January 2023
Fear thou not; for I am with thee:be not dismayed; for I am thy God:
I will strengthen thee; yea, I will help thee;
yea, I will uphold thee with the right hand
of my righteousness.
Isaiah 41:10
The eternal God is thy refuge,
and underneath are the everlasting arms:
and he shall thrust out the enemy from before thee; and shall say, Destroy them.
Deuteronomy 33: 27
These are the verses I read this morning.
The sermon yesterday was titled
Thy Will Be Done
God is in control
What is my response when control is taken from me? We explored three common responses.
Anger
Blaming someone else
Worry
Ouch! My toes were stepped on. I've been guilty of all three responses. The main thing to remember is: "God is God and I am not."
I know that phrase isn't original with me. I looked it up and found a song written by Steven Curtis Chapman -- God is God --
where this phrase is found.
A thank you to Japheth and Aimee Stauffer for visiting church yesterday. Japheth brought the message. I'm thankful to be reminded of who is in control.
My mom and my siblings and I traveled to PA last week for a funeral. Mom is from a family of twelve. There were six boys and six girls in this family. Lloyd is Mom's brother. He was married to Dad's sister, Sharon. Sharon died rather unexpectedly 13 months ago with heart trouble. Lloyd was surrounded by family members who helped him in the grieving process. But now he has joined his bride in Heaven and sees Jesus face to face.
Parents, siblings who have gone before, a son, Rodney, and many other family members and friends who went on ahead to that beautiful land are there to meet him.
Lloyd and Sharon have twelve children. Eight girls and three boys. In my family we have four girls and one boy. When Lloyd and Sharon visited us or we traveled to WI to visit them there was always someone close to our age to play games. We always had a grand time. So many memories....
I'm glad we could go to Lloyd's celebration of life.
Look at those drapes and the chair. Yellows and oranges are coming back. And avacodo green. Well, that's come around full circle in my life time.
Dawn, Maria and Hans standing in the back
Trenda, Mom and Ladina sitting in front
February 15, 2023
Well, nothing like finding this all ready to send and here it is - still in my drafts - unsent.
Just like finding an envelope with an unfinished letter folded up inside.
This brought back many swirling memories. My Grandpa and Grandma were foster parents. My uncle and aunt, Paul and Mary Stoll cared for three girls. Those three girls are my cousins even though they don't look like the rest of the Martin cousins.
Later on Jerry and Trenda and John and Ladina became foster parents. Many children were cared for in their homes.
We don't know the future of these twins. Is there anything more charming than a cuddly baby drinking a bottle? Tiny, dimpled hands clutch my fingers or try to hold the bottle. Sparkling brown eyes stare up at me, searching my face. I am holding a miracle.
Here we are on Pearl's 2nd birthday in Heaven. This weekend overlapped with our celebration of Jeremy's 40th birthday in October 2022.
We don't know the future, but our hearts have been comforted as we cared for these sweet girls this past year.
