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Little Things Mean a Lot

10 Jun

My Take

 DiVoran Lites

Author, Poet and Artist

One of our adult Sunday School teachers happened to mention the other day he was sitting in the open door of his garage looking out and talking to God when a neighbor going by on her bike stopped to ask if he would fill her water bottle. He gave her a new one. He has done that before.

Every Sunday I see a man all dressed up in his black suit with his Bible in his hand waiting for a ride to church. He stands as straight as a soldier and I admire his faithfulness and that of the person who picks him up, sometimes after we have gone by. They don’t go to our church.

Funny what happens when you do only one little thing over and over. Your good deeds add up.

A woman in my class is a red-hat lady and she loves thrift store sales. You wouldn’t believe the bags of children’s clothes she finds in perfect condition for little or nothing. She brings them to church for families who can’t afford a lot of clothes for growing children.

Our other Sunday School teacher works at the hospital as a volunteer to take people to their cars in wheel-chairs. He’s a father himself and he gets a big kick out of being around teenagers who volunteer for the same job. What a precious counselor I’m sure he is.

I know someone who goes to the home of her aged mother-in-law where other members of the family care diligently for her and bathes her twice a week. She makes it special with soaps, and powders and takes supper for both of them that evening.

We hear so much about movers and shakers, about heroes, and heads of charities, but we don’t hear that much about the little people doing the little deeds many times a year. I’d like to celebrate them, wouldn’t you?

The song, “Little Things Mean a Lot,” is a love song, and why not. We show love with our small, faithful, routine deeds. Maybe we’ll discover that they pile up and if we could see the accumulation of them or the way they have changed people’s lives, we’ll be surprised. Won’t that be encouraging?

dog

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Say What?

3 Jun

My Take

 DiVoran Lites

Author, Poet and Artist

We celebrate Alexander Graham Bell’s invention, the telephone. in June. I wonder what he said when he tried it out. What would you say if you didn’t think your statement would be going down in history?

I know what my dad would have said. He would have said, “Hot dog!” That’s because, you see, dad liked progress, new things. He paid thirty dollars for his first ball-point pen. That seems excessive in this day and age when you can get them in bulk for nothing much. But he was pleased with his pen because he came up in the days when the only common writing instruments were a pencil or a dip nib pen in a holder. He had some trouble in school because he so much wanted to live out of doors working with his hands. A dip pen could make a big mess, for which a kid would get into trouble. After that came fountain pens and they were better, but tedious and messy, too. They often leaked. So a ballpoint pen was a miracle to dad. They had refills back in those days, too.

His mother, my grandmother, was in favor of progress too. She didn’t believe in looking back and talking about the past. She didn’t tell stories or her childhood and young adulthood.

Grandmother loved the telephone. She talked for about an hour every day with her best friend who lived in the same town and whom she saw frequently. When she got her first T. V. she made everyone watch the commercials because it was only right. After all hadn’t those people paid for the shows?

We all love technology and we have different ways of relating to it. Now would you like to know what Alexander Graham Bell Actually said? Here it is as recorded probably by a newspaper man.

“Mr. Watson come here, I want to see you.”

I’ll bet Alexander Graham Bell had no idea that we’d still be looking up his words 138 years later or he would have said something profound.. After thinking it over, I’ve decided I would have said. “Can you hear me? Can you hear me now?” Makes sense. In case you don’t have anything else to think about—I wonder, what might you have said?

First phone call

First phone call

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Timepieces

27 May

My Take

DiVoran Lites

Author, Poet and Artist

I received my first watch when my maternal grandmother went home. I was seven years old. The watch was beautiful and fragile, and of course it had to be wound. I was as careful as could be, and I had it for what seemed like a long time. I wore it on my left wrist so I could tell my left hand from my right. I thought about Grandmother Mabel every day.

But all that doesn’t explain the reason for my becoming practically obsessed about knowing what time it was. I have a clock or two in every room of the house including the bathroom and on the porch, I have four timers (one on my IPod) and five watches that work. Even I know that is excessive.

I read a book once about a boy in a mental institution who was obsessed with timepieces, but I don’t think I’m as bad as him. No, I more or less just love knowing what time it is and I love the wide variety of time pieces available. If it helps to know…I didn’t plan all this it just snuck up on me.

You’ve head the saying, “The unexamined life is not worth living?”

Well, to me the unscheduled life is full of pitfalls such as: T. V., computer dabbling, novels, eating chocolates, and others signs of enjoyable depravity. I get depressed if I give in to overindulge or get to feeling lonely because I’m not doing something that takes a bit of effort and thought. But that’s just me. You do what you like, it’s your life.

When Bill retired he stopped wearing a watch. He almost gave up looking at clocks, so we sometimes ran a bit late, which of course freaked me. Now I’m adjusting and I can even make myself late if I get absorbed in one of my projects. Maybe I need more timepieces or…maybe I shouldn’t care so much what other people think. I really like my timepieces and they all work. Three need the bands fixed or replaced, but I’ve figured out how to make that happen, at least for one of them.

All my clocks and watches are inexpensive except for the one in the picture. I wouldn’t want a fancy gold or platinum one with real diamonds because I’d have to wear it night and day in order to justify its existence. Variety is, after all the spice of life.

 

clock

 

“Hour by hour I place my days in your hand.”

Psalm 31:15

 

 

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Cloudland

20 May

My Take

DiVoran Lites

Author, Poet and Artist

 

I was telling about Mother playing with us and training our imaginations by showing us how to find dogs, cats, and worlds of imaginary creatures in the clouds.

There’s a lot to be said about clouds, though, and I’m saying more. It occurred to me that electronic devices use Cloud technology and God uses it too, in a manner of speaking.

Have you ever been concerned that you didn’t pray hard enough or long enough about a situation or that you had to constantly remind God of a need or your prayers wouldn’t get answered? Well, my printer set me straight on that one. I realized that all I had to do was hit, click, or press print and the item I wanted would store itself in the printer and, all things being equal, not go away until it was printed. I began to know that God was like that too. He doesn’t forget. In fact, the Bible says He, or Jesus, or The Holy Spirit, or all three pray diligently for us all the time. Yes.

When I was looking at the clouds I took it a step further. I have a computer, an IPod, and a Kindle. I no longer have to worry about having enough Gigas or whatever it was that happened when I first got a computer. All my devices have lots of room and if they run out of room, it can all go to the cloud and be there if I ever need it again. I guess God has enough memory too. And the thought went even further to trying to remember what I need to do, and ideas I have about things I’d like to do or write or whatever, it gets to be a lot, but hey, maybe all that is in God’s cloud too.

I have one technical question. If God can handle all that “stuff” and God lives in me, does that mean that there’s a place in me that keeps it all and that if I need it, He can make it available to me? Hmmm. Experiment time.

Psalm 34:8 Taste and see that the Lord is good.

 

Cloud

 

 

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Dad’s Music

14 May

My Take

DiVoran Lites

Author, Poet and Artist

Dad was tone-deaf and he hated music. He was tone-deaf, couldn’t sing a note, well, a correct note, he did go for: “Mary Ann, Mary Ann, down by the seaside sifting sand,” now and then. His rendering was unique. I can hear it still.

Dad’s mother never played music on a radio. I don’t recall her having a radio, so maybe he got the disability from her. I do know he became angry when I played mine too loud. But doggone it, I loved music, couldn’t get enough of it. I bought the, “Hit Parade,” magazine every week, laid on my bed and sang all the songs to myself until bedtime.

For our bar and restaurant, we had to have a juke box. What a wonderful, magical thing that was, beautiful too. And you know, even though Dad didn’t love music, I suspect that he must have loved his little daughter who delighted in song and dance. Sometimes when we had no customers, he’d give me the key to the jukebox (we called it a jute-box) and let me trip the trigger fifty times in order to play every single record on there. If it were winter the big table would be gone from the 10×10 dining room and I could dance to my heart’s content while Dad loaded bullets in the other room. There were a few songs he did like. I guess it was the words. He liked: “Tumbling Tumbleweeds,” “Smoke, Smoke, Smoke that Cigarette,” and, “I’m Looking Over a Four Leaf Clover.” I wonder how I know that.

Dad liked to load up mom, brother, and me, they called me, Sister, and go down the mountain roads to visit his mother and dad. The scenery made me want to sing, “When it’s Springtime in the Rockies,” and “C. O. L. O. R. A. D. O, (I love you.) quietly to myself. Sometimes I made up songs. I didn’t think anyone could hear me over the hum of the car, but I was wrong. One day my dad was taking Granddad somewhere and Granddad said, “She sure knows a lot of songs.”

“She makes some of them up,” said Dad. How did he know that?

“Well, well,” said Granddad approvingly and I thought, looky there, I’ve done something good.

One year when we took our annual trip with kids to visit Mom and Dad in California Dad had some cassette tapes in a holder on the front seat of his king cab. Of course I read the titles. You’ll never guess in a million years… Believe it or not, they were opera tapes! I hadn’t even learned to like opera myself. When taxed with the incongruity, Dad admitted it. He actually liked to listen to opera tapes driving down the road. Did that mean he missed the little music maker in the back seat? I’d like to think so. “Yep,” says he…”drives your mother crazy.”

I like opera now, too. I’m listening to Pavarotti, as we speak. You hear that, Dad?

 

Dad and I

Dad and I

DiVoran and Pavarotti at Madame Tussaud’s Wax Museum in London, England

 

DiVoran and Pavarotti at Madame Tussaud’s Wax Museum in London, England

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A Mother’s Day Collage

12 May

I put out a request to the contributors to this blog to write anything they wanted to about Mother’s Day. I thought it would be interesting to read how each related to the day and it certainly was, especially since two of our bloggers are sister and brother.

So let’s start our Mother’s Day Collage with a “Match the Mother to Child” game. Enter your answers in comments to win a digital copy of one of DiVoran Lites  or Rebekah Lyn’s books. If we have multiple correct answers we will put your names in a drawing. You may also comment on  Facebook under comments.

Moms and Bloggers

No.6

No.6

No.2

No. 1

No. 5

No. 4

No. 3

No.

No. 8 Blogger

Mother's Day

No.9 Blogger

No. 10 Blogger

No 11 Blogger

No 11 Blogger

No. 7 Blogger

No. 7 Blogger

As an example in comments you would write: 1/7,2/8 etc. Good luck!!

Onisha

We hope you enjoy our Mother’s Day Collage. Choosing what to share brought back such memories and tears too. In her later years my mother told me “you will always miss your mother. I still miss mine” This surprised me since my grandmother had died many years earlier and she only saw her once a year on our family vacations. I understand that ache now. So I decided to share a poem from my mother. The date was 1964 and I was twelve years old

I said a prayer for you today

And Know God must have heard.

I felt the answer in my heart

Although he spoke no word!

I didn’t ask for wealth or fame

(I know you wouldn’t mind)

I asked that he be near you

At the start of each new day,

To grant you health and blessings

And friends to share your ways!

I asked for happiness for you

In all things great and small,

But it was for His loving care

I prayed for most of all.

Bill Lites

Thank You Mother

My mother was such a great influence and inspiration in my life.  She taught me that God loved me and wanted to guide me every step of my life, if I would only ask Him.  She taught me to be a gentleman in every area of my life.  She taught me to learn all the details and to never take anything for granted.  She taught me to always give the other person the benefit of the doubt, and to do to others as I would have them do to me.  She taught me to be observant, to work hard and to be patient with others, and to always be kind and loving.  She taught by example and there was never any question about her love, acceptance and forgiveness toward others and me.

Louise Gibson

                                                    Reflections
                         What does a Mother say to her children
                         At the end of her days-
                         Those she has loved in so many ways?
                         “Oh, what joy I felt in my heart
                         When I was informed that new life had its start!
                                Each of you was a blessing from above-
                        A gift of God, the symbol of love.
                        Each is unique, not one is the same.
                        You are loved for who you are, what you became.
                        Your talents are many-
                        Thank God for each one.
                        They will nurture your being
                        When the day is done.
                        God will supply the strength
                        To face each new day-
                        I will be with you in spirit
                       Every step of the way.”
                        I love you.
                        Mom
                       A quote from Max Lucado:
“God knows that we are only pilgrims and that
eternity is so close that any “Good-bye” is,
in reality, “See you tomorrow”.

THOUGHTS OF MY MOTHER ON MOTHER’S DAY 2013

Judy Wills

How do I describe my Mother?  She was so unique in all her ways.

One of the most unique things is that she met, fell in love with, and married a man who was 20 years older than herself.  And yet, the marriage was one that I hoped to emulate with my marriage.  She created a loving and secure home for her husband and her children.  She was heart-broken when her husband died.

                                    Judy Wills Mother and father

She loved to sing and to play the piano.  She had a great alto voice.  She had a good ear and would just go and sit down at the piano and begin playing.  I’m still frustrated that I can’t remember the names of the songs/hymns she played.  My brother and I tried to remember them, and have them played at her funeral, but neither of us could remember.

She was a good cook.  She made a pot roast that would just melt in your mouth.  And that’s something I’ve never been able to duplicate.  I never learned her technique.  My Dad used to tease her by saying “this meat is no good – it just falls off the bone!”  She made the best cherry pie.  She made home-made peach jam from the peaches in our back yard.

One time, as she and I were sitting in the living room watching TV, we heard a terrible sound!  We both ran to the kitchen – only to find that the pressure cooker had “blown” out the pressure valve and pinto beans were all over the ceiling!  What a mess!

She had the most giving spirit I’ve ever seen.  One morning, early, we were told that the husband of a friend of ours had died.  He was a gun smith.  He was carrying a rifle along his side, tripped over a rock, and essentially blew his head off.  As soon as Mother heard that, she was in the car and over to that house.  Not only did she comfort the widow, but she grabbed rags and bucket and began cleaning off the blood, bone and brains from the side of the house.

Although I suspect she would have loved to be a stay-at-home mom, she worked as an accountant at Kirtland AFB, to make money for “extra” things in our life.  She bought a new piano for our house.  But one of the best things about her working there, was that she would find young military personnel – usually men – who were away from home and homesick, and bring them to church with us on a Sunday, then home to Sunday dinner.  She kept in contact with many of them throughout her time there.  One time she broke her ankle and couldn’t climb the steps to her office upstairs.  The officials were so insistent that she not “retire” that they placed a desk and lamp under the stairway just for her.  They really liked her work.

                                                         Judy Wills mother

When my Dad retired and money was tight, Mother bought a Merle Norman Cosmetic Studio, trained for the job, and set to work.  She had a really good, strong work ethic.

Judy Wills Mother

5

Oh my………so many more memories, but these fill my heart and mind.

I miss her still.

May 12, 2013, My Fifty-First Mother’s Day

DiVoran Lites

“Mom, how do you feel?”

“Fine.”

“But really, How are you doing?”

“Divine:”

My hair is gray, my socks fall down,

And I’m not going out of town,

And I must say, I forget some things,

But what matters is: my heart has wings.

I hope you enjoyed reading out Mother’s Day collage. We all view our mothers and Mother’s Day with  our own unique perspective and  I love that.

For those who read to the bottom, here is a clue. There is one more picture than there are bloggers! Don’t forget to write your matches in comments here or on the Facebook post.

Happy Mothers Day

 

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A Handwritten Note

6 May

My Take

DiVoran Lites

Photo by Melody Hendrix

Photo by Melody Hendrix

When I was younger, I decided not to fall into the trap so many older people live in, with several dates a month marked for the purpose of going to the doctor. However, you know what Robert Burns said, “The best laid plans of mice and men gang aft aglay.” Last week I visited three doctors with a member of the family in two days and this week, for various reasons I will have been in waiting rooms every day except Monday and Wednesday (twice on Thursday).

I get tired of passive things like reading, listening to audio stories, watching TV. (I never do that anyway), but I don’t knit or crochet, so I’m coming up with a new plan. I will take a small packet of paper; pens, maybe watercolor crayons and either write notes or draw a bit.

Emails are a big thing now, but writing notes and letters on paper has been part of my life since I was a child and I still get the urge to do it when I’m waiting. Mother and I wrote to each other every week. I still have all her letters and she kept mine up to her last days. When I was twelve and moved away, my best friend and I wrote each other every day. Recently, we wrote our schooldays memoirs together, but that was by computer. Out of habit, I hurry to the mailbox every day expecting something, but usually it contains only commercial mail, so I take that in, sort it out, and throw most of it away.

On my last run to the SPCA store, I got a thin book that reminds me of Alexander Stoddard’s beautiful, Gift of a Letter. It’s called, The Art of the Handwritten Note, this one by Margaret Shepherd.

Realizing how happy it made me to read another book about the subject, I realized I missed writing and receiving handwritten notes more than I knew and decided there was no reason not to take it up again.

Ms. Shepherd says, “Writing by hand makes you look good on paper and feel good inside. Even an ordinary handwritten note is better than the best email, and a good handwritten note on the right occasion is a work of art.”

One thing I’ve always loved about notes is that you can save them and re-read them. I know you can do that with emails, and I do have a file, but for some reason, once they’re out of sight, I never take the time to look at them.

“Art Has Always Survived Technology,” says Margaret Shepherd. I agree. It takes about a minute to write a note, so I’ve put a small pad of paper in my purse and some cards in the door pocket of my car. Last Tuesday I wrote a note to my son, (who, because he lives in another town, always sends a handwritten note on birthdays and mother’s days) and one to our pastor’s wife who did my family a big favor. She is also a card-sender and note writer, so it was a pleasure.

Don’t get me wrong I like to get emails, and I enjoy writing them. It isn’t one or the other, for me, but both. It’s something I’ve missed for many years. Are you missing it too?

Handwritten note copy

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Announcing…..Living Spring

29 Apr

My Take

DiVoran Lites

Photo by Melodie Hendrix

Photo by Melodie Hendrix

My neighbor came over yesterday to return something. Since I was about to get in the car, we stood in the driveway for a minute to talk. She had finished reading my newest book in the Florida Springs Trilogy, Living Spring wanted to tell me how much she liked it. She said what she said when she read the first book, Sacred Spring. “Living Spring is a wonderful book, it kept my interest the whole way through, when is the next one coming out?” This is a smart and successful person and not one who is inclined to flatter or gush. I was pleased with her report.. Truly all my readers are intelligent and discerning. I’m so glad they like my novels.

I’ll tell you a teensy secret, though perhaps I shouldn’t…I was a tad worried about my new baby, Living Spring. Even though I love the characters, the setting, and the plot, I wasn’t quite ready to turn loose of it for publication.

When I told Onisha what I’ve told you, she said, “Your niggling feeling about turning loose of it may mean, Living Spring is one of your best books.” Now, I understand that it was because I would miss working on Living Spring that I didn’t want to let go of it. Now, I’m on to Clear Spring, the third book in the trilogy, so all is well.

When Bill, Billy (our son) and I were having lunch at Tibby’s New Orleans style restaurant in Winter Park, I told our son about my doubts and how they have been overcome by good reports. He who is the father of two perfect (to me) college age kids, said, “Is Living Spring better than Sacred Spring?”

My answer was: “I don’t really want to know or think about that.”

”Why?” says he. Why has been his favorite word since he learned to talk. He’s a biologist now and since he has the inside scoop on nature, he is my chief source for questions about plants, animals, land, and water. We have a lot of lovely scenes and encounters in our Florida Spring trilogy, along with real love stories and a bit of suspense.

How do I explain to our inquisitive son that I don’t want to compare the two books? Aha, I ask him this: “Is your daughter better than your son or your son better than your daughter?”

“I see what you mean,” says he. “But it’s not the same thing, your books aren’t your children.”

“Oh, yes they are,” his father and I say in unison. “Or anyway they’re the next best thing.”

What do you, blog reader and friend have to say about all this? I hope you’ll say with the neighbor, “It was wonderful, it held my interest all the way through, when is the next one coming out?” I can’t ask for more than that.

Sacred Spring is available exclusively from Amazon right now, for Kindle or in paperback, but that will soon change and you’ll be able to get it, as you now can now get, Living Spring, from Amazon, Barnes & Noble and Smashwords. In case you don’t know what Smashwords is, it’s an eReader service that can sell you the books in any format to fit any eReader or device.

Please buy Sacred Spring, and Living Spring in whichever format you prefer and let us know what you think on our blog comments or my Face Book page. We’ll soon have a website up and running, too, for Rebekah Lyn Books, a new Christian publisher who will take the world by storm. Her first book is Summer Storms, and she has two more after that. Look her up, you’ll like her.

In Living Spring, Jean Schaefer, sister of Hank, has suffered from overwhelming anxiety for the past four years due to the death of their parents and an entanglement with her child’s father which ended in a shocking rejection. She contracts for an original settler’s house in the woods near, “Living Spring,” hoping to use the renovation process as therapy. She must now learn to live in new ways and begin to allow people into her life again. As the history of the old house, along with elements of her own past begin to surface, Jean finds herself fighting inner battles she thought she had buried forever.

Living Spring

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The Long, Smooth Highway

22 Apr

My Take

DiVoran Lites

Photo by Melodie Hendrix

Photo by Melodie Hendrix

 

One Sunday on the way to church, Bill asked if I had any aspirin. No, but here’s something else if you have a headache. He took it. He was rather sluggish all day, but headaches will do that to you. After lunch he said, I can’t wait to lie down. Though he usually takes a nap it wasn’t’ like him to actually say he was tired.

That night or I should say the next morning at 1:41, he woke me and asked me to take him to the hospital. “I think I’m having a heart attack,: he said.” I got out of bed, went to my closet got warm clothes, but not warm enough as it turned out, got my iPod, we got in the car. I was calm, he was calm. We rode down the smooth newly asphalted highway that runs through town in our comfortable old Merc. We talked about how this might not even be a heart-attack so why get our knickers in a knot. Bill walked into the emergency room while I parked the car. He told them he couldn’t get his breath because of the pain and pressure in his chest, so they didn’t make us wait long. They took me in to him after he got his backless nightie and a nitroglycerin tablet. They gave us blankets from the warmer and they started hooking him up to a beeping machine, drips, tubes and I don’t know what all. We were both praying with faith that was given by God and not of ourselves. An old friend who works in environmental services came in and sat down and talked to us the whole time of her break. It seems like it was a long time and we were happy to have her there, happy for the distraction.

I was thinking our daughter would go to work the next morning and since we didn’t know what to tell her I didn’t call until 6:00 a. m. As soon as she got up and got dressed she came. She had called our son and he came from another town, but didn’t get there until after we’d been moved to a room. Both of them were there when the doctor came to talk to us. It was New Year’s eve Monday so the doctor scheduled a catheterization for Wednesday. The adult children and their support made a tremendous difference. There was no fear, no panic, we all thought it was a small thing and not life-threatening, at any rate we knew everything was going to be fine.

You can imagine our surprise when we saw the video of the catheterization the minute it and the insertion of two stints was over. He could have died, the doctor said. It’s a good thing you came when you did. (He had been saved by medications, especially heparin which thinned the blood and allowed it to pass through the two damaged vessels. ) We left the hospital on Thursday morning. We hadn’t called anyone else, there was nothing anyone else could do. We knew everything was going to be all right. It was especially good to spend the time with our children. At one time a nurse said, “Is your company going to stay all day.” Which meant go away and let him rest, I guess she didn’t know they were the best medicine he could have in addition to the methods and medicaments given to save his life. It was all like a dream, a dream on a cloud where everything ran smoothly just like the car did on the Long Smooth Highway.

Bill is doing great. He has been to all the cardio classes, done the exercise therapy and taken up his other exercises again. If they hadn’t had stints, they would have had to do by-passes. Oh, we are so thankful he didn’t have to go through that. He’s taking good care of himself and has lost twenty-five pounds. We have nothing but praise and thanksgiving to our Lord and to all the wonderful people who took care of him. We’ve seen the veins for ourselves and they are in good shape. We are not worried, should we be? No—it’s not necessary, each day is complete in itself. But I’d say we are all a bit more appreciative of each day we have together and we are hoping for a whole lot more of them, God willin’ and the crick don’t rise.

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Angels Watching Over Us

15 Apr

My Take

DiVoran Lites

Photo by Melodie Hendrix

Photo by Melodie Hendrix

 

Not long after I became a Christian there was a sort of underground movement to study demonology so people could be delivered and set free of their compulsions. Some of us read books on the subject and even prayed for ourselves and others to be exorcised. That was about the time the movie, “The Exorcist,” came out. I read the book (I was very sorry I did, too because it was scary, and did not, in my estimation carry a true Christian message.) I didn’t see the movie, thank the Lord.

The strangest thing went with the movement, and that was a fear of studying about or even thinking much about angels. The belief  was that if we gave much credence to the existence of angels we might worship them and be led astray. Demons okay, angels no. It sounds weird now.

I had a book on my shelf I was going to read someday if I ever got the nerve. It was called Angels, God’s Secret Agents, and it was written by Billy Graham. Now I don’t care what religion you are or what you believe in, you probably understand that Billy Graham would be one of the last people on earth who would lead you astray. But still, there the book sat.. After about thirty years I decided I was never going to read it and I donated it somewhere.

Eventually the adrenaline rush of demons went away leaving in its stead a returning appreciation of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Then one day I had the nerve to pick up a book about angels. It wasn’t very good,  just a bunch of second-hand sightings and ancient stories. I wished for my Billy Graham back, prayed for it back.

A few weeks later I had an urge to stop by my favorite SPCA store where I can get hard cover books for 32 cents and there it was. Oh, not the same copy, I’m sure, but just the book I wanted and had prayed for. I started reading it and I wondered why I was ever afraid. There are three hundred mentions of angels in the Bible and Billy Graham told about them in a calm peaceful way that was barely even exciting. They exist, they are God’s helpers, and that’s about it. No adrenaline rush.

I’ve never seen an angel or a demon, but I came to believe that demons loved attention more than anything and that I didn’t have to play their game. I never even think about them any more and that’s just fine. In some places missionaries might have to think about them, battle them, all that. I don’t.

So one day we were on I-4 barreling along 70 miles an hour in heavy traffic and seemingly from nowhere a large piece of metal came bouncing toward us making sparks as it gouged the highway. We thought it had come from the truck ahead and left of us. As Bill swerved, we felt an impact. Thank the Lord there was no one in the lane right of us. The man behind us to the right had to go to the shoulder, though.

We caught up to the truck and looked it over. We wanted to tell the man he might have something loose, but we were all going too fast to communicate.

When we got home we examined the car and discovered a three-foot long crease at the bottom of the driver’s door. That sharp metal bar missed slashing a tire, missed the radiator, missed the windshield and missed us–by inches. What do you do when something like that happens and you know plenty of other people have had bad accidents that day, some even died in them? I don’t know about you, but all I could do was thank God for having his secret agents on the job. I had to give a thought to all the invisible sources that are out there helping us day after day. Sure terrible things happen all the time, but these angelic encounters do too. I don’t think we deserved it, I don’t know why bad things happen to good people. I don’t have nearly as many answers as I used to. I just know to give thanks in everything, good or bad and keep on keeping on. Ministering angels can help with all that too.

Psalm 91:11 For he will command his angels concerning you to guard you in all your ways.

Luke 4:11 They will lift you up in their hands so that you will not strike your foot against a stone.

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