Ups and Downs

Mother's Day was wonderful. Church blessed me as always. I have been praying for and with four special young men at The Vine who God has laid on my heart, showing me, I believe, a bit of His call for them and leading me to pray earnestly for their protection, development and spiritual growth.

I was so pleased with Anthony's sermon. This was his best one yet, and I see several answers to prayer exhibited in his presentation, willingness to challenge the faith of his hearers rather than seek their approval, and his overall comfort in the pulpit. 

I have been nudged by the Holy Spirit to speak with each of these four servants of God about what God is showing me. Two of them already know God awakens me at night to pray for them and discuss their lives and callings and situations. We'll see where all this leads. 

As I waited at the church to meet up with Richard and go to Athena and Brian's for dinner, a man showed up saying he had just been burned out of his house. He looked familiar but I have been unable to place him. Richard and I don't carry money, so I had none to give him but did provide some phone numbers and prayed with him. I still pray he received help.

All but one of our children called to wish me Happy Mother's Day, and I had good visits with each one. I discovered Julia had been in an auto accident and has a "mild concussion" I am praying diligently for her, since my first brain injury was also called a "mild concussion," but the next day I was in a coma and then lived the following five years in a wheelchair. Brain trauma is tricky and often misdiagnosed.

Dinner prepared by Athena and dessert created by Brian were superb, as always. They are both gifted chefs by avocation. We didn't stay late. Brian didn't feel well and Richard had been up since the wee hours and was tired. 

Today was a day of spiritual and emotional highs and lows... 

Long before we moved to Florid, during one of our visits here, I took a photo of Mr. Maynard, the man who played Moses at the Holy Land Experience, telling him I wanted to paint him and promising to bring him a copy of the finished work. I did, indeed, do the painting, but never got around to taking him a copy until recently. But Mr. Maynard was no longer Moses, no longer employed at the Holy Land Experience. 

We found Mr. Maynard, now 88, in a nursing home not far from where we live. We delivered his painting today and had a good visit with him. Tomorrow, his kin folks are coming to move him out of state, so I we were just in time! God is SO cool!!

We enjoyed our Small Groups study. Our group is indeed small, but precious and we learn from one another. The fellowship is always sweet.

I just learned that our friend Stan, who is fighting stage four cancer, has five new tumors in his brain. He had been doing SO well. I am calling for prayer, for the Body of Christ to don the full armor of God and follow Him into battle. The victory is His. Even so, my heart aches, a deep wrenching pain fills my spirit and the hot flow of my tears will not be stemmed.

Just as Jesus wept over a friend He knew He would call back to life, so I grieve over my friend for whom I know the Lord has already provided healing... either by curing the cancer here or by providing a perfect body for eternity.