photo: unsure

It has been awhile since I have been here at FMF. I think I missed the end of September and all of October for sure. The past 6 weeks have been a little crazy around here.

1. It started with our 50th wedding anniversary party that our 3 daughters threw for us here. Two of the three girls had to come from out of town with their families. But all of us were here together for the weekend to celebrate…the 3 families and us. Yes, all the grands were here too! We had a delightful time. As usual, the time was way too short.

2. Then I wrote a 31 day series for the month of October titled Scars and the Hope of the Gospel.  stop   Feel free to check it out here. The link goes to the link page for all the posts. It was an encouragement to me as I wrote it. Generally, I interchanged posts about Scars with posts on The Hope of the Gospel and what it means to us practically in our everyday life.

It is interesting how so much of the Gospel needs repeating, whether we repeat it to ourselves or allow it to be repeated to us by someone else. It is often called preaching the Gospel to ourselves or to each other. One of the main reasons it needs to be repeated is because it is so unbelievable! Someone died for you in order to reconcile you to a Holy GOD as well as to one another. Then He offers it to you as a free gift. There is nothing you can do to improve on the value of this gift. It is truly amazing!

3. The other event we had in our home this past month was cataract surgery for my husband. The two surgeries were a week apart. For 2 weeks after each surgery, I had to put drops in his eyes. There were 3 sets of drops. one set were done 4 times a day, another set were 2 times a day and the last set were done done once a day. Without a written schedule, I would never had have gotten the drops in the correct eyes at the right times. There was a lot of repeating going on there. I’m glad it is over now. We are down to one drop a day of one medication in each eye for a few more days in one eye and a little over a week in the other.

This last 6 weeks involved a lot of repeating, whether it was the celebration of the repeating of many years together, including years that were mundane, difficult and delightful. We celebrated it all. GOD was with us enabling us to be faithful and enduring through all of it!

Or whether it was simply repeating the posting of 31 days of posts about a topic we repeat often because of its joyful and amazing content. Or whether it was a rather mundane series of weeks of repeating drops in eyes so they will heal properly after surgery. We did lots of repeating…and will continue to do so!

 Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses,
let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely,
and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us,
 looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith,
who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross,
despising the shame,
and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.

Hebrews 12:1-2 ESV