Hard putting into words

Putting into words without crying is hard to do. Honestly, I have tried not to think about it. I've tried to somewhat pretend it was not happening, even though I knew it was. But this week has been a major breakthrough. Joey has been struggling since about August, mentally and spiritually. As most men are, he kept alot in, however I do know him sometimes better than he knows himself. I pushed when I thought I needed to, and stepped back at other times. Men get their self-esteem from their job, (first of all, I think that this is awful, why can't they get it from the people who love and respect them) but Joey really has not had a employment goal for about 5 years, he kept thinking something would come around. He has worked, sometimes harder than he had all those years in business, but nothing that says, here is your new career, get busy. So I have been pushing him a little bit to start making a plan. He has no idea still the direction he is suppose to take, thank goodness God still has kept us a float. But in saying all this, God spoke to Joey Monday while he was on a backhoe praying at our new church. He said it was almost audible to him. It has moved him so much that he cannot hardly talk about it without tears coming to his eyes and if you know Joey this doesn't happen often. I knew this fall that he was broken but I had no idea how to fix it, I knew I couldn't fix it only God could. I hoped that he would figure it out and not go so deep it would be hard to return or not return. Joey keeps telling me that this week is his recovery week, like after you have been in a bad wreak, you need time to recover. I have sat back and listened carefully to him, asked him to take it slow, he is so excited to see the light again. Most people who know Joey, would never know what and where his mind has been these last 6 month. Our children knew sometime was wrong but never to the extreme of my worry, I would tell them to be patience, for Josh not to pick on his Dad so much.
To just encourage him as much as possible. Men do need encouragement, I have always thought Joey was smarter, kinder and more thoughtful than he ever thought he was. Telling someone that and them believe they are, are two different things. I will say that I thank God that he has shown Joey things that he hasn't shown me this last week. That Joey is experiencing God in a whole new way. That he is finally at peace with somethings that has been a struggle these last 6 months. As verse that the Lord showed Joey on Monday night was I Corinthians 2:3&4 " I came to you in weakness and trembling. My message and preaching were not with wise words, but with a demonstration of the Spirit's power, so that your faith might not rest on human wisdom, but on God's power." Joey's comment to me after reading this was, I was before God, in weakness, sitting on a backhoe in the middle of a field, and my prayer was not made up of wise eloquent words, just a construction workers vocabulary and God showed me his power and made me speechless. I thought that if those men out there working were looking at me at the particular time, they would probably say I was losing it and I could not have explained to them what was happening at that moment. GOD IS GOOD ALL THE TIME.

Lincoln Brewster - Today is the Day

All he has in store for me is GOOD, Today is the day he has made, lets rejoice and be glad in it.........

Pictures from the last month

I plan on getting a new camera before the new grandchild is born. My cheaper digital camera does an OK job, here are a few of my favorite pictures from the last month.

I Love sticky snow

I thought I would try something new in picture taking, I like the result

This is one of my favorite pictures of my eldest. He looks pretty handsome and happy. He had been hunting that day, I cut off his kill for the day.

Joey took this picture, I thought it was pretty with the fall pumpkins in the picture.

I loved the teal colors from this picture.

This is finally a picture of Wesley really smiling and not a beer in his hand.

My step-brothers daughter Kylie and Josh she really likes him

Pops, he kinda looks like Santa Clause with his red shirt

We always take a picture of us, We put the men in front this year and us girls like it that way, they hide parts of us. HA!!!!!

CHoosE

Yesterday at church we had a group from Virginia Tech in to sing for us. They are called CHoosE, they are a christian a capella group and one of our old youth girls sings with them. What a wonderful ministry they have, the music was beautiful. We are hoping to get them back this fall when we open our new church. It would be a great way to introduce today's youth to Christ. You forget they don't have instruments, it is all in their voices.
Our church is usually very generous to other ministries out there, and once again they did not fail. When the girl came by the office to pick up their love offering, she was blown away. Never have they received so much from one church. I believe sometimes the college kids today have a view that southern christians are a little backwards, socially, financially, and politically and it is nice when we jumble up their apple cart. I think that we as a body ministered to them as much as they blessed us. Its great when God works.

Matthew 8 & 9

I have decided to read the New Testament all the way through without jumping around the next few months. I enjoy Bible studies more than just reading straight through, I like topics but I thought their might be some verse the Lord will show me that are for me at this time than from a topical Bible study. I am in Matthew chapter 8 & 9 . It is all pretty much red letter, so I figure that it is pretty important, since God himself physically spoke it out of his mouth. The problem is that most of us don't want to work on these areas, I know I don't. I got stuck on two areas. First forgiveness, why is it so hard to forgive? For me, it usually means that I didn't get to have my say, so I can't clear up something that was said or done that might have been taken the wrong way or somebody did something to me or heaven forbid my family and I haven't been able to right the wrong, so I dwell on it. As I was talking alone in the den last night to God, trying to decided if I really do forgive when wronged, because I bring it up in my mind every once in a while. I came to a realization about myself and probably many other women. We are nurturers, it is our nature to fix things, to make things alright. Just because someone has wronged us or our family, we can forgive in time, but as a women we think that once we forgive everything will be OK and we should go back to the way things use to be. That is where I struggle with did I really forgive if I don't want to be friends anymore. I realized that it is OK not to be friends, that I don't wish any harm, grief, or failures to this person. I just don't need or have to hang around with them anymore. That I have forgiven them, however because of the offense, I can't trust them at this time, and if the offense has happened more than once it will take a lot longer to trust them again. As a woman I had to tell myself that this is OK, that I really have forgiven, and that my communication with the father is still in tact. We as Christians try to tell everyone that if your a good christian, you will get along with everyone. I don't see Jesus happy with the Pharisees, or him wanting to hang around in close contact with the ones who opposed him. He loved them all but was wise enough not to get but so close..... The other verse that stopped me was Jesus saying he wants mercy (to be spared from harm, judgement, danger or trouble/to be kind and forgiving) instead of sacrifice (Forfeiting, giving up something, to offer up something). God doesn't ask me to give up things, but to be merciful. It is much easier to give up things than to be thoughtful, forgiving or kind to people. This takes an effort on my part to have a relationship with others. I still have to think on these things and make clear all God is telling me

B.Reith "The Comeback Kid" Official Music Video

I have gotten hooked on GMC television. This was on this morning and I liked it. We get knocked down but we get back up again. We Christians are the Comeback Kids.....

Old Movies

This is my two cute children about 20 years ago. My sister decided to get married on a Monday night at my mothers house, last minute. So here are my lovely children in shorts and t-shirts. Leigh Anne's husband found this picture and sent it to Audrey, she then sent it to me and her brother. He called laughing the other night, asking do I have a Mutant Ninja t-shirt on at a wedding. We all have laughed.My brother-in-law thought Audrey looked a little mischievous in this picture, this was the time that she was pretty sneaky. Joey, Audrey and myself since we have been in the house for a couple days, decided to play cards and look at old home movies. We have laughed till we cried in some of them. It brought back such wonderful memories for me. Audrey and Josh with family and friends singing, playing in the snow, holidays, and my children carrying around the camera taking their own movies at a very young age, I can't believe I let them do some of the stuff they did. I thought I was alot stricter on them.HA!!!(that is what Josh says) What a great evening of remembering.....

Ski Retreat

This weekend turned out to be a very eventful time. Friday when we arrived at the mountains it was starting to snow a little, we knew they were calling for a dusting. The group of young adults came up a few hours after we arrived. We needed to make sure everything was in working order and get all the food in and ready. By 5 pm we already had about 2 inches of snow. One of the van drivers called to let us know that they were in Galax about 6 so that I could get the baked spaghetti in the oven so it would be nice and warm when they got there. Joey had thought it would be fun to ride the rhino out and meet them since it was dark and Tom had not been there in a few years. It's hard to explain these back roads to city people. Tom decided to GPS the place and he must have put in to take the shortest route, because he did not come in the way we do. So Joey was sitting out in the now 6 inches of snow and wind waiting on them at a back road to nowhere. I heard knocking on the front door and Tom said I"m Stuck at the bottom of the hill in a ditch. All the 12 young adults were huffing and puffing up the hill with their luggage. Earlier in the conversation with Tom, Joey told him not to come up the driveway, but him being the Yankee that he is he blew him off and told him it would be no problem to get up the hill. Needless to say, Tom and I went in Joey's truck and searched for him by the rhino tracks in the snow, every little road side we could see where Joey did donuts in the snow. We finally found him about 3 -4 miles on the side of a road talking to a farmer who was out dealing with cows having babies in the freezing weather. Tom did not get to live it down that he did not listen and make it up the hill. We had a great meal, a little later than planned, got the van out of the ditch and put at the bottom of the hill so they could go out the next day for a trip to Boone to go an ski. The next morning when we got up it was 11 degrees, the wind was blowing so hard, it was snowing so hard, and they headed out. Joey had to get them to the main road and stayed with them in case they need to be pulled out with a chain from a ditch. There was about 8 inches of snow. So our dusting that was expected became multiplied and the adventures began.
They had a great time at the ski lodge, finally made it home at 9 that night. We were blessed to have such great people in this group, it was fun, we played games, prayed, had devotions, ate alot and just talked. Joey and I were a little nervous having 16 people in that little house, the sleeping arrangements, the little septic tank HA!, but all in all it could not have gone any better.

Today

Today we are heading to the mountains with 15 young adults for a retreat. I am cooking for all of them. I always worry when I do this that I will not have enough food, especially since the closest grocery store is an hour away and they close early up there. Our house really on sleeps about 7 people but we are taking inflatable mattress to put in the garage for the guys, us girls get the house. So I probably won't get much rest over the next 48 hrs. So I will today look for the good over the last few days. We have rented a few units here at the storage buildings, this is a praise, Josh told me the other day this is going to be a good year for us here. A good friend from high school who visits me at the office has a possible opportunity for Joey and some work, another praise. We are in the final stages of closing up our old church and moving to the high school for our services, this is very exciting and a little scary at the same time. And my dear sweet husband and son, who a month ago told me that this is going to be a mild winter, informed me of their next two predictions on snow a few days ago, they are next Mon or Tues, maybe between 3-4 inches of snow, but the whopper is about the 19th the model that are watching shows over a foot of snow here on the ground, (actually it shows about 2 feet) I am trying to be realistic. So we will see if my little weathermen are right.

Crystal Bowersox - Up To The Mountain (Studio Recording) [iTunes Version...

It is coming soon.....

Looking for good

I said this year I am going to look for something good about every day. Saturday, we went as a family all 6 of us to the movies and then to a family belated Christmas party. It was so good to be with both of the kids and their loves, we haven't done this in a few years. Sunday was a nice day of putting up Christmas decoration at a slow pace, Wesley even helped me move furniture since my back is bad, Praise the Lord everything have been in place since last Monday. YAH!!!! I love to move furniture after the holidays, it makes me clean everything really good. Monday, I Joey and I watched a wonderful Hallmark movie, the man in the movie loved this lady, whom he married, who was pregnant with another mans baby unconditionally. It was set in the 40's, her Dad was a pastor, who shipped her out from embarrassment, the quote in the movie I liked best"I have felt more love in the last 6 months with this family, than I did the last 20 years in my fathers home". I want to strive for unconditional love. Today, I saw a beautiful sunrise... what more can you say...