I want to introduce you to a great friend and writer Rob Carley ~ He is walking a path of grief after the passing on of his adorable wife Jean, whom we all miss so much! I want to make him my first invited guest blogger ~ I hope you are soul fed! Love Denise
It’s about the time when on a winters morning the crisp silent air is occasionally jingled by the lonely footsteps of a milk delivery or a newspaper drop or a Christmas party reveler beginning the lonely walk home with party hat askew and tatty Chris Kindle gift clutched tightly in a frozen hand. It’s a time when life hangs between the memories of yesterday and the hopes for tomorrow. In this small parcel of life is the darkest hour. It’s as if the candle of past has been extinguished and we await the burst of light as the match of future strikes and ignites tomorrow’s possibilities. It is a place where all things are possible. Imagination has property here. A shore front property with amazing views but in an exposed setting. In this time ones mind can wish the best or wonder the worst. In this time our hearts can dance or die. We can sing or sink. We can choose life or death. Often our pain or loss screams out an invitation to us to pitch our tent towards hopelessness but a still small voice beckons to us to dwell in what old time gospelers referred to as Beulah land.
My Aunt Charlotte who is now singing in heavens choir used to sing a chorus (there’s a word we don’t use in church now!) and in it was a line
“Oh Beulah land oh Beulah land on heavens higher mount I stand”… that sounds such a glorious location.
It sounds like a VIP area for overcomers, it almost sounds like an exclusive area. I guess it is but it’s more a place we are carried to rather than a place we climb to. Arrival is by right and choice. As Christmas arrives we celebrate the arrival of Jesus who came to redeem a people and give them unrestricted access to heavens riches. He came to bring abundant life to those who choose to follow. He offers us a way to peace and freedom just based on that word gift. It’s a done deal a finished product a total whole shebang! When we were kids and even now when we are bigger kids our mother would often tell us to choose life, what wisdom what simple truth. You see in this quiet hour when the flowing waters of communication are stilled two voices call to my heart, the voice that says all is lost and or the voice that says the best is yet to come. I will choose which one gets my heart.
There is a native Indian tale that says something like this ~ Two wolves called despair and hope are fighting a viscous fight to the death battle. The little boy asks which one will win?
His dad replies whichever one we feed the most! Chose life!
Denise Kennedy❀ 