Church Picnic Rules

So I went to a wonderful church picnic service in Centennial Park Sunday. There was great singing, good fellowship, and of course food. Our family had a great time and as always we brought TONS of food. In my family we live by the motto, "It's better to have too much than not enough food." Throughout the day our family and a few friends feasted on chicken, sub sandwiches, chips, baked beans, potato salad, any drink you could want and an array of desserts. My mom, aunt, uncle, and cousins all put in MONEY for our food meaning the food was for us.  Now the rules of the church picnic are as follows:


* The church will provide a boxed dinner from KFC and water. You bring whatever else you want to eat for YOUR FAMILY. (We of course did not get the KFC food since we had so much already.) 
* Since the church was hosting other churches from around the Southeast we also were to feed them if they asked.


Later in the day we began to notice random people coming up to our tent for food. Now some of us (ME and my cousin) began to have an attitude about strangers and other church members coming up grabbing food. My aunt who is much nicer than the rest of us told us to let it go. One guy in particular took the cake. He came up UNDER our tent unannounced and began fixing his plate. My cousin - let's call her G began asking him who he was since she had never seen him in her life. He responded with an attitude. That was the WRONG thing to do. G let him know in no uncertain terms that he could not just grab our food. We found out during the exchange he was from another church. My aunt told G to calm down but it was far too late. We all were a little upset by his rudeness.


My question is this does being at a church picnic mean you can't be protective of what YOU bought? Do you have to allow members from other churches to be rude? Let me know your thoughts.

Ma and Me: The Traveling Circus

Yesterday as my mom and I were halfway home to Tennessee we decided to change our plans and head across Kentucky to see my cousin move into her first dorm in Louisville. We were going to surprise my aunt and cousins by not telling them that we were coming. As we entered Louisville yesterday I started laughing uncontrollably at our travel mishaps.I kept thinking what if we've gone 200 miles out of our way and we never find them. I realized that would be fitting for my mom and I. Luckily we found them and were able to surprise them. Ma and I love traveling and spontaneity is such a big part of our journeys.Many trips went off without a hitch but there are the others. The ones that left us crying with laughter. My mom and I began our travels when I turned 6 months old. We flew to Washington D.C. to visit my aunts. It was all down hill from there.


At age three on one of our many trips to DC I saw pretzels in an airport convenience store. I begged my mom to have them. Ma knew she had NEVER fed me pretzels and kept telling me I didn't want them. Well of course I wanted them so I began to pester her repeatedly for this huge bag of pretzels. She finally gave in and bought them for me. We went to our seats and I headed for my window seat. My mom and I got settled and I started to open the pretzel bag. The bag EXPLODED. Pretzels everywhere. On me, on the floor, on my mom, on the lady in front us, and definitely not in my mouth. Guess what I did with the remaining pretzels that were left in the bag? Yep you guessed it. I didn't eat a single one. My mom didn't speak to me for the rest of the flight.


In the fourth grade my dad won a trip through his State Farm agency to Maui, Hawaii. Ma and I were SO EXCITED! My aunt Nita took us to the airport. On our way there her Peugot began to stall. It was an automatic. It became sluggish on the highway- barely moving. The closer we got to the airport the more flights I began to think we just weren't going to make it. Finally after giving all it had the car slowed to a stop and we were stranded on the side of the road. Please remember this was before cell phones and most of our family was asleep in a town 30 minutes away. My dad ran to a gas station to call his brother Dan and somehow we got to the airport with only minutes to spare. Once we got to Maui it was great! We had an awesome two weeks in paradise. Good food, good weather, good times with my parents. However, when it came time to leave we encountered a monsoon! I mean a full out rainstorm from hell. After two weeks of sunshine there was just WATER everywhere. We even had to spend two extra days stuck in our hotel room trying to get back to the mainland. I was sunburned, bored, and READY to go home.


In high school my mom and I decided to sneak out of town to go visit my aunts again. This time by car. The trip to DC is about 11 hours. We didn't tell a soul that we were heading out of town- something we NEVER do. We hopped in the Caddy at 3am and were headed off on another mommy and me adventure. We got a few miles out of our subdivision and the car made a strange noise. We kept on going. We stopped at a red light and as soon as we tried to take off,  the car died. It wasn't a quiet death. Oh no not us. The car made the most sickening, frightening sound I've ever heard. Think fingernails on a chalkboard. Since it was 3am and no one knew where we were we had to walk back home embarrassed and sweaty. We've never tried to sneak off again.


One of my favorite mishaps happened in 2005. I surprised my mom with ESPY tickets for her birthday. Since we live in central Illinois we usually try to fly out of Chicago or Indianapolis. We booked our flights for Indy to LA and we ready to go. Since our flight left at 8am we left Illinois at 4am to give us two hours to spare when we got to the airport. We were bouncing along two exits away from the airport and we saw it. IT being a clock on the side of a bank. Instead of saying 6:00am as we expected it said 7:00am. WE HAD FORGOTTEN THAT INDIANA DOESN'T OBSERVE DAYLIGHT SAVINGS TIME. We had assumed that Indy was on Central time just like Illinois. Nope. They are Eastern Time part of the year and Central Time part of the year. Weird. We of course had no time to get to the airport, park, ride the shuttle, check-in, and get through security in an hour. We got to the desk and vowed to each other that if we didn't make it to LA we would not tell anyone. Luckily we got a flight six hours later and were able to enjoy the show but lesson learned- just fly out of Chicago.


We've had so many mishaps that I couldn't possibly name them all but here are some highlights of the rest:
* We've sat on a runway in a thunderstorm for 3 hours with no food.
* We've gotten lost in Connecticut.
* We've fallen asleep on a tour of Martha's Vineyard (actually that was me but ma was there).
* We've been stranded in Myrtle Beach for six hours due to some type of monsoon.
* We've flown into and out of blizzards fearing for our lives.
* We've been ripped off by a tour guide in Bermuda.
* We've destroyed my convertible top by trying to open it while going 70 miles per hour down the highway.
* We've flown on a plane with no air conditioning.
* We've been re-routed from Phoenix to Tucson for three hours due to wind. We live in Illinois. You don't know wind.
* We've gone to Titans and UT football games and left our tickets at home.
* We've run through airports like OJ only to be told we missed our flight and they would see us tomorrow.
* We've gotten lost in Phoenix while visiting my cousin and left the GPS at home. Lost for hours.
* We've planned a trip to Gabon, West Africa only to be told we can't go due to the West Nile virus.


For my 30th birthday my mom treated me to a trip to Bermuda. This year I am treating her to a surprise trip for her 60th. Here's hoping the "island" is still standing when we leave!

Tales from Bristol: Why I Hate Kobe Bryant

The Lakers championship parade is today and I for one am still annoyed. I am not and have never been a Kobe fan. The last time I cheered for the Lakers Kareem had on those silly goggles and Magic had on short shorts. I hate when people say Kobe is the best Laker. Um best Laker since Magic sure. Best Laker all time. No. Many people have asked me why I hate Kobe and since when was I a Celtics fan. My answer is two-fold. The Celtics answer is easy. I was a fan of Ron Mercer. Who you ask? Ron Mercer was a two time Mr. Basketball and had great collegiate success at Kentucky. When he was drafted by the Celtics I followed along. I even have a Celtics key chain to prove it. And who else am I supposed to cheer for? The Grizzlies. No thanks. Fast Forward to 2007 and the Celtics traded for my favorite player Kevin Garnett. So of course I'm a Celtics fan. Now on to why I hate Kobe. Let's get a few things straight. I know he's good. Great even. A proven winner. All that. I got it.

When I ask others why they hate Kobe they give me one of these responses:

* He raped that girl in Colorado (do you know that?)

* He's not MJ (of course not- no one is)

* He's cocky (a lot of NBA players are cocky)

* He beat my team (he beats everybody's team)

* He married a video chick who isn't black (he wasn't going to marry you so...)

I don't hate him  for any of those reasons. My reason is my own and it has to do with my mom's chicken salad. It was May 30, 2007. I was three years into my time as a production assistant at ESPN. At 10:30 that morning I walked into the 6pm Sportscenter meeting. As we were going around the room getting our assignments we realized it was a slow news day. I was even wearing my slow news day outfit. A sundress and heels. (Sidenote- you are ALWAYS taking a risk by wearing heels at ESPN. You might be called to run at any moment.) So I was assigned all NBA news that wasn't playoff related. I almost turned cartwheels as I headed back to my computer. Since it was playoff time what else could there be to talk about? The day wore on and at noon I decided to run home for lunch. My mom was visiting me for the week and she had made her chicken salad. I could eat her chicken salad anything she cooks every single day. So I sent a quick instant message to my producer that I was heading home but would sign into my laptop so he could reach me. I got home and ma had my plate ready. JOY was mine. I sat down at the table, signed into work and I had 67 instant messages from my producer. I HAD JUST TALKED TO HIM  5 minutes ago and NOTHING was happening. Instead of eating my lunch and ignoring him like I wanted to I called him. He said you have to come back right now. I asked why. He said in what can only be described as a scream: 

KOBE BRYANT JUST ASKED FOR A GD TRADE AND I NEED YOU ON IT! 

I crumpled to the floor with my phone in my hand. I actually started to tear up. My mom, who knows her only child is melodramatic, didn't even look my way. She just said in her normal, calm tone. "It will be here when you get back." I wanted to eat not deal with some primadonna basketball player who didn't like where he was playing. Let's get one thing straight. NBA is far down on the list of sports I like. My list is as follows. 1. College Football. 2. NFL 3. Women's College Hoops 4. Men's College Hoops 5. NBA So with my stomach growling and my football brain getting more and more angry that I had to cover NBA I hopped into my trusty convertible and headed back to work. There are a few things that make you nervous in sports television. One of the worst is walking into a room and EVERY SINGLE PERSON screams your name. I almost ran back home. Here's what had happened in the 15 minutes since I had left the building- Kobe Bryant had asked for a trade from the only team he'd ever known. The team that he demanded Shaq be booted from. He called the Lakers front office a mess. He said he'd rather play on Pluto and he ALSO said his mind was made up. He was leaving. Now had he said that on a television interview my job would have been easy. Nope not Kobe Bean Bryant. He said it on ESPN radio to Stephen A. Smith and Dan Patrick as well as other radio shows in LA. Ugh- keep in mind I work on the TV side of things. So my assignment was to produce an 8 minute piece of him rambling about wanting to be traded to air at the beginning of Sportscenter. Now 8 minutes might seem like nothing to you but in television 8 minutes is a LIFETIME. So I take off running down to ESPN radio in my heels. I gather all the sound from all the shows and that's when I feel it. I feel air on the side of my foot. No no no I think to myself my shoe cannot be busted on the side because of Kobe Bryant. First the chicken salad now this. I loved those shoes. I'm more comfortable in heels due to these extremely high arches I have so to lose these was a tragedy. I managed to get my work done on one heel but the damage was done. I had no love for Kobe. I was hungry, sweaty, shoeless, and worn out due to a guy I didn't even watch. I've never been able to like him after that. He ruined a really easy day at work, a wonderful lunch with my mom, and some really expensive shoes by basically lying cause if you haven't noticed. HE'S STILL A LAKER! Such a loser.

VBS: Day 2 What a Difference a Little Girl Makes

So Day 2 was MUCH MUCH better! I have always loved studying the differences between men and women and that even extends to boys and girls. Last night I introduced you to Aiden and Bill. Tonight we had an addition. Meet Mecca. All smiles. COMPLETE sentences and POTTY TRAINED at 2 years old. I'm not saying women are smarter...wait YES I AM! She was a joy. She reminded me a lot of one of my favorite little cousins, Akira. The funniest thing I saw all night was that Bill and Aiden competed for Mecca's attention and she was far too busy to be bothered. It was hilarious to say the least. Here's a quick recap.


5:50pm Bill cries a lot when his dad leaves him. This has become a normal occurrence. No big deal. Except for the fact that I picked him up. My mistake. He stays in my lap for the next 2 hours. GREAT!


6:00pm Aiden arrives. Doesn't cry at all. Things are looking UP for day two for sure.


6:05pm Mecca comes in with her full sentences and potty trained self and I say out loud. THANK YOU GOD I WANT ALL GIRLS PLEASE!


6:30pm Poop time. I leave Valerie (the other nursery worker) with the diapers.


7:00pm Never underestimate the power of a Disney/Pixar movie. The kids loved the Incredibles although I'm not sure they know what's going on.


7:30pm Bill takes a quick nap in my arms. There is a God and he was in the nursery today.


8:00pm Everyone gets picked up and nothing horrible happened. It has now been determined that I prefer girl children. They might talk a lot but they don't run trucks over your toes.


See you tomorrow. TWO DOWN. THREE TO GO!

True Forgiveness

The entire world is watching the World Cup this month and host nation South Africa and it's storied past are on display. Nelson Mandela served as President of South Africa from 1994 to 1999. Most of us know what he did before that. He was an anti-apartheid activist who spent 27 years in prison. That's right; a lifetime for some of us. Nelson Mandela was imprisoned on Robben Island where he remained for the next eighteen of his twenty-seven years in prison. While in jail, his reputation grew and he became widely known as the most significant black leader in South Africa. On the island, he and others performed hard labor in a lime quarry. Prison conditions were very basic. Prisoners were segregated by race, with black prisoners receiving the fewest rations. Political prisoners were kept separate from ordinary criminals and received fewer privileges. Mandela describes how, as a D-group prisoner (the lowest classification) he was allowed one visitor and one letter every six months. Letters, when they came, were often delayed for long periods and made unreadable by the prison censors. What is remarkable is that when he emerged from prison he had compassion for the government that put him in jail. On the day of his release, Mandela made a speech to the nation.  He declared his commitment to peace and reconciliation with the country's white minority. He also said his main focus was to bring peace to the black majority and give them the right to vote in both national and local elections. 

After being imprisoned for 27 years the last thing I would have been thinking about was bringing peace to any country that had forced me to work in a lime quarry. I would have gotten my passport together and headed for a nice tropical paradise to live out my twilight years. I'm thinking Bermuda. Luckily Nelson Mandela is not me. He chose to stay and make his country better, stronger, and safer. I truly believe that South Africa would not be hosting the World Cup this month if not for his efforts to bring equality to the country. 

Forgiveness has been hard for me at times. I don't hold grudges. My forgiveness usually means I forgive you but I'm probably not going to talk to you again. Lauren Conrad said it best on the show "The Hills" a few years back. She said "I want to forgive you and forget you." This applies to friends and acquaintances that I have allowed to fall by the wayside in my "attempt" to forgive. Could I be like Nelson Mandela and say “I forgive you and I love you?" I'm not sure I could but I'd like to try. 

What about you? After spending 27 years in prison could you forgive; or would you be joining me in Bermuda? 

VBS: Day 1 Dear God What Have I Done?!

This week I am going give you quick updates on my journey into the VBS nursery. Well Day 1 is over. I survived. I had two little boys named Aiden and Bill both age 2. Now for those of you who know me you know I was scared and praying they didn't have to use the bathroom for 3 hours. VBS runs from 6-8pm every night this week. I'll give you blow by blow.


5:50pm Aiden's mom drops him off. He cries for the next 30 minutes. Yep that's right. VBS hasn't officially started and HE'S ALREADY CRYING. HELLLLLLLLLLLLLL NO.


5:59pm While Aiden's crying his head off Bill's family drops him off. Guess what he does. Nope he doesn't cry. He poops. GROWN MAN POOP. LIKE HE SHOULD HAVE A TOILET. I'm sick to my stomach before 6pm.


********Just FYI******** The last diaper I changed belonged to a person who graduated high school last month. Her name is Lele. That was 18 years ago.


6:00pm To add insult to injury my Pastor drops by and says "oh come upstairs and teach the high schoolers with me". Are you serious? If it wasn't just me and another single woman in the nursery I would have left in a heartbeat. WHY DIDN'T MY PASTOR ASK ME THIS QUESTION BEFORE NOW?! If he wasn't my Pastor he would have gotten the Anetra look.


6:30pm It's dinnertime. Oh goodie. Guess who wants to cry now. Yep Bill cause well he obviously HATES food. Yippee.


7:00pm They've both stopped crying but now they realize they don't like each other. Aiden is an only child and has no time for sharing.  I am too so I get it...who is this kid trying to play with my toys? However this is not good for me since now they are fighting.


7:30pm Bill decides he's hungry now. Um what? So we take a trip to the food room and I guess Bill liked freedom so much he CRIED as soon as we got back to the nursery. At this point the executive decision is made that I take care of the child this is not crying or poopie. While Valerie takes care of the crying/poppie kid. So I start reading to Aiden. I'm not trying to say he has ADHD at 2 but......


8:00pm THANK YOU LORD JESUS it's 8pm and it's time for the parents to get the kids. Bill's dad comes in with jokes he asks "hey do you ever babysit?"  I give him the Anetra look. If I hadn't been in church he would have gotten some words.


Day One is over and luckily both boys are cute. Here's hoping as the week gets busier with more kids they get less tearful and poopie!

Revelation A.K.A. that book after Jude

I was reading one of my favorite Newsweek columns online earlier this morning and it referenced that many white evangelicals (their words) are claiming that the oil spill is a sign of the End Times. Here we go. Again. Isn't everything a sign of the End Times to these guys? For the record: I am not obsessed with the end of days. As a matter of fact I haven't read Revelation in full since I was seventeen years old. I had no business reading it at such a young age because I got so confused that I haven't been back since. I believe that yes we are living in the End Times but we've BEEN living in them since Jesus died on the cross. So I can't think that every earthquake, hurricane, oil spill, war, etc is a sign that the end of the world starts TODAY.


 I was very close with a guy for about a year, who of his own admission, is obsessed with Revelation. I asked him why and he had no clear answer. Maybe he likes to think of it as an action movie. He sites the decline of our society as an indication of Armageddon. He sites murder. Cain murdered Abel. He sites immorality. Sodom and Gomorrah were OUT OF CONTROL. He sites prostitution. Um it's called the world's oldest profession for a reason. He sites weather. Bad weather isn't new. He even began talking about December 21, 2012 and I asked him the question- what are you going to do differently? That day is coming whether it's the beginning of the end or not. I had to examine my own thinking and ignorance to how it's all going to end and I honestly feel that since God is in charge understanding it all would be futile with my finite human mind. I prayed to God about my feelings on Revelation and when I emerged from my prayer time this is what I came away with.


There are so many other things we could be doing instead of worrying about something we cannot change. Including:


* Live with the belief that Jesus Christ is our Savior
* Tell others about your experiences with God
* Help plant seeds of Christianity into those who are lost or who just don't know
* Help those who are less fortunate than you


I think that being aware of the Armageddon, the Rapture, End of Days, etc. is a good thing I just don't think it should be our main focus when we have been given a job to do while we are here.

Babies + Black Debutante = Everyone Crying

So God asked me to do something really crazy. I mean like CRAZY. I actually can't believe He asked me to do this but who am I to deny Him anything. I feel like Noah, Moses, and Jonah. Really God? Is it really going to flood? Do I have to talk to Pharaoh? Nineveh? I hate Nineveh!

Last week I was helping my mom do Vacation Bible School sign up and I realized I hadn't put my name down for anything. Well in the past I have taught the high schoolers cause that's what I like to do. Teenagers don't bother me. I actually think they are funny and they are in the stage where they need young professionals the most. This year however there was no teenage class spot available so I decided to do the food. That was easy. Nope the food group and runners were filled as well. I kept looking over the sign up sheet for some place that I could be of service and I noticed that the nursery had no teachers. Um. Single woman with no kids here. I don't really DO babies. They don't talk and I have no idea what they want. They seem really fragile. Plus they need a lot of attention. Babies have never been my ministry or so I thought. I have always told myself and others that when I become a mom that's when I'll deal with babies. I kept looking at the sheet hoping someone would come fill the nursery slot. What was I going to do? Sing songs? Change Diapers? (gulp!) Guess when they were hungry? Minutes went by with NO ONE stepping up for the ministry and that's when I heard it. I avoided it but I heard it all the same. I heard God, Jesus, the Holy Spirit all say- "Why not you?" Why not me what? The nursery? This is when I launched into an all out argument with my heavenly Father. I stated several reasons why this was a bad idea. He shot every reason down and by the end of our conversation I had signed up to teach the nursery class. 

I have no idea what I am going to do with these kids but I really feel like I was led to do this. God is constantly pushing me out of my comfort zone. If I had taught the teenagers I would have learned nothing knew about myself or children in general. If I had worked in the food ministry I would have learned nothing about the word of God. I am actually looking forward to it at this point but I am scared all the same. I should know now that if God sends me to do it He has my back. So I am studying my lessons and getting myself ready. I just hope when people look in the nursery next week I'm not sitting in the middle of the floor crying amongst the babies. 

Houston We've Got a Problem

I was watching Dateline a few weeks ago and it was a repeat of the Apollo 13 mission where three American astronauts were trapped in a space module with almost no way to get home. Their OXYGEN tank had exploded. Yep you heard me their source of life was rapidly being blown into space. There is a famous but misquoted line from that mission: "Houston we've got (had) a problem." While Matt Lauer was interviewing two of the three astronauts as well as workers in mission control I couldn't help but notice how calm the astronauts were.


HOUSTON WE'VE GOT A PROBLEM?! That might be the understatement of the century. Let's see how that message would have gone if it were me:


"OH LAWD SAVE ME!"
"I KNEW HUMANS SHOULD HAVE NEVER COME TO SPACE NOW WE'RE GOING TO DIE!"
"GET ME DOWN FROM HERE!"
"I HATE YOU ALL FOR SENDING ME UP HERE!"
"MA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"


But not the crew of Apollo 13. They were cool, calm, and collected. They paid attention to their surroundings, followed mission control commands and instead of panicking, calmly prepared themselves to get home. Now down in Houston it wasn't calm at all. There was WORK going on. Men were running around coming up with plans to get their astronauts home. We could all take a lesson from the men of Apollo 13.


When things "blow up" in my life I panic. I try to control the situation. I try to make things go how I THINK they should go. In the Apollo 13 mission one of the astronauts said if he had followed his plan he might have missed the bigger picture. Sounds a lot like me. Since that show I decided to really allow God to be my mission control. When things come up  I listen instead of going with my first impulse. I listen to people with experience. I also listen to God because He, like mission control can see the bigger picture while I am stuck in my little space module of life.


The interviews with mission control were much different. They were busy. Engineers worked relentlessly on how to rig the broken space module in such a way that the astronauts could land on Earth without injury or worse death. Since we know God doesn't get nervous we can go ahead and say "God I have a problem", then cast our cares on HIM. If mission control can lead Apollo 13 home with no way of knowing the outcome think about how much safer we are calling on a God who does.

Natural Defense...

So I was in Chicago with my cousin a few weeks ago and we decided to go to a psychic. Now before you get all holier than thou and quoting Bible scriptures I know it's wrong I can even give YOU the scripture so anyway... I prayed before I went in thinking God PLEASE give me a sign that I should leave. I walked in and the psychic had a picture of Jesus above her desk. Really God?! Since it was white Jesus I had no idea if that was a sign to leave or stay. I asked God  to show me another clear sign that I should leave. A soon as I sat down Angela (the psychic) said "You spend a lot of your time talking to God. The two of you have a close relationship." I was floored. I thought God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit were forbidden in a place like that. She then went on to tell me how she had been blessed with this gift from God and that she used it to help people. I'm still not believing it but I go along praying the entire time. I chose to believe that God would protect me and I let her tell me about myself. I won't go into details but she was accurate. Scary accurate. So later that week during my prayer time I spoke with him about the psychic. I asked "was that you speaking through her or not." I heard maybe/maybe not. What's that? Since when does God answer with a maybe?


In the weeks after, I left the issue alone because I feel that if God wants me to know the future- He'll let me know without a psychic.. However it did get me thinking about my protection intuition, and knowing the future or what I like to call the Holy Spirit. 


Many animals have a defense mechanism that they are born with. For example:
* snakes and spiders have venom
* the octopus (yuck) has ink that creates a diversion if they are being attacked 
* lions, tigers, and bears (oh my) can eat you or at least maul you with their strength
* and there is some lizard that sacrifices its tail to a predator to get away then grows a new one


But where is OUR defense mechanism? As humans at the top of the food chain we don't have a so-called natural predator other than each other. I learned first hand that we do have a natural defense but many times we ignore it. Our defense comes from a famous passage in scripture: "and after the earthquake a fire, but the LORD was not in the fire; and after the fire a still small voice." 1 Kings 19:12. Our defense comes in the promptings, urgings, pushings, leanings, whispers, and thoughts that come from the Holy Spirit. In this well-known sequence of wind, earthquake and fire, the noise is overwhelming; but it is only with the stunning quiet of the aftermath that the Lord speaks to Elijah in the "sound of sheer silence."  When people think of the still small voice, they are looking for verbal instructions -- words. That's natural, but God excels at nonverbal communication: URGES, NOT WORDS. He speaks with an inner welling or rising energies in the body. These urgings and promptings are also known as our the fight or flight response humans get when endangered or scared.


Think about how many times you've come face to face with a situation where you'd felt a sense that you shouldn't have gone to that place, met that person, or taken that gift. 

Think about how many times you chose to listen to the urgings in your gut that told you not to get on the road only to find out hours later that there had been a wreck or something that would have put you in harms way. 


In high school my friends and I were in Panama City Beach for our senior trip. At the end of the week I had the option of leaving with the set of friends I had come with or travel back another way with a group of friends from another school. I kept getting this overwhelming feeling that I shouldn't go. So I said no. I found out a week later they'd been in a horrible wreck. That  "something" saved my life. 


My friend Jalaine and her roommate in college were driving from Pittsburgh to West Virginia and "something" told Jalaine to move out of the right lane she was driving in. As she did so she saw a very large buck come running into the lane from the trees. That "something" saved her life. 



A co-worker was scheduled to work late at night in Smyrna years ago. Something told her that she shouldn't go. She called out of work. The restaurant was robbed and all workers were killed. That "something" saved her life. 


I don't believe that I can always know the future, but I do believe that God can and will keep me from harm not of his design. Many times God shows us a way out of a danger but in this crazy, hectic, loud world we must always stay tuned to our defense mechanism- "the still small voice".