rambling rosemarie

Last night I was trying desperately to talk a friend from high school out of going into the dark of night to look for something or someone. I pleaded with her that it wasn't safe. My stomach was in a tight knot and my throat muscles were aching with tension. Tears spilled down my face. I had her hand in a death grip and then she vanished. Deep grief spilled out of my soul and into my dream. I was crying out for her children when I woke up. The friend I was dreaming about died several years ago. We had lost touch as is often the case with people leaving high school and going where their adult lives take them. I remember hearing about her passing and wanting to make contact with her children. They have no idea who I am and I really have nothing to offer them except to tell them that she and I had once been friends. She was kind and funny and we shared some confidences. All that is ancient history. It wasn't an underlying sense of guilt or grief for my high school friend tha...

Ever notice how painfully time moves when you're waiting to hear how someone is doing? Each second feels like coarse-grained sandpaper moving slowly on sunburned skin. It is agonizing. Yesterday my sister had bilateral lumpectomies. Her four hour surgery turned into seven hours. Her outpatient surgery turned into admission and being on a ventilator. I am approximately 2400 miles away from her as the crow flies. As the heart loves I am right there beside her. (Post Script: She is off the ventilator, alert and talking. Thanks be to God!). I should be grateful to God that she is receiving good care. I should be thanking Him that her cancer was found early. Our mother's wasn't. I should be doing a lot of things that good Christians do, instead I am doing what I do best. Worrying. Worrying because I am not there. Worrying because if I was there, those doctors and nurses would really have to act right, that's my sister they are treating. But I am not. I am worried f...

Suffering. We all have some of it in our lives. Some of us get by with a sprinkling and others get dumped on. Most of try to avoid it at all costs by avoiding, denying or medicating it. A few of us are compelled to try to alleviate the suffering of others. Some twisted souls enjoy either receiving or causing it. Old, young, white, black, saved, reprobate, rich, poor, man, woman none of us are exempt. I can't help but think of Ophelia's mad scene and her distribution of flowers. "There's fennel for you, and columbines: there's rue for you; and here's some for me: we may call it herb-grace o' Sundays: O you must wear your rue with a difference..." Shakespeare was using rue as it symbolized sorrow or regret. Each of us has particular sorrows and regrets. Ophelia's sorrows drove her mad. She allowed her suffering to overwhelm her. Poor thing, love gone awry, torn between family and the prince who toyed with her. I do understand it, but t...

I used to think that God had singled me out to go through every crisis known to mankind so I could fulfill what Paul wrote in 2 Corinthians about comforting others with the comfort that we have received. How else could I know what it was they were going through unless I too had been in their situation? When you're full of yourself and bad theology, it's easy to think those sorts of idiotic things. It is also easy to think that you are receiving more than your fair share of hardships whether or not your theology has improved and even though you realize that you are not the center of God's universe. When you're the one that hurts, when your pain is the focus it's easy to lose perspective in large increments. That's when bitterness and/or resentment sets in and takes hold. Bitterness is like a creeping vine that takes root in the cracks between God's truth and your lost perspective. I have been guilty of being focused on my pain of late both physical and ...

I have said many times how blessed I am to be in the church that I attend. The folks are loving and want to live their lives according to the Word. Last Sunday Scott got to preach. He is a God honoring young man who cuts the Word straight and isn't afraid to hit you right between the eyes. I thought about blogging my notes on the sermon but instead I will just make it available to you. Here it is . Sit back and take some notes of your own. A little later in the day I was chatting with friends online about heroines of the faith and I heard a name I was unfamiliar with; Darlene Diebler Rose. Here's a link to her testimony on YouTube . Listen to it and you can be double dipped in blessing like I was.