Happy Saturday friends! I am beside giddy to introduce you to my friend Karrilee. Have you ever met someone and felt like they were a kindred spirit? I have felt that since we connected through the Five Minute Friday Community, Write 31 Days, etc. I feel like Karrilee is my soul sister in so many ways so I was beyond delighted when she said YES when I asked her if she would write a guest post for my space. I cannot wait for the day that we get to meet InRL. Her words are pure gift and I pray they bless you today my dear readers and friends!
Grace… it truly is Amazing!
I actually wrote about it twice already this week over on my own blog as part of my 31 Days series… but one never really tires of talking about grace!
As I prayed about what to share, Tara mentioned the ‘live’ date for this guest post and, well –there was my answer!
October 17th…
Maybe your calendar, too, informs you that Saturday, October 17th is “The Sweetest Day” this year.
To be honest, I’m not even really sure what that means, but I know when we were picking our wedding date some twenty three years ago, getting married on “The Sweetest Day” seemed just about perfect, because –of course!
Grace was definitely present on that Sweetest day. (Happy Anniversary, My Honey!)
But I look back over my life and I can see how Grace has been present on all of my ‘sweetest days’. Grace was there at my traumatic birth and many, many days in the hospital following my early arrival. Grace was there when I got to go home, despite all the declarations of my final hours… Grace was there for birthdays and new puppy’s and first crushes. Grace was there with new neighbors and best friends… on vacations and summer breaks and Christmases galore! Grace has showed up for every major celebration and highlight in my life. Yes, Grace was there even before I knew Him or knew that He was there!
And then, Grace poured out on the day of my Salvation, at my baptism, on my wedding day, for the birth of our Girlie, and so many other sweetest days since then!
But Grace shows up in the not so great days too!
Grace covers on our dark days –in our hard seasons, when sweet is nowhere to be seen and all we taste is bitter!
If you have been around my little corner of the interwebs much lately, you will know that I have fallen completely in love with this new CD… as in, I can’t quit playing it on repeat! It is gorgeous, and powerful and full of –you guessed it—Grace! I promise you that I didn’t plan this, but this is how God flows… as I typed out Bitter, I could hear this song. I hope you will take a moment to listen to it, and to hear it too!
~ Bitter/Sweet by Amanda Cook, Brave New World
Grace, right? That is grace because He really does make all things new!
He really does turn the bitter into sweet and winter into spring!
Grace –Jesus really, who IS Grace—
He’s with us on ALL of our days
–the heavy and the light,
–the dim and the bright…
Grace is beside us
and within us
on the days filled with cold, or with heat…
with bitter or with sweet.
In fact, it’s been on some of my darkest days that Grace has flooded in to light the way! It’s been the times when darkness clouded my vision and my hope was shaky at best, and I was weighed down with doubt that I have felt a stirring down deep and caught a glimpse of Grace that lifted my vision higher. Grace reminded me of better days and a bigger vision. Grace reminds me of promises and prayers that have yet to be answered and fulfilled!
Grace walks beside us… urges us on… and carries us when we have lost our strength. When all we have in our hands or hearts is bitterness, His sweetness overcomes and overwhelms and oh how He invites us to the table of Grace and how He beckons us to taste and see that He is good!
I recently heard someone describe Grace like this:
“Grace enables you to be so in love with Jesus that you walk and look and love like Him!”
Now that kind of Grace – God’s Amazing Grace –
could take ANY bitter day, and make it sweet!
May His Grace find you, and fill you, and pour out wherever you go!
May He take every bitter thing, and make it sweet!
Happy Sweetest Day, my friends!
Speak Life. Be Love. Shine On.
~Karrilee~
