What a Gift

This guy or gal is enormous!  Over two feet long and at least 18 inches wide.

July 9-10

The kids and grands have all cleared out for a few days and the guest we had expected for the weekend had to cancel. We decided to pace ourselves and spread out the clean up process from the two past fabulous weeks.  After working on the house a few hours yesterday morning, I sat down on the porch to do my Bible Study and I fell asleep for three hours!

Arriving home from work my husband and I were having a heart to heart over some tough issues facing our lives. Deciding we'd move our conversation to the dock, I stepped out onto the screened porch to check the temperature and was shocked by what I saw on the patio.  All that came out of my mouth was a whisper of "Get the camera, get the camera."

For the past 19 years, I have spent summer and early fall keeping an eye out for this old tortoise.  Last summer I was elated to watch a new young turtle swim in our beach area. Never have I seen these creatures out of the water.  I can't imagine what drew him or her to the patio where such chaos has been abounding, but it truly was a gift from God on a day we could use some confirmation of his presence, his power and his protection.

"Then God said, 'Let the waters teem with swarms of living creatures.'"

Genesis 1:20 

Never will He leave us, never will He forsake us! God is always up to good.  Today's Biblegateway verse is one of my top ten favorite verses!  Getting to see this tortoise face to face was more than I ever could have imagined.  When we followed him back to the water, my husband said, "I think he just waved to us!"

"Now to Him who is able to do far  more abundantly beyond all that we ask or think, according to the power that works within us, to Him be the glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations forever and ever. Amen." Ephesians 3:10-21


In The Message translation:
"God can do anything, you know-far more than you could ever imagine or guess or request in your wildest dreams!  He does it not by pushing us around but by working within us, his Spirit deeply and gently within us. Glory to God in the church!  Glory to God in the Messiah, in Jesus!  Glory down all the generations! Glory through all millennia!  Oh, yes!"