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Trish Southard

Trish Southard

Tag Archives: God

What Scares Me – Part 3

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Posted by trishsouthard in Comedy, Healing, Places With God, Uncategorized, Words That Heal, Work and Spirituality

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A Quiet Place With God, Bible, Christianity, Faith, God, Healing Words, Jesus, More time with Jesus, Organizational Tips, Religion and Spirituality, Restful enviroments, simplify, What Scares Me..., Words That Heal

Shoal Creek

Shoal Creek

Being cooped up.

I’m an outdoor girl.

Mothers Day or my birthday are usually a day of canoeing, hiking or horseback riding.

Studying for my big exam this spring I missed taking in the grape kool-aid (mountain laurel) air with honey suckle top notes.

The scent of flowers and birds singing all calm me.

My coursework of memorizing laws and regulations kept me from my daily visit to the creek to breathe in the fresh air-conditioner free air.

Stepping out for a few minutes this spring, a young gentlemen from the next building whistled out the mocking jay haunting melody making me laugh.

I must remind him of a much older Katniss Everdeen.

Getting out of the routine of being outside scares me. Spring seemed to rush by without me noticing.

Don’t be scared… go outside.

Healing – Part 10

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Posted by trishsouthard in Healing, Places With God, Restful Homes for Our Families, Uncategorized, Words That Heal

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A Quiet Place With God, Bible, Christianity, Church, Faith, family, God, Grief, More time with Jesus, Neighborhood, Radiance, Rejoice, Religion and Spirituality, Restful enviroments, simplify, Sorrow, Talmud, Texas, Tremble, Words That Heal

Go to Church

Find a bible-based church that’s not so large you get lost in the shuffle.

“See and be radiant and your heart will tremble and rejoice.”  (first half of Is. 59v.5)

Experience the transformative power of God’s Word.

Sorrow is better than laugher, for sadness has a refining influence on us.

Ecclesiastes 7:3

Just soak it all in.

Rest.

Worship.009

Teaching.

The old.

The young.

Cry.

Church is a safe place to weep.

The deeper the sorrow, the less the tongue has to say.

The Talmud

Healing – Part 8

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A Quiet Place With God, Beautiful Women, Bible, Christianity, Faith, family, God, Jesus, Lord, Religion and Spirituality, Words That Heal

Develop relationships with people in their 90’s.

They have walked through great and irreparable loss.

A seasoned perspective.

My Aunt Virginia almost 94, and a friend Frances, who is  94 seem to have a quick way of pulling me to a feeling of ease.

A beautiful sheath of lilies unfolds in my mind and the scent wakes me, when encouragement or advice comes from these women of distinction .IMG_1005

Show respect to the aged; honor the presence of an elder; fear your God.

I am God.

Leviticus 19:32 The Message

Healing – Part 7

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Posted by trishsouthard in Healing, Places With God, Uncategorized, Words That Heal

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A Quiet Place With God, angst, Bible, Calm, Christianity, Faith, God, Healing, Licorice, Loss, Psalms, Religion and Spirituality, Sadness

A well dressed gentlemen walked past me in the library.

His perfectly polished cordovan dress shoes were in contrast to a strong alcohol odor passing by and nauseating me.

Liquor seeped out of his skin on a Sunday afternoon.

I was just relaxing catching up on the latest periodicals, but another story began to unfold in my mind.

Sadness so unbearable some turn to old vices.

My old vice was candy, especially black licorice.

Blue after visiting with a grieving dear friend, I bought a box.

A strange calm arrived as I bite into the chewy, salty, tart sweet.

Perhaps this well-groomed young man had suffered a loss of some kind.

When the dark angst hits go outside and read the psalms beginning at 100.

Read out loud till you hit 107 verse 20.SONY DSC

He saved them from their distress.

He sent His word and healed them;

He rescued them from the Pit.    Psalm 107 v. 20 HCSB

 

 

Healing – Part 5

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Posted by trishsouthard in Healing, Places With God, Restful Homes for Our Families, teens, Uncategorized, Words That Heal

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A Quiet Place With God, Be the hand of God, Bible, Christianity, eco-fashionable food prep, Faith, family, Food Pantry, God, HEB, Homemaking, Jesus, Lord, Moms, More time with Jesus, Religion and Spirituality, simplify, Southern Hospitality, Texas, Words That Heal

In line at the grocery store a young mom started setting items aside she could not pay for–

bananas, apples, and other veggies.  I handed the money to the cashier and she, with her many lovely long braids, and her sweet children were on their way.

I’ll never see this family again, but I assured her it was from God and He loves her.

Standing in line at the gas station one of our coaches from the high school was checking out.  It was less than $10.00 but it gave me the opportunity to thank him for all he does for the young people in our community and a simple God Bless you.

You are reading this and thinking I don’t have any extra.

Save a quarter a week till you have a dollar and give it away and bless another.

Perhaps one of my biggest adjustments to having an empty nest is the grocery store, mine is HEB.  Feeling blue grocery shopping alone one Saturday, two teen girls stood in front of me at the checkout counter with a giant bottle of chocolate syrup. The only thing I said as I slipped several dollars to the cashier on their behalf was “God Bless you” to the two smiling young faces. It ended up being on sale and just one dollar, but it was my small way of demonstrating God’s love toward others, and God lifted my spirits as I gave just a little away, my unexpected blessing from Him.

A young mom from our neighborhood texted me to see if she could pick up some food for her three small children from our churches pantry. I could not get there, but the owner of the preschool was there to help, and helped her carry the groceries to her car where she quietly handed the young mom an envelope with extra cash.  That mom called me later to say how she could not believe how God had met her need so quickly.  Sometimes our random acts of kindness are really divine appointments– God’s way of letting others know they are loved and not forgotten.

Feeling Sad?

Be the hand of God.

 

Healing – Part 4

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A Quiet Place With God, Bible, Christianity, Faith, family, God, Grief, Home, Jesus, Jewish, Lord, More time with Jesus, Religion and Spirituality, Restful enviroments, Shiva, Sorrow

Yesterday I fell off my bike carrying too much on the way home from our mailbox. It was a pretty hard fall, contents of my basket flying everywhere, and blood dripping from scrapes on my wrist and leg as I rode home.

Photo by Trish Southard

Photo by Trish Southard

Share your load with others.

Todd would have been glad to swing by our box and pick up some of the bigger items on his way home from work.

Our family lost three loved ones in four years.

Multiple loved ones passing away or one is too much of a burden for anyone to bear alone.

Grief Group helped me lift my heavy heart.

Surrounded by people who have suffered the loss of a loved one, and a leader, the group gently persuades you to share your imperfect memories, portraits,  all while putting you at ease.

Our leader had us write letters to our loved ones sharing that we wished they would have remained alive longer, our anger that they missed an important event, regrets, anger and how lonely we feel without them. We then read those letters at the cemetery or somewhere significant to the two of us. We then burned or buried the letters.

Somehow I felt lighter and more at ease with each letter.

In the Jewish faith when a loved one dies, they sit Shiva for seven days.

They stay home and allow others to listen to them, care for them, and bring them food.

When others are in pain, you will find yourself more compassionate and confident to walk through it with them.

Sit beside them quietly.

No advice needed.

When others are happy, be happy with them.

If they are sad, share their sorrow.

Romans 12:15 TLB

Healing – Part 3

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A Quiet Place With God, Aunt Grace, Bible, Blessing, Blessing others, Christianity, Corolla Chapel, Faith, family, Favor, God, Healing, Healing Words, More time with Jesus, Outer Banks, Religion and Spirituality, Restful enviroments, Retreat, simplify, Unplug

 

A Holly Hobby stitching gently nudged my thoughts as I passed it each day.

Whenever you’re blue

Find something to do

For somebody else

Who is sadder than you

 

Blood Moon   Photo by Colleen Lienhard

Blood Moon
Photo by Colleen Lienhard

 

Fill your friends’ and families’ darkness with God’s spectacular paint brush.

Stopping off in Columbia to see Uncle Tom and Aunt Grace is always a powerful time of prayer.  Celebrating their 51st wedding anniversary they are blessed by God. Grace stayed up till 1 am with me, and we prayed big and bold and color-filled blessings and prayers on everyone in our families.

Praying the Word of God over each one individually.

At the beach we sunned and swam every day, just the three of us, and occasionally Rick and Laura after work at Corolla Chapel.

I missed the family that had sat beside me the 27 previous years –with our Lord, or off to college, college bound and others spending their vacation elsewhere.

North Carolina was our state.  My husband born in Chapel Hill, our daughter’s summers here at her grandparents’ beach house and my summers for 27 years.

Refreshed by salt air and my family’s laughter and constant teasing, God comforted me.

Fresh sun, vivid oranges and blue streaked memories.

We played new games and visited different spots rediscovering the Outer Banks.

I checked out of email, FB, text and all the rest.

The spaciousness of the ocean and expansion of my time with my family turned my attention upward Praising God and lifting everyone, many of you who are deeply hurting in intercession to our Lord.  I am certain He is going to change your situation or your struggle.

Have faith and believe.

Look up and enjoy His favor and blessing.

 

 

 

Healing – Part 1

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Posted by trishsouthard in Places With God, Restful Homes for Our Families, Uncategorized, Words That Heal

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Beautiful Women, Bible, Birthdays, Blessing others, Bringing in Finn, Christianity, Faith, family, Flowers, Girlfriends, God, Healing, Jesus, Lord, Minnie Driver, Restful enviroments, Return to Zero, Sara Connell, Southern Hospitality, Today Show

Healing is like a flower blossom each petal needs to open in its own time.”

Anonymous

My healing came through blessing others.

How could I change and be a little miracle to others, like Peg did all the time.

Peg knew everyone’s birthday.

She probably knew her mail lady’s birthday.

A simple step, but it would mean writing down birthdays.

For me,  that often means a visit to my favorite florist, Lisa.

I love to hear her say, “So who is it for today!”

She listens and creates a visible expression of the friend I’m celebrating.

A single rose or wildflowers with a ribbon when someone doesn’t expect it.    IMG_5228 Showing the grandeur of God’s beauty and His expansive love through flowers.

Healing happens very slowly as the petals unfold.

I lift you into the prayer below.

Jesus loves you so much.

You are His beautiful masterpiece created in the image of Almighty God.

Now to Him who is able to do above and beyond all that we ask or think- according to the power that works in you- to Him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and ever. Amen

Ephesians 3:20,21

 

Anonymous Quote from a recent interview on the Today Show with Sara Connell author of “Bringing In Finn” and inspiration for the upcoming movie “Return to Zero” starring Minnie Driver

Sara Connell author of Bringing in Finn

The Suffering of Jesus by Lee Southard

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Bible, Christianity, Easter, God, Jesus, Lord, More time with Jesus, Recipes of Hope, Religion and Spirituality, Suffering

The Suffering of Jesus
As Christians at Easter we rejoice in the fact of a risen Lord.

We easily do that and it makes us feel good. But do we realize the true price paid in understandable human terms to get to that resurrection?
I sit here on Good Friday with a little discomfort due to an illness I have and the therapy I am receiving.

I cannot go out much or too far.

That’s good because it gives me time to deeply contemplate the sufferings of Jesus prior to his death, which on a scale of 1 to 10, mine is a 0.002 and his was 10 plus.

Because of His extreme suffering His death would have seemed like a welcome event for Him.

Based on some knowledge I have of His sufferings a little research adds to the knowledge base but most importantly helps connect me with his sufferings.

When I realize the agony of His sufferings and understand that he endured for me the unfathomable pain it is as the song How Great Thou Art puts it “I scarcely can take it in that on that cross He bled and died for me”.

My soul groans with the agony of it. It brings to reality the love He has and God has for me and you.

Contemplate on this as you read the following.

We know Jesus while God in Spirit was every bit as human as you and I.

So picture yourself or a loved one going through what He went through in the following narrative taken from expert medical sources.
Before the cross Jesus began a process of psychological suffering. It started with betrayal by one of His disciples who had been with Him for His three years of ministry of teaching and healings. From there he was abandoned by more of his friends as went to pray in Gethsemane and assure His father that the father’s will would be done.

He agonized over what was before Him. This agony was in the form of extreme stress because He knew His death and ultimate resurrection was to be preceded by the most awful and cruelty man could inflict upon another. Imagine yourself in the same situation.
Psychological stress is known medically to lead to a condition called hematidrosis, a condition where severe stress causes chemicals to be released that can break down the capillaries in the sweat glands whereby blood is secreted through the sweat glands. The Bible reports He sweated blood. It is also reported that hematidrosis also leads to a heightened skin sensitivity. This is important as we consider later sufferings.
Jesus was brought before religious and ultimately Roman authorities in the middle of the night who had but one agenda to see him tried and condemned to death. It was not a fair trial and not done according to Jewish law and conducted by His own people he came to save.

The experience was a humiliating to Him and in spite of an appeal to the ultimate Roman authority who found no fault with him he was sentenced to be crucified as a politically expedient measure.
Roman floggings were extremely brutal and done by trained executioners whose sole purpose was to create so much pre cross trauma on the one to be crucified that crucifixion would lead to a more rapid death, which it did. Floggings were usually thirty nine lashes (Jewish law allowed 40) with a flagrum, a cat of nine tails, imbedded with metal balls and sharp bone were considered standard and would rip and tear tissue to the point where often the internal organs would be exposed. The whippings (or rippings) would have covered to neck, shoulders, back, buttocks and legs. The strands of the flagrum would wrap around the back and legs and when pulled back suddenly would rip and tear tissue deeply. Veins and muscle would be torn into bloody strands and the pain unimaginable for us.

Once it was determined that the sufferer was near death the beatings would be halted. Eusebius, a third century historian described flogging as “The sufferers veins were laid bare, and the very muscles, sinews, and bowels of the victim were open to exposure.” The term excruciating comes from this experience. Excuciating means “out of the cross”. Many did not survive the beating.
After the flogging and being at a point just before death Jesus must now carry His own cross to Golgatha where He will be crucified. Jesus carried the cross member that makes the cross. This wooden member weighed from 75 to 125 pounds and would be difficult for a healthy man to carry. But Jesus had been flogged to near death and yet he carried this cross through the streets of Jerusalem while being mocked and spit on by a crowd. (I have to digress here and say Jesus had to have been physically fit man before He began his ordeal where He was able to lift that cross and begin the walk. Anyone who says being like Jesus is not manly doesn’t know what they are talking about.) He stumbles and falls and a man from Cyrene (Libya) takes the cross the remaining distance to Golgotha where Jesus is crucified.
Already, near death and in excruciating pain Jesus is thrown upon the rough wooden cross where the open wounds in his back are against the rough wood. Then 5 to 7 inch spikes are nailed through His wrists and feet and the cross is pulled up and set down into a hole as Jesus’s whole weight is now supported only by the nailed feet and hands.

Excruciating pain!
There he hangs and begins a slow death by asphyxiation as the chest and diaphragm is in an inhaled position. To get air and to exhale he must push up with His nailed feet against excruciating pain. He must do this again and again each time scraping his raw back against the rough wood. During this process the ultimate abandonment occurs when Jesus asks God “Why have you forsaken me?” Jesus has been totally laid out for our sins. He has paid it all.
Finally exhaustion gives way to not being able to push up and breath and respiratory acidosis takes over. Respiratory acidosis occurs when the carbon dioxide in the blood turns to carbonic acid causing the blood to become more acidic. This leads to an irregular heart rate and ultimate cardiac arrest. Concurrently with the acidosis Jesus and due to blood and fluid loss Jesus would be experiencing hypo-polemic shock and a rapid heart rate contributing to the heart failure. The result is a collection of fluid in the membrane around the heart and around the lungs called pericardial and pleural effusion respectively. When the Roman soldier thrust the spear into Jesus’s side to see if he was dead the spear passed through the lungs and maybe the heart to get a clear liquid. This was followed by blood as described by the apostle John in his gospel. This was a sign of death. There was no need to break His legs to speed up the process.
Jesus was dead. He has endured hours of suffering and excruciating pain. It was 3:00 PM on a Friday. It is now 3:00 Pm on this Friday, the 18th of April 2014 and I will stop only to say.
We take the death and resurrection of Jesus for granted perhaps.

We see people die during our lives and we can grasp it. We can understand somewhat that to lay down your life for friend as an example of love.

But it seems another level of love to knowingly suffer, to suffer excruciatingly, for another and then die.
I scarcely can take it in that on that cross He bled and suffered and died for me so that on believing on Him I too can be resurrected into eternal life.

It was God’s plan all along for you. What’s your response?Image

A Quiet Place With God- Part 11

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Outside my window tonight the rain is coming down sideways.

A night storm with a morning dove perched her nest.

Protecting her eggs

My stomach lurches.

IMG_5126

I’m involved.

Asking God to hold her steady.

Gazing any chance I can to see if she is at her post.

The challenges and opportunities our children face, develop the gleam in their eye.

A confident step.

They often have circumstances with wind and rain pelting sideways and days the clear blue sky smiles and kisses their lives.

They’ve had to struggle through many surprises and challenges, just like the baby doves will to fight out of the shell.

If we’ve done our job we’ve been close by at our post praying, encouraging, and standing guard, but breaking off that shell is their job.

The shell breaking and the flight that follows is all theirs.

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