My daddy. He doesn't recognize me anymore.  I looked into his eyes and knew he was confused about who was looking back at him.  He heard my voice and called out my name, "Deb!" I went to him and touched his delicate, bruised hand that was covered with a band aid from his fall. He recognized my voice but when he looked at me all he saw was a grown woman staring at him, not his little girl. Confusion gave way to sadness.
Growing older is an oddity. My eyes (and my mind) are not as sharp as they used to be and gravity is causing everything to slide south! But instead of a mid-life crises, I am experiencing a mid-life awakening. The beauty of watching my children turn into young adults I am proud of. The resposibility of taking care of my parents as much as I can from a distance, and celebrating twenty-five years of marriage to a boy I had a crush on from church back in high school. I can face all these changes in my life when I trust every step of this journey to be taken with my Lord and Savior. For trusting is not a destination but a life long pursuit that will bring great joy along the way. Trusting that no matter how difficult this journey may be, God has purpose in the pain, the laughter, and yes, in growing old.
No matter how old I get, I will always be Daddy's little girl. There are a few things in life that don't change!


Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding, acknowledge Him in everything you do and He will direct your path. Proverbs 3:5-6

The Precious Present

  The stockings were hung by the chimney with care.....

Decorating the tree is  equivalent to opening a treasure chest of yesterdays.

As I placed each ornament on the tree, my hand touched a memory that took me back to an earlier time; our first Christmas together, the baby’s first Christmas, ornaments from places we visited. 

At Christmas we tend to look back, become nostalgic, sometimes sad. Our thoughts can also jump to the future with worry and uncertainty. In all this we can miss today, the gift God gives us this present day. Yesterday is behind us, tomorrow will take care of itself. Today is a gift. When I was a teenager, I was given the gift of a book The Precious Present. I pull this book off my shelf this time of year to remind myself where I need to be. There is a beautiful line in it that reads:

 “The present is who you are

 just the way you are....

right now.

And it is precious. 

You are precious.” 

Christ is also our Precious Present for He is our gift today and for all our days through eternity.  This Christmas I hope you will unwrap God’s gifts to you through your faith in Jesus Christ. And may the Peace of Christ reign in your heart today. In the true sense of the Hebrew word for peace, shalom, may you have completeness and a quietness of the soul.

For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God—Ephesians 2:7-9
 

Grace and Peace this present day,

I Listen To Dead People

The first of December and all through the house, you can see signs of Christmas. Time to pull out the decorations and try to get into the seasonal cheer. For me, it starts with my Christmas music.

  Many, many years ago, one Christmas when my husband and I were first married, I pulled out all my favorite Christmas albums, Elvis, The Carpenters, Jack Benny, it went on and on. Because Christmas is my favorite time of year, I had all the old classics.

   As we were decorating the house, my husband asked me, "Why do we just have dead people music?"

"I don't know", I said.

So he goes out and buys the latest, hottest Christmas album, Kenny Rogers and Dolly Parton's "Once Upon a Christmas."

I tried to like it... but it was, well, new.... and those people weren't dead yet. It just didn't have the same meaning.

 It is interesting to me how nostalgic we become as we get older. Christmas becomes a time of looking back, clinging to some comfort we might have had as a child. Those old familiar songs take me back to a seemingly simpler time, when Christmas was magical and the mystery of it all brought unspeakable joy.   

 Today as I write this, I have my nonstop Christmas music playing. It's the best from the 40's to the 60's. I guess it makes me nostalgic, or weird. But I like the old stuff. 

So, ......is Kenny Rogers dead yet?


My heart leaps for joy, and with my song I praise him. Psam 28:7