Peace

1 John 14:27  Peace I leave with you; my peace I give unto you; not as the world giveth give I unto you; let not your heart be troubled; neither let it be afraid.

This verse has been my constant companion since the start of my struggle to keep living in 2006. At that time, I printed the verse with a beautiful dove in the background, and put it on my refrigerator.  I "FED" myself this thought multiple times a day until peace became the goal in all of my decision-making.

With all of that said, I am not ashamed to admit that it's been incredibly nigh unto impossible to be at peace this Spring!!  This verse, though, has paved the way for peace to accompany me into many a lion's den!  Peace, how I love thee!  Let me count the ways!!!!

First of all, we were forced to sell our cattle herd!  I say, "Forced" because we couldn't afford the nearly million dollars that the pasture we rented in the Summers sold for.  This has been a very difficult decision to make, as we could have borrowed the money to buy it, but it doesn't make sense to work only to loose money!  Still, I have been around cattle all of my life, and this change has brought many tears already.

At the same time that we were sorting and loading our cattle onto other people's trucks, our new house arrived here.  Yes, it's a dream come true but even good things are stressful!  We're only moving across the road but everything will have to be sorted out and taken or left behind.

If you would like to see what our new home will look like when we're all finished with it, feel free to watch this video.

The biggest stress for me is that Cora and Andrew have decided not to move with us!  I understand that they want to be independent but it will still be sad not to have all of our meals together anymore and many other changes will come with this move.  If you would like to see how our new house will look when it is all finished, you can watch this video.

We're STILL waiting for my dad's estate to get settled but I could write a book about THAT irritation.  There is a certain lawyer who deserves to be disbarred for incompetience of GROSS proportions but I better move away from this subject soon as the way I survive, as I have already stated, is to seek peace in even the most difficult situations.

Now our latest struggle is the news that my father-in-law is at the end of his journey here on Earth.  Any day now he will leave us and a very, grieved wife!!! 

Between grain cleaning; calving; and preparing the site for our new home the guys were swamped.  Needless to say, our garden is sadly lacking in care too!  So many times, my head just spins with what to do next.  That's when I take a moment to ponder 1 John 14:27 and it all comes back to me.

  Peace is God's gift to us that no matter what we are going through, HE is there too!  YAY for peace!