A word or two on praying, our mission as Christians, and a little personal background

I think the Lord gives every Christian a mission. I'm not real good at witnessing and telling people how they can be saved. This comes in part because I believe each time a person tried to witness to me in earlier years it just drove me further away from God and the church. But I feel I am good at being a prayer warrior and I think that praying for people is the mission the Lord has assigned to me.

I have kept a lengthy, active, daily prayer list for years. Including my church prayer list I pray for 150 to 200 people a day. Even when I was not really saved, I prayed on a regular basis for my family (especially my children) and friends and peace and for those who were in need. Some will disagree, but I know the Lord heard and answered my prayers for others many times. He did not punish me for not being a Christian at the time, and my prayers were answered.

I grew up attending many different churches and continued with that pattern through most of my early adult life. I can remember asking Jesus to come into my heart during several Vacation Bible Schools (each of a different faith) when I was very young. I almost converted to Catholicism during my teen years, much to my (Episcopalian) grandmother's horror at the time.

What brought me to the Southern Baptist was a neighbor and good friend, Mrs. Alexander. Mrs. Alexander encouraged me to send my youngest son to church with her each Sunday when he was still so small his little short legs couldn't make the steps on the church bus. I would lift him on and someone would help get him off when the bus brought Mrs. A and Glove back home.

Whenever there was a special program at church I would attend with them, and then I started volunteering each summer to help with Vacation Bible School and from there I began building a true relationship with the Lord and with a group of friends that would become and still remain like family. I nearly drowned the preacher when I was baptized, but it was of course a blessed day in my life.

After becoming a Christian I struggled a little with my prayer life. Mostly because I tried to pray the "right" way. One day during a Sunday School lesson I shared this with the (then) preacher's wife. She shared that she believed we all can pray in a different manner. There doesn't have to be a right or wrong way to pray if it is sincere (although scripture will guide us on how to pray). She said that she herself prayed for different things and different people on different days of the week, but on a regular basis. This inspired me to go back to my old way of praying for everyone by name on a daily basis. It immediately felt right to me.

A few months back I ran across a blog that I can't find now. I just remember that when I read the post I was angry at the blogger because he in essence was saying that people who pray like I pray are not praying at all that it's just a bunch of words and names with no meaning. In other words it's not the right way to pray. So maybe that blogger's mission is to make us stop and think about the way we pray.

I know the Lord leads me in my praying. That's all I need to know about prayer for now.

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War, no one wins, everyone loses

So, here we are watching the Middle East come to what many have predicted and most have feared for so long. I wish I were articulate enough to write about what is happening, but I'm not. I can only write about what I feel in my heart.

Setting who and what is right aside, as I watched the news coverage today and read on CNN's website the personal e-mails from those affected directly from the crisis both here in the United States and those who are right in the middle of the attacks, I know that regardless of how this crisis ends there will be no winners, only losers.

I watched as people fled Lebanon into Syria with only the belongings they could carry, leaving everything else behind, to get their families to safety. Children carrying bundles that were bigger than they were.

In the middle of all of this a short news take on the G8 leaders and a shot of them all standing together for photographers . . . smiling.

I have no answers . . . only questions.

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I just discovered Steinbeck

I have several rather detailed posts about the books I have read and what books interest me (mostly anything between a front and back cover) but this week I discovered an author I hadn't read before and now I think I will have to go through all his books.

I picked up a used copy of John Steinbeck's Cannery Row and I just fell in love with the characters and their era and especially how they handled the poverty that they lived in. I can't imagine how I have missed Steinbeck in all my reading but the Pulitzer and Nobel Prize author writes in a simple form and everything (at least in Cannery Row) is character driven.

I am now halfway through another of Steinbeck's books, Tortilla Flat. Both of these books are such fast reads, but very entertaining for literature.

Of course Steinbeck is best known for The Grapes of Wrath, Of Mice and Men and East of Eden. I believe movies were made of all of those and I probably started watching The Grapes of Wrath a dozen times over the years and it was just to depressing to sit through. Don't ask me to explain how I can read about the depression and hang on every word but can't bare to watch a movie about it. Sometimes I am a complicated person.

Anyway, I'm on to Steinbeck now, so I will move through his books for awhile. If they are all as good as the first two I have tackled, I am going to love my new discovery.

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Working out of my comfort zone

I wish I had time to decide if I am getting slower or the days are getting faster. Whatever the problem, I keep running out of day.

I haven't blogged for a week. It seems each night there is something else that takes priority or maybe I should say I allow something else to take priority. After staying up until 2:00 a.m. Friday and Saturday I just hit bottom last night and crashed about 8:30 which wasn't very productive.

I have been struggling with a simple little report that I volunteered to put together. All the work was already done, all I had to do was pull it all into a document, but I had to use WORD. I hate WORD! I am an old PageMaker person and WordPerfect is my choice for reports or documents. The process was a challenge and with the help of my friend Carole (at least I hope she is still my friend) I learned some new things about WORD.

I am one of those people who must constantly have a challenge or I fear I might turn into a vegetable. When I am in the middle of a project that stresses me I swear up and down I will never get myself into another mess like it and then turn right around and do the same thing all over again.

I have to work outside of my comfort zone or I don't feel like I am growing or contributing. It has nothing to do with proving to someone else that I can do something and everything to do with proving to myself that I can do, whatever.

It's nice to have friends that kind of understand that and bail you out in a pinch.

Thanks Carole for the help!!

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The power of Hillary, thanks James!

James Carville is already on duty! Check out the Washington Post article by Carville The Power of Hillary . . . if you dare.

Oh boy, I am getting excited already! It is going to be a heck of a road to the 2008 White House and I can't wait!

I can tell you this, Kerry better give it up. I would be thrilled with either Hillary or Edwards, but I won't go the Kerry way again. When I voted for Kerry in 04 it was the first time I ever voted for a candidate on a party basis. I was so disgusted with the republicans and George Bush. I have actually voted for as many republicans in my voting life as I have democrats, because I am one of those who in the past voted for the person and not the party. That all changed in 2004. I am not sure I could go back to a non-partisan outlook, probably not, although, if Rudy Giuliani would run on the republican ticket I would keep an open mind.

Giuliani would make a few right wingers squirm. I know Edwards is pretty soft, but after seeing and listening to him in person during the 2004 campaign he is what he says he is a total for the people person. Hillary? I don't know why the woman would want to put herself through all of it, but I believe she is the most global of the three. Other countries and their leaders respect Hillary Clinton more than the US does.

Anyway, it's going to be a great race. The best part is, regardless of who wins, we won't have four more years of George Bush.

Thanks James Carville for the Power of Hillary. I am gearing up!!

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God Bless America

We had a great patriotic service at church Sunday morning. Everything was decorated in red, white, and blue. The older kids marched in carrying the flag with the pre-schoolers in tow behind waving little hand flags. Our choir sang a medley of patriotic favorites and we all joined in. It really was quite moving.

I looked at those little children and wondered what the world would be like for them twenty years from now. It was a serious thought at the moment and one that made me cry. I imagine others were harboring thoughts of their own and maybe a few tears sprung forth, none of us knowing what had moved the other.

It's odd (maybe not the right word) how we can be so sad and at the same time be so joyous, and we were joyous. Joyous that we could worship our Lord and celebrate our nation under the same roof without any threats. We were joyous that our little children were dressed well, looked like they had been fed well, and were in a safe, loving environment. We were joyous to know that our prayers for our nation will not go unanswered.

God will continue to bless America in His way and in His time. But we must never stop asking Him to do so.

God, bless America . . . please.

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My pink piggy slippers are missing!

Have you ever misplaced something in your house and you know it's got to be there somewhere, but you just can't find it? Well, my pink piggy slippers are missing. The ones that go oink when you pinch their head. I need my piggy slippers!

My piggies are to me what Linus' security blanket is to him. When I am stressed and need to chill out I have to have those slippers on.

Mind you, we live in a small six room house with two closets. How can you misplace a pair of slippers, each one the size of a shoebox?

I don't have a clue what happened to them. I'd hate to think that someone broke into our home undetected and ripped off my pink piggies and left everything else in tact, but you never know, anymore.

Let's hope I find those suckers soon or I may be in a bad mood.

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