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No longer on the river and, again, an empty nester. Back to living on Fleming Island and making some more friends!

Monday, October 19, 2015

A "Hold Thou Thy Cross" type of day

October is the month where, among other things, miscarriages or stillbirth losses are recognized. I find myself joining them in their losses though I did get to enjoy my child for 5 years. This morning I began my day by reading one of the blogs I follow where the pastor wrote about the roots of hymn "Abide With Me". He relates the history of the author and includes the hymn stanzas in his posting. The closing one I will go out on a limb and say 'always' tears me up: "Hold thou my cross before my closing eyes, shine through the gloom and point me to the skies; heaven's morning breaks and earth's vain shadows flee; in life, in death, O Lord, abide with me." Sigh....

Later at Bible study we were in Colossians, talking about how the people then (and now) were looking to angels and other types of mysticism in a worshipful sense. There was discussion involving certain TV programs showing haunted places in St. Augustine, and how can the 'screams' coming from the buildings be explained. Pastor talked about the ability of the devil to do such things attempting to work against people's faith and what the Bible says. This was an interesting conversation. 

It was additionally brought up about the people who have 'been to heaven and come back', how is that explained. Whether those people actually 'see' heaven or if they experience physiological or drug induced visions...The Bible is the only source we need for describing heaven and how one gets there. I mentioned the great comfort I get from the words Christ spoke from the cross to the criminal next to Him: "Today you shall be with me in paradise". He doesn't tell the guy he has to linger and haunt buildings, nor would the criminal get a peek and then come back to earth. Nope, He said today, and that is quite comforting to me. 

We talked about what we think heaven will be like, our only true reference source again being the Bible. I brought up, through involuntary tears, a portion of a fiction book I read a few years ago called "The Shack". That book was really out there, but I did enjoy the portion when the father whose daughter was murdered was given a glimpse of heaven. There he saw Jesus playing with little children in a meadow, and his daughter stopped playing long enough to acknowledge him and indicate her joy of being in heaven. Of course, that just blew me away, such a beautiful picture. The Bible does not indicate this will occur but tells us about the bliss beyond compare, where angels are surrounding the throne and singing God's praises day and night. Just thinking about that evokes tears. 

At lunch I shared a picture with the ladies which was sent by Angelo's grandma (he is my great nephew) of him showing my mom his new Kindle. This 5 year old got the Kindle on his birthday, imagine that! I told the ladies how happy I was that Angelo was celebrating his 5th birthday, and got teary eyed again. There is just something about little boys and their 5th birthday that gets me. I am thankful to have the friends I do, who don't care if a tear or two slips out. In my car was a bouquet of flowers which had graced our worship yesterday. Betty donated them to me after the service for placing at the cemetery. And she never knew Timmy. I love that, so thoughtful of her. She told me today she is having flowers on ThanksLiving too and said I can have those for Timmy's grave as well. 

Justin and I were planning to have dinner out tonight, his pay day, but he came home with a headache, which he'd had all day. We instead ate leftovers for dinner. I have a headache of my own, I think it's my usual crying headache. At least I hope it is so tomorrow when I wake up, it will gone. And I hope Justin's headache is gone in the morning, too. Poor guy!