I just got over an illness and now have hurt my back. I cannot sit up to write. Hope to be better soon. Thanks for your patience and prayers.
This blog is about my Walk to Emmaus and my spiritual walk with the Lord. Both have been an amazing journey. While the walk to Emmaus lit a fire in me like never before, my personal walk with Jesus will keep the flames burning. If you ever get the chance to go on A Walk to Emmaus, please don't hesitate. You won't regret it.
Sunday, December 1, 2013
Saturday, November 23, 2013
Here I Am Part 8
I believe I will fast forward a bit. I experienced the child
like emotions of waiting-for-Santa on the morning the walk was to begin. My
sponsors were not set to pick me up until 2:00. It was an incredibly long
morning so there was ample time to send several prayers up to Heaven’s gates.
“O.k. Lord. This is it. The day I have been waiting for.
Thank you for preparing me. I feel no anxiety and I cannot wait to get there.
Thank you for the many blessings I have already received and for the ones yet
to come.”
Finally the time arrived! My sponsors came and loaded up me
and my suitcase and we were off. Now is the time I need to be incredibly
careful as to what I post. I do not wish to spoil anything for those of you
that have not yet gone on a walk to Emmaus. I will recount the spiritual
impacts I experienced without much description of the actual event.
Had I known all the events that were in store for me ahead
of time, I would have “anticipated” instead of being fully focused on “participating”.
This is crucial to the experience.
I am so grateful that is the only substantial
information my sponsors shared with me. A lot of planning, prayer and preparation
go into the walk and you gain so many blessings by just letting the events
unfold in sequence.
There were several people going on this particular walk so
we took 2 cars. I rode with yet another person sponsoring me that I had not
previously met and honestly didn’t even know she existed! The amount of people
behind the scenes eventually became quite staggering.
The first event was the “Send Off”. This took place in a
little cowboy church filled with more behind-the-scenes people and those
they were sponsoring. There were certainly a lot of people packed in there for
only 36 women.
It was so touching and emotional to see how many souls had come
to pray for the 36. I didn’t know then that the emotions would be ever
increasing throughout the next 3 and ½ days. Happy overwhelmed tears, they were
just beginning.
Traditionally, after the prayer service everyone that was at
the church heads over to the same restaurant where we all enjoyed a great
dinner and wonderful fellowship. After the meal, the sponsors gather up their
pilgrims and head over to the Emmaus walk venue.
Once there, you could just feel the excitement building. The
lobby was full of lovely women that would become very important in my spiritual
walk and my life. After everyone had the opportunity to find their rooms and
visit awhile the welcoming ceremony began.
All the “staff” for the walk are introduced along with the
pilgrims. When this is complete, the sponsors depart and the pilgrims begin
their adventure in the Ark. And what an adventure it was.
Wednesday, November 20, 2013
"Here I Am" Part 7
I have the best memories of Christmas as a child. Moma
and Daddy always made it seem so magical. They would put up the tree after
Thanksgiving with Christmas music playing in the back ground. My sister Jodi and I would have hot chocolate
and cookies while we helped hang the ornaments. Several gifts would appear a
few days later.
I loved just having the Christmas tree lights on. They would
blink and reflect off the packages. The anticipation would build up as each day
seemed to slowly pass. I remember my brothers’ reactions to our excitement.
Greg, the oldest (12 years older than me) would always ask
what we wanted from Santa Claus. He loved seeing us so excited and would let us
chatter on. I can remember Mark (10 years older than me) crawling under the
tree with me to inspect the packages.
Mark would ask me which one I wanted to try and guess what
was inside. I would point to one and he would pick it up and gently shake it. “What
do you think is inside this one?” I could never guess, but it didn’t matter. I
loved playing this game with my brother.
Moma always made Christmas cookies with us. Always. I can
remember the laughs and giggles and wonderful smells of that little kitchen. I
remember I couldn’t wait for the cookies to come out of the oven so I would try
to sneak dough while Moma wasn’t looking. And all those fabulous sprinkles in
different colors to put on the cookies! Christmas needed to hurry up and get
here if there was any hope of some cookies being left for Santa.
On Christmas Eve we would get all dressed up and head to
candle light service at church. Daddy would have the radio on in the car and
the radio station never failed to have the latest updates from the Santa Claus
radar. They would give some part of town as the “last sighting” with Jodi and I
eagerly asking, “Is that anywhere near us? Is he close to us?”
The answer was always the same. “It’s going to be a little
while yet.” I suspect they had to say that. Had they said he was very close
they would have had 2 little girls begging to stay home in order to catch a
glimpse of Santa Claus. Oh and the reindeer! Especially Rudolph! What child
didn’t want to be witness to all that?
I remember one Christmas in particular. My sister and I were
quite young. We were walking out to the car to go to the candle light service
when Daddy suddenly said, “Oh I forgot something. I’ll be right back.” Being a
daddy’s girl I of course wanted to go back in with him. Moma quickly said, “No
sweetheart. Daddy will be right back. Come get in the car.” I complied
(surprisingly) and a few minutes later Daddy was back out and we were on our
way.
When we came home after the service and walked into the
house magic was everywhere! More gifts! I cannot tell you what all the gifts
were but two still stand out vividly in my mind after all these years. Twin
baby dolls each in their own carriers; one for me and one for my sister. I
remember thinking, “how could Santa possibly know I would just love this baby
doll?” Magic.
I knew it had to be magic because we did not have a chimney.
That little fact used to be a little troubling to me at that age. But I had
proof positive that Santa was real and he was magic! Gifts appeared and Santa’s
cookies were gone.
After I was finally able to put my new baby down, I began to
open my other gifts. I loved the sound of the wrapping being torn off the gifts
to see what else the magic held for me. It was one of many perfect Christmas
celebrations we had in our house growing up.
I’m sure by now you are wondering what this has to do with
my Walk to Emmaus. It’s simple really. I grew up to realize that loving parents
were behind the magical Santa. I was every bit excited for the walk to begin just
as I was excited for Santa to come. Only now, miracles had replaced magic and I
absolutely knew I would have wonderful gifts to open at Emmaus. I couldn’t wait
to tear off that wrapping.
Sunday, November 17, 2013
"Here I Am" Part 6
Wonderful things took place during the next couple of weeks while I was waiting for my name to move up the waiting list and onto the
coveted Pilgrim list!
I have mentioned my anxiety issues once or twice and this is
generally where my mind starts to go into overdrive with all the possible
things that could go wrong and all the "good solid reasons" as to why I shouldn’t go.
Once again. Complete peace. No anxiety. No rationalizing
this experience away. No turning back. The fact that I am not anxious is a
tremendous gift from God and I recognize it as exactly that. God answers
prayer, people! I continued to pray for him to prepare my heart for what He had
in store for me.
I really wish I would have written all this down just for
the time accuracy of events, but basically it went something like this. After
what seemed almost an eternity and an onslaught of prayer requests banging on
the gates of heaven, my name began to climb up the waiting list. And not an
ounce of anxiety. But my excitement was certainly growing.
I kept watch on that list as long as my eyes were open! At
work and at home I would leave the browser up on the website and refresh it
ever so often. O.k. Probably 100 times a day. Then about a week before it was
time to go, I had made the pilgrim list! I was #36 on a list of 36 pilgrims. Oh
that looked so good I had to hit refresh again! And just because God could, he
moved me to # 35 for good measure!
I ran through a quick inventory of what God had already
accomplished in me and for me. A person with such anxiety as I
have, and I was feeling none. Blessing. Such a doubting Thomas at times and
yet, I knew I was going despite the
already filled up pilgrim list. Blessing. I could feel the Lord working on my
heart; preparing me for what lie ahead. Blessing. The amount of prayer time I
was able to devote to just this one event in my life was already bringing me
closer to the one I so desperately wanted to be near. Huge blessing.
A good and wise friend of mine (Kim Hawkins), when asked to
pray for me to get on this walk said something I will never forget. She simply
said, “Do not rely or wait on a process to get closer to God.” What a statement. How many times do we think…”If
I can just do that, I would be closer to the Lord.” Or,” I need this and this
and this before I can start getting closer to the Lord.”
No you don’t. You just need now. Start where you are. Right now.
Don’t put conditions on a relationship with God that God himself does not put
there. Don’t waste valuable time. Just start now. Now is all we are promised. Now is all you need.
Thank you, Kim. That statement made me realize I could have
been too focused on the “if I can just do this event” mentality that I very
well could have given the event more importance than the actual goal. Honestly, it makes me wonder how many time I have actually done this. Shudder.
The short
term goal of course was to attend the walk. But the purpose and overall goal
was to draw nearer to our Lord. Wow. I could have missed it. I could have missed
out on receiving those blessings. Blessings that would see me through that
4 day weekend called A Walk to Emmaus.
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