Refreshed #search #truth

 

“Come to the water

stand by my side

I know you are thirsty

you wont be denied”

Words that we sang

we could drink deep

take refreshing sips

the well is always full

There are days I doubt

distracted by drought

 when I have been starving

  clothes threadbare

you have always provided

what I needed

even in my disbelief

you shared your pool of mercy

where I could bathe in hope

 

Do you ever face days where you can’t see past the trial or the trouble? Do the words “He will provide” seem trite? I cannot count for you how many times He has provided food for my family when the cupboards (and bank account) were bare. I am reminded of the prayer of my child for shoes and the next day I was given money that bought four pairs of shoes for my little ones. And the prayers of a preteen whose best friend has just lost her mom when we find out I also have cancer.

Sometimes life seems like Russian Roulette and The doctor says “you might live and you might die.”

In a van going to another country to get alternate treatment the woman next to me tells me her bleak story. “There are very few healthy cells left in my body. Maybe a month left now and so I made this trip as a last hope even if it can buy more time with my kids. They have no one except me. No one…” Her 18 year old son sits next to her. He is her designated caregiver because there is no one else.

Cancer takes on a new meaning for me as God pulls me out of my own dark reverie to pray without ceasing for this young mom.

I am assured not beaten down

I am certain that God has a plan not destruction

I am lifted up on eagles wings not on a paper airplane…

Weeks of treatment go by. The woman has had many up and downs. I sit with her one day during treatment and she starts going downhill. She hands me her PET scan. “The cancer is diminished. I may have more than a year now.” As she leaves the hospital she hands me her PET scan done that day. There are little bitty pieces of cancer. I am going home with more than a figthing chance and I know many prayers…”

 

If this God cares about shoes and a woman’s cells then does He also not care for your circumstances? What about the World’s?”

CoVid-19 is indeed scary so is having no money.

He knows your every need He hears your every prayer!!!

“You keep track of all my sorrows.
    You have collected all my tears in your bottle.
    You have recorded each one in your book.”

~Psalm 56:8

 

What Would We do Without Water? #hydration #health #elderlyissues #atozchallenge

Most of my clients don’t need to pump their own water though some are on well water.

I recently got a call from adopted family in Africa. ” My wife is sick and the baby is bloated.There are no resources and no medicine and the hospitals are out of reach.”

Have your wife lay down and drink 6 bottles of water each day and give the baby spoonfuls of water. (clean water )

Dont get me wrong water is not the answer to all our problems but hydration is a huge issue for our health.

***

Many Elderly are not getting enough water (coffee and soda drinks do not qualify as hydrating fluids). I know a caregiver that would stop all fluids at 5 pm so there would be no night-time brief changes. That convenience puts an elderly person at risk.

Elderly people often don’t drink until they are thirsty. All of our senses diminish with ages so most seniors are not getting enough hydration.

I have seen that clients with a better diet and hydration seem to have higher function.

I am all for health for the elderly. I have had several family members who  were/are chronic illness and drug free into their 90s. They were all active, ate well and water was their main fluid.

 

I drink about 80 oz of water each day – how about you?

 

Quart #water #atozchallenge #children

 

 

start with a pint

work up to a quart

neck, shoulders are strong

carrying water always work

Our friend started carrying water on his head at two. It’s part of life when you need to move water from the well to your home. Many heads gets the job done.

Our first trip to Uganda we fought a fire. The children (from 3 and up) were the water carriers. They faithfully moved jugs of up to 40 gallons to put out the fire that was engulfing their school. I can’t even carry one gallon on my head.

 

 

The Story of a Village #photography #poetry

There were children

that we didn’t hear

there were mamas

burdens to bear

there was water

miles carried away

there was sunshine

 too busy everyday

                                                                                   

a well where people praise

water on their heads

children stop to play

we call her Pawell

laughter heard today

sonshine spills from hearts

 

 

Water #poetry #drought #Uganda

one blue cup each

flows easily through her hands

dry river beds

laughter’s pure reflection

sing song they learn A B Cs

*

so young to be old

internal Acholi’s strength

Nile clouds my vision

*

If I share a handful of their giggles, would you share a handful of precious water?

This week’s  Word Press photo challenge is Reflections

and Reflections at Weekly Tanka Prompt

Water #AtoZchallenge #Uganda #orphans

 

Life bringing

children drink

cool refreshment

fills our cup

life changing

times of drought

thank God

each wet drop

life saving

one faithful pump

children fire brigade

fire stopped

While we were there – From this one pump more than 80 children were refreshed, a school fire was quenched, and there were still more drops.

 So much demand had been placed on this single pump. On our last day they had to do a major overhaul or lose the water giving pump.

Here’s a poem about the fire the staff and children bravely fought.

Simple Beauty #haiku #photography

beckons my eye

nature in perfect balance

effortless beauty

*

see small loveliness

blue reds rise autumn dawn

tail twitches “welcome”

Happy 1st day of December to each of you lovely people!

Drink #sundaydevotion #poetry

Weary of this dusty land

searching for a single drop

refreshment little remains

tho many for you have sought

sojourn in the desert

on weary feet I walk

thirsting for oasis

…and hopelessly I stop

***

rushing free the fountain

my hands eagerly reach out

touching living water

unencumbered by the drought

a wellspring ever deep

daily relieves my doubt

dry robes gone I dive

“drink all you can” – I shout

As the land that I call “home” is being devastated by drought (now thirsty wildfire), I am reminded anew of how satisfying a dip into cool water is on the hottest of days.

*****

 “For I will pour water on the thirsty land, and streams on the dry ground; I will pour my Spirit upon your offspring, and my blessing on your descendants.”

Isaiah 44:3

“And the Lord will guide you continually and satisfy your desire in scorched places and make your bones strong; and you shall be like a watered garden, like a spring of water, whose waters do not fail.”

Isaiah 58:11

“…but whoever drinks the water I give them will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”

John 4:14

“And he said to me, “It is done! I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. To the thirsty I will give from the spring of the water of life without payment.”

Revelation 21:6

Sharing with Godinterest

A Drop of Water… #poetry #unity

Were I a bird on the wing

I would perform

an aria I would sing

you would marvel

at the tone

on the limb

I perch alone

*

Were I a fish in a stream

I would dazzle with colors

blue, red, green

against the current

I would go

never motivated

by the flow

*

 

Were I a drop of water in a lake

formed together

community we’d make

linked together

you and me

beautiful ripples

flowing toward the sea

 

 

*****

 

“He that commends me to mine own content
Commends me to the thing I cannot get.
I to the world am like a drop of water
That in the ocean seeks another drop,
Who, falling there to find his fellow forth,
Unseen, inquisitive, confounds himself:
So I, to find a mother and a brother,
In quest of them, unhappy, lose myself.”
― William Shakespeare, The Comedy of Errors

 

Today’s prompt at Poet’s United is Unity.

The Day Beauty Died #sundaydevotion

 

I had an ominous dream

time had passed before my eyes

a dark cloud swept over our earth

filled with dark corruption and lies

 

a storm charged with hate

no control how it spun

ripping apart all that inspired

where the final gate was  hung

 

inside was  preserved

only one small tiny world

open-faced smiling flowers

and one grey mourning dove

 

a brick path had been laid so long ago

and the arbor overgrown

shielded unique flowers

from the cold biting snow

 

frozen were the tears

that lay upon my cheek

as beauty was discarded

ripped apart so to speak

 

and now what is left

I can tell you what is not

today beauty died

the remaining world now LOST

“Time began in a garden.” and it will end there as well. I sometimes have imagined with my children what the garden of Eden must have been like. We all liked the idea of riding tigers, talking to the monkeys, and being lifted up in the trunk of an elephant. The part of the garden that was different from all gardens was the absence of SIN. That would mean the animals would have gotten along. Many claim that the lion laying down the lamb at the end of the Age. I was struck by a visual that I saw in an article written by a young Pakistan woman. She spoke of how life had been simple in her (impoverished) village but people looked after each other and they celebrated the good fortune of another. In the garden of life, people care for one another. She expressed her consternation at the change of the bigger village in just 50 years since the days when people would split their last loaf of bread with another. In this new society man throws a struggling survivor of a boat (in the sea) because their beliefs are not the same. Children are taught to wield blades bigger than themselves – their prey is man.

Truly our garden is dying.

Isaiah 12:3

“Therefore you will joyously draw water From the springs of salvation.”

Genesis 3:22-24“Then the LORD God said, “Behold, the man has become like one of Us, knowing good and evil; and now, he might stretch out his hand, and take also from the tree of life, and eat, and live forever”– therefore the LORD God sent him out from the garden of Eden, to cultivate the ground from which he was taken. So He drove the man out; and at the east of the garden of Eden He stationed the cherubim and the flaming sword which turned every direction to guard the way to the tree of life.”

Revelation 22:1-2

 “Then he showed me a river of the water of life, clear as crystal, coming from the throne of God and of the Lamb, in the middle of its street On either side of the river was the tree of life, bearing twelve kinds of fruit, yielding its fruit every month; and the leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations.”

Isaiah 11:6

“And the wolf will dwell with the lamb, And the leopard will lie down with the young goat, And the calf and the young lion and the fatling together; And a little boy will lead them. 7Also the cow and the bear will graze, Their young will lie down together, And the lion will eat straw like the ox.…”