Almost Spring…well…

 Actually spring began March 21st, but it is always a little bit late reaching us in Ontario. I am trying my hand at winter sowing…

I planted mostly flowers from seed in the bins. I planted them mid February and they are just beginning to pop up. We still get freezing temperatures at night so they are growing quite slowly and many of the seeds have yet to show any signs of life. I was beginning to think it wasn’t working and that all my seeds had died. So I searched the Internet to find out more and discovered that it can take up to 8 weeks for the seeds to sprout! 

Only a few parsley plants showing up in this one so far…can you see them?

Does that help? Yeah, just barely out of the ground…man, this process requires patience!! 

Some sunflowers and lupines….

Black flowered Johnny jump ups and bee balm starting up in this one…

Crocus

Miniature iris

Around the garden some of my bulbs are pushing up through the soil. A couple have even started flowering!

A storm is brewing. Time to go inside and do some more housework ☺️ 

February is Beautiful

 Well, it’s a bit cold outside, and windy, and we are supposed to get rain later today….but for February it’s quite beautiful, actually.

There are patches of snow still on the ground…

About 44 Fahrenheit, practically summer! 😃 Just kidding…

I am experimenting with winter sowing, I’m trying it in plastic totes. I’ll let you know if it works. 

I will be posting on my other blog later today. You can find the link to my other blog on the sidebar —-> it is called “Bible Treasures and pearls”. I’ve been neglecting that blog… I want to take a bit of a deep dive into being born again vs. trying to earn salvation and it’s a heavier topic than I want for this blog site, so if you check back tomorrow it should be up.

Pray that your day is blessed with noticing the many tiny miracles the Lord blesses us with FOR FREE simply through living life.

Seek Ye First…..

 

Hebrews 1:10-12 And, Thou, Lord, in the beginning hast laid the foundation of the earth; and the heavens are the works of thine hands:

They shall perish; but thou remainest; and they all shall wax old as doth a garment;

And as a vesture shalt thou fold them up, and they shall be changed: but thou art the same, and thy years shall not fail.

***

Life’s briefness has been heavily on my mind lately….

While standing in line at the grocery store we may sometimes feel like “it takes forever”, but when we really contemplate the matter these and other moments pass by us quickly. This has truly been impressed upon me recently when I got notified that a dear friend of mine passed away in January. “But how can that be?” I thought to myself as my mind struggled to believe the truth of it. 

I visited his Facebook page and read the condolences and well wishes directed toward his family. I reminisced on my time as his student years ago, twenty years…has it really been THAT long ago??? He often placed “likes” on many of my Facebook posts but he will never interact with me on social media again…no more corny jokes, no more sharing of inspirational quotes and scripture verses. 

My conversations with him now will be one sided, from me to the memory of him, of things I would still like to share with him, enjoy with him, to hear his point of view …silence…

The book of Ecclesiastes in the Bible mentions the fleetingness of our mortal existence here. It points out how meaningless life is unless we see the bigger picture with  the Lord included in it. If our lives are empty of God’s grace and mercy what would be the point of living at all?…. if it all ends in nothingness? What would be the point of struggling through life, working and toiling to attempt at making a fortune… or perhaps even just to strive at paying the bills on time… until one day comes death and then ….

…nothing….

Is that all there really is???

But Jesus said there is much more than what we see here, and that the Kingdom of God is very near to each one of us. He told many parables of what that Kingdom of heaven is like and to desire it more than all the riches of earth.

He said “Seek ye first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness and all these things (temporary fleeting things) shall be added unto you” Matthew 6:33. 

But if we only seek after the temporary things which are here today and gone tomorrow, we will end up with nothing, because the truth is we cannot take any of those things with us when we leave this world. 

So seek the thing that will be with you even after time on earth has come to completion for you, what Jesus died to share with you. Seek His mercy and His grace while you still have time and He will give it to you free of charge, already paid for with His own blood. Don’t waste another minute of the time that is fleeting, chasing after the wind. 

Hear His voice calling you, 

answer His call to you,

bask in His mercy and His love for you….

Life will still be hard, but it will have infinite meaning.

Ecclesiastes 12:12-14 And further, by these, my son, be admonished: of making many books there is no end; and much study is a weariness of the flesh.

Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter: Fear God, and keep his commandments: for this is the whole duty of man.

For God shall bring every work into judgment, with every secret thing, whether it be good, or whether it be evil.

1Timothy 6:17-19 Charge them that are rich in this world, that they be not highminded, nor trust in uncertain riches, but in the living God, who giveth us richly all things to enjoy;

That they do good, that they be rich in good works, ready to distribute, willing to communicate;

Laying up in store for themselves a good foundation against the time to come, that they may lay hold on eternal life.

For God so Loved the World….

 

Matthew 22:34-40 But when the Pharisees had heard that he had put the Sadducees to silence, they were gathered together.Then one of them, which was a lawyer, asked him a question, tempting him, and saying Master, which is the great commandment in the law?Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.

This passage seems simple enough on first glance, and I have seen explanations for Jesus’ words that I think do not fit the context. I’ve heard it explained that the first portion “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God…” to mean 1-4 of the Ten Commandments and “thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself” to refer to 6-10 of the Ten Commandments. Jesus is talking to the Pharisees here and they were very aware of all of the Old Testament including the Ten Commandments so it would seem out of place for Jesus to be saying to obsessed rule keepers another way of saying “keep the commandments”. They believed that they did so better than anyone else. But how did Jesus show His love for the Father and for us? Jesus showed His love by laying down His life; He died for us in accordance with the Father’s will.

Do we love God enough to die in place of our enemies? 

THAT is what Jesus is saying, and He affirmed this when He showed us that kind of love; a love that is impossible unless the love of God resides in our heart, mind and soul; a love that can only be carried out by His strength through us. May He grant us that simple yet profound and powerful kind of love.

John 15:13 Greater love has no man than this: that he lay down his life for his friends

Romans 5:8 But God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. 

On the Day the Lord Saved Me…

 It was a beautiful spring day in 1988. The sun was shining brightly and the birds seemed delighted that the coldness of that year’s wintery days was behind us. I was busy cleaning up the one room cabin where we (my lover and I) lived, like I did many days before, a day much like any other day.

A knock at the door. I opened the door. There stood our friend/neighbour/landlord. We stood and chatted at the doorway, he outside and I stood but didn’t invite him in.

 He talked a bit about the Bible and the love of Jesus.

I thought: Silly man, I am so much smarter and more evolved than he is. He thinks being spiritual is believing in a book that makes zero sense, while I enjoy all things under the sun and can live as I please and gain wisdom from all religions and peoples.

I made some kind of haughty remark to him, I do not recall exactly what I said but it caused him to respond by saying:

“The Bible tells me that I should shake the dust from my feet (shaking his feet) and should walk away” (as he started to turn away from me)….

…and that instant I knew that the Lord was in it, in this moment in time, and I heard His voice “life or death, choose life” within me and was given the wisdom and the power to say:

“Wait a minute!! I’m not rejecting you!” …saying these words to my neighbour, but actually saying these to Jesus: 

“Do not abandon me, I didn’t really mean it”

My neighbour asked: 

“Do you have a Bible?”

Me: “no”

Neighbour: “If I get you one will you read it?”

Me: “yes”

He quickly turned on his heel and left me there, but soon returned with a brand new Bible for me. He had gone down into town about eleven  miles from the ranch to buy a Bible with money that was very precious to him and his family. They were dirt poor, their children in clean well worn hand me downs and shoes slightly too big for their little feet. He used money that would be better spent on his wife and children to buy me a book that I told him I would read. I knew that I’d better read it.

I began from the beginning: Genesis 

The Israelites. I don’t know why, but all kinds of feelings of disgust for the Israelites was stirred up in me from I didn’t know where. I never felt that for others before; not like that. It disturbed me. I felt horrible as I continued reading and experiencing these vile feelings come up, disgust and disdain for a people I did not even know. What is this? Why am I feeling these things?

I walked to the neighbour’s house. I needed to know if they would know what is wrong with me and why I would feel this way reading this book. He told me to start with the New Testament, not the Old Testament. He explained that I needed to know about God’s grace before learning about the things pertaining to the law.

That night I had very frightening and very vivid dreams.

The first dream: 

A beautiful and very large tree stood strong and tall, it’s branches reaching out very wide. Suddenly a booming voice said: 

“This is God: JUDGMENT!!!”

…and immediately the tree was ripped up out of the ground, roots and all by an invisible force and just as suddenly everything went pitch black.

Image: http://weknowyourdreams.com/tree.html

I awakened and sat upright in bed while taking a deep gasp of air, my heart pounding in my chest. But the moment of panic passed quickly and soon I was back asleep to dream a second dream:

I was in the ocean with my lover. I was drifting further and further out into deeper water. At first I treaded water easily, but it became more and more difficult and I was getting tired. I saw my lover now far away from me. I called out to him but he was too far away to hear me. Suddenly I was under the water, sinking very fast. I could see the top of the water and bits of sunlight penetrating through the surface, but it was retreating up and away from me very fast as I sank, down, down, down, the waters grew darker and heavier…

and I suddenly sat up with a gasp, because I had been holding my breath while under water…

What was happening to me? I told my lover about my dreams. He shook his head and rolled over to go back to sleep. Am I going crazy? What is happening? 

I went back to sleep. A third dream:

I’m laying in bed with my lover next to me. A very large serpent is slithering towards me in the room…closer, closer, I want to scream but I’m not able to, I’m paralyzed like I am in some kind of weird trance…I sensed that it knew me, that as it’s tongue flicked out of its mouth it could taste me, and I saw through his eyes, like I could see what it saw, its eyes saw heat coming from my body…closer, closer…I hear my lover say:

 “Is that a snake?”

“Yes!” I scream as I jump up dancing in fright on the bed “It’s a snake! A snake!”

Now my lover is very annoyed…”What the hell???” 

Me: “ You said is that a snake and I’m saying yes!!” As I look for where it went…

He: “I didn’t say a thing.” …

The next day I continued reading the Bible and I felt miserable. 

“I’m such a horrible person. I am doomed. God hates me. I’m going to hell. I’m going to hell. I’m headed straight to hell”

I’m sobbing, knowing no one can help me; “God help me! God please do not hate me! God please save me! I know I cannot save myself, only You can help me! Please forgive me! You are so far from me, do not give up on me!”

BOOM!!!!

In that moment of crying out to God the cabin shook and I thought “God heard my cries”

It was probably a sonic boom from a jet coming out of nearby Edward’s AFB, but it came at that precise moment of my crying out, that I knew God heard me. “He loves me…He forgives me, He saved me!”

But inside I knew that the battle had just begun, a battle I would fight against forces of evil…. that once were  “friends” but now fought against me…. but God was on my side to help me. He loves me…He forgives me…

”Praise the Lord Who is able to save!!!”

❤️

Transformed by God’s Love

Becket Cook’s channel is one of my favourites (if not the absolute favourite, I have a few running neck and neck). He is articulate, honest, compassionate, and in love with Jesus!!❤️ His testimony is so wonderful, and his videos are always packed with his thought provoking sentiments touching the topics of our day. His videos often include the sensitive topic of homosexuality because that defined his life prior to the life changing event of being born again. It is a sin that is escalating and sweeping throughout all areas of our current cultural landscape.

In this video he explains the phenomenon of how upside down society is from how it should be, and how his life was turned upside down when Christ entered into his life. I can so relate to that fact because that also happened to me. Everything that I thought I knew was upside down from what the Bible shows us to be true.

I hope you will take a few moments from your day to watch this video and then to ponder what we see all around us, to pray for the lost, and humbly and prayerfully seek ways in which you can influence people in your circle of friends, family, and coworkers with the love of Christ.

I love reading comments on videos. Becket's videos have some incredible and very uplifting and shining comments that pierce my heart. here is just one example:

I pray these things help to add a sense of added desire to see more people have their lives transformed by the power and forgiveness and grace of our Lord and Saviour as He uses us to reach the lost in a world that is dying.

God bless you. ❤️

A Fresh Start and a Hope for Better Things

 

January at our house is usually covered in a snowy blanket. Although I do not enjoy shovelling our driveway and pathways, it sure does look pretty on the landscape. The whiteness reminds me of what the Bible has told us about washing away sins to make us “white as snow” (Isaiah 1:18)

Most of us have high hopes of a fresh start at the beginning of each year. It’s a time for new year’s resolutions, a time to hope that this year will be better than last year. 

When I came to Jesus (or, rather, He came to me) I was trapped in a terrible sin condition that I wasn’t even aware of. Looking back I see what horrors I was headed towards and were already enveloping me before Jesus rescued me. When He saved me He washed all of that away. He caused me to understand how much I needed Him and that His blood was enough to wash away all my sin. His righteousness which is perfect and pure as white new fallen snow is the righteousness He sees when He looks at me. God had mercy on me, a sinner, and gave me a new beginning, a clean start, that begins and ends with what He has done and continues to do in my life. 

May you also enjoy a new fresh start in Jesus cleansed of all sins by His blood sacrificed for you. He gave His life so that we can live forever with Him. ❤️