Our Sixth Week

Thanking God for His many gifts to us - finishing up the sixth week of our Sabbatical/Time Off - all a gift. How can we so blessed to have these three months off, celebrating the privilege of being in ministry for 40 years, and pausing to rest and reflect before we continue on ...

Thankful for so many things ...

Strength and endurance to tackle a much-needed home project last Monday - cleaning out our garage (we tackled it with determination to get rid of a lot of junk that has just been sitting around unused - such a good feeling to clean it up so thoroughly).

Our wonderful, refreshing Devo/Prayer Outing the next day to beautiful Chalco Hills Recreation Area - we loved this spot, and want to go back again - was such a refreshing time for both of us.

These familiar verses - in a different translation, bringing depth of meaning:

"Consider it a sheer gift, friends, when tests and challenges come at you from all sides.

You know that under pressure, your faith-life is forced into the open and shows its true colors.

So don't try to get out of anything prematurely.

Let it do its work so you become mature and well-developed, not deficient in any way."

(James 1:2-3 MSG)

And so thankful for family and friends ...

A day filled with family last Thursday

More progress with yard work and garden - thankful for a son's help

Time with a daughter and a three year-old grandson and his baby sister

Bread made together - bread, plus 80 hamburger buns (for our freezers, to use on summer days)

Nine year-old grandson and four year-old granddaughter here for a few hours

These wonderful days of Sabbatical/Time Off with my husband

Gateway to the West parade in nearby town - watching with friends

High school reunion for my husband's class of 1962 (graduating 50 years ago - unbelievable - and we continue to be in full-time ministry - to high school students!)

Visiting with good friends at our church picnic

Words of thanks from a friend

And so blessed each day, with the closest of Friends

"The way of the soul's transformation is the 

Way of Divine companionship.

Not so much the asking Me to make you this or that

but the living with Me, thinking of Me, talking to Me -

thus you grow like Me."

(God Calling)

(Counting 1000 Gifts in 2012 #506-519)

(Digital Scrapbooking Credits: Page Template - Scrap Girls ABR_SSLOAlb-Ser 8, Frame Template - Scrap Girls MRE_WindowPane, Paper & Embellishments - Scrap Girls JRE_Reflections of the Heart)

Linking up at: