New Every Morning

The History Behind this Blog, Part I

My Sweet Doc's eyes dance with delight and boyish mischief. He does not look like a man who is 97-years-old. He bows his head to pray and the familiar voice rumbles deep...like soft distant thunder trumpets the coming rain in drought. Over and over again, I've followed him to the eternal throne of God's grace, my own heart and soul brought to its knees as he prays, "Our Father and our God, Your mercies were new again this morning."

Our family met Dr. E.C. Sheehan and his wife, Louise, when he was 75-years-young. (He slammed us on the racquetball court several times a week in those days.) Because of his influence, I became a published writer in the 1990's. This blog isn't a sudden narcissistic indulgence of my own self-exploration or even an assumption that I have anything to offer. I hope, however, that God will use it in the lives of others the way he has used My Sweet Doc in my life.

After an illness forced me to stop writing for publication in the late 90's, Doc would call me on the phone and simply read back to me something I had written years earlier and sent to him. Then he would say, "God wants to use this in the lives of others. Get it out there." And so Doc, I am finally "getting it out there." I've known this faithful man of God since 1988 and God used him to change my life...in fact he probably saved it.

As a preschooler, I yearned for a grandfather. Storybook pictures of children curled up in a grandfather's lap fascinated me. I wanted one too and frequently upset Joey, the kid across the street when I introduced my imaginary grandfather into our play. My grandfathers died before my birth but my mother knew my desire and suggested we find a substitute. We chose a great uncle, a godly man on the maternal side of the family, Greenwood Worthington. On our next visit with extended family, Mama and I visited him and made known my request. He was delighted to have a new granddaughter and I was so excited. My next trip back was to his funeral a couple of months later. I never searched for another grandfather.

As I grew older, I longed for a close relationship with my daddy but he wasn't spiritually or emotionally equipped for such a relationship. We often butted heads and my relationship with Christ was something he neither appreciated or understood until close to the end of his life. Even after marriage, I longed for a relationship with him. At the time, I told Al that it felt like I had a hole in my heart that would never heal. I was fortunate not to fall into the mistake I've seen other women make...trying to force their husbands into a father figure. I loved being Al's wife and was never tempted to confuse those roles. I sought Christian counsel and was told that because of his advanced age, Daddy would probably never be saved and I needed to forget having a relationship with him.

I continued t pray for Daddy's salvation and came to understand that while I wanted a relationship with him, my greatest concern was that he come to Christ. Most parents do the best they can for their children and in time I was able to forgive him for the rejection I felt and simply love him. I also asked God to fill that hole in my heart that had been there since childhood with a relationship with Him. I began to write in my prayer journal almost daily. As I read through my Bible each year I discovered that my Abba, Father wants a close relationship with His children. The Creator of the Universe wants fellowship with me!

"Hear , O Lord, when I cry with my voice! Have mercy also upon me, and answer me. When You said, 'Seek My face," My heart said to You, 'Your face, LORD, I will seek.' Do not hide Your face from me; Do not turn Your servant away in anger; You have been my help; Do not leave me nor forsake me, O God of my salvation. When my father and mother forsake me, Then the Lord will take care of me" (Psalm 27:7-10 NKJV).

As parents we're to love, support, care for and teach our children the best we're able but God never intended that we meet all their needs. If we could do that, they wouldn't need their Heavenly Father. There would be no reason for my children to come to Christ if I had the ability to give them what only their Heavenly Father can provide. We all have a big hole in our hearts that only He can fill but many try to fill it with another person, a career, money, drugs... the list is endless.

Although I had been a Christian since the third grade, it wasn't until I learned to fill that huge hole in my heart with a relationship that only Christ can give that God brought My Sweet Doc into our lives.  God moved them back to the city where he and Louise met, married, and began their lives together. We met years after I thought I no longer needed or even wanted another earthly father and he became "my father in the gospel." At age 97, My Sweet Doc continues to learn...and to teach me.

Your Walls are Ever Before Me

Today I'm thinking about walls.  There are good walls and bad walls.  Some protect and shield us while others become barriers we must overcome.  God's Word says, "I will not forget you.  See I have inscribed You on the palms of my hands. Your walls are continually before me" (Isaiah 49:16).

God knows our walls and He doesn't sit outside them and chide us that we're trapped behind a barrier where there appears to be no solution.  Instead, He takes the time to come inside and join us "in the fellowship of our suffering" as He shows us the pathway over the wall or how to learn contentment inside those barriers.

Many in our nation are facing long-term unemployment.  Never have I felt more thankful my husband is gainfully employed.  There are many with no marketable skills and others with great talent that were laid off and continue to search for a job.  Walls.

One of the most painful walls is loneliness.  Moving to a new city, an illness that isolates, a recent divorce that has split family and friends, or a marriage that is distant and cold after the children have left home.  Few things hurt more than the wall between two people who were once best friends and lovers that is now cold and indifferent. 

My cousin's husband recently went to be with the Lord.  God called his name one Friday night while he was sitting at his desk working and today there is the wall of death that separates all of us who love him from our daily lives.  We have beautiful memories and evidence of a life lived well by a godly man who cherished his wife, sons, and family.  A man who loved God fervently and gave his life in service to others. In our minds he was taken too soon but we trust in the wisdom of God's love, even when we do not understand it.  He is now with our Heavenly Father and even though we are not with him, in heaven there are no more walls.  He is now among that "Great cloud of witnesses, cheering on those of us who are still here and remain in the faith."  One day there will be no more walls for the person who loves God and has Christ as his Lord and Savior.  Those who are in heaven and have gone before us are cheering us on and praying that we remain faithful.

So, what do we do with those walls on this side of heaven?  It depends on the wall and its purpose.  I have a cat named Simon.  Simon loves our little granddaughter but he enjoys her much of the time from a safe distance.  She pets him and then when he's had enough, he slips away and hides.  She returns home to her parents but it is only when Al and I have retired to our bedroom that Simon begins to truly miss her.  From up the hall in front of her room we hear cat wails.  He sounds like someone is standing on his tail and he's screaming but it is a strange scream.  He sounds like he's gagged.  The first time it happened I was frightened he might be choking on something and ran to rescue him.  What I find is always a surprise and always the same.  Simon misses his playmate and he is mourning that she's left and so he goes into her bedroom and retrieves her toys and carries them around like a mama kitty with her young.  In the beginning it was a little pillow with a bunny cross-stitched on it that he always picked up and carried.  More recently, it is her very first doll that I bought for her right after she was born.  Simon goes into her room and carries the doll into our room.  Crying and howling all the way down the hallway.  Then he carefully places his "baby" beside our bed and curls up around it.

 

If he can't have our granddaughter, he'll hold on to evidence she'll come back to him.   Simon has learned that he can't just sit and wait for the barrier between he and our granddaughter to go away.  Even when a wall is a barrier, there is activity behind it. He searches out our other cat Salli, and they wait together. Like Simon, we are not to wait behind our walls alone and our wait is an active wait.

And while we wait, God waits with us.  Simon carries around a little doll to remind him that our granddaughter will return to him.  God inscribes us on the palms of his hands. Our names and faces were put there with nails by Roman soldiers as they nailed Christ to the cross.  It was Christ's love for us that marked his hands with our image and He will never forget us.  He sees each wall and each barrier we face.  Invite Him to join you as you wait - together.  Your walls are always before Him and He waits WITH you.  You can count on it. There are others who wait with you as well. "His mercy is new for you again this morning.  Great is His faithfulness."