"The LORD shall...satisfy thy soul in drought...and thou shalt be like a well watered garden, and like springs of water, whose waters fail not." Isa. 58:11
Dear Praying Friends and Family,
Well, the precalculus class, has come and gone...it is finished, and through the strength and grace of GOD, I survived
. Not only did I survive, but GOD allowed me to make better than I ask or thought and I praise HIM for HIS great faithfulness to provide all my needs in CHRIST JESUS. Thank you all so much for your encouragement to my heart that lifted my wilting spirits, your prayers that HE answered and strengthened me to do what I didn't think i could do. I turned my final precal test into today...after taking it yesterday on my backporch that I have called "the campsite" this summer. Early on in the summer, when I was spending my Saturday mornings on the back porch instead of on the river paddling where I had rather be, I got out my Werner boat paddle and leaned it up against the garage door facing in the breezeway. I had my Cabela's lounge chair that I sat in to do my school work and watch the lecture's on line while i propped my feet upon a Coleman cooler. I even had a Coleman lantern that I would turn on in the late evenings while I did my homework. Since i went fishing the other day, I have propped up my rod and reel out there too, and it really does seem like 'the campsite." Some Saturdays I would get on my "Life is Good" t shirt that has a kayak on it, and says, "Take me to the river," my nylon shorts, and Keen water shoes that I wear kayaking, along with my "Kayak and Canoe" cap and just wear it while i was studying so I would feel like i was at the river. It didn't altogether make me feel like I was at the river, but it did ease the pain, and GOD has been gracious to allow me to go paddling a few times this summer, along with my studies. The most important thing I took with me to "the campsite," was a stack of cards I've written Scripture and words of encouragement on to strengthen and encourage my fainting heart when I've wanted to give up. I've been wanting to tell ya'll about "The Campsite," cause I sure did spend a lot of time outside on the porch this summer, studying and doing math. That will really be a fond memory to me, and something special the LORD did for me to help me. I could really think better outside in the mornings and late afternoons, and that place became my haven. I even did my final outside yesterday morning on the porch....setting up the card table and setting up the fan on the cooler to blow on me, while I took the test. I wasn't feeling well when I got up yesterday morning , and GOD was so gracious to give me that spot at "the Campsite," to help me settle down and be able to concentrate and think once I got going. I got up yesterday morning, feeling anxious and just wanting to get the test over with. I thought, I will just have a short quiet time, and get out there early and start on the test. Well, GOD had many sweet things to encourage my heart yesterday morning, and as I began reading HIS WORD, and my other devotions, HE just continued to encourage me and strengthen me in the midst of my body that was rebelling against me. I ended up having a longer time with HIM than usual, and I was so blessed and strengthened in HIS WORD. HE brought peace to my soul through that time with HIM and after i finished reading and praying "Troy" and I went for a bicycle ride...he rides in the basket on the front. Our computer man came about 9:30 to get our internet working, and I knew he is a great brother in CHRIST and I asked him to pray for me. He is deaf, so he talks like a deaf person, and he prayed the sweetest prayer for me and I sure thank GOD for hearing and answering his humble cry for me. I sure wanted to feel better to take the test, but GOD strengthened me and helped me to do very well on it. GOD sent me those "streams of refreshing," outside at "the Campsite," all summer to make the trials I was going through with my health and precalculus easier to bear. HE is so good...
Well, I didn't mean to tell you about the campsite in this email, but I'm glad the LORD led me to share it with you. I have been wanting to share it with you all summer because it has been, and will continue to be a special place to me, that I have been able to meet the LORD and HE has strengthened me to do the task that was a mountain for me to climb. If you had told me before the summer started that I was going to face all the health challenges I have AND do precalculus, I would have run as fast as I could in the other direction....but GOD's grace has been sufficient and HIS power has been made perfect in my weakness. I remembered this morning one frantic day a couple of weeks into the semester when I was feeling panicky and the LORD used that panicky feeling to get me down to Calhoun and switch my class back from online to "being in the classroom," and there my teacher allowed me to do all my work at home, including taking the test and turning them into her. She allowed me to watch the lectures online with another teacher, do my homework on line, show her my scratch paper, and give me credit for that...and worked with me every way imaginable. GOD just really made the way for me...and I am so grateful, so very grateful for all of HIS help to me, through my teacher, my tutors, your prayers, your encouragement, my doctors, ....so much help to this weak vessel.
Well, that precal class, was the last prerequisite i needed to start my senior year of nursing at UAH...and I have orientation for that coming up next Thursday, and I sure would appreciate your prayers for me as it is several hours indoors in the library and being indoors around chemicals is not my strong suit....but we will see how GOD provides. I will be taking three classes, and that is intimidating for this gal who struggled with one this past semester. But, GOD has been so gracious over and over to encourage my heart and strengthen me along this path....
Yesterday, HE shared so much with my heart at "The Campsite," and I feel led to share some of those thoughts with you who may be trudging along the same path as I am, feeling not quite up to the call that you feel the LORD is leading you to....i talked with someone very dear to me this morning, who will be beginning a new job in a season of life that one is usually considering retirement in a few years, he confessed to me, that he was not confident that he could do the work. I was reminded of the words from Oswald Chambers..."the weaker, the better." And this morning's words in "My Utmost for HIS Highest concerning GOD choosing us were:
"The bravery of GOD in trusting us! You say-"But HE has been unwise to choose me, because there is nothing in me; I am not of any value." That is why HE chose you. As long as you think there is something in you, HE cannot choose you because you have ends of your own to serve; but if you have let HIM bring you to the end of your self sufficiency then HE can choose you to go with HIM to Jerusalem, and that will mean the fulfillment of purposes which HE does not discuss with you."
"We are apt to say that because a man has natural ability, therefore he will make a good CHRISTian. It is not a question of our equipment but of our poverty, not what we bring with us, but of what GOD puts into us; not a question of natural virtues of strength of character, knowledge, and experience-all that is to no avail in this matter. The only things that avails is that we are taken up into the big compelling of GOD and made HIS comrades (I Cor. 26-30). The comradeship of GOD is made up out of men who know their poverty. He can do nothing with the man who thinks that he is of use to GOD. As CHRISTians we are not out for our own cause at all, we are out for the cause of GOD, which can never be our cause. We do not know what GOD is after, but we have to maintain our relationship with HIM whatever happens. We must never allow anyting to injure our relationship with GOD; if it does get injured we must take time and get it put right. The main thing about CHRISTianity is not the work we do, but the relationship we maintain and the atmosphere produced by that relationship. That is all GOD asks us to look after, and it is the one thing that is being continually assailed."
...And once again, I am reminded that this is a relationship, not about the work, but about walking and abiding and living and leaning on my LORD JESUS CHRIST and following HIM when the way seems baffling to me...trusting HIM, and leaning not on my own understanding, and taking delight in HIM as HE reveals HIS love to me in so many ways in the midst of the journey just as HE has done through this precalculus class....now, back "at the campsite," I want to share with you some of the thought HE shared with me yesterday morning on my backporch as I prepared to take my final precal test.
Manna from Heaven:
"Take therefore not thought for morrow." Matt. 6:34
JESUS CHRIST knows our circumstances better than we do, and HE says we must not think about these things so as to make them the one concern of our lives." Oswald Chambers
"Maybe you see no way out of your situation, no light at the end of the tunnel. In GOD's time HE will deliver you. HE is your strength." Elisabeth Elliot, Gratitude...www.
"And the LORD will deliver me from every evil work and preserve me for HIS heavenly kingdom." II Tim. 4:18
"Those who honor ME, I will honor." I Sam. 2:30
"Do not pray for easy lives! Pray to be stronger men. Do not pray for tasks equal to your powers. Pray for powers equal to your tasks. Then the doing of your work shall be no miracle, but you shall be a miracle." Phillip Brooks
"Quit you like men, be strong." I Cor. 16:13
"I learned that I must accept with joy all that YOU allowed to happen to me on the way and everything to which the path led me!" Hannah Hurnard, Hinds Feet on High Places
"HE holds victory in store for the upright, HE is a shield to those whose walk is bleameless, for HE guards the course of the just and protects the way of HIS faithful ones." Pr. 2:7-8
"GOD help us so to live, and thus to make real to those around us, the simplicity, the beauty, the glory and the power of the CHRIST life." Springs in the Valley
"CHRIST in you, the HOPE of GLORY." Col. 1:27
"I will make all MY mountains a way." Isaiah 49:11
"Longsuffering is really that lovely quality of forgiveness and beraing contentedly and joyfully the results of the mistakes and wrongdoing of others." Hannah Hurnard, Mtn of Spices
"Is your life full of temptations and difficulties? Then be happy for when the way is rough, your patience has a chance to grow." James 1:2-3
"Faithful is He that calleth you, WHO will also do it." I Thess. 5;24
Well, this is only a partial sampling of the WORDS of life that GOD has been speaking life into my heart the past couple of days to help sustain me during this time of "drought" in my life. My makeshift "campsite," on the back porch has helped me keep my sanity, in a hard place for me. I hope that you have "a campsite," a place where you can get alone with the LORD JESUS each morning, and let HIM speak HIS WORDS of life and peace to your soul, and bring comfort and strength and refreshment to you in the midst of the circumstances that HE has engineered to reveal HIS great love to you and to me. I wouldn't have chosen to take my final without my thyroid medicine, and had to change IV ingredients in the middle of the semester, and all the other changes i have gone through...but my sweet SAVIOR has met met in the midst of my dismay, and discomfort, and reassured me that HE is in the midst of my circumstances and they will not overwhelm me...though I have felt like it at times. HE loves you and me so much that HE gave HIMSELF for us on a Cross to pay for your sins and mine, and set our feet upon a ROCK and give us a reason and purpose to live...that HE might live HIS life through us and fulfill the plans and purposes for which HE created us. HE loves us so much and will do whatever it takes to bring us into a living and intimate and personal and vital relationship with HIM that overflows with HIS life to draw others to HIM.
Another neat thing the LORD did through me this semester was the privilege to go on a "mission trip," with our church. No I didn't go anywhere, except to church every Tuesday evening for the past four weeks, and all I did was pray and write notes to those who our callers had talked to, but what a joy to my heart it was to be a part of GOD reaching out to our community and showing HIS love to them through our church family. When I signed up for "Harvest Unlimited," I had made up my mind to drop my precal class, and shortly thereafter, GOD persuaded me to keep on. I didn't think I would be able to go to the church and be a part during my class, but GOD enabled me to, and I even went the night before my final, to be a part of the final evening for me to participate...just amazing grace what HE allows us to do for HIM when we don't think we can do things in our own strength. I'm looking forward to going with our choir tomorrow evening to the "Downtown Rescue Mission" in Huntsville, where some of the members will be going early to help serve supper, sort clothes and do whatever needs to be done. Then later, others of us will join them, and we are going to sing and play GOD's praises and encouraging songs...I can't wait. Ya'll pray for us that the HOLY SPIRIT will fill this time with HIS presence, CHRIST will be magnified in all that we sing and play and do, and HIS love will reach out through us and draw others to HIM. GOD is so good to let me be a part of these "mission" trips and I love HIM so much for HIS plans and purposes.
One of the songs we are singing at the "Down town Rescue Mission" is "Amazing Grace, My Chains are Gone," by John Newton and Chris Tomlin. http://www.youtube.
"Although my memory's fading, I remember two things very clearly: I am a great sinner and Christ is a great Savior." — John Newton (Amazing Grace)
Thank you JESUS for your amazing grace in my life..."and like a flood HIS mercy reigns, unending love, amazing grace."
" HE wanted weakness, who was so weak as I? HE promised that HIS grace, that wonderful transforming grace into which I had just been lifted would prove sufficient all the time." Hannah Hurnard
"And HE said unto me, MY grace is sufficient for thee: for MY strength is made perfect in weakness. Most gladly therefore will I rather glory in my infirmities that the power of CHRIST may rest upon me." II Cor. 12:9-10
Please continue to be in prayer for my friend Darlene who is in Houston this week for treatment for her cancer. Her husband said she may get to come home this weekend. Darlene and Arthur love CHRIST, and HE is being magnified through there lives through this journey. Thank you so much for praying for them. I also would like for you to pray for a friend that has some life threatening health issues. Please remember Blanche Clanton in your prayers. Blanche is younger than I am and she is really struggling. Thank you so much for continuing to remember our family in your prayers...HB heads back to U of Mobile next Thursday, the same day I have orientation at UAH. I sure am glad I will have something to think about...i'm going to miss my baby girl. It's not the kind of summer I would have envisioned for us, we mostly just studied, and we moaned and groaned over our school work together...and we rejoiced together when the LORD brought us through our classes and helped us to make good grades. I didn't feel like doing much of anything else with her, but it's been the summer that GOD had for us and I thank HIM for HIS plans and purposes. John Mac is working on submitting his secondary application to UAB now, and will know by Oct. if he's accepted into the early entrance program. Johnny hasn't found out anything about his hip yet...please continue to remember him, and then there is me...you can just pray anything the LORD brings to your mind to pray for me. GOD bless you prayer warriors...I love you and thank GOD for you and your emails and calls and all that reassure me of your prayers for us, and your words of sweet encouragement to my heart. I wish you and I could enjoy visiting at "the campsite," and enjoy sweet fellowship together in our LORD JESUS CHRIST. We could spend time talking about the good things the LORD has done for us and HIS faithfulness to help us through the hard times. I will pull you up a Cabela's chair, we'll turn on the fan, share a glass of iced tea, and enjoy the sweet fellowship we share in CHRIST JESUS "at the Campsite" on the back porch. But until then, keep those emails a coming and we'll fellowship, "Across the Internet..."
With all HIS love,
mitzi
More Manna from Heaven:
Do Not Forget the Holy Nature of God
AUG
God be thanked for the simplicity of the gospel. The longer I live the more I bless God that we have not received a classical gospel, or a mathematical gospel, or a metaphysical gospel; it is not a gospel confined to scholars and men of genius, but a poor man’s gospel, a ploughman’s gospel; for that is the kind of gospel which we can live upon and die upon. It is to us not the luxury of refinement, but the staple food of life.
We want no fine words when the heart is heavy, neither do we need deep problems when we are lying upon the verge of eternity, weak in body and tempted in mind. At such times we magnify the blessed simplicity of the gospel. Jesus in the flesh made manifest becomes our soul’s bread. Jesus bleeding on the cross, a substitute for sinners, is our soul’s drink. This is the gospel for babes, and strong men want no more.
From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled "Soul-Satisfying Bread," delivered May 18, 1873. Image by Steve-h on Flickr under Creative Commons License.
"For GOD so loved the world that HE gave HIS only begotten SON that whosoever believeth in HIM shall not perish but have everlasting life." John 3:16--
"Men ought always to pray and not to faint." Luke 18:11
"When I passed by thee,...I said unto thee..., Live."
Ezekiel 16:6
"When HE Said Live"
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