Day Twenty: Will your anchor hold?

READ:  Joshua 9:3-9, 11, 14-16

(3-6) The people of Gibeon heard what Joshua had done to Jericho and Ai and cooked up a ruse.  They posed as travelers: their donkeys loaded with patched sacks and mended wineskins, threadbare sandals on their feet, tattered clothes on their bodies, nothing but dry crusts and crumbs for food.  They came to Joshua at Gilgal and spoke to the men of Israel, "We've come from a far-off country; make a covenant with us."

(7) The men of Israel said to these Hivites, "How do we know you aren't local people?  How could we make a covenant with you?"

(8) They said to Joshua, "We'll be your servants."

      Joshua said, "Who are you now?  Where did you come from?"

(9, 11) They said, "From a far-off country, very far away.  You servants came because we'd heard such great things about God, your God--all the things He did in Egypt!....Our leaders and everybody else in our country told us, 'Pack up some food for the road and go meet them.  Tell them, We're your servants; make a covenant with us.'…

(14) The men of Israel looked them over and accepted the evidence.  But they didn't ask God about it.

(15) So Joshua made peace with them and formalized it with a covenant to guarantee their lives.  The leaders of the congregation swore to it.

(16) And then, three days after making this covenant, they learned that they were next-door neighbors, who had been living there all along.

THINK:  "Is there a place in your life where you are susceptible to offers and flattery, so you can form attachments without asking God for input?  (Attachments refers to relationships and commitments to people, tasks, and organizations.)

PRAY:  "Ask God to help you go over your attachments by moving through the following questions as if God were sitting next to you with his arm around you.

          What attachments, if any, have you rushed into without investigating further, especially by asking God what you need to know about the situation?

          Ask God to show you where, if at all, you need to back off from an attachment."

LIVE:  "Wait with an open heart for anything God might say to you.  If nothing comes to you, ask God to make it apparent in the next few weeks if there's anything you need to know about your attachments."

When I first started this blog (back way before this series), I just wanted someone to see me, to be noticed.  To use this as a way of doing something for God that might be important.  The thing is:  I didn't care so much about it being important to God.  I wanted it to be important to my fellow man.  Surely, if I did something that made an impact in the lives of people around me, that would be good in God's eyes.  And if that was good in God's eyes, then maybe I would be  good in God's eyes.  Doing good to gain approval has been my attachment for as long as I can remember.  Being good enough to be considered worthy of love.  In an effort to gain approval, I have over-committed myself far too often.  I have agreed to things before I've thought them out.  I've volunteered for things that I didn't really want to do because I wanted approval.  Fear of rejection has been a pretty big deal in my life because I have believed the lie that I have to perform well to be accepted because who I am surely will not be enough.

Realistically, there are plenty of areas in my life where this has been demonstrated as untrue.  Amazing, isn't it, how good Satan is at magnifying the areas where the lies we've believed seem to have proven true so as to overshadow the times the truth has shone out?! 

The truth of the matter is:  none of us can ever do anything "good enough" for God because all have sinned and fall short (Romans 3:23).  The Devil is so crafty, however, that he knows just how to twist that verse around in our minds so that he can use it against those who desire acceptance and approval just so they can feel loved, or believe they are loved.  It's like he says:

"See, even the Bible says you are not worthy, that you have fallen short."

And if you just stop there, it would be easy to believe that there will never be any hope for people such as this, such as me.  However, because God is good, He made a way for us to escape that "fallen-short" state.  Satan knows this, which is why He never volunteers the rest of the sentence (continued in Romans 3:24) or the context for the verse (all of Romans, but specifically chapter 3).  The rest of the sentence (Romans 3:24 says):

"and all are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Jesus Christ."

If my attachments are based in on Earth, I will always fall short.  Those attachments will always disappoint.  Nothing here can satisfy the longing of a soul that was designed to love God and be filled by Him.  However, if I continually place my faith and hope in the Lord, I will always be satisfied.  I will always be loved and accepted.  Even when I am disappointed by things that happen on Earth.  Even when God allows me to walk through things that hurt or leave me wondering where God is, I can know that it is BECAUSE He loves me and wants me wholly reliant upon Him for my fulfillment and satisfaction. 

But, of course, since we are humans, we will forget this.  We will tether ourselves to something here on Earth that will

disappoint us.  We will attach ourselves to things or people that were never meant to be our anchor.  And God, because He is a jealous God, will graciously allow those moors to fail us.  He will allow us to go through something that will force us to place our faith in Him ALONE.  And then, He will not disappoint us.  He may not remove the storm from our lives, but He will calm our spirits so that we can weather that storm.  And we will be able to walk calmly because we are securely tethered (attached) to the only One who has never failed or faltered, and who will never leave us nor forsake us.

Day Three: What Satan Intended for Evil

READ:  Today's passage took me to Genesis 50:15-21.  For expanded reading, the suggested texts are Genesis 37, 42, 45 & 50.  This is the story of Joseph.  You know, the one with the coat of many colors.  The one who was a little haughty when he would tell his brothers his dreams.  The one whom his brothers knew was most loved because he was the first born of Jacob's love with Rachel, whom he served 14 years to gain after being denied by Laban, who pulled a bait-and-switch on Jacob at the altar on what should have been the best night of Jacob's and Rachel's lives.  Yeah…that Joseph.

Well, his brothers got mad and conspired to get rid of him.  They couldn't kill him outright and live with looking at their father, so they threw him down into a pit, sold him to some passersby on their way to Egypt.  Then, they killed an animal and smeared the blood on his precious coat, which they had stripped from him.  They went home and told Jacob that Joseph had been attacked and killed in the wilderness.

Fast forward several years, Joseph is serving in the house of the Potiphar.  The guy's wife lusts after Joseph and propositions him.  Joseph, having Potiphar's utmost respect and high position in the household, runs from her presence, naked, because Potiphar's wife grabs after him, ripping his tunic from his body.  Then, she says that he had his way with her and that is the end of Joseph's stay in Potiphar's house.  He is told, and I'm paraphrasing here, "Do not pass go.  Do not collect $200.  Proceed directly to jail."  (They surely had a version of Monopoly in Egypt.  Right?)

So, even though he had been sold into slavery, he managed to work his way out.  And, now, he's sitting in jail.  By rights, Potiphar should've (or could've) had him killed.  (I believe he knew there was something fishy in the state of Denmark.  Wait!  That's Hamlet.  Sorry!)  But, he spared Joseph and just threw him into prison.

So…there he sat.  I know if I were Joseph, I would be wondering, as I sat in jail, what in the world happened.  God, you gave me all these dreams when I was growing up.  I thought I knew what they meant and where my life was going to go as a result.  But…here I sit.  In jail.  God, what in the world!!!!

Funny, isn't it, how God's plan for our lives never looks the way think it ought to.  But, Joseph's current circumstances (sitting in jail) did not negate the truth of God's plan for his life.  Joseph just didn't realize it.  I also suspect that, maybe, Joseph needed to be humbled.  Somewhat.  So that nobody BUT GOD could get the glory for what had happened in his life.  And let's face it!  I'm pretty sure that if God had let Joseph's life go the way Joseph thought it might, Joseph - most likely - would've taken the credit for it.  Granted, Scripture doesn't say that, outright.  But, he was pretty full of himself in his younger days.  And his way was paved pretty smoothly until he was sold into slavery.  Then, afterwards, HE worked his way up into Potiphar's house.  I imagine he had started to feel like he was bouncing back after than hand that had been dealt him.  I know I would've.  I would've felt like this was some sort of vindication, even if it didn't look like I wanted it to.  But, notice, Joseph hadn't been face-to-face with the people who had "caused" his life to go so sideways.  There were still some forgiveness issues that would need to be worked through before God's work would actually be complete.

THINK:  This part of today's reading challenges us to listen specifically for the word or phrase that touches our heart.  Throughout the last three years, I have been holding tightly to Genesis 50:19:  "…you planned evil against me but God used those same plans for my good, as you see all around you right now--life for many people." 

PRAY:  Here, we are challenged to think about forgiveness - what it's like to be the forgiver and to be the forgiven.  We are asked how this expression of love is meaningful to us.  We are also called to listen for what God is inviting us to do or become this week.  "Perhaps his invitation will have to do with a new perspective on who you are in his eyes, or maybe you sense an action he is calling you to take."

This part speaks to me today in that, I have no question that, had I not been knocked down a peg or two - had "my plans" not been made to go awry or take this unsuspected detour - I would've been living my life saying what I've been saying since I left my home for Navy boot camp.  I left my house believing that my life would be the way I wanted it to be because of the choices I made.  For the most part, I like to think I made fairly responsible choices.  And, I was choosing to be happy.  I had orchestrated my life in such a way that everything made sense, and basically turned out the way I wanted it to, especially when I was obedient to what God was asking me. 

Then April 2011 happened.  We here T-boned by an accusation so heinous that I couldn't believe God had been caught off guard.  (Yeah, I said it.  And, yes, I know the absurdity of that statement.  It doesn't change the fact that I felt that way.) 

Then, March 2013 happened.  The results of the accusation were that God allowed my husband to go to jail. 

"UM…EXCUSE ME!  Don't you know that when I do what I'm told, and I make my requests known believing you will grant them, you are supposed to respond by giving me the desires of my heart??  And, by the way, we had plans!  And what about our kids?  And…and…and……….

Now, here I sit, reading the story of Joseph.  Thinking, "Man, that boy was arrogant!  I'm not even his brother and I wanna throw him in a pit, just to shut him up!" 

Man….it's a good thing I'm not like Joseph.  I never walked around talking about how perfect my life was and how it was turning out just like I had planned.  Why wouldn't God bless me?  Look at how good I am. 

I don't know if you could detect the sarcasm there.  If not, trust me, it's dripping with it.  While I was not walking around actually saying those things, I was living them.  And God looks at a man's heart!  So…He knew!  He knew what I was saying even when there were no words coming out of my mouth.  And He also knew that what those words scream is:  I WILL BE MY OWN GOD! 

I don't think that this little side trip has derailed God's plan for our lives.  I also don't think that I have to abandon all my deepest dreams and desires because He has allowed this to happen in our lives.  What I do believe, FINALLY, is that the only way God was ever going to get the glory for the things in my life He has done, or permitted, is if I got knocked down off the pedestal I had built for myself so that He could take His Rightful Place in the life of one who calls herself a child of God.

LIVE:  "Take time to meditate on the following quite from the Book of Common Prayer (1979), and let it become your own:  'Let not the needy, O Lord, be forgotten; nor the hope of the poor be taken away.'"

As I come closer to the end of my education as a counselor, that prayer resonates with me.  That is precisely what I hope to do as a counselor:  to not forget the needy and to help restore hope to the poor.  The only way that I can do that effectively, though, is by directing them to the Comforter.  The Healer.  To the only one who can actually transform a life.  And I cannot do it if I think that I can be the God of my own life.  That attitude will spill over into my counseling sessions and I will sound "holier than thou" and, thus, I will fail in our Number One law:  First, do no harm."  Harm is all I will be doing!  Then, I will be like Paul, not doing the things that I want, but unable to stop doing what I do not want to do.

As I head out to class today, I challenge you to look at those areas of your life where you feel like God has let your life go sideways.  Then, TRUST HIM!  But then, ask Him to show you if there might be an area in your life where He has been trying desperately to get your attention, but you have been ignoring Him, or missing His point.  Then, pray for the courage to face it, HEAD ON, FACE TURNED UP TO HIM.  Then, deal with it.

Day Two: Dear God, I'm Hanging on 'til You Bless Me

READ:  The devotional for today comes from Genesis 32.  Here you will find the story of Jacob wrestling with "a man" on the brook and him refusing to let go until God blesses him.


THINK:  In this section, the reader is challenged to picture the scene.  Specifically, the book says:
(1) Picture yourself in this passage.  Are you Jacob?  Are you an invisible bystander watching it all? 


(2) What moment in this passage resonates with you most?
  *wanting desperately to be blessed
  *wanting desperately to know more of God
  *other


I don't know about you, but every time I read this, I am Jacob.  I feel like I have been begging God my entire life to bless me.  But also, I want to see the face of God, Peniel.  Or, as it is in Hebrew, P'nay-El, which is literally, the face of God.  "P'nay" means face today, still.  And "El" is still short for Elohim, or God.


PRAY:  Without even realizing it, what I have been doing, in my spare time, while I've been here at class, is searching desperately for God to bless me and to show me His Face.  Perhaps, more than either of those things though, I want to believe that I can be seen by God and not have to worry if I'm good enough, to not have to worry about whether or not He will actually see Christ when He looks at me, even though I have taken all the necessary precautions to make it so.  I want to be able to read the passages in the Bible that tell me He rejoices over me with singing and actually believe them for myself, and not just for everyone else.


LIVE:  I will share this part with you verbatim:
  "Sit quietly before God, imagining the night sounds and the smell of running water.  Try to be comfortable with God in this wild atmosphere.  What does it feel like to trust and to reveal the desires of your heart?  Be honest if you feel uncomfortable.  What would you like it to feel like?  Rest in that."


What does it feel like?  Unsteady.  Uneasy.  Like maybe it doesn't matter what the deepest desires of my heart are if He's going to do what He wants to anyway.  But, what I would like it to feel like is that He was listening.  One song from my grandfather's church hymnal sums up what I would like it to feel like.  It is called "Leaning on the Everlasting Arms."  If you've never heard it, here are the lyrics:


1. What a fellowship, what a joy divine,
   Leaning on the everlasting arms;
   What a blessedness, what a peace is mine,
   Leaning on the everlasting arms.
• Refrain:
  Leaning, leaning, safe and secure from all alarms;
  Leaning, leaning, leaning on the everlasting arms.
2. Oh, how sweet to walk in this pilgrim way,
   Leaning on the everlasting arms;
   Oh, how bright the path grows from day to day,
   Leaning on the everlasting arms.
3. What have I to dread, what have I to fear,
   Leaning on the everlasting arms?
   I have blessed peace with my Lord so near,
   Leaning on the everlasting arms.


From <http://library.timelesstruths.org/music/Leaning_on_the_Everlasting_Arms/>


If you'd like to listen to it, you can click on the link below to get to a YouTube video of Alan Jackson singing it. 


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=caUOl-URnNM


I will leave you with that for now, and with this final thought. 


I am trying to make Proverbs 3:5-6 my prayer on days when I feel like I can't see the path God has laid out for me, or when I find that I have been struggling to make sense of this world.  I hope it will give you some comfort too.


Trust in the Lord with all your heart,
And lean not on your own understanding;
In all your ways acknowledge Him,
And He shall direct your paths.
     ~Proverbs 3:5-6 (New King James Version)

I HATE INTRODUCTIONS!

Okay, maybe "hate" is a strong word, but I never read the introductions to books.  Usually I find them tedious and dedicated to people I will never meet.  Yesterday (July 12, 2014), I found this book at the Barnes & Noble in Lynchburg.  I've been here (at Liberty University) a week already for one intensive and starting another week tomorrow.  I decided to use what spare time I had here to work on my relationship with God and delve into some of the areas that I felt like He had shown me needed some work.  As I was walking through the Christianity section of the bookstore with that in mind, I passed by several books, most of them decent, but, sadly, missing the mark of what I felt like I needed deep in my soul.  Then, I saw this one. 

THE MESSAGE:  SOLO 

AN UNCOMMON DEVOTIONAL

The cover is minimalist: white with grey letters.  All CAPS. 

I was intrigued.  So, I picked it up and glanced through a couple of pages. 

It is not like any other Bible study book or devotional I've ever seen.  This one is actually more like what I've been thinking I needed, just the thing to jump start my exploration into who God really is and what He wants to be to me.  The initial passage is relatively short but, above, it shows the expanded passage, so you can get the context.  (Kay Arthur says, "Context is key.")  Then, the next page invites you to READ, THINK, PRAY, and LIVE what that passage could mean to you and your life. 

READ, THINK, PRAY and LIVE takes me back to the Introduction.  When I sat down to read today, I started at the Introduction.  While I was skimming over it, I came across the term "lectio divina".  Read, Think, Pray and Live are the four basic principles.  The reader is encouraged to "Remember as you dive into this devotional that lectio divina is about wholeness: whole practice, whole Bible, whole God."

Jump down a couple of paragraphs and this is what I read:

"Eugen Peterson called the Bible 'a book that reads us even as we read it.'  That's an uncommon sort of book, and it requires an uncommon sort of read.  Knowing facts about God doesn't change your relationship with him, so take the time to splash around in the Word, to absorb it, to discover what God as to say to you each day."

"KNOWING FACTS ABOUT GOD DOESN'T CHANGE YOUR RELATIONSHIP WITH HIM"

NO, IT DOES NOT!!!

More than anything, THAT has been the truth that I have discovered about myself, not just over the course of this last week, but over the course of this whole ordeal my husband and I have been walking through.  I know a lot of stuff about God.  I know a lot of Scriptures.  I know all the right things to say.  How to speak it.  How to act it.  How to fake it.  But, I don't think I can say that any of the stuff I know has really made that huge an impact on my life. 

Don't get me wrong.  Over the course of my life, I can see where God has worked and has delivered me from many things.  I am grateful for all of that.  But, to be quite honest, I'm starting to think that I've been spared too much pain.  I've been rescued from so many things that my walk with God has been, for the most part, superficial.  Even if "superficial" is too harsh a word, it would not be a stretch to say that I have been in it mostly for my own comfort. 

The problem with that kind of thinking is:  when things are not comfortable for me, I doubt my faith.  I doubt God's love for me.  I doubt His Goodness and His Provision. 

What I've come to realize is that I have been behaving much like a child who first learns how to use the word "please."  We teach our children to use the word "please" when they ask for something because:  (1) it sounds nice and (2) it tends to make a request out of a demand.  However, we also have to teach our children that there is no guarantee that they will get what they want just because they say please.  There are many reasons for this, but most of them boil down to the fact that getting what they want all the time is not realistic and it is not good for them.

Having that kind of pseudo-faith (I call it that because it resembles faith but doesn't really work like faith should) has left me feeling like I've been wandering around out in the desert without a canteen or a map.  Like God has left me.  I've even said to people, "At least the Israelites had the cloud by day, the pillar of fire by night, and the Ark of the Covenant.  They had physical representations of God.  I've just been left out here to die in the wilderness.  And, as such, I've been begging to go back to Egypt.  However, unlike their Egypt - full of slavery - my Egypt was pretty sweet.  My husband was there, our family was intact, and we were basically untouched by the horrible injustices of the world. 

But, then, if I’m to be honest, there was bondage there too.  In fact, it took being led out of
"the Egypt of my own making" to even be made aware of my bondage.  I have found that I have multiple gods in my life.  The biggest one:  ME.  I've been just like Frank Sinatra, doing it my way.  But, see, my way was not so bad.  I wasn't hurting anyone.  We were going to church, being obedient, and trying our best not to screw our kids up too badly.  I had several causes I was passionate about and wanted to help out, and was working toward that.  I was even submitting to my husband.  And, to top it all off, I was begging for a life that was lived sold out to Christ because I wanted my walk with God to really mean something.  I did not want to just spend my time here on Earth, going to church the rest of my life, calling myself a Christian, and leaving nothing behind to show for having worn that title.

Well, I was saying it, anyway. 

My god was my comfort, my safety, my security, my plan. 

And now, I have been led out into the desert, away from my plan, and have seen that, I am just like the Israelites, cursing God for having brought me out into the desert to leave me to die, when things were good in Egypt, because I had fish to eat.  Sure, I was a slave.  But at least I was eating well. 

I never could understand how they could do that.  How could they possibly talk to God that way after all He'd done for them?  After all they had just seen, how could they think that God would leave them to die in the wilderness?  But, alas, as Ecclesiastes says, there truly is nothing new under the sun, and I have done exactly what I have found so remarkably unbelievable.

So now, here I sit, with this devotional in front of me.  Ready to start checking off the boxes of getting together with God, every day, but not just for the sake of checking off the box.  If something doesn't change - if I don't do something to take steps toward God and letting Him show me His plan for my life - I know that I am going to continue to be just like the Israelites.  And what I fear is that when God calls me to enter into the Promised Land of His Calling for me, I am going to look and see what is there and say that I cannot go in and take the land because there are giants, and I will miss the riches He has for me.

So, here I go.  Solo.  One on one.  Just me and God.  "God, let it be with me just as you say."

I'm back!

Hello everyone.  I am back.  I didn't realize that it had been over a year since I'd last written anything.  For those of you who've been wondering what has happened to me, I apologize. 

Over the past year, I have pouted.  Doubted my salvation.  Cried.  Whined.  Moped.  Recovered.  Worried.  And tried to figure out what I wanted to use this blog for. 

I am human, so naturally, I come with dirty laundry.  Some of it, I have aired here.  I have done so in hopes of being inspiring while, at the same time, looking for solace from people, rather than God, and for proof that, maybe, I can do something good while I feel so horrible.  I'd spent some time questioning those motives while taking a Facebook hiatus over the holidays, and then, just didn't think about the blog.

A couple of days ago, however, I was out with a couple of girlfriends and one of them, that I hadn't talked to in a while, asked me why I hadn't posted anything on my blog for a while.  I didn't know she even read it.  I told her, in a nutshell, basically what I had just typed, plus a few more details.  She said that even though she didn't know why I was posting, she had been encouraged by what I had posted. 

With that one statement, I made up my mind.  I had to start posting again.  However, I will be doing so with the right motives this time. 

I wish I could say that this was the first time this kind of thing has happened in my life.  The first time was when I decided I was going to revitalize the United States Postal Service, and get more "real" mail in my mailbox by starting to write letters again.  To be honest, it had more to do with getting mail than caring about the postal service, in case you couldn't guess. 

Anyway, I started sending out letters.  I would spend hours at my local coffee shop after I dropped the kids off at school, before I really started my day, writing to various folks.  Some I knew.  Some I wanted to know better.  Some just popped into my head randomly.  Sometimes, I had been thinking about them for days.  At first, I was using my coffee shop time as my "quiet time" to do some Bible study.  I love the atmosphere in a coffee shop.  It's like white noise for me and I can really concentrate.  Eventually, the letter writing became my quiet time.

One day, I was about to drop a particularly personal letter in the mail to a woman that I was not quite sure I knew well enough to write this kind of letter.  I mean, I knew enough about what I was writing about to encourage her, but I couldn't say that I knew her well enough to be the person to say those things.  As soon as I opened the mailbox, a steady stream of second thoughts washed over me and I was suddenly overcome with doubt about dropping the letter.  Before I could talk myself out of it, I let the letter go and decided to trust God.

The next Sunday that woman came up to me and told me that she got that letter on exactly the day she needed it.  She had been having a rather rough day and just needed some encouragement.  Then she went to the mailbox and saw my letter.  That was when I knew that, even though I may not have started my letter writing with the purest of motives, God had his own plans. 

The next time it happened:  a dear, dear friend of mine came home from the hospital to find one of my letters in her mailbox.  She and I had been exchanging letters for about a year.  She was always a very good letter writer and it was the highlight of my day to get her letters.  Well, it had been her turn to write me for a long time.  But, "for some reason" I just felt like I needed to write her and check on her.  Sure...in hindsight, I know that I could've called.  But that was not our thing.  We write.  Well, the day she got that letter, she was coming home from the hospital, as I said.  She had been at the hospital that particular day because her husband, who had been having heart troubles for years, had passed away.  I received an email from her that evening thanking me for my letter because it had come at just the right time.  Even thinking about that email brings me to tears.  That God would use me to brighten that horrid, dark spot in her life is humbling beyond belief. 

But it goes right along with the why behind this blog, and the why behind my letter writing.  When I started, it was all about me and what I could get out of it.  Attention.  Recognition.  A response.  Mail.  But what I have received that has blessed me in ways that I never dreamed are the stories I shared above. 

One thing I do know:  I have always really really wanted God to use me for something in His Kingdom.  I've always wanted to know that I make a difference in someone's life.  Of course, I'm a mom, so that means that there are people around me everyday that count on me.  But I wanted something BIG, you know.  Well, what I didn't realize is that BIG doesn't always look like what I think.  And what was BIG to those two women is that someone cared enough about them to drop a letter in the mail to them out of obedience to a still, small voice. And the provider of that still, small voice knew just when those letters needed to get into the mailbox on my end so that they would arrive at their mailboxes on the exact, right days when they would be needed.

To be fair, I have received a lot of letters.  And they have been wonderful letters.  Encouraging.  Helpful.  Hopeful.  But all of those letters put together pale in comparison to the "thank-you's" I received from the two women who got their letters just when they needed them. 

But what does that have to do with this blog?  For the most part, this has been entirely self-serving.  Is that wrong?  I don't know.  But what I do know is that there have been people reading, you have been reading, and some of you have told me that it has been encouraging.  Well, folks, I don't know that I really have anything to offer that is all that inspiring because, most days, I end up feeling like I'm just barely making it.  But, I've talked to many people who tell me they feel the same way most days as well.  So, if writing about my own struggles with "barely making it", can help anybody else to carry on who is just barely making it, then, maybe, this blog will have served their purpose.  At least, that is my prayer.

I promise you will not have to wait as long for my next post.

Be well & God Bless!
Patty