Good bye my good friend warm weather...

So today I finally took on the job I have been dreading. I packed up the deck furniture, the pretty pillows, the umbrella, pulled up all the annuals in the yard, stored the hoses for the winter, emptied all the flowering pots (which were still quite beautiful!), and picked the last of the peppers and basil. I still have a few fall flowers lingering and of course the pumpkins from my 'unexpected' pumpkin patch. What a beautiful October we have had. A bonus as we prepare our yards and minds for what's to come. 

I will try, as I do each year, to search for the beauty and opportunities that the winter months have to offer.
My garden is a gift from God. I take such pleasure and joy in it's beauty. But it's beauty does not compare to the beauty that God has set for me in my future with Him. I can enjoy this temporary earthly beauty as His gift, but the true gift He gives is His Blessed Assurance ... that Jesus is Mine.
So that is the beauty that I am going to carry into the coming winter months with me.

Blessed assurance, Jesus is mine!

Oh, what a foretaste of glory divine!
Heir of salvation, purchase of God,
Born of His Spirit, washed in His blood.
Refrain:
This is my story, this is my song,
Praising my Savior all the day long;
This is my story, this is my song,
Praising my Savior all the day long.

Perfect submission, perfect delight,

Visions of rapture now burst on my sight;

Angels, descending, bring from above

Echoes of mercy, whispers of love.

Perfect submission, all is at rest,

I in my Savior am happy and blest,

Watching and waiting, looking above,

Filled with His goodness, lost in His love.

How does one turn 'packing up a garden' to God's Blessed Assurance? ... attend a Steven Curtis Chapman Concert, listen to his boys perform, listen to his wife speak of the journey they have been on since the loss of their little girl Maria...

See God. Trust God!

http://www.showhope.org/

~bekuyps