A Touch that Heals

This morning after daddy left, we went and did our grocery shopping. J got pretty antsy toward the end of the trip wanting to get out of the cart. Then I forgot that my credit card was closed out because of two fraudulent purchases (kinda scary) so I have no card until the new one comes. They put my cart in the cooler and I went to the bank and back to pay the bill. I also stopped by the post office to mail out an EBay package. I just started selling items there (due to buying the wrong thing) and had my first sale. It went well so I think I'll do more.

The day was just bing-bing-bing nonstop. J had an abbreviated nap and we had just enough time to eat and go. We had a neat activity planned. I signed up as a volunteer for a study day at our church. Every year the college students are invited and they open up the whole church so the students can study, eat, hang out, eat some more. I didn't want to get a babysitter to go volunteer, but since I wanted to help out I decided to bring J along. I thought it would be a good experience to serve with him. We were greeters and handed out a study day info sheet and J got into handing them out a bit too. Most of the time he colored or played with his car and played ball with one of the ladies. The college students and other students thought he was so cute. I'm glad we did this.

In my devotional time, I continued in Luke 5 where Jesus healed a leper and a paralytic. The man with leprosy came to him with complete belief that Jesus could heal him. Verse 12-13: When he saw Jesus, he fell with his face to the ground and begged him, "Lord, if you are willing, you can make me clean." Jesus reached out his hand and touched the man. "I am willing," he said. "Be clean!" And immediately the leprosy left him. To me this account is so moving. This man completely trusts that Jesus has the power to heal him, humbly comes to him, and Jesus's first response was to reach out his hand and touch him. In that time, touching a leper was completely unheard of. Lepers were shunned. We see Jesus' love, his compassion in his gentle touch, a touch that heals. Just writing that brings to mind again how thankful I am for God's healing touch in me bringing me out of a dark depression (see Feb 20 post, "We like our books and taste of Africa"). A friend sent me wishes for a happy Mother's Day on Facebook saying how wonderful that the HAPPY part is true. This past week I've had a lot of difficult memories resurfacing from that time period. I look at it as ways the Lord wants to continue the healing, by being able to accept the past and the memories that are there. Thank you, Lord. Later, it says that often Jesus withdrew to lonely places and prayed. If you follow closely in the gospels, you see that although Jesus' ministry was so busy with so many followers, he would often get alone to have times of prayer with God. I thought about my prayer times and it would be good to take more time to pray. To just sit before God, quiet my heart, and pray the things that come to mind. I enjoy times of praying for others, yet it isn't always as in depth as it could be.

This was Y night and it was a challenge doing my regular workout. It felt harder on my knees and overall I was just more tired. I had to really push myself. These last two nights I got to bed at 12:30am since we've had a lot going on but it's just a reminder that I need to get more sleep. So I'm going to hold to that. When we got home, J wanted to play outside. He walked over to daddy's side of the car and took his hand saying he wanted to play with daddy. So we kicked a ball around for a bit before taking J to bed.