{"id":1638,"date":"2016-06-14T23:34:00","date_gmt":"2016-06-15T03:34:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderjourneys\/?p=1638"},"modified":"2016-06-15T00:58:14","modified_gmt":"2016-06-15T04:58:14","slug":"stones-of-help-stones-of-fire","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderjourneys\/?p=1638","title":{"rendered":"Stones of Help, Stones of Fire"},"content":{"rendered":"

Today is my 52nd Birthday.<\/p>\n

Because 52 is such a cool number, and because there are 52 weeks in a year, I’m embarking on Project 52<\/a> — reflecting each week on one year of my life.<\/p>\n

I’ve also been thinking very much about Healing today.<\/p>\n

Ten years ago this summer was when I left Germany, utterly brokenhearted, and moved to Virginia.<\/p>\n

Now I am settling in — and I feel Healed. And that’s a wonderful thing.<\/p>\n

And I was thinking about I Samuel 7:12, where Samuel sets up a stone as a monument to God’s help. He names it “Ebenezer,” which means “Stone of Help,” and says, “Hitherto hath the Lord helped.”<\/p>\n

Today I planned to go to Great Falls, which I did, and pick up a stone to remind me of God’s help. I have some other stones. This one (actually I picked up two) is going to represent Healing.<\/p>\n

Here are the stones I chose along with some souvenir playing cards from places I loved. (I played some solitaire tonight using 52 cards at a time. It’s appropriate!)<\/p>\n

\"BirthdayStones\"<\/a><\/p>\n

But, rather more amazing — this morning I checked my doorstep (I’d forgotten to check last night), and there was a birthday package! It contained a gift from my generous friend Lauri Ann of beautiful opal earrings.<\/p>\n

Opals are special to me because one of my favorite books as a kid was a book written by missionary Isobel Kuhn called Stones of Fire<\/em>. In it, she compares a Lisu tribeswoman to a fire opal. She talks about how the colors of the opal come from pressure and brokenness.<\/p>\n

I love that thought. As I’m thinking about Healing — I declare that my healed broken heart is part of what makes me beautiful.<\/p>\n

So my Stones of Fire are also my Stones of Help. They speak to how far God has brought me — and that He has not only Healed me, He used those awful times to make me beautiful.<\/p>\n

Three years ago when I went to Great Falls on my birthday, the many great blue herons I saw represented Great Blue Herons of Happiness.<\/a><\/p>\n

This year, they were back!<\/p>\n

\"GreatBlueFalls1\"<\/a><\/p>\n

So the walk in great falls was about Healing and Happiness both.<\/p>\n

\"GreatBlueFalls2\"<\/a><\/p>\n

We got amazing views of many, many herons.<\/p>\n

\"GreatBlueFalls3\"<\/a><\/p>\n

And here I am modeling my Stones of Fire that represent Healing, with a Great Blue Heron of Happiness behind me.<\/p>\n

\"Opal\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Hitherto hath the Lord helped!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Today is my 52nd Birthday. Because 52 is such a cool number, and because there are 52 weeks in a year, I’m embarking on Project 52 — reflecting each week on one year of my life. I’ve also been thinking very much about Healing today. Ten years ago this summer was when I left Germany, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28,4,34,17,24,16,18],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1638","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-contentment","category-devotional-thoughts","category-gods-love","category-great-falls","category-joy","category-photos","category-waterfalls"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderjourneys\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1638","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderjourneys\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderjourneys\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderjourneys\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderjourneys\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1638"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderjourneys\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1638\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderjourneys\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1638"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderjourneys\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1638"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderjourneys\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1638"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}