5 things to do when you don’t know what to do

February 2, 2016February 1, 2016 / kstrick7 / Leave a comment

Do y’all ever have those days, weeks, years, that you wonder why

you haven’t given up yet? I’m talking about just a good ol’ throwin’

your hands up in the air & saying,

“Y’all can have this, I quit!”

Sometimes, it just seems like nothing is going right. When there’s

too much month & not enough money, not enough time in the day

to do it all, piled up laundry, stacked up dishes, legal problems,

deteriorating health (whether yours or a loved one), relationship

problems, or worse- you may feel like you don’t know where to turn.

It’s sadly a reality that people are hurting & sometimes the grief of

life can overwhelm us. However, sweet friends, I wanted to share

with you how you can get through these things in life & oddly

enough, come out ok.

Here are my 5 reasons not to go hollaring and screaming into the

sunset:

1. Remember that everything in life is temporary. If everything is going good,enjoy it, because it won’t last forever. And if things are going

bad, don’t worry, that won’t last either.

James 4:14 whereas you do not know what will happen tomorrow. For what is your life? It is even a vapor that appears for a little time and then vanishes away. (NKJV)

2. Know you have to trust the Lord. When God says you can do this,

you can. Know that the Lord will not let you go so far, you

can’t see your way back.

I Corinthians 10:13 No temptation has overtaken you except such as is common to man; but God is faithful, who will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able, but with the temptation will also make the way of escape, that you may be able to bear it. (NKJV)

God’s team is the winning team. Be on that team.

3. Don’t forget the prize. Keep your eye on the prize (heaven). Do

all you can to be faithful, so that you may be able to have that

prize. God’s plan for your life, far exceeds the circumstances

of your day. So, know if you just hang on there, the Lord’s

going to come right in & take care of it all. But we have to do

our part, too. Be sure you don’t forget to continue to be a beautiful Christian like example. God won’t forget you for it.

Job 23:10 But He knows the way that I take,

when He has tested me, I shall come forth as gold. (NKJV)

4. Be aware that with the good, comes the bad. Hard times are a fact of life.

How we view them & handle them is up to us.

Job 2:10 Shall we indeed accept good from God & shall we not accept

adversity?(NKJV)

5. Most of all know you are not in this by yourself. There are billions of people on this ol’ earth. Know when to ask someone for help. I had a dear friend tell me once, “You can get through anything with a lot prayer & a lot of Paxil.” I love her light hearted take on life. It’s reality that sometimes we have to ask our medical care providers for help. Don’t be afraid to do that. But do know that Jesus is right there waiting to help you no matter what. If the Lord does not seem close to you, seriously, who moved? It wasn’t Him. Just seek Him, because He’s there. Acts 17:27 so that they should seek the Lord, in the hope that they might grope for Him and find Him, though He is not far from each one of us; (NKJV)

Let me stop here & say something about Job. He lost everything he ever worked hard for. His wife turned against him. His friends gave him bad advice. He had health & financial problems. In one day his whole world was turned upside down. However, it was in his attitude, his God fearing, God loving, God trusting attitude that helped him make it through. It seemed like sometimes that God had forgotten Job. But He didn’t. It was over years before Job’s life ever turned around. What did he do during the mean time? He was faithful. Don’t get me wrong. He was upset & didn’t like what was going on. However, he never turned his back on God.He knew the Lord would deliver him. And guess what y’all? He did & Job was more blessed in the end, than the beginning.

Now that’s a beautiful reason to keep your head up & keep

going. I have been through times in my life, that it was day by

day, minute by minute that I had to try to focus on getting

through something tough. The good news is, I did it. I know I

prayed a lot, stayed faithful to the Lord, & just kept going.

Sometimes that’s all we can do.

I am so glad you came by to visit me today. It is SUNSHINING here. Am I really here in NE Mississippi or is this heaven? So glad to see the sun after all the cold & gloomy days. I hope you have had a blessed week. As for me, I have to be going because I should be washing clothes.

photo credit: pinterest

6 things to help you get rid of worry for good

April 16, 2015April 16, 2015 / kstrick7 / Leave a comment

I hope this finds everyone doing well. We have been having some rain. And too, I have found a new way to waste my time. I have been watching too many tornado videos online. Have you seen the one of the guy on the interstate that is like right there at a tornado? I mean he could have probably reached out & touched the thing?? It was the one in Rochelle, IL last week.

TOO MUCH for me. I am confident when I say, if my Mama Boyce were here today, in the times of youtube tornado videos, well, let’s just say she probably would not let me watch them. She was terrified of tornadoes. She & my family were in a tornado one time & to say they lost everything is an understatement. We stayed with my grandparents, during the day while Mama & Daddy were at work. Also, we were there after we got off the school bus. And every moment in between, if we wished. We lived right beside them. Since that awful event, every time it thundered, we were at the storm house. Peanut butter & crackers & a water jar in hand, we would make the walk to the edge of the yard to the storm house. My Papa Clyde would go in ahead of us & scare out any mice, rats, snakes, lizards, or whatever had set up shop since our last visit. Spiders & cobwebs were expected. However, since we were not a bunch of barbarians, my Papa Clyde would run out all of the before mentioned like it was his job. If for some reason we were not at their house, she was on the phone calling. Wanting to know when we were going to be at the storm house. This was a serious deal with her & everybody had just better go along with it. She was a worrier. She loved all of us & worried we would not make it to safety in time. However, we don’t have to live in a land of fear & what if’s.

Here are some ways to take worries out of our lives:

Give them to the Lord. Straight out of the shoot, let the Lord handle everything. I Peter 5:7 casting all your care upon Him, for He cares for you.
Pray. We should not do anything without talking to the Lord about it. All day long. All night long. The Lord never gets tired of hearing from you. I Thessalonians 5:17 pray without ceasing,
Forget about it. Time thinking about the negative, robs us of time to enjoy the good things in life. I can’t help but sing the Frozen song in my head when I think of this one. Just “Let It Go”. Philippians 3:13-14 Brethren, I do not count myself to have apprehended; but one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forward to those things which are ahead, I press toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.
Remember we cannot control all situations. The devil is on his game looking for whoever he can to cause trouble with. Don’t play the blame game & think you could have done something differently to deter a situation. Sometimes you just can’t. I Peter 5:8 Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil walks about like a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour.
Be thankful. Who has time to worry if you are using that time wisely? We should be thanking the Lord for the good things in our lives, on a regular basis. There is ALWAYS, ALWAYS, ALWAYS something to be thankful for.Psalms 100:4 Enter into His gates with thanksgiving, And into His courts with praise. Be thankful to Him, and bless His name.
Trust the Lord. Proverbs 3: 5-6 Trust in the Lord with all your heart, And lean not on your own understanding;In all your ways acknowledge Him,And He shall direct^[a] your paths.

The sun is finally poking it’s head out, this afternoon. I am very glad to see it. Speaking of someone poking their head out, last weekend Mr. Sweetie Pants came to spend the night. His dad picked him up on Saturday. He went non-stop the whole time he was at the house. When asked by his grandfather to please quit pulling the cords on the blinds on the living room window, he reassuredly replied,

“It’s ok Pap. I know what I’m doing.” Well, he is 3 years old you know.

Much of the time he was there was spent with him reassuring us he knew how to do things, him actually going ahead with what he was doing, & then blaming Miss Neenee with it all. And ya’ll after he left I was one worn out Grand! The next day, just in time for lunch, here he comes back. He runs back to the bedroom where I am. He pokes his head around the corner of the door & says,

“Grand, I’m back.”

I would not trade these days for nothing. But for now I have to be going because I should be washing clothes.

George Strait on my Pandora. It’s the little things.

photo credits: http://www.gitacoaching.blogspot.com, http://www.lovethispic.com

Easter throwback

April 9, 2015April 9, 2015 / kstrick7 / Leave a comment

Easter circa 1976

Easter circa 1977

I know, I know. Easter is over. I had to share this with ya’ll, though. Because, Easter is always so exciting. Especially as kids. The receiving of the proverbial Easter Basket from the Easter Bunny himself. The Easter Frocks which always were accompanied by white gloves & a hat. The coloring of the Easter Eggs. Ahhh.. it was a wonderful time.

On Easter Sunday, we always went to church & then to my grandparents house. Looking back, I can remember, one particular Easter when the weather was not very agreeable. All of the grandkids had assembled at my Mamaw & Papaw’s house after church. We ate our lunch with

Easter circa 1985. My brother in his Rico Suave phase. My cousin in her cuteness phase. Me in my homegirl big bow stage, wearing my Mamaw's dress. Sadly, not true.

Easter circa 1985. My brother in his Rico Suave phase. My cousin in her cuteness phase. Me in my homegirl big bow phase, wearing my Mamaw’s dress. Sadly, not really.

a heavy heart. How were we supposed to hunt Easter Eggs with it pouring rain outside? We must have looked pretty downtrodden.

Because low & behold Easter was not going to be terrible & disappointing!

Somebody suggested we hunt Easter Eggs in the house. Now, let me remind you, this was the early 80s. If plastic eggs were popular back then, well, we didn’t have any. I don’t know what possessed Mamaw to let us hide Easter Eggs in her house. But ya’ll, she did & we were very delighted to say the least. Because Mamaw had just saved Easter.

We hid & hunted eggs all afternoon. It wasn’t as fun as being outside, but not much of anything ever was. Anyway, a good time was had by all & that was that. Or so we thought. Fast forward about 6 weeks….my Mamaw was milling around the house & heard something back in the bedroom. Walking back to her room, she smelled the awfulest smell she had ever smelled. She got back to her room & started looking around. She could not, for the life of her, figure out what was going on. So, she started looking through her dresser, her vanity, her closet, & her chifferobe. That’s when she realized what had happened. One of our Easter Eggs had not gotten found & it exploded in her chifferobe.

Oh. My. Word. Ya’ll.

MAMAW’S UNDERWEAR DRAWER HAD A ROTTEN EGG IN IT.

Not just any rotten egg. An EXPLODED rotten egg. Needless to say, she washed & washed her unmentionables for no reason. Because the smell would NOT come out. In our family, word of Mamaw’s underwear got around pretty quickly. Each of us grandkids were sternly questioned as to

“WHO IN THE WORLD hid the egg in Mamaw’s DRAWERS drawer???”

I don’t readily recall who the final culprit was. EXCEPT I knew with ALL my heart, this time, I was not to blame for ANY of it.

The guilty party was in this group of Easter Egg hiding kids.

The guilty party was in this group of Easter Egg huntin’ kids.

Mamaw was not too thrilled to have to throw away all her undergarments. And she did declare, no more Easter Egg hiding in the house. I am QUITE sure my Papaw was laughing to himself, at all of this. He would have had to of been silently dying inside. If Mamaw would have thought for an instance this was humorous to Papaw, well, that would have NEVER done. She did not intend that she ever did anything for him to laugh at her about. But, sometimes those moments just came. Especially with us being her grandkids. So, there you have it. Reason 27 why we will never hide Easter Eggs in my house. I know, I am a mean ol’ Grand.

Here are some other thoughts for today:

Psalms 18: 1 I will love You, O Lord, my strength.
²The Lord is my rock and my fortress and my deliverer;
My God, my strength, in whom I will trust;My shield and the horn of my salvation, my stronghold.
³I will call upon the Lord, who is worthy to be praised;
So shall I be saved from my enemies.(NKJV)

We should strive to have a rock solid faith of trust & that the Lord will take care of us, no matter what. We need to remember, no matter what is going on in our lives, at the end of the day God is still in control. No matter how worthless I may feel or how dim the outlook may be, I need to forever remember I truly matter to the God of love, truth, & hope. No pain lasts forever. No evil triumphs in the end.

I hope all of you had a blessed Easter. It was overcast, for us. However, we still got out & hid eggs. The grands ran amuck. They played t-ball, too. Each of the boys had a new ball & bat. Which really didn’t matter if it were new or not. When they started hitting each other in the face & head with them, they didn’t care if that bat were old or new. It still hurt! Not much crying. A lot of “stand back” & “watch out” & “it will be your turn in a minute” was said. My little Miss Priss grandbaby played in the wagon while we were outside. All & all I would say it was a wonderful day. My Daddy came to be with us. He had preached at a local church, Sunday. He stopped by to eat & watch the kids hunt eggs. Then, as is his duty, retired home to study his lesson for Sunday night. Not before he ate a dog’s bait of the scrumptious pork loin my sweetie smoked. But, he was not by himself. We all did. Until next time I have to be going because I should be washing clothes.

As much as we try to separate these two, they seem to always end up together.

The best picture of me & the grandboys. Mr. Sweetie Pants kept trying to run off, thus, the death grip I have on him.

Pretty sure this one was the same age as the grands, say yesterday. I love this face.

One last Easter throwback with my eldest & his big ol Easter Bunny circa 1999.

Credits- Our Daily Bread author Philip Yancey

Learning to trust & can I get a marshmallow peep?

April 2, 2015April 2, 2015 / kstrick7 / 2 Comments

I can remember when I was little, if I was scared, I would run & hide behind my mama. This was mostly when I had maybe perhaps done something to my brother. He would chase me & I knew, if I could find mama, I would be ok. I can remember her saying to him,

” You have to be good to her. She’s the baby. You have to show her how a big brother acts.”

(This was promptly followed by me poking my head out from behind her sticking my tongue out at him.) And oh MY word ya’ll, if that hasn’t been a reality check for ME in life. Because, you know what? People aren’t always nice to me. And they really don’t care if I’m the baby or not. But my sweet mama used this tactic to try to get us to behave. I can remember her having to stand in between me & my brother & I would hold on to her just as tight as I could. I always trusted her & whatever I did, if I could get to mama, she would take care of me. No matter if I were right, wrong, or indifferent. I had that wonderful, special trust.

Do you ever have troubles? Sometimes problems arise from a wrong choice or decision that you’ve made. At other times, you don’t really have to be responsible for any of it & here it comes. Either way, problems in life are just plain unwanted. What makes an incredible difference in bad situations? How you handle it. We can be afraid, angry, disappointed, or have a multitude of emotions. We might start to ask God, “Why me? Why us? Why this?”However, we can trust, in the middle of all the heartache, that:

1. The Lord will not leave you. Hebrews 13:5 Let your conduct be without covetousness; be content with such things as you have. For He Himself has said, “I will never leave you nor forsake you.”(NKJV)

2. The Lord will take care of you. I Peter 5:7 casting all your care upon Him, for He cares for you. Things may not be exactly like you think they ought to be. However, there are times the Lord takes care of us in a way we don’t understand. Matthew 11:28 Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. If we only go to Him & trust Him, He will help us, period. He will NOT leave us hanging out to dry.

3. The Lord will turn tragedy into blessings. One of the worst things that has ever happened to me is my mama’s sickness & untimely death. I will Never. Get. Over. It. But you know what? God has blessed our family with deeper love for each other. He sent people to help us through our hard times. We always had someone we could depend on, around us. He has caused me to appreciate life & to remember the wonderful example my mama left for us. I realize that for 30 years, I had a precious mama. Some people don’t have that. Some folks have never known their mother or don’t have a Christian mother. I was very fortunate to have had that. I can pass along those qualities to my children & family. I have a hope that I will be with her again one day. Until then, I have got to keep on keepin’ on.

John 16:22 Therefore you now have sorrow; but I will see you again and your heart will rejoice, and your joy no one will take from you.(NKJV)

The Lord is always working behind the scenes for us. We just have to trust in Him. We readily accept good from Him. As a part of life, sometimes we will have to accept bad, too.

Job 2:10 Shall we indeed accept good from God & shall we not accept adversity?(NKJV)

Life goes on. Even in awful circumstances. It’s ok to grieve the loss of a loved one, to get down & depressed about an erring child, or to feel like no one has any idea what you are going through. Those are human feelings. We just can’t unpack our bags & live in the land of desperation. There are times we get stuck going through the struggles of life. Just like a big ol’ tractor pullin’ a truck out of the ditch, the Lord can send people to help. Let them. I have said it once & will say it again & again. Folks, we are all in this big ol’ mess called LIFE together. We have to depend on each other. I hope you are at a point in your life you have finally relented to this fact. It makes things so much easier knowing you have people, who care about you. Isn’t it wonderful to know we don’t have to go through trials alone? We always have the Lord there with us. He can do things for us no one else can. We just have to simply trust. Is there a struggle in your life today? Pray about it. Seek others to help you. Look to the Lord for comfort.

The psalmist David said in Psalms 56:3 When I am afraid, I put my trust in you. (NKJV)

I’m not saying your problems will vanish overnight. I am saying you will be able to bear whatever it is, until things are better. You will find peace of mind. Only if you are willing to trust. God’s love never fails. We must give Him a chance to show us that. Whenever I am facing something hard in life, I have to remind myself, there’s someone out there who has a worse situation than I do. There’s always something to be thankful for. Maybe it’s that things aren’t as bad as they could be. No matter what, I have to be thankful for a loving God I can depend on. It’s hard to see the other side of trials sometimes. We just have to remember to slow down & take things day by day & trust the Lord to take care of us. In times like those, we don’t know what we need. We have to let the Lord handle our needs. He’s good at that. Just like the trust that my mama was going to make everything all better, God can do the same thing. Even bigger & better. Promise.

I am so glad you came by to visit me today. Goodness gracious, I about got too serious & heavy hearted with all of this. But sometimes it’s just that way, ya know? This Sunday is Easter. I sure hope you have your Easter frocks ready for church. My grandbaby girl is going to look so sweet. If you see her, you will be tempted to eat her with a spoon. I would discourage any of that. She has a tad of a mother hen for a mama. My Miss Neenee is ready all but the shoes. We will be getting those this week. Oh the fun! The kids & grandkids will be coming over after church. We will be dying eggs, hiding eggs, running around chasing kids, eating good food, & oh the Easter candy. There is nothing that suits me more than a marshmallow peep. Until then, I have to be going because I should be washing clothes.

photo credits: graphicsfairy, pinterest

Lessons from a 6 year old & warm weather where are you?

March 2, 2015March 2, 2015 / kstrick7 / Leave a comment

There are times you just have to know there is good still in the world. As much as we hear of the horrible things going on, we must be confident there is good going on, too.

I was lucky enough to have 2 little girls, from my Bible Class, to sit beside me Sunday night at church. They had notebooks & were drawing different things. When I say notebooks, I mean we live in a place where these are still in style:

They enlisted me to draw a panda bear & a horse. It was pretty sad. Their pictures were MUCH better than mine. I was hoping the people sitting behind us could not see how truly pathetic my artwork was. I have taken art classes. However, my abilities are CLEARLY stunted when it comes to drawing things. The head of my horse resembled a lizard or dinosaur. I did add a mane & tail. One of my sweet little friends did ask what exactly the tail was. So, we made it a little longer. That helped out a lot. (Not.) They were drawing dogs, cats, & the occasional turtle. Then, I looked down & saw a picture I could not figure out. It was a stick figure with some lines drawn through it. I leaned over & asked the little artist to identify her drawing. She whispered,

“It’s Jesus on the cross.”

Really? I’m not even sure someone could have told me anything more precious right there in that moment. Here I am. Just a sinner, trying to make it through life, trying to make sense of it all, & I have a 6 year old sitting right beside me nailing it with her “what’s on her mind” drawings. She taught me some valuable lessons with her Jesus picture.

If I keep my mind on Jesus, well, that’s all I really need to do. I won’t have time to worry about being offended or getting my feelings hurt or much anything else.
I need to make sure I am living a righteous life everywhere. Especially in front of kids. Obviously, they are watching & listening.
I need to always be kind to children. Kids are wonderful blessings from the Lord. If we mistreat children, we are mistreating a work of God. Nobody wants to do that.
Kids are people, too. They think about things, wonder about things, & love like nobody’s business. We need to do the same.

Jesus loved children. He referenced how we must become as children to go to heaven.

Matthew 18:3 .. “Assuredly, I say to you, unless you are converted and become as little children, you will by no means enter the kingdom of heaven.

This tells me I must be humble, loving, trusting, forgiving & always anxious to learn about what Jesus wants.

I hope you are having a wonderful week. I promise to you right now, if we ever get warm weather again, I will never ever ever complain about it. Well, maybe. I am just ready to go outside and it be warm. I heard the other day, this has been one of the top 10 coldest winters, in the Mid-South, since 1875. Now, you know why I’m so opinionated about the coldness. Southerners are not made for cold weather. Word. Until the weather is hotter than the backside of a cast iron skillet, I have to be going because I should be washing clothes.

photo credits: http://www.poraora.com, pinterest

A cow with no horns

February 25, 2013 / kstrick7 / 1 Comment

“Mister, why doesn’t this cow have any horns?” asked the young lady from a nearby city, on a trip to the country.

The farmer kinda had a funny look on his face, for a moment. He then began in a very patient tone. “Well ma’am cattle can do a powerful lot of damage with horns. Sometimes, we keep’em trimmed down with a hacksaw. Other times we can fix up the young’uns by puttin’ a couple of drops of acid where their horns would grow in, and that stops’em cold. Still, there are some breeds of cattle that never grow horns,” the farmer continued. “But the reason this cow don’t have no horns, ma’am, is ’cause it’s a horse.”

Have you ever felt misunderstood? I know I have. Sometimes I feel like no one could ever understand how I feel about certain things in my life. My kids, my family, my church- these are all things I have a particular emotional tie to. I feel like there are times that it’s hard to put into words my love, my attempts of caring, and my concern. When my college age daughter doesn’t answer her phone, it may be something as simple as she’s in a spot with no service or she’s driving. I start to worry. And by the time I do talk to her, I may be a tad impatient. (By a tad, I mean a gigantic frenzy of WHAT IN THE WORLD HAVE YOU BEEN DOING??) She & I may be a little misunderstood with each other at that moment. She doesn’t seem to know what all the hoopla is about. I don’t know why she has to be so nonchalant about my hissy fit. In the end, we agree, that if I did not love her & care about her well being, it would not matter if she answered her phone or not. We may sometimes misunderstand each other. However, there is One that is always here to understand us. All we have to do is trust.

Proverbs 3:5 Trust in the Lord, with all your heart. And lean not on your own understanding. v.6 In all your ways acknowledge Him & He shall direct your paths.

I hope that if you feel misunderstood, that you will seek out the understanding that God gives us. He can love us & be there for us like no other. There is nothing that can fill the God shaped void in one’s life, but God himself. I am so glad you stopped by to visit with me today. I love it when you drop by. Until next time, I have to be going, because I should be washing clothes….

The funny cow story was taken from a ‘House to House Heart to Heart’ bulletin. You can visit them at www.housetohouse.com