March 4, 2011

  • Happy New Year!!!!!

    NwYrRetroMar4th Today 4 years ago I was lifted out of 'The Pit' of my 4 1/2 year deep dark depression!  I have been on the mountain top and down in the valley, but that "continuous low lying black-cloud" has never returned.  I thank God everyday for His kind and undeserved deliverance.
                                               [The following was written about an actual event one day after I had been pulled out of 'the Pit' in March of 2007]:

    My Journal of Beginnings. . . . Happy ‘New Year’, Lynn [Stardate: 3.05.07-1]

    Tiffany’s early hour dream yesterday (Sunday March 4, 2007) was a prelude or simultaneous event with my 3:30 A.M. ‘wake up’ call from God. My customary recitation of woe and despair (honed to a fine edge in four years’ time) was instantly transformed into an anthem of praise and thanksgiving. The God who had seemed so distant, indifferent; even hostile toward me, was suddenly close at hand, quite eager to fully embrace me in complete acceptance, love and forgiveness. There was a deep awareness that four years of crying to God had not gone unnoticed as I had presumed. He had listened to every word and had answered according to His own timetable.

    As magnificent as all of this was, Tiffany’s dream was the linchpin, the element that reaffirmed the authenticity of what I had just experienced. However, I was totally unaware of her dream–until this morning. I was preparing for work today, when I received Tiffany’s email relating her dream of the previous morning. She said in part;

    "Dad,

    I love you so much! . . . I rejoice to hear of the beautiful insight that God gave you [this morning] when he woke you up! : ) Also, I didn't get a chance to tell you on the phone, but last night I had a dream with you in it. All I remember is that it was pretty happy, and you gave me the biggest, most comforting dad hug ever. It made me feel happy and safe. I love you dad! Hang in there . . . we'll keep praying, and we'll see how God decides to work.

    Your liltuliphead"

    I was blown completely away by the total impossibility of anyone but our great God ever pulling off such a beautiful and seamless series of circumstances in such a marvelous manner. He had been planning this for weeks, months-- probably even for years and years. He had provided hints all along the way, but these incidents were insignificant in and of themselves. It was only after He had pulled everything together in yesterday’s culminating event that all of these seemingly unrelated piddley happenings began to gel into mounting importance and relevance.

    At work today, as I mulled over the last couple days’ events, along with these other recent and long past experiences God had woven together into a lovely tapestry of memory, the immensity of it all began to emerge. Likewise, the trip my wife and I took to Chicago in February, and one experience in particular, came to mind. During our stop at the Navy Pier, we learned that a large throng of brightly costumed Chinese people in the Chicago area were gathered together that morning to celebrate the Chinese new year (the year of the pig). Also Agnes (our daugheter 'from across the Sea'), last year’s foreign exchange student from Hong Kong had written to remind us of the Chinese new year in her e-mails from time to time in recent weeks.

    So at the end of my work day today I was ready to go home to make an important proclamation. I walked through the door of our home into the kitchen where my wife Debs and my youngest daughter, Kimberly were, and boldly announced; "The Williams family will no longer recognize January 1st as our New Year’s celebration. As of today, our  New Year will begin the week of March the 4th. This is when I began my new life with God and is also the week that Kimberly has entered the Randolph County Art Show for the first time as a professional artist. This week will be the start of our new year! If Agnes and the Chinese can do it, so can we!"  At that very moment Debs calmly approached me and said; "Happy New Year, Lynn!" as she thrust an envelope into my hands that had just arrived –A ‘New Year’s’ card from Agnes.

    Look, what else can I say? Our God is an awesome God!

                                      
                 
                 

                      "To the praise of the glory of His grace, wherein He hath made us accepted in the Beloved!" 

                                                                                                                                              Ephesians 1:6 [KJV]