I am so thankful! Your prayers are such a help. I was enabled by the Lord to share my heart in a Sunday School class - "Faith Builders". Indeed the experience was just that to me - a real faith builder - because God was so near to me during the fifteen minute talk. I didn't choke up until the last sentence. The sweetest folks - some I knew and some I just met - were such an encouragement afterwards.
I admit there was a lot of tension in my mind about accepting the invitation to speak about Jody like this. "Is this for You, Lord - or for me?" My prayer is that God would use what I share in any context to encourage others - especially those who are facing similar trials. In the end, I believe it was both. By sharing some of what I am learning through this with the men of Faith Builders, I met some that were genuinely helped by the Lord. Simultaneously, by preparing to share about Jody, I had
such a sweet "communion" with her. It was a tearful, painful preparation, but I enjoyed the
warmth of meditating about her in this special way. Thank you, my exalted Savior, for blessing me even with Jody's memory.
I've given up hope that my heart will grow stronger as time marches on. It only gets weaker and more lovesick. I realize where this is going. It's going to hurt more and more, deeper and deeper for a very long time. I am still paralyzed in the house and can't bear to move any of her things. I hate the idea of living in a type of shrine - but I just can't avoid it yet. I am trying my best to do normal things but they are empty. So, I revert back to what I know is true about God, and He meets me in those thoughts. I love the Lord. Be sure to thank Him for your next breath, for your next righteous thought, for the light of His Word, for the Spirit that comforts and teaches, and for the Lamb that was slain that you might not experience Hell, but instead an everlasting, face to face, holy, purposeful, glorious existence in His Kingdom! After all, He may return tonight!
Come quickly Lord!Rev. 22:1-8 Then he showed me a river of the water of life, clear as crystal, coming from the throne of God and of the Lamb, in the middle of its street. On either side of the river was the tree of life, bearing twelve kinds of fruit, yielding its fruit every month; and the leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations. There will no longer be any curse; and the throne of God and of the Lamb will be in it, and His bond-servants will serve Him; they will see His face, and His name will be on their foreheads. And there will no longer be any night; and they will not have need of the light of a lamp nor the light of the sun, because the Lord God will illumine them; and they will reign forever and ever. And he said to me, "These words are faithful and true"; and the Lord, the God of the spirits of the prophets, sent His angel to show to His bond-servants the things which must soon take place. "And behold, I am coming quickly. Blessed is he who heeds the words of the prophecy of this book." I, John, am the one who heard and saw these things. And when I heard and saw, I fell down to worship at the feet of the angel who showed me these things.