Don't You?

It is no great secret that I love books and reading.  I fondly remember my mother taking me to the little Montgomery Village branch of the Sonoma County Library or the classic old 1904 Carnegie Library in downtown Santa Rosa on warm summer days to choose a book to read as I wallowed away the dog days of summer as a child.  I don’t recall if Piper had similar library memories of her childhood or not, but she also retained that same love for books that I did… even though you’d hardly find her sitting down alone and reading except for her Bible or in her dramatic or silly sharing from the written volumes of many good children’s books with our four kids. 

In fact, that’s how I read… or rather heard the entire Little House on the Prairie series by Laura Ingalls Wilder.  For months the four kids and I would gather in one of the kid’s rooms while Piper read to us at their bedtime!  I bought Piper a brand-new set of the series for our last Christmas together, but didn’t get the time to re-read every book to her before she passed on to her new home in heaven.

I purchased a Kindle digital reader numerous years back, joined a few discount digital book clubs and have been purchasing volumes of books ever since.  I have so many now, that I forget what I've bought.  I’m thankful that my Amazon account keeps track of my purchases and lets me know if I already have a particular book or not! 

I recently purchased one called “The Best of American Heritage: The Old West.”  It contains a collection of articles from “The American Heritage Magazine” which was first published in 1949. Yesterday I was reading a chapter entitled “Pioneers in Petticoats” that was written by Helena Huntington Smith in February of 1959.  Through painstaking research and countless interviews with direct descendants or still-living participants, the author totally debunked the well-crafted idea of the “dreadful experience” that most known literature of the West wrote of, concerning the women who pioneered the West with their husbands and families.

She wrote that most of these individuals were a special breed, who worked hard, stood in the harrowing face of the vast myriad of troubles that came against them, did what it took and enjoyed the simple things in life.  Sure, it was rough and tough, but they harbored a good attitude and faced hardship while rejoicing in the good times and the life that they had chosen.

I couldn’t help but tear up as I read this chapter for it reminded me of my Piper.  She was of that unique breed that possessed the (I) “Can-Do” (all things through Christ who straightens me” -Philippians 4:13) attitude.  She approached most things in life with a smile and saw it as an opportunity to see God work in, through and for her… and most times she somehow made it fun!

Like me, once we set our face toward a goal, we went all out to successfully complete it.  We had jointly decided early on in our relationship (years before we got married) that we were going to “Trust in the Lord completely, and  not rely on our own opinions, but with all of our hearts to rely on Him to guide us, and know that He would lead us in every decision we needed to make.”  Our number one plan was to initiate all that we did “by staying intimate with him in whatever we would set out to do, and once again, KNOW and DEPEND on the EXPECTATION that He would lead us wherever we were to go.” (Proverbs 3:5-6 The Passion Translation, personalized)

During our time together we occasionally had those who criticized our decisions and bemoaned some of our choices or even the way we raised our children, but I have come to realize that they simply did not understand our personalities, our giftings, our hearts, our pioneering spirits nor our callings in life.  I learned through some personal experience’s while Piper’s life deteriorated before my eyes, that you cannot judge what another individual does or doesn’t do based on your own background or experiences.  We’re all different!  It’s the unique way that God created each of us.  It’s one of the things that makes life interesting, enjoyable and exciting… and although different, we are all very special in His eyes!

Psalm 91:15 in The Passion Translation tells us when talking about God’s ability to answer our every cry for help, that “I will be your glorious hero and give you a feast.”  Well… I want to be just like my heavenly Daddy and be a hero as well!  Don’t you?  I want to be a hero like Him and love and accept others who may not think, act, speak, hold similar political beliefs or live exactly like I do.  Don’t you?  I want to be known as someone who will encourage others and not seen as one who becomes a part of their problems.  Don’t you?  When people see me, I want them to see Jesus… Don’t you?

Have a great rest of the week.  We’re in the middle of a day of potentially severe thunderstorms, so our “I’m expecting to trust in the Lord” barometer is registering at the top of the scale today!  Where is yours registering?