I am a Christian, a retired teacher, a mother and a grandmother. I love to read and I love the Lord Jesus Christ! Unless otherwise specified ,all visual illustrations are from the YOU VERSION APP of the Bible.
Many days, in fact most days, I get out of bed after a quick “good morning” prayer to God and start my day frantically trying to rush through all the tasks that I have before me. Now that I am retired, I don’t have a set time to get up, but I still arise most mornings before six, take care of our cat, mix my flavored water and sit in my recliner to do my Bible devotional and my blood pressure. Some mornings, I have book reviews that are due so I work on posting those on social media. Then, I read the next book that is up for review, eat, take meds, etc. My day is not a busy one as many define busy, but it is busy enough for me that sometimes I get to the end of the day and find that I have not taken time just to be quiet, to relax and to wait to hear God’s voice.
Jesus called His disciples away to a quiet place, just to relax and eat and rest. Sometimes, I need to do that, too, and I’m certain that all of us do. We get so caught up in what has to be accomplished for the day that we forget to take time for self care. I know that I need to sometimes just take time to let myself relax, to not worry about online shopping that needs to be done or the reviews that are awaiting me, but just to be quiet and rest my mind and just be. Jesus thought self care was important, so I plan to take more time taking care of me. Don’t get me wrong. I don’t intend to be selfish or ignore needs, just to make sure that I take time to renew my spirit and to build up the energy I need so that I can better focus on what needs to be done and the priorities that I have to establish.
Self care is not being selfish, I don’t think. I believe that it is taking care of the vessel that God has given you to occupy until He takes you home to be with Him. Thus, I’m going to just set aside some time for me today and tomorrow and all of the other days that are coming. I need to just be with Jesus, rest and eat the spiritual food that He has set before me to nourish my soul. That is ultimately how my physical body will find renewal, too!
Have a wonderfully blessed day, but I strongly recommend some self-care be built into your busy schedule! Its an Rx from Jesus!
God is always ready to teach us the way that we should go. This is a sad verse for the Israelites because God is telling them that they have not paid attention to His commands and thus they do not end up having peace like a river or well-being like the waves. But this verse is also a warning for us…listen, obey, have peace and well-being. God shows us, tells us, teaches us, directs us. We have the responsibility to listen and obey, to follow what he says.
I’m certain that many of you, if not all, did not always do as your parents instructed you. The consequences that followed were probably less than pleasant. I remember rebelling over and over again and always reaping the consequences, during a time when physical punishment was acceptable. In fact, I was sent outside to get a sturdy stick for my mom to “switch” me with and if I came back with one that was too thin or weak, she sent me back again until I came back with one that would “get the job done.” I bore those marks on my legs for days, the marks that showed my disobedience.
The marks of our disobedience to God are not visible but rather invisible in God’s removing His protection from us and our not receiving the blessings that He has prepared for us. Nevertheless, those marks are there and we know when we have failed to listen and follow as God has directed, just as surely as I knew when I had broken a rule from my mom. God is loving and wants the best of us. As His children, it is up to us to choose to follow His directions and then receive the blessings that He has for us.
May we never take for granted God’s blessings and may each of us look for the lessons He is trying to teach us and learn what we should be learning, moving forward in this life with Him as our guide.
I know you have heard it, that lie from the pits of hell that Heaven is not hard to get into. You just have to do good, be good and God, because He is good, will take you to Heaven when you die. I have heard this falsehood from friends and family. “What kind of God would send someone to hell?” The reply is that God does not send anyone to hell; they choose to go there because they did not choose to believe in the only way to salvation that God provides, His Son Jesus. Don’t be deceived. God is a God of love and mercy, but He is also the great “I Am,” the God of Justice. He wants to set things right in the world that have been wrong for so long and the only way He can do that is to banish sin. There will be no sin in Heaven and no one can be good enough to earn their way there. No confessions to a priest or last rites will guarantee your way through the narrow gate. Only Jesus! It seems so simple, yet so many are perishing because they choose to keep living in sin and ignorance rather than accept truth and life. Since none of us knows when we will die, we need to live like it may be the next moment or as though Jesus is coming back imminently. God provided a way for us, narrow though it may be. We have to find our way back to Jesus and then stay on that pathway for the rest of our lives. God’s desire is to save all, that no one would spend eternity in hell, but He is a God of justice and He will allow us to go there if that is what we choose. Choose and live wisely…the narrow way leads to life!
May you be blessed with the knowledge of God’s great love for you and may you stay on the narrow path until He calls you home.
I must confess that some things that happen cause more anxiety than others. Like when Tyler, our grandson, was badly injured in an accident. I was immediately caught up into the world of “what ifs” instead of using my God given gift of faith. Only a few seconds of heart-racing anxiety reigned before I recalled God’s love, power and faithfulness and began praying and calling on others to join me in prayer.
The peace that I felt as I prayed defied all logic. I was nine hours away and waiting for word from my daughter at the ER about Tyler’s condition. Many hours later, we got the news that his brain was not damaged. Again, hours passed, and we received the news of the extent of his injuries and that he was being sent home and later to specialists.
But the waiting did not end there. Neither did the prayers. So, an update on Tyler. He returned to the ENT this week about his ruptured ear drum. The doctor was amazed at the fact that Tyler’s ear drum had already repaired itself. He said that almost never happens so quickly. So, praise God! Continued prayer is needed though because Tyler’s ear drum did not totally attach itself to the surrounding tissue, so it is flapping around and creating annoying noises for him. And he cannot hear anything in that ear. The ENT says there is nothing else he can do but wait and see if the ear drum attaches and if the hearing returns to normal. However, I believe in the God of miracles, so I am believing for the ear to be made whole.
Tyler’s clavicle was fractured and when he want to the orthopedist, they told him that it was not aligning correctly and gave him a brace to wear for a few weeks, in hopes that it will pull it back where it belongs. When he returns to ortho, they will determine if he needs corrective surgery or not. Again, this is reason for anxiety, but more, it is a reason for my faith to kick in and for me to pray for his clavicle to get back where it belongs and to heal properly.
So, it’s my choice, just as it is yours. Are you overcome by anxiety or ruled by faith? Sometimes, the fear rears its ugly head and I have to choose to push it back and pray through the fear to the peace. God is always waiting there with open arms, offering me His peace. He has told me repeatedly that Tyler is His child and He loves him and is working things out for him. I believe…help my unbelief, and my anxious thoughts!
May your day be blessed with the peace that only comes from God and many answered prayers.
Sometimes, we must stand our ground and fight for what is right. But other times, we should flee, especially when it’s our own evil desires from our past that are tempting us. Just a little food for thought. Run away instead of being captured by the past! Run towards righteousness, faith, love and peace!
May your day be blessed and filled with healthy and life-giving pursuits!
I am absolutely convinced that the world has lost its fear of God and the judgment to come. I can glance at the headlines or hear the teaser for the news and know that this is true. Parents are befriending their children instead of leading them down the right pathway and disciplining them as they need. The “woke” culture is turning our world upside down and insisting that we accept their lack of morality. Our President has given a speech that is divisive and creates rancor among the people already suffering from his failed policies. All of this, and the people of the world think that they are fine, there is no God and they will just continue on their merry way until one day they are no more. But…
This is truth from God’s Word. We ALL appear before His judgment seat, not just the sinners who never accepted Him. We Christians need to realize that God will hold us accountable for our actions or lack of them.
The good news is that God is in the business of forgiveness. He doesn’t want us separated from Him, but rather, He invites us to draw closer to Him, for our own benefit. We cannot survive what is happening in our world without holding on tightly to the hand of the One who created us and knows us best. The world has gone crazy, but God is still the same. His expectations have not and will not change.
The book of Micah is written to a nation without hope, one that has turned from God and has not remembered all that He did for them. Written to the nation of Israel, Micah encourages the people to hold on to their belief that God will have compassion and forgive once again. We, too, can hold on to that promise of love and forgiveness. Yes, judgment is coming but forgiveness is still available to all who seek Him.
We need to make the first move, drawing near to God and seeking His face. Yes, judgment is coming and the day of God’s wrath will be a terrible one. However, we who believe in the Lord have a hope that He is our Redeemer, that He is our advocate at the judgment and that in the end, we will be with Him for eternity.
But what of our world and the loved ones in it? It is our solemn duty to warn them, just as the prophets of old did. Some listened and repented while others perished in their sins. God has not changed what He expects us to do. The world has changed, with technology making it possible to send out messages in seconds. Should not the message we send out be one of repentance and hope before the day of judgment comes? It’s easy to feel overwhelmed by life’s circumstances and all that is happening around us, but God is not feeling defeated. He is victorious and knows exactly where this world is headed. We are all on a one way course to a collision with the truth of the Word of God, a place where sin is sin, not some nice euphemism that makes things sound better than they are. Adultery is adultery, not an “affair’; extra-marital sex is fornication, not a “guilty pleasure”; and homosexuality is a sin, not a trait you are born with. Men are lost and so they sin, excuse their own sin and think that they will escape judgment. That won’t happen. God’s Word tells us what is coming if we just read it, believe it and tell it to others in the hope that they, too, will believe.
I’m sad for our world and all that is happening here, but the rampant sin lets me know that Jesus is returning soon and Judgment Day is coming. I am not a prophet so I cannot say when He is coming; I just know that He is and that His heart must be breaking because of the sinfulness of the entire world that He died for.
May each of us be blessed by the knowledge that God’s Word stands even when all around us there is chaos. Have a blessed day.
This is very dark comedy with some romance mixed in, so it was quite a different genre for me. The premise is one that I had never read before about a woman named Laurel Applebaum who is very unhappy with her marriage and deals with it by constantly imagining that her husband Doug dies. Of course, he is not dying quickly enough to suit her purposes so she diabolically plots his death, scheming to cause him to die a natural death by what he feeds him or asks him to do. The first time her mind wandered to what life would be like without Doug, I was amused. Then, when it kept happening, I just wanted her to be honest with him and do what a normal person would do and either work it out or leave. The subterfuge and almost pathetic way that she went about plotting his demise lost its humor factor about halfway through the book. There are many characters who contribute to the story, none of them particularly relatable or likable except perhaps Laurel’s mother and her friend Eleanor who has a snarky macaw who inserts much needed laughter into some of Laurel’s antics. Doug was a weak man who was whiny and not at all relatable since he didn’t even try to help his marriage but he did constantly complain about how bad it was. His protestations that he truly loved and needed Laurel were too little, too late for me since he was more like a child than a forty-something year old unemployed man who was not seeking employment. Laurel was a somewhat sympathetic character because she did work hard to keep money coming in and she understandably wants to go to California to visit her son and daughter-in-law when their new baby comes. A burning desire to visit a first grandchild was a realistic detail as was the description of Trader Joe’s (where Laurel works) and the upscale customers who frequent that shop. I was not able to relate well to most of the characters and at some points I just wanted to find out what the final solution to the marriage was going to be and be done with it. The plot was moderately paced for the most part and at times slowed down. There were some very humorous parts, like the Thanksgiving dinner, but most of the humor was portrayed in the scenes of Laurel’s dark imagination of life without Doug and those fell short for me. I give the book a solid 3.5 stars, rounding it up to 4 for its originality. Some of the language is coarse, so that was not a plus for me. Although I liked reading about a woman with creative solutions to ending her marriage, I was not totally engaged in the read and was not sure where it was going to end up at times. Without spoilers, the ending was satisfactory if a bit over the top for me. Fans of contemporary fiction will enjoy Meister’s book with its wit and sharp, biting dialogue. Disclaimer Disclosure of Material Connection: I received a complimentary copy of this book from the publisher via Netgalley. I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions expressed are my own. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255, “Guidelines Concerning the Use of Testimonials and Endorsements in Advertising.”
Content is somewhat disturbing and not for all readers. I would rate this book M for mature audiences due to language, theme and descriptions. Ellen Meister is the author of several novels including THE ROOFTOP PARTY, LOVE SOLD SEPARATELY, DOROTHY PARKER DRANK HERE; THE OTHER LIFE and others. Ellen is also an editor, book coach, ghostwriter, and frequent contributor to Long Island Woman Magazine. She teaches creative writing at Long Island University Hutton House Lectures and previously at Hofstra University. Her latest novel is TAKE MY HUSBAND. For more info visit ellenmeister.com.
Laurel Applebaum heard a familiar ringtone as she shuffled toward the lockers at Trader Joe’s, tired and spent after a full day on her feet. Was that her phone? Her first instinct was to rush, but she stopped herself. It was probably her husband, Doug, with one of his inane emergencies, like running out of chocolate-covered almonds. God forbid he should go ten minutes without a snack.
The phone rang again, but still Laurel didn’t pick up her pace. She could have—there was always a little reserve left in the tank—but she decided to indulge in her end-of-the-day crankiness, even though she might pay for it later, when Doug started whining about his deprivations. For now, for this one moment she had to herself, it felt like a miniature vacation.
Sometimes, Laurel told herself she should get a job where she could sit all day, like her sister-in-law, who answered phones in a doctor’s office. Then Laurel would look at her co-worker Charlie Webb, who was more than twenty years her senior and the fastest cashier they had. Always smiling, he was beloved by staff and customers, and Laurel thought of him as a cross between Kris Kringle and the philosophical deathbed guy from Tuesdays With Morrie. He made her laugh. And want to be better.
By the time Laurel opened her locker, the ringing had stopped and started up again. She pulled her purse from its hook and fished out her phone. Sure enough, DOUG was on the caller ID.
“Hi,” she said wearily, hoping she conveyed enough pathos with the single syllable to elicit some sympathy.
“Laurel Applebaum?” said a woman’s voice.
A chill swept through her. Something was wrong.
“Yes?”
“I’m so glad I finally reached you. I’m calling from Plainview Hospital. Are you Douglas Applebaum’s next of kin?”
“That’s my husband,” she said, her scalp prickling, her whole body suddenly alert. An instinctive chill had her in its grip. “Is he okay? What’s wrong?”
“He was brought in by ambulance after a motor vehicle accident. We’re still assessing his condition, but he’s unconscious. Right now the doctors—”
“I’m not far,” Laurel said. “I’ll be there in ten minutes. Less.” She dropped her phone into her purse and grabbed her jacket. Dear god, was this really happening? And why did it take a near tragedy for her to remember how much she loved him?
I have to do better, she thought, a lump taking shape in her throat. I have to.
“Is everything okay?” asked Charlie Webb. He had been standing close by, which wasn’t unusual. Sweet as he was, the old guy was just this side of stalkerish when it came to Laurel.
She chalked it up to a harmless crush. To Charlie, Laurel was still in the blush of youth. But she understood that his age filtered her through a softening gauze. To most men, she was all but invisible—a fifty-two-year-old woman who maintained only the last vestiges of attractiveness. It had been at least ten years and as many pounds since anyone told her she resembled Diane Lane. Granted, she didn’t make the effort she used to, but she simply couldn’t see the point.
She looked into Charlie’s kind face. “I don’t think so,” she said, her eyes watering. “Doug’s been in an accident. They wouldn’t have called me unless…” She searched his expression, hoping she didn’t have to finish the sentence.
He nodded and took her by the shoulders. “You’re going to be okay,” he said slowly, “no matter what. You are here and you’re fine. You only have one job right now, and that’s to drive carefully. You understand?”
The cadence of his speech slowed her rocketing heart, but she was suddenly so overcome by his concern she couldn’t speak. So she gave him a quick hug, and dashed out.
Laurel slammed the door of her twelve-year-old Altima, considering Charlie’s advice as she pulled her seat belt across her torso. Drive Carefully, she thought, turning the words into initials. It was something she often did to settle herself, playing a game where she tried to think of famous people to match the letters. DC=Don Cheadle, Dana Carvey, Diahann Carroll.
Calmer, she realized Charlie was right—she didn’t need to tear out of the lot. Reaching the hospital two minutes faster was not going to make a difference. Because realistically, she thought as the bulge in her throat swelled and tightened, Doug was probably already dead. She could almost feel it in her bones. He was gone, the life snuffed from his body. That was why she had been summoned. The hospital probably had a policy against giving next of kin the news over the phone.
Once she got there, she would be pulled into a private room by a doctor and a social worker. They would tell her they did everything they could, and ask if there was anyone they could call for her. She thought about her mother, elderly and detached, who would be no help at all. Then, of course, there was Doug’s sister, Abby, who was just the opposite. She would want to push in and take over.
Laurel bristled at the thought as her salty tears began to dry on her face, contracting the skin on her cheeks. Abby. God, she was annoying. The woman had an answer for everything. And usually, it was wrong. Maybe Laurel wouldn’t call her right away.
But no, Abby could be helpful if she stayed in her damned lane. Laurel would just have to be strong, assertive. She would give Abby a list of people to call. That would make her feel useful and important. Keep her out of Laurel’s hair.
And then, well, Laurel would have to make the most difficult call of all—to her son, Evan, who lived on the West Coast and was expecting his first child. He’d want to fly to Long Island for the funeral, but what about his wife, Samara? She was having a difficult pregnancy and might not be allowed to fly. Maybe Evan wouldn’t even feel comfortable leaving her.
It was painful to consider, and Laurel shook her head. She was making this too complicated. Of course they would both come to the funeral.
The thought of seeing them lightened her heart. She’d been depressed about not being able to fly out there for the birth of their child. Money was just so tight, with Doug still out of work. And he had insisted it was foolish for them to get any further in the hole on their credit cards. But now…now she’d be free to buy a ticket without getting into a fight about it. At least there was that. She would finally get her wish of being there for the birth of her first grandchild, to hell with credit card debt.
And then Laurel had a thought that made her gasp. She hadn’t remembered it until this moment. Doug had a huge life insurance policy—$850,000. So much money! It would solve everything. She’d be able to pay off all the credit cards. She could sell the house, and move to a cute little apartment, all by herself, and live off the savings. My place, she would call it. The decor would be soft and cool, in shades of aquamarine and sand. She imagined getting up in the morning without thinking about making Doug breakfast, setting out his vitamins and medication, picking up his damp towels from the bathroom floor, washing the dishes he left in the sink, swiping his crumbs off the counter. There were always so many damned crumbs. But now, she might even get a little dog. Doug was allergic so she had never been able to, and the thought of it filled her.
Laurel stretched in the seat, thinking how lovely it would be to quit the long shifts at Trader Joe’s and give her aching back a rest. And with no job, she would be able to stay home with a new puppy to train it.
And then there was her mother, who desperately wanted Laurel to spend more time with her. This could be just what their relationship needed. Laurel imagined her mother being so grateful for the extra attention she might even summon the courage to take a break from her vintage doll collection and leave the house. Laurel warmed at the thought, the tension in her throat easing.
And of course, that would be nothing compared to holding her first grandchild. How she loved newborns! Their impossibly tiny noses, their kernel-sized toes, the smell of heat rising off their velvety little heads. She imagined a baby girl with Evan’s silky dark hair.
By the time she parked at the hospital, Laurel was trying to work out whether it made sense to get a dog right away, or if she should wait until after the birth of the baby, so she wouldn’t need to worry about finding someone to care for it while she was in California.
She stopped the thought in its tracks. This wasn’t about her, it was about Doug, and she needed to be sadder. He was her husband. They had been married for nearly thirty years. Laurel tried to picture the early days of their courtship, recalling when they first met. She had just landed her first real job, working in the marketing department of a trade magazine publisher, when one of the women in her office offered to fix her up with a friend of her husband’s. “A solid citizen,” the woman had said, and Laurel took it to mean he was someone she could trust.
The phrase stuck with her all these years because it had defined Doug from their very first meeting. He was an honest and decent man who had gone into his father’s business. Eight years older than Laurel, he had a boyish face, unruly hair that charmed her, and an irresistibly corny sense of humor. Even on that first date, she didn’t mind that he was overweight. It made her feel safe to be with someone who wasn’t all that attractive to other women. Here was a man who would always be faithful. And also, he thought he was the luckiest guy in the world to be dating someone so very pretty. She was even flattered by his jealousy. It made her feel like a princess.
When he proposed six months later, Laurel was dizzy with joy. She was young—barely twenty-two—but she had always dreamed of being a wife. And she was being offered a sparkling emerald cut diamond solitaire ring by a man who wanted her so desperately he couldn’t wait to make it official. She’d been so overcome she could barely choke out the word yes.
Laurel parked and pulled a tissue from her purse, well aware of what she was doing—digging into memories to feel appropriately sad. It worked. Her heart felt leaden as she slammed her car door and hurried to the emergency room entrance.
“I got a call about my husband, Douglas Applebaum,” she said to the woman at the desk. “He was…in an accident.” She arranged her face into a stoic expression so the receptionist would understand she was prepared for whatever bad news was about to unfold.
But the woman remained impassive as she tapped at her computer, asked for ID, and then printed out an adhesive name badge. “Observation unit 4B,” she said, handing it to Laurel.
“What?” Laurel asked, confused. She had expected someone to come out and greet her.
The woman pointed a long nail embedded with a diamond chip. “Straight down that hall, all the way to the end. Make a right, show your badge to the security guard.”
For a lingering moment, Laurel stood transfixed by the glamorous manicure, a covetous urge growing tight in her gut. She hid her raw, unmanicured hands behind her back as she recalled better days, when she would indulge in mani-pedis with her friend Monica, as they laughed and gossiped.
And then, just like that, the nostalgia was replaced with furious reproach. How could she possibly be so shallow? Especially now, when there was so much at stake.
Guilt brought her back to the present, where she tried to focus on the instructions she had just been given. Dazed, Laurel did as she was asked, going through door after door until she found herself in a room full of patients in reclining chairs, separated by curtains. Some were alone, others had a loved one sitting close by in a plastic seat, crowded into the tiny space. Medical professionals buzzed around the middle of the room, going from patient to patient. The air was too hot, and smelled like disinfectant.
Laurel followed the signs. 1B, 2B, 3B, and then she stood before 4B, where two nurses in lavender scrubs hovered over a patient, blocking her view. One was leaning across him, pulling off a Velcro blood pressure cuff, and the other adjusted a bag of clear liquid hanging on an IV pole. The patient said something to make both nurses laugh, and then they took a step back, as if sensing Laurel’s presence.
And there he was, lounging in the reclining chair, a purple bruise across his forehead.
Laurel stopped and blinked, taking it in. The IV bag was connected to his arm by a thin tube. He wore the faded plaid shirt she’d been trying to get him to throw out, his belly hanging over his belt.
“Doug?” she asked, trying to make sense of the tableau before her. There was, she knew a term for what she was experiencing. Cognitive dissonance. Still, she couldn’t understand what she was looking at. That is, until he spoke.
Just about everyone is seeking some kind of treasure, a way to be rich without having to work hard. Whether it’s by pursuing sound investments, flipping houses or waiting impatiently for an inheritance, we want what we want and we don’t want to work for it. The truth is that we already have a treasure, but some of us don’t recognize it.
This treasure is the truth of God’s Word that we are supposed to freely share with others. It is the gift of eternal life that was freely given to us by the sacrifice of Jesus. We did nothing to deserve it and yet sometimes we just carry it around in our “jars of clay” instead of sharing it with others. Our jars of clay, that is our human bodies, are decaying daily, but the treasure of eternal life that we hold is renewing our inner soul in a way that is unimaginable for us finite beings.
Instead of always wanting more of the goods that the world has to offer, we should be content with the treasure that God has given us, a treasure that is so plentiful that we could share daily with multiple people and never deplete the supply. The truth about Jesus is not a lake but an eternal fountain, one of life and restoration.
Have a blessed day and may you recognize the treasure God has given you and be willing to share it daily with others who need to know Gospel.
Vickie's Book Nook and Meditation Corner 