It's A Wonderful Life!

As I looked at my life these past few months I began to feel a kinship to George Bailey in the holiday movie classic “It’s a Wonderful Life.”

 From his youth up, George lived a life of helping others.  As a young man he gave up his long anticipated dreams of traveling and attending college after his father unexpectedly died.  Instead he sent his brother to college, and took over his father’s business to ensure that honest hardworking families could realize their dreams of owning a decent place to live and raise their children.  He even gave up his honeymoon money to protect the interest of those families who would have been taken advantage of by the hateful and wealthy Mr. Potter during the town’s financial crisis.  When George’s blundering uncle unknowingly gives the company’s deposit monies to Mr. Potter, Potter, in an attempt to destroy George, keeps the money and takes out a warrant for his arrest accusing him of embezzling company funds.  It is at this point that George contemplates suicide and later wishes he had never been born believing that everyone would have been better off if he’d never existed.

With the help of his guardian angel, George discovers that his life really did make a difference.  Had he not been born, Bedford Falls would have become Potter’s Field.  His brother would have died as a child and an entire transport of soldiers would have died because his brother would not have been there to save them.  Uncle Billy would have been in an insane asylum; his mother would have become a bitter old widow; the druggist would have gone to prison for accidental poisoning of a patient; and the honest hardworking families would have been subjected to living in Potter’s slum houses.  George also learned that the people he helped didn’t take him for granted.  They and even his old rival classmate and his brother came to his rescue when they heard he was in trouble.

My personal version of Mr. Potter had for a moment blinded me to the truth that God had used me to make a difference in the lives of those He sent me to serve.  The very people I was sent to serve showed their love and appreciation for me through acts of service, gifts, dinner, and well wishes.  Many of them didn’t even know I was in crisis.  I will probably never make the Forbes 500 list but because of friendships formed by the Spirit of God I am one of the richest women in the world.

CHRISTMAS EVE 2012

Its Christmas Eve.  I haven't posted in a long time, even now I struggle at what to write.  The latter half of this year has been very stressful for me, yet God has brought me through. 

Aside from personal crisis, I lost two friends to cancer.  One of those friends was a young woman from work, and the other was a dear friend that I served in ministry with.

Geneva Smith-Anderson and I met in the summer of 91 through an outreach jail & prison ministry we were apart of.  In the following years our ministry expanded from conducting worship services in the County Jail to conducting worship services at the Women's Correctional facility in Kankakee. We also did a weekly radio broadcast.  In 2000 she continued to minister to the incarcerated  as I transitioned to providing aftercare ministry to those who received Christ through her ministry.

After she and her husband moved to Indiana to pastor a young congregation, we continued to stay in touch through phone calls, emails, and visits.

She was the god-mother to all of my grandchildren.  Several hours after Geneva went home to be with Jesus, my youngest daughter (whom Geneva stood with me in prayer for a safe and healthy pregnancy) gave birth (at 36 weeks) to a 6 lb 4 oz baby boy.

Although I miss her, I celebrate her, a life well lived for the Lord; and rejoice that she is in His presence.

Favorite phrases and scriptures of Geneva:

"To God be the Glory!"

"Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not to your own understanding.  In all thy ways acknowledge Him and He shall direct your paths."

"God is good all the time, and all the time God is good!"

STILL HERE!

It's been a while since I've posted here----life has been very busy.  I continue to grow in my job as a Case Manager for infants and their mothers.  Their stories at times are so overwhelming, I'm mentally drained when I get home from work.  But I love what I do and seek God's direction in caring out my job responsibilities in a manner that pleases and honors Him.

PASSING the (Family) BATON

My Siblings & I - 2009

Yesterday my family got together to celebrate our sister's only son as he prepares to enter the Navy next month.  We had a wonderful time getting reacquainted with each other's children and grandchildren.  Some we haven't seen since they were babies, and meeting great nieces and nephews for the first time.

My brothers have taken over the cooking for our family gatherings.  When we were kids it was the women who prepared all the meals (on occasion my father would grill ribs, corn on the cob and hot dogs).  Today, the men take great pride in their grilling (and deep frying) of a variety foods.  They even make the side dishes!  The only thing they allow the women to do is make the deserts.

While enjoying the meal my sister-in-law and I reminisced about events, tragedies and triumphs of our families; and how we missed the passing of grandparents, parents and other family leaders.  Becoming silent in our thoughts my eyes began to fill with tears.  I looked at my sister-in-law and said, "We're now the patriarchs and matriarchs of our family."  On my mother's side the remaining patriarch is her brother battling cancer for the second time and not doing too well, and her sister is still alive.  On my father's side all of the grandparents, uncles and aunts are deceased.  The oldest female would be my cousin, if she's still alive (we've lost contact with her and her children).  If not, that makes me the Matriarch and my eldest brother the Patriarch of our family.

It seems we're so much younger than our parents and grandparents were when they stepped into the role of Patriarch and Matriarch of the family.  What will we leave behind to those under us when we pass from this life?  My hope is that we will leave a legacy of faith in the Living Christ who has always been our source of strength to triumph over every obstacle, crisis, disappointment, hardship and failure. 
TO GOD BE THE GLORY FOR EVER AND EVER, AMEN!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY MOMMA!

Today, April 25, my mother would have been 77 years old. She died on Mother’s Day, May 14, 2006 at 11:30pm.

I never realized how much my life mirrored my mother’s life until recently. As teens and young adults we see the many faults of our parents and vow never to make the mistakes they made. And many times without realizing it (perhaps because we judged without understanding, mercy and grace) we find ourselves walking in their shoes; in both good and bad choices.

Besides repeating some of mom’s mistakes, I’ve also followed her in the good things she accomplished in life. She was an avid learner and teacher of the Word of God; I share her passionate devotion to God and His Word. At my age my mother wrote religious articles for a community newspaper (Bulletin-Chicago, IL). Today I write Christian articles for a south suburban community newspaper (The Shopper-South Holland, IL).
We both served (and I continue to serve) as ministers in our local church, and we’ve written teaching materials and booklets to edify and encourage the Body of Christ.

I thank God for my mother and the imprint she made in my life for the Kingdom of God.

VICTORY!

Struggles and hardships on every hand,
My soul in anguish, how can I stand?

Bruised and parched, on this side of the mountain,
O LORD be thou my rejuvenating fountain.

A song of Zion comes to mind,
I sing Praises to the LORD Divine.

"I am with you always"
I hear the Holy Spirit say.

"Your victory is guaranteed,
I'm your Faithful Helper indeed."

GOD'S MOBILE CHURCH

Tired, exhausted and weary from yesterday's events, I slowly got out of bed wishing I didn't have to work a 9 to 5 job. What I'd really like is to be able to work from the church; building, equipping, and encouraging the Body of Christ and reaching out to those who don't yet know the Lord. Dragging myself to the shower I could hear the Holy Spirit say, "You are the church! And you work from the church every day!"

As I showered and dressed, scriptures began to run through my mind. I thought about the Tabernacle in the wilderness under Moses. It was a mobile "church." God dwelled in the midst of it and it moved when God moved. Another scripture came to mind: "Know ye not that your body is the Temple of the Holy Spirit (of God)?" and "You are lively stones, a spiritual house, acceptable to God by Jesus Christ."

Since the coming of the Holy Spirit on the Day of Pentecost indwelling believers; Christians became the "church" or Tabernacle of God. I laughed at myself in the mirror as I thought about this Illuminating Truth from the LORD. "I am the church, a mobile church in the wilderness (world)in which the Holy Spirit of God leads, directs, and touches others through me."

When I service my clients, I'm doing more than just my job; I'm expressing God's love for them in the way I treat them, with respect; and when I put myself in their shoes to assist them in obtaining needed help. Some have asked me if I believed in God and if I do would I pray for them, or answer their questions about the Bible or what they've been told about God. I also minister to co-workers. I encourage them, pray with them, and answer their questions about faith in God, my faith, and how I manage to go on when things look so bleak. Some of my co-workers have followed me to worship services at my church; another came to the realization that she wasn't a Christian as she had thought, and gave her life to Christ. As a mobile church with a 9 to 5 job (actually I work from 8:30am to 5:15pm) I have access to people that stationary pastors don't.

How about you? Are you a Mobile Church with a 9 to 5 job? Glorify God in His Temple and allow Him to touch those you come in contact with through you.

God, Abraham & Me

One way we recognize God's presence is with us is when we find ourselves walking in the shoes of those who've gone before us; and in the heroes of faith we read about in the scriptures.

When the thought came to me to leave the church my mother brought me up in and go to a place that would be showed to me, I assumed I had been studying too much. "Okay Anna, pull yourself together," I said to myself. "That command was to Abraham to leave his father's house, a place of idolatry. Your mother's church is not a place of idolatry; it's a place where God's Word is taught and He is worshiped. You're active in several areas of ministry, surely God isn't telling you to pack up and leave."

On Sunday afternoon following service, one of the church mothers approached me. She said, "Baby, God has a great work for you to do but you've got to leave this place and go where you can be trained."
Where would I go? Is God really telling me to leave? How will I know when I'm at the place where He wants me to be?

After several weeks of pondering and prayer I packed up and began my journey of faith. Since Abraham went south, I traveled south listening, looking and trusting God to lead me to the place He wanted me to go. In the process of my travels I've learned to discern God's direction, experience His heart for people, to see and love others as He does, and be a part of His plan in meeting needs and leading others to faith in Him. I have also felt God's heart for me through personal crisis-----breast cancer, family conflicts, long term unemployment, failures, sin, and the need for His forgiveness.

It is in my current tour that I came to realize the place God was leading me to. It is the same place He led Abraham to; a place of relationship with Him. Jesus has made it possible (through His death, for our sins, and His resurrection) for each of us to experience a personal relationship with God. What must one do to experience this connection with the Almighty? A-admit your need for a Savior; B-believe that Jesus is the Savior, and C-commit yourself to God asking Him to be the leader of your life.