Random ramblings...

First off, HAPPY BIRTHDAY MOM! This year might qualify you for the worst gift-getting ever, as I just mailed your birthday card yesterday (no chance of it getting there by tomorrow unless the postman flies all night to deliver it for only 49 cents...) and I still have yet to finish your present. What do I do with myself all day? I'll try to be more on the ball next year, but for now, hope your day is great!!

I have been reading some awesome stuff lately and, not that I have any brilliant insight to add, wanted to share. I grabbed a book at the Christian book store the other week called "Found Faithful" by Elizabeth Skoglund. It is a compilation of stories about Christian heroes like Charles Spurgeon, Amy Carmichael, C.S. Lewis, and Ruth Bell Graham. I found myself reading the part on Spurgeon, not because I wanted to be some big shot intellectual, but just because I wanted a little light reading to help me fall asleep (sorry, Chuck!). But, what I read kept me up a lot longer than I had planned, pondering over how God uses terrible, inadequate, miserable people to do His awesome and mighty will. The man who was called the prince of preachers was so overcome by depression and anxiety that he would spend weeks in bed and was physically ill with worry and loneliness. My favorite quote that I read was "'The strong are not always vigorous, the wise not always ready, the brave not always courageous, and the joyous not always happy.'" I realized that God might have given Spurgeon this cross to bear so that he would never be able to fully rely on himself and pat himself on the back at all that he had accomplished. Rather, it would keep him with one eye on the world and one eye on his Lord, without whom he could so obviously do nothing.

I'm also reading a book by Stormie Omartian, the author of "The Power of a Praying Wife". This one is called "Just Enough Light For the Step I'm On"...a long title but pretty self-explanatory. One quote grabbed me so much that I am stuck at that point in the book - I can't read another word until I get my puny little brain around these..."Even if you are certain God has given you a vision or dream for your future, He will still ask you to surrender it to Him so thoroughly that you will think it's as good as dead." Now, I don't know what that means to you, but that thought kind of scares me! Good as dead? Yikes! How about stable, doing well, or even "kicked in the rear but still breathing!". The more I think about that statement, though, the more freedom I see in it. Hope it means something to you, too.

Well, since I have left myself with no room to hide, guess I'd better get cracking on that present for my dear old madre. Hang on, Billings...spring has to be right around the corner...right?

Cherishing every minute,
Brooke