Oceanskater’s Blog

In the mornings, I try to daily spend some time with God. Today, I read from a little booklet called “Our Daily Bread”. The Scripture was Psalm 27.

To me, it served as an amazing reminder that we have so much to be thankful for.

“The LORD is my light and my salvation - whom shall I fear? The LORD is the stronghold of my life - of whom shall I be afraid? ” v. 1

It’s a psalm of King David. We know that he went through many trials. But in this psalm, he’s reminded himself of God’s goodness. He’s reminding himself that if God is for him, who can be against him?

“For in the day of trouble He will hide me in His shelter; in the secret place of His tent will He hide me; He will set me high upon a rock.” v. 5 (AMP)

“Although my father and my mother have forsaken me, yet the Lord will take me up [adopt me as His child].” v. 10 (AMP)

A quote from “Our Daily Bread”:

“So let’s look more closely at the psalmist’s hope. His expectation was not necessarily deliverance from bad circumstances but the hope of seeing ‘the goodness of the Lord.’ That’s something we can see even in times of trouble.”

“I am still confident of this: I will see the goodness of the LORD in the land of the living.” v. 13 (NIV)

And in the end, he strongly believes that no matter what happens, he will choose to see the goodness of the Lord while he still lives.

Thanksgiving is an opportunity to remember all the gifts we have in our lives. It would be very easy to look around and see plenty of things we want that we don’t yet have. Often in life we walk around with the “glass half empty” mentality rather than the “glass half full” mentality. We can get stuck in the rut of constantly asking God for all the things we don’t have rather than remembering to thank God for all the things we do have. Of course, God wants us to be honest in our prayers and He does want us to ask for those things we need, but we have to remember to not get those focused on what we lack that we forget all the good gifts God has already blessed us with.

We have a lot to be thankful for. No matter what trials we are facing today, no matter who abandons us or what enemies we face, we can praise God for life, for breath, for all His gifts, and for His promise that He works out all things for the good of those who love Him (Romans 8:28). We can thank Him that when we wait on Him, He always comes through.

“Wait and hope for and expect the Lord; be brave and of good courage and let your heart be stout and enduring. Yes, wait for and hope for and expect the Lord.” v. 14 (AMP)

Roy & I went away for the weekend to a conference, and while we were gone, Noodles got into some fancy European dark chocolate in our roommate’s room and ate 16 pieces.

I was so scared he was going to die. It’s amazing how attached I am to that cutie pie.

Thankfully, the dogsitter misunderstood our instructions on food and fed him twice as much as he was supposed to get. Since his food is high-fiber, I think it absorbed all the chocolate. She also fed him some burnt toast. Since it had been so long since he had eaten the chocolate, it probably wouldn’t have helped to make him throw up. And our vet won’t even talk on the phone unless you pay $50. (Of course, we would have paid the $50, but we were in NY and my cell was barely working, so the dogsitter went on the internet and it was highly likely he needed to eat like 10 times that amount of chocolate to be anywhere near toxic.)

Noodles seems fine, though hilariously (is that a word?), he is visibly fatter. I’m not kidding

Tomorrow is Election Day! Please, everyone, get out and vote. And make sure to pray before you do.

Here in Massachusetts, we have some ballot questions. I understand the 1st one and know how I will vote. I also understand the 2nd one, but I don’t understand the ramifications of it. And the 3rd one I’m totally confused about. So I’m going to go look into those.

Here’s a picture of Noodles from my friend’s camera on her computer: