CROSSES

My favorite time of the year is again almost here!  Yes, Easter is one week away.  The blessing of the week before Easter begins tomorrow.  How I love Easter and what it represents in the most important area of MY life and the lives of other believers in my Lord and Savior!

Because of a youth Sunday tomorrow and Easter the next Sunday, I had my Easter lessons with my little two and three year old Sunday School kids during the last two weeks.  I struggled a bit as I tried to think of how to explain to little minds the wonder of the cross and the joy of the resurrection.  I mean, really some days my mind can't comprehend such love.  How was I to explain to these young ones?

As the cross lesson began that particular Sunday, I explained shortly (everything with twos and threes is short).  Then one of the little ones piped in, "There's a cross on top of the church."  Well duh, of course there is....where was my mind?  The Lord set off a light bulb as it occurred to me the cross was a simple lesson.   I simply knew just to tell them that EVERY time they see a cross, think Jesus.  Every time.  I then took the children on a "tour" of sorts of the outdoors and indoors and we found crosses.  For every one we found, I asked them what it meant.  They learned and said, "Jesus".  Jesus.  JESUS.

You can imagine my delight the next Sunday when we arrived in class.  One of the children picked up the foam cross on the table, the other one said, "Jesus."  Yep, I was pleased but more than that, I know that my Lord was pleased.  Maybe those little ones "got" it enough to relate the cross and Jesus.  As they grow and come to the age of accepting Christ as Savior, I have faith they will know more about Him.

With tomorrow being Palm Sunday, I again encourage you, my blog readers, to take God's Word every day and read what happened as the week led up to crucifixion and resurrection.  If you like, you can revisit my  blog entry group for May 22, 2013 (My Favorite Time of the Year) daily through April 1, 2013 (Up) and last year's April 12, 2014 (Rejoice) for the week's scripture list.

Enjoy the spring and the sunshine.  More than that, watch for those crosses everywhere and enjoy the celebration of the Jesus and the RESURRECTION!  

REMEMBER

"remember":  to recall to the mind an act or effort of memory, to retain in the memory, keep in mind, remain aware of....

Uh huh, that's what it means and uh huh, as I age, the remembering process becomes a bit harder.  The past couple of weeks or so has caused me to consider the importance of remembering.  In my Beth Moore "Believing God" Bible study that I can happily say I have been doing every single day for the past weeks, the last few days have been on remembering life, God, His works, and His goodness.  It's been a good Bible study that has opened my eyes to many things.

In fact, it was one of those Godstops for me when I studied the session on my life and it's happenings between the ages of birth to twelve years of age.  I visited revival this past Sunday night at the church where I was saved as a child....the place where my walk with the Lord officially began....and I was blessed as I sat there and remembered that time.  Odd that it was 50 years ago that walk began and that I was there on the first night of their spring revival, just as my salvation began 50 years ago on the first night of their spring revival?  I think not odd at all, but God sent so I could be blessed by remembering.

For the past couple of weeks or so, I just haven't felt so perky.  Fatigue and such have been present.  One seems to just get accustomed to it but as I think back, it's been much more prevalent.  Even before I went to Sunday night's revival, I took a three hour nap.  Physically, I just didn't feel good somehow.  The next day I still didn't feel perky.  In fact for the first time ever as I stood for a couple of minutes watching something on my kitchen TV, I had the thought of being so very sleepy.  The next thing I knew, I was catching myself as I began to fall asleep and topple over.  Uh huh.  Standing straight up.

I won't bore you with the specific details but  later that night after testing and finding high blood pressures, I found myself at urgent care as I just felt something was not quite right.  Let me tell you, when one goes to urgent care and the complaints are that my blood pressure is too high for my norm, my heart rate is too fast for my norm, and I don't "feel quite right', this particular urgent care's doctor will look at you like you are not so smart and wasting their time.  Really.  Seems that doctor's attitude changed when she brought in the result of the EKG and said, "Don't be upset but this shows you might have had or are having a posterior infarction."  Okay, I'm smarter than she thinks and reply, "A heart attack?"  To which she (in a kinder attitude) says, "Yes."  She then instructs me that I will need to go somewhere else to have more testing that she is not equipped for....she's urgent care and not a cardiac unit.  I ask if that means next week, or tomorrow, or now....she replies, "Now. Can I call an ambulance for you?"  Still at that point I am not upset, thankfully.  If one is have an infarction, being upset doesn't help.  The Husband is sitting there quietly in his mask (his cold is horrible but he's a great husband).   I reply that he can drive me.  She gets four baby aspirin and instructs me to take them all at once, then we head to the local hospital south.

When I got in the car, I thought, "Man God, I hope you're not done with me.  I've not been as good as I could but I'm willing to keep on trying if you'll give me that opportunity.  Plus, my carport's not clean yet."  (Joke around here is that I've asked the Lord to let me get everything cleaned up and out before he takes me so my family don't have to mess with it.  The Husband says don't worry about it and don't be in a hurry.  Guess he likes me around.)  As The Husband drove quickly, I found myself calmed as I knew that the Lord had this in control.

I'll condense here.  You probably would enjoy the whole story but it would be long.  The hospital south took me in immediately when I handed them the EKG results.  I was admitted to the hospital for observation finally in a real room at l:30 a.m.  I did send The Girl and The Son-In-Law home at midnight when I knew I was staying.  They insisted on coming so the four of us enjoyed each other's company in that small ER room for a few hours.  (I told the nurse they could not sit in the germ filled waiting area.  He agreed.)   The next morning after a nuclear stress test, numerous enzyme labs, and other testing that showed no posterior infarction and  happily no infarction at all, I was released around lunchtime.  I had slept only half an hour, The Husband had came home and slept only about two hours so we were totally zonked and in bed early last night.  It will take us old folks a night or two to catch back up.

Yes, the blood pressure remains high for some unknown reason and I am increasing medicines and the heart rate remains high as well but I will continue to monitor and pay a lot of attention to my lifestyle, stress level, and diet.  I see a bit more rest in my future which I shouldn't argue about.   I was glad I had lost over forty pounds, can't imagine being that much heavier and being in the hospital with a possible infarction.  And yes, I will continue to pay attention to the feelings of "not quite right" even when I can't explain.  As my family doctor said it is good that angina can alert us to blood pressure and heart rate problems.  Now I know to call it angina and I know that those feelings I have had off and on the past few weeks have been angina.  I will remember that and what that feeling means. I hope I don't have it often.

Now to finalize my thoughts on the subject of remembering.  As I lay in that hospital bed in the emergency room, I was praying and remembering scriptures that had been brought to my mind.  Scriptures such as "...when I am weak, He is strong...".  Scriptures like "My God will supply all your need...".  One of my favorites "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid...the Lord thy God is with thee whithersoever thou goest" and so many more.  As I lay in my observation room bed in the quiet of the 3:30 a.m. hour, I found myself wishing I had my Bible.  No there was not one in that room.  I looked.  I promised right then, I would do even more Bible study so I can have more of these precious promises in my mind and heart.  I used my remembering and thought of the hour earlier when the non-English nurse was asking those personal questions as I was lying there and she was typing answers in her computer.  She asked me if I had a "religion".  Without hesitation, I so happily told her that I have a Lord and Savior Jesus Christ who I love more than any other.   She, at first, sat there a minute, then she smiled a slight smile and kept typing.  The answer obviously was enough.  I found my heart, infarction or not, so thrilled the He is with me!  And that Lord and Savior Jesus Christ is ALWAYS enough.  Oh how I love HIM!  I will forever REMEMBER that!

You can join me as we all say, "AMEN"!