today i will rejoice: 67 years to live

today i will rejoice: 67 years to live: Psalm 39:5 You have made my days a mere handbreadth; the span of my years is as nothing before you. Each man's life is but a breath han...

67 years to live

Psalm 39:5 You have made my days a mere handbreadth; the span of my years is as nothing before you. Each man's life is but a breath

handbreadth [ˈhændˌbrɛtθ -ˌbrɛdθ], hand's-breadth

n

(Mathematics & Measurements / Units) the width of a hand used as an indication of length

 

I lay in bed rubbing the sleep from my eyes wondering what the day will bring. The alarm goes off and I hear the D.J say it's the 137th day of the year. I have this picture in my head of a calendar page being ripped away, not the date, but a countdown of how many days I have left to live. Weird.

But days later I can't shake it, this picture of this callendar tearing away the days I have left to live, I see the pages blowing away in the wind.

Months later my mind is going crazy with thoughts about how fast life is going, I can't slow it down, I will die one day. Is my faith real? Is Jesus who He says he is? What if i'm wrong, what if Christanity is wrong, what if it is all an elaborate lie?

I watch A CASE FOR CHRIST a documentary by Lee Strobel http://topdocumentaryfilms.com/the-case-for-christ/

He is a journalist/athesist set out to find the truth, and I realize again the answers to my questions, yes my faith is real, there is proof, there is historical evidence and documentation, but I beleived before the proof was in front of me. So why these doubts?

My friend text me around this time and wonders why I seem different lately. I just reviewed my text and I stated to her "God is working in my soul and it is not always beautiful" I go on to tell her that I'm praying fervently for two huge miracels, one for my Dad to discover the truth of who Jesus is and second for my husbands feet to be healed."It is incredibly emotional and overwhelming praying for the two men in my life I love the most and unconditionally,then my own heart, deceitful,dark at it's core, why would a God of pure love want to answer much less listen. I know the verses in my head about how HE delights in me, that I am saved, but my heart is different, the questions are too big.My life I know is a mere handbreadth, that's a few inches,each day is a countdown.I feel almost overwhelmed not to waste a moment, my impact. I don't want to be forgotten,is that prideful? it wakes me up at night, but has taken my prayer life to a different place, my thoughts of life and reality different. I almost feel crazy or manic at times and who would understand all this crazziness in my head without comitting me? My mind is a whirling tornado, do you understand?"

My friend is wonderful and just happens to be a therapist!! She replys "I have had a feeling things have been building in you. We all have dark hearts and HE is listening and loves you HE may just be starting a new you like the pot john talked about  in church, we all make mistakes, you sound extremelyextremely overwhelmed but not crazy! Look for today not the end of your life. you are leaving a legacy my dear and are impacting people each day! You are such a prayer warrior. Do not let Satan convince you of lies!"

Two months after this conversation I see the pages whirling all around me and I can not catch them.

My life is a span of approximately 2 inches.

 

Today is September 9th 2012. It's been about 3 months now since I first saw those calendar pages, and it seems like yesterday, time is passing.

 

Psalm 144:4 Man is like a breath; his days are like a fleeting shadow. This is what I can't get out of my head, hopefully I can get it across with written words what I'm really trying to say. My plan is to live to be 100 if I can. Lets assume I do, because all of this is based on that. When I'm 99 I think  I'll be afaid to go to sleep! Will I be waiting and watching to die? This idea scares me. Let's back up to now. For awhile I have had this feeling that God is about to do something really big in my life, and really big things have been happening and with that another blessing unfolds and He does something else! These blessings and answers to prayers are coming faster and faster like an avalanche! Even in the midst of doubt and difficulties He continues to answer. Before my lips can sing praise and my hands can complete the task before me, God opens another door, sends down another blessing, fulfills another desire within my heart, and pours out His love on me. I feel  unworthy at times, but my head tells me because I am redeemed I am worthy, sometimes my head and my heart have a difficult time making the connection. Jeremiah 29 11For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. 12Then you will call upon me and come and pray to me, and I will listen to you. 13You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart. 14I will be found by you,” declares the Lord, “and will bring you back from captivity.b I will gather you from all the nations and places where I have banished you,” declares the Lord, “and will bring you back to the place from which I carried you into exile.” I read this and I beleive this. I am watching it unfold in my life, I am a testimony to this entire passage here.  My mind is still a whirling tornado. I have 67 years to live, it seems like a lot but it's not. I realize this week that the chance of me being alive right now in this time is so slim. I wish I knew matmatics and probabilities for the number! I think about how if one person in my genealogy wasn't born I wouldn't be here. I'm sure somewhere in my line someone had an affair that led to a pregnency, someone had an abortion, someone had an unplanned pregnency, if none of that would of happened I wouldn't be here, of all the times my parents could of conceived and didn't untill that one time. then at church this morning we started the book of EXODUS and read these verses  15The king of Egypt said to the Hebrew midwives, whose names were Shiphrah and Puah, 16“When you help the Hebrew women in childbirth and observe them on the delivery stool, if it is a boy, kill him; but if it is a girl, let her live.” 17The midwives, however, feared God and did not do what the king of Egypt had told them to do; they let the boys live Wow! Now my mind is really spinning! If the midwives hadn't feared God, if the baby that was killed was a descendant in my line then I wouldn't be here! Ok so I'm here on earth and it all had to allign in such a way for me to be here, if I wasn't neither would my kids and their future children, all of my conversations with others would be non existant, my salon wouldn't be here, my art would never be seen and so on, and who would my husband be married too? Then my brain goes another step, why was I born now in this time, this generation? I could of been born 100 years ago or 100 years from now. I could of been born on the street to a drug addict or a prostitute, I could of been born in a slum in a third world country, or one of the millions born into severe poverty in the deslolate villages in Africa, the list goes on. I realize I have won the lottery of life, to be born in America is a chance, and right now in this day and age, what a blessing. We have so much here! So now I see that my life can not just be a random chance, it's not pointless. But I look around at all the people and I don't just see people. I see it as this generation, and one day this generation will pass, like the generations before me. Life hasn't been just what it is right now, there was so much before me and there will be so much after me. Ecclesiastes 1 Everything Is Meaningless 1 The words of the Teacher,[a] son of David, king in Jerusalem: 2 “Meaningless! Meaningless!” says the Teacher. “Utterly meaningless! Everything is meaningless.” 3 What do people gain from all their labors at which they toil under the sun? 4 Generations come and generations go, but the earth remains forever. 5 The sun rises and the sun sets, and hurries back to where it rises. 6 The wind blows to the south and turns to the north; round and round it goes, ever returning on its course. 7 All streams flow into the sea, yet the sea is never full. To the place the streams come from, there they return again. 8 All things are wearisome, more than one can say. The eye never has enough of seeing, nor the ear its fill of hearing. 9 What has been will be again, what has been done will be done again; there is nothing new under the sun. 10 Is there anything of which one can say, “Look! This is something new”? It was here already, long ago; it was here before our time. 11 No one remembers the former generations, and even those yet to come will not be remembered by those who follow them.   I am here for this season,  God has created me for a reason, He has a plan to prosper me, not to harm me, I am not the first person to have all these questions. I am feeling a mixture of excitement and anxiousness. I am feeling more alive now than I ever have realizing and really feeling in my being the truth that I have a purpose. God designed me specifically, for this time! I don't want to mess my chance up. I don't want to let God down, I feel a great deal of responsibility, I feel like this is also the most exciting revelation of my life!!....so far!!!! I think looking at my life as a countdown not to death but my new life, has changed everything. All these objects I try to attain and the acceptance of the people around me, no longer seems to be so important. yes I do care about others opinions but it is not the driving force behind my actions, yes I do like beautiful clothes and nice things, but it does not determine my worth or value. My life is not to be meassured by things, but I want to live out what I know is true, what I beleive, I want to live love and be remebered for love. To me that is of value. When I take my final breath as we all will, this entire generation will, when our vapor has dissaperared... JAMES 4:14 Why, you do not even know what will happen tomorrow. What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes When the midst of my life vanishes I will c Acts 20:24 24 However, I consider my life worth nothing to me; my only aim is to finish the race and complete the task the Lord Jesus has given me—the task of testifying to the good news of God’s graceling to this My  mind is still a whirling tornado of thoughts and questions but it feels good to see my thoughts out of my head.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

today i will rejoice: Legacy of love

today i will rejoice: Legacy of love: Today I will rejoice, because 'this is the day the LORD has made and I will rejoice and be glad in it.' Psalm 118:24 I'ts been way to long ...

today i will rejoice: Legacy of love

today i will rejoice: Legacy of love: Today I will rejoice, because 'this is the day the LORD has made and I will rejoice and be glad in it.' Psalm 118:24 I'ts been way to long ...

Legacy of love

Today I will rejoice, because 'this is the day the LORD has made and I will rejoice and be glad in it.' Psalm 118:24
I'ts been way to long I feel since I have last blogged here. I think of it often, have it prepped in my mind, but the time, the time just keeps slipping away.
My life in measures of time has been something I have been thinking about quit a bit lately,not just thinking, more like consumed almost obsessive.
I had a picture in my mind one morning as I was waking up, a calendar page being ripped off, the number wasn't the day but how many days I had left to live here, a count down, and they were coming off quickly. I looked at how much time is behind me, 37 years and if I live to 100, the space in between leaves me 63 years. That seems long enough but it isn't really, not on the scale of eternity. I have thought so much about this that it has woke me up in the middle of the night,almost in a panick, I have no controll, I can't change this, I can't press the rewind button, I can't add more time.
So I am left with this middle spanse and what to do with it.
I did a google search for Bible verses on time, there were many but this one caught my eye and seared deep into my soul,
Psalm 39:4-5 "Show me, O LORD, my life's end and the number of my days; let me know how fleeting is my life. You have made my days a mere handbreadth; the span of my years is as nothing before you. Each man's life is but a breath

A handbreath, that's all my life comes to, and by definition it is

A linear measurement approximating the width of the palm of the hand, from 2 ¹/₂ to 4 inches (6.25 to 10 centimeters).

Dosen't seem like much does it.

So I am thankful for each fleeting breath, every moment I have, living as well as I can to leave a legacy of love.

today i will rejoice: o happy day

today i will rejoice: o happy day: This is the day the lord has made and I will rejoice and be glad in it! Psalm 118:24 So much to be thankful for!!! My favorite part of t...

o happy day

This is the day the lord has made and I will rejoice and be glad in it! Psalm 118:24

So much to be thankful  for!!!
My favorite part of this whole week may seem small and insignificant based on evrything that is happening, but thats okay, it's my heart that was touched!
We finally opened up the new salon!!!! YEAH!! whew what alot of work and it looks awesome! I can't beleive I actually finished something! I'm great at starting and haveing ideas, but i'm not good at follow through, God gave me an awesome husband, thats for sure!
 But thats not the best part of my week by far!
Finally had date night, at a fancy smancy place! Yes, we had a gift card!! how nice to just talk and laugh and be together!
that comes close but wasn't the top!
This small littel peice is.
I walk out to my car and in the fresh fallen snow is a messgae written with a 7 year old finger, happy day, I think is what it said! Hard to make it out completely because the wind was blowing new snow on top of it.
SIMPLE.
HAPPY DAY
yes. it was a happy day! and today in the midst of life and watching my dreams come true, and walking knowingly down the path God has paved for me, it is a very happy day.
this week I encountered several tragic stories, stories that have saddened me greatly, young women with rare cancers, losing babies in car accidents, tumors, suicides, heart ccancers, some I've never met but have heard through a friend and we as a family have been praying for them and then I meet a family memeber of that person! My heart has been heavy this week for them, but in the midst of that, somehow I feel closer to God than I have in a long time. Prayer I'm realizing is far more powerful than I can wrap my mind around. I read this verse in revelations 8;4 ⁴ The smoke of the incense, together with the prayers of God’s people, went up before God from the angel’s hand, I wonder if all of my prayers make a differnce sometimes, then I read this and they actually create an aroma in heaven, wow. thats my only word.
So even with the hard news, long suffering of these families, in this time not to be insensitive, I keep praying and I keep enjoying my life with those around me, because I will never know if and when it could be one of them or me, and i don't want tot live with regrets anymore, allready done that. I want a life filled with beautiful memories. So yes today is a happy day.

today is a good day

This is the day the LORD has made and I will rejoice and be glad in it. Psalm 118:24

What am I thankful for tody?
My life is a good life.
 I'm healthy.
 I never really was thankful for that, but lately there are many people around me, young people being diganosed with brain tumors, cancer, unexplained illness. And I complain about the last 10 pounds.
I have children.
Some wait for years and never have children, some lose their children tragically too young, some have lost them to drugs and other addictions. Some have to love with knowing they have a terminal illness.
My girls are alive, healthy, and happy! What a blessing in my life!
I have a wonderful husband.
What a joy it is to be married to my best friend. We have a unique love that I think most only dream of having. How fortunate we are.
I have a home..
A beautiful littel green house where all these wonderful memories are being made!

I feel like I'm bragging, but I'm not. It sounds like my life is perfect, but it's not.
God is taking what was meant for evil and turning it into something beautiful
Genesis 50:20
As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good, to bring it about that many people should be kept alive, as they are today

Not saying people are being kept alive by me, just the point that God took the beautiful life I was given and all of the suffering and tragedy that occurred in it, and did not let it be for nothing. He is taking that and turning it into something beautiful. I never would of chosen this path, the pain was immense, the abuse still haunts me, but now on the other side looking back, it has brought me to where I am so in some twisted way I give thanks. Not for what happened but was is happening now, but that could'nt be without what happened. I guess it may only make sense to me in my head.

I give thanks for a fresh start. I give thanks for all the things I so easily take for granted. I rejoice in the blessings of creating this beautiful life, and am thankful for the strength to walk through it.

Today is a good day, I'm going to enjoy it and not worry about all that is surrounding me, and the littel troubles that seem big in the moment, because I know without a doubt God will provide, he will answer and he will turn it into something beautiful, I say this not just because His word says this, but because I have seen it, experienced it, touched it.
Yep, today is a good day.

today i will rejoice: seeing beyond

today i will rejoice: seeing beyond: This is the day the Lord has made and I will rejoice and be glad in it. Psalm 118:24 Amazing what a littel excercise and a goods night sle...

seeing beyond

This is the day the Lord has made and I will rejoice and be glad in it. Psalm 118:24

Amazing what a littel excercise and a goods night sleep can do!!! I feel wonderful!!! I never should of plugged in the heating blanket though, I could stay in these blankets all day!!

 Today I am thankful for the ability to see beyond. Beyond the mess, beyond the chaos, beyond the extra money required, beyond what is seeming to take forever.
We are remodeling an old salon into a very contemporary, very cool and upbeat salon/art studio. I thought it would take a week. It is taking alot longer than that and all these littel problems keep coming up that are slowing us down. Problems below the surface that no one knew was there.

Like my own heart. It always looks good from the outside, but if you really start to pull back the layers something else is revealed, things I thought were buried so deep no one, not even myself would ever discover.
We painted the walls and as the paint is drying it blisters all over, we keep peeling the paint away and repainting, still not working, so we texture and mud the area, repaint, still bubbeling. My heart is that wall, layers and layers of stuff to hide the yucky stuff, but like the walls, it's covered in mud. We realize the walls had been wallpapered a million years ago and repainted a hundred times, but the shiney gloss I was applying was reacting with the old glue from the wallpaper. No one had ever taken the time to scrape it away and start anew.

I think how many times do I ,do we try to hide under the shiney gloss? All it takes is a great hair day, some pretty lipgloss and a nice big smile, but soon the bubbels will come forth, and like the blistering walls the heart that has been wounded, covered in mud, blisters, almost begging to be scraped clean and made anew.
I know that in the grand scheme of things, it dosen't really matter if the salon opens a week or two later, somehow the money will come and everything will work out. what matters is that it's been restored  and from that day forward I know it is how it should be,the blisters are gone and the roughness that peeks through the glitter, well that's okay because like my heart there will be healing and it's okay to let the rough edges show, those scars are my story, and they helped form who I am, and I don't need to cover it in mud anymore.

endurance

This is the day the Lord has made and  I WILL rejoice and be glad in it. Psalm118:24

My heart is filled with a sadness, but still I choose to rejoice.

Funny how everything can be great and in an instant life can spin around and take you by suprise.
Love is a powerful force,
Hmm... I started to write this 2 days ago, but didn't know how to say what I feel.

 I am so blessed with a beautiful and wonderful life, I am in a very good place, my marriage is wonderful, my kids are fantastic, my buisness is going well, I feel close to God.  In the midst of all these blessings it only takes one thing to make the heart sad.
The point of my blog is to give thanks even when all is not wonderful.

Without specific details because of privacy all I can say is this....

You can love someone before you even met them, I never realized it untill recent years, you have ideas , know about the person, seen pictures, your mind creates fantasies. And it builds anticipation and excitement  and nervousness all at the same time.
Then all to soon they are gone, distant visits, and occasional letters, life seems so busy you all but drift away, then after a long awaited arrival many hugs and tears, then the rebuilding.
Love, hurt, releif, figuring out where and how you belong. pulling close, pushing away.
Forgiveness
Then just like that dread, not knowing, anxiety, fear of the loss of time, fear of not seeing, fear of not being able to give comfort because my own heart is struggeling with  questions that can not be answered any time soon.
The waiting...
The anguish...
The memories...
The hope of more time, more memories
Prayers
The only thing I have left, the greatest most powerful force but it feels so littel. Crying out to God to rescue, reveal,save. because He can.
Desperate tear stained prayers, and it feels not enough.

So today I am thankful for endurance. I am thankful that when my heart feels it's not enough that I still know the trunderstand it I will trust in my Father.
the verses that follow are...

 O Lord, save us;

O Lord, grant us success.

26Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.

From the house of the Lord we bless you.^a

27The Lord is God,

and he has made his light shine upon us.

I know He can save ... but I want to feel it, see it.
Previous verses

In my anguish I cried to the Lord,

and he answered by setting me free.

6The Lord is with me; I will not be afraid.

What can man do to me?

7The Lord is with me; he is my helper.

I will look in triumph on my enemies

Yes in anguish I have cried out to the Lord and am waiting for Him to answer, it's all I can do...

starting over day 1

My idea seemed simple. Post everyday for 6 months a reason to rejoice and be glad for that day, no matter the circumstances in life. Easy idea, but the time was the hardest, so I declare a do over!!!

This is the day the Lord has made and I will rejoice and be glad in it. Psalm 118:24

Making time for the things in life that matter most, I want to leave a written legacy of my life, the good and the tough times and the overcoming, for my grandchildren and great grandchildren to come. It's always intriging to discover lost diaries of dead people and see what they really felt, I may never be a a famous world known person, but I want my descendants to know who I was. Where they came from.

So today I'm thankful for so much. I just got married, moved into a new home, starting a new salon/art studio, most importantly I have beautiful daughters whom I love and adore and they love me!
My life seems like an amazing adventure right now and I'm so excited to see all the twists and turns on this path!
Thank you for reading and following along with my blog and my Altered Ego blog as well!!

Excited to hear of the blessings in your life as well, become a foloower and in the comment section I'd love to hear of all you are thankfull for as well!