And in the morning, rising up a great while before day,
he went out, and departed into a solitary place,
and there prayed. Mark 1:35

Jenna from Feminine Farmgirl has put up a challenge for April ~ that of  Self-Control ~ diligence in spending our quiet time with the Lord each morning. Sometimes it is so easy to forgo that quiet time with the King of Kings, especially if we are I am running late, and it is not something that I am proud of.

It is that time when the tone for the day is set, and I carry His message through the day with me. This last month there have been very few days when I have not spent quiet and productive time with our Heavenly Father, as I have needed to call on His strength, guidance and wisdom in all things pertaining to our home and family. Perhaps it is good that He puts us through the difficult and trying times, for it is in those times that we are drawn closer to Him.

This last week has been particularly trying for me, as I have had stitches in my foot, due to dropping a bowl of cat dry food and the bowl smashing. My foot required stitching, and then developed an infection in it, but my friend, Gwenda prayed, claiming God’s promises and His mighty healing power. Guess what ~ the infection is gone!

My husband has been a tower of strength, as he has supervised the children while I have spent my quiet time with God, and this time is just so special. It is truly quiet time with our children studying, and I gain so much more out of the time spent with God, when there are no interruptions. I praise God that I have a husband who helps me to keep my appointment with God each morning and helps to make it special, and I praise Jesus for restoring our fellowship with God, so that we can spend time with Him, hearing His voice, praising Him and spending time in prayer with Him.

Why do we spend time in prayer and meditation with God? Because Jesus set us an example, that’s why!

Malachi 3:3 says: “He will sit as a refiner and purifier of silver.“

This verse puzzled some women in a Bible study and they wondered what this statement meant about the character and nature of God.
One of the women offered to find out the process of refining silver and get back to the group at their next Bible Study.
That week, the woman called a silversmith and made an appointment to watch him at work. She didn’t mention anything about the reason for her interest beyond her curiosity about the process of refining silver.
As she watched the silversmith, he held a piece of silver over the fire and let it heat up. He explained that in refining silver, one needed to hold the silver in the middle of the fire where the flames were hottest as to burn away all the impurities.
The woman thought about God holding us in such a hot spot then she thought again about the verse that says: “He sits as a refiner and purifier of silver.”
She asked the silversmith if it was true that he had to sit there in front of the fire the whole time the silver was being refined.
The man answered that yes, he not only had to sit there holding the silver, but he had to keep his eyes on the silver the entire time it was in the fire.
If the silver was left a moment too long in the flames, it would be destroyed.
The woman was silent for a moment. Then she asked the silversmith, “How do you know when the silver is fully refined?”
He smiled at her and answered, “Oh, that’s easy – when I see my image in it.”
If today you are feeling the heat of the fire, remember that God has His eye on you and will keep watching you until He sees His image in you.

For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known.
1 Corinthians 13:12

John is the kind of guy you love to hate. He is always in a good mood and always has something positive to say.

When someone would ask him how he was doing, he would reply,

‘If I were any better, I would be twins!’

He was a natural motivator.

If an employee was having a bad day, John was there telling the employee how to look on the positive side of the situation.

Seeing this style really made me curious, so one day I went up and asked him, ‘I don’t get it!’

‘You can’t be a positive person all of the time.

I choose the positive side of life.

‘Yeah, right, it’s not that easy,’ I protested.

‘Yes, it is,’ he said.  ’Life is all about choices.

When you cut away all the junk, every situation is a choice.

You choose how you react to situations.  You choose how people affect your mood.

You choose to be in a good mood or bad mood.

The bottom line:  It’s your choice how you live your life.’

I reflected on what he said.  Soon hereafter, I left the Tower Industry to start my own business. We lost touch, but I often thought about him when I made a choice about life instead of reacting to it.

Several years later, I heard that he was involved in a serious accident, falling some 60 feet from a communications tower.

After 18 hours of surgery and weeks of intensive care, he was released from the hospital with rods placed in his back.

I saw him about six months after the accident.

When I asked him how he was, he replied, ‘If I were any better, I’d be twins. Wanna see my scars?’

I declined to see his wounds, but I did ask him what had gone through his mind as the accident took place.

‘The first thing that went through my mind was the well-being of my soon-to-be born daughter,’ he replied. ‘Then, as I lay on the ground, I remembered that I had two choices:

I could choose to live or…I could choose to die.  I chose to live.’

‘Weren’t you scared?  Did you lose consciousness?’  I asked.

He continued, ‘…the paramedics were great.

They kept telling me I was going to be fine.  But when they wheeled me into the ER and I saw the expressions on the faces of the doctors and nurses, I got really scared.  In their eyes, I read ‘he’s a dead man’.  I knew I needed to take action.’

‘What did you do?’ I asked.

‘Well, there was a big burly nurse shouting questions at me, said John. ‘She asked if I was allergic to anything ‘Yes, I replied.’  The doctors and nurses stopped working as they waited for my reply.  I took a deep breath and yelled, ‘Gravity”

Over their laughter, I told them, ‘I am choosing to live.

Operate on me as if I am alive, not dead.’

He lived, thanks to the skill of his doctors, but also because of his amazing attitude….I learned from him that every day we have the choice to live fully.

Attitude, after all, is everything.

Therefore, do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself.  Each day has enough trouble of its own. Matthew 6:34.

After all, today is the tomorrow you worried about yesterday.

The Anzac tradition was established during World War I when the ANZACS landed at Gallipoli in Turkey on 25th April, 1915. This place is now called ANZAC Cove, and there are Dawn services held in Gallipoli each year to commemorate the landing of the ANZACS.

Rosemary was believed to make the memories stronger by the Ancient Greeks, and this idea continues today as people remember those who have died in war. Red Poppies were the first signs of life in northern France and Belgium after World War I, and the poppy has been adopted as a part of the ANZAC tradition, for it shows that the thousands of servicemen and women are not forgotten.

The name “Digger” originated during World War I and is the slang term used for Australian and New Zealand soldiers. The Diggers were especially good at digging tunnels which provided them with shelter from enemy attack.

Another ANZAC tradition is the ANZAC Biscuit, which is made from rolled oats, plain flour, sugar, dessicated coconut, butter, golden syrup, boiling water and bicarbonate of soda. These biscuits were made as a bread substitute for soldiers fighting in hostile conditions, and they kept for a long time. They were very hard, although there are now recipes that make them more palatable and softer on the palate.

The Dawn Service is held at dawn on the 25th April each year, and this has its traditions in routine within the Australian Army even today. The time just before dawn was the time when the enemy was most likely to attack, so the soldiers were woken before dawn so that they could be in position and alert, and this is known as stand-to. It is common for a minute’s silence to be held during these dawn services to reflect on what these brave soldiers did when they fought, and in many cases  died for us, and as a sign of respect.

The Last Post is played during the Dawn services to serve as a tribute to the soldiers who so valiantly gave their lives for us.The Ode (in bold below) is the fourth stanza of the poem, “For the Fallen” which was written by Laurence Binyon in 1914 to honour the many British troops who lost their lives on the Western front of World War I.

For the Fallen

With proud thanksgiving, a mother for her children
England mourns for her dead across the sea,
Flesh of her flesh they were, spirit of her spirit,
Fallen in the cause of the free.

Solemn the drums thrill: Death august and royal
Sings sorrow up into immortal spheres,
There is music in the midst of desolation
And glory that shines upon our tears.

They went with songs to the battle, they were young,
Straight of limb, true of eyes, steady and aglow,
They were staunch to the end against odds uncounted,
They fell with their faces to the foe.

They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old:
Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn
At the going down of the sun and in the morning
We will remember them.

They mingle not with their laughing comrades again,
They sit no more at familiar tables of home,
They have no lot in our labour of the daytime,
They sleep beyond England’s foam.

But where our desires and hopes profound,
Felt as a well-spring that is hidden from sight,
To the innermost heart of their own land they are known
As the stars are known to the night.

As the stars shall be bright when we are dust,
Moving in marches upon the heavenly plain,
As the stars that are stary in the time of our darkness,
To the end, to the end, they remain.

Mary had a little lamb,
His fleece was white as snow,
And everywhere that Mary went,
The Lamb was sure to go.
He followed her to school each day,
‘Twasn’t even in the rule.
He made the children laugh and play,
To see a Lamb at school.
And then the rules all changed one day,
Illegal it became,
To bring the Lamb of God to school,
Or even speak His name.
Everyday got worse and worse,
And days turned into years.
Instead of hearing children laugh,
We heard gunshots and tears.
What must we do to stop the crime,
That’s in our schools today?
Let’s let the Lamb come back to school,
And teach our kids to pray.

Image from here

Curiouser and curiouser – today I went to the physio, and he told me that I have not one disc bulge, but four – ahem, I had thought that this was going to be easy to remedy the disc bulge, but four of them are going to be a trifle more difficult. The posterior (bulging backward) disc bulges that I have are L2, L3 and L5, while the anterior (bulging forward) disc bulge is L4.

At the moment, the physio has given me one exercise – lying face down with three pillows under my tummy. Treatment consists of ultrasound once a week, with hot wheat packs in between to ease the inflammation. On my visit today he said that we will continue on the road that we are on until the muscle pain settles, and then we are going to have to go the opposite way to try and heal the posterior disc bulges.

It seems that when I fell down the cellar steps, I really did a ‘good’ job of hurting my back. Little things, such as putting the nebuliser into the boot of the car bring on intense pain;  it’s not until you I do something, and it causes intense pain that I realise how much damage I have done.

One thing that I do know, and that is that God allows certain illnesses to happen for His glory.

And as Jesus passed by, he saw a man which was blind from his birth.
And his disciples asked him, saying, Master, who did sin, this man, or his parents, that he was born blind?
Jesus answered, Neither hath this man sinned, nor his parents: but that the works of God should be made manifest in him. John 9: 1-3

I need to have a voice of thanksgiving, but this is not easy unless I draw on God’s strength, and then, and only then will He give order and meaning to my life. I need to draw on God’s strength, and know that His grace is sufficient for me. We are told to glory in our infirmities, and that God will use the weaker vessel for His glory – that’s me!

And he said unto me, My grace is sufficient for thee: for my strength is made perfect in weakness. Most gladly therefore will I rather glory in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me. Therefore I take pleasure in infirmities, in reproaches, in necessities, in persecutions, in distresses for Christ’s sake: for when I am weak, then am I strong. 2 Corinthians 12: 9, 10

Lord, I am willing to be used for Your purpose – take me, use me, mould me, shape me to achieve your purposes here on earth! I need to remember that God works all things together for our good, and I need to give Him my thanks, no matter what happens, even if I don’t understand the “why” right now. Trusting God means that I am not drawing on my own understanding, for it is not for me to understand – God is our omniscient (all-knowing) Creator God, and I lay my life in His hands.

Trust in the LORD with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding. Proverbs 3:5

Sometimes, we I as a Christian, ‘say’ things without really thinking through the consequences of what I’m saying, and God says, “Whoa, wait – that’s not what I meant!” Then He goes through all sorts of ways to try and reinforce what He actually did mean.

Yesterday was one of those days, and God made sure that I really knew that the way that I was thinking was wrong, and I find it utterly amazing that God will use several different ways of reinforcing the same idea. Sometimes I wonder if it would be easier for Him to use a brick to get His idea across!

To backstep just a little, I said that I wouldn’t like to be found in creased clothes when Jesus returns, but then one of my dear friends, Ruby said, “We are clothed in the righteousness of Christ. We each must have the wedding garment to enter the marriage feast on that great day!”.

Just to reinforce that point, Amanda came here with the idea of writing almost the same thing. She wrote, “Oh Ruby, you took the words right out of my mouth! I came back to say the very thing you said!!”. Now, as if that isn’t amazing enough, our Bible devotion this morning was all about false hope, and it stated that, “God’s standard of perfection, however, requires a totally sinless life. There’s no way any of us can ever be ‘good enough’. It is only through the sacrifice of the sinless Saviour that we are made righteous. God made Jesus ” who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him” (2 Cor. 5:21).

It is not important what we wear when Jesus returns, for we shall be,

“arrayed in fine linen, clean and white: for the fine linen is the righteousness of saints”. Revelation 19:8

I truly look forward to the day when we shall meet with Jesus, and be arrayed in the fine linen of His righteousness.

Accept the teaching of the world

And hopeless you will be,

But trust in God’s eternal plan

If you want life that’s free. - Branon

There was a Scottish painter named  Smokey Macgregor who was very interested in making a penny where he could, so he often thinned down his paint to make it go a wee bit further.

As it happened, he got away with this for some time, but eventually the Baptist Church decided to do a big restoration job on the outside of one of their biggest buildings..

Smokey put in a bid, and, because his price was so low, he got the job.

So he set about erecting the scaffolding and setting up the planks, and buying the paint and, yes, I am sorry to say, thinning it down with turpentine..

Well, Smokey was up on the scaffolding, painting away, the job nearly completed, when suddenly there was a horrendous clap of thunder, the sky opened, and the rain poured down washing the thinned paint from all over the church and knocking Smokey clear off the scaffold to land on the lawn among the gravestones, surrounded by telltale puddles of the thinned and useless paint..

Smokey was no fool. He knew this was a judgement from the Almighty, so he got down on his knees and cried:

“Oh, God, Oh God, forgive me; what should I do?”

And from the thunder, a mighty voice spoke..

“Repaint! Repaint! And thin no more!”