Category Archives: Miracles

Discovering MIRACLES in the Mailbox

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Discovering Miracles in the Mailbox

It’s #FiveMinuteFriday and the prompt is DISCOVER. Join me for a for a personal flashback story!

My earliest memories at the mailbox go way back to my favorite mail lady, Sandra Sylvester (pronounced Saundra). She actually delivered the newspaper and her husband was our mailman, a wonderfully kind and humble gentleman was this U.S. postal employee. As nice as he was, it was the familiar sound of Sandra’s little VW bug coming up our hill, but still a few houses away, that would cause me to put down whatever I was doing, pause any fights with my little brothers and head for the mailbox/paperbox.

Sandra always had time to say, “Hello” and give away her lovely smile. She literally allowed Jesus to shine and I wanted what she had. I can remember running to the box when I heard her coming, not because I loved to read the paper, only thing good in it for my age at the time was “the funnies”. (For you youngsters, that is what we called the comics. For those younger than that, a newspaper, “what is black and white and read all over”, was how we discovered what was going on in the world and our town…before smart phones and apps!)

My excitement was not in The Herald Times, I wasn’t even a teenager yet. But Sandra always seemed to have time for me, for everyone, and the short time she spent talking to me seemed as if it were so much longer. I was always encouraged and felt as if a little heaven had stopped to visit. She literally glowed with the power of the Holy Spirit. Sadly, she was taken from this life all too young and too soon but her memory lives on in her beautiful family (my cousins) and those who loved her.

Some things you expect to see in your mailbox and others you dread:

  • Advertisements. No need to explain, we probably all stand at the trashcan and sort our mail, most of it is junk.
  • Collections. Bills, bills and more bills.
  • Solicitations. Mostly in the form of THIS IS NOT AN ACTUAL CHECK…but it could be if you want to pay 75% interest on a loan!
  • Samples. Isn’t it crazy how we could get excited over a half ounce of dishwasher detergent?
  • Cards. Okay, okay, let me explain this one too. Back in the day, people sent these little things we called greeting cards that wished you a happy birthday or anniversary, conveyed good thoughts about your illness or loss and even congratulated you on an accomplishment or a new home. Now, we have social media to save us from the $6/per card ridiculousness! (sarcasm is free)

But sometimes, on rare but exciting occasions, there would be a miracle. One particular that comes to my mind happened shortly after we returned from Latvia. Our financial situation was not one to brag about, most of our donations did not come through as promised and we had survived on a wing and a prayer for sure. Obviously, we weren’t starving, but we were learning how to depend on God. I don’t remember praying that particular morning for a miracle to be in my mailbox but when I sorted through all of the junk, I discovered a letter with handwriting I didn’t recognize. I opened it to see a beautiful hand-written note from a pastor’s daughter in another state. Her words?

“In prayer this morning, I strongly felt led to send you this and pray you are not offended. I don’t know the need but God does and we appreciate your sacrifice and honor your ministry today with this small gift.”

Inside the card? $500.

And a side note; we had never even met this young lady.

I had long forgotten about this miracle until recently when I opened our mailbox and once again discovered a miracle. This was something I had prayed about and I had great anticipation and faith that He would provide…and He did. Now, it doesn’t always happen just the way we ask, or pray, or even think, because HIS timing is perfect but it is rarely what we are anticipating. He always knows what is best and the answer, HIS perfect answer, will arrive right when it is most needed.

But this past week was that timing and when God performs the little miracles for you, it gives you faith to believe for other needs. You know He has done it before and He can do it again, according to His will, the key ingredient in every prayer.

What do you anticipate being in your mailbox? Do you look forward to what God might do each day? Do you anticipate you might discover a miracle? Your mailbox can look like many other things; the miracle may come through another person, through a spoken word, a message or through prayer. You might see it in tangible form or it might be a promise of good things to come. When He speaks and you KNOW you have heard HIS voice, that is a miracle of fantastic proportions, no one can take it from you!

So go forward today, anticipating that you may discover a miracle and it could just show up in your mailbox.

Share with us today a time when something unexpected showed up in your mailbox, or in your life, that has built your faith to believe He will do it again. Encourage someone else with testimonies of answered prayers!

For the kingdom

 

Korey and Alicia: A Guide Post for your Wedding Day

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Korey and Alicia: A Guide Post for your Wedding Day

This post is too long for a #fiveminutefriday submission but today’s word prompt and the occasion is my excuse to tie in my youngest son’s wedding today and the word, Guide.

I will instruct thee and teach thee in the way which thou shalt go: I will guide thee with mine eye Psalm 32:8.

No one likes to be called a baby but the youngest in the family takes on that title role rather unwillingly, for a while unknowingly and hopefully wears it proudly, as mine likes to say, “Why have any more when you created the best?!”

Korey Ross Elkins came into our lives almost 26 years ago and has been guided and protected by his brothers from Day One. They are each a little over five years apart so there was quite a spread between the oldest and the youngest. But, it never seemed to matter, especially as they have all grown into adults, I have seen the three of them be angry, even furious with the other but you better not let anyone else do the same or you would have all three of them to tangle with!

When we first made the decision to sell all and move to Latvia, for what was initially a long-term adventure, Korey decided to go with us for the first six months and make sure there was a music team for outreach and church planting. He was 18 years old. It forever changed him and was such a great time for all three of us learning to be guided and even protected by The One True God, Jesus Christ. We have gone through things together that others may or may not understand and we will forever have those memories of the big and the little things that God did just for us…right on time…every time.

But today isn’t all about Korey, because Korey has found Alicia Melynne Hudson, who just happens to be the baby of her family too. (I didn’t look up statistics on the possible day-to-day pitfalls of that arrangement.) If you follow them at all, you have heard that they can create beautiful music together. Understatement! Alicia has the voice we all wish we were born and blessed with. She sings with passion, anointing and allows her ministry to be guided by the Holy Spirit. Walking a pathway of brokenness, she has a ministry to the hurting, the lost and the lonely, giving assurance that this great God we serve never, ever leaves us even when we are sure we can never rise above our circumstances or our past. You can see some of her writings here on her blog, So Far, So Good and her newest recorded Spoken Word here.

Together, they are allowing God to use them, however He chooses, putting Him first and their ambitions in His hands. And with them they bring a pure bundle of joy that has won our hearts from the very first day, Lark Lynnette.

 

This precious, bouncing, never-know-what-she-will-say two year old beauty is the icing on the cake. There was no doubt  from our first meeting that The Sweetheart and I would love her and spoil her rotten because that is what Nana’s and Poppy’s role is.

But we also want to be part of the influence and guide in her life, along with her other grandparents. (She is blessed with so many!) What we do and say in front of these little ones impacts them for the rest of their lives and I want her to have memories of us with her in church, hands raised to God, and even more importantly, I want us to live it out in front of her. The best teacher is LIFE and what she sees at church, and around church people had better be what she sees when she is in our home. Let it be, Lord, let it be.

So, we will be thankful today, even with happy tears, that what God has brought together, no one can put asunder. I finally looked that up after hearing it for 56 years! The common definition is to tear apart, into pieces.

The Middle English used to know the word asunder as distinguish or tell apart. And that makes today even more special, whether those words are actually spoken over them or not, that as they are united in marriage, that they will truly be one, as the Bible declares, that no one can distinguish them apart from the other, no one can tell them apart because they forever belong together. “For this cause shall a man leave his father and mother, and cleave to his wife; And they twain shall be one flesh: so then they are no more twain, but one flesh. What therefore God hath joined together, let not man put asunder.” Mark 10:7-9

The NKJV says it like this:

“For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh’; so then they are no longer two, but one flesh. Therefore what God has joined together, let not man separate.” Mark 10:7-9 NKJV

Korey, Alicia and Lark, as you begin this journey as a family, may you always put God first and your family as the utmost second, let nothing get in the way of allowing Him to guide your every thought and purpose and then no one, absolutely no one, can tell you apart or tear you apart.

Love,

Mom

 

 

So, I thought I could raise the dead…

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So, I thought I could raise the dead…

“Our prayers may be awkward. Our attempts may be feeble. But since the power of prayer is in the one who hears it and not in the one who says it, our prayers do make a difference.” – Max Lucado

Several years ago, coming home from church one evening, I was about a half mile from our house when I saw a young woman, with a baby on her hip and cell phone to her ear, pacing back and forth in the road. I was hesitant, it was dark, and the road was out in the middle of absolutely no where with not too many houses around. I had my son with me who was about 15 at the time so I felt a little safer and yet didn’t want to put him in danger either.

But I stopped.

When I pulled alongside her, I could make out that she was talking to a 911 operator. Screaming, cursing and lamenting, “Where in the ******* are you?!” She disconnected the call and tried to tell me the story in a nutshell. Her boyfriend’s father was in the house dying. He had been in a fight with his girlfriend and she had kicked him in the chest. He came to their house in extreme pain and then sat down on the couch and stopped breathing.

I pulled into the driveway, told Korey to lock the doors, call his dad and tell him where we were and I would be right back. “Mom, this is crazy, wait for Dad, wait for the ambulance, wait for somebody!”

The trailer-modified house was definitely not inviting. In fact, it was a little scary, hidden back in the woods and not very well kept at all. A couple of dogs roamed around but I made my way to the steps where another little girl, about four or five, sat crying. She looks up at me with the most pitiful eyes and says, “Don’t go in there! Please, don’t go! It’s awful in there!” I assured her everything would be alright even though I could hear screaming, more cursing and horrible grieving coming from the open door. Once more she tried to keep me from entering, “It’s dirty in there!”

Have you ever felt that you had been sent somewhere? Sent by God, to be His hands and His feet in a situation? That is the way I would describe myself at that moment. I was sure the Almighty had sent me, not that I was anything whatsoever, but that HE was EVERYTHING and He was about to do something miraculous. I was terrified, anxious and expectant all at the same time.

On the couch sat a man about 55 years old, over six feet tall and probably 230 pounds. His head was lying on a pillow on the back of the couch and he was NOT breathing. On either side of him were his two sons, early 20’s at the most. They were hysterical, cursing one minute and praying the next when I walked up beside them.

I knew their father was dead.

His color was gray, almost white, there was no breath whatsoever coming from this man. One of the sons grabbed me and fell on my shoulder sobbing, “Please pray for Dad! Tell him to wake up!”

I begin to pray. I had faith to believe that God was going to raise this man from the dead! Or, if there were any chance that the EMT’s could revive him, if they ever arrived, we would praise God for that as well. Either way, we needed a miracle and fast.

I kept praying for him and for his boys. They were screaming at the ambulance, which wasn’t there. They had called over a half an hour earlier and the girlfriend was still out in the driveway trying to give directions. Even in the midst of chaos, I was wondering why their GPS couldn’t find this house!

It seemed an eternity, and found out later it was over 40 minutes, before the emergency team arrived. I moved out of the way, out onto the porch with the little girl and held her while they worked on the injured man. By then, The Sweetheart had arrived and was trying to comfort and pray for the boys. They had both been drinking so they had enough sense to know they couldn’t drive so he drove them to the hospital.

And that is where they pronounced him dead.

They told us later that he was definitely already deceased at the house but they took him to the hospital for the boys sake.

The Sweetheart stayed with them until the wee hours of the morning and then we attended the funeral a couple of days later. They were so appreciative and when we walked in they both hugged us and thanked us for being there.

So many thoughts were swimming in my head those few days but I hadn’t expressed them until we left the funeral home.

Why?

Why, when I prayed for this man, stepped out in faith and believed, did he not come to? All things are for the glory of God and this seemed like it would bring so much glory to Him!

When I felt for sure that He had me stop, had me enter that “scary place” as the little girl had said, why were my prayers not answered so that others could see His greatness and experience a true miracle that would have awakened them to the power of God?

This God—his way is perfect; the word of the Lord proves true; he is a shield for all those who take refuge in him. Psalm 18:30 ESV.

I do not know why, but this I do know:

We don’t answer prayers, God does. We don’t raise the dead, God does. We are His hands and His feet and we go where He wants us to go, do what He wants us to do and do it all in His name. From there, HE decides what happens. HE decides who is healed, who is raised to life and who will see His glory and HE decides when that timing is perfect.

What I can’t see, what you can’t see, is down the road, the bigger picture. We only exist in the here and now and our finite minds are fixated on the why’s because we only know what we see.

I am trusting that the things that happened on that dark and gloomy night will some day come full circle for those boys. Or maybe for the girlfriend? Or maybe even for the little girl who was sitting on the steps who is now at least a teenager. I pray that when prayers were said in that place that those sons remember feeling the power of God and the peace that only He brings, even into chaos and confusion.

I pray that the little girl will remember the kind lady who held her and prayed over her while everyone was screaming, crying and saying things a little girl shouldn’t hear. I pray she remembers that while someone was whispering, “Jesus” that she felt safe and secure.

And even though I thought I was going in there to see the dead raised to life that maybe God’s purpose was totally different. Maybe He had something else in mind. Perhaps I will never know on this side of heaven what it was truly all about but I do know He called, I do know He gave me unbelievable strength, courage and faith to do the unthinkable because I knew I was not doing it alone.

Have you ever had a situation where you felt God was leading you to step out of your comfort zone and when you did, it was nothing like you thought it would be? That God didn’t answer the prayer that you prayed and you almost felt stupid? Prayer is never a bad thing, it blesses the one that you are praying for and it blesses you as well. And God is working behind the scenes preparing something greater for His glory, all in His perfect timing.

Don’t be afraid to be His hands and feet! We are called to minister to one another, to reach out to the poor, the needy, the sick and the lost. If we don’t, who will? But if we DO…HE will!

Sharing with Modest Mondays