Notes from Saturday

What a fantastic day! Coffee and breakfast, and then enjoyed gospel music videos (Gaither Vocal Band and Signature Sound Quartet) for a couple of hours. Then my sis-in-law said, "Let's read your verse for today." I hadn't chosen one yet, but offered to read Friday's verse from Ephesians. I read the verses I shared with y'all yesterday, and then my sis-in-law read the same passage from The Message version of the Bible, and my sister read from NIV. It was so beautiful and brought us all to tears. My brother wept and said, "That's SO POWERFUL!" And it is!



It is indeed power packed - difficult to talk about and adequately portray what happened in my brother's living room this morning. It probably sounds pretty hokey (is that a real word?). At any rate, we ended up reading the verses several times, just to fully soak them up and bask in their whole meaning. And then we had a beautiful interchange about their implications in our lives in a real way. I will share The Message version of the verses as I close my blog for today. Now I want to go shopping online for a copy of The Message to add to my collection of Bible versions. It reads so great!



Here's the funny thing about it. The other day when we were shopping at Dollar Tree in Santa Rosa I saw a little decorative plaque there that had a portion of the passage enscribed on it. It caught my attention, and I told myself I had to remember the text reference so I could look it up later and read it in its entirety. That's how I ended up with it yesterday. God uses mysterious ways to speak to us and get our attention. Sometimes even shopping!



This evening some friends of my brother came to visit. We built a fire in the firepit, ate snacks and enjoyed a pleasant visit around the fire. It was a perfect way to end a great day.


MY TEXT FOR TODAY: Ephesians 3:14-21 (as numbered uniquely in The Message Bible)
"My response is to get down on my knees before the Father, this magnificent Father who parcels out all heaven and earth. I ask him to strengthen you by his Spirit--not a brute strength, but a glorious inner strength--that Christ will live in you as you open the door and invite him in. And I ask him that with both feet planted firmly on love, you'll be able to take in with all followers of Jesus the extravagant dimensions of Christ's love. Reach out and experience the breadth! Test the length! Plumb the depths! Rise to the heights! Live full lives, full in the fullness of God.


"God can do ANYTHING, you know--far more than you could ever imagine or guess or request in your wildest dreams! He does it not by pushing us around, but by working within us, his Spirit deeply and gently within us."

Glory to God in the church!
Glorty to God in the Messiah, in Jesus!
Glory down all the generations!
Glory through all millennia! Oh yes!