Wordless Wednesday~Sort Of...

 I've never really done a "wordless Wednesday" post before. Is there a group I'm supposed to link up to? I don't know how to be "wordless", as most of you can tell by now.  But here are a series of photos that I've taken on our walks recently and/or around our neck of the woods.  I'll try to be as wordless as possible...

2 Peter 3:9 New International Version

"9 The Lord is not slow in keeping his promise, 

as some understand slowness. 

Instead he is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, 

but everyone to come to repentance."

(deer vertebra found in the woods; it's been there a long time)

Before

After

(another view from cell phone photo)

Psalm 62:5-8  New King James Version

"5 My soul, wait silently for God alone,

For my expectation is from Him.

6 He only is my rock and my salvation;

He is my defense;

I shall not be moved.

7 In God is my salvation and my glory;

The rock of my strength,

And my refuge, is in God.

8 Trust in Him at all times, you people;

Pour out your heart before Him;

God is a refuge for us. Selah"

That's all folks!  Have a lovely rest of your week.

Note: Our "kids" made it home safely from their almost month long trip to Minnesota! They will be coming over for supper tonight, so I need to get to work! Can't wait to see them!  Catch ya later alligator!

Finally Back!

 Dear Friends in Blogland and beyond! 

It's been a long week since my desktop computer crashed!  But thankfully, that waiting is finally over and my new computer arrived today.  Let me explain...what I now have is a refurbished Dell desktop computer that I ordered via Walmart online, and it only cost around $70.00. It came fully equipped with Windows 10, which is what I had before and what I wanted to keep so I didn't have to learn a new program on top of adjusting to a different computer.  My last computer was also a Dell refurbished computer, purchased the same way, and it lasted quite a few years. So I feel pretty confident that this was a good plan, and we will trust that it will last for a good long time!  Now I am waiting for a little $10.00 piece of equipment to arrive via Amazon tomorrow that will enable me to transfer my files from my hard drive from the old computer to the new one. I have already removed the hard drive from the old computer, and I am trusting it was not corrupted when the computer crashed and that my files are still intact. We shall see what develops!   Thankfully I have saved a lot of my pictures and important files to flash drives, but I had not done a backup recently and so I know there are many files that I want to make sure I can save.  

One thing that will be different for me is my Picasa Photo editing program is no longer available, and I do not have it on a CD so I cannot load it onto my computer.  So I am experimenting with what comes with the computer programming online. So far I am not too impressed, but I'll keep working on it.

Here's a few pictures I took yesterday at our monthly "Women in Faith" fellowship...Since both St. Patrick's Day and Easter are during this month, the decorations covered both special days.  We had a great time of fellowship and prayer for one another, and a delicious lasagna luncheon provided by the ladies. Different ladies take turns each month in preparing the lunch, and we always have something good! There were about 22 ladies present, which was great for a regular meeting month.  Our bigger events are in May, when we have our "May Fellowship" and invite ladies from all of the local churches to join us for a luncheon and a nice program/guest speaker,  and at Christmas, when we have our Christmas potluck fellowship.    

We are now called "Women in Faith", since our church no longer belongs to the United Methodist Church, where we were known as "United Methodist Women". We now belong to the Global Methodist Church, which is the conservative new denomination recently created for churches wishing to leave the United Methodist denomination. As of yet I don't believe there is an organized women's group for the Global Methodist Church, so each church has developed its own group and we wanted to be known as "Women in Faith".  

 A funny thing happened yesterday.  At our last month's meeting one of the ladies said she was going to order some new bags for each of us, and she passed around the catalog and told us to choose the one we wanted.  I thought she meant for each of us to pick the one we wanted in particular, so I chose this one:

Those of you who know me will know why I wanted this particular bag. My "One Word" for 2024 is "Strength", and so I thought this would be perfect.  Well, much to my embarrassment yesterday when she gave everyone a new bag, everyone else received bags that were all alike, which said "Women of Faith", except for me. I got this one, because I was the only one who thought we were supposed to pick out the bag we wanted.  What she had meant was did everyone like the bag she had chosen for our group, which is what everyone else got.(I just found this picture online of the bag everyone else received):

Everyone had a good laugh at me for being the only one different from everyone else. She did have another bag like this to give me, but I told her to save it for someone else who may not have been there yesterday and would still want a bag. It was funny and I guess I need to learn to listen (my one word for last year!) better to instructions from now on! LOL.

Lest you think I've moved away from Still Waters Pond, here are a few pictures I've taken this past week of the birds:

The Goldfinches are still coming around for seeds. Not sure when they will head north, but we are enjoying them in the meantime.

The Bluebirds still come and go also, but we aren't sure what exactly is going on as it doesn't appear that there are any new babies in the nest yet, and it seems like they are way overdue. So I'm just watching and waiting to see what develops.

Mr. Cardinal stopped by for a visit.

And Mrs. Sand Hill Crane still comes up for her daily break away from the nest to get a snack before returning to her place of waiting. I figure the new "colts" should be cracking open their eggs sometime late next week.

These Great White Egrets came by to visit Mrs. Crane while she was on the nest yesterday morning:

They danced and pranced and flew around as if they were entertaining her so she wouldn't get bored.  I'm sorry the pictures aren't more clear, but it was till early morning and low light.

So what else has been happening you say?  Oh my, when it rains it pours! Not in the literal rain sense, but in the happening of events.  Not long after my computer crashed, the water dispenser and ice maker on our refrigerator basically stopped producing any water or ice. I thought perhaps it was time to replace the water filter, so I ordered one online. It came in a couple of days, and so we installed it, but the problem with barely a trickle of water continued.  Thankfully, this time when we purchased this refrigerator almost 4 years ago we also purchased an extended warranty! It is good for 60 months, so we are still within the time frame to be covered. I called the company and they are sending out a repairman tomorrow to repair the issue (hopefully!).  No fees for parts or labor! Hooray!! That was good news!!!

The other item we ordered was a replacement part for our generator. We couldn't get it to work last summer during hurricane season, so with that dreaded season coming soon we thought we'd better get it fixed and ready to work in case we need it.  So I ordered the right part. We had some fellas from church coming today to repair it with the new part, however, the part we received was not the correct part. At first it appeared to "others" that I must have made a mistake in ordering the wrong part, but when I looked it back up, I had ordered the correct part, but they sent me the wrong part! So now we must send that part back and they will send us the correct part (hopefully) soon. I'm just thankful to know that it wasn't my fault!  

Also, keep in mind that all these things I had to order happened after the computer crashed, so I had to do everything on my cellphone! I am amazed at all you can do with cellphones! I even figured out how to write a blog, but commenting on other's blogs is not always as easy, as it wants to go to "anonymous", and there are too many steps involved to change it, so I have gotten way behind in reading and commenting on your posts. Plus, I just don't like reading such small print and trying to type on the cell phone with any decent comments! LOL.  So I will try to get caught up with you all in the next few days as I am able. Please bear with me!

One more thing...Last night hubby kept mentioning that he had pain in the top of his head and down around the left side of his face and cheek and neck and his left eye kept wanting to close. Also he had a swollen gland in his neck. We thought maybe he had a sinus infection working on him. But this morning a small rash of blisters appeared on his cheek, and we both said "shingles!"  So thankfully we were able to get into the doctor this morning, and he agreed that he thought it was shingles, but that he also could have some sinus infection as well. So he is now on several medications for all of the above.  Praying that we got it in time before it really had a chance to take hold on him, as anyone who has had shingles knows it is very painful. And no, we haven't had the vaccine. The Dr. said for him to wait 3 months to get it now, but I need to go ahead and get it soon. So I will.  Thankfully he said it is not contagious. So we are thankful he was able to get right into the doctor right away.

Well, I think I will close with this photo of the sunset last night.  Our kids were here for supper and Rose and I went out on the back porch for a while and enjoyed the sunset until the mosquitoes started biting and we had to go back inside! Yes! It's that season already!!

And here are some good verses to close out our day, after a week of expectation, waiting, some frustration, but much thankfulness to God for all of His wonderful blessing and kindness shown unto us. Our problems are so minor compared to so many in the world today. I am very thankful indeed.

Psalm 62:5-8

My soul, wait silently for God alone,

For my expectation is from Him.

6 He only is my rock and my salvation;

He is my defense;

I shall not be moved.

7 In God is my salvation and my glory;

The rock of my strength,

And my refuge, is in God.

8 Trust in Him at all times, you people;

Pour out your heart before Him;

God is a refuge for us. Selah

Amen, and Good night!

It's so good to be back!

It's a New Year...and I'm Going to....

Rest!

Yes, my friends, it is a New Year...and I am going to REST!  That is my "One Word" for 2017!  I "labored" over what my new "One Word" should be...and my mind grew weary with trying so hard.  Then this morning I opened my "Jesus Today" devotional book by Sarah Young, and this is what I read:

"Find Rest in Me alone, dear one; 

Your hope comes from Me. 

You have a restless mind. 

It skips and scampers about continually, rarely taking time to be still.

Listen, and you will hear Me saying,

"Come to Me."

I am the only resting place for your mind that will truly satisfy and strengthen you.

Take time-make time-to direct your thoughts to Me.

Whisper My Name and wait in My sacred Presence.  

You are on holy ground.

This provides refreshment not only for your mind

but also for your soul."

(Jesus Today, #108)

And this message confirmed to me what I was already thinking...it is time for me to 

find REST in Christ alone.  

"Find rest, O my soul, in God alone;

my hope comes from Him."

Psalm 62:5

In keeping with this idea, my mind was already spinning (not resting!) with ways in which I could accomplish this idea of resting.  Doesn't sound like I've quite learned anything about it yet, does it?  But hear me out, please.  

You see, my son sort of started it when he gave me this wonderful surprise gift for Christmas:

Here we are on Christmas morning, as my son Scott explained to me that he found this bench, in pieces in a dumpster, and he knew he had to bring it home and rebuild it for his mom!  And so, after he'd get home at night after work he was secretly laboring over this project outside when I was totally unaware. I was warned to stay away from the lean-to in the yard, but not told why.  And so on Christmas morning he revealed this beautiful park bench to me, which is still not quite completed, but good enough to show me...and I immediately started thinking about where I was going to put it so I could enjoy it the most!

I've had a dream of establishing a little "secret garden" in our back yard...even wrote about it once before I think...(Click HERE for that story...three years ago!)  but I never really got that project off the ground.  I was still working and going through other difficult things in our lives, and the secret garden kind of just faded into the weeds...(ferns mostly)

and even the spiders found a home there:

But now that I am retired...I feel God nudging me to set aside this special place where I can go and find REST for my soul...my own little "Secret Garden" where I can meet the Lord in the morning or the shade of the afternoon...whenever I feel the need or prompting of the Holy Spirit to steal away into a quiet place and meditate on Him...

I found this quote on Pinterest today...and it expresses my sentiments exactly....

and so one of the first things I have set in place is a gate that opens wide into my secret garden:

It is actually an old iron headboard that I found in the old shed on our property...so I painted it and we set it in place...permanently in the OPEN position, so that nothing will hinder me from entering this secret garden...and you are welcome too!  The beautiful glass flower ornament is a Christmas gift from my sweet hubby! He didn't know this would become the first thing to decorate this special place...he just saw it at the flea market and knew I would like it!

He was so right!!!! He knows me better than I realized!

And so now that I have embarked on this new project...it is supposed to help me find "REST"...but first I have work to do so that I CAN rest!  (Something wrong with this picture? Perhaps...but I can't rest until I know everything is in place...) so stay tuned for future developments....(Now you may understand why God wants me to learn how to REST).   

By the way, last year my "One Word" was GRACE...(Click HERE for that story)...and I must admit that God has shown me His loving grace in so many ways this past year...as well as I have had to  learn how to be filled with grace as I have helped to care for my mother in law as she progresses in her physical and mental needs each week...that is still a work in progress for me.  

So perhaps the time of REST will help me to fully understand just how great is God's Grace.  

Psalm 46:10 says:

"Be still, and know that I am God;

I will be exalted among the nations,

I will be exalted in the earth."

This won't be the first time the Lord has tried to teach me to be still and meditate on Him.  I pray that this year I will do exactly what He is teaching me to do...and just

Rest!

Post Update: Linking up with Deb and friends over at Breathing in Grace to share our One Word for 2017!  Check it out and see how the Lord is leading others in this adventure to draw closer to God in 2017...

MY HOPE IS BUILT ON NOTHING LESS...

"My hope is built on nothing less

Than Jesus' blood and righteousness;

I dare not trust the sweetest frame

But wholly lean on Jesus' Name.

Chorus:

On Christ the Solid Rock I stand;

All other ground is sinking sand,

All other ground is sinking sand.

When darkness veils His lovely face,

I rest on His unchanging grace;

In every high and stormy gale

My anchor holds within the veil.

(Chorus)

His oath, His covenant, His blood

Support me in the whelming flood;

When all around my soul gives way,

He then is all my hope and stay.

(Chorus)

When He shall come with trumpet sound,

Oh, may I then in Him be found,

Dressed in His righteousness alone,

Faultless to stand before the throne!

(Chorus:)

On CHRIST THE SOLID ROCK I stand;

All other ground is sinking sand,

All other ground is sinking sand!"

(Edward Mote ~ 1797-1874)

(One of my favorite old hymns of the faith...)

HOPE...

my "one word resolution" for 2012

You may ask me why I chose this word as my "one-word" resolution for 2012?

Because...

My hope is in the Lord..."On CHRIST the SOLID ROCK I stand...

All other ground IS sinking sand...

One morning this past week, after I had announced in my previous post that "HOPE" was my "ONE WORD" resolution for 2012,

I heard the following song on the radio on my way to work...and that was a confirmation that I had made the right choice to focus on "HOPE" for this year.  And then as a further confirmation, I heard the same song again that same day on my way home from work!   Does God ever talk to you that way? He does to me...frequently...through songs, scripture, other people, special little ways...some obvious, and some not so obvious unless I am paying attention...

Maybe God wants you to put YOUR hope in Him for 2012 as well...no matter what the storms or droughts or doubts or fears...Put your complete trust and hope in His unfailing grace...

"My Hope Is In You" by Aaron Shust  (click on link to hear this song)

This is my reminder from God's Word today regarding "HOPE":

"My soul, wait silently for God alone,

For my expectation is from Him.

He only is my rock and my salvation,

He is my defense;

I shall not be moved.

In God is my salvation and my glory;

The rock of my strength,

And my refuge, is in GOD.

Trust in Him at all times, you people;

Pour out your heart before Him;

God is a refuge for us."

Psalm 62:5-8 NKJV

Is YOUR HOPE in the Lord????

I "HOPE" it is!!!!