“The RoseBouquet”

Still struggling to get to bed earlier, but I allowed myself some weekend naps, and I AM feeling much more rested. Things just don’t seem so huge and serious when we are well-rested.

Spring has definitely arrived, and it was great today to walk to the office today in runners instead of boots, and to wear a light spring/summer jacket instead of my winter parka. I haven’t seen any new green grass yet, but aside from a few chucks of black ice in some shadowy corner, I believe all our snow is gone.

Somehow it feels like spring surprised me. Usually I spend most of March pining for it, and this time it arrived the first week of March. Last week we had some snowfalls and cooler temperatures again, but this week there is a sense that the seasons have changed and we can enjoy living outdoors more. What’s more, Easter is here this weekend.

On the weekend the air was positively balmy - compared to winter temperatures. If I can make some proper covers for some cushions I could be having naps in that old black futon frame that was in the back yard when I moved in.

On Saturday I managed to get some cementing done, and preparing floor space for tiling. The drain is working better but still forming a small puddle, so I may have to put off the tiling until I can get a professional rotor rooter in to chew out any tree roots growing through my sewer pipes. Considering all the roots I’ve found in my flower beds and garden I think the latter is very possible.

Again, as I see all the yard cleanup to do, (and weigh an opportunity to give computer classes) I can see that my indoor reno projects may get set aside again until the fall. (Sigh!)

Oh well, Easter is of greater importance. I won’t get everything done I can see to do, but I’ll get some done - and I will be grateful for that!

Let me wish you a blessed Easter too, this weekend. May the Joy of the Risen Jesus continue with you!

Let me start with an apology. I forgot to send today’s Bible friendship article over to this office computer this morning, so I don’t have it ready just now. I will send it out though as soon as I get home today. I promise.

There is only this week’s article and next week’s left in the series, and then I’m gungho and ready to start with my daring new experiment. We’ll have a Virtual Writers’ Workshop in place of the articles for eight weeks. I want to discuss my novel with you and brainstorm for ways to improve it and do a much better job of promoting and selling it. To put it plainly, I’m fishing for some help.

You will help, won’t you? You’ve always wanted to spy on a writer as a book is polished for publication, right? Well, I’m going to invite you to toss in your suggestions. Who knows. You may influence me in ways beyond what either of us imagine right now. I’ve got the outlines ready, but how each session will turn out will be up to you.

I’m planning some prizes or rewards too, for those with the best suggestions. (wink!)

Meantime, I’ve got some serious matters to pray over on the weekend. I will be in church on Good Friday morning, but I plan talk some things over with the Lord in the afternoon. A new opportunity has been offered to me, and I need to see if I can make room for it in my life. Maybe I’ll have more specifics next week.

Last Friday, at our mission’s Annual Meeting, we wrapped up a 3-year project I’ve been working on, the updating of our Constitution and By-laws, and the Policy Handbook. It was adopted by the membership. Now I just have to send a copy to the government. Other projects are already slipping into that vacuum.

If we did not celebrate Christmas once every year, we might begin to forget what a great thing it is that Jesus came to earth to be born as a human baby and to deliver us from our sins.

If we did not celebrate Easter once every year, do you think you would forget over time, that Jesus died on the cross in your place and mine to wash our sins away forever? His resurrection is such a stupendous, marvelous truth, but would we remember that if we had no Easter morning to review it and be astonished all over again?

It is wise that we have a special Easter weekend to commemorate the greatest, best event of all history. I recommend that you take time, in the midst of family gatherings, and holiday travel, to really celebrate our glorious Saviour’s death and resurrection, and to thank Him with humble adoration.

If you do - you will have a tremendous Easter Blessing!

A little story that Jesus told is a good illustration of friendship.

“Suppose,” He said, “At midnight you suddenly have unexpected company arrive at your home. Your guest has travelled all day and is famished, but you are right out of bread. You have no food to set before the traveller.”

“Quite naturally,” Jesus continues, “You dash over to your friend’s house and bang on the door. You describe your crisis and expect your friend to help you out.”

He goes on to describe how this friend might easily answer, “Don’t bother me. I’ve shut down the house for the night, and we are all in bed.”

Ah, but we all know that a true friend would not reply like that! No, a true friend jumps up and scurries to his cupboard to get you what you need. That’s how good friends behave. They help each other out in a crisis. Usually without a moment’s hesitation.

Jesus goes on to say that this shows how freely we may approach God to ask for things, to knock on opportunities, and to look for solutions. If we, as humans, are so ready to help out a friend in need, why do we imagine God to be more reluctant?

I have known more than one preacher and some Christians who bristle when I talk about my friendship with my Lord and God. They think I am demeaning Him by comparing the Lord to a Friend. (I do capitalize the word when referring to God). Plainly, Jesus is saying that we should assume that our Heavenly Father is every bit as ready to bless and respond to our cries as our earthly friends.

Oddly enough, I’ve observed that those that dare not get so intimate with God don’t usually have the courage to ask Him for any help, and must struggle through one crisis after another on their own wits and abilities.

I am compelled to say again and again, that Jesus is my Best Friend, and I mean that as reverently as possible. There have been many times in my life when I had no one else to turn to, however, He was there for me! I could sob out about my pain, my dreams, hopes and my disappointments – even with Him. He was someone who could persuade me to try things that seemed too hard, and who brought me back to repentance and faith when I was ready to give up, or totally ashamed of myself. My dearest Friend taught me to hope again, and again!

He has also provided for my living when it appeared I had no means of support or income at all. He has not only been my Best Friend, but my Great Physician too, healing me when I could not afford a doctor – and teaching me how to use just the resources at hand.

I have proved that I might ask and receive from this Friend, and I might knock, and He opened doors for me, and I might look for solutions and ideas to solve problems, and He helped me to find them.

Every overture of friendship from others is precious to me. I value my friends highly and sometimes entertain myself by imagining them as roses in my bouquet of friendship, but my Lord, the Rose of Sharon, is the center-piece, the best of them all.

What’s more, He is teaching me to be a good friend to those in need or in crisis. Exactly the kind of Friend He is to me.

[Note: if you missed any articles in this series of article on Friendships in the Bible, and want to read them, you'll find them all linked from this index which is about Friendship]

Do you have problems with sleep? I normally don’t. It’s getting to bed that is my problem. I have taken on so many projects, and my evenings are committed to various clients and projects, and I hate to short-change them, so even though I have taped a note to my monitor - “Be Done by 11:00″ it rarely happens. I often work until I’m dozing off at it.

This weekend, I took time for friends rather than pushing my own work agenda. A dear friend stopped by on Saturday afternoon, and she was kind enough to offer to give me a free reflexology treatment. Hey, I never turn that down! She mentioned that she could tell I was having problems with sleep.

I agreed, but not with falling asleep. My problem is with not getting enough of it. When you go to bed late and get up early and do it as a lifestyle, I believe it is called burning the candle at both ends.

On Sunday afternoon I had another friend over for lunch and a visit. About 4:30 I was spacing out in the middle of a sentence, so I told her that I had to lie down for a nap before we went to the evening service at church, and the birthday party to follow. She was content to copy recipes out of a new cookbook I had received in the mail, while I went to lie down. I could hear myself breathing deeply and dropping off almost as soon as I was horizontal. About an hour later I woke up we hurried off to church. My, but was I ever glad for that nap! I was able to be alert and take everything in, and enjoy some conversations over the lunch afterward.

Yesterday at lunch I was telling my friends about this, and Anne pointed out that if I’d had a reflexology treatment it would really relax me so that this could have brought on the more urgent need for sleep. Ah…!

Well, last night the friend that was over on Sunday asked if I had a prayer request. I said that I needed to shift my daily routines so that I would get more sleep. She must have prayed effectively, for I did stop work just minutes after 11 and went to bed.

However, we’ll have to refine how we pray about this. My deep sleep or REM cycles must have been out of order because I seemed to wake naturally just moments before my alarm was to go off, and then rolled over and fell into another deep sleep. Turned out, when I got up, I had slept through my bath time!

I feel fine this morning, but I think I’ll have to work on this a while before I really have a new and comfortable routine.

I’m happy to share some reader feedback with you today. This one from Barbara of Barbara-Good-Books.com was encouraging!

Don’t think your “Friendship” writings are unproductive. I have a week of late evenings and have to fit things in where I can. I am using the “David” one to help a grandchild’s assignment and I was inspired by your quote in “Friends,” Eccl..4:10, to use it at the head of my new combined book. See blog. Barbara.

Another long-time reader and friend, Kathy O. wrote;
Hi Ruth,
How are you doing? I’m doing okay except for having COPD & the other breathing problem that I have, plus I have what the nurses call a break down on my bottom where I sit on, plus I have been in the hospital since I e-mail you last Ruth so please keep me & Frank in your prayers, okay?

I replied;
I’m sorry to hear you’ve been having so many health problems. Yes, I’ll be sure to pray for you and Frank. I trust the Lord is with you even through all these trials and problems. Do you find Him near you each day?

Kathy O responded:
Yes I do, Ruth! There was a while that I didn’t, but now I do. Please pray for Frank as he goes for his colonscopy this morning, I’ll be here at home praying myself. I have two nurses coming in today, but still have our friend from church coming over too. It is raining here this morning, so I’m on my laptop right now, Ruth. Talk to you soon.

Would you be willing to whisper a prayer for Kathy and Frank too?

As for business news bits, here’s just one: I’ve been having fun learning to use InkScape to do vector drawings. This is really computer art that can be manipulated to create animations. I haven’t got to that stage yet, but once we have some drawings we can work with, Jondalar says he’ll show me the next step.

Just two more articles left, after today, in the series on Friendships in the Bible. Then we’ll start that Virtual Writer’s Workshop. Today’s article is about Jesus, the ultimate in BEST Friends!

I was thrilled last week to see that I’ve started to get some regular income through the ClickBank ads I’ve been showing on my http://www.aloe-vera-and-handy-herbs.com site. I went to see what I was selling to get these $22 checks in the mail every few weeks. Turns out that these ads are really effective! So I’m now trying to work in some time to create more of them for my other sites.

If you have a website and would like to make a bit of income on the side, you may want to check it out. There’s no fee to be an affiliate, but a one-time fee to sign up so you can sell your own digital (downloadable) products that way. This works great for e-books, or software programs, or anything that people can download right after paying you, through ClickBank. I’ve set that up long ago, but now I see that there are ways to make those more productive too.

Just in case this applies to you - here’s where you can research it;
Start Selling Your e-products with ClickBank

When Jesus walked this earth, He befriended many people. In fact, He stopped to talk to outcasts that others would avoid, and He accepted dinner invitations at homes of tax collectors, or the politically unsavoury types. The established upper class did not approve of Jesus’ choice of friends.

It was not that Jesus was looking for acceptance and inclusion with the sinners (as many lonely people do even today) – rather, He cared for them and wanted to show love and acceptance to these misfits. Jesus treated them as human beings with feelings and the ability to make choices too.

Jesus could have a deep, earnest discourse on starting life over with Nicodemus, a member of the Sanhedrin (the leaders who made and enforced religious laws). Another day He talked with the Samaritan woman at the well about living water – which astonished her, and His disciples, for Jews generally avoided speaking to Samaritans at all costs. He was a friend to anyone willing to let Him touch their hearts.

I think this is a key friendship lesson for us to learn. We must not look down on anyone for their race or appearance, or any other “oddness” about them that makes them different from ourselves.

If we know who we are before God, and that He has accepted us as we are, and that, as we walk with Him in friendship we are transformed and made more Christ-like in character, then we find it much easier to be gracious to others and to show acceptance and a friendliness for their own sakes, just like Jesus did – and still does.

If we tend to be friendly only towards those who will bless and benefit us we do not yet properly understand friendship and how it is suppose to work. It is suppose to be a two-way street, but it doesn’t always start that way.

We need to think more of friendship as something we offer to others as a kindness. Sometimes we are fortunate to get a similar amount of kindness back, but it is not guaranteed. If we can overcome our natural bent toward self- centeredness, and think more about befriending others, no matter who they are, or whether they can reciprocate, we will find that others will approach us and desire a friendship with us.

Of course, if we don’t grow mature, and can’t maintain our our character well, the ‘like attracts like’ principle will fall into place by default. That generally means some of them will be bad friends and lead us into becoming sinners. Then we will need a friend like Jesus to rescue us!

Perhaps you are in that lonely pit right now. The few friends you might have are bad ones? You really would like good friends?

Just cry out from the depths of your being to Jesus. He’ll be at your side in an instant. Usually He uses human friends who are somewhat like Him for the human touch, so consider accepting the overtures of someone who appears to offer help right about then, especially if it comes with no strings (obligations) attached.

Another thing, turn your back on the bad friends and get some distance between you. Why? Simply because evil friends have claws and they try to keep you in that slimy pit of despair and self-loathing. Cooperate with any new friend who will help you get away into a different circle – one of caring people.

There you will heal and your soul be restored to peace as you grow to know and love Jesus in that circle. If He is not there, make tracks out of there too, and cry out to Him again.

[Note: if you missed any articles in this series of article on Friendships in the Bible, and want to read them, you'll find them all linked from this index which is about Friendship]

Spring is definitely early this year. It is still possible to find some old patches of snow and ice, but to a large degree it has disappeared. Even my garden is nearly all exposed. Temperatures are above 0 Celsius most days, dropping below at night again. But those of us who are older and wiser are waiting for the other shoe to drop; there’s bound to be another snow fall or storm yet before we really have spring. It’s always been that way, right?

Oh the other hand, all around the world weather systems are off-key… so, honestly, only God knows for sure.

I’ve taken to saying lately, that I’m glad God has kept the weather department in His own portfolio. Just imagine if a human was in charge of the weather!! Everybody who got into that job would be murdered sooner or later. They simply would not be able to please everybody.

Yes, I was back at my basement renovation work on Saturday. I ended up mixing four pails of cement and pouring it into the hole in the wall that my brother Ernie had created when he was here in February. But I began to feel a chemical burn in my tonsil area from the clouds of dust that form while stirring up the cement, so I didn’t get that job done. I need to mix a few more pails full to finish that off.

Once I put paneling over that wall it should look much better.

Meantime, I mentioned to a friend on the weekend that I was beginning to long for when I’d have all this reno work done so I could have time for socializing with friends on the weekend. She replied that I should maybe put friends before the reno work.

Whoa, did that stir up some thoughts and reactions in me! I’ve been running through a gamut of emotions, from self-pity because I have no other time to do my housecleaning and reno work, and I have to do it alone, to yes, I should just ignore it, but then I can’t have friends in because of the clutter that NEEDS to be cleaned up.

The up-shot this morning is that I need to return to doing what the Lord impresses me to do - and sometimes that does mean skipping a reno Saturday - rather than thinking I have to do what everyone else expects of me. I’ve tried to be both sensitive and self-disciplined so maybe I need not let one comment turn me into such knots.

Hey, do your friends ever do that to you? Not intentionally, but something they say sends you into a tailspin of raw reaction? How do you respond?

My skills in vector drawing are not coming on as fast as I might wish. This will take time. Yesterday I hesitated, not sure whether to give more time to practice, or to go back to polishing the new site template. I made some progress on that last Friday, and like anyone else… I like to be where you can see results forming faster.

I’ve also been wrapping up several projects for the mission, WTM, and have just tackled some new ones.

Remember my hint about the virtual writers’ retreat idea last week? Well, I’m having fun planning those sessions, and have even thought up some prizes to offer. If I can rouse some friends to take part I think that’s going to be lots of fun! What’s more I’ll get a better grip on my novel and how to improve and market it better.

That’s another flower in my Bouquet of Enterprises.

Oops, did you realize I have two bouquets? One is my RoseBouquet of friends, and the other is my Bouquet of Enterprises or ventures that I’m into.

Today we have my last Friendship Bible study out of the Old Testament. Three more in the New Testament and then this series is done. So far I’ve had as good as no feedback on these articles, so maybe I’ve done all this for my own benefit. I hope you’ll enjoy the eight Writers’ Workshop sessions. And participate!