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Bruised But Not Broken

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Thanksgiving Is Rooted In Receiving.

Posted on November 21, 2018by tara.dickson

Thanksgiving is upon us and maybe like me you want this season we are ushering in to be MORE. With every passing year, I feel the holy hush enter my soul just a bit earlier. It’s more than just the upcoming holidays filled with family, food and friends. It’s the general lifting of so many […]

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How to Help Your Children With Transition.(Blog Swap)

Posted on July 17, 2018by tara.dickson

As a part of my Summer Blog Swap, I am so happy to welcome Dorina Gilmore to the blog. She walked her own brave road as a widow and I had the honor of getting to meet her in California a few weeks ago, although we have talked for months as ”writing friends.” She has […]

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When You’re Ready to Let That Wound Heal. (Blog Swap)

Posted on July 10, 2018July 10, 2018by tara.dickson

As part of a Blog Swap I am doing with a few of my fellow writers for the month of July,  I am so happy to welcome Lea Turner to the blog. I know you will love her heart and her words. Take heart beloved. The Lord wants to heal those wounds as much as […]

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A Truth to Savor When You Need Direction.

Posted on July 1, 2018by tara.dickson

I read this verse the other day and I was stuck. I couldn’t go on until I soaked in every bit of it’s life giving truth. “The Lord went ahead of them in a pillar of cloud to lead them on their way during the day and in a pillar of fire to give them […]

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How To Move Forward, When Life Feels Broken Beyond Repair.

Posted on April 9, 2018by tara.dickson

When my beloved husband went to Heaven at the age of 45, I felt like life as I knew it was over and I couldn’t imagine how to step forward. In fact, it felt like my own heart had stopped beating with his. But the ache didn’t lie. I was still here with four children […]

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Only in Dying Can We Live.

Posted on March 18, 2018by tara.dickson

Remember the parable of the sower? I remember hearing it for years and thinking, “ Well, I am a believer so I must have good soil in my heart.” That immediately ended anything good I could glean from hearing the Word and applying it to my heart. Beloved, as long as we are living it’s […]

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He Still Moves Stones

Posted on March 5, 2018March 6, 2018by tara.dickson

After a month or more of too many feelings and not enough words, I felt the Spirit’s excavating presence. We survived. We made it through the month of Alan’s birthday and home going. It was 2 years ago that we walked away from the cemetery and retreated to the beach, to walk the shores and […]

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Learning to Breathe Again.

Posted on January 24, 2018by tara.dickson

New beginnings and new seasons often begin with a new year. Just like clockwork ours did too. After a night of board games and egg nog, we found ourselves in a cold, sterile ER. What we thought was a stomach bug that was dehydrating my husband was a large mass pressing on his brain. While […]

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Before You Ring in the New Year!

Posted on December 29, 2017December 29, 2017by tara.dickson

I grabbed my stocking cap, pulling it snug over my ears and stepped outside. Pulling my gloves from my pocket I inhaled deeply. “There’s nothing like the crisp clean air of winter,” I thought. Still, the temperature had dropped and it took everything in me to brave the cold. Walking around the bend I passed […]

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It’s more than a day. I’ve always associated It’s more than a day.

I’ve always associated giving thanks with abundance. 
But I’ve learned that “thanksgiving” can happen anytime, and is probably most profound when it comes from a place of brokenness.

Not only does it carry a peculiar beauty, it carries power. I believe that power is a gift God wants to give to you today.

When my husband was diagnosed with aggressive brain cancer at the age of 45, then moved to Heaven just 14 months later, our hearts were shattered. 
But ..,,it was only seconds after he exhaled earth and inhaled Heaven that I experienced true thanksgiving in the midst of heartbreak. I remembered feeling it and marveling that the two could coexist.

When life gets hard and the way we envisioned it would always be ceases to exist, we have two choices. 
We can become bitter or we can press into the Father. We can hop back up on that potter’s wheel and say, “Fashion me into the vessel You want for Your glory.” 

It’s a choice we make, not one time but again and again.

I had actually been “practicing” giving thanks daily for the three years leading up to this massive change in our story. 

 The practice of noticing and giving thanks shifted my focus from the little things that used to rob me of my peace to all the tiny drops of grace the Lord would shower my days with.

When you begin practicing the presence of God, it opens up a whole new world of sight. It is this perspective, this seeing with new eyes, that allows you to walk by faith. 

What once was impossible is now the only way. 
The only way to move forward in joy is to give thanks with each step.

Cultivating a heart of thanksgiving is a process, but we have a good Gardener and the harvest is so worth it. 

I pray that the eyes of our hearts are enlightened to gratitude long after the day set aside to “give thanks.” 
Ask the Lord to help you notice some things today you may have formerly passed by, and give thanks for them. And if life finds you in a difficult place, you, too, can choose a sacrifice of praise.

“I will sacrifice a thank offering to you and call on the name of the LORD” (Psalm 116:17, NIV).
Save or share🙌🏻
In case you need to remember that His eyes are sti In case you need to remember that His eyes are still on you beloved…
Grief may blur your vision but it doesn’t blur his. 
His eyes are on you just like they are on the sparrow.
When life gets hard and it feels like one attack from the enemy after another, we may feel our vision blur. 
But this is when His Spirit whispers, “Eyes on me beloved. Lift up your eyes. Seek my face. Savor my presence. I’m there. Look for me.”
Begin to remember his# faithfulness. 
Find joy “in the midst of pain.”
See the evidence of God’s tender mercies. 

He lines the grief with unexpected moments of joy like a bird lines her nest with feathers from her own breast so the harsh sticks won’t harm her babies.

You are loved friends. You are so loved.

#lifeafterloss #nothingiswasted #hopeforthefuture #joycomesinthemorning #rejoicealways
Change. I’m smack dab in the middle of changin Change. 

I’m smack dab in the middle of changing out the room decor. 
A family wedding, early Christmas with my grand babies, all of these things are creeping up on me. 
Sitting in the dark morning lit only by Christmas and candle glow I’m alone. 

Nate’s upstairs getting ready for work for a few more weeks then He will walk out the door and only come back to “visit.” He will be a husband. 
Emma and her family are on vacation with Nick’s family this week. They have been living with me waiting for their house to be ready. 
They too will soon be leaving. 
There is change once again. 
It’s made me remember the biggest change we had to mold our hearts to.
I remember when Alan moved to Heaven, and then we moved 3 months later…
I longed for nothing more than things to STAY the same. 
I needed things to stay the same.
But Jake joined the military, Abbey and Adam heard God calling them to California and things kept on changing.
Take it from a girl who hasn’t seen anything stay the same for the last 7.5 years. 
Our comfort isn’t supposed to be found in things staying the same. 
It isn’t supposed to be found in “things” at all.
Our comfort comes from Immanuel, “God with us.” 
And while this didn’t start out to be some early “Christmas  post,” isn’t that what this season is about? 
A need in our hearts is uncovered maybe by change maybe by something else. 
We look up in the uncomfortable, in the longing and we remember even in the quiet and the dark we are not Alone. 
He is Immanuel. 
He is God with us. 
No matter where you find yourself today and in the days to come I pray the lights you see remind you of the Light of the World that came down for YOU. 
May He be your comfort and your joy. 
Because He lives .
Tara
From one traveler to another…❤️
“Let your gentle spirit be known to all men. The “Let your gentle spirit be known to all men. The Lord is near. “ 
Phil. 4:5

When I read this verse one day it just stuck in my heart. I love when God does that. It means He wants to teach me something. 

Those words are a simple command. Maybe they aren’t  always simple to do when we feel challenged or offended. 

But, I think it’s something we overlook. We don’t remember how being gentle on the daily truly can make a difference. 

Remember the verse, “A gentle answer turns away wrath”? 

Then those last four words…a sense of urgency,  that this can make a difference and we MUST be the ones to make a difference! 

“The Lord is near.”

I’m winding down this week remembering this truth, walking in gentleness, expressing it in the face of trials will remind me that God is near He has all that I need. 

It will remind others that mercy triumphs.
It may even be the balm needed in any situation you are facing. ❤️
Share or save to REMEMBER.
I miss him always. But especially in the fall. I I miss him always. 

But especially in the fall. It was our time.

He loved his family so well, giving and receiving love right to the end. 

Sometimes love is given to you poured out running over and sometimes it’s required of you. 

A pulling out of a reserve you didn’t know was there. 

Being loved by Alan was a gift and loving him in return was an even greater gift! 

Alan spent his life pouring into his kids. He chose time with them over more labor to accumulate wealth. 

He followed and participated in most every sport with them. 

He always worked hard but put his family first. 

He gave and gave and gave and then received the greatest gift. 

I will always be grateful I was chosen to be his wife. 

Sometimes beloved we just need to remember, how many ways the Father has been faithful. 

Looking back strengthens us. 
It reminds us of all the ways our God is an abundant God. 

Of course , I could count many ways I have seen heartache. So could you, but remembering and counting the gifts is what brings joy! 

And our strength comes from JOY! 

The joy of the Lord is our strength!
Share a “goodness of God,” you remember below! 
Tag a friend or share to stories. Let’s fill this space with JOY and stand in our Father’s strength! ❤️
#rememberme #liftupyoureyes #onethousandgifts #rejoicealways
I’m not sure where your heart is today beloved. I’m not sure where your heart is today beloved. 
Maybe you find yourself encountering those various trials 1 Peter talks about. 
Maybe you are waiting, praying, knocking and you find yourself growing weary. Hoping against all Hope can be hard. 
Or perhaps the overwhelming darkness that is swirling around in the world at large is pressing hard against your heart. 
These are the words God is comforting my heart with this morning. 
He is able, more than able.
“Where can I go from your Spirit Lord?
If I take the wings of dawn, 
If I dwell in the remotest parts of the sea,
Even there your hand will lead me.

If I say, surely the darkness will overwhelm me, 
And the light around me will be night,
Even the darkness is not dark to YOU. 
And the night is as bright as the day.
Darkness and light are alike to YOU. 
You have covered my head in the day of battle.
Behold Oh, Lord you know it all.”

I’m praying these excerpts from Ps. 139-140,
Will gird up your faith dear ones. 
May your heart remember that He knows and May that be enough. ❤️
Because He is still on the throne and that is enough. 
#peacethatsurpassesallunderstanding #liftupyoureyes #christourhope #rejoicealways #renewyourmind #graceupongrace #lightoverdarkness
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