Love Disappointed

One day recently I was cleaning house and I was thinking about love. Love is such a strange thing! You can love someone to the ends of the earth, yet sometimes you want to end them by throwing them over the edge of the earth! How is it that we can have such strong feelings on both sides of the spectrum, often at the same time?

I got to thinking about the song The Eagles sang after the September 11 terrorist attacks. In their song Hole in the World, they sing, "They say that anger is just love disappointed." Once you really think about it, that statement is profoundly true. The definition of the word "disappointment" tells us why we feel angry when love disappoints us:

Disappointment (noun): the feeling of sadness or displeasure caused by the defeat of one’s hopes or expectations.

We set the bar for what we expect from each other, and when our expectations aren't met, we get mad!

In the last few years, I've noticed a trend with people seeming angry all the time. If you don't believe me, post something about the President on Facebook..whether it be a compliment to him or an insult to him...and then sit back and enjoy the show! You will likely see an argument spring up under the comments between two people who may not even know each other. You will probably be "unfriended" by some as well.

People have become like guard dogs, standing by, ready to attack at the smallest of threats. I think it is partly for entertainment purposes for some, but when someone truly feels passionately about something, I believe the root of their passion is actually love.

Think about some of the political debates we seem to have going all the time now. If you are pro-life, you stand up and fight for the unborn. Why? Because you love those babies! If you are pro-abortion, you stand and fight for the moms because you feel like they have a right to make their own choices for their bodies. Why? Because you love those moms! If you fight for gay rights, it's because you want all people to be treated fairly..because you love them! If you are against gay rights, it's because you want others to live in a way that you see as better for them..because you love them and want good for them!

Where we go wrong when debating these topics is that we forget that people generally mean well in these situations. We become defensive, we want to be right and we want them to stay out of our business. We want to be in charge of our own destinies! We become angry when someone tries to sway us otherwise. Again, that anger can be traced back to love disappointed. We want to be loved unconditionally, no matter what our political beliefs or decisions.

On a more personal level, love disappointed cuts us even deeper. Think of a situation between yourself and someone you love deeply. All of us have been hurt before by someone we love at one time or another, and most of the time anger soon enters the picture.

What made you angry about the encounter? I would guess, once again, that you were disappointed. You thought they loved you more than that. You thought they respected you more than that. You thought you didn't deserve that. You were disappointed to see their true feelings emerge. The natural result of that disappointment is anger! "How could they..?", "Why would they...?" are thoughts we have as we stew over the unfortunate event.

Maybe if we could stop for a moment and think about the underlying love in someone's words, we wouldn't be so quick to get angry. Maybe we need to at least consider what they have to say, especially if someone that you know loves you is the speaker. Maybe we need to also consider the person's track record before reacting in anger...do they have a history of being hurtful? Have they shown you unconditional love up to this point? Maybe the love they have shown you every other day before this encounter outweighs the disappointment of today.

James 1:19-20

 (NIV)

My dear brothers and sisters, take note of this: Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to become angry, because human anger does not produce the righteousness that God desires.

We live in an angry culture. We live in a disappointed culture. We are self-focused. We see things through our own lenses and we assume others should see through the same lenses. Maybe we just need to stop expecting so much from each other, or maybe we ought to receive more things with a loving spirit rather than a defensive spirit. Maybe one day a song lyric that needs to be written is, "They say that joy is just love well received." I think I will suggest that to Don Henley the next time I see him. I just hope by changing his lyrics I don't make him mad! That would be really disappointing. 😉

Press Along Weary Pilgrim

I was ironing my clothes the other day, and once I was finished, I unplugged the iron and set it on the end of the ironing board to cool. All of the sudden, the iron let out an audible sigh as it released what steam it was holding back. I thought, "I know, little iron..me too!" That iron had done his job. He was tired, and I got it! Because I tend to think in puns, my mind immediately went back to an old hymn we sang in the church I grew up in: Press Along, Weary Pilgrim. At least I didn't actually say that to the iron, but I did think it!

That little iron had pressed all he wanted to press for a while. Even still, tomorrow I will go to the closet and get out that little iron and plug him back in. I expect that he will heat up and fill with steam, and stand at attention, waiting on my hand to guide him along my wrinkled clothes. There's really no other tool I can use that can serve the same purpose as he does as well as him. Thankfully, he won't complain, and he likely won't refuse to work. He will do his job, pressing on, working to iron the wrinkles out of my clothes so I can go out the door looking and feeling my best.

We all feel like that little iron occasionally. We work at our jobs, we work in and around our homes, we work at keeping our families well fed and nicely clothed. We volunteer in our communities, we help at our schools and serve at our churches. We work at being the right kind of neighbor, the right kind of friend and the right kind of Christian. We work, and work, and work some more. Yet, still it seems our work is never really done.

Much of the work we do seems to go completely unnoticed. A lot of it appears to be unappreciated as well. Sometimes even as hard as we work at something, someone else will tell us it isn't good enough. It's sometimes tempting to just wave the white flag and give up altogether! But like that little iron, no one can do whatever it is that each of us do in quite the same way as we do it. We are all called to our own unique purposes! Just as I reach into the closet to get my iron down for the task ahead and fully expect it to be ready to use, God reaches for us to do His work here on earth. He calls for us to be ready to go!

Because of life's stresses and responsibilities, we are often found running from His reach. Sadly, we don't always see our position as a servant as the blessing it is intended to be. Instead, we do what we have to do with a heart of frustration and irritation, drudging through the day as if we feel cheated in some way to have to serve. We feel resentful that it falls on us to do. We get overwhelmed. We want to be unplugged and left alone on the ironing board to cool!

Even though we obviously need rest too, we are expected to work and to work as diligently and as hard as we can. The bible addresses this, and God has much to say about our attitude in serving as well. He guides us not just about working, but working with a happy heart and not giving up when you tire out:


Romans 12:11 NIV

Never be lacking in zeal, but keep your spiritual fervor, serving the Lord


Mark 10:45 (NIV)

For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many

Collosians 3:23

Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for human masters

2 Chronicles 15:7 (NIV)

But as for you, be strong and do not give up, for your work will be rewarded.

We have to press on, no matter how weary we get. Turn your mind toward God and His purposes for you. Allow yourself to feel honored that God trusts you with responsibilities, and honor Him by doing your very best with them. Ask Him for the steam and fervor you need to get the job done. Ask Him where to serve. Then, press along weary pilgrim, press on!

The Little Boy I Learned to Love: Finding Forgiveness After Sexual Abuse

I don't think he could have known the damage he caused me. I'm not sure it would have stopped him if he had. Pedophiles are obviously not interested in the welfare of their victims.

I was the perfect victim. My dad had been in an accident when I was a child and spent much time in the hospital, which meant Mom was gone a lot too while she stayed with Dad. I was shy, insecure and needy.

I spent a lot of time with my grandmother, and my uncle lived with her. He was the type of man who, when the adults were playing Rook at the kitchen table, took me outside to throw a Frisbee or pass a baseball back and forth. I thought that was great! I always liked being outside, running, playing and climbing (I'm still not a good sitter!). He had studied me enough to know how to connect with me. He told me I was the prettiest of all the nieces, and he pointed out how Mom favored my sister, always taking her side over mine. I thought, "Wow! Finally an adult that can see that Mom likes her more than me!" He bought me little gifts. He made me feel like a princess.

Looking back now, obviously, all the warning signs were there. Remember, though, this was in the 1970s, and back then, we didn't publicly talk about sex. We certainly didn't know what we know now about pedophiles. This was pre-Adam Walsh. This was also a time in our family that we were just trying to survive!

I kept that deep, dark secret for many, many years. I thought I was fine! I had no idea that it had even had an effect on me.

It did. I spent much of my teens and twenties desperately searching for someone who would love me. I put up with almost anything to be loved. I was used and tossed away like yesterday's garbage. I was stuck in a cycle of choosing the wrong guys because I didn't feel valuable enough to have someone treat me with respect, and then was left feeling even less valued after each relationship ended.

When my life changed in a new direction was after the last dead-end relationship finally ended. That night, I asked God to save me..really save me. I had been saved as a young child, and I knew Jesus was in my heart, but at such a young age, I really didn't have anything in my life I desired to be saved from yet. This night, I surrendered. For the first time in my life, I told God I was totally His! I told Him if he would take me, I would trust Him with it all. Maybe I wasn't supposed to meet someone and get married and have babies like I so desperately wanted. Maybe I was supposed to travel as a missionary, or some other line of work for God that would have been suppressed if I were tied down with a husband and kids. I didn't know why I hadn't been able to find what my heart so desired, but on this night I quit asking "why" and started trusting God for His plan for me, whatever that was!

I literally met Dave less than two weeks later. I was actually very rejectful of him because I was so afraid he was a "test"...maybe God was seeing if I really meant what I said? It took me a while to give him a chance, but after 2 years of dating and 25 years of marriage, I can truly say he was sent by God, but not as a test. He was sent to fill my heart's desires, answering all those prayers I prayed for so long in the quiet of the night.

After marrying my Prince Charming, the hard part of putting all the hurt of my past behind me was just beginning. I had never thought about forgiving my uncle. I had buried all that so deeply that I didn't know I needed to. Soon, though, I began to realize how scarred I was emotionally over all I had endured. My hurt also caused Dave a great deal of pain as he felt rejected and unable to help me. For the first time in my life, I felt mad and cheated because of what my uncle had stolen from me! He took my innocence, my trust in men, and ultimately much of my youth away. I was mad!

I had a dream one night that my family was at a reunion at Steel Creek Park. My uncle was there, and in my dream, I completely unleashed on him! I was fighting him and hitting him and thrashing as hard as I could! He just cowered down and took it, and I beat him so badly there was nothing but a little pile of mush left of him, heaped up right there in the park under the swing set. I calmly walked over, knelt down with a spatula and scooped up what was left of him into a pizza box and closed the lid and threw it away. I woke up with a new perspective the next morning: I can't hold all that in anymore. I have to forgive him!

But how? How can I let go of holding him accountable for all he took from me? One day, unexpectedly, the answer came. My cousin had been tracing our family tree, and she sent me a packet with the information about our family and pictures from years ago. The one that got my attention was this one:

The little boy in this picture is my uncle. He was 4 years old in this picture. It just so happened that my middle son was 4 years old at the time...my little blonde baby boy. Oh my goodness..now here in this picture is another perfectly innocent little blonde-haired boy. He was my grandmother's baby son. He wasn't born a pedophile, he was born an innocent little baby. Someone, along the way, hurt him. Someone probably sexually abused him. Somewhere, someone failed him.

My feelings for him suddenly changed. I no longer wanted to scoop his remains into a pizza box and throw him away! The momma in me wanted to scoop him up into my arms and hold him, and protect him from whatever future thing would change him into the man I knew. I often think of my former pastor saying, "Hurt people hurt people." My uncle was hurt. I felt so sorry for that little boy.

We are all hurting. You may not have been molested, but you may have suffered some other form of abuse. Maybe you were exposed to drugs as a child, maybe you were neglected. Maybe you just struggled to survive. Maybe you are holding on to that hurt and resentment.

If that is you tonight, think for a minute about who hurt you. They weren't born a bad person, sin made them act that way. God still loves them, even in their sin. They are still His little boy or little girl. Pray for them, and ask God to convict their hearts of their sin and ask Him to heal their hurting hearts. When your focus changes from how they hurt you to how they have been hurt themselves, you will find that your compassion for them multiplies. Isn't that just how God sees us all? He loves us all, through the good and the bad..His children..His little girls and little boys.

Galatians 4:7 (NIV)

So you are no longer a slave, but God’s child; and since you are his child, God has made you also an heir.

Picture of Love

When someone dies, even a celebrity or public figure that we don't even know personally, there is a trend of replacing our profile pictures on social media to that of the deceased as a way to honor their memories. Even though I think it's nice that people want to show their love and honor those who have passed, every time I see that happen I can't help but wonder why we don't honor them while they are still alive to see it themselves?

Can you imagine the feeling of opening up your Facebook one morning and everyone you know has changed their pictures to a photo of you? What if their posts that day were a story of how loved you are and how much they admire you and need you in their lives?

Too often, we humans don't even give much thought to the important people we do life with. Maybe it's our nature to think they'll always be there, maybe it's because we would be uncomfortable sharing our feelings publicly about that person, or maybe it's just because we are just plain selfish and we truly don't think much about them because we are so focused on us!

Now, I get that it would really freak you out to see your picture flood Facebook while you are still alive! If I looked at Facebook and saw my picture and a post about me pop up on everyone's page at once, I would probably think for a minute that maybe I had died and just didn't know it yet! But why don't we make a conscience effort, not just on social media but in real life, to tell those we love how important they are to us? Why do we often not realize how we need them until they are gone?

My parents are in the final years of their lives. Both are in poor health and my dad was recently diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. I don't know how much longer I have to tell them and to show them that I love them, but I want to make sure that I never miss the opportunity to say how I feel while I still can. I want them to know they are not alone in their suffering. I want them to know I value them and appreciate them. I want nothing to be left unsaid, and I sure don't want to leave things I should be doing for them undone.

You don't have to be old or even be sick to die. We have also had young friends and relatives who have died recently. I always wonder when I hear of one of these unexpected deaths what that person's loved ones said to them the last time they spoke. I wonder if they had known it would be the last time they would have to speak to the person they love if they would have said or done something differently.

Honestly, I think most people would wish they had another chance to make sure that person knew how deeply they were loved, even if they regularly spoke it and showed it already. I think at the moment the news came that their loved one was gone, most people would immediately wish they hadn't worried so much about some of the frivolous things we tend to focus on. I think most would immediately wish they had a do-over.

Find someone you love and vow to honor them today, while they can see it! Show up unexpectedly with a special treat, send a card, or give them a call. Tell them how important they are to you. Remind them that they are cherished. Change your profile picture to a picture of them! Love them today like there's no tomorrow!

Romans 12:10 (NIV)

Be devoted to one another in love. Honor one another above yourselves.

Are You Raising the Next Billy Graham?

I was just talking with a friend who is making a bold move of faith. She is quitting her job!

As an occupational therapist, that's giving up a significant part of her family's income. Why would she do this after so many years of college to prepare her for working in her field of study? Why would she be willing to cut finances so drastically after proving herself in the workplace for all these years? The answer can be found in one word: motherhood!

Nothing changes your life like a baby. For the first time in your life, you have to be completely responsible for another human's survival..a tiny human who can't do anything for his or herself. That in itself is quite a daunting task, but what many don't realize is our job doesn't stop at just keeping them alive. We are shaping the next generation when we raise our children. We are their primary spiritual leaders, and that may be the most important title we ever own.

I recently watched an interview with Billy Graham's mother that was taped many years ago. She was a strong Christian leader, and by all accounts had raised her children first and foremost to love The Lord. But did she know she was raising "The" Billy Graham? Maybe the most influential and long-standing spiritual leader of the generation, standing beside presidents and dignitaries from all over the world?

I'm in no position to answer what God may have revealed to Mrs. Graham all those years ago, but what if she had not trained Billy for what he might do for this world and for God's Kingdom? What if she had never led him to seek God's word in a trial, or to pray about his life's path? What if Mrs. Graham had just simply provided a home and nice things to her children, and maybe even love and attention as well, but no spiritual leadership and no example of faith?

Billy's testimony doesn't just speak of how God used him. His children are all involved in ministry, as well as some of his grandchildren. Just think how many people have been touched by these generations of leaders! I can't imagine how many souls are in Heaven today at the feet of Jesus Himself because of this family and their faithfulness.

Billy Graham's mother may not be where it all started. Her mother or father and their mothers or fathers may have led them to The Truth so that they could lead their young to Christ. Each person who invested into the other has a hand in Billy's ministry, and a part of each soul who was saved because of it. Our spiritual leadership over our children will have repercussions for generations to come as well.

In my own opinion, I bet Mrs. Graham never knew how instrumental Billy would be in this world for God. I bet she was an ordinary mom, like me and you, who simply made choices for her family in obedience to God Himself. That's where it starts, and then God does the rest.

I'm proud of my friend's leap of faith in being obedient to what God has called her to. I am excited to see how God will bless her family, and I have no doubt her little baby boy will be better because she is leading him on this journey. Who knows, she may be raising the next Billy Graham.

Deuteronomy (NIV) 6:6-7

These commandments that I give you today are to be on your hearts. Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up.

3 John 1:4 (NIV)

I have no greater joy than to hear that my children are walking in the truth.

From the Gold Years to the Golden Years: Sandra Taylor Guy

As I get older, I tend to think more about age than I once did. In our twenties and even thirties, old age seems so far away it seems irrelevant. By our forties, we begin noticing some slight changes in how well your body performs, but it's not a significant enough difference to interfere with daily life so it's easy to ignore. I am now in my fifties, and I am noticing even more changes that make life slightly more difficult, still. Contrary to Yukon Cornelius's famous line in the classic Christmas movie Rudolph, Bumbles don't bounce! We break smack-dab in two!

At 51, I can still do most things I used to do, but now I hurt things when I do them. Not long ago, I laid in the floor of my van with a vacuum hose cleaning underneath the seats. I was on my side with my head suspended slightly off the floor, looking under the seats as I cleaned.

Fast forward about 2 hours and you'll see me needing one of those neck braces that guy wore on The Brady Bunch when he falsely accused Mike of injuring him in an accident! It took me a couple of weeks to be able to turn my head normally! Fortunately, whatever I did healed on it's own without having to go to the doctor, but I worried I had messed up my neck permanently!

I have a dear friend, Sandra, who I think of as a second mom. She is 76 years old now, and she is one of the most amazing women I have ever had the privilege of knowing. She was a teacher all of her adult life, and she was one of those teachers who genuinely loved her students. Besides being super-smart, she was an amazing athlete. When I was in middle school, she played on softball teams and competed in track events, usually winning the ribbon or trophy. I thought that was pretty crazy because in my mind she was just so old to be doing that! Looking back, she would only have been around 37 years old then!!

She continued to compete all the way into her early 70's, still bringing home the prize most times. She ran track, jumped hurdles, and long jumped. That in itself is amazing enough, but what makes her success even more unique is that for about the last 10 years of her sports "career", she was battling Parkinson's Disease.

Sandra competing in a track event

As her disease progressed, she was forced to give up her love of sports to protect herself from serious injury. I know that had to be devastating for her, because sports were a huge part of her life and how she spent much of her time.

One day we were chatting and she started talking about how hard it is to see yourself age, and how differently you are treated when others see you as "old". She had went somewhere and was trying to talk to someone who sort of brushed her off, like they thought what she was saying was of no value. She said she felt invisible and irrelevant. It broke her heart. She cried while telling me of the encounter. This lady, this smart, amazing, lived-life-to-the-fullest lady, was being treated as though she had nothing to contribute!

After talking to her about that incident, I began noticing how younger people often tend to treat elders, and it turns out this kind of treatment seems fairly common! Even my own kids have made comments like, "that old lady over there..", or, "that old man..", when referring to an elderly person. We always tried to teach them to be respectful of elders, and they really are, but in paying closer attention I realized that most people say those kinds of things without even realizing that the tone in which they say them indicates that they are sort of just a fixture..not equal to the rest of us.

In reflection, I am trying to remember that these elders that we disregard day to day were the core of our society just a few years ago. They raised children, worked jobs, built homes and ran our churches, and most of that generation did it all with very little help or resources given to them. Most of them in our area were raised in very poor homes and got where they are by good old-fashioned hard work.

The older citizens in our community are a wealth of knowledge. They didn't have Google, they didn't have graphing calculators and they certainly didn't have computers to do all the thinking for them! They had to problem-solve and draw from their own life experiences to get things done.

Their bodies may have aged, they may not stand as tall or as confidently as they once did, but their years of experience should be a resource that young people should be seeking to tap into. Don't be fooled by the worn cover on the book. Sandra's body may not be able to run that marathon anymore, but she still possesses the knowledge of not just how to do it,  but how to do it and win the gold!

There is still a lot to be learned from these great people who have "lived it". Look beyond the cover. Therein lies a fascinating tale.

Celebrating her 75th birthday

Leviticus 19:32:

"'Stand up in the presence of the aged, show respect for the elderly and revere your God. I am the LORD."

Proverbs 16:31 NIV:

"Gray hair is a crown of splendor; it is attained in the way of righteousness."

Mama's Left Holding the (Cheese) Bag

I almost had a breakdown today in Wal-Mart over, of all things, a bag of shredded cheese! Last night was our first night without Hagen living with us, and overall, I have been doing pretty well. To be honest, between helping him get things done at his and Emily's new home and my dad being sick, I haven't really had time to process that he has moved on. Truthfully, I am so excited for him that I really hadn't felt sad that he has left us. Maybe it's because I am not a first-timer at losing my babies to adulthood. Grant has been on his own for a year and a half now. Maybe it's because he's 4 years older than Grant was when he moved out. It also probably helps that he's only 5 minutes away from us!

With three growing boys and countless other random boys in our home over the last 22 years, we have always bought a lot of groceries. There was always someone looking at me like I was crazy when they watched me load our usual 6 gallons of milk each week into my cart...to which I would always remark, "It would be cheaper to feed a cow!" Then I added the giant bags of cereal, the industrial-sized bags of chicken nuggets, 2 or 3 cartons of ice cream and enough other random groceries to look like I was feeding a small village! I would always say I have to go pay my Wal-Mart tithe..I might as well have handed them $200 as I walked in the door each week!

As I was wandering around the store today after the cheese incident, I thought about an experience I had many years ago. Dave and I had taken our three little boys to Arby's for lunch after church one Sunday, and we sat down in a booth on the opposite side of the aisle of a middle aged couple. I noticed the woman staring at me. I became very uncomfortable, because every time I looked up, she was eye-locked with me! I even said something to Dave like, "What is her problem?! She is still staring at me!" I managed to ignore her long enough to eat, and then she got up and walked straight over to me.

She apologized for staring at me. She said she noticed that I had opened the ketchup packets and squirted the ketchup onto the sandwich paper for the boys. As soon as she started talking, tears started rolling down her face. "My son doesn't need me to open his ketchup anymore!", she cried. She then went on to explain how her son had recently graduated high school, and she and his dad had finished the entire downstairs of their home for him to live in through college. He was their only son, and they envisioned him living there at least the 4 years he would be in school.

Her son's plans, however, were much different! Just that morning, he had come home and proudly announced that he had joined The Army and was leaving the following day for basic training! He hadn't ever mentioned the military to her before, and she was caught completely off-guard. She was devastated! She couldn't quit crying as she told me how hurt she was and how lost she would be without him. I tried to encourage her as best as I could, but from that perspective of having preschool and elementary aged kids, I just couldn't imagine them one day moving away. I felt so sad for her.

So here I am, all these years later, and I'm standing in Wal-Mart holding a 5 pound bag of cheese when it hits me: we don't need 5 pounds of cheese! We are down to just having Coby, and the three of us can't eat that much cheese before the mold takes over and ruins it. I don't need 5 pounds of cheese!! How can that be?! I held it in, but I could have laid down in the cheese aisle and had a good cry if I had let myself really feel what I was feeling. I decided to wait until I got to the car to let it all go, and fortunately the feeling had passed by the time I actually got there.

I have often wondered what happened to the Arby's lady and her son. I've wondered if he made her proud, and if her grieving lasted a long time or if she quickly learned how to live without him. I wondered what life was like for her on the "other side", where her life role was no longer "mommy". By now she is hopefully also a mother-in-law, grandmother and a completely fulfilled woman, and hopefully by now her son realizes how much he is loved and how blessed he is to have a mom who loves him so deeply.

I'm sure she is like me, she probably misses having him close to her. I really miss the chaos of a house full of boys, and I miss the nights around the dinner table listening to all their stories for the day. I miss the constant sound of music playing and the sounds of laughter coming from down the hall. I miss the basketball games in the driveway and the football games in the front yard. I miss the Saturday night Uno games at the kitchen table. I miss all the "normal" that's changed into mostly quiet and serene, and I miss the comforting feeling of knowing all my babies are safely home for the night.

Change is hard, and this phase of life is changing in many ways all at one time. I'm losing my parents and my babies, and the life I've known for so long..the life I longed for so deeply in my youth is phasing out. There is much to miss.  But I don't miss the grocery bill that went with it all..or the 5 pound bags of cheese. 😉

Isaiah 43:19 

See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the wilderness and streams in the wasteland

There's No Time Like the Present Time

I just left after getting Dad settled back into the hospital. He had a rough day. Actually, he's had a rough year.

I'm not ready to give my dad up just yet. I know God knows best, and I know I'm not the only person who has suffered this pain of seeing someone you love go down. I remind myself daily how fortunate I am that my dad has lived 81 years. He is the toughest man I know! He has suffered countless health crises since all the way back to the 1970s, any one of them which could have ended his life many years ago.

He was in a terrible accident when I was 8 years old that almost took his life. In that wreck, he broke most of his ribs, broke his nose, had a collapsed lung, broke his back and completely crushed his left leg. Since then he's had 13 pulmonary embolisms, a stroke, 5 heart attacks and he's got 10 stents in his arteries and one in his bile duct. He's had pneumonia and pluracy too many times to count, he has had blood sugar levels from 30 all the way to 700. He had several low blood pressure events over the last few months that were 70/30 and even lower. He beat prostate cancer about 5 years ago. He has fought pancreatic cancer the last few months like a beast! Just today, he had an intestinal hemmorage that caused him to lose almost 4 liters of blood. How he was not passed out on the floor, I don't know. He is Superman!

Dad says often that he doesn't understand why God had a brought him through so much. He says he doesn't deserve it. My response to him is always, "Dad, thank God most of us never get what we deserve or we would all be in a bad spot!"

My dad may not be a perfect man, but to me, he's the best dad in the world. He "gets" me. (Not many people do!!) He's my Golden Corral buddy, my sentence-finisher, my singing partner and my friend. He's the only dad I will ever have and the only one I've ever wanted. I'm not ready to let him go.

I am thankful for the promise that when my dad's time on this earth is over, I KNOW he will be in Heaven, waiting what will seem to him like the blink of an eye for me to show up, even though my time here without him will seem painfully long. He will be reunited with his mom (my Granny), and many other relatives that have gone on before us. My dad will meet Jesus face to face. The Jesus who knows my dad's struggles here on earth is the same Jesus that has loved him through it all, never giving up on him. He gave Dad the gift of time..time to think, time to pray, time to say what needs to be said, time to love and be loved, time to make sure he is at peace with God...time that many people don't get.

I told Dad today that for whatever time he has left, we are breaking all the rules. If he wants ice cream at midnight, I'm throwing on some flip flops with my pajamas and heading down to get him! If he wants to drive to his hometown of Appalachia, we are loading up and going. Life is short. 81 years isn't that long when you are lying in bed, facing the end, reflecting on life and wishing for more time.

We are not spending the rest of Dad's days thinking about what's to come. We are receiving the gift of today and squeezing everything out of it that we can. When that tomorrow comes, I'm going to thank God for time..for answering my prayers for just a little more time.

Psalm 91:14-16

“Because he loves me,” says the Lord, “I will rescue him; I will protect him, for he acknowledges my name. He will call on me, and I will answer him; I will be with him in trouble, I will deliver him and honor him. With long life I will satisfy him and show him my salvation.”