Take a step of faith and God will meet you at...STARBUCKS?

So, for those of you who know me I haven't been out of the house much this fall~ but I did make it to meet my sister, Elisa Burroughs at Starbucks yesterday morning. Not really wanting to go other than to see my sister, no other excuse~ and then God had another plan. First, I ran into Ben Franzel~ who told me all about his trip to Tijuana last month! I learned about his trip w/ Marty Cassity and Brian Bennett to La Igleasia Bethel Baptista and about the deck that they built. Ben met my sister and we both got to hear about this mission trip. Perfect.

I ran into a dear friend from my old job as a preschool teacher, Miss Judy. It was great to see her and chit chat about our past movie dates and catch up... and we both agreed that God is bigger than cancer and encouragment and affirmations were shared.... Again, perfect.

Then, a woman who looked familiar smiled at me and I thought that perhaps she mistook me for my sister. She didn't. Instead, after getting her coffee she walked outside to where I was sitting and said, "Lori?" And I said, "Yep" and she said that I might not have remembered her but she was Crissi's neighbor and her name was Nora and she met me during the donation drop off at my home over Labor Day weekend. I remembered. She asked if I was doing anything else these days and I said, "Yep" again...and told her about feeding the families in Santa Rosa on Thursday nights and the Toy Drive, briefly. I handed her my UGO4GOD card and she told me that she felt bad because she had bought a Wal-mart card for me to take to New Orleans but never dropped it off. I told her it was okay! And then, she said, "I still have the card and I want you to have it, I know and trust you will do what you need to with it." And she told me that she felt bad using it for herself and had thought often about "me." And then she reached into her purse and handed me a card. I said thank you and as she walked away she said, "Oh, by the way, it's worth $100." Wow.

And so, thank you Nora. I don't know your last name. I am hoping that you will stop by our home or online after Christmas and see pictures of all the children you have blessed through your generous offering~ Maddie and Cece (our girls) went to Wal-Mart today and bought $96 worth of toys! They had so much fun choosing toys~ and the rest of the money on the card was donated to the family behind us, "muchas gracias" they said, and so do we.

Dear Jesus,
Your timing amazes me. Here I was again in my home not really wanting to go out and see a whole lot of people, too comfortable in my home and a million things to get done before the next surgery....like clean out the closests, clean out the cupboards, wrap presents, fold the laundry...but I get an invite from sister and of course I wanted to see her...when she told me where we'd meet (Starbucks in the neighborhood) I silently groaned because it's more than likely I'd run into a ton of people there...not really up for conversing about my health...but instead, dear God, YOU were talked about. Thank you Jesus for honoring me yesterday with fellowship with my sister, testimony from Ben, encouragement from Judy and blessing from Nora. Thank you for meeting me this morning, the morning I didn't feel like going out and seeing anyone. On the way to meet Rudy for lunch I couldn't help but be tearful of your constant presence in the lives of so many~ and how your love and blessings flow~ how important it is to GO and build relationships with others, serve you and to be still and acknowledge that from YOU all blessings flow... to be spirit-filled knowing that YOU really aren't faraway at all...you're even at Starbucks. Thank you, Jesus, your love amazes me. May all of this be for your glory, forever and ever, AMEN.