Grampa

My grampa passed away last Monday of a brain aneurysm. He lived 85 incredible and impactful years. My gramma and grampa have impacted the lives of so many including mine. I probably wouldn't have the relationship or any for the matter with Christ. My grandparents were both married prior to being married to each other. My grandfather took on 4 rambunctous kids and did so in an amazing way. He loved my grandma so deeply. Neither were saved when they got married. They made a decision in 1969 to surrender their lives to Christ and it's amazing what the decision of two people could make. Their children, grandchildren, and great grandchildren have been touched and influenced in the most profound way. I was sitting in the funeral service and it hit me just how much of an impact these two amazing people have had on my life. Although it is my decision to follow Christ, they have truly been part of saving my life.

I have really always looked to my grandparents as one of the couples that I want to resemble when I get married. Their marriage was not without some bumps, but they were so in love and it is one of the things that everyone who encountered them saw. I loved when I was at their house and I would find love notes all over. They would be on the fridge, in the bathroom. I knew from a young age that this was something I want. It doesn't have to be notes, but I want to have a love for my husband that everyone knows about, and vice-versa. I want to marry a man who is in love with Christ and that is what draws our relationship closer.

My grampa was a man of courage, a man who lived what he believed and loved God with all his heart. That is a man to strive to be like.

Accidental or Ordained?

Last Friday in the chapels at Heritage I spoke about Esther and her story in the middle school and another teacher spoke in the high school chapel. It is amazing and I know it may not be something you want to be reminded of, but there is no accident in what happens and what situations we end up in. One of the students spoke about incidents in his life that could be paralleled to Esther, not that they were exact replicas, but that God ordained the situations to happen in the way in which they did. His father died when he was sixteen, completely unexpectedly and Jon was actually not at home or with his family when it happened. The thing is that through all of the things that occurred in his life, Jon is living the life that God has ordained for him to live. One of the things that he said as a comparison to Esther was that had Esther been told five years before everything happened that she would be queen and be a part of saving all the Jews, she would have never believed it. The same was true for Jon. The circumstances of his life, his father passing or even him speaking in the chapel and having the relationship with God that he has, were not things that he would have dreamed of just five years ago. I know that I will never know what you are or have gone through, and I know that we don’t always want to hear it, but God is working through everything and each situation that we are put in, whether it is where we work, the team we are put on, or the cell we are in, God has ordained it and there is a reason that we are in that situation. I don’t believe that things happen by accident; there is a purpose in everything.