Today is a “Play Date Day” in our house. Macey will be bringing two friends home from school with her this afternoon. Oh, she is SO excited! To tell the truth, I’m excited too. I’m excited for her because I know how much she’s looking forward to it. Sure, this means I have to really get on the ball and clean the house today, but there shouldn’t have to be an excuse for that anyway, right? This house ought to be pretty lively this afternoon with four little girls here. How exciting! 🙂
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Book Review – When Crickets Cry by Charles Martin
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When Crickets Cry
By Charles Martin / Thomas Nelson From Christy Award finalist Martin comes a work of “God-haunted” southern fiction sure to tug at your heartstrings! Travel to a sleepy town square in Georgia, where a 7-year-old child sells lemonade to raise funds for a heart transplant, an onlooker watches, and a speeding truck comes around the bend, changing bothe lives forever. |
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The more I read by Charles Martin, the more of a fan of his work I become. This is the third novel I have read by him and, so far, it is my favorite. The whole time I was reading this book I was in a real Catch-22 situation. I wanted to keep reading to see what happened next, but yet I didn’t want to rush through the book as I wasn’t ever ready for it to end. This novel took me in from the first page and never let me go through its entirety.
This novel is beautifully and skillfully written. Charles Martin has a gift of writing and he uses his God-given talents to engage readers and create memorable and realistic characters. The way Martin writes, I always feel a familiarity with the surroundings and characters. As if I am reading about my own hometown and people I have met and care about already. I felt instantly drawn into this novel and its storylines and back-stories. As I said above, I didn’t want to put it down, but certainly didn’t want it to end.
I really don’t want to give away anything about any plot lines in this novel. Martin’s storytelling and detail weaving are remarkable. Anything I could say here might detract from that and I would rather leave it all intact for you all to read, savor and enjoy.
I whole heartedly recommend this novel. It’s one that shows depth of love, perseverance of faith and importance of character. Beautiful through and through!
Busy Busy Busy…
This week is shaping up to be a busy one for me. Every day there is at least one “thing to do” on my Google Calendar. Good thing the calendar will send text messages to my cell to keep me on top of things. 😉 Most of this week’s activities are going to be fun, especially Macey’s class field trip to the children’s museum on Thursday, but some are just necessities like check-ups at the ENT for Mariana. Still, with something to get out of the house to do every day, we’ll have a hopping week.
Now that Lent is over, I am back on Facebook. It was actually kind of nice to give it up. Don’t get me wrong, I missed the interactions there, but it was a good Lenten sacrifice because it really freed up time for me. I have discovered that a lot has changed on there in time time I was away, but I’m adapting well so far.
Speaking of Lent, I hope everyone had a beautiful Easter. Ours was great! We went to our church’s contemporary service (which is normal for us) and the message was just incredible. We had a very low-key afternoon at home which was also nice. We pondered going to the zoo for awhile in the afternoon, but opted to stay home and relax which was a great decision.
I got my hair cut and colored today. I just love my hair stylist, Jenna! She is so sweet and does a great job with my hair. In addition to “doing hair”, she is also director of children’s ministry at a church in a nearby town, so we always have a lot to talk about on that note too.
The weather here has been nuts lately. This morning we had a good bit of rain with crazy wind. Lots of limbs and debris around our neighborhood. From what we have seen, nothing bad happed, so that’s good. The power went out at our church, so Mickey couldn’t work today and the kids all had to be picked up from preschool early. Crazy crazy!
Guess I should wrap this up and figure out supper. It’s getting close to that time.
Have a great evening, all…
Blessings,
Kelly
Happy Easter
When the Sabbath was over, Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, and Salome bought spices so that they might go to anoint Jesus’ body. Very early on the first day of the week, just after sunrise, they were on their way to the tomb and they asked each other, “Who will roll the stone away from the entrance of the tomb?”
But when they looked up, they saw that the stone, which was very large, had been rolled away. As they entered the tomb, they saw a young man dressed in a white robe sitting on the right side, and they were alarmed.
“Don’t be alarmed,” he said. “You are looking for Jesus the Nazarene, who was crucified. He has risen! He is not here. See the place where they laid him. 7But go, tell his disciples and Peter, ‘He is going ahead of you into Galilee. There you will see him, just as he told you.’ ” Mark 16:1-7 (NIV)
Easter is here! We celebrate the glory of Jesus our Lord overcoming cruelty and death. He died to take our sins and arose to give us the promise of glory forever. Praises be!
Easter Eve
In yesterday’s Good Friday post, I talked about God’s amazing grace. Grace that brought about the most beautiful good from the most violent evil. In addition to that amazing grace, I’ve also been thinking about God’s amazing love. The purest love that can exist is the love God has for us. Nothing we can ever do can separate us from that love. It’s always there for the taking. Amazing, isn’t it? Truly, it is. I don’t say that lightly either. I am in absolute awe of the way that God is the full and complete definition of love. God is the fount and source of all love.
The most incredible way God showed His love for us was to send His only begotten Son, Jesus, to this earth to save us all. Jesus came to this world as a fulfillment of God’s unending and unbending love for us. When you think about it, we really don’t know that much about Jesus’ life, but the most important parts to our salvation are contained within what we DO know. His birth fulfilled God’s promise to send a Savior. His teachings are the very foundation of how we should live and the truth of His lessons will always remain. His death and resurrection fulfilled His place as the one and only Messiah. Everything Jesus did within the course of His earthly life was done out of love. Love poured out from God the Father and love that Jesus Himself carried for everyone – even those who would beat Him, mock Him and eventually kill Him. His love was so great for man, that He even revealed it to the thief hanging on a cross near Him when Jesus Himself must have been in unthinkable pain and agony at that moment. His love is so great that He bore every single minute of undeserved punishment on behalf of mankind. He took on all of our sin at that time and took it to the grave with Him when He breathed His last breath and died. He left our sins in the grave when He arose from the dead. Want to talk about amazing love? There it is. That is amazing love.
We cannot even fathom the depth of that kind of love. We just can’t. As much as we know that the love is there and believe in its infinence, we simple cannot begin to comprehend it fully because we can’t love that deeply ourselves. That kind of love is only of God. As a parent, I cannot even begin to imagine letting my child be punished, let alone be made to suffer and die, for the sins or misdeeds of another. Can any one of us imagine doing THAT?! God did. God sent His own Son to save every one of our lost souls. The world was and is so full of sin that God in His infinite grace sent Jesus to preach, teach and to save. Then Jesus endured absolute torture to the point of death all for the sins of every.single.person on the earth when He Himself was sinless and blameless. And, here’s what really moves me, personally…He didn’t have to do it. Jesus was fully-God and fully-man and as He lived upon this earth, His every motive, action, thought and deed was pure and true for the Glory of God. He didn’t have to allow Himself to be tried, beaten, tortured, mocked, spit upon and hung on a cross. God didn’t have to allow it to happen either. It could have all ended in the blink of an eye and all of humanity could have been destroyed right then and there. (Or worse) But, because of the incredible depth of the love of God that Christ Himself possessed, He did do it. He took all of our sins onto Himself and He bore what most of us can’t even begin to imagine. He didn’t do it for Himself. He did it out of love for us. Love that originates from God the Father and pours freely from Jesus Christ. There is no greater love. No greater grace. Jesus was innocent and pure and did not have to do anything for the salvation of man, but instead of doing nothing, He did it all for every one of us. Again I say…AMAZING.
As we prepare to celebrate the ressurection of the risen Christ on Easter, I want to remind each of us to be mindful of Jesus’ love every day. If we know that He loves us and we live in His love, we can give forth from that love. Â Pure evil and sin took Jesus to the cross, but it was love that kept Him there for the sake of our souls. Let’s not take that for granted. Let’s not forget that Jesus truly paid it all. All to Him we owe.
John 3:16-17 (NIV) really says it all:  “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him…”