ADORE- Five Minute Friday

It took me awhile to meditate on this one and find the time to settle down and post for this week's Five Minute Friday. Here are my thoughts this week.


Admiration 

Directed towards

Others

Relishing them with

Endearment 

We adore. We delight in. We give and serve whatever our hearts hold closely. Others see what and how we adore by our time, talents and treasury. They see. We can see who others ADORE. Who or what is it during this special season? 

We look. We buy. We shop. We wrap. We are busy, busy online or in the malls. How does God know we adore Him, Christ the lord ? How do we show that is where our focus is? 

The least of these. Whatever we do for the least of these. Whatever we do for the least of these, we do unto Him. How can we adore if we're not looking or noticing? Christmas is not a happy time for everyone. Many are broken from the grief of losing loved ones passed on. Others reaping defeat from another year of dreams lost or closer to death. No, Christmas is not a joyous time for everyone. 

Adoration seems to be more of a choice than a feeling. How and what do we direct our attention to this season and always? 

STOP

If you would like to see what others are thinking, check out Kate's blog where we all post a response to her prompt.

www.katemotaung.com

PREPARE- My Five Minute Friday Take

Purposeful

Readying of materials, places or self

Each 

Person

Anticipates

Relishing an

Event or experience

How much time is spent in the phase of preparation and how much enjoying the actual event?  If our journey through life on earth is meant to prepare us for eternity in heaven, it seems all of our life as we know it, is spent readying ourselves. Yet eternity is such an abstract concept, not one we can fully comprehend. I would rather spend all of my time enjoying the final event, but preparation is always necessary.

STOP

Check out what others think at www.katemotaung.com

Dear...Five Minute Friday

My head was feeling fuzzy this morning and so I could not think of an acrostic right away which totally embodied it's true meaning. The first thing that popped into my head was "Dear Santa"; tis the season.

We use the word to address someone in a letter of any kind.

I use it to describe my friend, Natalie of more than 20 years.

Deserving of

Every sign of

Affection I can give

Remembering her kindness to me

We love because someone else has loved us!

STOP

Check out what others hold near and dear at www.katemotaung.com

GIVE! Five Minute Friday

I took another night to sleep on it after peeking at yesterday's prompt. The word is quite fitting for the holiday we just celebrated, but I am hoping my thoughts will bring a fresh perspective to someone out there as it does not go along with the traditional "giving thanks on Thanksgiving" practice. What flowed this morning is how we treat others, a reminder I need to give myself time and time again.

Generous and

Interested

Very much in

Everyone's well being

Years ago I read that when you truly love someone, you want what's best for them. We GIVE out of concern for the people who cross our paths and come into our lives. We GIVE and hopefully we and they are better for it.

Another thought that comes to mind is how we approach new people or strangers. There is a moment even if it be ever so brief to GIVE. Asking them and showing interest in who they are, what they do and like, may seem trivial, but how easy it can be for us to talk about ourselves. We so need need to become others focused. What opportunities we may miss when we aren't.

To see what other are thinking. Check out Kate's blog 

www.katemotaung.com

NOTICE! My Five Minute Friday Blurb

It is Saturday and I am just getting to this, but I took a peek at Kate's website last night to discover the new word and had time to sleep on it. Here are my thoughts today.

Noting

One's observations

Talking about them

In a positive way and

Compassionately can

Encourage and empower others each day

I use the expression, "I noticed......." with my students to reinforce the positive behaviors I see. I need to be watching and catching them acting appropriately.  They need to know what they are doing that's right.  It's something that can be used by anyone in any relationship, even to confront a problem. We can "NOTICE" behaviors that need questioning and more attention.

STOP

www.katemotaung.com

STILL- Five Minute Friday

Satisfied

Taking                              

It

Little by little

Letting things lie


This is another challenging word and concept. We can be "still", not moving and ceasing to strive because we are satisfied, or we can be "still" stuck in the same season or spot resenting it.

I am still single and not always satisfied with that. More often than not, I am not.

I am still a teacher at the same school I've been for more than a decade; satisfied, but also searching now for perhaps something different.

My soul needs to be "still" and know who God truly is. I am "still" seeking.

STOP



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Turn- Five Minute Friday

Another great prompt from Kate. If you'd like to join the party check out www.katemotaung.com

Take what's

Undesirable and

Redeem it

Never looking back at the past again

TURN, TURN, TURN-

There is a season and time to every purpose under heaven.  Turning away from the past and turning over a new leaf takes work. It is a conscious decision. You make something ravishing or leave it undesirable and ugly. It is a choice to turn the worst into the most dazzling.

The question is how?

Life has a habit of handing us lemons. We need to make a choice, but we also need to know the sky can be the limit. To turn over a new leaf is what we all need at some point in time. I am wondering what to TURN and how to redeem.

Reminds me of..................

STOP

More Thoughts on Leaving...FMF

It is a new month and my dad would be 73 tomorrow if he were still here. As I sat in church yesterday listening to an interview with a couple who have adopted four children from the foster care system, I thought of my adopted mom and dad. November is National Adoption Month.

Looking back over the years on the

Endurance shown from 

All those who

Ventured to veer off and

Envelope me with grace & love, shows me others were willing to leave what was familiar and comfortable, in order that more would gain true life.

My adopted mom and dad were willing to LEAVE one town and move to another, which is where they met me.

They were willing to lay aside their own comforts and conveniences to care for me.

They were willing to endure the ups and downs that come with taking in a teenager so that a better life would be possible for me.

Little did they know the fruit that would come forth over twenty years later. Fruit that continues to grow to this day in and through me.

I can look back at the love shown to me.

They were willing to lay so many things aside and endure because God, Jehovah Jireh, called, but not just for me.

Now these questions keep staring back at me-

What and when am I willing to LEAVE?

LEAVE- Another Five Minute Friday

It is Saturday evening and I am getting ready to do the FMF post. Better late than never. I did compose it late Thursday evening, but am just getting around to posting it now. For those of you who are curious to know more, you too can check out the Five Minute Friday Party at the link below.

www.katemotaung.com

This week's prompt is ....

Leave

Laying

Everything

Aside

Veering off to new

Encounters encompassing eternity


Leave can mean so many things to so many from "Leave me alone!" to "Don't Leave me!" or "It's time to leave and move on."

I connected it with last week's prompt "DARE" because leaving can be heart wrenching, freeing, or downright depressing, depending on one's circumstances. I hate leaving and the thought of it. I hate being left, but there are times we all need to LEAVE well enough alone and just move on. May we each be granted the wisdom to know when and how.

What should I leave and where to?

STOP

DARE- My Five Minute Friday

Drop

All we

Relish, require, or revel in

Each day to explore the unknown

OR

Drop

All our

Reservations

Each day to explore the unknown,   exercising freedom to choose and enriching our lives

I like the second poem better, but both are hard to do.  How open am I to drop what I love or forego my fears to enrich my life? Life is monotonous at times.  There's safety in the familiarity or rising each day to go to work, knowing I have a job to go to and a paycheck coming. Safety in seeing the same people each day.

  STOP

katemotaung.com

LONG- 5 Minute Friday

 I am so thankful for this exercise each week. It helps me to be creative and gives me an outlet I've needed for awhile. After a short week, but a long day here is what came to mind.


Lagging

On and on

Never

Going fast enough

This is how a day can feel sometimes, especially when there's too much monotony and not enough spontaneity. Sometimes it feels so LONG when prayers go unanswered and the same old, same old has grown stale.

I wish there weren't days and periods like this.  Then I remember the times when the time is not LONG enough; like when I'm riding bareback or trotting through a field of bright, yellow buttercups.  These are the moments that never lag behind. So I revel in them, craving the next time while trying to find something to rejoice in until then.

STOP

http://katemotaung.com

CARE- Five Minute Friday

Ok, so it's really Saturday afternoon. I'm slacken' a bit, but this is the time I could retreat with my little write it down book and scribe what came to mind. The word CARE brings so many images and thoughts to mind. I wasn't sure what would flow as some of the cares of the world have been weighing me down, but here are five minutes worth of practical application.

Careful concern, compassion

Actively

                                                               

Restoring, resurrecting, redeeming

Each and everyone with encouragement

That is what came to mind when I first read the prompt. Who cares? How much? How do I know?  When and how does God show this concern for me and compassion in such a powerful way?

When we take the time to be the person we need to be for somebody else who's hurting. We are hands and feet. We are the ones who can touch others' lives.

I've experienced it in great waves and at other moments in dribs and drabs.

How much does He care for me?

STOP

http://katemotaung.com

New- Another 5 Minute Friday

To keep in step with the word for this week, I went to a new place other than my blue plaid love seat at home and I set the timer on my i-phone while I scribed the words that flowed. What came out was quite different than I expected. I also wish there was more than just 5 minutes, but this is what came to mind.

Nothing

Expected

Whizzes by when one is watchful
      and waits, or does it?

When I'm watching for something, waiting patiently, and know what to look for and what to expect, then I'm ready for it when it comes; even if it is something new like a "package" or a new person to meet on a blind date.

I wonder how much of the "unexpected" we miss out on, simply because we are not mindful or we are expecting the someone or something "new" to look or be a certain way. Most of the Jews missed the Messiah because although they've been waiting and watchful, they've expected Him to act and look a certain way.

STOP

http://katemotaung.com

Because..... 5 Minute Friday

Because of other's choices, I needed a new place to go

October 23,  1993

Because he wanted what God wanted, I was found

Because he loved me and God, I was given a chance


Because he was not afraid to endure, I learned unconditional love

Because of this man, Guy Milroy, I was given a fresh new start in life

Because life is not fair and death is part of our world,
 he was called home to a better place

Because of his absence now, my heart aches and misses him dearly

Because it is September and two years since he left,
  I think of him and what he did for God and me

Happy 2nd Anniversary in Heaven. Pops! Love you & Miss you immensely!

http://katemotaung.com

Patterns to Learn From

Have you read the 

Old Testament? Take time!

Listen to lessons from the kings'

Downfalls. Many started off well, but

In their selfishness & sin, came

Tumbling down, down to a very sad end!

A Lesson From Amaziah

Each morning I read one chapter in the Bible. My goal has been to read straight through in an effort to understand who God is and how He really deals with His children. I began last fall in Genesis and I am currently up to the 25th chapter of II Chronicles. What a soap opera! It's also pretty bewildering to read how quickly people can change their alliance, even after God has done something great for them. I must admit, I have been guilty of that also. 

Today I felt impressed to HOLD ON after reading about one of Judah's many kings. It is also a take off on the 5 Minute Friday prompt.

 II Chronicles 25:5-12
Amaziah called the people of Judah together and assigned them according to their families to commanders of thousands and commanders of hundreds for all Judah and Benjamin. He then mustered those twenty years old or more and found that there were three hundred thousand men fit for military service, able to handle the spear and shield. 6 He also hired a hundred thousand fighting men from Israel for a hundred talents[b] of silver.

7 But a man of God came to him and said, “Your Majesty, these troops from Israel must not march with you, for the Lord is not with Israel—not with any of the people of Ephraim. 8 Even if you go and fight courageously in battle, God will overthrow you before the enemy, for God has the power to help or to overthrow.”

9 Amaziah asked the man of God, “But what about the hundred talents I paid for these Israelite troops?”

The man of God replied, “The Lord can give you much more than that.”

10 So Amaziah dismissed the troops who had come to him from Ephraim and sent them home. They were furious with Judah and left for home in a great rage.

11 Amaziah then marshaled his strength and led his army to the Valley of Salt, where he killed ten thousand men of Seir. 12 The army of Judah also captured ten thousand men alive, took them to the top of a cliff and threw them down so that all were dashed to pieces.

biblegateway.com

Hold on, help is 

On the way

Look to God alone to

Deliver you from the enemy

God gave Amaziah an amazing victory over his enemies. Yet in the same chapter, he is found to be looking elsewhere for his support.

II Chronicles 25:14-16

When Amaziah returned from slaughtering the Edomites, he brought back the gods of the people of Seir. He set them up as his own gods, bowed down to them and burned sacrifices to them. 15 The anger of the Lord burned against Amaziah, and he sent a prophet to him, who said, “Why do you consult this people’s gods, which could not save their own people from your hand?”

16 While he was still speaking, the king said to him, “Have we appointed you an adviser to the king? Stop! Why be struck down?”

So the prophet stopped but said, “I know that God has determined to destroy you, because you have done this and have not listened to my counsel.

biblegateway.com

It's good to stop and take inventory of where we are and to what or with whom our alliance lies. I am thinking though that sometimes our greatest enemy is not one that resides outside of us, but within.

Hold. 5 Minute Friday

Hold me in your heart
Hold my hand each step of the way
Hold my dreams carefully, God
Please don't let them break!

Hold my heart close to yours
Let me dance in the rain
Hold me, Jesus, forever
Hold back the water, let the waves not break

I hold my breath and wait


5 Minute Friday

May I Be Ready to......

More thoughts of being READY. Amazing how one word can inspire so much and stir up the pool a bit. This came to me during today's sermon as I listened to readings from the gospel of Mark when Jesus fed the five thousand and accomplished many other miracles in the sight of man.


May I be READY to have God..............

Revitalize my

Expectations of Him, the 

Almighty, so that I 

Drop unrealistic ones of others and

Yearn to expect from Him

Ephesians 3:20 -Now to Him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to His power that is at work within us. (NIV)

Am I Ready?

That word from 5 Minute Friday got me thinking some more. Today I felt challenged to ask myself-


                                  Am I ready to............




Release

Expectations of others and

Abandon all I'm feeling deserving of,

Die to myself and

Yield to Christ?


This came to me after talking and spending time with loved ones today. Some older and some younger. One of the younger ones asked me, "How do you like your new home?" He showed interest and liked hearing about my life and talking with me. Another one didn't even say hello. One forgot she made a breakfast date with me and never showed up. She felt horrible and was very apologetic.

I don't know which I did more of when I was younger. I would have to ask. Perhaps I showed interest in others. Perhaps I was pretty caught up in myself or life with my friends. Perhaps it was even a little bit of both depending on my mood and the day.

What I do know, now that I have entered a new decade, is that everyone is insensitive or forgetful at times. Each one of us can be pretty darn selfish, just plain careless, or overwhelmed by life.  I don't know what it was like to be a parent raising me all those years ago. I do know I would not want to do the teen years over again. Too much change and for a lot of it, too much pain. Now I realize I could of and should of said thank you a whole lot more for the sacrifices others made.

I also realize, I shouldn't make other people pay when I'm having a bad day. I can and should be pleasant and friendly. I don't always succeed at that. God knows I have failed many times. We all have, haven't we? We all have something that's hard for us. We've all been scraped by the prickers on a rosebush when we've stopped to smell them along our way.

As I have read some of the other posts on FMF, I understand more and more, we really are all in this together. Unless I know someone personally, or they tell me what's really happening in their everyday life, I cannot fathom the struggles they endure or the miles they've walked. Nor can they of me.

It is better to be kind to even the cruelest of strangers than become disgruntled or annoyed. Each and everyone of us at some time, needs a whole lot of grace.

So, I ask myself "Am I READY? Am I willing? Am I able to release, abandon and die to myself? Am I really ready to love God's way?

1 Corinthians 13:5 " (love) does not act unbecomingly ; it does not seek its own, is not provoked, does not take into account a wrong suffered"

READY! 5 Minute Friday

Ready to relax

                      Ready to reflect

Ready or not

    Here it comes

                                       It?

It can be anything

                          Anything is something

Good or bad

Makes you feel great

          or

Makes you mad

                                                Here I am

Ready for what?

A new opportunity I've been longing for

                     or

news that the worst of the worst has finally arrived?


A sudden downpour to make me feel alive

                                                Ready?

             Perhaps


                                 Perhaps I need to just relax

Whisper- 5 Minute Friday

Whisper sweet sounds in my ear
Beckon me far away
Leaving the hustle and bustle behind
Refreshing my soul each day

Whisper words of comfort or challenge,
something to make me think
Lift up my spirits and awaken my senses
Let my heart see Him smile and wink

Whisper my name and a command
speaking with authority from above
Lord, help me find my way in the dark
Pour out your grace and love.

5 Minute Friday!

Reaching out

Jumping in, a stone lands
Ripples ebb, near and far
When they stop no one knows

Word exchange
Heart strings resonate
Brighten up skies
Music plays, fills the air
Vibration, echoes on and on

A week or two, a hundred years
One never knows if, how, or when
Ripples from words do reappear
Their reach unfathomable

Have you seen your ripples reaching?
Heard their music play?
Have they come back to greet you?
How long has it been?

Reach- 5 Minute Fridays!

Reach out and touch somebody is the song that comes to mind at first, but as I just recently celebrated a birthday, I am inspired to reach ahead into a new year. Reach for the stars. Move onward and upward. See what wonderful surprises may await me. It involves extending oneself to obtain something desired or needed. Yes, reach! Reach high and low. Reach far and wide and don't give up! I suppose that may be what I am doing here at Five Minute Fridays. This is a first for me and so I am jumping back into blogging with a fresh new twist. Reaching to find or perhaps rekindle some creativity. It is a great opportunity for me to reach out and connect with others as well. I'm happy to join the conversation!

katemotaung.com/2014/08/28/five-minute-friday-reach/