Happy September! I’m not sure where August went! Espressos of Faith is belatedly celebrating a Blogiversary! We opened up the site on August 3, 2014 and started posting August 15, 2014. I’ll never forget it because I was on vacation, and my web site manager and I said: “Okay, ready or not, here we come!” (I’ve since learned to put better margin in my life and not attempt huge undertakings while away to relax.) Not long after, by the amazing grace of God, Not Just on Sundays: Seeking God’s Purpose in Each New Day was published on October 1, 2014, a day shy of my birthday.
This summer, I’ve been keeping a weekly faith column at Your Tewksbury Today and slowed down in terms of adding content to the blog site. Personally, we had a challenging summer on several counts, and rest became a must.
In honor of a year of faithful readers, engaging conversations, and much-needed personal growth, Espressos of Faith will aim to post twice a week this month, hopefully posting a few guest bloggers along the way.
Thank you for coming alongside me and reading what my heart wants to communicate. I dedicate each post to the Great I AM, Whose hand I never want to let go of—not in the stormy seas and not even when the skies are clear and the air about me dancing with dragonflies. It’s the best hand I’ve ever held: The Warm Hand of Jesus on Cold Days of Doubt.
Blessings to you this September,
Bonnie
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Summer: A time when the family spends significant amounts of quality time together, regroups from the busy school year, checks every item off the year-in-the-making to-do list, and catches up on each other’s lives.
Sound good? Yes, yes it does.
But summer can also be a time when all problems shoved to the side by our busyness the rest of the year come rushing into that empty space like an angry brook moving so swiftly, it polishes pebbles along the way.
Only I’m the pebbles, and no matter how smooth I think I am, the water continues to force its way in and demand my attention.
Know what I mean?
We glided into July with a few weeks of calm. It was good to sleep in, not worry about schoolwork, and follow our whims about the schedule.
And then, like a gigantic, threatening, visible but still-out-to-sea tidal wave, suddenly every issue that had been building—some unbeknownst to me—piled on top of my head. When I thought maybe I had a handle on one area, another person in the family would point out another flaw in our relational dynamic. Not fun.
Pretty soon I was seeing not just the frayed edges, Read the rest of this entry »
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In the previous post, we looked at the beginning of Gideon’s story in Judges 6, when God spoke the seemingly impossible into Gideon’s circumstances, but we stopped short of another twist in the account. Gideon’s need for reassurance went even further than the back-and-forth with the angel of the LORD. Gideon was called a “mighty man of valor” at a time when he was hiding in a winepress threshing grain, trying to stay under the radar so Israel’s enemy didn’t find him. Considering how weakened Israel was at the time, avoiding the enemy and living in constant fear, it is understandable how much he needed to be sure he was hearing from God.
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