Sneaky Weakness

I am taken by surprise to see the picture my husband takes of me walking into the room.

What happen?

God healed bones and nerves to give me strength stand to stand up straight, and I lost it?

 

Back in 2010, my muscles are so weak I need assistance walking any distance. I use my husband and daughter to help me walk, but I am about ready to get a cane. My butt muscles need help.

Before I buy a cane, God steps in! He gives me brand new vertebrae which takes away pain and starts connecting nerves to create muscle strength.

An example of of my weakness before: my middle school daughter comes home from school,

“Mom can we play catch?”

“Yes!”

Heading out back with mitts and a softball we start but I am not able to throw the ball across the yard to her. Why?

I switch to underhanded tossing and it works, but my body stops functioning after only three throws.

“What is going on? Why can’t I throw the ball? Is sitting on the couch all I can do? I am only 40 years old!”

A few years later I loose the ability to raise my right hand above my head or extend it out in front of me. I don’t understand.

Age 49, God challenges me to run! Christmas 2011, I am able to run a funky mile by running the blocks and walking the streets. I am working hard enough to stop at the end of the street to catch my breath before I turn and run home.

The next day I have a desire to run. I’m thinking,

I can’t run two days in a row.

The desire is strong enough I try,

Wow! I can lift my legs and run!

Running two days in a row is a definite miracle! God is So Very Good!

Over the years, God continues to teach me how to stand straight and tall so the bones reform causing me to loose my forward lean. I am able to grow muscles and my new strength erases my  limp. It is shocking when I try to show someone my old posture but it is gone! My forward lean disappeared.

A friend says, “Every seven years our cells completely change over.”

I have spent enough time standing straight and tall that my forward lean is erased!

Looking at the picture I wonder,

“I have been standing tall and straight for years, so why am I leaning so far forward?

Searching for answers I decide my peak happens in 2017 when my daughter sees me returning from a 10 mile run and says,

“Your legs are skinny!”

The first inclination of weakness shows up after Mom dies January 2018 when I need someone to help me weed my flower garden.

The year 2019, comprises of being caretaker for my dad and my husband. This is when my thinking starts to change from run to walk,

“I am able to run 5 miles so I should be able to walk 5 miles.”

November 2021, Grace, my cat dies. May 2022 Dad dies and depression starts to creep into my life.

When I try to get my strength back I believe lies!

First I believe all I need to do is run one mile a day to keep my strength.

A year later, I remember when God taught me to run at least 2 miles daily, But it is not enough.

In the winter of 24-25, I happen to run 5 miles and the next day I feel strength in my core!  I am standing tall for the first time in years!

Since life gets in the way, I started doing planks and push-ups daily. This helps me stay strong enough to run when I get the chance.

It is a journey of faith as I fight for health and strength!

Strength makes life easier and more fun!

 

 

Feeling Blessed

Today, I woke easily and made it to Bible study where we talked about spreading the Joy of The LORD.

After Bible study I drive to a larger grocery store close to church. I have been out of Aloe Vera Juice and can not find it at my local store. It helps my intestines work. Thankful to find it, I pick up two gallons and realize a cart would be handy.

I walk past a lady on the way to the carts. I am not sure if she is working as I carry two gallons of Aloe Vera towards the doors, hoping no one will think I am stealing it. After grabbing a cart, I decide to stop and explain what I am doing.

The woman turns out to be a customer resting on her walker. I start to explain what Aloe Vera Juice does to keep me healthy and then she tells me about her health issues.

She is interested when I offer the idea of believing God to keep her healthy instead of waiting for the problem to return. We talk for a good 15 minutes and she allows me to pray for her healing.

Noticing people and stopping to give an encouraging word can change a person’s day and even make our day better.

I am actually still smiling and feeling joyful a full 24 hours after this conversation.

GOD IS SO VERY GOOD!

Jesus Already Paid

We survive Y2K, now we are set to move!

We are selling the house in Florida and buying a couple acres in Kentucky.

Surprise, all of a suddenly a pain in my tailbone shows up. Sitting and standing both become difficult!

“God, You have to do something, I need to be able to take care of this house and yard we are buying!”

“Justine, When you take your daughter to the radio station to give her offering, ask them to pray for your healing.”

Arriving at the radio station, we enter the building unsure where to go. Finding our way to the announcer we wait until she is done announcing the next song.

Getting  past the awkward moment she assumes my daughter wants to empty her purse, I mention.

 “God told me to ask you to pray for healing.”

We stand in a circle and she prays over me. Nothing happens we offer thanks and leave the building. Opening the door to the outside I question God!

“What’s up God? You told me to come here and have them pray for me, and I did! Nothing happened! What’s up?”

“Jesus already paid! You don’t have to pay!”

By the time I reach my vehicle the pain is gone!

Fifteen years earlier a thought enters my mind.

I deserve to hurt because I didn’t listen!

God doesn’t make us pay!

JESUS ALREADY PAID!

John 3:17 For God did not send the Son into the world to judge the world, but that the world might be saved through Him.

JOHN 19:30b Jesus said, “IT IS FINISHED!” And He bowed His head and gave up His spirit.

Healing Exposes Creativity

Walking in the fresh snow Bart is walking faster then I am able. This gives me the ability to see the foot patterns in the fresh 4 inches of snow left by Bart and Charlie.

Later we switch to walking in the street’s tire tracks making it easier to walk.

This cross tire tracks catch my attention and I stop to take a picture.

Checking to see if cropping  the picture improves it or not? What do you think?

 

 

The screenshots at the bottom looked better on my phone. The colors pop and just look beautiful.

This game has shown me how I think color and pattern and my husband thinks numbers. Every once and a while they will have the exact same pattern only flipped and I will wonder why being upside down would be so much harder.

The answer came from Bart. He sees they increased the numbers explaining the reason it is harder.

What does all this have to do with healing? Spending most of my life protecting myself from life, all my creativity was shut down. As I am being set free from protecting myself my brain is opening up to the creativity I was born with.

GOD IS SO VERY GOOD!

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The Power of Scripture

Being Washed and Renewed in The Water of The Word

Yesterday we were listening to a sermon talking about The Power of Scripture in our lives when I turn to Bart and say,

“You wouldn’t want to be around me if I haven’t spend time with God, would you?”

Laughing he replies, “No way!”

I start to really learn this years ago about 1995, when we leave a small town and move to a big city. We do find a church to join. They ask me to teach music for Vacation Bible School.  The only way I know how is with a tape recorder and Amy Grant music. I am very nervous helping out for my very first time.

During a break I grab my Bible, walk outside, and sit on the steps to read a chapter in the Old Testament. I read about kings and don’t understand much but it is time with God.

When I go back inside and start to work with kids, everyone is able to tell something has changed! They want to know,

“What happened? You are so calm and peaceful?”

I said, “All I did was open my Bible and read a chapter out of the Old Testament!”

That was the first time I knew other people could see a difference in me by just reading my Bible.

Around the same time I ask Bart to watch Michelle who was one or maybe two. I NEED to spend time with God, I don’t want to be around me.

After an hour, Bart calls down the stairs, “Are you done yet? I want to watch sports.”

“No! I need more time!”

“OK, don’t worry.”

A few years ago in the 2020’s, my troubled soul wakes me and doesn’t allow me return to sleep.  So I drag myself out of bed on a cold night to spend time with God until I am at Peace!

I quickly learn it’s better to spend time with God before bed.

Does anyone have any thoughts?

Does anyone think I’m crazy?

Does anyone else know the calming peace of spending time in God’s Word?

What I Know is,

When I write  all my worries and cares in my journal

and spend time in His Word,

Peace fills my soul and Joy Bubbles up inside me.

God Bless you.

GOD IS SO VERY GOOD!

 

Exposing My Greed

Today, God is explaining what went on two years ago!

Sitting in church paralyzed by fear of what others might think if I dig in my purse for an offering.

Sunday, January 1, 2023, God covers me in His Glory asking, “Do you realize the power of giving on the first day of the year?”

“Yes, I do!”

“Give the $100 bill you received as a Christmas gift.”

I am looking in my journal where I put it and cannot find it!

Then God suggests, “You have a $1oo in your wallet for food, use that!”

Sitting there frozen. I cannot move.

Why can’t I grab it? I’ve done this before?

Too fast the offering plate arrives and I put in my normal $1 and The Glory of God lifts off of me and I want to scramble to obey, but the moment is gone and I know it!

I don’t understand why I didn’t obey?

What difference does it make giving the one in my wallet for food or the one set aside as a gift?

God is exposing my greed, my need to protect MY food money. I am not trusting Him to provide for the food I need.

I know it comes from the choices my biological dad made which cause us to live in deep poverty.

LORD JESUS only You can set me free from my fear of not having enough!

Do What You Only You Can Do! Set me free!

It is interesting how we can Trust God with everything but keep one little area we don’t really know if we can trust Him with it yet?

Has anyone had a similar experience with God?

Have you ever asked God for answers about a situation and expected an answer?

God has answered some of my questions immediately and one question took 40 years for Him to give me a “Yes!” as I was eating breakfast in 2020. I knew exactly what the question was He was answering.

God Bless each and everyone who reads my stories. I hope and pray they help people realize God wants to be involved in every part of our lives to grow us into Christlike people!

GOD IS GOOD!

 

True Understanding of a Miracle

I heard a news article about a women who lived through a horrible accident in her young adulthood. Her life was saved but her financial life was killed because of the great amount of unpaid medical bills.

Forty years ago I had a horrible accident,

but God prepared me for it.

Eighteen months after being filled with God’s LOVE, He kept me reading Joshua 1 for six weeks. This is where God teaches Joshua to “Be Strong and Courageous” five times total.

Not only do I read this over and over but I also listen continuously to the song, “Be Strong and Courageous” by Michael W. Smith.

The end of July, my friends and I are planning to camp in Canada as part of a church retreat. Days before the camping trip, God prepares me with something else I am going to need. He uses a good friend to suggest I buy health insurance for just $25. (this is 40 years ago) It is in my price range so I agree and buy it.

The women drive in vehicles and the men drive motorcycles. The day after we arrive at camp God impressed upon me the power in a motorcycle, but instead of listen to His warning I go in my tent and write my prayer.

“I don’t care what You say, I’m going to buy a motorcycle and go cross country driving it.”

The next moment the guys suggest driving through the park on motorcycles, and all the girls join them.

As we start back to the camp, the guy I am riding with takes notice my fear and slows down.  Soon he realizes we are falling behind, and speeds up just as we approach a blind curve. He cannot stay in his lane and chooses to put the bike down. Both the bike and station wagon are totaled the driver flies 40 feet and breaks a leg and I am thrown off the motorcycle into a station wagon with a 65 mph impact.

God prepares the scene with an ambulance at the entrance of the park but the nearest hospital is an hour away, and they reject me because I am very broken.

These are the days before helicopter ambulances so it is an ambulance van driving me to Winnipeg, Manitoba. I spend 7 days in the ICU fighting to live and another week learning to walk again.

Mom says, “It is a flat $500 bill for each day which is great in the ICU but very high for a normal room.”

The price of my insurance goes up just after my accident, thankfully my friend pays to keep me covered as I fight to live.

My brother, who doesn’t want to be in the hospital, takes me outside in a wheelchair when I am out of ICU. The downtown sidewalks are very broken and my body is feeling every bounce of the lumpy sidewalk. When we go back to my room I notice a bone is moving that is not suppose to move. I am too afraid to say anything.

My physical therapist says to the doctor, “She is hurting more than expected, you need to check her broken bones again.”

The X-Ray exposes the three breaks in my pelvic bone have moved. I need my leg in traction. My parents decide to transfer me to the states so my friends can visit me. This drive is in the back of a station wagon with a milk laced with morphine in case I need pain medicine. Canada does things a bit different than the states.

I have a couple more surgeries before I get out of the hospital and my insurance pays all but $100.

A few years ago, my sister asks,” How did you pay for your accident?”

That was the first time in a long time that I have thought about it.

This week the news report brought into focus that God gave me one more miracle than I knew.

GOD IS SO GOOD!

How many miracles have you been given that you thought was good luck?

Ponder with me the possibility that God is at work to do Good in your life and mine?

Catching Up Turns

Sending a text about Happy New Year turned

to accusing  Joyce Meyer of being a cult leader.

Anger arose as I hear someone compare Joyce, who was sexually assaulted for 15 years as a child, to Warren Jeffs who sexually assaults children.

Doing my best to not take offense I ask, “What is your definition of a cult leader?”

He says, “when the followers die for the leader.”

I’m thinking he puts God in this category when God sends Elijah to a widow and tells her to feed Elijah her last meal before cooking for herself and her son. 1 Kings 17:13-16

Or when Jesus is watching people put money in the offering and He praises the widow who puts in her last two copper coins. Mark 12:41-44

I have no idea what cults have to do with Joyce Meyer who teaches people to grow up in Jesus and forgive those who abuse you Matthew 6:14, and do good to those who hurt you, Matthew 6:44.

She does have a ministry “Hand of Hope” which feeds the hungry, opens orphanages to give children safe home and food and education, saves women who have been trafficked, helps with disaster relief, brings doctors together to heal in places without doctors, digs water wells so women don’t have to walk miles for dirty dangerous water, and so much more.

I first found Joyce Meyer in the late 90’s when she taught me to forgive my dad who kidnapped and trafficked me.

Then I learn from Joyce to bring my worries to God instead of getting on the phone and calling every person I know, to release my stress. Not only did this knowledge help with friendships but it also gives me peace of mind.

I no longer have thoughts

constantly

running  through my mind!

God says in 1 Corinthians 9:14 that those who proclaim the gospel should get their living from the gospel, and Galatians 6:6 says let the one who is taught the Word share all good things with the one who teaches.

THANKFULL, I  am a partner of Joyce Meyer Ministries for over 25 years, JOYFULLY I start to volunteering at her conferences after God heals my broken spine and gives me nerves to gain muscle.

Aside from Being filled with God’s LOVE, meeting my husband, adopting our daughter, and Mom rescuing me: FINDING JOYCE MEYER on TV CONTINUES TO MAKE THE BIGGEST IMPACT IN MY DAILY LIVING.

GOD IS SO VERY GOOD!

From Selfish to Generous

A selfish soul transforms into a generous person!

One day, while working the 2nd shift at The Pony Soldier motel I order a pizza. It happens to be a day I’m training a new person. I do not allow the person have any of MY PIZZA! I NEED to bring the extra home to feed my husband.

I have no compassion for the person working with me who has not eaten all day.

This makes me cringe realizing how selfish or self protecting I am. Why I am not able feel the other person’s pain? Is my pain so large not to see others?

Other places selfishness shows up is when my husband wanted to give to church, I disagreed with him even though I am the strong Christian, praying and studying my Bible daily.

As a kid I spend $.25 for a Bazooka bubble gum and allow myself about a half to an inch to chew of the foot long gum. I need to save it in case I might not be able to buy it again.

When friends asked for a piece of gum, I give them exactly what I give myself and they call me stingy.

How does God breaks this fear of not enough?

A few years after my failure to share, we adopt our daughter and move across the country for employment. While Bart works out of the house, a neighbor sets me up to babysit a baby for $80 a week. Another neighbor asks me to let their dogs out every day for $25 a week.

One day while doing dishes I hear someone on the radio speak about tithing. My brain thinks that is $8 of my $80 of my food money! I cannot give away my food money!

That day, God takes away my babysitting job.

I catch on quickly and start putting away $2.50 from the money I am still making from dog sitting.

Soon, a mother wants me to watch her child who happens to be my daughter’s age of 3.5 years old.  This mother doesn’t appreciate the $80 I am charging, she bumps it up to $90! Later, she calls back and bumps it up to $100 a week.

God gives enough money to tithe 10% and sill have $10 more than before!

Not only does God do this wonderful thing, but He gives me back the baby so I am earning $180 every week plus the dog money.

Lesson learned!

GOD IS GOOD!

The Promise of a Penny

Trust God and fear not!

Suddenly, I notice a new bill in my email. This monthly bill of $5.00 doesn’t sound big, but when counting food money it will pay for a gallon of milk or a carton of eggs.

Doing my best to not worry, I ask God for help and head out to a doctor’s appointment.

Leaving, I take the elevator and grab the bar when it moves. Suddenly, I see is something falling like paper sticker flipping over and over as it falls to the ground.

Bending over I see a penny!

God sends a penny our of thin air to tell me, “I have it! Don’t worry things are going to work out!”

God is so Very Good.