Hi y’all! I’ve never before left my SmellingCoffee friends alone for such a long time! It’s been a short and busy week, and I was hoping that the book release would be my next post. But it’s not quite ready yet, so I thought I’d hop on here with a tiny update about life and a link to a super message by Beth Moore. How’s that?
Keeping Christ AS Christmas:
The book is entirely written! The Lord and I finished at 1 am on Tuesday, and I’m still praising The Lord over that! My sister helped me know how to make a PDF out of the word document and it, too is ready. My brother created a beautiful website for it, and a friend helped me make a book cover that makes it look like a “real” book. 😉 There’s just ONE thing we’re waiting on… and it’s a biggie. I tried, and I just absolutely could NOT put my book into the “Kindle” and “EPub” form by myself. In the wee hours of Tuesday morning, I contacted someone who does that for a living (found her via Smashwords) and after some prayer and a few e-mails back and forth, sent the book to her. She will finish what God has started, then the book will be out! Hopefully the next post will be the debut of Keeping Christ AS Christmas. You have been so supportive and encouraging along this journey, and I’m so grateful.
Nathan:
It’s now been a month since we’ve been home from LeBonheur. I wish I could say that everything has been perfectly wonderful since we’ve been home, but I can’t. The doctor started Nathan on some new medicine that we weren’t expecting to produce negative side effects. However, several weeks into taking it, the “episodes” started again. We didn’t rush to the hospital these times because the doctors told us that as long as Nathan was awake and aware of his surroundings, there was nothing a hospital could do. He had severe headaches surrounding these episodes, but when the episodes would pass, Nathan would be “ok” – not great, but ok. After a really rough week of these episodes, James and I felt led to remove him from all medications. It is taking time to work the med out of his system, but we see an improvement in him every day. We are seeing a psychologist as the LeBonheur doctors suggested, but the psychologist doesn’t feel that Nathan is under “stress.” We’re kind of at a loss right now, but have our next appointment at LeBonheur in December. We are still praying that God will reveal exactly what is going on with our son, and how he can be helped. And, we are still praying for the Lord to heal Nathan. Most of all, we are praying and trusting that God is using every bit of this to make him into the “mighty man of God” we’ve prayed for him to be.
An Encouraging word from Beth Moore:
I like to watch Life Today’s “Wednesdays with Beth.” Just recently I stumbled upon LightSource.com and found that we could watch and absorb messages from many wonderful Bible teachers. Along with the others, they have the Wednesdays with Beth episodes available to view at any time. I’ve enjoyed watching back episodes of her messages. This is the “home link” for the episodes of Beth’s teachings.
The past two Wednesdays have really resonated with me and made me think about many of you. She shared a two-part message about being “Wrecked, But not Ruined.” It helped me think of an especially difficult period of my life from a few years ago in a grateful light. I can look back now at this post I wrote, and see how God used those pressing times to work out the overwhelming fear and desire for control that previously defined my days. I’m still reaping the benefits from what God worked out of my life as “Out of the wreck I arose.”
If you are wondering why God has allowed or is allowing several storms to hit you at once, you will be encouraged and strengthened as you listen to what God has to say through our “friend,” Beth. Click on the links below and be blessed. May our Lord speak to you and encourage you today. I’m praying for you, my friends…
Jennifer