For every Mountain...

For Every Mountain

(From Mt. Everest, the tallest mountain in the world - to Mount Wycheproof, the smallest.)

 

Jeremiah 29:11

New Living Translation (NLT)

¹¹ For I know the plans I have for you,” says the Lord. “They are plans for good and not for disaster, to give you a future and a hope.

This week has been a beautiful, amazingly wild week… 

You all know that the Echo was stolen (by the way she hasn't been recovered). However, two beautiful women that I love, brought three babies into the world - Twin boys and a princess...Known in my world respectively as Beta, Alpha and Red Velvet. - My church was under attack (Character attack) and - I got engaged to be married.   

Yes, all these events occurred over a seven-day period.

Well, I was sitting on the couch.  I would love to say I was in deep meditation, but the truth is, Sanford and Son was on and it had just struck me that it was Tuesday and something was incomplete.  I had fed the girl and my guys and already checked homework.  Ahhh yes my blog, (God's blog, my commitment) I had not started or thought about my blog! 

As always the Father was right on time, because in the background I was hearing Fred Sanford calling his son a “Big Dummy”, I heard ‘For Every Mountain’ coming from the radio.  This is a beautiful song and my Spirit directed me to look at the lyrics.  (No worries I will attach the link and a video below). 

The lyrics don't say, “For all the good times…. the new car….” But instead it says, “For every mountain you've brought me over, for every trial you've brought me through, I give you praise!”

Praising God through the ‘storm’, the ‘mountain moments’, the ‘I cannot get out of bed moments’, the moments when you ‘feel all alone’.  Praising God in the middle can bring about a peace so sweet and a joy so powerful that your heart will begin to sing, mine has and does. 

You may have heard it before, but let me say it one more time.  Praise him through it all, ‘cause his heart's desire is to bless you with a Hope and a Future.

 Here are the lyrics - Try saying them without singing them, which makes it real personal:

http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/kurtcarr/foreverymountain.html

Now get your sing on and let the words sink into your soul:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=usFt04naqxM

This one is for you (subtitled) I Get It Now

 

 Isaiah 38:2

Then Hezekiah turned his face to the wall and prayed to the LORD,

 I get it now how God's time is different from ours.  HE has given me a glimpse into his style and how he does things.  He has allowed me to see that time is pointless and that love is everything.

I met you in a place that I have stood so many Sundays greeting smiling.  Then there was you and you came back.  Who knew that an earthly split second would be a life time of forever.  One hello would lead to a infinite number of I love yous.

I get how you just know.  I understand that in the blink of an eye time can grow sails and travel pass the past into the future and rest in now.

All that was before you is blank.  There are no names but yours.  There is no prayer as sweet as your eyes.  There are no eyes that reflect God like yours.

I struggle when you question my past because my past is irrelevant when I face my wall, I only see now and then.

All old things are made new.  I have never loved like this and every day that follows, I continue to be blessed in saying I have never loved like this because every moment of loving you is like know one before.

My errors are here for you to see.  My slate clean there is only you.  You are My Wall.  I turn to you for prayer, for love, for direction and you turn to our God.  Obediently I will follow. I love you My Wall. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Thefts, Blessings, Echo and Friends - It's so hard to say Good Bye to Yesterday

It's so hard to say good bye to yesterday (And I will take with me the memories to be my sunshine ...)

 

James 1:2

My brothers and sisters, consider it nothing but joy when you fall into all sorts of trials

 

We met in 2001 and although I had my eye on something else, something a little fancier, faster, and stylish, I walked passed you, but you called out to me.  Your zippy spy car looks tickled me, your efficiency delighted me and so the investment in to our friendship began.  2001 Toyota Echo it was me and you.

 

You were small but powerful, I packed you up and we left our homeland and moved to Charlotte.  When I was homesick you were right there for me to get me safely thru the 400 miles, back home to my Mom.  Even though in the earlier years I got homesick every weekend, you never flinched, on one tank of gas and a prayer we made the back ‘n forth - those were the thousand-mile-weekend days.

 

Not only did you bond with me, you blessed others by giving them jumps, trekking out to the airport at all hours of the night, so I could get a friend home.  The air was always cool from the ac and the heat was always warm in the winter.

We had our moments, when you had a rattle and a shimmy - and don't even get me started on how you handle the miles of Kentucky mountains - brining both my daughter (your new charge) and I back from a nerve breaking drive that included motion sickness medicine.

 

And when I forgot to check the oil? You loved me anyway!

And on your last day, you showed me something greater than I could have ever expected.  When the strangers took you away, stolen from right under my nose, your spirit remained and I was blessed by those who loved you and truly love me.

Through the theft of my car my daughter and I were blessed by those loved ones and were taken care of quite well.  Happy Hazel my neighbor handed over the non-keys to me to make sure my daughter and I were off to work without missing a beat.(LOL I haven't had a new car in a minute yall imagine my shock when I learned some of the new cars have pushed button ignitions!  some cars don't even have keys what the what)   From offers of car sharing, to people who were even willing to sacrifice their own comfort, (I love you Kay and Tee) willing to drive the hundreds of miles here to bring me a car and then turn around and drive back to their home so that they can share a car.   Right now as I write this, another angel is on her way to loan me her vehicle. 

God I count it all joy! I miss my Echo, but I have an even greater love for those who stretched out there arms, their words, their gifts and blessed me. My prayer for you is – “May God surround you with the right people at the right time and in the right place,” - you also need to love on them like crazy.  You are a blessing so be a blessing.

 

A moment of reflection for the Echo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sUDVj7qPqRE 

A moment of PRAISE Cause my God has blessed me with Angels  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vflf3wLZP4I

 

Selah...

 

 

Psalm 32:7 New American Standard Bible
You are my hiding place; You preserve me from trouble; You surround me with songs of deliverance. Selah.

 Selah - (subtitled…ahhhhh!) Breath In-Breath Out or, ‘I Googled- It’

I looked up this word...As it appears a lot in Psalms and I have heard of many different interpretations.  Back in the day I would have pulled out the huge Webster Dictionary that came with the encyclopedia set that my Mom invested in.  Now? Well things have changed, I can find the definition and I don't even have to really know how to spell the entire word.  Thanks to Google and/or Bing you start typing and it will quickly ask…Did you mean…What is Selah?  Why, yes, that's exactly what I wanted to know!  It's like the net knows my thoughts before I complete them.

Selah (Hebrew: סֶלָה‎, also transliterated as selāh) is:

-          A word used 74 times in the Hebrew Bible  

-          Mentioned 71 times in the Psalms and three times in Habakkuk and is a difficult concept to translate.

-          (It should not be confused with the Hebrew word sela‘(Hebrew: סֶלַע‎) which means "rock.")

-          It is probably either a liturgico-musical mark or an instruction on the reading of the text, something like "stop and listen".

-          Selah can also be used to indicate that there is to be a musical interlude at that point in the Psalm.^[1] The Amplified Bible translates Selah as "pause, and think of that".

-          It can also be interpreted as a form of underlining in preparation for the next paragraph.

 

Last week I took a vacation, wait, not so much of a vacation because I strongly feel a vacation should involve beach, sand and a lounge chair.  So I will call it” a Break".  A break from my normal routine of wake up, pray, wake up the child, send her off to school, and send myself off to work, (work really hard, like a hamster in a wheel going nowhere!) at the end of the day - pick up the child, put her to sleep, then myself and then getting ready to do it all over again the next day.

Instead, this past week I took work out of the equation.  Unfortunately I filled it with house-work like tons of laundry, cleaning, and running errands.  Don't worry, I still took care of my sunshine in the midst of it all, but I was still tired.  You ever take a vacation or a break and find yourself needing a break or a vacation from the vacation?  Well, that is right where I found myself, needing a break from the break.

Selah is a break in the song, a break in the music of life, a time to sit still and listen.  Not talk, but listen to the residue left of the song.  A time to reflect, it's a ‘no action required’ moment.

My prayer for you is to schedule in Selah moments.  I know you've got too much going on, but let me tell you, the Selah moments may just save your life and your soul and present the world with a better you. - The God you.

This blog is a little shorter than most, but it’s full of what God gave me to give to you.

Selah my friends, my family, strangers (aka future friends)

Sources: God the Father, Maker of Heaven and Earth! - And http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Selah and http://biblehub.com/psalms/32-7.htm

Are you a kid?

Are you a Kid?  (No but I play one in my heart)

 

And he said: "Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.    KJV Matthew 18:3

 

“Are you a kid?”  The cute little boy about eight or ten years old asked me as we stood in line.  He had cotton candy around his mouth and his little eye glasses were in desperate need of a mother’s tissue from her purse.  “Excuse me?” I asked, as I smiled down at the child. Wishing I was his momma so he wouldn't be upset if I pulled my tissue from my back pocket, licked it and cleaned those lenses.  “Are you a kid?” he asked again, squinting to see through the dirty glasses and the bright sunshine on his face. “No sweetie, I’m not a kid, but I play one in my heart.” I replied.  He frowned or squinted, who knows at this point, as he asked...”What does that mean?” I just smiled and told him to move forward the line was moving.  He grabbed his sack and scooted forward.  Ok fine, let me give you some background, the little kid had a valid question since the line I was standing in was to get on a two story inflatable slide. 

 

There were about five us in line, bare feet, holding sacks and waiting in line for the ‘slide guard’ to tell us who could go next.  I was the tallest in the bunch and I trumped these kids in line by about 3 decades. We were all there for a really nice cookout that had all types of great activities for families and children.  My daughter was somewhere getting her face painted, being properly spoiled by Aunt Kay and Aunt Tee, while I had decided to ride the slide. The thought came to me to ride the slide while I was sitting on my metal chair in a circle talking grown folks talk and laughing about times past.  I glanced at the slide and thought I am too old for that, but wouldn't it be so cool to slide down the slide?  Then my spirit said, “No regrets, go get on the slide.”  I excused myself, headed down the hill and stood happily but awkwardly in line with the kids.

 

When it was my turn I screamed all the way down!  It was amazing, all the stress of life went away as I was on a huge sliding board and I was free.  I dragged Kay over later on and our grown selves slid down side by side laughing all the way.  Sometimes it's great, beautiful, and joyous for a brief moment to experience the world through the heart of child even if it's your own adult heart!  Innocence is sweet, cherish it!  By the way if you’re over a certain age...I do not recommend getting on the swings...I don't remember needing motion sickness medicine as a child, but I sure did this time. Even in your adulthood, may God bless you with the ability to see, love and laugh through the heart of a child

 

Mr. Buddy swallowed an acorn..

Mr.  Buddy swallowed an acorn (When I was a child...)

 

1 Corinthians 13:11

New King James Version (NKJV)

¹¹ When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child; but when I became a man, I put away childish things.

God, all glory to you...May these words be delightful (full of joy and make you laugh out loud) in your sight my source!

Well, I have written about my Grandma Esther in the past.  And depending on how you receive this blog by social media or email, you will notice that I sign my emails - Grand of Esther.

My grandma was a huge part of my childhood. She contributed to the funny, colorful, character I am today.   There is one funny conversation that I hold onto all these years later and I can even see it vividly in my mind's eye, it's Mr. Buddy and the acorn.

Mr. Buddy was a friend of the family and a part of the 5th Street Washington DC family I grew up around.  Back when neighbors raised children.  That was when you shared plates of food, sometimes plastic cups of gin and my world was a one block island, 5th & 0 Street North West Washington DC.

There were not a lot of trees where I grew up in DC, here were little five foot plots with these huge trees growing out of them.  The trees produced acorns that would fall all over the sidewalk.  Back then kids were creative.  Acorns could be used for so many fun things, ammunition for home made sling shots, whistles, or a fine imaginary meal when we were playing house.  I use the word imaginary loosely because I was always tempted to put one in my mouth.  One day while I was holding an acorn in my hand and sitting on the stoop, the thought came to me about Mr. Buddy.  Grandma, why does Mr. Buddy use that voice box machine on his throat to talk?

Let me explain, Mr. buddy had an eight inch rectangular shaped machine (trachea machine/voice box) that he had to hold up to his throat and press a button so he could talk.  His voice sounded like a machine.  It didn't scare me at all it was just a part of the characters in my neighborhood, just like Mrs. Mary's crooked wig. 

Quick as lighting my Grandma said "Mr. Buddy ate an acorn and they had to cut it out of his throat and now he has to use that to talk."  I wasn't shocked by this information, heck, in my young mind it made perfect sense.

Now fast-forward oh, say 25 years.  My Grandma and Mr. Buddy have passed on and I'm talking with my Mom, reminiscing about the old days on 5th Street.  My Mom said it was so amazing that Buddy lived such a strong and healthy life after the throat cancer.  What throat cancer? I never knew he had throat cancer!  My mom looked at me in an odd way and said, well, why do you think he used that trachea  machine to talk? 

In all seriousness I looked at my mom and said, because they had to remove the acorn from his throat!

Apparently that wasn't the case and Grandma had told me this so that I wouldn't eat acorns (For the record it worked!)

As it says above - when I was a child I thought like a child!!!

I'm all grown up now...

I pray you have wonderful memories of the past and wisdom in the now!

 

Beats by Dr. Dre' (Yikes they cost HOW MUCH?)  

 

Ephesians 4:29-32
Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen. And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, with whom you were sealed for the day of redemption. Get rid of all bitterness, rage and anger, brawling and slander, along with every form of malice. Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as in Christ God forgave you.

Thank you God...I apologize for being late.

One day I was hanging out with my family and I noticed that one of them had something that I felt cost way to much, so much that I never even attempted to try them out.  She was holding a pair of  Beats by Dre headphones.  If you don't know what they are, these are head phones that cost more than all of my 20 pairs of dollar store head phones combined.  They usually start at around $100.00.  (correction I just looked it up, the pair I want cost $168 - don't judge me yet until the end LOL)  I quickly judged her purchasing such an extravagant item and told her that headphones are headphones and they can't be that great!

Of course this comment by me was followed with, can I try them please?  She found one of my favorite songs on her mp3 then handed me the headphones.  I only wanted to try them so I could laugh at the money she had thrown away. 

I put these large headphones on my head that reminded me of my first Walkman headphone/radio combination from back in the eighties that had the radio built in, however, I was suddenly transformed into another world.  I was at a gospel concert, I mean seriously, I was in the front row.  I could hear every instrument and every note...It was insane.  I opened my eyes because the bliss of the music had caused me to close them and enjoy my vision.  And it got even better when I opened my eyes because there before me stood my daughter.  She was talking, but I couldn't hear her.  I mean I couldn't hear a single word, but her lips were just moving.  I could only hear the beautiful music.  She was pointing at candy or something, not now...because I had a beautiful symphony a private concert going on in my ears. 

 Dollar store head phones, no way! I had been put in touch with something that was worth the cost.  I officially began planning my budget for Beats by Dre headphones (FYI, if I am on your Christmas list - Amazon gift cards would be appreciated because I sure know what I want for Christmas).

This is not an advertisement for fancy headphones, but it did make me think of the value and beauty of quality.  Are you giving quality?  Are you loving with quality or are you giving dollar store love, just enough so that if it breaks you can quickly replace it with something else that is cheap.  Are you giving the best? Remember God gave His very best, His most qualified, His perfect heart beat.