You know you're a homeschooler when........

............you dream you're having an adventure with characters from a book you read!

Can you guess who?

PIPPI LONGSTOCKING!!!

Good Intentions

I had them.

It is National Poetry Month. I love poetry. I fully intended to post one each and every day.

Then, then, then............

Then I came down with the mother of all colds.

Then Dwayne came down with a nasty infection.

Then our ancient septic system declared itself sick and tired.

All this on top of various and sundry cares, large and small, that have claimed our attention in the past few months. Financial difficulties. Job stresses. Health problems.


This is not to complain, for I know that it is the Lord's will concerning us at this time, and I pray that he will be glorified in it, that we will be strengthened and become more conformed to the image of Christ, and that he will use us to comfort and encourage others. I know many people who are in the midst of one trial or another, all different but equally distressful to those involved.


Jesus said that in this world we will have trouble, but to take heart, for he has overcome the world. I do take heart in those words. I also remember that he was able to look beyond the agonies that he endured on the cross to the joys which lay ahead.


Are we not blessed? I thank God: For Jesus Christ, for my salvation, for my marriage, my husband, and my children, for my family and friends, for the place we worship, for the unity of the body, for my life. For it is in him that I live and move and have my being. He is the reason for my existence. What is my purpose? To glorify God and to enjoy him forever.


There is great joy and peace to be gained in sharing our burdens with one another. I want to encourage anyone reading my blog to place what is on their hearts here so that we can pray for each other and praise the Lord together. Our bodies may decay and grow feeble but we can still exalt his name.

Have you surrendered all to Him? Every aspect of who you are? Every belonging? Every "thing" to which you cling? Not just the things you hold near and dear to your heart......but your pain and sorrow and sufferings as well?

Each morning after we read Scripture and have a devotion, Anna Rose and I recite whatever verses we are memorizing, and then sing a hymn. One we have recently learned is called Take My Life, and Let it Be. Its lyrics were written many years ago by a young girl named Frances Ridley Havergaal whose heart burned with the desire to be used by God to reach others for his kingdom:


Take my life, and let it be consecrated, Lord, to Thee.
Take my moments and my days; let them flow in ceaseless praise
Let them flow in ceaseless praise.


Take my hands, and let them move at the impulse of Thy love.
Take my feet, and let them be swift and beautiful for Thee,
Swift and beautiful for thee.


Take my voice, and let me sing, always, only, for my King.
Take my lips, and let them be filled with messages from Thee,
Filled with messages from Thee.


Take my silver and my gold; not a mite would I withhold.
Take my intellect, and use ev'ry pow'r as Thou shall choose,
Ev'ry pow'r as Thou shall choose.


Take my will, and make it Thine; it shall be no longer mine.
Take my heart, it is Thine own; it shall be Thy royal throne,
It shall be Thy royal throne.


Take my love; my Lord, I pour at Thy feet its treasure-store.
Take my self, and I will be ever, only, all for Thee,
Ever, only, all for Thee.



This is not an eloquent post, no Scripture references, just what is on my mind and heart today. I hope to encourage others by a reminder that even though circumstances may be difficult right now (and difficult may be the understatement of the year) for you, and it may seem that the Lord is distant, remember that he is forever the same, his Word never changes, his promises are unfailing. Pray. Pray. Pray. Read his Word, even if it is just the Psalms. Especially the Psalms. Praise his name. Pray some more. Trust. Be diligent. Be faithful. Be still and wait upon him.

More Blue

I spent most of the day today with some dear friends at an uplifting, but emotionally draining, event called Ladies' Day Apart at a local church. The speaker was Dee Brestin whose theme was The God of All Comfort. I'm exhausted but refreshed, and looking forward to church tomorrow.

And now, today's poetry selection, an original penned by yours truly.

Ahem.

Blue

Blue is the color of the morning dew.

Blue to me is a color true.

Blue is the color of the sky

Where the airplanes always fly.

Blue is the color of the tide

When it is at my very side.

Okay, I sheepishly confess that I wrote that a long time ago.....in Mrs. Akus' first grade class, to be specific. She stapled it to a background of blue construction paper in the shape of a cloud and hung it on the wall. It amazes me that over forty years later I can still remember all that. Just don't ask me what I did yesterday. (Psst....what day was yesterday anyway?)

Speaking of sky and airplanes, here is another selection, one which is much more impressive than my childish attempts at verse:

High Flight

Oh! I have slipped the surly bonds of Earth

And danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings;

Sunward I've climbed, and joined the tumbling mirth

Of sun-split clouds, — and done a hundred things

You have not dreamed of — wheeled and soared and swung

High in the sunlit silence. Hov'ring there,

I've chased the shouting wind along, and flung

My eager craft through footless halls of air. . . .

Up, up the long, delirious burning blue

I've topped the wind-swept heights with easy grace

Where never lark, or ever eagle flew —

And, while with silent, lifting mind I've trod

The high untrespassed sanctity of space,

Put out my hand, and touched the face of God.

— John Gillespie Magee, Jr

Read the story of the brave young pilot who wrote it here.

Memories of Another Blue Sky

i thank You God for most this amazing.......

i thank You God for most this amazing
day:for the leaping greenly spirits of trees
and a blue true dream of sky;and for everything
which is natural which is infinite which is yes

(i who have died am alive again today,
and this is the sun's birthday;this is the birth
day of life and love and wings:and of the gay
great happening illimitably earth)

how should tasting touching hearing seeing
breathing any--lifted from the no
of all nothing--human merely being
doubt unimaginable You?

(now the ears of my ears awake and
now the eyes of my eyes are opened)

e. e. cummings

Once again it is National Poetry Month, and I respectfully doff my chapeau to Carmon at Buried Treasure for the reminder. If you are a poetry lover, and may I suggest that even if you are not, please read the selections she has been posting. She has even invited her readers to share their original poetry. Hm. I don't know if I am that unhibited but I have a whole month in which to work up my nerve. Though I've already missed three days, I'll try and make up for it by posting one each day for the rest of the month of April.



The poem I chose for today was one that came to mind yesterday when we experienced what was probably the closest thing to a real spring day to come along this year after a tremendously long, cold, dreary, wet winter. I stepped outside, inhaled, looked up appreciatively at that bold, blue swath of color, and was immediately jolted back in time. Sixteen years ago this August my husband-to-be and I stood before God and man in a garden that we had planted in my in-laws' back yard. It had been a long, cold, dreary, wet summer that year.....until that special day when the Lord blessed us with a blue true dream of sky. My brother-in-law, Dean - tall of stature and deep of voice - read that poem, and read it well and reverently, and my heart soared as high as the sun. The day was utter perfection, crafted by the hand of God.



To quote a psalm that Anna Rose and I are memorizing:



The heavens declare the glory of God;

the skies proclaim the work of his hands.

Day after day they pour forth speech;

night after night they display knowledge.

There is no speech or language where their voice is not heard.

Their voice goes out to all the earth,

their words to the ends of the world.

--Psalm 19:1-4, NIV



For since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities - his eternal power and divine nature - have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse. --Romans 1:20



how should tasting touching hearing seeing

breathing any--lifted from the no

of all nothing--human merely being

doubt unimaginable You?



Indeed!