A Woman's View

A lift for moms--and all of us

Sometimes tales from long ago refresh our hearts with hope and truth. This is one of those stories.

Once long ago a mother in the country we know as Algeria watched her brilliant 16-year old son walk out of her life.

Worse yet, he renounced the Christian faith in which she raised him. Nothing she said could change his mind.

She thought her heart would break.

Predictably, the young man took up with the wrong crowd and indulged himself in worldliness, even fathering an illegitimate child at age 18.

His mother, Monica, did what moms have done ever since Eve. She wept and prayed and prayed and wept.

For more than a decade young Augustine pursued the teachings of famous philosophers of the time in an effort to explore all things intellectual and thus achieve happiness.

Instead, he experienced recurring bouts of severe depression and grief.

His thirtieth birthday came and went and still he searched. Still his mother wept and prayed.

Finally he scraped bottom. One day he fell on his face in despair, sobbing, and cried out to God. Then it seemed he heard a child's voice chanting, "Take and read. Take and read."

He opened a Bible to Romans 13 and read verses 13-14. At once his heart was changed.

Augustine soon was was baptized and became a strong believer in Christ. Not so long after that, his mother Monica died, her heart at peace.

That same man, once the despair of his mother, wrote these timeless words

God loves each of us as if there were only one of us.

Thou hast created us for Thyself and our hearts are restless until they find their rest in Thee.

Seek not to understand that you may believe, but believe that you may understand.

The years of pain and wandering worked spiritual depth in Augustine and it comes through in his writings.

He turned his superb mind to learning more about Jesus and pondering what faith meant and authored many books still treasured by believers. 

This story still speaks--to each of us, whatever our life situation 

Nuggets of truth leap out at us.

• Never give up! Not on anyone or any situation. You've heard me quote Jeremiah 32:27 before:

        "I am the LORD, the God of all mankind. Is anything too hard for me?"

• If you're a mom, never doubt what your love and your faith are worth to your child.

Your tender, loving care of your children helps them grow into themselves. As you model faith, they notice, even when they seem oblivious.

We are called as moms to be faithful. To reach out, even when we're not sure anyone sees or hears. To make the first move, again and again and again. To keep on praying and yes, sometimes, to keep on shedding tears.

To never give up.

Our loving Father knows. He cares. And He uses all of it, all our pains and all our griefs. Within our children.

Within us.

God bless you with His strength and peace, my friends,

Lenore

Swap anxiety for Easter peace and then never let it go!

Take a nap, take a walk, take a pill, it's still there.

Blame it on anything or on nothing, it makes no difference. It's an indefinable sense that somehow we don't quite measure up. The feeling gnaws away at us and refuses to budge.

Peace is available . . . if we ask

Lasting peace and hope are as near as our breath, because everything changed that first Easter. That's when Jesus set things right between God and us.

Now all it costs us is believing the Good News of the Easter Gospel. We say something like, "Please forgive me, Lord, for my sins. I know I cannot live a perfect life, but I want to belong to you." We give him all our failures and mistakes and uncertainties.

Our loving Father answers, "What sins? My only Son paid your debt in full. My darling child, I love you."

It's as if God looks at us through one of those camera lenses that filters out the haze and sees his perfect Son.

The cross was God's way out for you and me

He sent his one and only son, Jesus, not just to live among us, but to suffer and be nailed to the cross and die. For you and me and all the world, because on our own we cannot meet God's standard for holiness.

Jesus died in our place, so we can live free from guilt and fear of punishment and hell.

As 2 Corinthians 5:21 states it: "God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.

On that Friday we call, "good," Roman soldiers nailed God's Son to the cross and let him hang until he died.

His grieving followers and family watched with aching hearts as Jesus died an agonizing death and then his lifeless body was laid in the tomb.

We had nothing coming but punishment, yet God's gift to us is forgiveness, with no strings attached.

Jesus didn't stay dead!

Every week our pastor always asks during the children's message, "Did Jesus stay dead?"

The kids fairly shout, "No! He rose! He came back, alive!"

Over a period of days Jesus appeared to his followers and friends several times. He called them by name and spoke with them. He ate with them and they touched him. In Matthew 28:20, Jesus told them, "And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age."

Later, while he was blessing them he was taken up into heaven. Even so, Jesus is with us. His Spirit lives in the heart of every believer, every minute of every day.

Impossible? It would be if Jesus were merely a great human teacher, as he's often described. But he is true God, and we cannot explain God, the unexplainable.

The youngsters at our church know that. So when our pastor asks, "And where does Jesus live now?" they answer, "In my heart!"

One more question from the pastor always follows. "So what happens to us when we die?" The children answer, "We get to live with Jesus in Heaven!"

That's why we celebrate Easter.  

We can swap anxiety for peace. For good.

Jesus living within us means we are never left alone to fear what comes next. Not even death, because we know that's not the end of our story, either.

It's only the beginning of the good stuff.

So take a deep breath and relax. Let yourself believe and feel the peace of being loved and accepted by God, without any ifs, ands or buts.

Now there's peace that lasts through whatever life may bring.

Easter Blessings, every day,

Lenore

Comments, please.

Note: You can read the eyewitness accounts of Jesus' last week on earth for yourself in the Bible. Turn to Matthew, chapter 21 to the end; Mark, chapter 11 to the end; Luke, chapter 19 to the end; John, chapter 12:12 to the end of the book.

Looking at the up side of the down side

My husband and I came out of families that watched every cent. My parents joked about pinching every penny until it squealed. In my husband's family the theme was:

"Use it up, wear it out. Make it do or do without." 

As newlyweds we expected to do the same. With less. 

Now we look back and see how those years of pulling together strengthened the glue in our marriage bond.

That principle still works

Each of us, married or single, needs support.

Most of us can name a number of people we know who feel stuck in hard times. If there's any sunlight in this present down economy, perhaps it's this. Misery may not love company, but there's something comforting in not feeling so alone.

Recycling and "re-purposing" and shopping thrift stores are hot topics. Discount stores and dollar stores feature crowds. 

A lot of people share the same chummy boat.

Lowered expectations kept us from feeling sorry for ourselves

Our recently affluent society taught us all to consider what was billed as "the good life" to be the natural right of each one of us.

That delusion did no favors for anyone, especially when the economy turned shaky.

Perhaps now more than ever our family members and friends need from us what my husband and I got from the older-and-wiser people in our lives. They told us, "Give it some time. You're just starting out."

When disappointments came, somebody would come alongside and say, "Well, that's life. Be patient. Something will come along eventually, so keep on praying and trusting."

Sometimes we wanted to answer, "Oh, sure, easy for you to say."

Yet there they were, survivors, and that's what we wanted to be, too. So we took their words as hard-earned wisdom.

What mattered most, then as now, was that we were in it together

My husband and I started out with a big advantage. We loved each other and we both loved the Lord. That's what we built our life on.

Whatever came, we pulled together and tried to support each other. Along the way we picked up wisdom, too, and grew stronger, as individuals and as a married couple.

Those of us who've have lived awhile know the song in our hearts won't last if it depends on wealth or material possessions or even on "perfect" children.

Anything we can touch or hold in our hands can go poof! in an instant. As for perfect human beings, they have a distressing way of revealing occasional imperfections from time to time.

Call that a "trend" that won't go out of style.

Let's encourage each other

Life is easier to handle when someone tells us they care about us. Married couples can say it to each other and parents to their kids, whatever the age. Let's not stop there. What about the single person who doesn't have an on-site cheerleader?

Something as simple as, "I believe in you and I know God will get you through this," can lift a tired heart for days.

Even better, pass on a favorite Bible verse that encourages you. I like to underline verses in my Bible and I keep an informal list on the blank pages in the back, so it's ready when I need it.

Here are two of my favorite sections. Isaiah 40:27-31 promises that when we're weary the Lord will renew our strength. Jeremiah 29:11-13 tells us God has a plan for us, to give us a hope and a future.

Hope. This most valuable gift we can give costs us nothing. All it takes is that we turn our thoughts beyond ourselves. That we say to someone else the words we long to hear ourselves.

At the least we'll grow into an individual others like having around. And who knows? Perhaps we'll start a new trend.

Warmly,

Lenore

 

 

 

 

 

How to speak hope, even when the unthinkable happens

When our sense of security crumbles, as it did after 9/11, or when our personal world gets shaken up, how do we cope?

What do we tell our kids? 

Times like that we may feel empty, but our children and family members look to us for strength and stability. We may be shaking inside, but they think of us as security.

That's true for children of all ages, even when they've happily settled into their own lives. Often they look to us for reassurance and for clues on how to deal with life. 

Even when we have nothing left to give.

So we do what moms and wives have been doing since the beginning of time. We give anyway. 

We take our thoughts off what was lost and talk about what is left.

We speak hope that comes from beyond ourselves. Hope that's based on more than what we see and think and feel, based on faith.

Faith in the One who promised to be with us, no matter what, no matter where and to be our strength, even when we have none left within ourselves.

How do we protect our children?

We can't, not really. We can grab their hands so tightly it cuts off their circulation and follow them around like bird dogs, but there's no way to absolutely ensure they will never hurt, never be disappointed. We watch over them, of course, and every day we commit them to God's protection, asking Him to watch over them.

We can hug them and comfort them and speak the love we feel. 

Nobody ever gets too much love.

How do we model living in faith?

I don't know about you, but I used to think at some point I would arrive at a more, um, exalted state of being. I would "graduate" to being--and feeling like--a hero of faith.

Not so far.

I've found when I'm running on "empty," the best way to refuel is to spend time in the Word.

If you're not sure to start, here are a few verses I've marked in my Bible.

God is my refuge and strength, an ever present help in trouble. Therefore we will not fear, though the earth give way and the mountains fall into the sea . . . The LORD Almighty is with us; the God of Jacob is our fortress.      --Psalm 46:1, 11

I lift up my eyes to the hills--where does my help come from? My help comes from the LORD, the Maker of heaven and earth. --Psalm 121:1-2

The LORD gives strength to his people; the LORD blesses his people with peace.  --Psalm 29:11

The LORD is a refuge for the oppressed, a stronghold in times of trouble. Those who know your name will trust in you, for you, LORD, have never forsaken those who seek you.   --Psalm 9:9-10

You and I can't stop the evil in the world--and yes, there is evil in the world. Every year the 9/11 remembrances prove the point.

But we can stay planted in the Lord. Then when our children and loved ones turn to us, we'll be ready with love and with strength that comes from the Lord.

Lovingly,

Lenore

Take a fresh look at trials and sufferings

Maybe right now you're in the midst of a long, hard time in your life.

Maybe you've reached the end of your endurance. Sometimes you wonder whether God has turned his back on you. Otherwise, how could you pray and pray, yet nothing changes?

Been there, thought that, sometimes.

That's when we try to make sense of it on our own. Every one of us can think of times when we "knew" how "A" would lead to "B," then inevitably to "C."

Except it didn't.

Then it's time to remind myself what I know. I see only today. God sees yesterday, today and tomorrow. He loves us and promises to be our strength all through life, in good times and in the worst of times. 

That does not guarantee our life will smooth out and be pain-free. All we can do is keep on trusting and keep on walking.

Someone sent me this YouTube. The song was new to me and so was the singer Laura Story. Her song touched my heart. She says what we all need to remember when we're slogging through one of those misery times.

I hope these lyrics speak to you as they do to me.

Lovingly,

Lenore

Story Blessings song http://youtu.be/1CSVqHcdhXQ

Flooding. Tornadoes. Misery. When challenges overwhelm, where do we turn?

Doesn't it seem like the cup of misery is overflowing lately? 

News reports continually feature shots of flooding along the rivers. Water  stretches for miles.

Every one of the homes now almost submerged was the center of family life not long ago. 

That water swirls with  mosquitoes, with snakes, some of them poisonous, and even a few alligators.

Those who've been flooded out and now live in shelters or with relatives can only watch and wait, knowing what they'll find when they get back in.

Thousands of acres of farmland are flooded, too Farmers can do nothing but wait, even though it's crucial for them to be able to get into their fields. If crops don't have a full growing season they won't be ready to harvest before the first killing frost.

Farmers can't forget how all this will affect their year's income. No crop, no income.

Then there are the tornadoes. You could snap photos like this all across the Midwestern and southern states. Destruction stretches for miles.

I won't say, "They lost everything," because it's not true. So long as their family members are alive and well, they have everything that matters, as so many of them said. 

But what can they do when their hearts are breaking? Where can they find strength to go on?

I only know one answer: Come to Jesus. Today I was on misery overload, so I did what I often do, played this Chris Rice song over and over. Somehow this song always speaks to my heart. I hope it blesses you, too.

Chris Rice, "Come to Jesus"

So, my friends, whatever challenges you face, may you find your answers in Jesus.

Peace and joy,

Lenore

As one woman told an interviewer, "It's all gone. Nothing will ever be the same."

If these scenes overwhelm you and me, think what it would be like to be in their shoes.

Encouragement for when we're scraping bottom

Have you ever said to yourself, "I've never done anything special and probably never will. The future looks like more of the same.  What's the point of going on?"

I haven't read The Noticer by Andy Andrews, but a quote I read makes me want to. According to a synopsis, the main character, Jones, tells a hopeless individual the reasons why he or she is still living: 

Hop1.  God has a purpose for every single person.

2.  You won't die until that purpose is fulfilled.

3.  If you are still alive, then you haven't completed what you were put on earth to do.

4.  If you haven't completed what you were put on earth to do, then your very purpose hasn't been fulfilled.

5.  If your purpose hasn't been fulfilled, then the most important part of your life is still ahead.

6.  You have yet to make your most important contribution.

(Chapter 6, pp. 83-85.)

I can't know what's going on in your life right now, nor you mine. But we're still walking around, so that means we haven't yet fulfilled our purpose.  That makes every day vitally important, doesn't it?

It doesn't matter if we look back on the past with yearning. It doesn't matter if we feel unsure about today or tomorrow. It doesn't even matter if at the moment we feel no hope.

Robert Browning put it this way:

"Grow old along with me! The best is yet to be, the last of life, for which the first was made. Our times are in his hand who saith, 'A whole I planned, youth shows but half; Trust God:  See all, nor be afraid!'"

Psalm 139:16 tells us: 

All the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be.

What will tomorrow bring? None of us can say. But we know we will have the strength to meet the challenges. God says so, in Deuteronomy 33:25: "As thy days, so shall thy strength be."    

So if today is "one of those days" and we're at a low point, it's time to look up from the pits and look past our problems.

You are alive and so am I. We cannot know how God already is using us in someone's life. We cannot predict how He will use us tomorrow, but He will.

Let's take a deep gulp of fresh air and get on with living.

Lovingly,

Lenore

Can searching for happiness leave us depressed?

Have you ever known someone who constantly takes a reading on their state of happiness?  

Am I happy today? Am I as happy as I could be? If not, why not? Is it his fault? Her fault?

Something must be wrong, or I would be happy all the time. I must be depressed. Maybe I need to see someone so I can get over my depression. All I really want is to be happy!

A new study from the University of Denver reached an unlikely conclusion: The more strongly a person wants to be happy the more likely the person will be unhappy.

Even more surprising, those with the highest desire to be happy and the least amount of stress in their lives rated themselves more unhappy in every measure. 

That doesn't sound right, does it?

Researchers finally concluded that people with a lot of stress and difficulty in their lives don't expect to be happy, so they're not disappointed when they're not. It seems they have more pressing things to think about than Am I happy today?

Another finding: Those who care for others and do more for others rate themselves higher on the happiness scale than those who don't.

I suspect you and I are not so different from the women who participated in that study.

When things are going well and we have more leisure, we wonder more often how we look and how does this dress fit and how can we get our husbands to be more romantic. We fret about whether the two of us are really "communicating."

Simply put, we have time to focus on our flaws--and everyone else's deficiencies, too. Real or imagined, these pesky little "gnats" keep our "picnic" from being as perfect as we think it should be.

That's when we begin to wonder if we're "really happy."

I heard a marriage and family counselor in private practice say she's noticed a trend in her clients. Right away they announce they are depressed. When she asks how they know that, they answer, "Because I want to be happy more than anything and I should be, because there's nothing really wrong with my life. But some days I'm just not happy. So something must be wrong. I must be depressed and need counseling, probably medication, too."

This counselor said the biggest hurdle is getting most of her clients to understand that nobody lives a life that's 100 percent happy, 365 days a year. She said once they do, they suddenly see more good in their lives.

(Please understand that I know depression can be serious and hard to treat. I in no way mean to minimize the real pain that individuals feel.)

I think this counselor's comments point to an important truth. We do our children no favors when we tell them they should be happy all the time. For every human being, some days are good, some not so much. Helping our kids understand that gets them ready for life.

Great Grandma would have called that elementary common sense. 

Even the writer of Ecclesiastes talked about it, in 7:14:

When times are good, be happy; but when times are bad, consider: God has made the one as well as the other.

I love that. Whatever comes, God is in the midst of it and we do not walk alone.

Now there's something to lift our spirits, every day.

Lovingly,

Lenore

Where can we go when disaster strikes in our world?

Nobody saw it coming. Catastrophes are like that.

This is the face of one woman in the aftermath of unimaginable horror, Japan's 9.0 earthquake and the devastating tsunami that quickly followed.

You and I have not lived what she experienced, but we know that face. We know those tears and those inner groans of, "Oh, please, not that!"

Our world can shake and crumble around us without an earthquake. We can be swamped and drowning without a tsunami.

All it takes is being given that diagnosis we never wanted to hear. Or a day when we wave goodbye to our husband or wife who never makes it home from work. A sports accident that turns our healthy, strong son or daughter into a paraplegic. The young adult child with so much potential who chooses a path we know will lead to unhappiness. The rumored pink slip that awaits us when we thought our job was safe. Home values that plummet and investments that tank when we thought we had saved up some money for the future.

Each of us has our own list. We watch, we cry, we pray. We scream, "Why?" into our long, sleepless nights. And we feel utterly helpless.

That's when we wear the same face as the woman in this photo, the face of fear and dread and hopelessness. She cannot escape her reality and neither can we.

But we can find refuge. Listen to the wonderful words of Psalm 46:1-3 and verse 7, followed by Isaiah 41:10:

God is our refuge and strength, an ever-present help in trouble.

Therefore we will not fear, though the earth give way

and the mountains fall into the heart of the sea,

though its waters roar and foam and the mountains quake with their surging . . .

The LORD Almighty is with us;

the God of Jacob is our fortress . . .

So do not fear, for I am with you;

do not be dismayed, for I am your God.

I will strengthen you and help you;

I will uphold you with my righteous right hand.

The hard truth of life is that we have no truly safe place here on this earth. No guarantees of a perfect life in this imperfect world.

No place to run except into the sheltering arms of God, who so loved the world that he sent his only Son to earth to die on a cross and live again. For you. For me.

In His strength we weather our storms and go on, leaning on the everlasting arms.

His peace,

Lenore

 

 

Living in the time between . . . .

 
Here we are in the time between the times.

Between the joy and wonder of Christmas into the unknown of the New Year. Ahead of us lie 364 days that hold . . . what? We cannot know. All we know for sure is yesterday, but that's behind us. Our next day, our next breath are yet to be.

You and I live in the now, always in the moment. Every moment of every day we get to choose whether we'll live with fear or with joy and anticipation.

It's easy to let fear get the upper hand because it drags us down without any effort on our part. And why wouldn't we be uneasy, considering all the warnings and threats and crime reports that drop on us morning, noon and night?

Except . . . we do not enter the unknown alone. God is already there. Remember Psalm 139? I love that Psalm. Over the years, like everyone else my husband and I have had some tough times sprinkled among the good. That's when I turn to Psalm 139, verses 1-18. Oh, I know all along that God is with us and of course, I pray. Yet the words of that beautiful Psalm reassure me and calm my fearful heart every time I read them.

When I find verses that "speak" to me I underline them or mark them in some way. But I needed a way to be able to locate them quickly. So a few years ago I started also writing where to find them on the blank pages at the back of my battered old Bible. My system is haphazard, but it works for me.

That's what jogged my memory with this verse, which is good advice for any day of any year.

I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses. Now choose life, so that you and your children may live and that you may love the LORD your God, listen to his voice and hold fast to him. For the LORD is your life . . .

Deuteronomy 30:19-20

Now you and I can prance into the unknown unafraid--and we will prance, won't we?  Long ago I ran across the words of Minnie L. Haskins, who tells us the best way to travel:

And I said to the man who stood at the gate of the year:  Give me a light that I may tread safely into the unknown.  And he replied: Go out into the darkness and put your hand into the hand of God.  That shall be to you  better than light, and safer than a known way.

Dear friends and gentle readers, thank you for taking time to stop by and read my words during this past year. May your New Year be filled with many blessings and great JOY!      
      

Love,

Lenore

Comments? Questions: What Bible verse(s) do you turn to?