This is my Day 4 Blogtober post. The theme is “Laugh Out Loud,” and I thought this video of my husband playing a favorite game with our grandchildren might make everyone laugh out loud at least a little. We gain so much from the time we have with our grandbabies—including the chance to laugh out loud a lot!
This video is from early 2019. Enjoy! ❤
Today my Mother would have been 90.
I never imagined my Mother dying. I thought she would just live and live, until the Lord returned. He had other plans, and I don’t argue with Him. I see His hand in her life, and in her death. I feel His comfort in my loss, though the missing doesn’t stop. As I watch my friends mourn their own mother’s, I realize it actually never ends. Moms are just too much a part of us. We enter life listening to their heartbeat. They become the rhythm of our life. Their absence is always profound.
I have friends who did not have good mothers. Or, lost their mother very young. So, I know I was blessed to have a mother like mine, and to have her as long as I did. I am grateful for every minute we shared. I wish every memory was a good one, and I wish I had no regrets. I’m sure I’m not alone in feeling that way, when it comes to those loved ones we have “lost.” However, I am so grateful for what was good.
And, there was so much good.
❤️
P.S. I know 32 is a weird number to stop on, but it’s just where I stopped. No meaning in it.
I sent a press release to the Portland Press Herald, when my mother decided to make a trip to Africa in 2000. I thought it might make an interesting story, and they agreed. They sent a photographer and reporter, and this is the resulting article, written by C. Kalimah Redd and published on November 11, 2000. For the record, the writer got a few facts wrong. We’ll ignore those for now.
Following the article are a few photos from her trip. On the day before her flight, Stella was hurrying downstairs to give Doug some information he needed to arrange the transportation of the three keyboards she was taking with her for the churches there. As she came downstairs, she missed a step and seriously injured her leg. We really thought she should cancel her trip, but she refused to do so. She even extended her trip, despite the pain and challenges she encountered once she was there.
My mother was always a role model for me in life, but even in death she continues to remind me how to live.
The Rev. Stella L. Mosqueda lives in pain.
A leg problem forces this 69-year-old Kittery resident to walk with a cane (though she walks an hour every day), and the severe arthritis in her joints has long slowed her down. But these things will not prevent her from stepping on a plane Wednesday for a two-day journey to Webuye, Kenya. There, she will work as a missionary and preach for a month.
“If an opportunity comes up for me to do something , even though other people think I can’t do it, well — I’m Irish, and I can,” she said. “I’m stubborn and independent. I have no interest in doing the same thing every day.”
Mosqueda (pronounced Mos-ke-da), who technically retired from the ministry in the mid-1980s after her husband died, has lived a life reminiscent of a Hollywood script: A farmer’s daughter moves to Cuba as a missionary without knowing a word of Spanish, meets and marries a Cuban evangelical preacher, escapes the county during the 1959 revolution, then travels throughout South America and the United States championing missionary causes while raising three girls.
Steven Spielberg, eat your heart out.
But Mosqueda’s life is no fable, and her journey next week to the east African country represents a lifetime commitment to helping others. Her faith, she says, tells her that she will blend in and love the people there, that everything will be all right.
“God really has been good to me,” she said. “It’s easy for me to love people, so I expect to have the same result in the Kenya.”
Years ago, it was Mosqueda’s faith that led her to the decision that would change her life forever.
Then Stella Cooper, she left her house in Columbus, Ohio, for Miami, against her parents’ wishes and with less than $10 in her pocket. She had a one-way ticket to Cuba.
Until then, at 21, Mosqueda had never left her home state and had never even met a Spanish-speaking person. She grew up on a farm with no electricity, the fourth of 11 children. Her family had gone to the small church closest to her home and only once had she spoken from a pulpit, when she was 9 years old and was called upon to read from the Bible.
One day, Mosqueda briefly met with a Cuban missionary who came to visit her church. They kept in contact and he invited her to join his family in the tiny country to work as a missionary.
“I knew nothing about being a missionary but figured there are things that I could do, and those I didn’t know, I would learn,” Mosqueda recalled.
Getting to Cuba was the first challenge. It was 1952, and no one could enter the country with a one-way ticket, she said. The airport clerk receiving Mosqueda saw the discrepancy after first questioning why “a pretty girl like” her wanted to go to Cuba.
Telling the clerk of her goal to be a missionary produced an unlikely outcome: He paid for her two-way ticket in full.
Upon arriving in Cuba, she could not remember what her Cuban visitor looked like and she could not speak Spanish to ask. Luckily (Mosqueda would say miraculously) she ran into another missionary woman from Ohio who led her to the missionary’s home.
Within six months, Mosqueda had control of Spanish and began working throughout the country teaching children and spreading the gospel of the Pentecostal church.
In 1955, she married Ignacio Mosqueda, and the two canvassed the country preaching and establishing churches. Many of these congregations still operate today.
By 1959, the Cuban revolution was in full swing. Ignacio knew Fidel Castro personally, but that connection did not mean he and his wife had less to fear from an unpredictable government. The Mosquedas escaped the country that year by disguising themselves as tourists, donning colorful clothing, sun glasses and a camera while boarding a government plane. “I was shaking like a leaf,” Mosqueda remembered. “I could hardly get on that plane.”
Safely in America, the couple continued their missionary crusade. They lived in or traveled to Puerto Rico, Mexico, Costa Rica, Hawaii and throughout the United States. They settled in California, where they raised their three daughters and Stella Mosqueda received a bachelor’s degree from Latin American Theology Seminary.
Mosqueda’s husband died in 1986 of a heart attack, and she returned to nursing to support her children. In 1997, she moved to Kittery with her eldest daughter, Caroline. There, she has enjoyed helping to raise her two grandchildren and volunteering in the community.
Less than one year ago, she joined the Dover Church of the Assembly of God in New Hampshire, where she occasionally preaches. Her pastor, Glenn Hurley, 32, said he is in no way surprised by Mosqueda’s desire to travel to Africa, and he is confident her journey will be a success.
“It’s years and years of trusting God and years and years of Him supplying the need,” Glenn said. “Once you learn it, you never go back.”
For her part, Mosqueda hopes to go back to Cuba to visit her family still living there soon. After her return in December from Africa, Mosqueda will likely tutor a Latin American family in English. She is considering avoiding the cold Maine winter by visiting one of her other daughters in Florida.
Mosqueda said she has no plans for any more big trips. Her physical limitations and increasing age turn simple tasks like packing into a major chore. “(But) who knows,” Mosqueda said. “My life is open.”
Copyright (c) 2000 Portland Press Herald
If anyone is interested, I would be happy to scan and share the rest of her photos from Africa. These are just the few that included her. ❤
A post about grieving, originally published 2/22/13.
Life has been different lately.
Seven-and-a-half weeks ago, my mother passed away. Really hard to even say that, much less write it. I hate that this happened. It’s actually been rather debilitating. I am, however, finally beginning to accept that she really is gone.
It’s been hard. She and I lived together almost my entire life. And, we were close. We weren’t the ‘best friends’ kind of Mom and Daughter, so we weren’t close like that. It was more like she was my hero. As I have passed these weeks since she has been gone, I’ve realized how often my decisions were all about pleasing her. Will Mother like this? Her satisfaction, her happiness, her contentment, her needs being met—this was a primary focus of my life.
Now, that she is not here to please, I’ve been pretty unmotivated. It’s been hard. I’ve done better the past week (obviously, because I am blogging), but it’s been a slow process.
Well, maybe not that slow. I mean, it’s not even been two months, you know? Seriously. Should I be expected to recover from that kind of loss in just a few weeks? I don’t know. I do keep wondering, though, how she would be handling this—or, what she would say if she was here, watching me. What if Doug had died first, and she was here watching me mourn his loss by wasting away my life doing nothing? I think she would have gotten pretty irritated at me.
So, I am trying to balance these things. I do wish someone could tell me how long it takes to move on. I am kind of legalistic that way. I follow instructions well. But, there don’t seem to be rules for this kind of thing. I googled it, and just found a lot of nothing. Basically, it can take forever to recover. Do I have forever?
Doug reminded me of something I said after I found out I had cancer. I talked about how much I wanted to be a faithful steward of the time the Lord had given me, and how much it grieved me to think that if I died in surgery and all I’d have to show for myself was what I had done up until then, that I would have been disappointed in what I would have to offer the Lord when I met Him face to face. It’s kind of hard to regain that kind of passion, once you lose it—or lay it down at the alter of self-indulgence.
And, that’s what I am beginning to fear, that I am becoming self-indulgent in my grief, and I hate that thought. Self-indulgence is such a sinful thing.
I do excuse myself a bit, in that caring for my Mother was my occupation for several years, and this past year it was a 24/7 job. So, I have lost more than just my Mother; I have lost a big part of my identity. You know what I mean? I was a caregiver. That became my job description. I woke up everyday with a Mother-centered purpose. I had things I had to do—someone depending on me to do them. Life and death dependence. And, now? Not so much. This is kind of challenging. A lot challenging.
Yet, I think of her and I remember her life, and I know she would be very displeased with some of my choices these past two months. I mean, seven-and-a-half weeks. She would appreciate my missing her, but then she would say, “Stop crying for me! I’m with Jesus. I’m with my friends. I’m having a great time! And, I have no pain. I don’t have to get shots, or take pills. I’m dancing with Jesus, Caroline. I’m OK! You’re the one you should be crying for right now. Look at you, wasting those two good legs and that strong mind and that lovely home. Get busy. Make me proud!”
It’s so hard to let go. To let go of grief. To let go of her. To let go of that life. I had no idea what her death would mean. When she died, I was just so relieved her suffering was over. This is still the hardest memory, remembering the pain in her face, the fear in her eyes. I still can’t bear the thought without so much pain and sadness. I hate how much she suffered. The last month was the very worst. It was so hard to know how hard it was for her—and I didn’t even really know. Just how miserable was she? My heart aches from the thought. I just want to comfort her and relieve that pain—
This is the hardest thing.
I couldn’t relieve her suffering. I couldn’t do anything for her, to make it better. I tried, but who knows if it really helped? And, I can’t stop thinking of all the things I could have done, or maybe, should have done. This is hard. The Lord is good, though. He reminds me each time of all the other times she recovered. She didn’t get better, because I did everything right. Her life was never really in my hands; it was always in His. In the end, her death was more merciful than it might have been any other time. I would have preferred it go differently, but is there a better way to die? Is death ever easy?
So, I am challenged. Very challenged. I need to move on, but these are such heavy boots. The sadness is still so great. Why aren’t I rejoicing in her triumph over sickness and eternal death? I seem to prefer feeling sorry for myself, which I disrespect so much. I don’t want to be that kind of person. I don’t want to be the hostess of my own personal pity party. I want to remember my Mother well. I want to honor her life. I want to celebrate her victory.
I have been reading a book called “Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close” by Jonathan Safran Foer. I began the book a long time ago, but picked it up in earnest after Mother died. It is the story of a boy whose father dies on 9/11. This author seems to understand grief and sadness very well.
“I didn’t understand why I needed help, because it seemed to me that you should wear heavy boots when your dad dies, and if you aren’t wearing heavy boots, then you need help.”
The sun will be down soon. I am trying to do things I couldn’t do before, and walking each day is one of them. So, I need to go.
You know, when the freezing cold wind hits my face, and I keep walking, I know there is a little bit of the best of my Mother in me. I want to build on that.
❤
This is fiction, inspired by my Father and based on both his and my Mother’s accounts of his decision to answer the call to ministry, instead going to law school.
He buried his hands into the decomposing leaves and tried to raise himself up. How long had he been there? His knees were sunken into the soft earth; the air was cooler now. Instead of the sun beating down on his head, he felt the shadows of the trees on his back. It must be dinner time, he thought. Today he would end his fast. It was time. His mother was concerned for him. She didn’t understand; she just wanted him to eat.
He tried to lift himself, again. He was weak. He realized he had not brought a canteen with him—it was definitely time to go.
Yet, he didn’t want to leave this place. He didn’t want to open his eyes. He just wanted to rest in this divine peace as long as possible. Here in these woods he was alone with God, alone in His presence. It was a great luxury he didn’t want to squander.
However, there was work to be done, and he was already beginning to get a vision of what God had in store. His spirit was suddenly filled with an indescribable joy, and before his legs could protest, he was on his feet. He was excited—but not quite stable. He stumbled as he took his first step and steadied himself against a tree. Oh, how his former sparring partners would mock him, if they could see him now. “When I am weak, He is strong,” he laughed. “Amen!”
Ignacio dusted off his pant legs, and ignored the damp stains on the knees—he had long ago learned how to take those out. One could not stand in the pulpit with dirty knees.
He reached down for his Bible and began the walk back to campus, so grateful and so eager. He could tell his load was lighter now, and he began to walk faster; his gait growing stronger with each step. Buried in those woods was everything he’d imagined his life would be—every ambition, every worldly aspiration, and every dream—and he was leaving it all behind. He was free now, to do what God had called him to do. He knew it wasn’t going to be easy—his mother was not going to take the news well. “If any man come to me, and hate not his father, and mother…he cannot be My disciple.” Christ’s words filled his thoughts. God knows I don’t hate them, but I cannot forsake You for them.
A flash of the setting sun hit him in the face as he reached the edge of the woods, and his hand quickly shielded his eyes. He stood there for a moment, just enjoying the glorious view and fresh air. His future was before him, and it was bright.
A couple days ago I posted about Maria Montessori-inspired games I had made for my granddaughter. Michel Fauquet, one of my dear, blogging friends, shared a quote of her’s with me:
“The action comes ahead of the thought,
and the thought comes from the action.”
Maria Montessori (1870-1952)
I really liked that quote, because it seemed to apply to what I have witnessed with Lucy. I wanted to share this one, too:
“Do not tell them how to do it.
Show the how to do it and do not say a word.
If you tell them, they will watch your lips move.
If you show them, they will want to do it themselves.”
Maria Montessori (1870-1952)
That quote really spoke to me. We always hear, “Do as I say, not as I do.” Yet, children really only do what they see. They copy us. It’s very interesting, and very compelling. It also rings true with my play times with Lucy. One of her games is putting beads on pipe cleaners. She watched with such intensity as I did it, and then did it herself. We played silently for several minutes. Silently! I was in awe.
Today, we played with Play-Doh. I was telling her to squish it, but she didn’t quite get it. Then, I squished it for her, and she smiled. She got it. We sat in near silence. I rolled the Play-Doh into a ball, and she would squish it. (By the way, Lucy is 22-months-old.)
Really interesting. I’m enjoying all that Lucy is teaching me.
by Doug & Caroline Gregan
Everything seemingly took place during our time in Arizona this past November, but really this is a story that was 26 years in the making. That is a lot of history, and we will not burden you with the whole story here. We will share just enough to help you understand that this decision to remarry is not about whimsy or romance or tradition. Or, hyper-spirituality. It is actually the fulfillment of a promise.
In 1 Samuel 25, the Word of God tells us of a very wealthy man named Nabal, his wife Abigail, and David. David and his army had been hiding from Saul in the caves of the Wilderness of Paran. On the day of a great feast at Nabal’s house, David sent ten men to appeal to Nabal for food, informing him that they had served him even without his knowledge. They had protected his shepherds and sheep in the wilderness. Nabal was now celebrating the shearing season with a large meal for all his household, and David only asked that he show him favor and give food to him and his men. Sharing of his abundance was a just reward. Instead, Nabal reviled David and flatly denied his request. When David heard this, he and 400 men armed themselves and left the caves to confront Nabal and destroy his household.
A servant, who must have known Abigail was a woman of “good understanding,” alerted her to what her husband had done and to what David was about to do. Abigail quickly gathered enough food for David and his men and sent it with her servants, following behind them on a donkey. When she saw David, she fell at his feet and made one of the most powerful appeals for mercy that we find recorded in the Bible. David recognized that she had been sent by the Lord to keep him from committing a terrible sin, and promptly spared her husband and household. When she returned home and shared this news with Nabal, he had a heart attack and fell into a coma. Ten days later, he was dead.
Upon hearing of Nabal’s death, David exalted the Lord for returning Nabal’s wickedness onto himself, and for avenging His servant and keeping him from sin. Then, the Bible says:
“And David sent and proposed to Abigail, to take her as his wife.”
NABAL
The story of our second marriage began just after I was born-again. Caroline signed me up for David Wilkerson’s newsletter, and in the first mailing I received two printed messages. One message really struck a chord: it was called, “Roving Eyes.” It spoke to the importance of guarding our eyes, hearts and minds from the sin of lust. This was a radical, new concept for me. My exposure to sexual perversion and immorality began very young. I was only a child when I took several pornographic magazines from one of my Dad’s brothers. My parents knew I had begun to look at porn, but never spoke to me about it. I grew up believing that lusting was normal behavior, so that message from Pastor Dave was a revelation to me and the beginning of my education in righteous living. I cleared out my apartment of anything that did not line up with my new life. I was determined to be a man of God.
Caroline did not know about this behavior before we were married. I believed it was over, and did not think of talk to her about it. However, when I fell for the first time, a few months after we were married, I quickly went to her and confessed my transgression. I was deeply remorseful—I did not want to be that man. My new wife did not hesitate to forgive me, and only needed to know that I had thrown the magazine away. For her, this was enough. That ended it. For her, not looking at pornography was just a decision one had to make. She had no idea the hold it had on me, but neither did I. The truth is that she had married a man like Nabal, who would one day be willing to risk everything he had for the sake of his own selfish desires. I had no idea how much I would be willing to lose for sin’s sake, but we were both about to find out.
Over the next nine years of our marriage and my walk with God, I pursued the Lord, served in ministry, and fought the temptation to sin. I also lost that fight more times than I can count. I sought help at every church we attended, but ministers either did not know how to help, or were too deep in a struggle of their own. In the ’90s, I didn’t know of any ministry geared to sexual addiction. I didn’t even know that what I was facing was an addiction. I make no excuses whatsoever for my choices, but there is a spiritual component to addiction that I did not understand at the time. I was in deep bondage. I needed to be delivered first.
About our eighth year of marriage, my company introduced the internet to our workplace. The nature of sin is that it is never satisfied, and the internet offered an endless supply for my growing appetite. By 1997, things were beginning to escalate. My computer became my alter to sexual idolatry. Everyday that I went to work, I would bow at that alter. This was the beginning of the darkest period in our life. I hated myself and felt a hopelessness that was beyond words. I began to believe that the only way out of this bondage was taking my own life. I was in complete despair of ever being free of sin.
ABIGAIL
The porn addict’s wife faces a battle all her own. Satan despises womanhood, and he uses porn to torment women with self-loathing, fear, and insecurity. He uses porn to drive a woman into despair for her husband, her marriage, her family, and even her own life. Though she is innocent before God of any offense, his secret sin becomes her secret, too. She becomes an unintentional co-conspirator in covering it up, because she feels disgraced by it. What if people find out? When people do inevitably find out, some might actually blame her. They cast a judgmental eye her way and wonder, “What could be wrong with her, that he needs other women?” In the ’90s, Caroline had no place within the church community to find support. The prevailing attitude was that an unfaithful man would always be unfaithful. It was the socially acceptable, unpardonable sin within a Christian marriage.
However, Caroline saw things differently. Her conviction was that forgiveness was a mandate from God. Someone asked her once, before we were married, if there was anything her husband could do that she would not forgive. Without possibly knowing the significance of what she was saying, or the foreshadowing in that question, she replied, “If he is truly repentant and God is willing to forgive his sin, who am I to not forgive him, too?” I don’t know how many times I tested her resolve, but I do know there were fewer times than fingers on one hand that Caroline did not forgive me before the “sun set.” More than Caroline loved me, she had a fear of God and a respect for the divine nature of marriage. She will tell you: she did not forgive me, because she loved me so much; she forgave me, because she loved God so much. Her desire to please Him was always greater than her desire to please herself, because she never trusted that she knew best.
Let be clear: nothing about this was easy for my wife. I have put her through more than her share of heartache and suffering, but the same faith that motivated her to pray for my salvation before we were married motivated her to pray for my deliverance. She knew my heart was for the Lord, even when my will was not. I don’t know why she didn’t give up on me, but she will tell you the Lord sustained her. Her mother was a faithful prayer support to us, and a constant encouragement. There were also some friends who stood with her in prayer, without judgment. When the internet came into our home, she sent prayer requests to every hotline she could find. In 2001, when we finally discovered two ministries aimed at sexual sin and addiction, she submerged herself in every book and article she could find. This is when the Holy Spirit told her, “Be like Eve,” teaching her about the spiritual influence and authority He has given wives. She gradually began to feel less like a victim of my sin, and more like a woman called of God to love her husband through the worst battle of his life. She became empowered as a woman of God, partnering with the Holy Spirit as an agent of God’s love, acceptance, and forgiveness.
It was also during this time that the Holy Spirit opened her understanding about a prophecy she had received during our first year of marriage. When I was at my very worst, and when Caroline would have been fully justified to leave, the Holy Spirit revealed to her a future that no one else would have believed. He assured her that her hope was not in vain.
DAVID
Let’s get back to Arizona. It is November 8, 2014. I had been reading Genesis 20:6, where the Lord tells King Abimelech that when he took Sarai into his palace to make her his wife—thinking she was only Abraham’s sister—it was God who kept him from sinning. God kept him from sinning. This really got my attention, so I began to follow the various cross-references that had to do with God keeping people from sinning. This search led me to 1 Samuel 25. The reference pointed to Abigail, Nabal’s wife, interceding on behalf of her husband, whom she calls a “man of Belial,” and “a fool.”
As I read these words, the Holy Spirit flooded my heart and mind with truth that pierced me to the core. He told me that I had been Nabal. He told me that the ONLY reason I had not been destroyed for my years of rebellion and sin was because of Caroline’s intercession. He told me that if she had not pleaded with God on my behalf, I would not have survived. He then said that just as Nabal had died by His hand, so had He killed my former self. My old man was truly and fully dead, and I was liberated to walk in new life.
As I sat on the back porch of my mother’s house, sobbing before God, many things were flying through my mind. I began connecting dots that led me to greater understanding. I looked at 1 Samuel 25 as representing the first twenty-five years of our marriage, and it was there that Nabal died. I believed the Holy Spirit was telling me that the twenty-sixth year was to be a new beginning, and that new beginning was to start with a wedding. The Holy Spirit was very clear: I was to ask Caroline to marry me, again. She needed to know that she was also liberated from Nabal, by marrying the righteous man God had promised her.
THE PROMISE IN THE PROPHECY
I mentioned above that there had been a prophecy. Well, there were actually two prophecies. In our first year of marriage, we attended our regular church on Sunday and Wednesday, and on Monday night we visited a new, Charismatic church. During one of the first services there, we were called forward for prayer and each received a word from the Lord. To Caroline, the Lord said He saw her like…Abigail. To me, He said, “a bruised reed I will not break, a smoking flax I will not quench.” He told me He was “the refiner’s fire, and the fuller’s soap,” and that I was to bind the Word like a frontlet between my eyes. I got the Lord’s message loud and clear: He had a lot of work to do in me!
However, Caroline didn’t know what to think about being described as Abigail. It never occurred to her that the prophecy had anything to do with her new husband—she had no idea what awaited her in our future together. She studied the passages in the Bible where Abigail is mentioned, and even asked one or two people what they thought. Was God just giving her a pat on the head?
Caroline felt in her spirit that there was more to this prophecy, and took the counsel of others to continue praying for revelation—which she did for 12 years. Finally, in 2001, during the darkest days of our life, she received the revelation she had prayed for so long. In a moment when she most needed a word of encouragement from the Lord, and a reason for her hope, the Holy Spirit opened her eyes to the promise in that prophecy. She suddenly understood that God knew her suffering, He saw what she was enduring; she understood that her husband was like Nabal, a son of Belial; and she understood that God had not forsaken her to be the wife of a fool for the rest of her life. The Lord spoke to her heart that one day her Nabal was going to die, and in his place she would have a man after God’s own heart. This was a powerful revelation, especially because it was a word the Lord had given her long before she could possibly know she would need it. That served as an evidence to her of His sovereignty over the present troubles in her, and that strengthened and increased her faith.
But, there was more! There was much more to that prophecy than Caroline knew, and it would be 13 more years. She did not know there was more for her in that prophecy. She was not seeking Him for greater revelation. In fact, she had been ministering this word to women for many years, urging them hold fast in faith and continue to do what was right before God, despite their husband’s choices. Then, one Sunday in the Spring of 2014, we were visiting the very church where God had begun His great work in our lives, Exeter Assembly of God. Pastor Ernie Karjala began to preach, and Caroline could hardly believe her ears. It was a subject she had never heard preached on before—even though she had heard thousands upon thousands of sermons in her lifetime. Yes, to her amazement, Pastor Ernie began delivering a message on Abigail—not a message about David’s mercy or Nabal’s insubordination, but Abigail! She was the heroine of this sermon, and as he spoke he opened up the prophecy even more. He brought a deeper meaning to the story, addressing not just Abigail’s role with her old fool, but also her role in David’s life. It was an affirmation of Caroline’s choices in her dealings with me, and a timely confirmation of her ministry to women. I will not repeat Pastor Ernie’s message, but I will tell you that Caroline definitely got a pat on the head from God that day!
THE PROPOSAL
Never had Caroline ever wanted to renew our vows. I had actually suggested it for our 10th, and brought it up again for our 25th, but to her our vows still held. Our vows were something we lived everyday. They didn’t need to be repeated or renewed—forgiveness righted any violations. A wedding was a once-in-a-lifetime thing, and there was nothing about our first wedding she wanted to change. So, I didn’t really know what to expect when I proposed to her. I started by walking her through all that had happened on that porch, explaining what the Holy Spirit had ministered to me and spoken to my heart. I finally told her that He had told me I was to propose to her and marry her again, if she would take me. I got down on one knee, as we were both crying, and asked her to marry me. She said, “Yes!”
Of course, we didn’t have much opportunity to discuss a wedding then, and as time passed Caroline began to think maybe it was better for that proposal to be strictly symbolic. It had been about a month since I proposed, and she had pretty much talked herself out of it between weighing the cost, mourning my Mother’s death, wondering what people would think, the busy-ness of this time of year, and you name it! So, when I reminded her we had a wedding to plan, I almost had to propose, again! It actually took some effort to convince her I was indeed serious, that there was to be another actual wedding, and that this was indeed God’s will that we take new vows. In the end, knowing it was God’s will was all she really needed to know. She broke the news to our daughter right away, before she got cold feet, and Hannah’s response truly sealed it in her heart. God was in this. Wedding planning commenced immediately!
CELEBRATE WITH US
We hope many of you will join on February 28th. There is much reason to celebrate, and we would be blessed to celebrate with you. We would greatly appreciate your RSVP (with total number of people attending), as this will assist us in planning. We want to have enough food and favors and programs, etc.
P.S.
Three resources we recommend for those in the battle:
Pure Life Ministries
Mastering Life Ministries
Covenant Eyes
Please, feel free to reach out to us, too. You don’t have to go through this alone.
God bless you all!
❤
The Saxophone Player's Wife 