Author: iner

The Importance of a Step

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Sunshine is a good motivator!

But last week there was a day God was drawing me outside to the warmth of the sun, but I stayed inside with my pain. It would have changed that day and the ones that followed.

Today, only takes an hour for the shining sun to draw me outside.

Walking around the flowerbed I chose a spot to pull grass in the sun.

The temperatures are dropping into more normal range of the 60’s. I choose to be brave and try my jeans from last year! Thankfully they fit comfortable enough to work in. The temperature is just too cool for shorts.

Do you think I have work? There is a hosta in the middle of the grass which I dig up and attempt to get all the grass roots separated from the hosta roots. I am not sure how well I did so we will see what happens when Spring arrives.

 

 

 

After working on the hosta, I see grass starting to grow from roots left in the dirt and dig to pull each root, then I continue to the grass behind the flowers.

Back in this area the dirt is holding the moisture from the last 2 days of rain making it more difficult, but I keep working.

 

 

Continuing to dig until the sun sets I do make an impact. Remembering years past this area used to be filled with hosta plants. Some of them probably left because of the change from shade to sunlight but mostly they were just crowed out by the grass that overtook everything.

Walking outside for sunshine transforms my day.

It helps me walks the dogs and puts a smile on my face. The better attitude helps me not get frustrated with the TV not connecting to WiFi.

Start each day, choose to move, one step at a time and shine.

God Bless Each of you with The Joy of The LORD Filling you daily! Amen.

GOD IS SO VERY GOOD.

Energy from God

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Unusual hours!

Bed at 4:53 A.M.

Awake at 8:13 A.M.

Church at 9:15 for choir practice.

Church service 10:00 A.M.

This October we are showing episodes of The Chosen season 5 after church with discussion time and a meal afterwards, to discuss what we watched. I really enjoy watching and talking about The Chosen, it has changed my life for the better.

Home 2:00 P.M. and to bed. Yeah, I get 4 more hours of sleep!

Waking up at 6:45 P.M. It takes a bit for my body to switch from laying down to sitting up with scoliosis, especially after sitting at church for 4 hours.

At 9:00 P.M. I am deciding it would be good to make a salad with boiled eggs. It takes me an hour to make my salad most days and up to, two hours to eat it.

Do you appreciate one size over the other of the picture?

This one is medium and the other is large at the bottom of the page. It is a big difference to me. I wonder what small is?

The other question: Do you like my salad?

At 10:00 P.M. I started to eat this salad and needed to lay down so the salad went on hold.

Laying down 10:35 and waking up at midnight. Fitbit gave me another hour sleep, up to 8 total.

I finish eating the salad at 2 A.M. and feel exhausted. The need to lay down returns but this time I am asking God.

God, “I don’t know how I am going to write a story or do anything to get myself to bed.” 

Usually the salad wakes gives me energy but not tonight, I lay down to rest.

Suddenly I feel hungry

Realizing the hunger is for milk and a granola bar and nuts I get up and make my snack. What happens next is amazing!

Strength and energy are rising up in me!

I don’t understand it but often when God suggests something it doesn’t seem normal.

Here I am finishing this story at 5:30 A.M. and getting ready to go to bed.

Prayer meeting is at 10:00 A.M. Today I believe I will ask God to wake me if He wants me to go.

I believe God wants me to write daily because it is how I live my life talking to God all the way through it. Sometimes He gives me hunger for something like today or pictures in my mind as I ran yesterday.

It is a learning process to find how God will relate to us. He knows we all function uniquely.

It is a wonderful relationship when we take time and invest in it.  

God Bless You with The Peace of God in Jesus, Amen.

A Space in Time

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This morning/afternoon I woke thinking run.

My husband suggested it is suppose to rain all day.

God will provide the way if it is His idea.

After an hour of waking up I start to get dressed to run and head out doing my best to miss the puddles of water everywhere.

Every once and a while I see the sun trying to peak through to give me encouragement! It reminds me of walking in the dark cloudy nights and having the clouds parting to show me the Big Dipper. It always makes me feel like God is watching out for me to keep me safe.

I suppose this day with the sun peaking out God is telling me He is keeping me dry and giving me what I need to run safely.Today the first look of Autumn surprises me! 

When I am not at my strongest my eyes look down so I see the patch of leaves on the ground long before I see the tree they fell from.

This color of leaves gives me great JOY! I think of it as Beautiful! Do any of you enjoy the beauty of leaves on the ground? Or do you prefer them in the trees?

God gave me a whole hour to run 3 miles, DRY!

I am Thankful!

My run has moved from 20mm to 17mm. Most people will think it is slower than they walk and that is probably is true but I can only do what I can do.

I didn’t experience any rain falling the whole time I ran. It started up a few minutes after getting home. It was probably the only dry moment of the day! God is Good!

GOD IS SO VERY GOOD.  

God is telling me to start typing every day so we will see what happens. I am noticing things to experiment with so we will see what I try and what works out.

So you like the pictures this big? Or do you want them smaller?

God Bless each and everyone with The Joy of the LORD FILLING your soul daily! Amen.

Continuing The Blessing of The Flowerbed

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GOD Gives and GOD Takes away


Job 1:21b The LORD gave and The LORD has taken away. Blessed Be the name of The LORD.

I think, “God doesn’t take, He gives and makes broken things whole, as He is doing in me.”

In life stuff happens. We have to deal with what is in front of us, but IN JESUS we are able to deal with life differently. We have a HOPE to KNOW that in the end that JESUS WON! We are walking it out but we know this is not all there is. Also we have the Joy of The LORD in us giving us an inner Hope to carry us through the stuff of life.

Over time I start realizing that sometimes God needs to take something we are holding on to, to do a good work in us.

The need to take the tree down breaks my heart. It would not be good for the a branch to fall on a person or our house but I love our tree. My husband decides to buy a wood insert to replace the gas fireplace that we have never used, a blessing? YES! A great Blessing!

Our neighbor takes the tree down int the Spring of  2014 and he allows me to sort through the wood to keep what I want and throw what is too small for burning. Lifting the wood is great for building muscle so I choose one log to lift for arm muscles and extra weight while doing lunges! It also does this thing when I lift it behind my head, it pulls me upright and settles my spine somehow. This is a scoliosis thing with a rod.

                     I am in awe of what I am able to do.

Two years earlier, God gave me the miracle of 5 brand new vertebrae and nerves connecting the muscles giving me the ability to gain muscle and start running. For perspective I was ready to get a cane to help me walk because I could no longer hold my body upright, But God moved.

I am sitting on the steps looking at the work, but my body isn’t ready to respond. It frustrates me that my body won’t function until 4:00 P.M.!

But God reminds me,

“Be Thankful and Patient with your body.” (growing strength and endurance  isn’t like the instant miracle of the new bone it is a much slower process.)”

It is easy to become greedy to want more than I am able to do at this time. When remembering just a few years ago my body could only do one hour of work for the day and maybe the week. But now I am able to work five hours lifting logs! One thing I tried is five hour energy and it did help me to do more for five hours.

Can you tell how much love there is for the tree?

Do you like what the tree has done to my beautiful flowerbed? There are tulips under the logs!

I am learning how to adjust things on my blog! Finally the pictures look as expected! Loosing more fear of computers and the blog!  They look better!If you look closely there are some tulips blooming under the tree limbs.

 

We loved the tree so much we put the trunk in our back yard and I do climb on it often! It brings joy even laying sideways in the back yard. Maybe I will have a good picture of that next time.

I learn to plant many different kind of flowers, no more shade plants!

God is teaching me, He is covering me even when I am in the wide open spaces, especially if I feel naked out in the open.

The strength gained by lifting logs has given me the ability to keep the flowerbed and yard in order, even adding a few more flowerbeds. I am in awe of what I am able to do!

My running grows to five miles a day and ten miles once and a while. I buy my skinniest pair of jeans a size six!

Wow, I am able to keep going for 10 days without my body shutting down and needing a day of rest. I am in Awe of What God is doing in me!

THEN MOM DIES! 

GOD IS STILL GOOD!

The Blessing of the Flower Garden, Part Two

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Water bubbling up in the flowerbed… trouble!

 

While weeding the flowerbed I find water that doesn’t belong. I’m not watering anything! The front of the flowers are getting flooded.

After contacting the city they inform us that they will need to dig in my flower garden to repair a broken pipe. They will shut off the water main so we should fill the tub for flushing the toilet and other containers with water to drink while the water is off.

We have lived here for 10 years and are thankful for the Maple tree with the flowers surrounding it. Thankfully we have time to save the a majority of the flowers. My wonderful husband helps save the flowers.

I watch the city workers take a backhoe to my flowerbed, and as they dig down to the broken pipe I hear him say,

“Oops, I hit the tap root!”

They way he said this made an impact! I had no idea what it meant but we soon find out.

This big massive tree is taken down by one little root being hit.

Big or small the root feeds the tree and the importance of that root shows up as our tree cries out in pain while dropping her limbs one at a time.

Thankfully all branches fall facing the street away from the house.

First on June 25, 2013, our daughter’s bug was smashed not long after she bought it.

 

 

 

 

Again in November 21, 2013 the neighbor’s vehicle was in the wrong spot as the branch came down and totaled the pickup.

Throughout the winter three more branches fall into our yard during a storm.

This shows us we have to take our tree down. First we call a professional to see if it can be saved, but we realize it has to come down.

Job 1:21b The LORD gave and The LORD has taken away. Blessed Be the name of The LORD.

We are thankful to have had the tree for as long as we did and now the process of taking it down starts.

God is Good no matter what is happening He is Always Good.

WORD in Action

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Feeling overwhelmed as if the end is approaching!

But God!

Devotions tonight started with Jeremiah 29:11 Amplified Bible

“For I know the plans and thoughts that I have for you,” says The LORD, “plans for peace and well-being, and not for disaster, to give you a future and a hope!”

Reading this a few times it washed our souls bringing a healing balm.

The next verse Romans 8:28 New American Standard

And we know that God causes all things to work together for good, to those who Love God, to those who are called according to His purpose.

2 Corinthians 4:16-17 New American Standard

Therefore we do not loose heart, but though our outer man is decaying, yet our inner man is being renewed day by day. For momentary, light affliction is producing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison.

I usually read before and after the verses to get a more full understanding,

but tonight I kept going.

Romans 8:26 -And in the same way The Spirit also helps our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we should, but The Spirit Himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words; and He who searches the hearts knows what the mind of the Spirit is, because He intercedes for the saints according to the will of God.

v28 And we know that God causes all things to work together for the good to those who love God, who are called according to His purpose, for whom He foreknew, He also predestined to become conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the first-born among many brethren; and whom He predestined, these He also called; and whom He called, these He also justified; and whom He justified, these He also glorified.

V31, What then shall we say to these things: If God is for us, who is against us? He who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how will He not also with Him freely give us all things? Who will bring a charge against God’s elect? God is the one who justifies; who is the one who condemns? Christ Jesus is He who died, yes rather who was raised, who is at the right hand of God who also intercedes for us.

V36 Just as it is written, “FOR THY SAKE WE ARE BEING PUT TO DEATH ALL DAY LONG;WE WERE CONSIDERED AS SHEEP TO BE SLAUGHTERED.”

V37 But in all these things we overwhelmingly conquer through Him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities,nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the Love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

We both left this reading in Peace,

Knowing The LOVE OF GOD FOR US!

GOD IS SO VERY GOOD!

The Blessing of the Flower Garden. part one

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The beginning of the flowerbed!

God created all the beauty of creation!

The fruit of the Spirit is Love, Joy, Peace, Patience, Kindness, Goodness, Faithfulness, Gentleness, and Self Control. Galatians 5:22

I happen to believe that a beautiful flowerbed exudes all of the fruit of the Spirit. When walking through a lovely garden doesn’t it fill us with love, joy, peace, kindness, and goodness?

Our huge Maple tree became a big part of the appeal of us choosing our new home. It is a cover of protection every time we walk outside. During family meals I would look out at the tree and think one day I will clime you.

Mowing with the riding lawn mower around the tree, and driving over the roots feels like I’m hurting the tree.

My solution: create beauty in the form of a flowerbed!

Do you appreciate the flowerbed from 2009? It looks small comparing to 2025!

Every spring I would spend $100 on flowers to cover the space around the tree and the three flower boxes.

Flowers are my Mother’s Day gift! It often takes 6-8 weeks to finish planting the flowers. If you take into account the weakness of my 40 year old body it could easily be compared to  someone in their 60’s. Every doctor visit of my life I would shake the doctor’s hand and they would be so concerned at the weakness of my handshake they would immediately grab my left hand to compare. By my late 40’s pain rose to the point I could feel every hit of the football players while watching them. Creating the flowerbed took months because I could only work a few hours a week

I am able to do this is because I believe and confess Isaiah 40:31!

Isaiah 40:31 Yet those who wait upon the LORD will gain new strength; they will mount up with wing like eagles, they will run and not get tired, they will walk and not become weary.

Planting and weeding the flowers pulls me outside into the sun and dirt bringing healing to my soul and strength to my body. I have been hearing about the importance of being in the sun. It does good things for our brains and lifts our attitude. There is a true suffering when living in the North during the winter months and lack of sunshine encourages depression.

My husband knows he can make me smile by encouraging me to follow him out and look at the flowers. This always draws me out to work in the dirt and pull weeds. I have shed many tears pulling weeds as God works in my soul bringing healing.

The flower garden is a Blessing that fills my soul with Joy.

And then:

Uh oh, I see water started bubbling up in the midst of my flowers. Something is not right!

The story continues next week.

As they say on YouTube like, comment, and donate!

I know there is no place to like but commenting what you like and don’t like would help.

Do you appreciate my stories and do you want them to continue?

God Bless each and everyone who reads this with The Joy of The LORD! Amen.

 

The Sea-Saw of Life

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Depression seeks to steal my life!

It has taken two hours of hunting for summer running clothes, only to find I have none that fit. The sudden rise in temperature has taken me by surprise! I don’t want to wear the warm running shorts meant for the cool spring temperatures.

I resort to cutting the elastic waistband,

but it doesn’t work!

This forces me to wear my warm shorts because they are loose enough. Rolling the legs up helps me stay as cool enough.

The shock of my body size is exposing how long it’s been since I’ve run regularly. I’m remembering in 2017 when I was running 10 miles I had a hard time with pants falling off, this is quite the opposite problem.

It seems every time I start succeeding life interrupts and it feels like I am start over.

Fitting into my clothes has been a see-saw experience, clothes fit one day but not the next. FRUSTRATING!

It is a daily fight to keep pushing to succeed! I have to hold on to every inch of life, fighting to stay out of depression.

Hope Rises! June 4, my run is a consistent 4 mph!

The Runkeeper app announces my speed at 14mm, or 4.1 mph! This is better than I have run for a long time. Most of my runs have been in the 18-22mm or 3 mph.

Fifteen years ago Charlie was a young dog with lots of energy that needed to be used. When I took him running I learned how to keep up.

Finally, I realize I am not going to gain speed with my two older dogs who want to stop and smell all the smells.

Today, I am getting comfortable without having a dog to keep me company and being my protection. It is forcing me to push out earlier than sunset so I am able to run the 2 miles in daylight.

Now it is my body I fight against and the heat.

Screenshot

My first decision to getting stronger is to run the length of the rows and stop at the end to catch my breath.

The 14mm doesn’t count the rest time because I pause the app.

In July, two rows connect without stopping!

These are my high points. There are days in between when my body says,

“All you are getting today is a run/walk!”

Then there are days my body says,

“No running at all! You can barely walk! Good luck on getting 10,000 steps!”

August 21 my body runs one mile without stopping!

The continuous run of 15:44 is the first one in years.

Bonus: I can now fit into my skinny summer running shorts!

 

 

                        Today, pain says,

“Stay on the couch!”

But I decide it is time to move and push past the pain and outside to weed the flowers I cry out,

“Help, Jesus! Help!”

Sometimes the movement causes pain. But I keep going, knowing it is important and I still want to get my 10,000 steps. Working in the flowers pulling grass makes me smile! Pulling weeds also loosens my body enough to walk, finishing my 10,000 steps.

Last spring as I was stepping outside to run, I heard God say,

“Thirty days!”

That month I made 29 days but day 30 I could not move off the couch. The months since that day have been 5 to 10 day stretches.

Something seems different about August 1, 2025, and so far things are moving in the correct direction. I have a 26 day streak of 10,000 steps, so I need 4 more days. Believing the next step is a 30 day streak of running every day!

“Help Jesus Help!” 

Life will start to change: my body will be strong, and my confidence will grow!

“Help Jesus! Help”

I experienced this 15 years ago and I believe God is moving again!

“Thank You! Jesus! Amen.”

GOD IS GOOD!

The Draw of Color

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Exhausted with pain, how do I get 10,000 steps!

This is a familiar place and I wonder how God is going to get me moving?

Most of my days start with pain, and it just takes a bit to be able to move. Some days it takes an hour or two to start moving. Other days food and a nap get me going. But today every step is difficult and sitting up hurts so I wonder if God is going to give me the ability to move outside.

Some days are meant to rest the whole day and other days God gets my interest with a little color.

This little bit of color forming out our front window draws me outside to look for hope and a sunset!

Outside I look in all directions for Hope!

 

 

 

 

This is enough color to put a little fire in my soul. I quickly dress for a walk. Sam is very happy!

Rain and thunder is expected to last well into the night but this looks like the possibility of a sunset.

Sam and I start out for the cemetery and do find beauty! Sam thinks he wants to run! I try to run, and it turns into kind of a trot!

Do any of you like the sunset?

Would you get up for this?

I did get my 10,000 steps. I am on day 12 hoping to reach 30 days.

God spoke 30 into my spirit a few months ago! I believe it will mean my strength has returned and life is moving forward to a future instead of surviving.

GOD IS SO VERY GOOD!