Do You Run?

I was raised in a mainline denominational church. We were one of the ones that allowed music (opening hymn, hymn in the middle, the Gloria Patri after collecting the offering, and the hymn after the sermon--right before the altar call). I still love the old hymns. But when I went off to college, I left "church" behind. It wasn't til I married and we had our first sweet baby that the stirrings of hunger for God came back into my life. After all, we were responsible for the spiritual life of this little person. It was almost five years before we acted on that hunger, but when we went back to church, something was different. I wanted more than the 3 hymn Sunday morning experience. I didn't know what it was, but there had to be something more.

We had been back in church for about 3 months (same mainline denomination; different city) when a new family moved into the area and joined the church. Our five year old DD and their six year old DD became instant best friends (and still are!) and the mom and I became best friends, too (and still are!) When she started a Tuesday morning women's Bible study, I jumped at the opportunity. And together we went to seminars and prayer meetings and crafting clubs--anywhere that women of faith were gathering.

I began to notice that at least part of the "something" I was looking for was in the way the women at these meetings worshipped. They raised their hands, they wept, they knelt or laid face down on the floor as the Spirit moved them. Let me tell you, we did NOT do that sort of thing in my mainline denomination church! My parents referred to that kind of people as "Holy Rollers". It was not a complimentary statement. At our church, your hands were only high enough to hold the hymnal in front of your face. Nobody evah cried!

One night at a prayer meeting, a women went around the room and prayed for each person there. She had a word from the Lord for me--that He was going to set me free to worship Him the way I wanted to. Wow. It didn't happen quickly. First, I realized that I couldn't stand still when the praise music started; I had to sway back and forth. Then I raised my hand! True, it only went as high as my waist but it was a beginning. Then up to my shoulder, then oh my goodness, all the way up over my head! I took a sign language class and that new skill gave me "permission" to praise Him with my hands during the entire worship service. Then came handbells. And now worship dance with the Messianic community. Every cell in my body loves to be involved in worshipping the God of the Universe, God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, the God who redeemed us with the precious blood of His Son.

There is a scene in the movie Chariots of Fire, where one of the main characters, Eric Liddell, is reassuring his sister that he has not been sidetracked from God's call on his life to go to China as a missionary. He will go, but first he has to train for and compete in the Olympics (0f 1924). In that wonderful Scottish accent he tells her, "I believe God made me for a purpose, but He also made me fast. And when I run, I feel His pleasure."

Doesn't that statement just melt your heart? Are you running? I'm not talking about the crazy rat-race-not-enough-hours-in-the-day-to-get-it-all-done kind of running. I mean the flowing-in-your-destiny-who-He-created-you-to-be kind of running. The kind that gives Him pleasure. Let's run that one as fast as we can.

Tagged!

kep tagged me for this one. Short and sweet!

1. Are you craving anything and if so, what? Not really craving at this point, but I wouldn't mind a trip to Chick-Fila.

2. What is the weather outside and do you wish it would change? The weather outside has finally changed to something nearer to what I like. I wouldn't wish Texas summers on a dog--every year I just grit my teeth and wait it out. The heat wave has broken for this year. Hurray!!

3.What two websites do you think you will go to next after you are finished here? I don't have many links so I usually run through kep's or ksl's links.

4. Do you wish you were somewhere else, and if so, where? This time of year, I always want to be in New England. Only to visit, though. Where I live right now is the center of my universe.

5. Do you wish you were someone else, and if so, whom? It's been a really long time since I thought about wanting to be someone else. Right now, I'm too busy trying to be the best "me" that I can be. (Wouldn't mind having someone else's clothes, though!)

Wasn't that fun? Only 4 people know me on line and one of them tagged me. So, just jump in, all the rest of you. This one is easy.

Oh, by the way...

Wow! My 4th post this week. My two readers are going to go into blog-shock! Just wanted to mention that there is a contest at Bluebird Blogs for 2 people to win a free web design. Please don't enter. I don't care who you are, you know more about doing something with your blog than I do. I want to win the fancy design. But go look--they're really cool.

How Did You Meet Your Honey?

Oh, sweet! I ran into this topic when I linked from Rocks in my Dryer to A Chelsea Morning.

DH and I have been married for decades, so I haven't gotten to tell this story in a very long time. But it's a fun story! ~~(Although I guess it would be reasonable to say that everyone thinks the story of how they met their honey is a wonderful story.) And this is long; you may want to go get a snack.

We were in college. It was my sophomore year. I had been in one of those stormy, up-and-down traumatic relationships since September with an outdoorsy, macho guy. Who, the first time he told me he "loved" me, then clarified by saying, "after my horse, my truck and my way-of-life". (I am not making this up.)

Fast forward to April and Dr Nichols' "History of the New South" class. Monday. Tiny room, lots of people, chairs squished real close together. My third class in a row. Tired of sitting. I cross and uncross and cross my legs trying to get comfortable. Then I swing my leg too wide and kick the guy in front of me right square in the bum. I lift him out of his chair. He screams. Really. Every head in the room turns, including the professor who stops talking to see what in the world is going on in the back of his tiny classroom. Red-faced, I mumble an apology. With a huge grin, the cute guy tells me sternly, "Don't kick me! I'm goosy!" Everyone roars with laughter. When class dismisses, I watch him leave the room with my footprint clearly visible on his white jeans.

Tuesday when I go to my geology lecture class, who do I see in the back of the room but the cute guy! He grins and waves me up to sit by him. I hear nothing that the professor says the entire hour because the cute guy is drawing pictures of little moon men all over my notebook.

Wednesday, back to History class. As I squeeze into the very tiny space behind the cute guy, he turns and tells me, "I would've call you last night, but I don't know your name or your phone number." I'm cool and nonchalant and nearly fall out of my chair into his lap telling him who I am and what my number is. Then, right there, he asks me out for Friday night.

In 2 1/2 seconds, what flashes through my mind is that Machoboy and I might already have plans. As in, if he doesn't go hunting over the weekend, we'll go out. I decide to take the chance and say very sweetly, "Love to!"

Thursday, Machoboy calls. He's decided not to go hunting. What would I like to do on Friday night? Uh....uh....I have plans. Long silence. He wants to know, do I have a date?! Now, my long silence. Yes, I do. Break it, he says. No, says I. We have a BIG fight.

Friday, I don't get out of bed. I skip all my classes and lay quivering under the covers like a big weenie. Late in the afternoon, my suitemate drags me out of bed. She brings me chicken noodle soup and tells me I have to go out with Cute Guy. She's been hanging out all year with a bunch of his friends and he's a really nice guy and I will be eternally sorry if I don't go out with him. So I eat my soup and get dressed and try to calm the butterflies in my stomach.

Then the girl down the hall, whose boyfriend lives down the hall from Machoboy, comes running in to tell me that her boyfriend has been talking to MB. He's not mad, he's just so hurt. He thought we "loved" each other, how could I be so heartless. I run straight to the bathroom and throw up my chicken noodle soup.

Now I'm really a mess. How can I go out if I'm throwing up? My suitemate tells me, just don't eat! You already have an empty stomach so there shouldn't be a problem. We fall down laughing. And I go.

Six months later , Cute Guy and I are engaged. 10 months after that, we are married. Several years later , I tell him about what happened the week of our first date. And I asked him, "If I had broken our date, would you have asked me out again?" His reply, "Absolutely not. I was going through a bad time with one girl after another just jerking me around. If you'd bailed on me that night, I would've spent the evening getting drunk, and you never would've heard from me again."

Oh my goodness. I didn't know the Lord then and neither did my suitemate, but I'm so thankful that He used her to shove me out the door. And into the love of a lifetime.

Thursday Thirteen

THIRTEEN THINGS I LOVE ABOUT THIS SEASON OF LIFE

1. Being Married--actually I have loved being married for 35 years, but this season is just so sweet. We've successfully raised two lovely daughters (all glory to God who redeemed all our mistakes!!!) and now we can just relax, enjoy each other's company and share life. Browning was right! "Come, grow old with me; the best is yet to be".

2. Grandparenting--one of the reward's of growing older, the grandkids are DA BOMB!

3. Dancing--I've always like to dance, but in our Messianic congregation, we worship in dance. It is so awesome!

4. Hebrew school--I loved school when I was a kid, and now I am loving learning how to read and write in Hebrew. I'm excited about being able to read the Bible in the original language.

5. The Internet--before the Web, whenever you wanted to know something, you had to go to the library and check out a big ole pile of books to find what you were looking for. Now, the world is at your fingertips!

6. DVDs--we were the last people in America (according to our children) to get a VCR. And I would've been happy with that forever. Movies on demand! But with DVDs you get to watch your favorite parts over and over without rewinding AND you get all the background documentary type stuff.

7. Fresh fruit out of season--did you see Victorian House on PBS? The vegetarian participant had the choice of potatoes, cabbage and rutabegas. That's all that was in season in winter. Not even a hothouse tomato. Look around your produce department in December. We can have anything.

8. Hot showers--I love 'em. Best way to kick off a morning. We have land in the country and a half built house with no running water at all and spending the night out there is a real eye opening reminder of how easy life is with water on tap.

9. Air conditioning--how can you live in Texas and not spend the entire summer on your knees thanking God for the blessing of cool air. I remember, as a child in the 1950's, when we got our first window unit. It went in my parents' bedroom. We all lived in that one room!

10. Gift certificates--what a great present! Right now I have one from Outback and one from Central Market, just waiting to give me a good time whenever I'm in the mood. (And DH can take me to the movies again with the rest of his AMC gift card.)

11. Cell phones--not too many years ago, long distances phone calls were an expensive luxury. Now we have more minutes than we can use in a month, even talking weekly to friends and family all over the country.

12. Big plans--when I was younger, I thought 40 was old and that anything older than that was heading for the rocking chair. But we have all kinds of exciting possibilities on the drawing board and are looking forward to putting them into action.

13. He's coming back!--I believe with all my heart that we are the generation that will see that happen. It doesn't get better than that!

Say Wha'?

My DH's name is Clifford (known as "Cliff" to other people, "Honey" to me--all irrelevant, but just to let you know that no one actually calls him "Clifford"). And he has a friend/employee named Antonio. This is all just background...

Shortly before they moved into Newbighouse, ksl brought Firecracker to me and said, "Tell Grammie what these are." She held up toenail clippers. And with a huge grin, he very proudly announced, "They Antonio Cliffords!"

Wow...personal hygiene will never be the same for me...

Remembrance

One of the things that ties our hearts together over 9/11 is the desire to tell our part of the story, where we were, what we thought and how it made us feel. That's why blogs all over the country have the events of that day 5 years ago as their topic for the day. And I'm no different.

I was home working that day, as I am every week day. Taking care of little babies. I never have the TV on because babies don't need to have the TV on. My sweet son-in-law knew that I never knew when something was happening, so he always called me when he felt like there was breaking news that I needed to know about. That morning he called and his voice was tight and tense as he said, "Go turn on the TV." I asked him what channel and he said it didn't matter, that it was on all the channels. And there it was--fire and fire. The second plane had already hit by the time I tuned in and they were playing the film clips over and over. No one could make any sense of what was happening.

DH and I are homebodies with local jobs and local lives, but I have two brothers who travel all over the place with their jobs. And I had to know if they were safe. I called them both and was vastly relieved to learn that they were nowhere near NYC. (One was stranded in Atlanta when all the air traffic was grounded. He grabbed one of the last rental cars in the city and drove home.) And one of my daycare babies' mom worked for American Airlines and she got stranded in Ohio. Also grabbed a car and drove home.

I've read a lot of blogs of people who were nowhere near a TV and watched very little of the news because it was too difficult. I was just the opposite. Home all day, I couldn't tear myself away from the extensive coverage. I watched for 16-18 hours a day. Even when it got to be too much to bear and I would leave it for a few minutes, I would be back almost immediately. The people who lost their loved ones couldn't leave their pain. How could I just turn it off and go back to my happy life? It was days before I could stop--eleven days to be exact.

We had tickets to fly to Denver for vacation on September 22. We talked about cancelling, but we had only taken ONE other vacation in 30 years of marriage. We had free reservations at a resort in Colorado. So we went.

I really expected to see armed guards all over the airport. My parents have traveled all over the world and have talked about how weird it is to see soldiers with machine guns on duty in airports. That's sorta what I was expecting. So extra checkpoints with very little increase in waiting time was a pleasant surprise. Flying itself is something I enjoy. Flying at this particular time was not scary or alarming. But I cried anyway, thinking about what it must have been like for the passengers on those four hijacked airplanes.

When we reached the resort, I made the conscious decision to stop watching the news reports. Again with guilt. But I needed to stop. I had seen all I could handle and I was already praying. I couldn't do anything more.