This coffee shop is in Stony Brook, N.Y. and at Christmas time children decorate the trees put outside for them. Mostly girl scouts troops and the like. It's nice to walk around and look at each one. Yesterday it was 49 degrees in N.Y. ! For January, that has got to be a new record.

My daughter Rachel is home until Sunday, so I am taking every moment to be with her. Nothing too exciting, regular errands and a few outings like that. She works in the Chicago court system on her way to being an attorney. Life around here is very slow paced compared to what she is used to. It's good for her to be here, where she grew up.

Having a grown child who lives in another city is challenging. I pray, trust God for her life, and know that He is working in her a far greater work than anything I could imagine! Do I miss her, of course! But again I'm trusting God to do what I have been praying for all her life, that she will be all that she can be for His honor and glory.

"Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways submit to Him, and he will make your paths straight."  {Proverbs 3:5-6 NIV}

We don't like that word, submit, but please remember we are not referring to any person here, but to the Lord God Almighty who is faithful and true, and loves us with an everlasting love.  He is not a man, who will lie, and deceive, NO, this is the one who formed you out of dust, and gave you your own individual looks, abilities, and strengths. Any time He wants to help me to be more like Hm, I want to obey.

Lord, help me to say yes, when you want to kill the fleshy part of me that gets in your way. I know my sisters who are reading this want to obey you too. BY your Holy Spirit, we can live a life that is far greater than our own lifeless ways. You fill us to overflowing so that we can give a drink to those who are weary along the way. Amen.