Adventures with God and theology student

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          Names and how you pronounce them Moira - Moy rah      Eoghan - Ew han Aiofa - Aye fah Demetria - Deh mee tree ah Aidan - A dahn Ea

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  Name pronunciations:  Eoghan - Ewan Eadwaerd - Edward Eadmund - Edmond Aiofe - Eye fah Siobhan - Shi VAWN                                 

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 Enjoy this small snippet from Warped.  It is currently with the editors and I pray it will be released before the end of 2022.  :D   Enjoy

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" Hosanna to the Son of David! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord! [ b ] Hosanna in the highest heaven!" Matthew 21:9 (CSB)   

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A Million Little Things

  A Million Little Things

It’s a million little things that tell me you are gone. 

No one to hug at night. 

No more listening for when you would stop breathing so I could rub your back to wake you and make you breathe again.

 No one to tell me stupid, inappropriate jokes that made me laugh and groan

No one to leave the toilet seat up sometimes in the middle of the night. 

No one to leave their shoes by the door so I trip.

No one leaves their underwear all over the floor but complains that the girls don’t pick up their socks. 

No one to watch cheesy B-rated science fiction movies with as I roll my eyes and you enjoy it thoroughly.

No one to see I need a break and take me on a long drive to let me vent, cry, or pray.

No one to bring me chocolate I don’t want to eat because I don’t crave chocolate that much anymore. 

No one to laugh when my irritation overcomes me and I speak what I’m thinking in private.

No one to laugh when I’m sleep-deprived and punchy or when I have a Julia Sugarbaker moment and tell someone off because I have finally reached the end of my fuse and it’s been coming for a while.

No one to listen to my stupid story ideas that will never see the light of day but who also cheers when I realize I need to take my characters in a different direction.

No one to pray with when life is hard.

No one to celebrate when the girls do something amazing.

No one to wear the huge LL Bean slippers I bought that now hangs in the shoe rack over the door and stare at me mockingly.

No one to protect me when life or people, in general, become too hard.

No one to buy stupid Dad t-shirts for that says cool things like “Stay calm let Papa fix it”  or “Husband, Daddy, Protector, Hero.”

No one to fix car issues for me so now AAA rescues me, it’s just not the same, I can’t kiss the AAA guy without getting weird looks.

No one to wake me up in the middle of the night simply by saying, “I love you.”

It’s a million little things that scream in the silence that you are with God now and not here with me.  Most days knowing you are with God is enough.  Today is not one of those days.

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           First I apologize, todays' blog isn't really about writing.  It's about learning to live without someone you love deeply.  So it'

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  Name pronunciations:  Eoghan - Ewan Eadwaerd - Edward Eadmund - Edmond Aiofe - Eye fah Siobhan - Shi VAWN                                 

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                                                Why Do Some People Refuse God?      Why is it some people simply refuse to choose following

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November 11, 2021

I hadn't slept well the night of November 10th and the early morning November 11th. It's almost as if God knew I needed to be awake so I could make sure Chris got to the hospital. He woke up and leaned against the door and passed out he told me a little later at a 90 degree angle. I convinced him with little argument to go to bed and call in sick. I'd been sick for over a week, what we didn't know at that moment is it was COVID.

Around 7 a.m. Chris asked me to call 911, he needed to go to the hospital - that told me it was bad. Chris never went to the hospital if he could help it. In fact, he was unusually healthy and could usually sleep anything off, not this time. The ambulance arrived quickly and took him to the ER where they tested him for COVID and he came back positive. They hoped to send him to a better hospital, but wanted to stabilize him first - it never happened. He called me about 9 a.m. and we spoke for 2 minutes and told each other we loved each other and I began to worry. I had a foreboding feeling and I felt like garbage myself and I couldn't go to him because of how sick he was - it was a blessing in disguise. Around 12 noon they had him call me and he could only speak for a few seconds, I could hear it, he felt awful and he wasn't improving, he was declining I asked the nurse to tell him I loved him one last time - he was gone by 1:30 p.m. His heart which was stressed due to high triglycerides (we had been fighting that battle for years already and his doctor was dropping the ball big time) just couldn't handle anything else. I made the call - let him go.

Life is different now. The man who backed me up is not here. His home office is empty and it is disturbing. Our girls and our dog all feel it, we all feel his absence and yet in the midst of our sadness, God is faithful. God promised us in Psalm 34:18 that He is close to the brokenhearted and He saves the crushed in spirit. We definitely are brokenhearted but not crushed in spirit because our redeemer is faithful and true, He is carrying us each day through our new normal. A life without Chris.

Chris was smart, he was funny, and he put people at ease with his warmth and his presence. He made people feel safe. We miss that the most.

I miss his smile, his stupid jokes, I even miss his procrastination. And yet in all of this I feel God's presence carrying me through this each day, even when that day is a day of tears. God tells us in Isaiah 55: 8 that God's thoughts are not our thoughts and His ways are not our ways. But He is also with us when we hurt, He weeps when we weep and He holds us close when we need Him and that carries me through the moments of sorrow and the moments when I am frustrated or just missing Chris.

A song that I listen to often right now is My Redeemer is Faithful and True by Steven Curtis Chapman. If you haven't listened to it lately I would. It's an amazing promise that what God says He will do and He promised to be close to us when we hurt, when feel crushed and when we are just so broken we can't carry on.

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An Attitude of Gratitude

Today's Gratitude List: 1. For a patient husband who also makes certain he gets me out of the house because he knows I'd be a hermit if left to my own devices, especially if I'm writing. 2. For neat little Mom and Pop cafes and diners. We have enjoyed Dari-Delite a lot since moving to our small town. 3. For fellow writer friends with different perspectives.

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Will You Follow

13 Jesus went out again beside the sea. The whole crowd was coming to him, and he was teaching them. 14 Then, passing by, he saw Levi the son of Alphaeus sitting at the tax office, and he said to him, “Follow me,” and he got up and followed him.

Mark 2: 13 & 14 (CSB)

I love that Matthew (also called Levi) didn't stop and ask a million questions. Jesus said, "Follow me" and he got up and left. The truth is Levi had probably been hearing about Jesus for weeks before Jesus came, hearing how He had made the lame walk, made the blind see, and healed the lepers, the demon possed, and healed the sick. It is possible that hearing that Jesus touched lepers resonated with Matthew on a deeper level than other people.

To be a tax collector in Jesus and Matthew’s day meant you worked for the Roman Empire. To the people living in Israel, that made Matthew a traitor. He could no longer attend services at the synagogue, he was no longer welcome in polite company. The Romans didn’t like him either, but he was at least given guards to make sure he wasn’t robbed or injured. What little we know about Matthew is that he was probably from the line of the priests of Levi (hence they were called Levites) and that meant he not only had chosen to work for the enemy but he had turned his back on God in the eyes of his friends and families. Worse, most tax collectors overcharged the people of Israel to make a prophet, and Rome allowed them to do this. I suspect Matthew may have felt rather lonely at times.

Then as Matthew begins to hear about this man, Yeshua who did amazing things, I suspect he became curious. So when Jesus came to his tax booth, Levi (a.k.a. Matthew) probably sat in shock and awe until Jesus said, “Follow me.” And without a moment’s hesitation or cause for concern, Matthew gave the guard his books and money bags and left. In one moment, Matthew left a life of shame, ridicule, and social ostracization to find freedom and life. I am sure at times like all of us, he might have wondered did he do the right thing, but in the end, he remained with Jesus.

How often do we say, “Yes, Lord.” How often do we answer as Samuel in 1 Samuel 3: 10 and say, “Speak Lord, Your servant is listening”? When was the last time you sat down, stayed quiet and just let God speak to you? Is there something He is asking you to do and you are afraid? Remember over 2000 years ago 12 men said, “Yes” when Jesus asked them to “Follow me.” What will your answer be today?

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An Attitude of Gratitude

One of the things I love about this time of year is the opportunity to thank God for all of the blessings He gives. Feel free to join me.

I was thinking this would be a good month to spend counting our blessings. Feel free to join in.

Today's attitude of gratitude:

1. For the privilege to pray for others. It sounds odd I'm sure, but honestly, one of the ways we can show others love is to cover them in prayer.

2. For warm fireplaces on cold mornings.

3. Gas in my car so I can make early morning runs to the grocery store to purchase eggs.

4. That the pantry is coming together. It sounds small, but we spent our first few years trying to find a way for enough space to hold everything. Our house was built in 3 stages the end of the 1940s, the 1970s and 1990s. It shows in lack of storage. Having this large pantry has been wonderful because it created so much more storage space. This means I can see better what we need when we need it.

FYI, we do not need more pumpkin.

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An Attitude of Gratitude:

Today I am thankful for:

1. Time with my husband on dates. We have fun and chat together, sometimes we even just sit in the quiet and enjoy each other's company no words needed. 2. For quiet Sunday evenings with Elizabeth. Chris takes Beka to teens and they have fun and I sit quietly with Lizzie just hanging out. 3. That I am almost done editing my book. I have enjoyed rereading it and getting back into the swing of writing. I'm looking forward to the cover design portion and to seeing the formatting. I've been also having fun learning about different options in self-publishing.

What are you thankful for today?

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Meet Elizabeth Strong

Meet Elizabeth Strong - heroine of this new series. Look for more information to come out about Warped - the first book in the Elizabeth Strong series. Elizabeth Strong stood on the Majestic deck, allowing the throng's joy and anticipation below to radiate up to her. She usually kept a shield up to prevent her from becoming overwhelmed with others' emotions and thoughts. Today though she didn’t mind sharing in their joy. If the passengers had looked closer or even those who explored the first-class deck, they would have seen a young woman of five feet, plump in shape, long red hair with blonde streaks, and freckles that sprinkled themselves across her cheek and nose, and expressive brown eyes with gold and green flecks. Those eyes often got Elizabeth into trouble, her father Dr. Nathaniel Strong often teased his daughter that she would be terrible at playing any games of chance because her emotions showed through her eyes.

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Annie and Max a snippet from Warped

I am editing my first book Warped and thought I'd share a fun snippet from the book.

Annie walked nearer to Maxwell. She laid a hand gently on his arm. Maxwell looked down at her long slender fingers and felt a thrill rush through him. “Max, that was very kind of you. I think you can improve Malcolm’s life a great deal.” Maxwell felt his neck grow warm, and he ran a finger along the inside of his collar. When had his stateroom become so warm? He looked at Annie, who stood only a few inches shorter than himself, and paused. Her hazel eyes were large and alluring, and something in them conveyed compassion and excellent care towards Maxwell. Maxwell found that he wished he could kiss her but instead laid his hand on Annie’s and hoped his eyes showed her his feelings. His emotions must have shown because she blushed and quietly took a step back.

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The Sermon on the Mount - Matthew 6.Changing How We Live Our Lives

#itsaheartissue

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The Sermon on the Mount - Matthew 6. Changing How We Live our Lives

#itsaheartissue