Happy Birthday, Mom...

today, march 5th, is my mom's birthday.  she would have been 61 years old today.  to be honest, the past week has been really tough for me (and i know for the rest of the family as well).  i think it's starting to sink in that my mom is no longer here.  my mom was one of the first people i would call whenever i got good news, or whenever i needed to ask a question.  i remember the other day i was in the kitchen in our apartment in dallas, and i had a question about cooking something.  i instinctively reached for my phone to call my mom, and then it hit me real hard that she wasn' t there.  

it still hurts everytime i pull into the driveway at my parents house, and my mom isn't there to greet me.  it still hurts everytime i walk by her empty piano bench.  it still hurts everytime i want to tell her something only to realize that i can't.   i feel like there's an emptiness in my heart.  i miss her so much, but i know by God's grace He will carry our family through.  my mom told us before she left that if it were possible, she would pray for us in Heaven.  i like to believe that she is still praying for us this very moment.

happy birthday, mom...we miss you.

And Let Us Not Grow Weary

i've been reading this devotion book called Streams in the Desert which i pulled off of faye's bookshelf.  the devotion for march 5th, our mom's birthday, seemed so fitting for her life...and i thought i'd share it with y'all:

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"We are made partaker of Christ, if we hold the beginning of our confidence steadfast unto the end" Hebrews 3:14.

It is the last step that wins; and there is no place in the pilgrim's progress where so many dangers lurk as the region that lies hard by the portals of the Celestial City. It was there that Doubting Castle stood. It was there that the enchanted ground lured the tired traveler to fatal slumber. It is when Heaven's heights are full in view that hell's gate is most persistent and full of deadly peril. "Let us not be weary in well doing, for in due season we shall reap, if we faint not." "So run, that ye may obtain."

In the bitter waves of woe
Beaten and tossed about
By the sullen winds that blow
From the desolate shores of doubt,
Where the anchors that faith has cast
Are dragging in the gale,
I am quietly holding fast
To the things that cannot fail.

And fierce though the fiends may fight,
And long though the angels hide,
I know that truth and right
Have the universe on their side;
And that somewhere beyond the stars
Is a love that is better than fate.
When the night unlocks her bars
I shall see Him--and I will wait.

--Washington Gladden