Bags, Baseball Bats and Potholes
Greetings sisters in Christ!
Praise God for another day, I pray yours was joyous in the Lord? This morning I hand washed some clothes and we ran some errands. Since we've been back at the Missouri homestead I've had a bit of a mess going on with various projects in different stages but I'm hoping to get them finished up soon.
As I was cleaning out the note app on my phone I came across a memo that I was going to share with you when we were on the road. We'd traveled thousands of miles last year and saw many different cultures in this one big country, some of which were a bit unnerving. Add to that the fact that when you are unfamiliar with a culture, it can cause 'culture shock' :-) until you get used to it or at least somewhat familiarized with it. Then, when you go from one culture to another in short periods of time it can be overwhelming. There were a few times brother Jim and I were commenting on the various types of cultures and how we don't normally see them in the midwest...until we got back here.
We hit the border of Missouri and were feeling a bit more normalized because we are more familiar with the territory and culture even though it was an area of the state we had never been. The town we were parking in was pretty busy because right off the interstate but seemed like a relatively safe looking town. We went to the marketplace that evening to go fishing and work online and praise God there was witnessing opportunities! At one point brother Jim went out to the van for something an when he came back in he shared with me that he saw a ?homeless? man carrying a bag...
...talking to himself and carrying a baseball bat.
I'm sure some of you already figured out that a homeless man, talking to himself, carrying a baseball bat through town is not a good thing. I won't lie and admit that it put me on edge just a little bit and I took back those thoughts I had that made me think that the cultures I'm used to are better than some of the other cultures because I was just proven wrong.
Needless to say there were no issues that evening while we stayed there and in fact, it was a very peaceful and quiet night.
I'm sharing this because our experiences and and what we are used to can make us comfortable and in that, we can let down our guard. I allowed myself to become a bit more comfortable once we were back in somewhat familiar territory but was jolted to reality through events such as this. As believers we should never become comfortable because letting down our guard could mean a matter of life or death, literally. We must always watch...
Watch and pray, that ye enter not into temptation: the spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak.
Matthew 26:41
You may feel like you can let your guard down when you're around certain people or even if you don't let it down, those people might wear it down and you can become weak. You may feel that when your life is going good you can allow yourself to become comfortable and when troubles come you are not strong enough to deal with them right away and they cause turmoil in your life.
Stand strong in the Word with one of my favorite verses:
Finally, my brethren, be strong in the Lord, and in the power of his might.
Ephesians 6:10
Keep on that armor!
On another note, you might appreciate this...
I've shared how there are many gravel roads in this state and some are challenging (to say the least) to drive on.
I will leave you with another picture of God's creation that I saw today while washing clothes.
One vibrant little flower nestled in the rocks, all by itself, standing strong. Let that be us sisters.
Peace to you.
Love in Christ,
Sister Deb
Praise God for another day, I pray yours was joyous in the Lord? This morning I hand washed some clothes and we ran some errands. Since we've been back at the Missouri homestead I've had a bit of a mess going on with various projects in different stages but I'm hoping to get them finished up soon.
As I was cleaning out the note app on my phone I came across a memo that I was going to share with you when we were on the road. We'd traveled thousands of miles last year and saw many different cultures in this one big country, some of which were a bit unnerving. Add to that the fact that when you are unfamiliar with a culture, it can cause 'culture shock' :-) until you get used to it or at least somewhat familiarized with it. Then, when you go from one culture to another in short periods of time it can be overwhelming. There were a few times brother Jim and I were commenting on the various types of cultures and how we don't normally see them in the midwest...until we got back here.
We hit the border of Missouri and were feeling a bit more normalized because we are more familiar with the territory and culture even though it was an area of the state we had never been. The town we were parking in was pretty busy because right off the interstate but seemed like a relatively safe looking town. We went to the marketplace that evening to go fishing and work online and praise God there was witnessing opportunities! At one point brother Jim went out to the van for something an when he came back in he shared with me that he saw a ?homeless? man carrying a bag...
...talking to himself and carrying a baseball bat.
I'm sure some of you already figured out that a homeless man, talking to himself, carrying a baseball bat through town is not a good thing. I won't lie and admit that it put me on edge just a little bit and I took back those thoughts I had that made me think that the cultures I'm used to are better than some of the other cultures because I was just proven wrong.
Needless to say there were no issues that evening while we stayed there and in fact, it was a very peaceful and quiet night.
I'm sharing this because our experiences and and what we are used to can make us comfortable and in that, we can let down our guard. I allowed myself to become a bit more comfortable once we were back in somewhat familiar territory but was jolted to reality through events such as this. As believers we should never become comfortable because letting down our guard could mean a matter of life or death, literally. We must always watch...
Watch and pray, that ye enter not into temptation: the spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak.
Matthew 26:41
You may feel like you can let your guard down when you're around certain people or even if you don't let it down, those people might wear it down and you can become weak. You may feel that when your life is going good you can allow yourself to become comfortable and when troubles come you are not strong enough to deal with them right away and they cause turmoil in your life.
Stand strong in the Word with one of my favorite verses:
Finally, my brethren, be strong in the Lord, and in the power of his might.
Ephesians 6:10
Keep on that armor!
On another note, you might appreciate this...
I've shared how there are many gravel roads in this state and some are challenging (to say the least) to drive on.
Most of the roads we travel on are paved like normal but some of the side roads (like this one going to the awesome dent and bent that we like) can be tricky to navigate.
And with a big van like ours, brother Jim has to work
our way through it like a mine field :-)
Finally at the end....and even bigger potholes!
You can't see the depth but they are at least
10" to a foot deep!
And just for fun I made a quick video...
One vibrant little flower nestled in the rocks, all by itself, standing strong. Let that be us sisters.
Peace to you.
Love in Christ,
Sister Deb
The biblical gospel...