Use Ur Voice: Women's Center

Use Ur Voice: Women's Center: I am excited to announce the beginning of the New Creation Women's Center! It will offer direct services to women in Central Virginia who ...

Dreaming

www.lilblueboo.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/09/Fall-Cleaning-Final.pdf

www.lilblueboo.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/09/Fall-Cleaning-Final.pdf

Mercy House Shop — Home

Mercy House Shop — Home

Summer Harvest

Quarrels are no fun...

Grace based does not imply leniency or passivity by Sally Carlson

Grace based does not imply leniency or passivity

Green Scholars Initiative

Green Scholars Initiative

Soaring

                                            

I saw a great bald eagle last Sunday afternoon.  Saw might not be the right word,  I experienced an eagle last Sunday.  We were driving back from the country, when suddenly it swooped down, filling all the view--it's wing span was the width of the two lane road. His snow white head and tail, unmistakable. He dipped his wings, zooming in on the possum on the side of the road.  Majestic...awe-struck I saw his glory, felt his power.  As he mounted back up, the sky seemed empty.

The Kingdom of Home

The Kingdom of Home

A Pinkdaisy Life: C'mon knock on her door...

A Pinkdaisy Life: C'mon knock on her door...: I have the privilege of guest posting at my friend Samantha Reed's blog today. Fields of Gold is a warm, inviting place where we are encou...

In the kitchen....

The pot bubbles on the stove with summer.
Red, with a hint of orange.
Tomatoes everywhere; tomatoes covering the kitchen table, ripe and ready for preserving; in jars-canned just last week: jars of tomatoes, jars of Italian sauce, jars of salsa; in the pot simmering to be placed in freezer bags, saved for cold winter days.

These last days of summer are spent preparing. Scripture flits through my mind, and I have a melody to a tune of praise that is flowing through my spirit:

"Open ye the floodgates that the King of Glory might come in.
Who is this King of Glory?
The LORD of Hosts,
He is the King of Glory!"

The principles of the 12 Steps

Principles of the 12 Steps:

1. Surrender. (Capitulation to hopelessness.)

2. Hope. (Step 2 is the mirror image or opposite of step 1. In step 1 we admit that alcohol is our higher power, and that our lives are unmanageable. In step 2, we find a different Higher Power who we hope will bring about a return to sanity in management of our lives.)

3. Commitment. (The key word in step 3 is decision.)

4. Honesty. (An inventory of self.)

5. Truth. (Candid confession to God and another human being.)

6. Willingness. (Choosing to abandon defects of character.)

7. Humility. (Standing naked before God, with nothing to hide, and asking that our flawsin His eyesbe removed.)

8. Reflection. (Who have we harmed? Are we ready to amend?)

9. Amendment. (Making direct amends/restitution/correction, etc..)

10. Vigilance. (Exercising self-discovery, honesty, abandonment, humility, reflection and amendment on a momentary, daily, and periodic basis.)

11. Attunement. (Becoming as one with our Father.)

12. Service. (Awakening into sober usefulness.)
taken from Peace thru Sobriety Facebook post on 8/27/2011

The Celtic Spirit - Be Thou My Vision / Slane

"If you quarrel with someone, make peace with him before sunset." Benedict

Serenity is sometimes hard to experience; it is elusive.  We look outside ourselves so often.  Behold the beauty of the world:  how do we recognize that we are part of a vastness that escapes words.  Listening prayer is an old Benedictine practice that invites us to see Christ in everyone and everything.  We are invited to welcome all as if we are welcoming Him.

"Make me an instrument of thy peace: where there is hatred let me sow love," is the beginning of an old prayer that invites us to respond in the opposite spirit of the world. 

Power of Place ::Currituck Sound OBX

Unfolding a Rose

UNFOLDING A ROSE 

A young, new preacher was walking with an older, more seasoned preacher in the garden 1 day. Feeling a bit insecure about what God had for him to do, he was asking the older preacher for some advice.

The older preacher walked up to a rosebush and handed the young preacher a rosebud and told him to open it without tearing off any petals. The young preacher looked in disbelief at the older preacher and was trying to figure out what a rosebud could possibly have to do with his wanting to know the will of God for his life and ministry.

But because of his great respect for the older preacher, he proceeded to try to unfold the rose, while keeping every petal intact. It wasn’t long before he realized how impossible this was to do.

Noticing the younger preacher’s inability to unfold the rosebud without tearing it, the older preacher began to recite the following poem:

It is only a tiny rosebud,

A flower of God’s design;

But I cannot unfold the petals

With these clumsy hands of mine.

The secret of unfolding flowers

Is not known to such as I.

God opens this flower so sweetly,

Then, in my hands, they die.

If I cannot unfold a rosebud,

This flower of God’s design,

Then how can I have the wisdom

To unfold this life of mine?

So I’ll trust in Him for leading

Each moment of my day.

I will look to Him for His guidance

Each step of the pilgrim way.

The pathway that lies before me,

Only my Heavenly Father knows.

I’ll trust Him to unfold the moments,

Just as He unfolds the rose.

Source unknown