First of all, I felt like a Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court… Robbie and I are known for just “being ourselves”. We are what you see… normal, casual, down to earth people.  We live a modest lifestyle. No where near rich, also not poor. We are both blessed with college educations, good paying jobs. But we also came from more modest backgrounds than we currently live in and we know there are no people better than other people.

It was interesting to see an affluent family from NY who had missed a connecting flight in Raleigh, with the mom/wife worried about the condition of the hotel the airline was putting people up in, naming a reputable chain. She called a place I would have gladly stayed “sketchy”.  Her husband is a spine surgeon. They own a home in Tribecca and in New Jersey. Her kids to go school “in the city.”

All of this made me think of my Granny; she was a wonderful, sweet woman who had a very successful life. She worked hard, she had 3 wonderful children and gave all she had to love them and her grandchildren. She also was a child of the depression in the mountains of NC.  She was the oldest daughter, robbed of an education to care for her siblings and the house while her siblings were all allowed to attend school, she only finished the 3rd grade.  She taught herself to read and write (with a little help). She found Christ late in life. Her favorite old hymn was one we sang at her funeral, “God Saves Old Sinners”… I swear my life story could be told in music.  One day maybe I’ll make a post for you that includes all the songs I feel “formed” me… this is one of them.  I can see her now, in the back row of that small Baptist Church I grew up in, tapping her foot and nodding along as she hummed or sang the choruses while we sang it.  I’m so glad we sang it at her funeral. It was like her life’s testimony.

Writing my facebook status update today about how rich people have the same amount of “junk” I have, just more spaces to hide it all, this song came to mind.  There is no escape from God. No place you can hide all your junk. No station in life that will gain you salvation.  We are all sinners in need of salvation. There is no salvation short of the grace of God.  Given tomorrow is Easter, you should know that short of the Resurrection of Christ, there is no salvation.  If you do know God, consider this Easter Sunday your chance to set your relationship straight with Him. If you don’t, consider attending a church service tomorrow and seriously ponder what Christ did for YOU!

Here are the lyrics to God Saves Old Sinners for you…. Hopefully I’ll get some pics of the girls in the Easter dresses up tomorrow.

The drunk on the street
The rich in their palaces
The poor and unlearned
And men of degree
They all have a soul
In need of salvation
And they all have to come
By Calvary

CHORUS:
I am so glad God saves old sinners
I’m thrilled and amazed, how He sets them free
But the biggest surprise in redeeming old sinners
Is that He would save and old sinner like me

Was I so wrong,
That I needed forgiveness?
And was I so bad?
I had to be redeemed
Well I wasn’t a thief
But I lived in sins prison
And I was as lost
As a sinner could be

CHORUS:
I am so glad God saves old sinners
I’m thrilled and amazed, how He sets them free
But the biggest surprise in redeeming old sinners
Is that He would save and old sinner like me

To catch everyone up, since November we’ve had quite the mess on our hands around here. Robbie has still been looking for work, his dad has been diagnosed with a terminal cancer, my grandfather’s health has seriously declined, and I lost my job. Oh yeah, and we had baby girl #2 (Miss Abby) in November!

This week, Robbie started a new full time job within 20 mins of the house.  I found out today I have a new job in academics of all places!  I will be teaching in the PA program at ECU as soon as they can get my contract drawn up.  I can’t wait, but at the same time I’m anxious about all I will have to learn.  Nonetheless, I know I’ll make it.  If God is for me, who can be against me? If God is with me, I will stand.

If I have learned anything in this time, it is about the faithfulness of God. Somewhere in all this, I have been clinging to the concept of “light”.. “God is light and in him is no darkness” more specifically…. These verses in John inspired me to dig a bit deeper. Within a day, I found this passage written by David in 2 Samuel 22: 1-37, 47. I have highlighted the verses that spoke out the most to me…

¹ David sang to the LORD the words of this song when the LORD delivered him from the hand of all his enemies and from the hand of Saul. ² He said:

“The LORD is my rock, my fortress and my deliverer;
³ my God is my rock, in whom I take refuge,
my shield^[a] and the horn^[b] of my salvation.
He is my stronghold, my refuge and my savior—
from violent people you save me.

⁴ “I called to the LORD, who is worthy of praise,
and have been saved from my enemies.
⁵ The waves of death swirled about me;
the torrents of destruction overwhelmed me.
⁶ The cords of the grave coiled around me;
the snares of death confronted me.

⁷ “In my distress I called to the LORD; 
   I called out to my God. 
From his temple he heard my voice; 
   my cry came to his ears. 
⁸ The earth trembled and quaked,
the foundations of the heavens^[c] shook;
they trembled because he was angry.
⁹ Smoke rose from his nostrils;
consuming fire came from his mouth,
burning coals blazed out of it.
¹⁰ He parted the heavens and came down;
dark clouds were under his feet.
¹¹ He mounted the cherubim and flew;
he soared^[d] on the wings of the wind.
¹² He made darkness his canopy around him—
the dark^[e] rain clouds of the sky.
¹³ Out of the brightness of his presence
bolts of lightning blazed forth.
¹⁴ The LORD thundered from heaven;
the voice of the Most High resounded.
¹⁵ He shot his arrows and scattered the enemy,
with great bolts of lightning he routed them.
¹⁶ The valleys of the sea were exposed
and the foundations of the earth laid bare
at the rebuke of the LORD,
at the blast of breath from his nostrils.

¹⁷ “He reached down from on high and took hold of me; 

he drew me out of deep waters. 

¹⁸ He rescued me from my powerful enemy,
from my foes, who were too strong for me.
¹⁹ They confronted me in the day of my disaster,
but the LORD was my support.
²⁰ He brought me out into a spacious place;
he rescued me because he delighted in me.

²¹ “The LORD has dealt with me according to my righteousness; 
   according to the cleanness of my hands he has rewarded me. 
²² For I have kept the ways of the LORD; 
   I am not guilty of turning from my God.
²³ All his laws are before me;
I have not turned away from his decrees.
²⁴ I have been blameless before him
and have kept myself from sin.
²⁵ The LORD has rewarded me according to my righteousness,
according to my cleanness^[f] in his sight.

²⁶ “To the faithful you show yourself faithful, 
   to the blameless you show yourself blameless, 
²⁷ to the pure you show yourself pure, 
but to the devious you show yourself shrewd.
²⁸ You save the humble,
but your eyes are on the haughty to bring them low.
²⁹You, LORD, are my lamp; 
   the LORD turns my darkness into light. 
³⁰ With your help I can advance against a troop^[g]; 
   with my God I can scale a wall.

³¹ “As for God, his way is perfect: 
   The LORD’s word is flawless; 
   he shields all who take refuge in him. 
³² For who is God besides the LORD? 
   And who is the Rock except our God? 
³³ It is God who arms me with strength^[h] 
   and keeps my way secure. 
³⁴ He makes my feet like the feet of a deer;
he causes me to stand on the heights.
³⁵ He trains my hands for battle;
my arms can bend a bow of bronze.
³⁶ You make your saving help my shield;
your help has made^[i] me great.
³⁷ You provide a broad path for my feet,
so that my ankles do not give way.

⁴⁷ “The LORD lives! Praise be to my Rock! 
   Exalted be my God, the Rock, my Savior! “

There are SOOOO many take home points from this passage, it is overwhelming to me.  What I liked best about the passage, is that David says he cried out to God who heard his cry… but it doesn’t say God immediately came to him and anything/everything was “perfect”. It says that as God came near, things got pretty ugly. The earth quaked.  The skies got “dark”. Darkness was his “canopy”. There were even lightning bolts. But through all of it, although those dark clouds “carried” God to David, God’s hand reached down and lifted David up.  Praise God for his faithfulness!!

Of course, here are some pictures to catch you up…

So, here we are, 4 years and 2 kids later… who knew how blessed we could be?!?   It all just feels surreal.  Enjoy pictures of our growing family!

Needless to say, as soon as the sun was up good this morning, I was begging Robbie to get me out of the house.  We took an adventure around downed trees to his parents where we had an unexpected but absolutely wonderful waffle and bacon breakfast! (That’s what you get when you wake up Grandma and Grandpa at 7:30 and let them know you have the grandchild with you in the driveway!)  Em has been really sweet for the most part the last couple of days. Today she got to playing a little rough/silly and had several bumps and bruises, but she’ll make it!

As I typed the title to this blog, I noticed the first line of that song was “Here I am!”  It makes me think of 2 things… Samuel (I think) in the old testament. When he was first getting the Lord’s call on his life. He heard God calling to his name and he said, “Here I am!”… The second thing is a song based on some verses in Isaiah, “Here I am, Lord send me. Here I am, Lord I’ll go.”  In looking at all the storm damage in person today, on the news and knowing there is a lot of damage in the Black Jack community, I really would have liked to have gone down there and helped personally.  That’s a challenge I’m feeling a lot lately. How do I serve God (physically) while still being faithful to my family?  I can’t exactly leave my 18 month old on top of Robbie all day to do physical labor. I shouldn’t go do that type of physical labor being pregnant and all.  I wouldn’t feel right asking Robbie to go do it all without me if he wasn’t called to do it.  It sometimes feels helpless to say, “All I can do is pray.” But at the same time, sometimes that’s the greatest thing we can do.  I guess I’ll figure it out as I go along.

Here are some videos of our booger today:

On another note, my father-in-law has had some not so good news lately.  He has been diagnosed with non-alcoholic cirrhosis of the liver. It’s a chronic illness that can be quite debilitating at times with chronic fluid build-up called ascites, varicose veins in your stomach and esophagus that can bleed, and of course, just liver failure and all that entails. Fortunately, his biggest issue so far has been fluid collecting and the discomfort that causes, then having to have it frequently drawn off.  Imagine going to the hospital to draw off 12 liters (6 2-liter pepsi) or 24 lbs at a time, every couple of weeks. This leads me to how I’m overwhelmed today:  I’m overwhelmed by the love and outpouring of friendship of my church family and this community. Tonight, one of the Sunday school classes at Black Jack had a pancake supper for my husband’s family. Before we even got to the parking lot I couldn’t believe the number of cars.. then the number of people inside.. then the droves that just kept coming!  We are truly blessed to have this church family and the support of our local community.

As usual, here are a few pics to wind up the blog and a couple of videos as well. Sorry you’ll have to turn your head sideways for the one video, but I couldn’t record it with the camera headed the other direction or I’d cut off their heads or make everyone sick like The Blair Witch Project.  Love you all, thanks for checking the blog!! (Sorry you’ll have to turn your head sideways to see the last video, but it’s worth it!)

Here are some pics of our recent adventure. I particularly love the first pic of my 2 peas in a pod!

Today (Sunday), I had a good night’s sleep, Emme was pleasant this morning. We went to a Mother’s Breakfast at church and sat with Em’s great-grandmother Ruth and her great-aunt Cathy.  The church service was very nice. These 2 girls sang a sweet song for special music called “The Best Day” and I cried like a baby. (Of course, now I realize this is a Taylor Swift song and I hope I don’t bust out every time I hear it in the car!)  Robbie leaned over with his arm around me and just asked, “You miss your Mama this morning?” and I cried and shook my head yes, but it was really more than that. It was the hope that I would get to do the things with my own baby that these girls were singing about, the things I have already done with my own Mama.

After church, Robbie cooked lunch for all of us… me, Em, his mom and dad and all his grandparents. It was so nice to have all of them here and to have Em surrounded by so much love and attention.  She missed her main nap time and ate a ton of chocolate cake, but it was worth it!  When Em got up from nap (way early), Daddy watched her while I continued to snooze on the couch off and on.  When I woke up, I saw her, sitting UNDER her highchair, just playing and she was so cute!  I look forward to every day to come with this family of mine.

Hope your Mother’s Day has been as blessed as mine!! Here are some pictures to catch you up on little Ms. Em.

Our church has a cantata or special music service for Easter and the music really is beautiful. I’m so glad to be a part of this church and this choir. The talent never ceases to amaze me. I can’t think of Easter without thinking of my grandmothers. We would always go down to Granny’s on the way to church and show off our dresses and then hunt eggs after church with all our cousins. I don’t know how we convinced the adults to come hide eggs for us or help us hunt. But we always had fun. In this year’s Cantata, there was the worship song, “Behold He Comes”. It was kind of a “mash-up” with the last verse of “It is Well with My Soul” mixed in. For those who don’t know, “It is Well…” was my Grandma Ruth’s favorite hymn. There are SO many beautiful hymns, especially for this time of year. It is hard to pick a favorite, but I was looking through the lyrics of “It is Well…” tonight and the 3rd verse is so perfect for Easter and the more I study this song, the more I see how much Grandma could have loved it and why. Here’s verse 3: “My sin, oh the bliss of this glorious thought! My sin, not in part, but the whole, is nailed to the cross, and I bear it no more! Praise the Lord! Praise the Lord, oh my soul!” How could I follow that up with anything more appropriate?

after helping Em pick up eggs at daycare, I knew she’d love the church Easter egg hunt. Robbie wanted to get in on the fun as well, so he went with us. He was the photographer until he wanted his picture made with Em, who didn’t really want to cooperate as it was very windy outside and she was distracted with all the other kids playing with their eggs. Anyway, here are a few pictures for you!

But this week, things changed. One evening, while she was standing with Daddy and I was on the floor, she bumped down to her butt and crawled over all excited anxious to get my fingers. She grabbed them, pulled up and turned around holding onto my index fingers. Then, she pushed my hands away, pulled her hands in and started walking all by herself to her daddy! It was soooo cute!! I don’t know who was more proud, us or her! When she gets her balance she’ll grin really big and you can see all 4 of her teeth, or she’ll even clap for herself. It’s just absolutely adorable.

Even though she knows how to walk now, she still stumbles. She’s still not perfect, but the little booger is persistent! She keeps reaching for our hands to get back up. She trusts us to be there. She gets up again and again and again and sometimes makes gets to her next destination. Sometimes she just enjoys where she is, but it’s her persistence amazes me. And it brings to light a message, “To those who by persistence in doing good seek glory, honor and immortality, he will give eternal life” (Romans 2:7). Here’s a bigger passage from my personal favorite, Peter:

Grace and peace be yours in abundance through the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord. 3 His divine power has given us everything we need for life and godliness through our knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness. 4 Through these he has given us his very great and precious promises, so that through them you may participate in the divine nature and escape the corruption in the world caused by evil desires. 5 For this very reason, make every effort to add to your faith goodness; and to goodness, knowledge; 6 and to knowledge, self-control; and to self-control, perseverance; and to perseverance, godliness; 7 and to godliness, brotherly kindness; and to brotherly kindness, love. 8 For if you possess these qualities in increasing measure, they will keep you from being ineffective and unproductive in your knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. 9 But if anyone does not have them, he is nearsighted and blind, and has forgotten that he has been cleansed from his past sins. 10 Therefore, my brothers, be all the more eager to make your calling and election sure. For if you do these things, you will never fall, 11 and you will receive a rich welcome into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

As usual, here are a few pics to document Emme’s progress (and ours as we learn how to be parents and how to teach her to add to her perseverance)!

And here are links to see her progress:

Pushing toys around
Persistent!!
Walking (a few steps)

Today I became acquainted with two women who are extremely different. The first, made me completely ashamed to call myself a “Christian” in so many ways. If you follow this blog, you may know that I work in a cancer doctor’s office. You may also know he is a Muslim and that doesn’t bother me. What does, however, bother me, is the attitude of patient #1 today. She was a new referral to the office who insisted she know my bosses religion before she would be seen. We let him answer that directly for her and offered her to go to another office. She declined leaving. However, I spent a RIDICULOUS amount of time with her as she explained, “It’s about religion for me…. It matters… It’s just important to me… I pray to God and he prays to Mohammad.” I’m a southern girl. I can be nice and sweet. I can also be very direct. So I asked, “How is it different if you are white and he is black? He won’t treat you any differently.” “That’s not the same,” she replied. “What if he was Jewish, would that matter?” “I just can’t explain it to you, you don’t know me, but for my reasons, no.” I attempted to go back in church and Biblical history enough to explain to her the gray area she is pressing into, but she wasn’t well-versed enough in the Bible to know where she was going. Closed-minded. Is he going to care for her any differently than anyone else? No. Is she going to get top notch care? Yes. REGARDLESS of her religious preference or feelings toward him. Today, he had more grace and poise than this woman who claimed to be a “Christian”. It makes my stomach churn to even think of her.

The second woman was one of the most stunning examples of Christianity I have ever seen and she never told me she was a Christian. She was standing behind another lady in line for the checkout window. Patient A (in front) was told she had a $211 balance (she’s been paying on it for a while). She politely asked if she could write a check for $20. Of course we said yes. She’s a good patient. She’s struggling. She’s depressed. She’s a cancer survivor but not all survivors are hopeful. Her spouse is also a cancer survivor. She admitted to me today she is depressed but doesn’t want to take meds. Patient B waited patiently for her turn. When she got to the window, she told our checkout girl she didn’t mean to overhear, but she was going to pay that lady’s $211 balance… in full… tear up the $20 check she wrote. Send her a note that says it was paid anonymously, as a gift from God.

What a day. It is the best of times.. it is the worst of times… it is the age of wisdom and the age of foolishness…

Father God, help me to see your ways this clearly everyday. Thank you, Lord, for shining examples of your Love. Please open the eyes of my first patient today. Help her to see you work in many vessels, not just the ones she expects.