Grieving and Christmas

Those are two words that I didn't ever picture applying to myself...at least not for 25 or 30 years! But, here we are!

On the plus side, Christmas is full of all kinds of wonderful, happy distractions, while our hearts are healing.

The message that Jesus is Emmanuel (God with us) is so comforting as we miss our dear one who used to be with us!

People often say to me: "At least you still have your kids."

True. 

(Not the same. But, true.) 

I'm blessed that they bring me nothing but joy, encouragement and lots of laughs!

Thank the Lord, I am not an empty-nester and a widow this Christmas! Oh, my stars, that would be rough!

I'm grateful that on Christmas morning, I will wake up in a house with 2 young adults and one teenager. It will be loud and wrapping paper will be strewn everywhere, just like always! Our favorite newlyweds will pop over and enjoy the day with us. Games will be played and way too much eating will take place. Then we will head to the movies to see Star Wars and visit friends, who've become family, and have dessert.

It will be a wonderful day despite our loss.

 

And the best part of any day is ALWAYS Jesus, and remembering what He's done for us!

 

~Becky

What are you called to do?

This bit of awesomeness is from Beth Moore's new book Audacious, and it is way too good not to share.

"When the blood in your veins runs hot with holy affection for the living Christ, what do you want to do most? Paul put it this way: Christ's love compels us.
When Christ's love invades every cell in your body, what are you compelled to do?
The follow-up question is critical. The answer to it is where the rubber meets the road, where dreams become realities and destinies that defy gravity finally get fulfilled.
 This is it: What would it take to do it? You answer those two questions: What are you most compelled by the love of Christ to do? And what would it take to do it? -Then identify one first step toward that direction, and, C
hild, you will find the next place to plant your foot on your divinely planned path. Don't tell me you're too young. Don't tell me you're too old. Don't tell me you're too busy. Get to it. Nobody but you can do it."

~Becky

Wednesdays in the Word

I'm keeping it real here today, but please don't read into this that I'm mad at God about my husband's death. Thankfully, I can say that I am not. That is a road that leads to nowhere!
 -I've been on it before.
Just processing and healing. He is the Wonderful Counselor, after all!
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The other night, the kids and I were listening to a sermon about having agapae love for other people.
Agapae is the Greek word for a love that is sacrificial and unconditional. It is the love that God demonstrated for us when He gave His only Son to die for us, when we did not love Him in return.  It is the love that He commands us to have for other people like our enemies. Ouch!
It is a love that expects nothing in return.
It is an act of the will and a commitment. 

I got distracted from the sermon and stopped listening because something hit me that I had never thought of before:
 I need to agapae God!

When life doesn't make sense on your end, sometimes even loving God, is an act of the will and a commitment!

My need to love Him in an unconditional way, was blowing my mind and it really helped me!

Since my resident theologian is no longer with us,
I had to use Google! ; ) And I found plenty of verses commanding us to agapae God!

I never realized this verse was agapae:

"You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength..." Luke 10:27

This verse in Job is a favorite of mine right now:
 "Though He slay me, yet will I trust Him."  Job 13:16

I am feeling 'slayed.' And that word is as dramatic as I feel, so how cool is that?! : )
I love that it doesn't say 'obey' Him or 'serve' Him. It says TRUST.
He knows best!

So, if you feel disappointed by Him, or the circumstances in your life hurt, and your prayers haven't been answered in the way you thought they should...Know that I'm right there with you!  Let's get our AGAPAE on and just trust...

Besides, as Peter said "Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words that give eternal life." John 6:68

He is our One and Only!

~Becky

Birthday celebration

Nate chose to have his birthday dinner at a retro pizza place in our neighborhood,

 and when I saw this,,,,

I may have squealed and went digging in my purse for quarters! 

I had fun impressing my kids with my long dormat

 Ms. Pac Man skills! 

They were like "Whoa, Mom has strategy!" 

-Why, yes! Yes, I do! I spent a good part of my teen years working on it because that is all there was to do. ; ) 

Then we sat down, and the menus were taped to the back of  album covers and mine was....

Duran Duran! 

My teen favorite! It was like 80's night!

We ate deep dish pizza and calzones with these great friends  

and then we headed back to our house for donuts, hot chocolate and a bon-fire. It wasn't really cold enough for those things but you just have to fake it in FL sometimes! : ) 

Then we went to for a drive to a lake (that is more like a pond) that has a great lights display every year. We all split up into two cars and Nate was one of the people in mine, when a family from CA called to facetime him and sing him Happy Birthday. So sweet!
They jokingly asked if he was going out drinking and we all laughed. His answer was "No, I'm in the car with my mom driving around looking at Christmas lights." LOL
Party on! ; )

~Becky

Happy 21st!

Nathan came home from CA in August to be with us when we found out that Hubby was fighting cancer for the second time. We've been so blessed and grateful to have him here. I can't imagine going through all that we have, without him!

Because he is so into cinematography (and very gifted at it) he had the presence of mind to always be recording or filming important moments (without our knowledge) ever since he got here. And now we have some priceless candid footage, especially of Hubby's last two weeks of life, that we can view whenever the day comes that we are up for it. What a treasure.

He has decided to extended his stay into the spring to make sure that I'm OK. Isn't he a sweetheart?

Then he has a calling in CA to get back to and I'm so proud of him for that.

Nate's passions are always contagious and we all can't help but jump on board. When he arrived here in August, it was with a passion to start a young adults ministry at our church and we all got involved. Hubby was very excited about this group and on one very rare day in the hospital, he was able to counsel Nathan about it by phone for 2 hours! It was a divine gift to Nathan, that I will never forget, because the energy to talk for that long was miraculous! So, it has been with great joy that we have watched God make this group take off and impact those attending and the adults, who are pouring out their wisdom into the next generation. God is doing great things!

It has been three years, since Nathan's been at home on his actual birthday, so it was great fun to make him the traditional birthday bear shaped pancake this morning! LOL -Because you are never too old to eat something that is suppose to look like a bear but turned out like a rabbit! ; )

Happy Birthday, Nate!!! So proud of my visionary guy!
xoxox

~Becky

Sweet and sappy stuff

I don't think my hubby was a big fan of this analogy, but I used to tell him that he was like Mary Poppins:
 "practically perfect in every way." : )  It was so true!
And it made a happy marriage very easy! How could it not!?

We were asked to write down marriage advice at one of the (many) weddings happening around here lately and my advice was something we did, and I'm happy to say that it worked for all 24 years!
When we got married, we made a promise to each other that we would never raise our voices at one another.... And we never did!
Such a blessing!
(I wish I would have been awesome enough to have thought to have made that promise to our kids
as well! But no such luck! lol)

We also promised never to leave our home in anger. You know, where one person drives away, angry at another.
We kept that one too!

For some reason, we also never used each other's first names.
Like ever.
He was "Hon," "Honey,"and "Lovey." And I was "Kind Woman" and "Baby Cakes" and all sorts of other ones! -I don't know if I would advise this. Sometimes it was embarassing in public. ; )

Even to the very end, my hubby was always finding a way to care for me. One of my sweetest hosptial memories is of his eyes searching a-sometimes-crowded hospital room, looking for my face! Whenever he found my face, he would wink his left eye at me. He did this many times a day!  It meant the world to me. And it was his sweet way of always reassuring me in the midst of everything that was happening!
Such a sweetheart! I'll always treasure that!

He spent years praying daily for me and one of the verses he always prayed was Prov. 11:16.
I pray that I would be "A gracious woman who retains honor." He was certainly an honorable man and I was blessed!

~Becky

Wednesdays in the Word

It feels like the scriptures on healing have been my constant companions for several months now and the other day I realized that I needed to make myself more familiar with the scriptures on widows.
 ~I'm not a big fan of the 'w' word at the moment, and the first time someone called me one, I cried. (not that it takes much to make me cry right now)   ; )

But, God is a big fan of widows!

Here are just a few verses out of many:

"A father to the fatherless and a judge for the widows,
is God in His holy habitation."  Ps. 68:5

"The Lord protects the strangers,
He supports the fatherless and the widow,
but He thwarts the way of the wicked."  Ps. 146:9

"Let your widows trust in Me."  Jer. 49:11

And here is a scorcher of a verse:
"You shall not afflict any widow or orphan. If you afflict him at all, and if he does cry out to Me,
I will surely hear his cry and My anger will be kindled, and I will kill you with the sword and your wives shall become widows and your children, fatherless."  Ex. 22:22-24

The New Testament has very specific instructions for who should care for widows, depending upon their age and if they ever had children.

And we all know that Jesus made it a priority, while He was dying on the cross, to give the care of his widowed mother into John's hands. So sweet!


~Becky