Amazing Grace

First of all, I am sorry it has been so long since I've blogged.  Life was pretty crazy here for a while as I'm sure you can relate.

As you know my life was pretty much consumed by my job from February 25th (my old boss's last day) until this week.  Our new CFO started on April 4th and has jumped in with both feet.  I am very happy to report that I had zero overtime this week and I am so excited about that!  There was always a part of me that wondered what it would be like to have a bigger career and executive status.  Well, that was a great way to "try it on for size" and I learned a very valuable lesson.  I don't want to be a CFO and I never want my career to come before my family on that level.  I am very happy being a financial accountant and I wouldn't mind being controller, but that's all the higher I want to go on the corporate ladder.  We have a really great team going at work right now and I'm enjoying it.

Enough about work and on to amazing grace.  In the middle of my work issue, my last grandparent passed away on March 20th.  Grandma Krause was 97 amazing years old.  She still lived on her own and was in great health except for extreme macular degeneration in her eyes.  She had a weak heart valve and was a two time breast cancer survivor.  Like I said, amazing.  She was in the hospital that weekend for a pulled muscle in her back.  That's what they were calling it because all her health tests came back great.  She was going to go to a nursing home temporarily for rehab before going back to her apartment.  The nurses found her Sunday morning not breathing.  Her heart just quit.  We'll never know if it really was a heart attack, or if the cancer had come back somewhere, but at 97 years old does it really matter?  She lived a complete, full life and taught her family a lot. 

Great-Grandma Krause, Jenna and Tori



Great-Grandma Krause, Jenna, Uriah & Tori
Thanksgiving 2010

So we had an unscheduled trip to Wisconsin for the first week of spring this year.  It was a whirlwind week.  We helped my sister and husband clean out Grandma's apartment, planned the funeral (although Grandma had most of it planned already) and otherwise just looked at each other wondering what we were going to do without Grandma.  It was really nice spending time with all our family, but it was a hard week.  Grandma's minister had a wonderful funeral service and we enjoyed putting together a picture board of Grandma's life (even though we joked the whole time about how she would hate us doing that as she avoided getting her picture taken at all costs and we even thought she might have had something to do with the foot of snow that fell the day before her funeral).  During the funeral service we sang the hymn "Amazing Grace".  That's when I really broke down.  I sat there crying as everyone else was singing "I once was lost, but now am found.  Was blind, but now I see".  I can't even explain how much I'm going to miss her. 

Flash forward to a week later at our ecumenical lenton service held at the methodist church in town.  We've been doing a bible study during lent about the blessing of the cross.  That week we talked about the blessings of blindness.  At the close of the service we sang "Amazing Grace", stood in a circle and lit candles.  It really struck me that I was singing "Amazing Grace" twice in one week under two very different circumstances.  Isn't God's grace truly amazing?

May you have a blessed Easter season!

Reviews, a Giveaway, and taking a dive!

So I know it's been a few weeks since I posted and I have a bunch of reviews and "life" to post so tonight I thought I'd "dive" in.

First, a giveaway!!!!  Tyndale House Publishers has given me a certificate for a FREE Life Application Study Bible, NLT.  This is my first giveaway on my blog and I am so excited.  I know a lot of bloggers leave the giveaway until the end of their posts, but I'm just too excited to keep it to myself any longer. :)  Leave a comment on this post and tell me what your favorite bible verse or story is.  I'll pick a random comment Sunday night, March 6th, and you will win a new study bible in time for Lent.  Isn't that exciting??

And now for my "dive".  There are so many life stories to tell about the last 3 weeks, but the "Wow God" moment that stands out the most to me happened on my way work yesterday morning.  To give you a little back story, my boss at work gave his two weeks notice and last Friday was his last day.  He is greatly missed and more than a few people tried to talk him into staying.  It was a very hard choice for him, but he needed to be closer to his family and we all understand. On Friday it became apparant to me that I would be responsible for a lot of his duties in the interim period.  Now I should tell you that my boss was the CFO and the company had $250+ million in revenue last year and I found out I would be monitoring the cash accounts among other things starting Monday.  Needless to say I had some butterflies driving to work yesterday morning!  It wasn't that I doubted my abilities, but I was nervous with everything seemingly piled on me at the last minute and I didn't want to make a mistake.   So there I was driving along listening to LIFE 101.9 when this song by Steven Curtis Chapman came on.  I LOVE the song and immediately started singing along and then I realized what I was singing.  Here are the lyrics:

Dive by Steven Curtis Chapman

The long awaited rains

Have fallen hard upon the thirsty ground

And carved their way to where

The wild and rushing river can be found

And like the rains

I have been carried here to where the river flows, yeah

My heart is racing and my knees are weak

As I walk to the edge

I know there is no turning back

Once my feet have left the ledge

And in the rush I hear a voice

That’s telling me it’s time

to take the leap of faith

So here I go

I’m diving in, I’m going deep

in over my head, I want to be

Caught in the rush, lost in the flow,

in over my head, I want to go

The river’s deep, the river’s wide,

the river’s water is alive

So sink or swim, I’m diving in

There is a supernatural power

In this mighty river’s flow

It can bring the dead to life

And it can fill an empty soul

And give a heart the only thing

Worth living and worth dying for, yeah

But we will never know the awesome power

Of the grace of God

Until we let ourselves get swept away

Into this holy flood

So if you’ll take my hand

We’ll close our eyes and count to three

And take the leap of faith

Come on let’s go

I really felt like I was in over my head at work, but after I heard this song I knew everything was going to be ok.  God was watching out for me and I knew that even if I made a mistake at work I'm still a child of God and Jesus loves me no matter what!  You know what?  I made it through the first two days just fine even with more surprises. :-) 

I wish you "Wow God" moments in your week, too!

Don't forget to leave a comment here for your chance to win a new bible!