Reading stories like this just makes me shake my head at scoffers and smile at earthly confirmation God is revealing more and more to unbelievers that He is real and so is His Holy Word, the Bible.

HIRBET QEIYAFA, Israel — An Israeli archaeologist digging at a hilltop south of Jerusalem believes a ceramic shard found in the ruins of an ancient town bears the oldest Hebrew inscription ever discovered, a find that could provide an important glimpse into the culture and language of the Holy Land at the time of the Bible.

The five lines of faded characters written 3,000 years ago, and the ruins of the fortified settlement where they were found, are indications that a powerful Israelite kingdom existed at the time of the Old Testament’s King David, says Yossi Garfinkel, the Hebrew University archaeologist in charge of the new dig at Hirbet Qeiyafa.

Other scholars are hesitant to embrace Garfinkel’s interpretation of the finds, made public on Thursday.

Why is it such a surprise to learn Jews lived in Israel when the Bible says they did?

I am constantly told by non-believers the Bible is just a collection of stories written by unknown men and is not literal. Then they insist I “prove” God exists. Duh! Look out the window and take in nature. Try to tell me it all happened by chance.

A couple of weeks ago I read that scientists now believe (at least some of them) that there is a void around the earth and that void is protecting us from objects in space. I immediately thought of Genesis 1, the story of creation and the first two verses of that book: In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.

And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.

If you want to know more about past, present and future happenings in the world just go to the Bible. The answers are all there if you have the eyes to read and the open mind and heart to understand.

None of these things surprise me. It only surprises me that I seem to be in the minority of people in this world, and getting that way in our country, who believes God and His Word. It disappoints me more than surprising me because I hate for someone to die and not know Christ and our Wonderful God Who loved us so much He became man while still God and shed His Godly and righteous blood that you and I can have the fellowship with Him that He has always wanted with us, but will not force upon us. We have the free will to accept or reject His message of love and salvation.

There can be no compromises. There is one God and only one way to heaven. That one way is through confession of our sins and acceptance of Jesus as God’s begotten Son, Who gave up His physical life, went to the depths of Hades, and rescued the righteous and took those souls to heaven. Until then they had been in a “holding area” of Hades because the souls couldn’t go to heaven until Jesus shed His blood.

If there is no God then we have been fooled for all our history. If I’m wrong what will happen other than I will die as a pet does and just rot in the earth? If I’m right, and I’m positive I am, I’m on my way to a place much more beautiful than this planet in all its glory.

If you are not a believer and you are right then you, too, will just rot after you die and become fertilizer. But if you are wrong…You will spend the rest of eternity in torment reserved for Satan for his rebellion. And don’t think you’ll see your buddies there because they will be in the same torment and pain and won’t have the energy to recognize you, if there is any light for them to see you. Think about it, and then pray and go to your Bible or to Bible Gateway and read the Book of John, first.

May the Holy Spirit of God open your eyes and your hearts. You’ll never again agonize over what’s going to happen because you will know there is a plan of God for everything.

Sue and I have forged such a friendship that we can complete each other’s sentences most of the time.

I love her like a sister, even though we have never met, so you can imagine my distress when she called me Thursday.

It seems she had her furnace worked on Wednesday and had the need to turn it on on Thursday morning. The furnace wouldn’t kick in so she called the people who worked on the furnace. She was told to go to the basement and check something so see if it was working properly.

While going to the basement, she twisted her left foot and fell on the last step of the stairs. She crawled back up the stairs to tell the people whatever it was they wanted to check wasn’t working.

Because she tends her two granddaughters in the morning and one in the afternoon due to the older one being in half-day kindergarten she had to stay calm while in excruciating pain.

She got hold of her daughter and her husband. Her daughter took her to the ER while Grandpop took care of the girls.

She has broken her left foot from the small toe up. She said the X-Rays look like a broken tree trunk, as it is splintered and surgery will be required to repair the fracture.

She’s on “happy pills” now, but won’t take two when the instructions say she can because she doesn’t want to be too dependent on pain pills. I told her to take the second one so she can sleep and if the instructions say every 4 to 6 hours take it in 4 hours to keep the pain under control.

Needless to say, my workhorse will be out of commission for awhile and we’ll miss her commentary.

The most important thing, though, is not the blog but her healing. I ask your prayers that she will recover quickly and not suffer too much longer.

Thank you, and I love you, Sue.

If I had to choose one ad and one only which I could view this political season, the following from Citizens United would be it.

Sarah Palin should be proud to be in such fine company.

Today around 9:00 am EDT Senator Edward M. Kennedy will be undergoing approximately six hours of surgery on his brain tumor at Duke University Hospital.

Duke is one of the premier hospitals in the country, and I ask you to be in prayer that God’s hands will be working through the doctors’ hands. After the surgery the Senator will have chemotherapy and radiation on the area.

The 76-year-old senator was diagnosed last month with a malignant glioma, an especially lethal type of brain tumor. A statement from the Massachusetts Democrat’s office said he would be operated on Monday morning in Durham, N.C., by Dr. Allan Friedman, followed by chemotherapy and radiation. Anthony Coley, a Kennedy spokesman, said the surgery is expected to begin around 9 a.m. It is expected to last about six hours.

“I am deeply grateful to the people of Massachusetts and to my friends, colleagues and so many others across the country and around the world who have expressed their support and good wishes as I tackle this new and unexpected health challenge,” Kennedy said in the statement. “I am humbled by the outpouring and am strengthened by your prayers and kindness.”.

He expects to remain at the North Carolina facility for one week to recuperate and then will begin further treatments at Massachusetts General Hospital and start chemotherapy.

Kennedy said that over the past few days he and his wife, Vicki, “along with my outstanding team of doctors at Massachusetts General Hospital, have consulted with experts from around the country and have decided that the best course of action for my brain tumor is targeted surgery followed by chemotherapy and radiation.”

Kennedy said he selected a team of neuro-oncologists from Boston’s Massachusetts General Hospital and Duke University Medical Center.

Friedman is chief of the division of neurosurgery in the surgical department at Duke and also co-director of the neuro-oncology department there. His clinical interests are brain tumors, skull-based tumors, peripheral nerve surgery, pituitary tumors and cerebrovascular disaster, according to his resume on the Web site of Duke Medical Center.

All our prayers and good wishes are with Senator Kennedy and his family today.

Update: Senator Kennedy’s surgery is complete and his surgeon has delivered his first statement:

“I am pleased to report that Senator Kennedy’s surgery was successful and accomplished our goals. Senator Kennedy was awake during the resection, and should therefore experience no permanent neurological affects from the surgery.

The surgery lasted roughly three and a half hours and is just the first step in Senator Kennedy’s treatment plan. After a brief recuperation, he will begin targeted radiation at Massachusetts General Hospital and chemotherapy treatment. I hope that everyone will join us in praying for Senator Kennedy to have an uneventful and robust recovery.”

HT:Drudge

I have just returned from Wednesday night services at my church.

For a couple of months I have felt that I was not walking with God as closely as I once did. I have prayed and asked God to give me back my tears of love I felt when I first met Jesus.

My neighbor has also been going through the same thing and we confessed it to one another just last week and started praying for each other, though I wasn’t sure my prayers were going any higher than the ceiling.

Tonight we had the most unusual communion service I have ever attended. Instead of the deacons serving communion to us, we went to the altar in two groups of eight at a time, with the senior pastor at one table and the associate pastor at the other table.

We actually broke bread and then the pastor asked one of the men to pray. We then ate that bread, the symbol of Christ’s body. We went through the same ceremony with the grape juice (no wine for Baptists) while the pastor quoted scripture again and had one of the other men pray. Then we drank the juice.

All the while this was going on music was being played by the bell choir or being sung by a soloist who was then joined by the congregation.

All the music that touched me so deeply as a child–”The Old Rugged Cross”, “When I Survey the Wondrous Cross”, “Were You There When They Crucified My Lord?” and others that seemed to move me with each one, until I had to quit singing and just started crying. Not little tears but giant, shaking sobs of regret and re-dedication to my Lord and Savior, who gave up Passover until He can have it with us in Heaven.

God gave me back my tears and now I feel as though I can walk on clouds and I feel emotionally drained all at the same time. In other words, I have been given the privilege of falling in love with Jesus all over again, and I wanted to share it with you.

The last song was not the usual “Blest Be the Tie That Binds” but was “Victory in Jesus” instead and one could feel the Holy Spirit moving in that sanctuary as people went forward to pray and re-dedicate their lives.

What a wonderful joy! He looked beyond my faults and saw my need. And He filled that need. Praise God!

On Tuesday I told you our daughter in law had been taken by ambulance to the hospital for a suspected aneurysm in her brain. After sending emails to our church list and to prayer warriors on my email list we were so relieved to get the answer in such a short time. She suffered a “complicated” migraine and sinus infection and thus the blood in her spinal fluid. She is feeling fine now.

What I didn’t tell you was that my husband had to undergo an endoscopy and colonoscopy on Friday due to the lab having found blood in his stool.

We spent the afternoon at the hospital with the doctor running about 40 minutes behind. Everyone in there to be tested was starving, but they had gone through the prep and had to stick it out. One doctor was on call at the ER as well as doing these scheduled procedures. Not very good scheduling on the part of his practice.

When I went back to the cubicle made with curtains my husband was lying there, seemingly awake, and doing what they tell you to do after this procedure.

Soon the doctor came in and told us he had removed a couple of polyps and could not find the source for the bleeding. He says that can happen from almost anything and my husband is on aspirin therapy per the instructions from his cardiologist. No, he doesn’t have heart trouble yet. They are watching a couple of small blood vessels to make sure they don’t get more blockage than they have.

My husband has to go back June 6 to have his colon checked with barium and an X-Ray. This is because my husband has gained weight and his colon has grown as a result. The doctor ran out of tube to check the entire colon and wants to see all of it.

We expect he will be fine and he went to bed almost as soon as he got something light to eat last night. He’s still snoozing away.

Just when Satan tries to put doubts in my mind about God and Jesus, the Lord takes them out by showing us the power or prayer and His healing powers.

We truly had the peace that passes understanding with my husband’s condition, but our daughter in law threw us for a loop since she has a history of cancer brought on by Non-Hodgkins Lymphoma. At one time she had three tumors on the base of her skull, and we thought they might be acting up.

Fortunately, that was not the case.

I cannot appropriately praise God in words even in the best of times, but at times like this I feel even more humble.

Words are not enough to express my love for each of you for praying for Lucy and probably for Don too as you read Sue’s post on Friday to pray for us.

It’s so wonderful to know the Lord, and if we didn’t have Him we would have been downcast at the very least. I’m convinced of that.

Now I’m also exhausted as I didn’t realize the strain on me until it was all over. I never panic as long as I know something has to be done, but after it’s all over, I collapse in exhaustion and exhilaration at what Jesus has done for us in addition to His blood sacrifice on the Cross of Calvary.

Have a wonderful week-end, everyone, and please go to church on Sunday. You will be amazed at how blessed you will be.

Please keep ~J~ and her dear hubby in your thoughts and prayers today.

Thanks!

From ~J~ In case you are wondering what is up, my husband has had blood found in his digestive tract and the doctor is doing an endoscopy and colonoscopy to find the cause of the bleeding.

Those recent twin shootings in Colorado rattled a friend of mine. Greg Stier, head of the Dare2Share youth ministry, sends his kid to the same campus where the first murders took place.

Around the blogosphere, I’ve seen well-deserved praise for the ex-cop (turns out disgraced former cop who has now been redeemed by the Lord) who took down the shooter before the guy blew his own head off. I’ve also seen plenty of “enjoy hell!!” comments directed at the murderer.

But on his blog, Greg had this to say just after the first incident:

“Our hearts break for the victims of the shootings at the YWAM Training Center in Arvada, Colorado. This tragedy took place less than five minutes away from Dare 2 Share Ministries International headquarters in Wheatridge, Colorado. This hits close to home to me personally because I live in Arvada where this horrific shooting took place. I ask all Christians to pray that the perpetrator of these horrible shootings is caught, brought to justice and then to Jesus. I ask that every Christian prays as well for the surviving victims and all the families that have been affected by this shocking and senseless tragedy.”

“Pray…that the perpetrator…is brought to Jesus.” Of course, we now know the ultimate outcome and know some of the background of the killer. But Greg, amid what really was a terrifying episode, was asking for grace for the shooter instead of joining in with the chorus of those damning him to hell.

Think about that for a while.

Kimsch from Musing Minds is having some gastrointestinal distress that has been going on for over a week now.

The doctors are stumped and I know from talking to her she has been in a lot of pain and discomfort.

I ask you to pray for her if you feel so inclined, that the Lord will put His healing hand on her and restore her health.

Kimsch is a very good friend who has done the design of this blog and I care for her very much on a personal level too.

The Anchoress is asking for prayers for her in-laws.

Both are suffering from medical problems, but her father-in-law has been taken to the hospital for emergency surgery. This is, naturally, difficult on his wife and the entire family.

Please pray for God’s Will to be done and, if it is His Will, to heal the father-in-law. Pray that the surgeon’s hands will be guided by those of God Himself as the surgeon operates on this man.

Thank you.

I am still not at liberty to give you the details for the Anchoress having to go to the ER except to tell you she had more kidney stones and an infection from it.

She’s slowly on the mend now and I wish to thank everyone who took the time to pray for her, as she would for you.

She says she felt the prayers and I’m sure she did. She contacted Captain Ed, me and her brother Thom because she describes us as prayer warriors. I am humbled by that description, and will admit I got my circle of prayer warriors involved in praying for her too.

Again, thank you for praying for her, keep praying and praise God she is on the mend.

I consider the Anchoress to be one of my best friends and she has never been anything but kind to me.

I went to bed early last night and awakened after 8 wonderful hours of blissful rest.

I checked my email and saw that Sue had written to say her aunt in Delaware has suffered a massive stroke and she had been asked by her cousin to be with her cousin and uncle.

The next 48 hours are the touch and go hours and I ask all our readers and bloggers to say a prayer for Sue’s aunt and family and for Sue and her husband as they travel back and forth to visit with them during this difficult time.

Wyoming Senator Craig Thomas is in serious condition while undergoing his second round of chemotherapy for treatment of Acute Myeloid Leukemia.

“Doctors have been administering a second round of chemotherapy to control the disease, but the senator’s blood cancer has proven resistant to their most recent efforts and he continues to struggle with infection in addition to the leukemia,” said Susan Thomas, wife of the senator, in a statement released Monday.

“At this difficult time, all we can do is give him as much love and support as possible. The support and prayers of Wyoming folks have made a tremendous difference to us. It has meant everything to Craig, and I know it helps him today,” she continued.

Our prayers and good wishes go out to the Senator and his entire family.

Update: Senator Craig Dies

Wyoming Sen. Craig Thomas, a three-term conservative Republican who stayed clear of the Washington limelight and political catfights, died Monday. He was 74.

The senator’s family issued a statement saying he died Monday evening at National Naval Medical Center in Bethesda, Md. He had been receiving chemotherapy for acute myeloid leukemia.

Just before the 2006 election, Thomas was hospitalized with pneumonia and had to cancel his last campaign stops. He nonetheless won with 70 percent of the vote, monitoring the election from his hospital bed.

Two days after the election, Thomas announced that he had just been diagnosed with acute myeloid leukemia.

Gov. Dave Freudenthal, a Democrat, will appoint a successor from one of three finalists chosen by the state Republican party.

Our prayers are with his family as they go through this trying time.

newton has been a good blogging friend of mine since she and I were the only bloggers on Oh How I Love Jesus. She moved with me and my partners to HRP but continued to write on OHILJ until I shut it down earlier this year.

She has written an email to me that breaks my heart.

There is a lady from her church who has 3 children, the youngest I believe is seven years old. Her husband left her after the third child was born and she became a nurse to support her family.

Monday night she suffered a severe stroke and there is absolutely zero brain activity on the monitor. She is technically dead, but her eldest daughter, who is married and a mother of two, has full power of attorney and I assume full medical power of attorney, and cannot give up her hope that her mother will live, so she will not allow her mother to be taken off the machines that are keeping her alive.

I fully understand how this girl feels as I was in the same situation seven years ago, and I held out hope my mother would come out of it.

I finally realized she was between two worlds and had to go to one or the other and since she wasn’t strong enough to come back to us I told her to go with the Lord.

Making a decision to pull life-sustaining equipment from your parent or anyone you love is the hardest thing I’ve ever been involved in.

I know the heartbreak this daughter and the other children are feeling. Thankfully, a sister of the mother has arrived from New York and will hopefully will give them good advice and, along with Jesus, will be their rock.

I have known of people who have died even while on life-support and I ask if she is to die that we will all pray this is the case for her so her daughter will not have to carry the guilt and she will not be forced against her will to do it by the doctor as we were.

Sweet, kind-hearted newton sent this amendment to her original email and asked me to ask you folks to pray for her friend:

Her name is Karen. Karen V. Originally from Brooklyn, NY.

She is not famous, nor rich. But right now, in the Lord’s presence, she’s a superstar.

(Daniel 12:3)

Please pray for Karen and her family during this difficult time.

Update from newton

I was at church about two hours ago. The secretary there told me that, as of last night, the machines were turned off: her kidneys and liver were taken off her for transplant purposes.

No one, not even the pastor, has any idea as to what kind of funeral arrangements are to be done. Her ex-husband said he was going to do all of that. As of this morning, so far, he has done nothing.

May she rest in peace. It is not unusual to not have funeral arrangements made the morning after a death.

Love him or hate him the Rev. Jerry Falwell has been found unconscious and another report says unresponsive today in his office after missing an appointment.

The Rev. Jerry Falwell was found unconscious in his office Tuesday and taken to the hospital, a Liberty University executive told a newspaper.

Ron Godwin, the executive vice president of the school, told The News & Advance of Lynchburg that Falwell was found unconscious after missing an appointment Tuesday morning. Falwell arrived at Lynchburg General Hospital around noon, the newspaper reported on its Web site.

When contacted by The Associated Press, Godwin said he couldn’t talk at that time.

We pray for God’s will to be done, whatever it is as Rev. Falwell would also say.

When I make my petitions known to God daily I always pray for the safety and strength of the Christians who are in Islamic countries, where they are at risk of death for being Christian, and for Christians in such places as China, where they are thrown into jail for long terms for preaching the Word of God.

The Christians in Iraq are mainly Chaldean-Assyrians, people who have lived there since biblical times. Some are Roman Catholic and maybe still others are of other denominations.

Under the kings of Babylon the Chaldeans were soothsayers or magicians and could not be described as Christians in any sense of the word, but when some of the people in Northern Mesopotamia aligned themselves with the Catholic church they became known as Chaldean-Assyrians, grouping them with the Assyrians who also converted to Catholicism.

Any non-Muslim in a Muslim dominated country is frowned upon and treated as a second-class citizen, subject to paying bounties or taxes to stay alive.

I was reminded of all this when I read this article today.

This is the only homeland they have known since before the Medes and Persians conquered what is now Iraq or at least parts of it.

Going through the history of Iraq is like walking through the Bible. The Garden of Eden is located somewhere in Iraq, although we must remember no one can really find it because when God tossed Adam and Eve out of the Garden he had angels with swords of fire guard it so no one could ever enter it again.

Abraham, the patriarch of the Jews and the Muslims, and the adopted partiarch of all born-again Christians, by covenant with God, lived in Ur, which is in Iraq.

Johah refused to preach to the people of Ninevah until God forced him to do so by putting him into the belly of a large fish to be vomited out in Ninevah, which is in Iraq.

And, of course, we have Babylon, home of the Babylonians who played a large part in the Old Testament as the ones who robbed the Temple in Israel and took the holy cups etc. to Babylon, which is in Iraq.

The story of Daniel takes place in Babylon. This is an area that played a large part in biblical history.

These people are fleeing to places such as Syria, I suppose so they can be among a people who understand their language and customs, but who are still mainly Muslim.

In my mind they are merely postponing the inevitable if they flee to a Muslim country, but I understand trying to keep as close to your culture as possible for as long as possible.

There are Christian people all over the world who are being punished by repressive societies simply for their faith. How many of these Christians are actual believers I don’t know, but we know of many devout Christians (what I call born-again Christians) who are being tossed into horrid prison conditions for their faith.

How many in China’s prisons will live long enough to serve their sentences and be set free only God knows, so we need to remember these special people in our prayers daily. We must pray that God will send the Holy Spirit to comfort them and sustain their faith.

We should be lobbying our own government to do something to get these people released and out of the hands of the Chinese Communists.

Our hearts should be burdened for all Christians who suffer for their Lord. We should also remember those who are without a roof over their heads, decent food, clean water, medicine and clothing—things we take for granted, but they can’t. And I’m not talking about just Christians here.

We should be burdened by people who are in need and do what we can do to help them live with at least the bare necessities of life.

If you are not already praying for these and other repressed people of the world I hope and pray the Lord will put them on your heart to pray for their welfare.

Darrell Scott who lost his daughter Rachel and whose son was injured that fateful day eight years ago at Columbine High School, accepted an invitation to speak before a House Judiciary sub-committee just a month later.

I do not recall this hearing or Mr. Scott’s compelling testimony, (there may be those who do), but whether reading for the first time or refreshing a memory his words are dynamic yet sobering.

Since the dawn of creation, there has been both good and evil in the hearts of men and women, and we all contain those seeds: We contain the seeds of kindness and we contain the seeds of violence. And the death of my wonderful daughter, Rachel Joyce Scott, and the deaths of that heroic teacher, and the other 11 children who died, must not be in vain. Their blood cries out for answers.

The first recorded act of violence was when Cain slew his brother Abel out in the field. The villain was not the club he used, neither was it the NCA - the National Club Association - the true killer was Cain, and the reason for the murder could only be found in his heart. In the days that followed the Columbine tradgedy, I was amazed at how quickly fingers began to be pointed at groups such as the NRA. I am not a member of the NRA, I am not a hunter, I do not even own a gun, I’m not here to represent or to defend the NRA, because I don’t believe they are responsible for my daughter’s death, therefore I don’t believe they need to be defended by me. If I believed that they had anything to do with Rachel’s murder, I would be their strongest opponent. I am here today to declare that Columbine was not just a tradgedy, it was a spiritual event which should be forcing us to look at where the real blame lies. Much of that blame lies here in this room - much of that blame lies behind the pointing fingers of the accusers themselves.

“I wrote a poem that expresses my feelings best. This was written way before I knew I would be speaking here today:”

Your laws ignore our deepest needs,
Your words are empty air.
You’ve stripped away our heritage,
You’ve outlawed simple prayer.
Now gunshots fill our classrooms,
And precious children die.
You seek for answers everywhere,
And ask the question “Why?”

You regulate restrictive laws,
Through legislative creed.
And yet you fail to understand,
That God is what we need!

This brave, grieving man had the courage to speak what many may feel…please continue reading.

Are you one of those people who prays only when there is a crisis in your life, and when it’s over you stop praying?

When you pray do you pray for an immediate answer and you want that answer to be yes? And if it isn’t yes do you just throw up your hands on God and get back to your old life?

When you ask for God’s Will to be done do you really mean it or do you mean you want YOUR will to be done? If you don’t get what you want do you walk away from Him again until you have another crisis?

I learned a lot about prayer and waiting upon the Lord, but it took years for me to see the fruits of that prayer.

My parents were not married when I was born. I barely knew my mother and didn’t even know what my father looked like. I was raised by my mother’s aunt and a boarder in the house who had lost his wife.

I had two step-fathers who beat me; one even went so far as to hit me in the face with his fist and throw me across a room.

If it hadn’t been for my aunt and uncle returning to our area on military assignment I honestly don’t know what kind of release I would have had or chosen. By then I was staying with my mother and I would be allowed to stay with my aunt and uncle as often as I could.

When I was 13 years old I got it into my head that if my father knew what was happening he would come to my rescue like a knight in shining armor.

That’s when I started to pray every day that I would meet my biological father on my fourteenth birthday. Birthdays fourteen through sixteen came and went and I quit praying to meet him.

I was saved and I believed I would meet him, but after two years I decided the Lord had other plans for me.

After I was married I found out where my father was and gave him a call. He gave me a calling down. I was 22 years old then.

My mother died suddenly in February 2000 and it became urgent for me to see if my biological father was alive or dead.

At the end of May 2003 I had mailed a check to someone back home in Maine to be used for charity. The check came back stating I had the wrong address.

I checked Yahoo to get the fellow’s telephone number, but I was informed I’d have to pay to get the information. I decided not to do that but then it struck me that I might be able to find my father because the note on the side said if you knew where anyone lived in the past ten years they could locate them for you.

You could pay $25 for an answer in 24 hours or $65 for an answer in an hour. I typed in my father’s name and my home town and struck out.

Then I remembered I had heard he lived in a different town so I put in that town. Voila! His name came up and I chose the one hour option.

When I got the information I called him, told him who I was and was met with the answer I had been waiting 40 years to hear: “I think it’s about time we met, dear.”

He was in the Panhandle of Florida and it just so happened I was on my way to Florida that very week-end. (This was on a Tuesday) All this time he had been three and a half hours from where my aunt and uncle lived and I had been going there every year.

We met at a Waffle House because his wife didn’t want me at her house. She was apparently afraid I wanted money. We hugged and kissed when we first met, and when we left we each studied the other’s face, cupping it in our hands a couple of times.

I thought I’d never see him again and I was satisfied with that, but a month later he needed serious surgery and wanted me to be there.

My Dad died 25 months after we met, but every minute we were together or on the phone during those 25 months it was a love-fest.

He had been a heavy drinker when I was growing up and said I wouldn’t have liked him back then.

I forgot about my prayer, thinking God had said no, when He actually said “Not yet.”

I held my father’s left hand as he drew his last breath. He, too, died suddenly, but our last exchange of words before he went to the rehab hospital on the Tuesday before he died Thursday night were, “I love you, Dad.” “I love you too, Dear.”

Don’t give up on your prayers or on God. He always does what’s best for you when it’s best for you. Just ask me. And my step-mother? She and I are best friends now.

But they that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength. They shall mount up with wings as eagles. They shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint.” Isaiah 40:31