Blah, Blah, Blah!!!: Sweet Home, Alabama

Monday, November 24, 2008

Sweet Home, Alabama

Hey ya'll!! Can you tell I'm back in the "Heart of Dixie"? We left Saturday morning for a weeks respite in Alabama. We have two children living in Mobile, Alabama - both of them are students at the University of Southern Alabama. So, we are spending Thanksgiving with them and are enjoying some time in our old "hangouts". We lived in Mississippi and Mobile was only 45 minutes away...that was the BIG city for us, so we would often come to Mobile for shopping, restaurants, etc. I'm taking lots of pictures, but can't download them until I get back home.

Yesterday we attended our old church. It was just wonderful and refreshing to visit with so many old friends! They had a Thanksgiving meal after the morning service, so that gave us even more time to visit. It was fun to catch up on each other's lives, compare family pictures, etc. One exciting thing happened for me. One item on my "Bucket List" has always been to have a speaking/teaching ministry for women. While I attended this church, I taught numerous Bible studies, Sunday school classes, VBS programs, etc. Because of this, I boldly mentioned my desire to begin a speaking ministry and my desire to begin at a church where I felt comfortable. They really encouraged me and I will hopefully hold a women's retreat with them early in the new year! I am over-the-top excited about this!! If any of you that read this blog have a women's group, I would love to travel to your church and speak. I have a few topics that I have been working on, so just leave a comment and we'll take it from there...

That's all my news from Alabama, ya'll! I'll post more later...HUGS!

1 comment:

Anonymous said...: So glad to hear you had such a great thanksgiving spending time with family and friends!! I'm so excited for you that they want you to be part of their retreat! PTL!! Your dream of speaking is coming around!! I know you will do an awesome job!! Love you lots!!; December 3, 2008 at 6:41 AM

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One thing we may be sure of, however: For the believer all pain has meaning; all adversity is profitable. There is no question that adversity is difficult. It usually takes us by surprise and seems to strike where we are most vulnerable. To us it often appears completely senseless and irrational, but to God none of it is either senseless or irrational. He has a purpose in every pain He brings or allows in our lives. We can be sure that in some way He intends it for our profit and His glory.
--Jerry Bridges

God is doing a greater work in us, and that can only come as we learn to trust Him no matter how dark the days and sleepless the nights. And it is only as we have been through the darkness with Him that what we know with our heads slides down into our hearts, and our hearts no longer demand answers. The “Why?” becomes unimportant when we believe that God can and will redeem the pain for our good and his glory. . . . When I put the sovereignty of God beside His unfailing love, my heart can rest.
--Verdell Davis

Our circumstances are not an accurate reflection of God's goodness. Whether life is good or bad, God's goodness, rooted in His character, is the same.
--Helen Grace Lescheid

All of us have wondered at times why God doesn't do more to fix our problems. But our human eyes often fail to see that God isn't rushing to change our circumstances because he is concerned with a much more serious problem -- our character. While you struggle with the woes of this world, God's main occupation is preparing you for the world to come. The focus of what God is doing in your life takes place in you, not around you.
--Andy Stanley, in "Like A Rock"

There is no circumstance, no trouble, no testing, that can ever touch me until, first of all, it has gone past God and past Christ, right through to me. If it has come that far, it has come with a great purpose, which I may not understand at the moment. But I refuse to become panicky, as I lift up my eyes to Him and accept it as coming from the throne of God for some great purpose of blessing to my own heart.
--Alan Redpath

The most extraordinary thing about the oyster is this: irritations get into his shell . . . . and when he cannot get rid of them, he uses the irritations to do the loveliest thing an oyster ever has the chance to do. If there are irritations in our lives today, there is only prescription: make a pearl . . . . And it takes faith and love to do it.
--Harry Emerson Fosdick

What a difference it makes when a trial comes, to see in it not the hand of an avenger, but the loving discipline of a father and the gentle admonition of a mother! God would not have us feel even the shadow of His anger. Judgment hardens the spirit and God never wants to break the spirit of His obedient child, but to win us by His love and transform us by the gentleness. Beloved, let us ever look upon our trials in the tender light of the Father’s love. It is not the token of His displeasure, but the very pledge of His jealous love, a love so inexorable that it will not let us miss His holiest and best.
--A. B. Simpson

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