Do you know today how very much God loves you?

New library today. One with windows.

And no curtains.

Seems like a small funny thing but it makes me look out the window more. The trees in Western New York are just beginning to turn color and light up the mountains surrounding our Great Valley.

It is a sweet, cool, lovely, lazy day at the Royalty house.

Yesterday we got Farmer Boy from the library and I cannot wait to pile the kids in a heap and sit and watch my husband read to them.

When he reads to the kids it settles the world and gives you that wonderful, "dinner is in the crockpot and the porch is swept clean," feeling. It is one that I could bottle and sell to the many frazzled Moms I pass almost daily, wishing I could bring them home with me.

Is our home a place of refuge? Absolutely. Is it free from chaos? Never. Organized that is.
And isn't a little chaos good? I read somewhere in my self-help frenzie that if we did not have any stress we would just die.

Some days I would like to test that hypothesis.

And some days I am enjoying the clutter and dirt and clatter and barefeetness.

The country has been good for me.

For all of us.

Today I am thinking of all of those I love who are in the midst of a battle.

Then again aren't we all? A battle of seeing the glass as God has intended it. Not just half full, but full to overflowing whatever our lot.

God is good.

At a conference lately I made a point to reach a speaker just as he stepped off the platform. I just had to speak with him. I know God prompted me to do it.

And so I did. And he began to ask me some questions and the answers began spilling out and at in the middle of it all he looked me dead in the eye and told me that God loved me. He told me that I needed to know just how much God loves me. He questioned me again,

"Do you know how much God loves you?"

And I did the unthinkable. My pen stopped the furious writing of all that he was telling me, enlightening me, and I wept.

With people standing by to ask him questions, with my little still in the nursery, with my husband gathering all the other kids.

I couldn't help it.

I think I just saw a glimpse of how much God really cares for me.

Me.

ME.

He DID die for me. For even me. He DOES live to make intercession for me and my needs.

MY NEEDS.

And today as I look through a glass darkly at fading beautiful trees, a beautiful creation, I am reminded that this is all for me.

For He and I to walk together and commune, and for me to worship Him with the sacrifice of praise.

When life is going smoothly or not.

I love these windows and this crisp day, and my family and friends who pray for me.

We were home a week ago and My FIL is just the best of men. He and I talked about life, about my kids and I told him that one is so so close to understanding what God truly has done for him and I asked him to pray for him and he looked me dead in the eye and told me that he does...

every day.

He prays for us every day.

For me stubborn in my kitchen,

For Joel leading wounded people,

For children so close to the heart of God.

And I even now just cry, in the library, with people seeing me look a mess.

God is good.

I have all that I need.

I have his love.

God LOVES you friend.