We love people and they leave our lives - for one reason or another. We love people who love us.  We love people we're supposed to love.  We love people we should not love and pay the price for decades. Because even if loving them is wrong, the love does not leave.We love people who are human and humans die and as their breath leaves the earth it takes our breath with it.  

My parents are still a love affair after 65 years.  They are now 84 and 85 years old and HOW THEY LOVE EACH OTHER.   One day, one of them will have to leave.  Someone's life will end, but someone's love will not.  The love goes on well past the life does not. I wrote a song a few years ago - "They say it's better to have loved and lost, than to never have loved at all. But when the love is true and slips away from you, you'll live longing for heaven's call.  Because true love never dies.  It just keeps on living on. So do not pray for true love if you are wise.  Because true love never dies."*  The lyrics to this song were written by me about the fact that loving someone deeply can sometimes be the saddest thing to do.  Because the love NEVER dies.  You will dream about that love forever.   If you love a person and that person is by your side at the moment, but thankful.  Be very thankful.  Because just because the person is gone, doesn't mean the love leaves with him.  My love remains.  Forever.  True love never dies and the the good thing is that neither will we.  *Words and music by Marie Armenia, copyright Penny Hill Publishing/ASCAP/

It's a sad and tragic news story about a huge earthquake in China.  Thousands and tens of thousands of people killed.  Of course, I feel badly and asked the Lord to help these people - but - I mean, China is all the way over THERE and I'm all the way over HERE.   I'm not heartless,just detached. 

But last night, my friend Wendy - a hugely talented writer  -  came over for a visit.  (Wendy has had quite a few children's books published).  Not that we need a reason to want to be together, but she and her husband JUST - as in last weekend - returned from two weeks in China and I've been dying to hear all about it and see her pictures and video.  (Her sister's husband is an exec with a U.S. corporation that has him there running their Asia division). 

We sat on the deck while I spent a few hours trying to get a fire started in the  fire pit I've dug in the ground in our back yard.  While sitting there eating take-out Chinese food,  choking on smoke (it rained all day and all night, ok?  The wood was wet) we sat back and simply talked about stuff... as good friends do.  

As Wendy spoke about the earthquake, her eyes teared up.  There's something about being there that caused her to care about these people so much more than I did. The people there were REAL to her....and they MATTERED to her. She was searching for information about it.  Worrying about the people.  Praying for the people. There's something about being there that made her heart ache all the more - and made her want to run to offer aid.  

We've all endured earthquakes.   And the earthquakes in our lives don't have to be the ones that move the physical earth.  You've had your earthquakes and I've had mine.   And when you're in the middle of the rubble that used to be your life you wonder if anyone cares.  You feel abandoned and all alone on earth.  Don't you?  I did. 

And it makes some sense to me that Jesus is the one the Bible describes as being touched by whatever touches us.  And it says that He is our High Priest, pleading our case (yours and mine) before God.  And it even goes so far as to say that we can be BOLD in our approach to God's throne - BOLDLY asking for help in our time of need.  

And I can imagine the angels in heaven observing the way Jesus, the King of Heaven, cares about these insignificant beings on a slowly dying planet. These angels, who can see in to eternity, who can view the Universe at a single glance, must be shrugging their shoulders as they see this amazing LOVE of His for us.  We are not the most glorious things in the Universe.  Angel One says to Angel Two  "What's the deal with all the worry, and interceding and pleading for the lives of this pitiful people?".  And maybe Angel Two answers, "I don't know.  Guess you had be there."  And He was.  And He is.  

A few months ago I was lambasting the poor workmanship of sunglasses.  "Every pair of sunglasses I buy is crooked!", I complained.  And then - AT THAT MOMENT - I realized that every pair of sunglasses sits on top of a nose that has a bump on it.  Yup.  A bump on my nose.  It isn't the sunglasses that are crooked, it's my nose. 

You know, I'm not perfect looking.  (Except of course to Phil who's eyesight is not what it used to be and who insists, "You look the same to me... You're beauuuuuutiful !" I'm not going to find his glasses for him any time soon.  Let him live in ignorance.)  Anyway, I have a crooked nose, and chubby toes that make it hard to find shoes.  

The key to contentment, in my opinion, is to accept that God created me.  GOD.  Created.  ME.  And HE is crazy about me.  He loves my crooked nose, and my chubby toes. 

He created my personality too.  And that's a little different also.  And when people decide they don't like WHO I am, it used to bother me.  I tried to BE what other people wanted.  But, He likes my STRONG personality, and my STRONGER opinions.  He knows that when He wants to "refine" me,  I'm someone who welcomes His refinement... painful as it may be at the moment. 

He likes that I'm NOT TALL... ok...ok... SHORT.  He likes that I like to think, and ask questions, and offer opinions.  He likes that I'm filled with passion about stuff.  And He likes that I don't always finish the projects I start.   He likes me.  He likes me. (And Sally Field).  

God likes you. He likes the way you are.  He does.  He really does.  I think that this simple and ASTOUNDING truth about us all is the least talked about reality about the reality of God.  Sure, God loves you, gave His Son for you, etc. But He likes you too. Well, ok, some people around you may not be thrilled with you, but He's still CRAZY about you.   He understands you.  Why you do what you do.  And He STILL loves you.

HE FORMED US in our mother's wombs.  We are not genetic mistakes.  HE wanted a woman with a crooked nose and chubby toes to be living on  Planet Earth.. right now.. right here.  And he wanted a man who would think that a woman with a crooked nose and chubby toes is EXACTLY the perfect woman to be married to.. so he created Phil.(Who, by the way, is a person who always finishes what he started and is willing to help me finish my unfinished projects.)

And after living in a place that insists on and demands perfection, and facial surgery, and the right house, with the right amount of money, I am amazed at a God who creates crooked nosed people.  And I am amazed at a people like me, who sometimes wish they were something else.  

Nowadays, my sunglasses sit straight on my nose.  Maybe I just learned how to put them straightly on a crooked nose. 

When somebody says something outrageous, like, uhhh, "I'm going to eat 10,000 oreo cookies tonight" we just look at them, brush them off and say something like, "Oh, you're so funny."  It's like we're saying, "We KNOW you don't mean what you just said.  We KNOW what you're saying is impossible.  You're so funny."  

Yeah, and I'm sorry but the truth is that's kind of like the attitude we often have with Jesus.  He says "Love one another as I have loved you."  Well,  the love one another part is not that earth shattering, but the way Jesus loves us certainly is earth shattering.  He gave earth shattering love.  The kind of love that blows the world apart with it's white hot intensity.  The kind of love that would DIE for us.   And He told us that the Holy Spirit would be the One who would give us the power to accomplish His will, impossible as it seems. And His will is that we love one another THE WAY He loved us.  Seems impossible.  But I should be saying, "Holy Spirit, please give me the kind of love that loves the way Jesus does.  I can't do it on my own." 

But it seems as if we've decided that Jesus wasn't serious, so we've come up with a religion that acknowledges Him as Savor and then all we do is go to church, give to church, work at church and then live our lives according to our own plans.  And when we read those outrageous words about the way He is expecting us to love one another, we just say, "Oh, Jesus, you're soooooo funny."   Someday, some of us will not be laughing.

Sooooooooo.. we got back on Saturday from a TWO WEEK VACATION in a wonderful condo that is right on the beach.. overlooking the Gulf of Mexico.  It is paradise... and halfway through the two weeks -- Philip and Renee and the three most beautiful children on the face of Planet Earth joined us. 

I got to watch the scene of my three grandchildren splashing in the waves, laughing, giggling, screaming with delight.  And the condo has a beautiful pool and my youngest granddaughter spent hours screaming, "Mema catch me!!!!" And she'd jump off the side of the pool and in to my arms.  As soon as she came up from the water she proclaimed, "DO IT AGAIN!!!"...  It was perfect.  It was paradise.  It was a gift from God.  And then they left for a few days at Disneyworld.  So, all in all, it was a PERFECT TWO WEEKS.  Not one drop of rain.  Good news for us... bad news for the residents who need water. 

BUT.. when I walked in the door of my house.. I was SO GLAD TO BE HOME.   And saying goodbye to the postcard-worthy scene we saw from the balcony wasn't hard because - although it was paradise and nothing went wrong and everything was PERFECT -  I was ready to get home. 

And Renee called from Disneyworld to say that when she was tucking the kids in to bed after a couple of days at DISNEYWORLD the oldest girl said, "Mom, I love this place, but I miss my bed at home too." 

What is it about being home?  No matter how wonderful the place we are at - if it isn't home, eventually we WANT to leave.  In our hearts we want to come home.  Cleaning the house, paying the bills, mowing the lawn does not compare to long leisurely walks, holding hands on the beach, and watching the sun set beyond the horizon - but I'm glad to be home.  And wanting to be home has nothing to do with not having fun on vacation.   Nor does it have to do with having MORE fun at home.  Home is where I'm supposed to be, and home is where I want to be.   

And inside my heart, I know that I'm supposed to be "somewhere else".  It's not easy to explain the feeling of not being "home" yet, although I'm having a perfectly wonderful time being here.  Yesterday, we heard the news of Dottie Rambo's accident, and her death.  And I wonder what she's feeling like right now.  The person who wrote the song, "We Shall Behold Him" has beheld Him. She's seen what she wrote about.  She's home.  

Maybe it's because I'm used to interviewing people for my writing.. or maybe it's because I'm a naturally born nosy interrogator, but it would be so great to be able to talk to someone who's arrived "There"... and find out what it's like.   And so many people here fear death, but I think death is just the doorway to Home.  And we all long to be home.  What is it about being home?   "Eye has not seen, ear has not heard, neither has it entered in to the hearts of men what God has waiting for those who love Him."