I have not been to my web site in months and months. What is the excuse? Time, business, letting all kinds of things interfere. So nothing gets done. The Coffee Café might as well close up. To tell you the truth that just about happened.

Than the other day as the weather was cooling down. It was time for a good hot cup of coffee. Enjoying, a really good cup of coffee can get you to thinking. What in the world am I doing, where am I going, and what plans do I have?

Following this I mentioned to one, that I was seriously considering closing the Coffee Café. She said you need to keep going. Giving me reason after reason why I needed to get back at it. She was so encouraging, that I sort of felt guilty if it closed. There was another friend that said you need to get going again. We all need friends to encourage us along the way

I praise God that I do have such friends. With God’s help I truly want to make this Coffee Cafe a place where ones who really need to be encouraged can come and find such a place. I want to give encouragement,a smile or two, be able to find something for children to seniors from time to time.

Fall comes and so does the work of getting everything finish before winter. Racking leaves can be a big job. There are those who use mowers and just chop them up, but here the racking is done by hand.

It was a beautiful fall morning, 70 degrees, warm sun, no wind and just the right kind of day to be outside. There is lots to do this time of year. The leaves are falling almost faster then you can rake them up. Depending on how many trees you have in your lawn, depends on how many leaves you are going to have to rake. As I began to rake it looked like an all day job. A big rake and moving quickly, in no time there are big piles of leaves.

The same with our lives we have big jobs to do for the Lord. It may seem like we will never get it done, but if we get right to it, then it will not take long and its done. There are some cards or letters you need to send to sick ones or shut-ins. You just cannot get started writing, but once you make up your mind to do it and get going, in no time at all you are done. The list goes on and on with things we have a tendency to put off. Things we need to do for the Lord, but just never get to it. Just like the leaves it needs to be done so just go do it.

It was enjoyable raking on such a beautiful day. I had raked the leaves the day before but now the ground was covered again. Another day of piling up the leaves. That is kind of like our Bible reading and prayer we cannot just do it one day and think it will last us for a week or so. We need it every day and all day long. The leaves needed raking every time they cover the ground. Just as we need filled up from God daily with His Word and talking to Him in prayer. In II Timothy 2:15 says, “Study to show thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth.” KJV How else are we going to learn and grow in the Lord if we do not study it? Like raking leaves it isn’t easy, neither is studying God’s Word going to be easy, but it needs to be done. If I want the leaves raked I have to do it, if I want what God has for me I have to get into His Word and study.

Last week my young grandson helped me rake the leaves and put them on the flower beds, that was a big help to me. But if he reads his Bible, that is going to help him, but is not going to help me.

When I was raking the leaves, there were others falling from the tree all around me. This made for a beautiful picture. Made me think of God’s blessings falling on us all the time, do we even take time to say thank you? Psalms 34:1a says, “I will bless the Lord at all times:”KJV Think of standing under a tree, with leaves falling all around. Now think of each one of those leaves being a blessing from God. Wow! Just look at all the blessings coming down on you. We better start saying Thank You; don’t you think?

When you think of fall, a beautiful time of the year; think of all the blessings you have and how many more you could have if you spent more time in His Word and in prayer talking to Him. Even one leaf can have great beauty and you are more important to God than a leaf.

Late one afternoon Jack came home,and as he came into the house he heard someone crying.He carefully walked down the hall. The crying was coming from his sister Susie’s room. The door was a jar just a crack, and he peeked in. There she was by her bed on the floor, crying. Jack carefully pushed the door open more and stepped inside. “What is wrong Susie?” he asked.

Susie began to tell Jack about the special girls tea and Bible time that she had gone to earlier that day, at church. The leader had told them about how Christ had died for their sins, and they could go to Heaven if they told Him they were sorry for their sins and ask Him to forgive them. That is just what she had done.

“So why are you crying now then?” asked Jack. “You see I am crying now because I know that you are not going to go to Heaven and I was praying and asking God to save you so you can go to Heaven with me.” answered Susie

Jack said, “I don’t need all that stuff.” Susie answered, “But Jack you do. You see you are just like a pumpkin at Halloween time. You take a pumpkin, it is dark and cold inside, nothing but a bunch of useless seeds just sitting in there, they cannot grow in there. Now here is how you are like that pumpkin, you are dark and cold inside of you. All you do is mean and unkind things to others. You sassy your teachers and talk back to mom. See that is just like all those seeds inside the pumpkin that all no good in there, all the bad things you do come from inside you. and you will never be any better until you ask Jesus to forgive you for all your sins, and tell Him you are sorry.”

“If you take that pumpkin clean out the insides, cut some eyes and a happy smiling mouth in it, then put a light in there you have a happy, smiling, looking pumpkin face. That is the same with you Jack, if you let Jesus come into your life, He will get rid of all your bad ’seeds’ you have inside. He will put a light in your life that will make your eyes twinkle and a big smile on your face,” said Susie.

As Jack, “thought about all that his sister Susie said, it began to make sense to him. Maybe he was so mean and unkind all the time, because of all the sin in his life.” Susie was right, if you want to have a twinkle in you eyes and a smile on your face you need to have Christ in your heart.

This was going to be the best Halloween ever for Jack. No more scary, ghost, and goblins for Jack on this day. Now since he had asked Christ to be his Savior, he was not cold and unless inside.

Sometimes life is like that, all is beautiful, seems so relaxed and enjoyable. What could be better, life is good, everything is great, good health, a home, food, bills paid on time, and there is nothing you really need.

I watched the hot air balloon as it went over our lawn and started over the tree tops along the side of the lawn. I could hear the operator in the balloon turning on the flame over and over. At first I didn’t think much about it, until I noticed it seemed to be going down behind the trees and not staying up in the air.

Life is like that we are going along really good then some little things come along and start to bring us down. It might be a cross word from someone, aggravation, or something we are trying to do and it doesn’t work. We burn the bacon, spill the milk, take the wrong turn onto a road, all can start to bring us down. We keep putting on the “flame” in the balloon, but we can’t get up. A cross word or aggravation starts to turn to anger when everything doesn’t work and all goes wrong. You start to loose your temper, it gets bad.

I hurried to the front lawn by the road to see beyond the trees and see where the balloon was headed. There I noticed it was on the other side of the road coming down even more, it was now over the top of a big tree and the house. Was it having trouble and couldn’t get back up?

How about us do our little things hit us and start to bring us down? Then they grow and grow, get bigger and bigger problems, we begin to worry, fret, stew and are going down, down, down.

As I watched it clear the house and tree, but as it passed over the field it was coming even lower. There was no way it was going to miss the electric lines and trees on the other side of the meadow. It wasn’t going up, just coming down and all the time getting closer and closer to the lines and trees. Was the operator in control? I was getting concerned and of course there was nothing I could do.

When our problems begin with worrying, fretting, stewing, then it doesn’t take long and we begin to really complain, blame others “It’s not me” but everyone else has caused our problems. Yes, we are going down and about to crash into something. There seems to be no hope.

To my amazement, especially, since I do not know anything about hot air balloons, that balloon came closer to the lines but then settled safely on the ground.

Why do we get ourselves in such a pity state? God tells us in Philippians 2:14 NKJV that we should, “Do all things without complaining and disputing.”

That big hot air balloon landed safely in the field. I am sure this was not the spot the operator planned on landing. How do I know? In all the years I have lived here, there has never been one land there before.

There are times when we head one way and God leads a different way. It may not be our first choice. I am sure the operator of the hot air balloon didn’t plan to land where he did. There are many times we do not plan to land where we do. “And whatsoever we ask we receive from Him, because we keep His commandments and do those things that are pleasing in His sight” I John 3:22 NKJV.

The hot air balloon was safely down. Not long after that, the operator started to let the air out and the balloon began to settle to the ground and be folded up and taken home.

“For it is God who works in you both to will and to do for His good pleasure” Philippians 2:13, NKJV. No matter if we fly high as a hot air balloon with clouds making all look great or if we are coming down, loosing power and landing where we do not plan. God is there. John 14:27 NKJV says, “Peace I leave with you, My peace I give to you: not as the world gives do I unto you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid.”

What are we going to do? Put our trust in God and let Him have control of our lives or try and run ourselves into trouble over and over again.

What would life be like without But God?

After attending a coaching class, in it we were challenge to look up the But God’s in the Bible.I started this project and than was inspired to take it a bit farther and put it into an article.

There are so many things we do in our lives day after day a good share of them not even thinking about what we are doing, and sometimes not even remembering God is with us and should be the center of our lives. Life is so busy we get up in the morning with our feet hitting the floor on a run. We have our schedule, times to be here and there, we eat, go to work, we spend time with our families and time with pleasures. Often we are so busy just living that we forget But God.

God was in the beginning and so was His Word. In II Timothy 2:9 says, But God’s Word is not chained or bound. Yes, God’s Word is free to all. No matter what race, color, or creed.

World wide God’s Word is for everyone and should never be chained, so others can not have it. There was a time in history when the Word was chained to the pulpit and individuals did not have the Word, we must never let that happen again.

There is the Father, Jesus the Son, and the Holy Spirit. It would seem to be three people but Galatians 3:20 says,“But God is one.” Acts 13:30 “But God raised Him from the dead.” I Corinthians 2:10, When Jesus went back to heaven the Holy Spirit was sent to be with all the believers. But God who gives you His Holy Spirit in I Thessalonians 4:8 says,“But God has revealed them unto us by His Spirit.” Yes we have God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit. God is our creator, Jesus died for our sins, and the Holy Spirit guides us daily.

But what has happened to us, we get so busy with life that we forget God. Look at why we should not forget Him.

“But God had mercy on him, and not on him only but also on me,” Philippians 2:27. Ephesians 2:4 says,“But God who is rich in mercy.”

He has mercy and grace, Galatians 3:18 says, “But God gave,” Abraham knew first hand the grace that God gives. I Corinthians 15:10, “But by the grace of God, I am what I am.” Paul knew this and so should we. If mercy and grace were not enough, He give us a lot more.
There is nothing missing from God, He knows everything. Luke 16:15, “But God knoweth your heart.” The one closest to you may not know deep down in your heart but there is no hiding from God.

God wants us to have peace, I Corinthians 7:15, “But God has called us to peace.”
Does He really want us to have stress, turmoil, anxiety in our lives? No there is much more He has for us.

But God’s kindness to you, Isaiah 54:8 “but with everlasting kindness,” we all want people to be kind to us, here is God offering kindness to us all the time.

When things seem impossible and we just do not know which way to turn, I Corinthians 10:13, “But God is faithful.” Yes God is faithful to us all the time we are the ones who are not faithful to Him, so therefore things seem impossible.

The very first thing we need in our lives is Romans 5:8, “But God commendeth or demonstrates His own love toward us, in while we were yet sinners Christ died for us.” When we confess our sinners to Christ and ask Him to be our Savior, it is the first step in our changed life to receive mercy, grace, peace, His knowing your heart, kindness, and His faithfulness to us.

We no longer are a slave But God’s own child. Galatians 4:7

After we ask Christ to be our Savior we need to live for Him, which means we need to grow by learning and serving our Lord, become a witness for Him and He will give you the growth. I Corinthians 3:6, “But God gave the increase or growth.”

God will continue to help us to build our lives to serve Him. Hebrews 3:4, “But God that built all things.” Men can build houses and barns but only God can build a life.

Romans 6:17, But thanks be to God. After all this should we not be thankful to God? Stop and think of all we have from salvation to all God gives us in our lives. Life is good. We are all happy, everything is going great, you would think, but . . .

That is right but . . . There are so many things in life that can go wrong, it’s not always happiness and joy. Dark days can be ahead as following:

There came the day your baby died, there was nothing you or the doctors could do. The stress begins.

There is a bad car accident your loved one is in the hospital between life and death, you are helpless, even your hope is failing. Will they ever get well and if so will they ever walk again? You are loosing it.

Your child has a serious mental problem, there is nothing you can do. Will he ever be able to learn and be like other “normal” children? You begin to worry.

You are living the “American Dream” a beautiful house and all that goes with it. One night you come home to find a fire has taken it all. There’s nothing left.
You begin to panic. What will we do now?

Your husband comes home one night and says, “I lost my job.” Hopeless sets in, then comes the worry. How are we going to pay the bills, where are we going to get money for food and other needs?

A friend tells you that your husband has been cheating on you. You don’t believe it and keep telling yourself that it is not so. But things are not so good in your marriage any more. Than one day he tells you he wants a divorce.
Panic and anxiety sets in, nothing like this ever happened before. What are you going to do?

One night you are coming out of the store, tending to your own business heading for your car, when you are caught, hauled away, raped, beat up, and dropped off side of the road. You can not begin to tell any one how you feel, the shame, anxiety and a hundred other feelings that hunt you day and night.

Maybe it’s a flood, earthquake, storms, cancer and the list goes on and on. No one but you know what you are going through and how you feel.
It may not be something this big, it might be something on a smaller scale like you are afraid of the dark, beginning alone, especially at night.

Maybe you just get all worked up about daily living, worried, stressed out, afraid of what might happen.

No matter what is in your daily life you can have “BUT GOD” he is always there for you.

Sometimes we have to go through a lot to learn the lessons He has for us.

Why can’t our lives always be happy and peaceful? How would we grow if we do not depend upon our God?

So without the But God . . . Where would we be?

He is always there for His child no matter how hard the times may be for us.

There are many more But God verses just waiting for you in His Word.

I have been running on empty, doing only what had to be done. I am not still back to 100% but at least I have the energy to pick up my pen now again and write.

Those times when you can barely keep going there is always a verse of scripture, a family member to encourage you, or a friend that has written on her blog, or a number of other little ways you are encouraged and can keep on keeping on.

Lately I have been thinking, what am I doing to encourage others.

Here are just three things we all could do.

1. Look for someone who looks sad or tired.

-  Give a word of encouragement

2.   Someone is sick

-   Send a note

3.   Pray

-   Let the person know you are praying for them. Then do it !

We probably all know these things, but lets put them to work.

We start right out with sin. There is no way around it at all. Thanks to Adam and Eve there in the garden. Eve just had to listen to that snake. To this day I do not like snakes and maybe that’s why. Back to Eve. It was bad enough that she had to eat of the fruit that she knew she was not to have eaten of, but turned around and gave it to Adam so he could also eat. Now we have the sin problem!

Stop and think, do you think we would have done any better if we had been there? Think about the last week or yesterday, did we go without sinning? Probably not.

Sin brings death. Lets take a look at the sweet, cute, loving, little new born baby. Surely there is no sin in that baby. They are to young to know anything about sin and never would sin. The Bible tells us “that all have sinned” in Romans 3:23. Think about your children when they were babies, only one thing was of interest to them and that was themselves and their needs.. That sure sounds like sin to me.

We  go from sin to a gift. That sounds so much better to me.

Do we not all like to get gifts?  Christmas, birthdays, other holidays and sometimes just an unexpected gift are nice to get. They are so much fun. Then we are expected to give back gifts on some of these occasions.

The best gift of all that we can get, is the free gift of eternal life that God gives to us. God loved us so much that He gave His only Son to die on the cross for our sins. If I had been the only person, with my sin, He still would have died for me and the same for you. This gift is free, all we have to do is accept it. That being, confessing our sins to Christ and accepting Him as our personal Savior.

Sin – Death -Gift – Eternal Life

When I think of all Christ gave up just for me, a sinner, just because He wanted me to be in Heaven with Him. It makes me ask what am I doing for Him, who loved me so?

Now why in the world would his brothers hate him for just telling the truth. After all it was what God had told him. Couldn’t they just believe him. Stop and think, do we do the same to other people also?

Joseph went out to the fields to see how his brothers were doing. He hardly had time to say hello and he was in a pit. Can you imagine being down there in that old well and no way out, no food, and  just plain nothing. I guess as it turned out he wasn’t down there to long before, his brothers hauled him out.

Life didn’t get much better even out of the pit. Now, off  to be a slave. That can not be good. What was Joseph thinking on that trip into Egypt?  Was he hating his brothers or was he trusting God with his life. I like to believe he was just trusting God, from what I know of his life.

For a while his life seemed to be going really, really well. Then there was a woman. Joseph did nothing wrong. He even tried ever so hard to do right, but once again he was lied about and that lead him right into prison.

Are there times when we try so hard to do right and it all seems to go wrong? Yes, there sure are some of those days.

Back to Joseph. It got worse, he was  in prison when he had done nothing wrong. Even in prison God blessed him, but when he helped the cupbrearer out he was then forgotten about  for two more years. I am sure he could have said life isn’t fair to me. Now, when we feel like saying life isn’t fair to me stop and think about Joseph. There is not one of us that has been that bad off, is there?
God did not forget Joseph, he did come out on top of it all.
If we love and serve God even in our bad times, He is there and has not forgotten us.

“He maketh me to lie down in green pastures, he leadeth me beside the still waters”

As I think of Psalm 23:2a and the green pastures. My mind goes to a nice spring day with lots of tender, sweet, new fresh grass in the field. I see all the sheep laying there on the soft grass either sleeping or drifting off. Nearby is a large shade tree with David the young man, as a shepherd, sitting there playing his harp.

The sheep have eaten of this tender green grass until their tummies are full and now with David playing this beautiful, sweet music on his harp it puts the sheep to sleep.

Now most often you will find sheep laying down sleeping. Not very often do sheep sleep standing up like some other animals do. The other day we were at this farmer’s type park and they had a petting zoo. There was this one little sheep standing by a tree with his eyes closed. He looked like a statue or frozen in time. We watched for some time before he moved. That was one little sheep that was sleeping standing up, that is the exception to the rule.

As I think of the sheep in Psalm 23, very contented just to lay and sleep with full tummies and beautiful music. The shepherd knew he could make his sheep lie down and be contented if they were full from eating and that helped to make them sleepy.

Then there is the young child. Most children do not really want to take a nap, but we know that especially young children need that nap. Many times children are like sheep, after they eat their lunch and are no longer hungry, with full tummies they will lay down on their bed with some quite music and before long they are asleep.

What about us as adults? Of course we love to eat and most of the time we eat to much. We certainly should by this time in our lives be eating more than physical food. We should be filling up on spiritual food from the Word of God and spending time in prayer with Him.

We surely need the spiritual food but we also need to get rest. As adults we get so busy with daily living and even the work of the church, that we do not take time to get proper rest we need. We think we are not sheep or children and do not need to rest and sleep.

Without being feed properly from God’s Word and getting proper physical rest we just can not  do what God has for us to do, we will only wear ourselves out and do no one any good.

The other day I was out in the 90 plus degree sun most of the day at an event. Most of the time I am not out that long in that kind of heat. By 9:00 p. m. I was in bed. The next day being Sunday, I woke later then normal, got partly ready for church and was so tired I laid back down and went to sleep. Then in the afternoon I took another nap as I still needed more sleep.

Sometimes God has to just plain slow us down to get physical rest also spiritual food and rest in Him.

Even Jesus when He was here on earth took time to rest and be alone with His Father. If Jesus needed that how much more do we need the same.

If we fail to listen to the shepherd Jesus, He can make us lie down and rest. Our Shepherd knows best.

Psalm 23:2b

“He leadeth me beside the still waters”

I think back to the Bible and David as a loving shepherd. When his sheep needed water, he was very careful to make sure he didn’t take them to any kind of rushing waters, water that was falling over rocks or creeks where there may be fast moving water. The sheep would be scared and afraid to go to the water to drink. If sheep get in fast moving water they could be carried away.

A shepherd like David would never lead his sheep where there was any danger to them.

The young child may be afraid of fast moving water. They would not want to go into a fast moving current of any kind.

A young child may be by the sea shore playing in the sand totally unaware  of any danger. An unexpected large wave could come and wash over the child. A parent that loves his child is not going to let him or her in the fast moving current or leave them alone on the sea shore for a wave to get them.  The parent as a shepherd will only lead their young child to the quiet, slow waters.

Then there is us as adults, we get so caught up with the fast moving pace of life. Many times it seems like we are caught in the raging river and unable to get out. How did that happen? Because we failed to listen to the shepherd who wanted to lead us by the still waters. On hot summer days we need lots of water to drink. We need to come to the fountain of living water that our Shepherd has for us and take time to drink.

Wether it be the sheep, a child or us as adults, the Shepherd is there to lead us all the way.

Is family important to you?

Family is very important to me. I have my husband, children, grand children, and even a great grand child. Yes I love them all and they are very special and precious to me.

Also we have family from the past that are in our memories, pictures on the walls, and in albums. All of these are cherished, especially as we grow older.

Surprised! What a surprise it was to get a phone call from a family member that was from my Dad’s brother’s family. We were able to meet and get caught up on family history. We exchanged pictures and information on our family line. Now we have extended family that we can keep in contact with. This was a great time for me.

Seeing this part of the family I really knew nothing about before the day we met them this week made me think even more about all those who have gone on before. How many of them knew Christ as their personal Savior? How many of them will I see in heaven one day?  I trust all of them, but I have no way of knowing if they had accepted Christ as their Savior, except the ones I knew personal in my life time.

What a great day that will be when all of our family from the past and present will one day all be together in Christ.

As I think about the great family I have past and present, I am sadden that there are so many families today that do not have family histories. So many families are without real love.

Take time for your family, build memories now! So soon and before you realize it, time has gone by and so much precious time has been lost. Make it all count for Christ, as only what’s done for Him will last.