Old Time Religion

I've been doing a lot of thinking over the last month about "today's" Christian. Has the new "deeper" preaching made me a better Christian than my parents and their parents. Has women's bible studies increased my ability to be a better wife, mother and christian worker. Has my dedication to "Through the Bible in a Year" really taught me more about the Lord. Have Care Groups, Life Groups, Bible Conferences and internet studies brought me closer to the Lord than my forefathers were.

I don't know!!! Right now I am missing "old fashioned" simple preaching 2 times a week. Wednesday night prayer meeting where we just pray and a song service where we sing hymns, choruses, bible verse songs and "new" music and never care what it is. Just enjoy it all.

Let me use my mother and father-in-law as examples. Before marrying my wonderful husband, we had been kids and teens together in the same church. Roy's mother had been saved as a young person and never missed a service. Roy's dad was the neighborhood drunk that we prayed for during each revival. In about 1956 Roy's dad was saved while watching Billy Graham on TV. I look at these 2 precious people as Godly examples of a christian life til each of their deaths.

1. they were always there. If the doors were open they just went. No questions, no debate just go
2. they tithed. no bible studies and conferences on giving. the word of God said do it so they did it.
3. they prayed before meals...simple again...Thank you Lord for the food......
4. they prayed and attended every night (usually 1-2 weeks) of revival. If anything else was planned during that week or 2 weeks it was canceled. They didn't miss revival meeting for baseball, football, school activities etc.
5. they prayed at bed time....Thank you Lord for the day... so simple and to us so very uneducated in how to pray
6. they read their bible every day...whatever the Daily Bread said to read
7. they studied their sunday school and training union lesson each day so that they were ready for their classes on sunday morning and sunday night.

The list goes on but the idea is consistent. They just lived the simple, faithful Christian life.

As I was discussing this with a friend a few days ago, my friend said; "but church wasn't their lives like it is ours. Our parents weren't involved in the church like we are" I've thought about that too and my response is.....maybe that's part of my problem. Church should NOT be my life. The Lord should be God's word tells me that "God is not the author of confusion". That seems to me to mean He is the author of order and peace.

There's an "Old" song that says "we need to get back to the basics of life". That's what I want. I want the basics again. I want to make a joyful noise again. I want to hear about Jesus..simple and basic.

NICOLE COMING HOME TODAY

I've had mother for 2 weeks now and I'm exhausted!!!!! When Mom left rehab we were told she needed to either be in an assisted liveing facility or have full time help at home. She really wanted to stay in her home so we hired Nicole to move in with her.

Nicole is really great with Mom and it's working out real well. One problem, 3 wks after she started she left on a 2 wk vacation to New York to visit her mother and sister. This left me and my family to take care of mom 24/7. WHAT A JOB.

Mom can't remember much of anything now. bathing, medicine, dressing, and eating are just a few of the simple things she can no longer do for herself. We have a nurse that comes in once a week and she sees both her family doctor and her heart doctor at least once a month.

Don't get me wrong. Having Mother here is worth any extra that I have to do, but being 66 myself means i move slower too.

Mom's short term memory is gone and she may ask me the day of the week or who someone is 20 times a day. At least it's usually different questions each day so I get to do new answers every 24 hours.

Today is the last day of Nicole's vacation so she's on her way home. I should be at the lakehouse within 3 hrs of her arrival! I can set and do nothing for a couple of days then it's back here. Nicole has tues and fridays off. Believe me. Those days are fun with Mom and I look forward to them.

Well, I must get back to doing the laundry and cleaning house before she gets here. Talk to you later.

today is day 6 of mom's hospital stay. this is my day 6 of mom's hospital stay.
up at 6am (do you realize that i'm retired and 6am is long before my usual wake up time)

at the hospital at 7am. why? because the dr can be in anytime between 7am and 7pm
mother asks "how was church?" thus starts the days conversations about what day it is.
meet with the nurse (love her) and explain what dr hale had said the night before

leave at 9:30am to go to the dr myself. - annual physical - I'm great!!!!!

back to hospital at 11:30am. meet with the nurse again (love her) and explain again what dr hale had said the night before - are you getting the picture?

noon i made my escape to the hospital dinning room for lunch. when you consider that as an escape it should indicate my frame of mind.

12:20pm i'm called to come back upstairs to meet with the "hospital" doctor. he says to mom "are you ready to go home" i say "but, we were told that when she leaves here she has to go to rehab for 1 or 2 wks" he says "oh, i guess i didn't read that" and here we go again.

today she has set off the bed alarm 2xs. ask why her plant has 1 flower in it 4xs. told me that she doesn't like her coffee several times. (she doesn't have any coffee, but, i being the good daughter ask the nurse to please be sure that her coffee is fresh when they bring it) she just told me that Vicki, my sister, from new york, was coming today. she thinks that she may to at my house now and told me to call her.


i'm thankful that she doesn't remember any of this as soon as she's said or done it and the stories of her childhood are becoming a real important part of her day.