Grace

Hello Friends, I am MaryAnn. This is the first post of my new site. I don't know how you found me. Maybe you have been following my journal on Caring Bridge, or maybe you just found me through the great acts of cyber space. I don't know, but I do hope that you will see Jesus in these posts.
 Let me explain why I chose a name with "Grace" in it. I love to talk about God's grace because it is very real in my life. I do not understand how anyone gets through the hard things in life without God's grace. There is way to much in life that I can't handle alone and I depend on His Grace. What is it anyway? Does Grace take away pain? Does it fix all the disappointments? Does it heal broken hearts? Does it rebuild shattered dreams? Does it promise a bright future? No, the answer is no. I wish it was Yes. I wish that depending on God would just Fix It All, but it doesn't. Depending on his Grace does mean that pain is more bearable, it means that my disappointments and shattered dreams can be looked at as big mountains that are climbed with a Bigger God, it means that the heart that is aching with loss can be filled with the never ending source of God's Eternal Love. Grace is many different things but it always ministers to each individual heart in just the way that it is needed at the moment.That is the beauty of my God and His Grace. He meets us wherever we are at the moment. Our journeys through this life are all different but we all need His Grace to get us through the hard parts.
 You may be in a financial crises, or maybe you need to make a decision that will affect your future, or maybe you have been devastated with a diagnoses that is life threating, maybe your teenager is giving you grief or maybe you lost a loved one and it feels like the world is caving in. Maybe you even which it would, at least you get that fleeting tho't at times. I don't know your pain or your story but I do know that when you allow God to help you in the hard times they are more bearable.
 Cancer has been a large part of the hard things in my life. I did not have cancer myself but the person I loved most did. He, my husband, fought a long hard battle with that dreaded disease and went Home to Jesus on April 5th 2015. It is God's kind grace that carries me through each day.
 I will write about the valley of dieting, the joy of eating healthy, the confusion of lots of information that does not agree, the school of suffering, and simply this span of time called LIFE that we all are in. Gardening, cooking, baking, and all the boring things that make up a day are all so much better when we allow God's Grace to shine in us. A friend told the story on her Caring Bridge site of a teenager that had serious health issues and yet she was able to smile. She said," I'm smiling cuz God's got my back." That my friend's is God's grace!! I was so inspired when I read that quote that I knew it would be my new favorite for a long time!!
  And so I conclude this first post with,
                     I'm Smiling cuz God's got My Back