Tag Archives: Life

635. Red is the color that makes my heart sing. ~ Author Unknown

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Red is the taste of a ripe, luscious strawberry,
and red the breast of a robin flying high.
Red’s also the crimson glow of Rudolph’s nose,
and red is the color of St. Nicholas’ suit.
Red are boxes of chocolate on Valentine’s Day,
and red is the shiny ruby that cries out to be bought.
Red are the garnet embers of a crackling fire,
and red is a feeling of safety with the ones you love.

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Red is hard and stubborn.
Red will never give in
Even when it needs to.

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Red has the brawn of an ox,
The skill of a pride of lions,
And the diligence of a colony of ants.

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Red does not back down or grow weary.
Red stands his ground firmly.
Red is optimistic.

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Red is like a harvest of fresh raspberries:
Satisfyingly and deliciously juicy.
Red is charming and romantic.
~Edited verses by Sunny Summers

Whoever pursues righteousness and love finds life, prosperity, and honor. ~Proverbs 21:21   ✝

**Images via Pinterest; collages created by Natalie

632. A garden is a bird’s dinner table bursting with bugs and worms and succulent berries. ~Anne Raver

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That little bird has chosen his shelter.
Above it are the stars and the deep heaven of worlds.
Yet he is rocking himself to sleep
without caring for tomorrow’s lodging,
calmly clinging to his little twig,
and leaving God to think for him.
~Martin Luther

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Red–bright, bright, glorious red! How easy it is to find in the winter landscape! Yahweh not only provided birds with sheltering places, but He also formed plants that produce colorful, and therefore easy to spot, feasts of red berries. In Scripture, we are told that we needn’t worry about what we require either because the Lord promises to provide for our needs too. However, since youth is an opiate that leads many a “fledgling” like I once was to a) believe that he/she is infallible and b) to believe he/she is the only one on the planet with a clue about anything, I foolishly thought for a time that my life was only what I was making of it. Then as time passed I began to realize there were doors that did not have to open, but they did; there were opportunities that didn’t have to present themselves, but they did; and there were misfortunes that could have occurred, but they didn’t, and so on. It’s our God-given free will which allows us to make choices that determine the outcome of our lives, and even poor choices can and do sometimes lead to a path that eventually merges back into the one the Lord wants us to travel. Looking back at such things I realize now that it’s only because of the intervention of God’s divine and saving grace that advantageous things happen. And who knows perhaps even the detours are gifts of His divine providence meant to protect the unwise sojourner from harm. Though prudence and patience are lessons I’m still trying to master, at least I’ve become more aware of the importance and necessity of listening to the Lord, consulting Him before making choices, yielding to His will and plan for my life, and living more like the birds who worry not. So on I go these days putting one foot in front of the other. In the meantime God keeps His eye on me and the sparrow, the birds feast upon the garden’s berries, and I rely more and more on the Lord, letting my little piece of Eden continue to feed my soul and remind me of His faithful provision and promises.

“Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothes? Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? Can any one of you by worrying add a single hour to your life? “And why do you worry about clothes? See how the flowers of the field grow. They do not labor or spin…” ~Matthew 6: 25-28   ✝

**Images via Pinterest; overlay created by Natalie

631. We can only be said to be alive in those moments when our hearts are conscious of our treasures. ~Thornton Wilder

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Blessings are the things we take for granted.
Most know the Earth is utterly enchanted
Yet walk through life and love mechanically.
Love brings the sweet relief of absolution,
Enveloping our hesitance in need.
No touch inspires so swift a revolution,
Transforming all the hieroglyphs we read.
In your love is the charity of spring,
Nor self-obsessed nor blinded by some creed,
Embracing the grey dawns that blessings bring.
~Excerpted lines by Cornelius Lyons

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Dawn washes away night’s darkness and brings light to the day. Be grateful for the light, your eyes, and the purposes they serve. Ears allow humankind to hear the song of the birds and words of love. Be grateful for them and the purposes they serve. Feet take mortals places where they want and need to go. Be grateful for them and the purposes they serve. Arms and hands enable people to work, care for themselves, and embrace others. Be grateful for them and the purposes they serve. The in and out movement of breath sustains the gift of life all have been granted. Thus, in all things honor the gifts, the Giver, and the blessings that they are and that they bring.

…because of your father’s God, who helps you, because of the Almighty, who blesses you with blessings of the skies above, blessings of the deep springs below, blessings of the breast and womb. Your father’s blessings are greater than the blessings of the ancient mountains, than the bounty of the age-old hills… ~Genesis 49:25-26   ✝

**Image via Pinterest

630. If Heaven made him — earth can find some use for him. ~Chinese Proverb

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Truly, I am as a grain of sand in the desert,
Infinitesimal, so very small!
And, yet, I serve a purpose in this wondrous world,
As do the trees, so stately and so tall.
I’m just a tiny atom that God has placed down here—
I do not even know the reason why!
But I’m sure that He, with wisdom, has evolved a plan
To fit me in His pattern ere I die.
~Gertrude Tooley Buckingham

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According to Scripture, each one of us is made in God’s image, and though we are, as Buckingham declares, merely an infinitesimal “grain of sand in the desert,” we do indeed, as she also purports, serve a purpose “in this wondrous world.” We are also told in Holy Writ, that the Lord with His limitless power is ready, willing, and able to helps us discern what our purpose is. So the question is how does He do that? Well, we are given a brain that has the ability to learn, a heart that is able to love, ears that hear, and eyes that are capable of discerning a wide spectrum of things. Okay, then, how does He, from afar, orchestrate the discharge of His plan. Well, since our mouths can deliver His loving smile, our voices speak comforting words, our hands administer compassionate healing, our legs carry whatever is lacking to places totally bereft of the “wondrous” aspect of life, it would appear our lives are to be spent serving Him with the gifts we’ve been given. The better question is: how can we who bear Yahweh’s image and breathe His holy breath, do anything but make it our primary concern to spend time with Him and ask for revelation about what it is He would have us do with our “one wild and precious life.” Otherwise, what would be the point of being able to give and receive love if there were no place to spend it nor people with whom to share it?

And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love Him, who have been called according to his purpose. ~Romans 8:28   ✝

** Image via Pinterest

629. One of the most delightful things about a garden is the anticipation it provides.
~W. E. Johns 

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The greatest achievement was at first
and for a time a dream.
The oak sleeps in the acorn,
the bird waits in the egg,
and in the highest vision of the soul
a waking angel stirs.
Dreams are the seedlings of realities.
~James Allen

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Part of the genius of God’s grand design is that we awaken every day to a fresh flowing of His energy and vitality that has been stored in the seeds of our being, seeds that possess the same strength as that of the rising sun, earth’s swelling seas, and its fertile plains. An excellent time to look for the shining of His everlasting light in the “sanctuary of the soul” is in the first waking moments of each new day. That inward realm is where doors open to the germination of new life because inside each one of us the Lord has planted His “seeds of greatness.” There’s never a moment in life when either in and of ourselves or in the people around us that there are not yet unopened gifts of promise. Simply put, “heaven’s creativity on earth” is born in our bodies, and therein the Master’s “sacred hopes” are hidden.

From heaven the LORD looks down and sees all mankind; from His dwelling place He watches all who live on earth-He who forms the hearts of all, who considers everything they do. ~Psalm 33:13-15   ✝

**Image via Pinterest

628. Nature is a revelation of God. ~Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

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I love to think of nature
as an unlimited broadcasting station,
through which God speaks to us  every hour,
if we will only tune in.
~George Washington Carver

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The child whispered, “God, speak to me”
And a meadowlark sang.
The child did not hear.

So the child yelled, “God, speak to me!”
And the thunder rolled across the sky
But the child did not listen.

The child looked around and said,
“God let me see you” and a star shone brightly
But the child did not notice.

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And the child shouted, “God show me a miracle!”
And a life was born
But the child did not know.

So the child cried out in despair,
“Touch me God, and let me know you are here!”
Where upon God reached down
And touched the child.

But the child brushed the butterfly away
And walked away unknowingly.
~Ravindra Kumar Harnani

He who forms the mountains, who creates the wind, and who reveals his thoughts to mankind, who turns dawn to darkness, and treads on the heights of the earth–the Lord God Almighty is His name. ~Amos 4:13   ✝

** Images via Pinterest

622. The temple bell stops but I still hear the sound coming out of the flowers. ~Matsuo Bashō

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If a poem is thin, it is likely so not because
the poet does not know enough words,
but because he or she has not stood long enough
among the flowers-has not seen them in any
fresh, exciting, and valid way.
~Mary Oliver

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I am a kind word uttered and repeated
By the voice of Nature;
I am a star fallen from the
Blue tent upon the green carpet.
I am the daughter of the elements
With whom Winter conceived;
To whom Spring gave birth;
I was Reared in the lap of Summer and I
Slept in the bed of Autumn.

At dawn I unite with the breeze
To announce the coming of light;
At eventide I join the birds
In bidding the light farewell.

The plains are decorated with
My beautiful colors, and the air
Is scented with my fragrance.

As I embrace Slumber the eyes of
Night watch over me, and as I
Awaken I stare at the sun,
which is The only eye of the day.

I drink dew for wine, and hearken to
The voices of the birds, and dance
To the rhythmic swaying of the grass.
~Excerpted verses from Song of the Flower

~by Khalil Gibran

By day the Lord directs his love, at night his song is with me—a prayer to the God of my life. ~Psalm 42:8  ✝

620. There are days when solitude is a heady wine that intoxicates you… ~Colette

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In solitude
she sifts silence
searching for insights
from a marsh of memories
within each of life’s stages
penning prayers and praise
tucking each thought
word by word
phrase by phrase
onto pages.
~Wendy L. Macdonald at https://greenlightlady.wordpress.com/

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Drip, drip, drip fell the winter rain. Deep, deep, deep grew the morning’s silence. Dark were the clouds that dimmed the light of day. Delicious was the morn’s “marsh of memories” floating through stages of my life. Time and circumstance seemed irrelevant as I basked in the quiet solitude punctuated exclusively by the soft pitter pats of falling rain. There were no fret nor frenzy in the morning’s damp and whispered song, and so I sat sifting the silence in search of nothing more to pen on today’s page than words of praise for the blessing of rain and the gift of life for another day, nothing more than words of gratitude for the peace it had brought and the Holy Presence I felt all around me.

“Now, my God, may your eyes be open and your ears attentive to the prayers offered in this place…” ~2 Chronicles 6:40   ✝

**Image via Pinterest

616. Our doubts are traitors, and make us lose the good we often might win, by fearing to attempt. ~William Shakespeare

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I’ve always been delighted at the prospect of a new day,
a fresh try, one more start, with perhaps a bit of magic
waiting somewhere behind the morning.
~J. B. Priestley

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I place on the altar of dawn:
The quiet loyalty of breath,
The tent of thought where I shelter,
Wave of desire I am shore to
And all beauty drawn to the eye.

May my mind come alive today
To the invisible geography
That invites me to new frontiers,
To break the dead shell of yesterdays,
To risk being disturbed and changed.

May I have the courage today
To live the life that I would love,
To postpone my dream no longer
But do at last what I came here for
And waste my heart on fear no more.
~Excerpt from a blessing
by John O’Donohue

In the morning, Lord, you hear m voice; in the morning I lay my requests before you and wait expectantly. ~Psalm 5:3   ✝

**Image via Pinterest, text added by Natalie

614. If you are lucky enough to have lived in Paris as a young man, then wherever you go for the rest of your life it stays with you, for Paris is a moveable feast. ~Earnest Hemingway

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I love Paris every moment
Every moment of the year
I love Paris, why, oh, why do I love Paris
Because my love is there.
~Excerpted lyrics by Cole Porter

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Ooh la la! Je t’aime, Paris! It was my high school French teacher and lines like these above that began my love affair with the French language and Paris, the city of lights. Now more than half a century later, I still have to agree with Audrey Hepburn that “Paris is always a good idea” and with Earnest Hemingway that “Paris is a moveable feast.” In fact I thought it was such a good idea way back then, that when I went off to college, I decided to major in French in hopes that one day I’d be able to go there and live for awhile or for that matter maybe for the rest of my life. But alas and alack, as the poet said, “the best laid plans of mice and men often go awry.” And so they did! Before I graduated from college, I met and married my husband, a born and bred Texan who vowed he’d never leave this place, but being the young romantic that I was, I thought I could change his mind. It took awhile but eventually I did. During the summer of 2013 after we’d been married 50 years, my daughter, her husband, their three children, and James and I left Texas for a whirlwind visit to London, Edinburgh, St. Andrews, Dublin, and Paris, all places that we thoroughly enjoyed.  But go figure! James fell in love with Paris at first sight, so much so that if all goes well with my knee replacement next month, he and I are going to Paris again this coming summer. The rest of the previously mentioned crew will head to Italy while James and I stay in Paris, and then we’ll all come together in Strasburg for a 5 day Rhine River Cruise before coming home. The moral of the story: No matter how old one gets, he or she should never give up on his or her dreams, and God is always good!!! Four weeks, four days and counting…

Hold me close and hold me fast
The magic spell you cast
This is la vie en rose
~Excerpted lyrics by Guglielmi, Luis Gugliemo/Gassion, 
Edith Giovanna/David, Mack

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“You know, I sometimes think, how is anyone ever gonna come up with a book, or a painting, or a symphony, or a sculpture that can compete with a great city. You can’t. Because you look around (in Paris) and every street, every boulevard, is its own special art form… ~Quote from the movie, MIDNIGHT IN PARIS

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Hope deferred makes the heart sick, but a longing fulfilled is a tree of life. ~Proverbs 13:12  ✝

**All collages created were by Natalie from images via Pinterest