Beautiful Lady

When was the last time you looked at yourself in the mirror? The progress comes bit-by-bit; a little change here, an itty bitty adjustment there, a lot of crying here and there. Crying is refreshing—it’s accepting life as it is at any certain moment in time.

And IT’S WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAY OK!!!

Give yourself permission to be where you are, where you really are and who you really are, and WHOSE you really are. CONGRATULATIONS MY DEAR, you’ve just parallel parked into this life. Realize that GUILT is not from GOD, so therefore you know where it does come from. The enemy wants to make you feel that it’s not OK to be imperfect. Will you, or me, or ANYONE ever be perfect??? WHY are any of us trying to be something WE WILL NEVER BE? That’s telling JESUS HE IS NOT ENOUGH FOR US.

OOOOOOOOOOOPS- I DON’T THINK SO!!!

Let’s take another look at guidance-GOD has made you exactly the way you are, HE KNOWS exactly where you are, that you cannot go any farther than HE wants you to go at any given time. HIS timing works far better than ours EVERY TIME.

Taking care of and accepting yourself AS YOU ARE, imperfect and all, IS IN GOD’S PLAN.

So relax, be you, ACCEPT YOU, I’m very well aware that’s easier said than done, but BEGIN to do it anyway. You gotta start “start” sometime, so why not now?!

 It’s all about accepting HIS GRACE and HIS LOVE, which cannot ever be earned nor will we ever deserve them. They’re HIS gifts that we receive by faith.

I hope this helps you. Don’t keep heaping “fracture upon fracture”. Take the cast off, just dance around somewhere and then make up your mind to start dancin’ through life. OKAY?

 Blessings to you in Abundance, and Embrace HIS Change,

Jeanna

Japan

   As I sit looking out my hotel window, the recurring thoughts, laments of overwhelming events of this day drift through.

   The nursery rhyme “Little Miss Muffit sat on her Tuffit, eating her curds and whey when along came the rue of the events of the day, causing Miss Muffit to pray.”

   Have I become so complacent, so desensitized to any kind of disaster, that I just look at the pictures of devastation, make my exclamations, then continue with business at hand.

   Yes there will be wars, rumors of wars, earthquakes HE tells us in scripture, but couldn’t I at least cry out for GOD’S mercy and compassion on everyone affected by the disaster in Japan? The right decisions to be made about medical help, evacuation, humane decisions.

   Surely it’s not just “another day in the neighborhood.”

THE BASKET

   I saw a pretty, pale blue wicker basket on a young lady’s arm. She was wearing a lovely wide brimmed hat with ribbon blowing in the breeze along with her long, curly, blonde hair and her dress long and glowing was tied with a pink ribbon at the waist.

   The path is strewn with beautiful fragrant flowers, food, items needed and desired to be placed in the basket.

   Upon seeing this bountiful basket, I had to look deep within my heart and ask myself, if that beautiful basket were mine, would I treasure those items and see them as gifts from GOD or would I take them all for granted, disregard their beauty and not acknowledge them as HIS gift to me?

Jeanna

NEW WINE SKINS

There are issues in our lives that we ‘think’ we have dealt with, forgiven, and moved past.

This was me, so I thought. If you have ever found or discovered yourself in that position, you will understand what I’m about to put on paper.

As we read things from time to time, the purposes for doing so vary. The subject arouses our curiosity, we need some specific information, someone suggests a ‘good book’, or someone is needing advice on something they have written, or a myriad of other reasons.

Regardless of the reason, we proceed to read. THEN it happens-the subject of the reading material exhumes an issue we thought we had buried. The coffin is opened and once again we are faced with the pain that we thought we had sufficiently dealt with and thought was long gone.

I found myself in this position VERY recently. The first thoughts that came to my mind were ‘raw flesh’. The next thought was what do you do with raw flesh and how can you make it into something useable - no longer bleeding, needing attention.
My next thought was that raw flesh is like the raw hide of an animal. This progressed to how do you tan raw hide and make it usable.

It was then that the LORD showed me this is how new wineskins start out. “Nor do men put new wine into old wineskins; otherwise the wineskins burst, and the wine pours out, and the wineskins are ruined but they put new wine into fresh wineskins, and both are preserved.” Matt 9:17

My choice is to truly allow myself to be healed so I can be a new wineskin and GOD can fill me with HIS new wine. From that point on I can be of use to others with their ‘raw flesh’ - their wounds.

FRAGRANCES

  Golly Gee!!  Peweeeee!  Just walked through the fragrance department.  Couldn’t walk out fast enough.

  Fragrances cannot only be “sensed” but they can be “felt’ as well.  The overpowering and heaviness of smells/aromas/odors is worth pondering, especially in the light of the truth that we are to be a “sweet smelling  savor, aroma, fragrance to HIM.”  II Corinthians 2:15

  Do we have the fragrance of LOYALTY like Truth, the fragrance of EXCELLENCE as the Proverbs 31 woman, or Mary and Martha’s fragrance of LOVE & DEVOTION?

  Today I will do some “fragrance” exchanging.

Jeanna

A Godly Marriage

What is a GODLY marriage?

We’re all familiar with the scriptures,”…they shall become one flesh,” “…be fruitful and multiply. ( have sex and make money)”  and ”leave father and mother and cleave to (be really glued to) one another.” All this is well and sounds good, it’s scriptural but in REALITY, when viewed in the STARK light of day, how does that translate?

After the “big question” has been popped (on bended knees of course) and answered “affirmatively” by the “fair damsel”,  the process starts- PREPARATIONS, SALUTE and THE MARCH FORWARD INTO “Fantasyland”.

When the fabric starts to fly, “How many times do we have to try on these dresses?”  “The cobbler has 11 pairs of your shoes to dye and hasn’t achieved the right color yet!?” “Do all your pigtails have to be perfect with perfectly coordinated ribbons?” “The crystal, silver and China are very rare, retro patterns and they have to be pre-paid before ordering.”  “Oh my, golly gee. Why does this have to happen to me?”  The guy that had gone to his knees may NOW be in a complete tail spin and is wondering how he got in this position.

Welcome to Fairyland ladies and is it really “all about us?”  Most guys just shake their heads, write the checks, and often ask themselves, “Is this a real marriage I’m in…?”

Life cannot be sustained in a very healthy fashion in this “Fairyland”.  Does it really matter if the family always has to have the best, and what is “best” anyway?

After 42 years of marriage I wanted to know what being married REALLY meant.  I looked back over the things I had allowed my husband to do alone; carry the weight of every day life on his shoulders- with “me ox” most of the time not being truly yoked to “he ox”. 

 My prayer in all of this is that just maybe us ladies need to take another hard look at guidance in regards to our ”GODLY Portrait of Marriage.”

GOD has facilitated many changes in me which have also spoken volumes to my “hunk”. (Imagine that I would need to change-YES I did and Still DO).

  As my hubby and I were driving home this morning after the removal of 7 polyps from his colon, GOD put this question before me again,  “Is our marriage indeed GODLY, is it pleasing to HIM and do HE and my husband feel welcomed and at peace there?”

Shalom,

Glo

Hello

Day one - Feb 3, 2011 - A cold and white day outside.