Stop ~ Look ~ Listen

by Sharon O | Nov 16, 2011 | Uncategorized

One can imagine ~
sitting on a deck out side in the brisk fall air listening to the quiet and enjoying the moment of doing nothing. 
The voices of nature and the stillness of the water splashing against itself is the only sound entering over whelmed ears.
So often we have to have noise in the air.
It would be good for us to stop and just listen.
Listen to the quiet.
Look at the beauty.
Listen closer as the season speaks in words we don’t often recognize.

Soon the quiet begins to change as geese fly overhead encouraging each other to press forward and on to that last winter resting place.
It is a distant call.
A migratory call. Almost a haunting sound.
A miraculous sound echoing into the vast sky.
When I hear them often I will stop and look up.
If I am in a car sometimes I will pull off the road to just listen to them and watch.
It always amazes me how they tirelessly fly high into the air and onto a journey only they know.
It is a God designed mystery.
It is a beauty that is almost too hard to describe.
For me it is a reminder that we are not meant to live this life alone.
We need each other to encourage and come alongside as we
journey through our individual paths.
Just as the geese need each other to continue on to their destination.
Each one of them listen and press forward and often there will be more than one
joining into the haunting call.
For us I think
This season is a time of reflection of what really matters.
It is also a season of choices.
I choose to enjoy the season we are in.
I choose to stop and look and listen.
I choose to perhaps take a walk or a drive and enjoy the colors God has painted around us.

11~ 11~ 11~

by Sharon O | Nov 12, 2011 | Uncategorized

On this Veterans day November 11th ~ 2011~
May we remember those who served to give us freedom
give us hope
and help to restore our faith
in the United States of America.
Even though our country is struggling and sometimes not doing so well.
We still pray that God will Bless our America and keep us from harm.

To say we thank you might not be enough to those who sacrificed so much for the good of the country.

We remember ~ Our words are not enough ~
For everyone who has served and is still serving ~  We thank you ~  We pray that God will protect you and send you all home soon ~

We slow down

by Sharon O | Nov 9, 2011 | Uncategorized

Gain Strength

by Sharon O | Nov 8, 2011 | Uncategorized

The other day I met with a friend of mine and after talking for an hour or so she leaned into the table and said to me:
“Have you ever thought of speaking at a ladies gathering?
You have so much to share and you say it so eloquently in a way that others can feel and see the story you are telling.”
I paused and took a deep breath and replied,
“I would really have to know that is what God wanted me to do,
it is nothing that I would pursue on my own.”
Believing in oneself is the beginning of a new challenge
and at this point my own ‘belief’ is not that strong.
It was hard for me to grasp that (i) would have anything to share.
When the above quote was found
it was as if I heard a quiet gentle whisper saying to me.
“You must do the thing you think you cannot do”
Oh that my confidence would be as as strong as my friends sitting across the table from me.
She said she was encouraged by my words.
She wrote me a note later in the afternoon and shared that she told her husband she felt SO blessed to have taken time with me at lunch that day.
It is hard for me to take in.
Hard for me to imagine that (i) could share part of my life’s story and others listening to it
would be blessed through my process of sharing.
Perhaps it is time to look ‘fear’ and disbelief in myself in the face and learn to say:
With God’s help i can do it.
(the little i means the attention is not focused on me).
The challenge remains for me to follow through with what my friend asked me to think about.
You gain strength, courage and confidence by taking one step at a time.
Will (i) someday be able to take that small step of faith?
Can you?
Is there something challenging you these days?
Do you need the step of faith to do it?

Many years ago

by Sharon O | Nov 3, 2011 | Uncategorized

Thirty eight years ago on November 3rd ~ 1973
We kneeled at the altar and said our vows to each other to God and our families
and all of those who were witnessing this young man and young woman begin a new life together as husband and wife.
Did we know what we were doing or saying?
I think we thought we did
but until one has gone through the sickness and health together
the better and worse times ~ the good and the bad
the joyful times and sad times one cannot really know what “I do” really means.

We were 18 and 19 and beginning a crazy life of young marrieds and eventually young parenting.
Trying to manage a home and budget and work and church and all the other ‘things that get in ones way’ of relationship.
We struggled and we have grown.
We have changed.
I still can’t believe you were in a  yellow tux pretty sure you wouldn’t wear one now.
Young love says yes sometimes when really you probably didn’t want to wear yellow.
One thing maturity has taught is that we have choice and we can say no now.
Throughout the years we struggled and moved deeper in the process of learning to ‘grow up’ together.

Times were not always easy but because we had a God we could lean on and people who supported us and a belief that we were in a commitment that could not be broken.
We worked hard to do what needed to be done to make it the best life we could make it.
On that afternoon 38 years ago when we bowed our knees and our hearts at the altar and said ‘I do’ to each other.
We chose to make it happen.
To make a life together for ourselves and our future children and grand children.
We had no idea God would bless us with a son and a daughter and later six beautiful grand children.
We had no idea what the years would bring us and how much we both would change.
For richer for poorer and for better or worse as you tell me often:
“remember we are going to grow old together”.
I truly hope and pray we do.

So as we walk into the next 38 years we lean on the Lord and each other ~
through the good times we will share many memories and through the sad times we will share many sorrows too.
Then with a smile on our faces and a dance to our step we will say to each other:                                                                         

A Real Reason

by Sharon O | Nov 2, 2011 | Uncategorized

   In this time of giving thanks and learning to be grateful
   it is good to remember to always go forward and not look back.
   When we look back we see regrets ~
   when we look back we see hurts that happened ~
   when we look back we see and remember things
   that cannot be changed ~
   ever ~ 
   so in the process of life and learning to be grateful ~
   it is far better to look ahead ~   
   to anticipate the sunshine after rain ~
   the rainbow after the storm ~
   the little glimpses of heaven here on earth ~
   and the real reasons to be thankful.
   The reason for the season ~
   it is to give thanks with a grateful heart.

Attitude of Gratitude

by Sharon O | Nov 1, 2011 | Uncategorized

As we enter into a season of thanksgiving and being with others.
I challenge us all to take note of what we are thankful for
and create within our selves an attitude of gratitude.

I challenge us all to create a quiet time
perhaps pour a cup of tea
write down on paper
our thankfulness
our gratefulness
and in that process
I hope
our thoughts will not be on how busy the season is
but how wonderfully blessed we really are.

Gratitude:
{the quality or feeling of being grateful or thankful; a feeling of thankfulness or appreciation; thankful; pleasing.}

~ An attitude of gratitude is not that hard of a thing to nurture within ourselves we just have to take the time to do it ~

Grateful:
{warmly or deeply appreciative of kindness or benefits received: thankful ~ as in: I am grateful to you. Expressing or actuated by gratitude; as in ~ a grateful letter to someone; pleasing to the mind or senses; agreeable or welcome; refreshing.}

Thankful:
{feeling or expressing gratitude}

   Give thanks with a grateful heart ~
             Give thanks with a thankful heart ~
                       Give thanks with a heart of thanksgiving ~

Living water

by Sharon O | Oct 29, 2011 | Uncategorized

There was another woman Jesus met along his road of ministry.
Her history was not positive as she was not highly thought of
or respected in the city and was rarely spoken to.
In John 4 of the new testament it tells the story.
“Jacobs well was there and Jesus,
tired as he was from the journey, sat down by the well.
It was about the sixth hour.
When a Samaritan woman came to draw water,
Jesus said to her, “Will you give me a drink?”
Thinking this was an odd request as she most likely had large pots or buckets she was carrying to draw water with.
I wonder if she thought
why couldn’t he draw his own drink he had been sitting there for a while?
She could tell he had the warmth of the sun pounding down on him
and that he looked tired and thirsty.
If I would have been her I would have thought why couldn’t he quench his own thirst?

He saw the woman walking there and asked her,
“Please give me a drink.”
She replied to him saying, “You are a Jew and I am a Samaritan woman. How can you ask me for a drink?”
(She was surprised he even talked to her since Jews did not associate with Samaritan’s).
Jesus answered her, “If you knew the gift of God and who it is that asks you for a drink, you would have asked him and he would have given you living water.”
“Sir,” the woman said, “you have nothing to draw with and the well is deep.
Where can you get this living water? are you greater than our father Jacob, who gave us the well and drank from it himself, as did also his sons and his livestock?”
Jesus answered, “Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks the water I give them will never thirst, Indeed, the water I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life.” The woman said to him, “Sir, give me this water so that I won’t get thirsty and have to keep coming here to draw water.” (Perhaps she was thinking of the difficult task of carrying the large pots and pails back home and wanting an easier way out.)
Not realizing he was teaching her a spiritual truth.
He told her, “Go, call your husband and come back.” 
“I have no husband,” she replied.
Jesus said to her, “You are right when you say you have no husband. The fact is, you have had five husbands, the man you now have is not your husband. What you have said is quite true.”
“Sir,” the woman said, “I can see that you are a prophet”
(Not realizing who she was talking to.)
As the story continues Jesus tells her of some history
between the Jews and the Samaritans and she then says to him,
“I know that Messiah (called Christ)”
“is coming. When he comes, he will explain everything to us.”
Then Jesus declared, “I, the one speaking to you ~ I am he.”
Can you  even imagine? Jesus saying to you.
I am the one you have been thirsting for all along.
I can heal your broken heart.
I can fill that void so you no longer have to have husband after husband.
No longer will you feel empty and alone.

He cared for her enough to sit on a hot sun filled afternoon and wait for her to arrive,
(Was this a divine appointment between a woman and her savior?
He must have known she would be there)
So he could say to her 
“I am He” ~ I am the one who can heal you.
“I am He” ~ I am the one who loves you the most intensely. 
“I am He” ~ I know the hurt of your heart.
Precious one You are valuable and worthy to me. 
I care about you.
Precious one I know you are thirsty
allow yourself to drink from the living water that will bring life to you.

Perhaps Jesus words pierced her heart so deeply
when John recorded what she did after she met him.
“Then leaving her water jar, the woman went back to the town and said to the people”,
“Come, see a man who told me everything I ever did.
Could this be the Messiah?”

I believe when she ran (not walked) to the town she already knew the answer to her question.
Perhaps she just wanted to share this man with the others
so they could have some living water too.
Perhaps she was so moved by his compassion and
words of truth
she couldn’t wait to tell someone.
Jesus loved hurting people
Often he would go out of his way to speak with them
and even heal and change them.
I wonder
what about you and I?
Will we find him sitting by a well waiting for us as we walk by
perhaps to offer us a refreshing drink of living water?
Just a little something for us to think about.

Who touched me

by Sharon O | Oct 25, 2011 | Uncategorized

There is a story in the new testament of a lady who had had been sick for a very long time.
She had suffered greatly for twelve years. 
In that culture she was untouchable.
Untouchable.
Can you imagine not being touched for twelve years?
Can you imagine her suffering and her isolation?
Can you imagine her thoughts when she heard of a powerful healer
that perhaps was not far from her location?
“A huge crowd kept following him wherever he went,
because they saw his miraculous signs as he healed the sick.”
John 6:2
Can you begin to imagine how she gathered the strength
she needed for the long journey to where he was?
She had heard he was a gentle man
who did miracles and changed lives.
It gave her hope for herself
and she needed to find him.
For if she did find him
she knew in her heart where her healing would come from.
She knew if she could just get close enough to touch the hem of his robe
her illness would be gone.
I don’t know what Jesus looks like but he could look like this.

I believe he is very approachable.
I believe we will feel safe with him when we are in his presence.
I believe he is full of warmth and compassion.
I believe he shows the love of the father
in all things and through all things.   
In Matthew 9 of the new testament; one version of the story is recorded.
{He was teaching a group of people when a woman who had been subject to bleeding for twelve years came up behind him and touched the edge of his robe.
She said to herself, “If I only touch his robe, I will be healed.”
Jesus turned and saw her.
“Take heart, daughter,” he said, “your faith has healed you.”
And the woman was healed at that moment.}

In Luke 8 of the new testament more is recorded about the same story.
(Have you ever been in a very large crowd with a mass of people pressing against you pushing and shoving as you all go in the same direction?
it is a horrible feeling)
{As Jesus was on his way, the crowds almost crushed him.
And a woman was there who had been subject to bleeding for twelve years, but no one could heal her.
She came up behind him and touched the edge of his cloak, and immediately her bleeding stopped.
“Who touched me?” Jesus asked.
When they all denied it, Peter said, “Master, the people are crowding and pressing against you.”
But Jesus said, “Someone touched me; I know that power has gone out from me.”
(Isn’t it interesting that he could feel the power leaving?
 I am sure others touched him but not in the way she did)
Then the woman, seeing that she could not go unnoticed,
came and trembling fell at his feet.
In the presence of all the people,
she told why she had touched him and how she had been instantly healed.
Then he said, “Daughter, your faith has healed you. Go in peace.” }

Can you imagine having Jesus heal you in such a way?
Can you imagine having him look at you with deep intense eyes
that are eternally wise and holy
and calling you daughter or son?
I don’t know what Jesus looks like;
I believe he is very different than anyone we have ever met.
I imagine his eyes are piercing as he looks deep into
the soul who sees them.
I imagine he is approachable and full of love.
I find it interesting that all she wanted to do
was to touch his robe
she didn’t expect him to talk to her
or even notice her
she didn’t draw attention to herself
she just wanted to touch his robe.
To her surprise this gentle man took notice.
To her surprise he spoke to her.
I wonder how her life changed
after she saw him.
I wonder when she shared the story
about when she was healed
did she include the part where
he asked
“who touched me?”
It is a story of healing and hope
and of love and miracles.
It is a story of a SAVIOR who asked,
“who touched me” and a woman who took the risk.

The prayer

by Sharon O | Oct 21, 2011 | Uncategorized

Our Father, who art in heaven
Hallowed be your name
means ~ 
Holy is your name ~
you are set apart ~ we have perfect adoration towards you.
We adore you
We regard you with the utmost esteem
We pay divine honor and worship towards you
We love you intensely
You are:
Eternal, Infinite, Limitless, Holy, Just, Love, Truth, Patient, Gentle, Jealous, Sovereign, All Powerful, Eternal, Creative, Wisdom, Merciful, Perfect, Beautiful, Glory Filled, Awesome, Forgiving, Master, Exalted Protector, Provider, Deliverer, Rescuer, Redeemer, Present.
Your kingdom come ~ Your will be done
On earth as it is in heaven 
means ~
God’s power reigns wherever He is
There are no boundaries where He cannot go.