Butterfly Days

  “ Were you there when He rose up from the dead? Were you there when He rose up from the dead?    Oh-oh! Ohhh…                                                    Sometimes I feel like shouting 'Glory, glory, glory!'    Were you there when He rose up from the dead?”     It’s been a long and happy day. The business of the day is done, and I’ve come home from the office. I’m going on a walk now. Will you come with me?        As I walk, all my plans and goals seem to evaporate into the pleasantness of the great outdoors. I climb a hill… I’m tired now, so I stop a minute to consider the monument I see. It’s a rough, wooden cross, stained with blood. There it stands alone; a silent witness to a battle fought and won: “The Battle for My Soul”. The longer I stand and look, the more convinced I find myself. I. Am...

    I never wanted to be single. I grew up dreaming of the home and family I would have someday. Only, I thought “someday” would be the year I turned 18. My eighteenth birthday came, and the year passed by, and I was still single. Oh well. I had great hopes the year that I was 19…and 20. And 21. And 22. And so the years passed. Every year I had new hope! Every year I was disappointed. Soon five years turned into ten, and then twelve. By this time, disappointment had turned into something very much like despair. Many of my friends were already married. There were hardly any single guys left… And - worse than anything else- because of my age, I was beginning to fear that I might never have children.       Then came the breaking point. A friend tried to comfort me by telling me that I should just not think about the pain I was experiencing. That I should be busy and happy and not think about it anymore. I nodded politely while inwardly I knew it was impossible. Tha...

 “Jesus loves me, this I know, for the Bible tells me so.”                              -Anna Bartlett  Warner “Jesus Loves Me.” It was one of the first songs my brother sang to his new baby, only he changed the words a little to say, “Jesus loves Rosie.” As her father, it was one of the first and most important things that he wanted her to know. And it’s the first and most important thing that your Heavenly Father wants you to know.      We find expressions of love all throughout the Bible:  “Before I formed thee in the belly I knew thee.” -Jeremiah 1:5  “I have engraved you on the palms of my hands” - Isaiah 49:16 (NIV)  “I have loved thee with an everlasting love: therefore with lovingkindness have I drawn thee.” - Jeremiah 31:3      But sometimes I forget that Jesus loves me. Maybe I’m upset with myself and I don’t feel worthy of love. Maybe the cares of ...

      Mia was out and about when she ran into her friend, Edward. It had been awhile since the last time she saw him. How nice it was to see him again! Mia and Edward were chit-chatting happily when suddenly, Edward brought up Mia’s husband, Tom. He made a subtle suggestion that Tom was too overbearing. That his rules for Mia were excessive. That it was wrong for Tom not to allow her to go out with her guy friends once in awhile. Mia was disturbed and surprised! She always thought she had a happy marriage. It had never occurred to her that her husband might be too strict. She quickly dismissed the thought, but since she didn’t want to offend Edward, she didn’t correct his assumptions. She was too embarrassed to tell him that the decision not to go out with other men had been entirely her own.     Months passed, and Mia continued to run into Edward around town. It seemed that every time she saw him, he made some comment about Tom, and the comments were never...