The next day David looked for my purse in all the dumpsters around the school and in the dumpsters around the apartments where the thugs lived. Several people helped him look. Lee Webster, owner of Pop A Lock was one of these people. He sent his locksmith out the next morning to change the locks on our house since my keys were in my purse. The purse was never found. We also had my suburban reprogrammed. No biggy. And, of course, I had to have a new driver's license. I even thanked the lady there because it was so easy! Through great detective work, the robbers were caught that Thursday night. I could go on and on about different ways all of this event played out. One thing I know for certain...my mother taught me this--God will take care of you if you let Him! Listen! You can hear the Holy Spirit speaking to you. God is alive! He is real! I pray that it is not before an armed robbery that you hear Him. But, listen! In your everyday lives...listen! We are not guaranteed that we will have tomorrow or even the next hour. I could have been killed that night. And, I know that because Jesus is my Lord and Savior, that would have been alright, too. I will have an eternal home in heaven. Let's not forget about the reason we celebrate Christmas. The birth of our Savior. Is He your Savior, too? Prayer: Our Father, thank you for protecting us and giving us the reassurance that You are always with us and will speak to us if we are willing to listen. Amen Leesa McMillin
December 6, 2011
A CLEAN SLATE
Psalm 51:10 & 12 “Create in me a clean heart, O God, and put me a new and right spirit within me….Restore to me the joy of Thy salvation, and uphold me with a willing spirit.” Recently I lost a document. A very important document: my novel manuscript; countless hours of work. A labor of love. I wanted to scream, cry, hit someone (Mike had to hide). My USB memory stick became corrupted. The hard drive copy on my laptop was corrupted. Not even our computer guru could save it. My only saving grace is the fact that I do not (and never have) totally trusted my computers, so whenever I complete a chapter, I print off a hard copy. I have a “physical” copy of the manuscript. It’s just a matter now of re-typing the entire novel: all 400+ pages…and quickly. Sometimes this happens in our personal lives. We sail along day by day, doing whatever we do in our jobs, our play, our home lives…but sometimes we get a “bug,” a “virus” (and I don’t mean colds, or flu, or strep throat). A little “bug” called sin, attacks our better senses, we give in to it, and our lives become corrupted – just as a USB stick becomes corrupted. With computers, we need a computer guru to solve our problem (or attempt to solve our problem): unscramble the errors and make the document readable again. Sometimes they can; sometimes they can’t. In our personal lives, we need God. Only God can wipe our slates clean, reprogram us, and make our lives ungarbled and free of sin again. Prayer: Heavenly Father, when we give in to one or more of the many temptations of everyday living, our hearts, our minds, and our souls become corrupted, just as computer programs or memory sticks become corrupted. Keep us focused, Lord, and when we give in to sin, give us the good sense to call upon You: to wipe our slates clean, to make sense of our lives again, and make us wholly acceptable unto You. Dianne Gibbens