After church during our fellowship time God blessed me with a very special gift! I have a friend, a sister here in Marble who has been and continues to be on a difficult journey. She is battling ovarian cancer. She continues this journey with such courage and grace! She leans on God and shares the things that He is teaching her freely, blessing all those around her.
Today she was sharing with me about the songs she has been singing; she has a God-given angel's voice! She has been singing blues song and laughs as she completes them. She has been reading dramatically some things at the table in English or Southern accents and again laughing. She shared that this week she asked her husband to dance with her and they had no dance music so they started out slow dancing. Then she decided to sing Davidic songs and they did Davidic dances. She laughed and I laughed with her, picturing the dance and hearing the music. We were laughing like two young girls right there in the fellowship room right in the middle of her difficult journey!! I sense God is giving her freedom in the midst of her struggle; freedom to continue to sing, freedom to dance with her husband and freedom to laugh!
This sharing she did with me, this laughter she shared with me was a gift from Heaven itself. Perhaps we will all sing in Heaven. Perhaps we will all dance in Heaven. Perhaps we will all laugh in Godly joy in Heaven.
Praise to God and thanks to my friend, my sister for sharing with me today.......

Advent......Next Sunday is the first Sunday of Advent. Advent is the four Sundays before Christmas. It celebrates the anticipation and the waiting over the centuries in the past for the coming of the Christ child to save our world. It also celebrates the waiting and anticipation of the second coming of our Savior. I love Advent in the church.
So today our church was busy decorating, getting some of the Christmas decorations up in the sanctuary and the fellowship hall in anticipation of the season. We were working together on several projects; everyone running around getting their part done. It was snowing out. Jon walked through the front door of the church. He and two other men had been decorating the huge outside Engelmann Spruce with lights. He had on his stocking cap and his heavy winter coat. He was covered in snow! I just had to laugh!
"Did you get the lights on!?" I was just like a little child! He told me that they had accomplished the task. So of course I ran out the door to see. When I opened the doors of the church it was a snowy, Christmassy wonderland. Snow was swirling and flying about. It was cold and the world seemed transformed in its new snow. Jon plugged in the lights so that I could see the tree. Of course the tree had snow on the branches enhancing the lights. I was filled with joy and I felt Advent stirring in my heart!
"Rejoice, rejoice Emanuel, shall come to thee O Israel!" My prayer is that I always watch and wait with anticipation like a child for the coming of our Messiah in my heart and in our world!

Great cloud of witnesses.......In the early hours of this morning, my sister-in-law's mother, Mary, went to her eternal home. It is a great loss for Monica and the family because we lost Megan not quite two years ago. But Mary left with us a great hope in her last hours.
AB, my brother, said that she kept saying I love Jesus, Jesus loves me and I love my Mama. At one point she said that she saw the people. Monica asked if they were saints and she said yes. Off and on she spoke in a Heavenly language. Then in the dark morning hours she gently stepped from this world to the eternal world.
We who love Hebrews in the Bible, know that the writer speaks of the "great cloud of witnesses." The writer uses the analogy of the Christian running a race to finish the course here on earth and that we are cheered on by this cloud of witnesses. He goes on to explain that these witnesses are the saints who have gone on before us. I believe that Saint Mary saw this crowd and has now joined them. So it is my prayer that I will finish the race here in this earthly realm and will hear Saint Mary along with the other witnesses cheering me on and welcoming me to the finish line which will be my true "forever" home!
Let us not forget that we truly are just passing through this earthly place. It is not our home. Our home has always meant to be with Jesus. Let Saint Mary's final day here among us be hope to us in what she spoke and in what she saw. Christian let us "comfort one another with these words....."

Back in Marble......this afternoon one of our younger churchgoers had a Birthday party in the fellowship hall of the church. They were running around the church laughing and playing games of imagination and having the time of their lives. The parents of the birthday boy planed original games and crafts. The fellowship hall was filled with laughter and Joy!
We live at the end of the road here in Marble. There are no McDonalds or arcade pizza places to have celebrations. We have no grocery stores or even a gas station. We do have the glory and majesty of God's creation, our small historical church, our small charter school and children who still enjoy games that are formed from their own ripe imaginations. There is Marble's heartbeat, a community church, a community school and children that still run and play freely in the great outdoors!
"......Suffer the little children to come unto me. For such is the kingdom of Heaven..." Jesus Christ.

Hands.....sometimes I remember especially poignant memories in the form of an image engraved within my mind. One of those memories was when we lost our young Megan. As they began to roll her casket out of the church, my brother, her father reached out and put his hand on the casket as it went by......his hand reaching out to touch her in the only way he could.
Recently I was visiting my Mother and Daddy in NC. Daddy has trouble remembering things and walks slowly with his walker. On my last night at home we went to a restaurant. As we were leaving I saw from behind my father trying to navigate his way out through the people near the entrance. And there behind him was my brother with his hand on Daddy's shoulder to steady him. It was the same hand and my mind went immediately back to Megan. His loving hand still offering that touch in the only way that he could.
There is another hand that reaches out to touch us, to steady us and to assure us that we are never alone. That hand holds everything that we are and everything that we could ever hope to be. That hand bares the scar of His sacrifice. That hand bares the scar of a nail.......Hands, O the power the touch of a hand holds!

To love people, to love a friend, to love a person with heart and soul is to feel their pain. It is that mystical thing, that is a God thing, that allows an individual to wrap their heart around another. When that love comes from God the time that you know someone matters little. For what is time to God? This love is an eternal thing and takes much risk. It is risky to love to the point that your own heart is broken in such a way as to lay open your soul before the All Mighty. Today as I was crying over the pain I feel for a friend, I asked God, "is there no limit or bottom to the pain we can feel on this earth that comes when we love others so much that we can feel their suffering?" In my spirit I saw the broken body of Jesus and I heard the familiar words........" Here is my body broken for you. Here is my blood shed for you." So there was my answer. And I was reminded of a "new command" that our Lord gave before He gave His life for us, "love one another as I have loved you."

Well......besides getting out and enjoying the first snow of our season, as Jon and I drove the Bob Marly (my jeep) up the trail, we also saw our first bear of the season. This sighting was on the way back from Lost Creek. Starbuck (my lab) and I walk this trail often. I do usually have a bear whistle with me to scare them away. But it was comforting to be in the Bob Marly! The black bear was very cute. He or she was a juvenile; larger than a little cub but did not look to be a yearling. Hey but what do I know about the age of a bear! Anyway he or she was quite afraid of us and after pausing to look at us, ran from us at breakneck speed. I can say from experience that a bear running away from you is better than one running toward you!