A Perfect Fit

Draw close to God, and God will draw close to you.

—James 4:8

The door creaked open as I made my way onto the deck and out popped that blonde-haired beauty, her round face turned toward me.

“Hi, Miss Addie! How are you? I’m so happy to see you!” I greeted my granddaughter.

Addie smiled as wide as the open door, and I quickly entered, placing my take-out dinner on the table. I scooped her up and kissed her soft cheeks, first one then the other.

“Are you going to play with me?” She looked up with pleading blue eyes.

“Yes, I am. What do you want to play?”

“This,” Addie pointed to a matching game. “And puzzles.”

I knew that. Addie is the queen of puzzles. She can put them together faster than any three-year-old I know. Heck, faster than me.

“But first Grandma needs to eat her dinner,” her mother Tara reminded, “And you and Eli need to eat too.”

“Let me give Eli a hug.” I lowered Addie to the floor to pick up 11-month-old Eli. His big blue eyes fixed on mine and his mouth broadened, revealing two cute little teeth situated at the front of his bottom jaw. I smothered him with smooches while he twisted this way and that.

“It’s time to eat, Addison,” Tara said while she brought food to the table. “You can put Eli in his high chair,” she gestured toward me.

Before I could wriggle Eli into his seat, he was already reaching for his food.

As soon as the children finished their dinner, their parents were out the door for their post-Valentine night alone.

“Now will you play with me?”

A Valentine Surprise

“Therefore my heart is glad and my tongue rejoices; my body also will rest secure.”

—Psalm 16:9

I told her “no.”

But here I was, two hours later, asking myself, Do you really want to spend Valentine’s night alone? I already knew the answer, but I worried about the impending winter storm. Should I really travel the distance in my car with malfunctioning heat? All the newscasters were warning viewers of the dangerous “feels like” temperatures.

But it’s sunny now. Leave while there’s still daylight, and you’ll keep warm in the sun, I tried to convince myself, And dress in layers and bring a blanket and pray.

But I should stay and work more on my writing, I argued.

I had just finished the Afterword for the devotional I was writing. Now I was scrolling through the Facebook news feed, trying hard not to envy all my friends who were spending Valentine’s with their sweethearts and showing off their lovely bouquets of roses.

I had hoped this year would be different for me, for God knows I've prayed about my situation over and over again. One of the hardest parts about being single—and an empty-nester—is not getting hugs on a regular basis. There are times when my craving for affection is like an extreme thirst—like how I get after taking some of my medicine, which makes my tongue as dry as dust . Try as I might, I just can’t quench the thirst. 

It Is Enough

And Israel said, “It is enough; Joseph my son is still alive. I will go and see him before I die.”

—Genesis 45:28

It is enough, I read the words of Jacob (also called Israel). 

Enough. I let the word seep into my soul. Enough. Jacob’s final wish before he died…his only wish…his only prayer was to see his son alive who he had believed was dead.

I have read the story many times, but never before had it impacted me as much as when I read it earlier this week. When I read how Joseph’s jealous brothers sold him into slavery and then deceived their father into thinking he had been killed by a vicious animal (Genesis 37:12-33), I was outraged. When I read the account of Jacob’s grief (Genesis 37:34-35), my mother’s heart ached for him. I tried to imagine how he must have felt, but I could only shudder at the thought of losing one of my own.

How He Loves

…how good is a timely word!

—Proverbs 15:23 

“What? Just five days into my plan, and you fail me!” I talked to my tablet, as if that would help. I poked and prodded, opened and closed. But my daily Bible reading plan refused to appear.

I shook my head, Why did I ever sign up for this? I should have stuck with the old way.

Recently I told a friend that each year I choose a different version of the Bible to read and that I just purchased the English Standard Version. I boasted how I bought the study Bible half-price on New Year’s Day.

Casually she mentioned, “You can do that on your tablet. You can choose whatever version you want on the Bible app.”

“I know, but I like holding an actual Bible.”

But when another friend told me that he too used the Bible app, I thought, Perhaps it’s time for me to check it out.