Another 'walk down memory lane' from a Karen's Korner of eight years ago. I had written a few days prior to tell readers about sister Amy's brain hemorrhage.


Today is Monday, February 5th, 2018; Karen's Korner #3728

Last night my sister Amy passed away. She never regained consciousness after she collapsed in the bathroom of their home on Wednesday evening.

Since she was 13 months younger than I am, I have never known life without her being in it. There is a void.

Hard to recap an entire life in a couple of sentences. But I hope you will allow me a few memories:

Because we were so close together in ages, Mom used to tell about she would get us dressed in the morning. She wouldn't see us again until almost lunch time, as we would go play either upstairs or outside, depending on the season. We did that until we were 5 and 4; or maybe 6 and 5. One day Amy came downstairs telling mom that she was tired of me always telling her what to do. No wonder we got along so well!

About in the same time period, we went Christmas shopping one day in our small town of Fertile. Part of the family was in the grocery store. Another part went to our local hardware store where there were several gift aisles. Amy came into the grocery store, crying. She was mad and sad. She and I had split up the good amount of change in our shared piggy bank. I had given her by far the most coins. I had given her all the pennies and kept all the silver coins for me. She didn't have enough money to buy anything. Mom saw to it that the coins were re-divided.

Those were some of the last days when I 'knew better' or thought I did!

Amy was a reader. She devoured books. She would tell that at any given time, she would be reading 5 - 6 books. One by her chair. One in the bathroom. One by her bedside. One in the car. One in the kitchen. Lots of them were fiction I think. But she knew 'stuff'. You didn't want to watch Jeopardy with her. Not that she knew all of the answers but she knew a bunch of them. She'd have the answer before I'd have the time to think what the answer might be.

She loved her home and her family. She was a decorator. Christmas? Oh, my! She had collections of things:  Santa Clauses. Nutcrackers. Various kinds of ornaments. A number of Christmas trees. She could  have won the prize within the five sisters for how good she was or interested in doing it (not that there was a contest!).

She and Keith hosted Christmas at their house in early December  this past year, for as many family members as could make it. It wasn't a large crowd, but fun. I hadn't been there for awhile so I was snagging some changes which I really enjoyed seeing. Some was her decorating work. Some seasonal throughout her house. Since my sister Jill and I had stayed overnight, we had more time together in that outing. And I can remember telling Amy about four times different things that caught my eye and how good I thought she was at putting things together (something I am a little devoid of!).

"I like doing that kind of thing," she said.

Not always do I tell people things that I appreciate about them. But I did that time.

I couldn't help but think in the last few days, "We never know when it is the last time we are going to see someone!"

Today's 'korner' is written by Chad Chapman and was part of yesterday's Communion Meditation. Perfect to kickoff February!

 

"I love you and there’s nothing you can do about it."

"If that sentence sounds familiar to some of you, it might be because it was said at least twice in the recent movie Soul on Fire.  Soul on Fire is a true story about John O’Leary. As a young boy, John made a huge mistake while playing with fire and it nearly cost him his life. The doctors told John’s parents that he had burned 100% of his body and had a 1% chance of survival.  Immediately while at the hospital his father said to him, 'I Love you and there’s nothing you can do about it,'  Again he said it to John on the phone after a car accident, and possibly other times that I might have missed. Either way, this was a statement that John’s father often told John throughout his life. It wasn’t necessarily a huge part of the movie, but it really caught my attention.

"I am not here today to go on about that movie, after all, if you haven’t seen it, I don’t want to spoil it for you.  It is an excellent movie, and I do highly recommend that you see it if you haven’t already.

"But just thinking about that statement, I love you and there’s nothing you can do about it, really hit me hard. It immediately made me think about our Holy Father. He has probably said that to me about a million times by now.  I am sure He says it each time I mess up, or sin. I know He says it when I glorify His name, help out one of his children, or even when I pray. He says it when He knows I have worry or trouble on my mind. That statement really hits home about how truly unconditional our Father’s love is for each one of us.  We know that there are many people on earth who choose not to love Him back, because He gives us that free will, but I can only imagine that He tells those people, and everyone else, 'I love you and there’s nothing you can do about it'.  These can be great words to hear, and they can also be hard ones to hear when we feel like we are not properly reciprocating the love back to our Holy Father. But the truth still stands, our Father always loves us.  We know the verse John 3:16, this is the ultimate demonstration of God’s love.  In 1 John chapter 4 verse 19 it says, “We love because he loved us first.”  And in 1 Corinthians, we hear that short, but ever so powerful sentence consisting of just seven simple words, "But the greatest of these is love."
So, my prayer for you, me and everyone of God’s children is that we hear him speak those words, 'I love you and there is nothing you can do about it.'"

****

So many benefits of being part of God's family:  unconditional love, His care, daily help, on up to eternal life and living forever with Him in heaven.

A Bible verse I really like and have repeated more times than I  can count, talks about 'freedom from fear'. And there is always a lot to be afraid. If it isn't true fear, it can be stuff we think about which causes us to be afraid.......which probably will never happen!

"For God has not given us
a spirit of fear,
but of power 
and of love
and of a strong mind."
~ 1 Timothy 1:7 (GNT)

Sometimes I forget that I don't need to fear. That I have His power. His love. And a strong mind. I tend to repeat it, until it sinks in. Or I no longer feel afraid.

Praise God!!

Today is our daughter Jamie's birthday! Happy birthday, Jamie.

A good day to celebrate. Aren't they all??

Today's Karen's Korner is Psalm, chapter 16; the theme it says is "The joys and benefits of a life lived in companionship with God. We enjoy these benefits now and eternally." Written by David (lots of translations, this one is The Message):

Psalm 16

A David Song

 ^1-2 Keep me safe, O God, I've run for dear life to you.
   I say to God, "Be my Lord!"
      Without you, nothing makes sense.

 ³ And these God-chosen lives all around—
      what splendid friends they make!

 ⁴ Don't just go shopping for a god.
      Gods are not for sale.
   I swear I'll never treat god-names
      like brand-names.

 ^5-6 My choice is you, God, first and only.
      And now I find I'm your choice!
   You set me up with a house and yard.
      And then you made me your heir!

 ^7-8 The wise counsel God gives when I'm awake
      is confirmed by my sleeping heart.
   Day and night I'll stick with God;
      I've got a good thing going and I'm not letting go.

 ^9-10 I'm happy from the inside out,
      and from the outside in, I'm firmly formed.
   You canceled my ticket to hell—
      that's not my destination!

 ¹¹ Now you've got my feet on the life path,
      all radiant from the shining of your face.
   Ever since you took my hand,
      I'm on the right way.
 
**

Today's entry from "365 Days of Prayer for Women" by Stephanie Sample:

While I Wait

"Be strong, and let your heart take courage,
all you who wait for the Lord."
~ Psalm 31:24 ESV

"God, waiting is hard! I look for the shortest lines in the grocery store and the quickest-moving lane of traffic, and then I come to you and request the timeliest solutions to all by problems. When you don't answer right away, doubt creeps in. Are you listening? Are you there? I need your encouragement, Lord, as I wait for your perfect resolution. Help me remember that you see the big picture, and that your plan is for the best possible outcome, which is not necessarily the quickest. Fortify my heart with patience, courage, and strength while I wait. I trust your plan, and I rejoice in knowing all will be well."

"Do you/we have trouble waiting for the Lord?"

****

Yesterday's Max Lucado. I really liked it. Don't know if it is because I turn 80 in a few months. Or if it is because I see health deterioration in others in my world. Maybe both! We need new bodies!

BODIES LIKE CHRIST

"As you discover your place in God’s plan, you make this wonderful discovery: you will graduate from this life into heaven. Jesus’ plan is to 'gather together in one all things in Christ.' 'All things' includes your body (Ephesians 1:10).

"God will reunite your body with your soul and create something unlike anything you have seen. An eternal body. You will finally be healthy. You never have been. Even on the days you felt fine, you weren’t. You were a sitting duck for disease.  And what about you on your worst days? Don’t you hate disease. I’m sick of it. So is Christ.

"When Christ appears, Scripture tells us, 'we shall be like him' (1 John 3:2). You’ll have a spiritual body, with all members cooperating toward one end. So we’re not giving up. How could we? As God’s story becomes our story, the best is yet to be."

***

There are so many Bible verses which are inspiring to me. Today's 'korner' is one verse our Sunday School class happened to look at yesterday.

As I get older anything with the word 'new' in it looks inviting!

"When someone becomes a Christian,
he becomes a brand new person inside.
He is not the same any more. A new life has begun!"

~ 2 Corinthians 5:17 LAB 

***

I started sending Karen's Korners in March 2003. It has just been the last few months when I have been looking back at any of them and reading them.

I enjoy some of them! Here is one from right when I started. From today's date; number 721:

Today is Monday, January 23rd, 2006; Karen's Korner #721

This is a great story and I hope you enjoy it as much as I did.

A true story by Josh and Karen Zarandona 

Brenda was a young woman who was invited to go rock climbing. Although she was very scared, she went with her group to a tremendous granite cliff. In spite of her fear, she put on the gear, took hold of the rope, and
started up the face of that rock.  Well, she got to a ledge where she could take a breather. 

As she was hanging on there, the safety rope snapped against Brenda's eye and knocked out her contact lens.
Well, here she is, on a rock ledge, with hundreds of feet below her and hundreds of feet above her. Of course, she looked and looked and looked, hoping it had landed on the ledge, but it just wasn't there.

Here she was, far from home, her sight now blurry. She was desperate and began to get upset, so she prayed to
the Lord to help her to find it. When she got to the top, a friend examined her eye and her clothing for the lens, but there was no contact lens to be found. She sat down, despondent, with the rest of the party,waiting for the rest of them to make it up the face of the cliff.

She looked out across range after range of mountains, thinking of that verse that says, "The eyes of the Lord run to and fro throughout the whole earth." 

She thought, "Lord, You can see all these mountains. You know every stone and leaf, and You know exactly where my contact lens is. Please help me."

Finally, they walked down the trail to the bottom. At the bottom there was a new party of climbers just starting up the face of the cliff.  One of them shouted out, "Hey, you guys! Anybody lose a contact lens?"

Well, that would be startling enough, but you know why the climber saw it?  An ant was moving slowly across the face of the rock, carrying it on it's back.

Brenda told me that her father is a cartoonist. When she told him the incredible story of the ant, the
prayer, and the contact lens, he drew a picture of an ant lugging that contact lens with the words, "Lord, I don't know why You want me to carry this thing. I can't eat it, and it's awfully heavy. But if this is what You want me to do, I'll carry it for You."

I think it would probably do some of us good to occasionally say, "God, I don't know why you want me to carry this load. I can see no good in it and it's awfully heavy. But, if you want
me to carry it, I will."

God doesn't call the qualified, He qualifies the called. 

***

Something a friend at our church prayer time, read to us yesterday. It was taken from a devotional booklet for December 31 and written by retired Pastor Don Ohm of San Antonio, Texas:

NO INSTANT REPLAY

"The memory of the just is blessed......"
~ Proverbs 10:7a

"We live in the age of 'instant replay' of news, weather, sport, politics, etc. If we miss something the first time, we just log on and view it just as if it were the original time and date. Both fortunately and unfortunately at the same time, real life is not like that. We are not really afforded the opportunity to relive a particular experience differently. You know, we usually wish we would have used more wisdom, compassion, tact or discretion.

"Most memories are not flexible but instead they are fixed. The issue isn't that God doesn't forgive our sins. He certainly does! Nor is the issue that other people cannot overlook our failures, is it not? We can't redo what happened in our ministries last year. We can't re-rear our children. Words cannot be unsaid. Scars won't be completely removed. Tear stains on the delicate fabric of our emotions are more often than not, permanent.

"God give us a NEW START each year, each month, and each day.

The message is crystal clear: pause before you act and think before you speak. Today is tomorrow's yesterday. Today is a memory in the making. Memories are deposits in the bank of time. Let us make these memories good and meaningful. Let us put our best ahead of our better.

"Yes, we are on the precipice of 2026! What will yesterday's replays be on the tomorrow of your life? The answer is not complicated. May God give you the best year of your life!"

***

Karen's Comment:  It is one thing to recap our sins - mistakes we have made - at the end of each day! But let's not forget to remember a thing or two that we did right. For which we are thankful to God! Something that maybe only you could have done!

Sorry for being so slow today!

Something from Max Lucado a few days ago.

SPIRITUAL DASHBOARD

"Is there anything in your life that needs to be removed? Any impediment to the impression of God’s Spirit? We can grieve the Spirit with our angry words and resist the Spirit in our disobedience. We can test or conspire against the Spirit in our plottings. We can even quench the Spirit by having no regard for God’s teachings.

""But here’s something that helps us stay in step with the Spirit. It’s in Galatians 5:22: “We know that the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.” These are indicators on our spiritual dashboards. So whenever we sense them, we know we are walking in the Spirit. Whenever we lack them, we know we are out of step with the Spirit. Keep in step with the Spirit."

***