My Dad Turned 80 This Year

My precious father turned 80 years old this year. That is a sobering and gratitude inspiring mile stone for all our family. My sister, brother-in-law, husband and I took him on a golf trip - his favorite thing is trips with his family. I wrote a poem in his honor for the trip and would like to share it with you:
To Ralph E. Crawford, on his 80th birthday year:
A Poem of Appreciation.

Daddy you have given us – so much throughout the years.
You’ve given loving discipline; you’ve wiped away our tears.
You said that we should follow – all of our dreams,
And there would be not limit – to how we would succeed.
We always felt you loved us – we were the apple of your eye.
Yet if we thought too highly of our selves – you were so wise.
You taught us many skills, such as changing oil and tires.
How to manage money to make it stretch for miles.
You showed us how to work hard, with all our heart and soul.
And playing just as hard kept the work from taking toile.
Thanks for all the glorious and amazing trips to golf
Of course the shopping wasn’t bad – the fun reached a great loft.
We will always love and appreciate your wit.
Your laughter, your thoughtfulness, your courage makes you fit
For all of your accomplishments – with family, your highest goal.
Thank you for that example – it has satisfied our souls.

All our love, forever, Brenda, Jim, Marsha & Bobby

Acceleration Continued

Well the acceleration continues. Like a giant rollercoaster, sometimes it's fun, sometimes it's not, sometimes it's encouraging and exillerating and sometimes the devil uses it to flood with fear and apprehension. The wonderful thing is that deliverence is from our Lord, who is faithful and just, loving and good and it is always worth it. I am learning so much more about believing His Word and not my soul. I am so happy His word is true - the greatest reality. This not believing my soul seems to require death to flesh - body, mind and emotions. I pray I receive all the faith He's giving and all the death required to believe - I WILL OVERCOME. I have seen a picture from God showing us on one of the fastest spiritual rides (acceleration amplified) we have ever been on as we enter 2007. Our hair is flying back, our skin is taught from the pressure, our clothes ripples with a loud flapping against our skin, sometimes we must close our eyes so they won't dry out. We seem to be out of control. We are, but God isn't. The acceleration is in the direction of life from the dead, healing in body, soul & spirit, freedom from debt, a year of jubilee, forgiveness from debt. Let us receive, let us run into the acceleration, not away from it. Let us give up and give in, knowing that the end of the acceleration will lead us to not recognizing who we are in comparision to who we were. PRAISE OUR GOD, HE IS GOOD. HOW I LOVE HIM.

Let God Accelerate Us Into 2007

I fell a lull in the storm. Through the last couple of months I have been going through some intense deliverance. This deliverance has been mixed up with: 1. a fight with hormonal depression 2. a working out of new and old relationships 3. a flood of new vision and clarification from God on priorities 4. a new time (first in my life) where it seems I actually have time to plan ALL the routine chores of life with purpose and not just shoot from the hip - Praise God - new success is on the horizon and there probably are more variables that don't come to mind right now. The storm has been relentless to this point and, like all storms, there are wonderful and terrible moments: moments of refreshing, moments of destruction, moments of cleansing, moments of debreeding, moments of majesty, moments of torment, moments of joy, moments of depression, moments of exhiliration, moments of terror. But no, at this moment there is great calm, great peace, great comfort, great focus. I see that this horrific and wonderful deliverance has, by the hand of my God, brought healing and wholeness. God has healed the deep festering wound, hard and seamingly impenetrable and created new heart and new flesh, like a child. This deliverance began it's greatest thrust after prays for a pure heart - a childlike heart - a heart that saw the best - a heart full of faith, hope, joy and love. I know deliverance will continue throughout my life, for there are always battles and enemies to be delivered from, but I think the current phase is complete, giving me a new heart and mind, answering my long time cry, bringing me to a place that is probably virgin territory. GOD IS GREAT, GOD IS GOOD, HE IS MY FRIEND AND I AM HIS. MAY PRAISE COME FROM EVERY CELL OF MY BEING AND FROM EVERY EXPRESSION OF MY SOUL, FROM THE VERY DEPTH OF MY SPIRIT - PRAISE GOD I AM WHOLE. Well, from that heighth of emotion and expression, my dear precious husband is calling me to Cracker Barrell for breakfast. I must continue this later - there is much to express on the current acceleration.

Lovely Christ, Lovely Christmas

How lovely is our Christ. How lovely it is to remember His birth with all the trimmings which leads us to remember more of Him. I remember so many times He has brought me new freedom. I have new found freedom received recently by the grace of my Christ. Freedom comes at such a price, yet worth every pain, every struggle, every ounce of energy, every ounce of time, every ounce of whatever it costs. Thank you Jesus for paying the price first. Our price is so small compared to yours, yet it costs us everything.

Can you believe I'm Superman?

Your results:You are Superman
Superman
90%
Spider-Man
80%
Green Lantern
80%
Iron Man
80%
Robin
70%
Supergirl
60%
Wonder Woman
50%
The Flash
45%
Catwoman
45%
Batman
40%
Hulk
20%
You are mild-mannered, good, strong and you love to help others.
Click here to take the "Which Superhero are you?" quiz...

God's Wonders to Behold

How glorious and wonderful is God's changing wheather. Today we woke to a sparsely snowcovered ground and chilling temperatures. The variety God brings to us in all areas of life is refreshing and encouraging. Everything is seasonal but the character of our God. Halelujah.

Counting a few blessings

How good is my life? Today has been glorious and it is not over yet. Never in my life have I had the time to spend on wonderful frivolities such as:
1. liesurely buying Christmas presents and decorations
2. stopping at a shop just to look with no need required
3. talk to my sister as long as we want
4. clean my floor and still be able to clean out a closet
and all these things were done before 5:00, when I arrived home and still had time to blog and read blogs while watching the food channel. Life is Good.
I thank my God for giving me this wonderful time of life.

Another blessing I would like to proclaim, is seeing that Ashlee Bradford commented on my last blog. Ashlee, your such a sweetie. I still owe you and your husband an email. Love you lots.

God's love is such a joy in all the ways He expresses it.

God makes the cutest Girls

I would never have started this blog, if I didn't have girls. I know you can "have girls" in different ways. My husband and I weren't able to have girls physically, so God gave us another way. He gave us girls spiritually. These girls He gave me are more awesome than I can say in words. They are beautiful and smart, witty and kind, loving and hard working, faithful and strong. They are so much more. Anyway, several of my girls blog. The things they blog often prompt me to comment. I haven't commented till today, and this showed me there are sometimes that blogging (or something similar) is the only way to get out what is in you. I needed something to help me interact more fully to their blogs, so here I am joining the blogging generation. Well, after this introduction, I must blog about one of my girls:

This precious girl has strength she doesn't know. She has 5 children, a husband, extended family, a church, friends. She is very relational and that is saying a lot, considering how many relationships she has. I would like to blog my prayer for her today. She has a child who is being healed. "Lord God, I do not understand all circumstances in my sweet girl's life, but I know you love her more than I do. I pray you will settle the inner conflict she has when she tries to put together the physical reality of her child and faith reality in the spirit realm of her child. We know what your word says. We know what we see with our physical eyes. We don't know who to meald those together without an atomic explosion. I thank you that when the realms of darkness and collide there is always an explosion. May your peace that passes understanding be hers and ours. Let the inner conflict be settled. I love you. Thank you for your answers. Thank you for his healing and the price you paid for it."