Love in the Margins, from Mum

A few years ago, my son Ian and I traveled to Atlanta, and during our visit we had the opportunity to attend services at Dr. Charles Stanley’s First Baptist Church of Atlanta. I won’t forget the sound I heard when he directed us to open our Bibles to a specific scripture. All we could hear in that church was the sound of pages turning. Ian and I just looked at each other wide-eyed in amazement.

I took several notes while I was there, and last night while thumbing through and cleaning up my cell phone, I came across them. Just for fun, here are the notes I took from Dr. Charles Stanely:

If God has assigned you, He will find you.
There is always a gap of time between the anointing & the appointing.
Those marked by God do not need the world to market them.
We must remember to pause before God and be quiet before making any decisions. Psalm 46:1-4,10
You will never be in a predicament that God does not already have the perfect plan for.
Don’t just read the Word, LISTEN to the Word.
If you are living in sin, you are living in disobedience.
Listening to people and not God will only get you into trouble.
What is it that you cannot do if God calls you to do something?
God is not a failure, and God does not create failures.
David encouraged himself, and look at his history!

And last but not least, my favorite – You cannot re-write history. But! You can write it in the margins of your Bible to pass on to your grandchildren. What a treasure for them that will be some day!

I seemed to have found these notes at just the right time, too. Cleaning up old files recently, I’ve come across some old but cherished recipes, so I’m attempting to record them here in my blog one at a time, but to continue cherishing the hand-written ones as well, tucking them back to mark the pages of my favorite scriptures. And I’m even writing little notes to my children and grandchildren.

There’s just something about getting older that makes me want to be sure my kids remember the little things that matter – things like Papa’s humming fiddle tunes in the kitchen, tapping his foot, and “tuning” while bouncing them on his knee. Things like recipes that have been passed down generation after generation, and nick names for our family members, the fireflies behind Uncle Harry’s house, the wild raspberries in the Ohio in Antigonish, and Aunt Gertie’s infectious giggle.

This particular recipe for butter tarts came from Aunt Joanie. I use it as a page marker in my Bible, the same Bible I hope to pass down to my grandchildren some day. I hope they’ll be excited. I hope we get to make memories that they can remember when they see MY handwriting in the margins, recording birthdays, or writing prayers for them….