile children and naturally, being mine, I adored them. Because they were obedient and docile I took great pride in being such a good young mother!!!

Fast forward............8 1/2 years later our first son was born. We were so delighted. We had wanted a son and had waited a long time for him. Well, almost from the beginning David was a challenge to this young mother and her pat child rearing skills.

First of all he never really crawled. He would kind of scoot but never got up on all fours. What he did do was begin walking at about 7 months and by 9 months he was running. He was into life and finding out all about this great big world in a big and fast way.

I also found out very quickly what a strong willed child he was. The first real test that I remember was we had a small TV on a TV stand. The stand had a shelf where we kept the newspapers. David would pull down the papers....I would say "no-no" and slap his hands and put the papers back on the shelf. Suffice it to say, he could hold out much longer pulling down than I could putting up. His little hand would literally be red from my slapping it but pull he would still do.

By the time he was two years old he was climbing the fence in our back yard. He would climb over the fence, run across the next yard, climb that fence and be into the 3rd yard before I could hardly get the back door opened and myself outside. An aside, years later when he was grown we ran into the neighbor who lived in the 3rd yard who said "I always will remember David for climbing the fence like he could!".

When he was 5 years old our second son, Marc, was born. Shortly after Marc's arrival my in-laws came from Tennessee to see our new son. I had put David down for a nap and the 4 of us were visiting. Sometime later I realized David was still napping. He usually didn't nap that long so I went to check on him. Guess what greeted me?.......an open window (he had opened the window) and no David. Across from our house was another row of houses and behind that was empty fields. He had opened that window, climbed out of the window and was gone. We hunted and hunted and finally found him playing in the dirt in the treed field. He was like "What's the matter? I'm just playing."

This incident occurred when he was in the first grade. His bestfriend was a boy, Rodney, who was the same age and lived down the street. Rodney went to a parocial school. One day I get a call that David is not in school. First grade and this kid is playing hookey!!! The story....the parocial school had a holiday that day and Rodney didn't have school. David decided he didn't have to go to school either and had gone to Rodney's house. His sister's at the time said "Well, look at it this way Mom, maybe he's going through the bad teen years early." That was a nice thought but it turned out not to be true.

Another very vivid insident I remember is this one. We had one of those above ground plastic swimming pools. A big one that was about 2 feet high. One day David threw our cat into the pool. I was horrified. I'd heard these programs on TV about kids that were mean to animals turning out to be murderers, etc. and I just paniced at the fact David had thrown the cat into the pool. I became a screaming manic myself as I yelled, hollowed and spanked him. Years later when we discussed this incident David said in his mind he was just having such a good time playing in the pool that he wanted kitty to share in the fun!!!

David has a brilliant mind. So often the really adventuress ones, the what we call, misbehaving ones, are very smart. And as Ginger so aptly stated they are exactly the way God made them to be.

By the way.....my Marc turned out to be the most docile, gentle child of our 4. He would entertain himself for hours playing with matchbox cars, etc. God knew that I was not up to handling another David.

Universal Body Of Christ

It was one month ago today that I tentatively entered the World of Blog. When we begin something new we have certain expectations of what the experience will bring to us and what we will bring to the experience. In my case my expectations were: 1) to make contact with others with the same interests and passions that I have; 2) a chance to share my thoughts with others; and 3) hopefully, to be able to share some knowledge I've been blessed to learn during my walk these many years. I was also hoping to make contact with people from a wide range of geographic areas, especially outside the US.

So how am I now feeling as I enter my second month? It definitely has lived up to those first three expectations. So far I have not made contact with anyone outside the US that I feel I have a lot in common with. I certainly hold that out as an expectation that will be fulfilled.

BUT the #1 thing I have been blessed to learn, and get a better grasp, is the Universal Body Of Christ. For years I have been aware of the importance of having a wider, broader view than just "our" individual church and/or denomination. In one short month this truth has been driven home to me with even a greater impact.

I live near Tulsa in what is called the Buckle of the Bible Belt. We are blessed to have MANY huge churches, Oral Roberts University and Kenneth Hagin's Rhema Bible College. We have more "big" nationally, and internationally known ministries coming to town than we can possibly attend all the meetings and conferences and still be the active, committed members of our local church we need to be. In the midst of this I think sometimes people here begin to feel we have an inside track on God. One month of blogging and reading so many wonderful posts and I certainly know that to be false. It is wonderful to realize and see just how very alive and well the living, breathing Church of our Lord Jesus Christ is. PRAISE GOD

I have been blessed to witness true honestly, searching and striving to become ALL that Christ intends for us to be. "But we all, with open face beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord" II Corinthians 3:18 KJV "Nothing between us and God, our faces shining with the brightness of his face. And so we are transfigured much like the Messiah, our lives gradually becoming brighter and more beautiful as God enters our lives and we become like him." The Message It is so healthy to see such openness and shedding of the masks and phony facade.

It is with even greater anticipation and excitement than when I began that I look forward to my on-going journey. This journey of sharing, learning from others, getting to know you better and your getting to know me better. What joy and how you bless me. Thank YOU! :-)

I Can Only Imagine

We sang this song in church a couple of weeks ago and I so relate. Wanted to share it here. Probably a lot of you are familiar with the words but they are certainly worth of our pondering:)

i can only imagine!

i CAN ONLY IMAGINE

wHAT IT WOULD BE LIKE

wHEN i WALK BY yOUR SIDE.

I CAN ONLY IMAGINE1

WHAT MY EYES WOULD SEE

WHEN YOUR FACE IS BEFORE ME.

I CAN ONLY IMAGINE!

Surrounded by Your glory

What will my heart feel?

Will I dance for You, Jesus?

Or in awe of You be still?

Will I stand in Your presence

To my knees will I fall?

Will I sing Halleluiah?

Will I be able to speak at all?

I can only imagine!

I CAN ONLY IMAGINE

WHEN THAT DAY COMES

AND I FIND MYSELF

STANDING IN THE SON.

I CAN ONLY IMAGINE1

WHEN ALL I WILL DO

IS FOREVER, FOREVER WORSHIP YOU.

I CAN ONLY IMAGINE!

I've been thinking about this on this Sabbath day. I can ONLY imagine!!! but Oh what a glorious day that will be!

Will The REAL Person Please Stand Up?

It is strange where our motivation of what to write about comes from. Being so new to blogging (mine is less than one month old) I have a lot of things and ideas rolling around in my thoughts.

This morning I was reading one of my small bookmarked list of people, Ginger, and her blog on Is That Really You? It really touched me and I thought immediately that I wanted to write about that so here I am. After all my heading reads "A lie is ANYTHING contrary to the naked truth". The devil is the father of lies "When he speaketh a lie, he speaketh of his own: for he is a liar, and the father of it". John 8:44b KJV "He couldn't stand the truth because there wasn't a shred of truth in him. When the Liar speaks, he makes it up out of his lying nature and fills the world with lies." John 8:44b The Message

Years ago, most of you probably are too young to remember, they had a TV show called What's My Line. They had a panel of, I think it was, 4 celebrities. Each week they would have a person on with a funny or unusual occupation and then 2 others who were impostors. Each of the 3 participants sat together behind a table and would be asked questions by the panel of celebrities. The celebrities were trying to pin-point and figure out who was REALLY the person. At the climax of the show they would say "Will the REAL person please stand up?" That's what we're talking about...the REAL you coming forward.

I doubt that there has ever been a person, other than our Lord Jesus Christ, who has not dealt with this issue. I wonder, " is it harder to be "real" today than at other times in history?". I do feel that our society today starts out at a very early age trying to put us in the acceptable mold. Comments and statements like "Don't act like that.", "You shouldn't feel like that.", "Don't say that.", etc. Shouldn't we be asking questions like "Why are you acting like that?", "What is making you feel like that?", "Why are you saying that?". I know myself I was told a LOT, not only by my parents, but later by my husband, that "you shouldn't feel like that". It bothered me a lot. It bothered me because it made me feel like something was wrong with me. That I didn't measure up. I did feel "like that" and why was I being told I shouldn't?

My "break through" came at the age of 44. My mother was ill and getting to the point where she was unable to live alone. My husband was converting our double car garage into a very lovely living area, small kitchenette, bedroom, walk-in closet and bath for her. It had its own private entrance from outside and was also separated from our main living area by a mudroom. It made a very nice arrangement where she could live with us. We were in the process of disposing of her extra furnishings, private effects, etc. and I was having a huge garage sale at her home before it was put up for sale. I was under extraordinary stress. Anyone who has had to dispose of their parents items at a time like this, or at the time of death, knows what I mean. My husband and I were driving toward my mothers house and I was holding a set of metal canisters in my hands. I don't even remember what I said but my husband said to me (for the upteenth time) "You shouldn't feel like that." Something exploded in me (I'd mostly been a pretty controlled person) and I suddenly found myself screaming "DON'T ever say that to me AGAIN" as I began to beat the canister set against the dashboard, smashing it and causing my hand to bled. It wasn't a pretty way or sight, and I wish I'd had the courage to have done it much earlier in not so violent a manner, but let me tell you.........it set me free!! I finally was able to express what had been bothering me for years. It so shocked my husband that I don't think he has ever said that to me again. If he has, it hasn't really mattered because I've been able to tell him not to tell me what I should or should not feel. We are ALL entitled to our feelings. Right or wrong, they are our feelings.

Do you know what coming clean and getting honest does? Well, those around you, especially those closest to you who have loved you the way you "were", suddenly don't really care for the changes they are seeing. After all it rocks the boat. The tranquil waters are suddenly getting sloppy and splashing out on them and they are getting wet. Sometimes they are getting drenched! After 24 years of a very tranquil, and I felt, happy marriage we were on stormy waters for a period of 6 or 7 years. For those of you who don't know, we have now been married 48 years and after weathering the storm we do now have a very tranquil, happy, completely honest marriage. Any of you struggling with the "storms" I am living testimony to ride out the storm and let the anchor hold (a dear friend of mine just sang that song in her church a couple of weeks ago. Boy, I didn't know I was going to be writing about my anchor holding!) Especially in the beginning there were so many times I wanted to just give up and leave. Everything "fleshly" in me was screaming for me to do just that..........BUT I clung to not what I felt but what God's word said and what I knew to be right in my heart and spirit.

I would like to tell you I am now completely honest and real with everything and everyone. That would be an enormous lie. I am not. I still have area's where I hold my tongue. I still have areas where it is difficult for me to be totally honest. BUT, and it is a big but, I am working on it and more importantly Christ is working in me, and "Being confident of this very thing, that he which hath begun a good work in you (ME) will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ". Philippians 1:6 KJV "There has never been the slightest doubt in my mind that the God who started this great work in you (ME) would keep at it and bring it to a flourishing finish on the very day Christ Jesus appears." Philippians 1:6 The Message This is truly my Life Verse.

What I like best about this new, to me, blogging world is the freedom it gives us to work on becoming the real person Christ had in mind when "we were yet in our mothers womb". I am so thankful it is His work. We just have to be willing to put ourselves on The Potter's Wheel and sometimes we just have to start with being willing to be willing. I agree with Ginger's statement "God has brought us together in quite an unusual way". In my case he is bringing us together. I am so thankful and extremely excited to see what God is doing and going to do.

The REAL me is standing up. How about you?

To Be A Disciple!

I just read a wonderful devotional from The Word For You Today and wanted to share it.

COME, FOLLOW ME

Matthew 4:19 NIV

The word "disciple" means being an apprentice to someone. And it was easy to tell if someone had done that. Peter, James and John make a decision to spend every day with Jesus in order to learn how to be like Him. Now, they did the same kinds of things you and I do. They ate, slept, worked, played, and learned. They just did all of these things with Jesus. And now it's your turn. What happened to those 3 fishermen 2000 years ago can happen for you. And your season of life, your temperament, your job - these are no obstacles. Throughout history when people came to understand what Jesus was really offering they would sacrifice anything - money, comfort, home, security - to get the chance to be an apprentice to Him. And this is your chance to follow Him too.

Read these words from a young pastor in Zimbabwe, Africa, who was later martyred for his faith. "The die has been cast. I have stepped over the line. The decision has been made - I'm a disciple of His. I won't look back, let up, slow down, back away, or be still. My past is redeemed, my present makes sense, and my future is secure. I'm finished with low living, sight walking, smooth knees, colorless dreams, tamed visions, worldly talking, cheap giving, and dwarfed goals. I no longer need preeminence, position, promotions, plaudits, or popularity. I don't have to be right, first, tops, recognized, praised, regarded, or rewarded. I now live by faith, depend on His presence, walk by patience, am uplifted by prayer, and labor with power." That's what it means to be a disciple of Jesus!

I liked that it pointed out it didn't matter our "season of life, temperament, job". What does matter is that we make the choice.

"But As for me and my house, we will serve the LORD" Joshua 24:15b KJV

"If you decide that it's a bad thing to worship GOD, then choose a god you'd rather serve - and do it today. Choose one of the gods your ancestors worshipped from the country beyond The River, or one of the gods of the Amorites, on whose land you're now living. As for me and my family, we'll worship GOD." Joshua 24:15 The Message

I don't know about you.....but I've decided.

Our Funny Language #III

The following comments are from a teacher who taught English to foreign students.

HEY! WATCH YOUR LANGUAGE!

dO MY TEENAGE STUDENTS get WHAT i SAY, OR DOES MY LANGUARE throw them for a loop?

These colloquialisms make no literal sense to very literal language learners and I CATCH MYSELF using them.

On CHECH-INN day they are told to SIGN UP and CHECK IN with the registrar. The nurse will CHECK OVER your immunization records. She'll CHECK OFF the shots you've had and CHECK your eyes and ears.

The counselor will CHECK your transcript and CHECK WITH your former school to get your records. CHECK IN with him for an appointment. While your waiting CHECK THROUGH the Course Selection Guide and CHECK OFF the courses you might be interest in. CHECK carefully


Oh, CHECK IT OUT! We have a new international student! He's the one in the CHECKED shirt. Maybe He's a CZECH!

CHECK IN with me if you need help. I'll CHECK UP ON you in a day or so. I hope you don't mine this system of CHECKS AND BALANCES.

Fast forward to a typical day in the classroom.

Good morning, class! HAND IN your work before the bell rings, and RAISE YOUR HAND if you have questions. I don't want to GET ON YOUR BACK, but I expect this assignment to go HAND IN HAND with the other ones. Remember, always PUT YOUR BEST FOOT FORWARD. As high school students it's important to STAND ON YOUR OWN TWO FEET. And don't be TONGUE-TIED! Don't just WRING YOUR HANDS and stay at ARM'S LENGTH from help. STICK YOUR NECK OUT when you need help. Help is always AT YOUR FINGERTIPS.

CHIN UP! Don't worry about having EGG ON YOUR FACE. Our scores put us NECK AND NECK with our rival schools. If you put your NOSE TO THE GRINDSTONE, you'll never have TO LIVE FROM HAND TO MOUTH and people won't RAISE THEIR EYEBROWS when they see your scores. (They should KEEP THEIR NOSES OUT OF YOUR BUSINESS, anyway.) In this country, the best learners use a lot of ELBOW GREASE. I hope you will too. I'd GIVE AN ARM AND A LEG to start all over again.

So, I'll HAND OUT the work and you'll HAND IT BACK IN tomorrow. I've got to HAND IT TO YOU for even trying to study in English. Keep your HEAD ABOVE WATER and hold your head high. Good luck.