Merry Christmas and Happy New Year

Wednesday, December 19, 2012

I can hardly believe that another year is coming to an end and in 13 more days we will be celebrating 2013! It has been a long year and yet other ways it has flown by like time had been given wings. It is very hard for me to describe this year but I can say God has continued to lead me, guide me and teach me.

            A joyous New Year’s Party at the Zimmerman’s house started the year and it was so good to get to know them on a more personal level and to just fellowship is what started my New Year off.

            In February grandchild number 8 made his debut on February 25, at 7:00 and turned a day that 6 years earlier marked a day of sorrow to a day of rejoicing. Thomas Jack Eli Rastall joined the family and as Gwen stated at one point, “Ain’t that just like God, He recycles.” Maybe in some ways he does but I do know for sure He restores and He restored some joy to my heart that day.

            I also thought I had found a job that month but it turns out that an allergy to cats is more limiting that I ever knew and had to give the job up. So the job hunt continued and at that point unemployment decided that I had voluntarily quit and cut me off from all benefits completely. That decision left me without any income and really caused me to question if I was in God’s will and where I might have ran off the road.

            I kept sending out resumes and kept myself available and kept searching. Another opportunity came my way in May with a home care agency that was attempting to establish a presence in the Muskegon area.

            June brought Sam and Brian and the kids came for a visit in June but I was living with my Aunt and she did not feel she could handle the house full of kids and added adults so the wonderful Ms. Elaine Klemm came to our rescue and let them stay at her home. What a tremendous blessing to myself and the kids. I found out later that the house became Ambree’s dream house. Thankfully it was warm enough in June to spend much time swimming and at the beach. Sam and Brian continue to stay with his parents in IL while he completed a property management course and continued job hunting himself. Currently Gwen, 9 and Ambree, 8 are homeschooled and Abi 2 and Thomas Jack now 9 months on Christmas day are enjoying the time with Grandma and Grandpa.

            Mike and Kary remain in Muskegon and both are now working with Port City Products. Mike had to have carpal tunnel surgery this summer but has healed well. Laben 11, Noah 8, Jaylee 4, and Acelynn 2 keep both parents very busy. The boys played pee-wee football at Oakridge this fall and were very excited that Laben team earned first place and Noah’s team came in third. Jaylee started “pretty school” this fall which is her terminology for pre-school. At Ravenna head start she cooks and draws pictures.

            Tim has relocated to Grand Rapids working with Springthrough as an application developer. He has a house on Wealthy St. and has a special someone he has been communicating with since this fall.

            The year is closing out another holiday season upon on us and again I find myself searching for a job. Spending time with Mike and Kary and the kids and enjoying some Sunday dinners together. I was blessed with a color tour through the U.P. and enjoyed another CCDA conference in the great Twin Cities that God opened doors for a day before it started. Elaine took me and another friend to the Gaither Homecoming Christmas concert which was really a 4 hour worship service and blessed my holiday fun.

I have experienced His care for me in ways that have been tailored just for me and I am overwhelmed how God brought so many moments together for me. The scripture that has been permeating my spirit this season is, “and she gave birth to her firstborn, a son. She wrapped him in cloths and placed him in a manger, because there was no room for them in the inn.” Luke 2:7 (NIV) I am looking in my own heart to make sure there is room for Jesus. How about you? Is there room for Jesus? I want Him to have all the room He wants and I surrender all has taken new meaning for me. This is not easy for me because I had ideas and plans but I am so thankful that God loves me too much to leave with a deceitful heart about all else or a heart of stone but is giving me that heart of flesh.

Thank you my friends and family for blessing my life in ways that has made me a better person all around. Merry Christmas and Happy New Year.

A Heart of Gratitude

Years ago I learned a slogan that went, "Gratitude will change your attitude." I have used this slogan many times and I have learned about myself that if I start "giving thanks" for what God has done in my life it is very hard to stay in a self-pity frame of mind.

As our country gets ready to take some moments out to actually pause and give thanks on Thursday God has been molding my heart to look daily every day of the week every week of the month and every month of the year to focus on one day of troubles and look for things to be thankful for. Now I have not done a stellar job of being thankful each and every day and I have started to plummet and focus on my station in life right now and whine and complain but each day and month is getting better.

The big thing right now is to make a conscious effort and to focus with the help of the Holy Spirit to start thinking about things to give thanks for. To focus and work on this day I have been given. To seek and pray to see what God wants me to do that day. To see what He will or has put in my life for that day. To say thank you.

Community

Tonight I went to a visitation for a young man who had passed away last week and had to wait in line to get to the family. I was awestruck! They had two lines going into the funeral chapel and the people kept coming. I was thankful there had been a private time for the family because there was none of that today at either visitation.

While I was standing in line a thoughts struck me about community, how we interact in each others lives and with other people, how a chance meeting could have a life long result, about people in the body of Christ but not only that but about a community in general. The families had been part of two communities for a long time and had work and served in both. They attended church, supported school activities, opened their homes to their children's friends, and to their neighborhoods. Their children had followed their example. The result of this example was the people that have sent their condolences, food, support, cards and love.

I listened as comments were made about how the families had touched the communities they live, work, fellowship, and play in. A revelation of sorts has started to form about being a part of a community and about what that means as a Jesus follower.

I have heard over the years of course that the job of the church was to "win souls for Christ", for heaven, to help them escape eternal damnation or an eternity in hell. I have heard we are preach to the poor, set the captive free, bind up the broken-hearted. I have heard we are to preach to the ends of the earth and that we should be a community unto our own and shut the rest of the world out and wait to fly away. It is all true and I believe most of what has been said.

But what I seen tonight just really made a gospel real. Jesus said, "Love the Lord your God with all your heart and all your mind and all your soul. This is the greatest commandment. The second greatest commandment is, "Love your neighbor as yourself." John in his three letters talks much about loving God and loving each other and even though Jesus said that we would do greater works than He and certain signs would follow those that confessed His name. I am sure we all would have rejoiced had this young man sit up in his casket, well after we got over the shock of that happening but what greater "sign" could there have been than that kind of love and caring.

A sign of the sacrifice many people made to take time and drive to another city, to stand in line, to bear others up whose hearts are breaking. To witness several communities to come together to lift up another friend, relative, co-worker, and church goer. To know that each person was bearing an image of God to each other there even.

This is what, I am sure, Isaiah was referring to when he wrote to preach the gospel to the poor, to bind up the brokenhearted, and give an oil of gladness for a spirit of mourning. This is what Jesus was talking about in His priestly prayer to His Father to "make his followers one just as you and I are one." In a world that is torn by disappointment, grief, hurt, and all those ugly emotions but we can even rejoice with one another when a new child is added to our family, we achieve a goal, a diploma, a new job, or to care for one another after a surgery, a car accident, a move or a change from the daily grind.

I seen it tonight, I have experienced in my own life, and I have seen it in larger venues such as conferences this is when the Jesus follower's shine. It is with this sign, this love, this feeling of community that the world will truly see a God unlike any other gods of the world.

The Days Go By

It has been quite a few weeks. Having to move when I had just started a job and not knowing how I would support myself yet it has been God's provision and through my income that has kept me going. Blessings of furnishings from friends and family like a love seat, microwave cart, kitchen towels, curtains, table and chairs. A beautiful hand made cedar chest. It has been good. I am enjoying my little apartment and thankful for God's provision.

During the move however I hurt my knee which at this point 8 weeks out it makes it very difficult to walk on but I am thankful for my friend and Pt person giving me some exercises to work the muscles and prepare it for surgery.  Now as patients and income has dwindled I am praying that God help me to trust Him to provide.

Emotions have begun to overrun me this last couple a weeks as a friend of my son passed away on October 20 at 27 leaving a child behind. Another friend grandson died in a car accident at 27 leaving 3 children behind. Then this week the son of fellow church members is diagnosed with cancer, another son dies because of blood clots in the lungs, and I see a friend of 33 years who has stage 4 Mesothelioma. A church member finds out she has ALS, another is "hit" by a car in her parking lot. Others have had joint surgeries, skin wounds that need healing and have grieved family members, others have had surgeries for other complications in their body. Another friend moves from her home of 17 years where she raised her children and celebrated a family. 

There seems to be so much grief, pain. heartache, and disappointment. And the answer to why does not make any of it better or different nor does it make it go away. As I pray and cry  out to my Heavenly Father I hear the Spirit say in a message from my Pastor that, "He is still on His heavenly throne, He is the first and the last, the beginning and the end, He is present today and holds tomorrow in His hands.

The Spirit speaks to my heart that none of this can separate us from His love, the whole earth is  His and all who dwell in it, we are the apple of His eye and He has engraved us on the palms of  His hand. His love endures forever and His mercies are new every morning. Our weeping may endure for a night and not necessarily a 12 hour night but a dark night of the soul but joy will come in the morning.  

Now as I sit here and continue to listen the Spirit whispers to occupy until Christ returns by loving my God with all my heart, mind, and soul, to love my neighbor as myself, and to embrace the body of Christ around me and look to them for love, support, and the ability to get through. Because only as we link together as cells in our own physical bodies do will we be able to keep walking and have hope that is anchored firmly and secure, because Jesus has become our high priest and this is the hope we can encourage one another in. This life is so crushing and many times one crushing event rolls in right after another and it is the hope of receiving a kingdom that can not be shaken and where they will be no more tears, where there will be no more death, and the light is the Lamb of God. The hope of that kingdom is what is to spur us on to bring joy in the morning and be an oil of gladness over our raw, hurting souls and before we know it we will be crossing that river ourselves.

Faith, Trust, All of it

Here it is August 12th. Granddaughter, Acelynn has turned 2. Laben and Noah are playing football. Jaylee is excited about going to "pretty school" this fall and all three showed me their back packs and new shoes for school. Tim is working and living in Lansing. Sam, Brian and the kids are in IL. I am still at Aunt Sandy's even though she has asked me to find some place else to live because the income is not rolling in. I don't have enough right now for monthly rent.

I have talked to a lawyer about the unemployment case of being cut off and waiting and sending out job resumes. And I wait....

Is waiting always a part of trusting God to move in life? Is it part of faith? It is so difficult to wait, to trust and to have faith. But then what have I had to really have faith for? Food, clothes, drink are all readily available to me so I have not had to really have faith for those. I have really had a job available to me to when I needed one. Really life has been pretty instant and easy.

Now I am being asked to wait and as each day goes by I sigh, and ask, "How much longer?" I many ways I have been waiting 6 years. For other things I have been waiting days, and months. But I continue to cry out to God, "How much longer?" And it seems like my life has started and stopped a few times, too. Most of the time life has felt like a holding pattern like a place circling the runway waiting to land.

I wonder if faith and trust has always been hard to be in?  My mind begins to recall the folks from scripture. What did Noah thing about or feel when he was building the Ark? What about Paul as he journeyed preaching the gospel? Did Daniel struggle emotionally while he waited for the answer to his prayer? Did Mordecai fear the King would not believe Esther? How long did it take for Esther to get to the King? How many years did Hosea wait for peace in his home?

So I wait. Meditating on the promises that nothing separates me from God's love, His grace is sufficient, He is faithful, and this period of time is only for a little while.

Realization

Likewise the tongue is a small part of the body, but it makes great boasts. Consider what a great forest is set on fire by a small spark. James 3:5 (NIV) 



I realized the other day how I have let my tongue become a disobedient member speaking things that makes others look bad, telling things about them without thought of how it might hurt them and just that I have let this member get too loose lately. I am one of those pendulums that have a tendency to swing from one extreme to another. My prayer is for God to bring me more toward the balanced area of life. How many times have things coming out of my mouth that has set something on fire not purify it but to burn it up?
Father God it is not my words that can purify or change people or anything else I pray you will keep my tongue from sparking fires.



The tongue has the power of life and death, and those who love it will eat its fruit.
Proverbs 18:21 (NIV)

It what ways have I spoke life into my family especially instead of speaking words of death? "Will they ever learn? Grow up? Change their ways? So many times this just brings death instead of saying an encouraging word. Why do I say, "You should know better?" instead of something more positive or head off a behavior  or problem instead coming down on the person afterward.
Father God I pray that you will help me to speak life to the people around me.


O generation of vipers, how can ye, being evil, speak good things? for out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh.  Matthew 12:34 (KJV) 

I speak out of what I have carried in my heart. I can speak words that make someone else look bad, I can speak words to tarnish an others reputation hoping they will look bad like me or worse. I can speak words that betray relationships and curse another person especially if I am feeling that I am scum or dejected or I feel everybody is better than I am or have low self-esteem telling me I will never measure up. Those are lies of the enemy and I don't have to believe them or put them on someone else.
Father help to realize you are the only one who can raise me up talking about someone else's mistakes or life habits will not raise me up.

Ladies and Gentlemen we interrupt...

....this life for the next few months to conduct a test.

"The Lord your God proveth you, to know whether ye love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul. — He shall sit as a refiner and purifier of silver: and he shall purify the sons of Levi, and purge them as gold and silver, that they may offer unto the Lord an offering in righteousness." — Daily Light on the Daily Path.

This so describes how I have felt the last few months between loosing my income, having to quit a job due to asthma attacks, and other circumstances surrounding me. One test after another and if it isn't testing it is warfare in struggling with illness, depression, or keeping a faith stance.

I really don't know why things are happening the way they are other than for the obvious that the enemy of my Father and my soul wants to discourage me to give up, make a wrong move or do nothing. Here I am waiting for the next set of instructions or an instruction. Meditating on God's promises, like "he will be with me always", "nothing can separate me from his love," and "his grace is sufficient for me." I listen to encouraging music and worship and praise my Father for he is Good, all the time. But the end is not yet and now I have been asked to find another place to live. Tears come and peace fills my soul I know God is with me and carrying me today and tomorrow I will be following Him. He has come near me and I am not alone.

June 25,2012
In reflecting about be tried in the fire or being purified, I have learned this is done before a metal can be used and it is the same with clay being fashioned into a piece of pottery. God has been using me and I know He will continue to use me but I have seen things like attitudes that needed to be changed and the end goal is to be like Jesus and I am certainly not all the way there yet. I don't love like Jesus did or forgive and learning to not respond to vile accusations is a real big one for me. So this has come to form me, shape me and to reflect more of Jesus through me and I should not find it strange. I am easing into a new job that has promise and possibility and God has shown me some people to reach and some things to do. Today I do feel like He is in control.

Wednesday

I walked around the park tonight and it was so nice. The breeze waving the branches of the weeping willow trees, brushing softly against my face. I stopped at the observation deck and the the water was still you could see the clouds and the sky in it except for the area that two parent ducks were swimming with their four ducklings causing gentle ripples in the water. The bugs touching the surface of the water, fish coming to the surface. The and azure sky held white and fluffy clouds.

About twenty junior high age kids were fill drink bottles with water and tossing the water at each other and there were 4 teams of young men playing basket ball. It was a peaceful summer night and a feeling of it is going to be ok swept over me. It has been very ruff since I had to leave the job at the long term care facility and I am still waiting for a decision from unemployment regarding my leaving but tonight it just felt ok.

June 1. 2012

On Friday my friends mother, Pat Langlois life was celebrated. It was certainly bittersweet knowing that she will be missed by so many but she had also lived life regardless what was thrown in her path. Rarely was she not smiling when you seen her and loved it when her kids, grandkids, great-grandkids, stopped by and she would welcome whatever friends they had with them.

I just admire what she accomplished in her life and how she loved her family and how committed she was to her God. I think of the song, "Find Us Faithful", it was recorded by Steve Green and even if he is not your favorite singer the words of this song describe Pat. And it did not matter how long it had been since I had last been around there was always a smile and welcome when I came. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ETotJxBC9XY

"...and her children rise up and call her blessed." I would only pray that someday my faith could be seen like that.

Goodbye for now, Pat. I know we will see that smile again. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b8q_7iVQF0w

This Afternoon by Katrina Sischo-Hansen on Friday, May 18, 2012 at 11:29pm

Well it is over, today we celebrated the life of Timothy Preston a sweet young man that left us too soon. There was a place to speak about what we remembered about Tim and I was not sure I could do it but I did make it through without breaking up too much. I was reminded how we make a imprint in the lives of other people and for some people they just can't live as "an island unto themselves." Tim showed that today and I know there are more lives out there he touched that we don't even know about.

Below is what I shared to honor Tim and since I did not have the written page with me I condensed it a little bit. But as you read this I pray that if there is a strained relationship in your life, or someone you have not seen in a while that you have wanted to touch base with, someone you need to forgive, or just say, "Hey", to pickup the phone, buy a card, message them, get in your car or say a prayer for them tonight and then connect with them. Life changes so fast mine changed dramatically in a span of two hours. Tim's changed in minuets and the ripples have washed over many of us.

Timothy means, "Honors God", and I know Tim did honor God because I knew Tim's heart. I seen and heard how he honored God in the love he gave his family and friends.

Tragedies like this just have no good explanation and answering why would not change a thing or help relieve our grief.  I suppose I could launch into some theological discourse of what it could me but that would not change anything either. (Breath a sigh of relief)

I have known Tim since he was 3 and there are many things to reflect on. Fishing trips that provided more entertainment than fish, curiosity, meals shared, and birthday parties and one time he showed my son how to get into the apartment upstairs the problem was someone else lived there.

So in situations like this I have to rely on what I already know and what we know is even though Tim’s walk with the Lord has been like Billy’s in The Family Circus when he is chasing a butterfly or going to the bus and has consisted of ups, downs, over, under, around, and that narrow road or go to this wide road and at the end of that twisted and curvy road there was a prodigal, extravagant, lavishing Father in love, mercy and grace waiting for Tim with his arms open wide maybe even running toward Tim to embrace him.

I know nothing has kept him from God’s love; he was sealed with the Holy Spirit after he believed, he has entered into God’s rest, and one day we will meet again. In the meantime Tim has become part of that great cloud of witnesses and is cheering us on to have perseverance as we run our race.

It will take some time but I also believe the God of all comfort will walk with us and as time goes by the why will become less important and the knowing of all God is and has given us will take its place in our hearts.

Jersey Boys

Tonight I was able to attend the Jersey Boys Tour at Miller Auditorium with my friend, Elaine.

Now if it had not been for my husband I would not know who the Jersey Boys were. He was the fan. I could take on stroll down the country lane but not rock n roll - - back then anyway. So the house rang with music from the early days of rock n roll to even some Pink Floyd. We seen the Beach Boys when they came to Muskegon and Chicago and other artists if it was to rocky the kids went with him.

I was watching the Emmy's 2007 and there was the Jersey Boys singing to outtakes of the Sopranos. This is what started the quest. I did what any computer savvy person would do and Googled the Jersey Boys found out about the Broadway play and knew it would have been something we would have enjoyed together. Seeing that it would be in Chicago in 08 I thought it would be a great 50th Birthday present. Well that did not happen because of knee surgery and short on funds and other hoops. The production left Chicago in 2010.

2011 I see an ad when I am in Lansing with Tim that the Jersey Boy production will be Lansing. I tried to get Tim to go with me but he was not all that interested. So I began to plan other options and started asking around to see who might be interested and the play would be there in October and November but once again I didn't get there. Then I seen the dates for the rest of the tour and when the play would be in Kalamazoo and it was after tax time so...

So I asked Elaine and she said yes and the planning began for tonight's the quest. Tickets are ordered and the date is set. The show was fantastic! Mike would have liked it and it was a great time. Memories flooded my mind. The good ones.

Sometime and somewhere between heaven and earth that veil parted.

Oh, what a night!

Stories

I like to hear people's stories. I like to hear about where they have came from, what they are doing now, where they think they are going and where God is leading them. We all have a story and that story has made us, changed us, and gave us roots. Each story is different but the same. Each story in the end is God's story.

Sunday, my friend Ken Wallace shared his journey of the last 6 years. He shared about what God has done for him, showed him and his wife Renae, and done through him. He shared how he has been led to and prayed for and  related to other people and I was so blessed.

I am also excited for the next leg of their journey. Ken shared how he feels he is called to minister to the church of Jesus Christ to encourage, pray for, and preach to and if there is ever a point in time that the church needs to be ministered to it is now. The church has come so far from God's mandate and His vision that we are in trouble and Ken mentioned that too. There are missionaries coming from other countries to evangelize the christian church in America and over all the church has become as self-absorbed, materialistic, individually isolated and narcissistic organization as any other organization.

Thankfully God has a remnant who realize this and they are at work to preach the good news to the rest of the church. Ken is going to do that too with his wife, Renae in an area retreat in Newaygo County. He is concerned a little regarding his age. But I say to him that we are young in comparison to Abram who was called at 75 to leave his home to a place God would show him. Ken there are others looking for a new land that you know about. Moses was 80 when he led the Israelite's from Egypt and there are those who still need to be led out of bondage. Caleb was 85 when he entered the Promised Land and received his portion of the land. Ken and Renae there are those who have no idea what portions God has for them. Joshua was 100 when God told him you've done a lot but there is more to do and I want you to divide the land. Just keep your spirits in tune with Abba's and you will know what he wants you to keep doing.

Grief Journey

Here is comes again the month that my husband died - the anniversary of his death. 

I was going through some cd's the other week and found the pictures of Ambree's birth, her bath, and her grandpa holding her. I heard his voice again. I ached. The what-would-it-be-like if he were here started running through my thoughts I would have someone to help bear the burden, someone to hold me when I hurt, someone to talk to about how I am feeling now, how the Lord showed me I am still a clay pot on the potter's wheel, someone to go places with. The ache grows.

He has become someone in my mind that he never was in person. I am missing what I think he would be but was not very often in real life. And as his diseased progressed he would have been even more reclusive and tired than he was when he died. Wow.

So then I begin to remember the real things the camping trip at Lake Sch-Nepp-A-Ho where we swam, fished, paddled a raft, cooked, and had fun. I came home with heat exhaustion. The trip to Nashville, picnics and a house game of tag. The boys working with Mike at the radio station and transmitter sites. Church camp in Bridgeman Michigan. The prayer team. Those are the real things we did. The emotional support, the heart breaking times, bearing burdens was out of his realm. 

I remember.