Prayer on the road

It's back to school time.
45 minutes of listening to Air 1...maybe if doesn't get staticky or the boys get really annoyed with a song and change it.
After they have all been dropped off for the day it's me and the radio and time to pray.
Pray for Stefani and her heart Cath today.
Pray for the staff at Shands to have wisdom and to share their hope and faith with our family.
Pray for Marcy and Tracy to be encouraged and make wise choices today.
Pray for Tracy, Lajuan and Susan that God would prepare their hearts for husbands and He would bring them soon.
Pray Stefani that she would trust God for the hard things she doesn't understand.
Selah.

That was Stephen's prayer a few months before he died and those words flowed from my thoughts so naturally into my prayer for Stefani.

After Stephen died, two different people gave Cathron the book, Choosing to See by Mary Beth Chapman. Cathron gave me one of the copies two years ago...I put in on the shelf.  I wasn't ready to read through someone elses pain.  I knew it would make my heart ache and I would cry. I started it during this season of nerve pain, it was a good time for that.  It was funny and very honest through the first half of the book, I almost forgot how the ending was going to go and so while I waited for Stewart to be done with Youth Group, I plopped myself down in a comfy chair in the middle of the library.  Wouldn't you know that the next chapter was where the dam breaks?  I closed the book before I started sobbing.  I waited to read it in the middle of the night when the nerve pain woke me up and the house was quiet and dark.

"So God confirmed this truth yet again; I can choose to SEE His story, or I can miss it.  And I know-in the winter of our grieving and the frozen mourning of my plans that will never be and my dreams that have died--the reality is this;  God's warm breath is on the move.  New life is budding...and often where I expected it the least, like right inside of me."

There were parts all over this book that are worth quoting but I did not underline or write them down.  It was a good book.  I recommend it, you should read this if you have suffered a loss, you should read this because at some point in your life you will suffer a loss. You should read this because you are women and have days when you feel overwhelmed.  You should read this because you know someone who feels overwhelmed.

After you have suffered a little while, the God of all grace who has called you to his eternal glory in Christ, will himself restore, confirm, strengthen, and establish you.  
1 Peter 5:10