Gateways to Joy

I am very happy to have had the opportunity to  review Amy Bayliss' book, 'Pursuit of Proverbs 31.'   I've never met Amy personally, but I have known of her for quite sometime, and I have corresponded with her via e-mail on several  occasions.  Amy and I are both southern girls so I automatically feel a kindered spirit with, but not only are we southern girls, we are "heavenly" southern girls thus my bond to her. When I first began blogging, Amy Bayliss' blog , Sarah Mae, Like A Warm Cup of Coffee, and the women that I met on the Christian Women Affiliate forum were my life lines to me. These places is where I found my much needed sanity, understanding and camaraderie. I had been hurt by people in my church and those that I were close to so I swore off intimate relationships.  Needless to say God was doing a work with me and my heart online.  I would end up opening my heart in a new and very different way. It was through Amy and CWA th...

I'm sure many of you are familiar with this writing by A poor Methodist woman, eighteenth century. I found it in Elisabeth Elliot's book 'Gateway to Joy: reflections that draw us nearer to God.' There are several writings that I read that I wanted to share.  Things that slow us down to see the beauty in life.  This sums up how I feel at times when washing dishes by candlelight.  I do that sometimes to quite my soul and see the beauty around me, even though at times there is chaos around me like now for instances. Kids are quarreling... need I say more.  So I still away.  Yes.  I get still and fly faraway in my mind. This is what I read: "I do not know when I have had happier times in my soul, than when I have been sitting at work, with nothing before me but a candle and a white cloth, and hearing no sound but that of my own breath, with God in my soul and heaven in my eye...  I rejoice in being exactly what I am, a creature c...