Of Milestones, Honeysuckle, and Standing Stones of Remembrance....

The blossoms that started it all. :)

  

 
Remember the children's book If You Give a Mouse A Cookie?  There was the whole series of "If You Give a _______ a ______" books, and then there were the various "If You Give a Homeschool Mom a ________" knock-off posts that have circulated online.  I love those.  They remind me of me. :)


Today's post should probably be titled "If You Give a MomBlogger a Honeysuckle Vine", because it happened a bit like those books.  :)


I was sitting in the backyard soaking up some of the beautiful sunshine this morning,  (I've been trying to remember to kill two birds with one stone by sitting outside to talk on the phone, read, work on paperwork, etc. while upping my Vitamin D intake), when I realized that we finally have honeysuckle blooming. 


I decided I needed to take pictures of the first honeysuckle blooms of the season.  I went in to retrieve my camera, planning to take my "real" camera out to shoot them, but then remembering that last year when Instagram finally came out with IG for Android tablets, my first IG pictures were of last year's sweet-smelling blooms (and the little girls enjoying them. :))

My very first Instagram post...Emlyn loving the honeysuckle.

So I decided to take the tablet out instead, in honor of those first Instagram photos.  I shot several pictures of the honeysuckle, and then looked up and saw a fat, beautiful Red-Bellied Woodpecker in the big tree about 15 feet away.


I bemoaned the fact that I didn't have my "real" camera, as the woodpecker was in a perfect position for a great capture and the tablet doesn't do that type of distance.  I knew there was no way I could get inside and get my camera before he was gone. Sure enough, by the time I opened the gate and walked back in to the yard, he had flown away.

 

At that point, I went inside to Instagram the honeysuckle pictures.  I was also pondering a quick blog post with some of the honeysuckle pictures and perhaps a mention of the Instagram milestone and the missed woodpecker shots.   I was curious how long ago those first Instagram photos were taken.  I knew it had been about a year, but thought that the honeysuckle was blooming rather late this spring.  

I then decided to check my blog, as I thought I remembered blogging the honeysuckle pictures, and I knew that that would give me an exact date, rather than the "56w" I was getting on Instagram.

 

 

I typed "honeysuckle" into the search box on my blog, and sure enough, there it was...April 10, 2012.  My first thought was, "Yes, the honeysuckle is blooming late this year."  My second was a realization of the post title: "focused on Glory...He Directs the Hearts of Kings {and Insurance Companies}.  

My jaw about dropped, and I decided that my "quick blog post" with a few honeysuckle pictures wasn't going to be quite so quick after all.  It had suddenly taken a whole new direction. 

Just the other night, Billy and I were discussing the standing stones of remembrance that God commanded the Israelites to erect as reminders of His faithfulness.  I said, "That's one of my goals for my blog...that it would contain a series of  'standing stones' of remembrance of God's faithfulness in our lives."

 

I just love it when I go digging around for something on my blog, and God causes me to "happen upon" something completely different that I really needed to be reminded of at that moment.  Those reminders of His faithfulness are those "standing stones" in action!   

And that's exactly what happened this morning.  I've been burdened all week for various friends going through really difficult times, as well as struggling with anxiety over some needs closer to home.  

But there it was.  A standing stone.  A reminder of His faithfulness, sovereignty,  glory, and  abundant sufficiency to meet every need.

 

And Joshua said to them, “Pass on before the ark of the Lord your God into the midst of the Jordan, and take up each of you a stone upon his shoulder, according to the number of the tribes of the people of Israel,  that this may be a sign among you. When your children ask in time to come, ‘What do those stones mean to you?’  then you shall tell them that the waters of the Jordan were cut off before the ark of the covenant of the Lord. When it passed over the Jordan, the waters of the Jordan were cut off. So these stones shall be to the people of Israel a memorial forever.”

~Joshua 4:5-7

  And he said to the people of Israel, “When your children ask their fathers in times to come, ‘What do these stones mean?’  then you shall let your children know, ‘Israel passed over this Jordan on dry ground.’ For the Lord your God dried up the waters of the Jordan for you until you passed over, as the Lord your God did to the Red Sea, which he dried up for us until we passed over,  so that all the peoples of the earth may know that the hand of the Lord is mighty, that you may fear the Lord your God forever.^" 

^{~Joshua 4:21-24}

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