Today I awoke with the realization that God has blessed me with the beginnings of another year on this beautiful earth. It is a blessing to be alive and I am aware that God has entrusted me a precious gift: Life.
Many family members and friends have already lived out the days God gifted them. Today, they are in eternity. Yet I am still here. Surely God intends for me to not only be aware of the gift of life, but to embrace it and experience it fully.
For the beginning day of the last year of my 4th decade, I pray:
- To be aware every day of the gift of waking up to experience life
- To be grateful for the husband, children, parents, siblings, and family members God has chosen for me
- To be a gracious friend to those who grace my life with their presence and their trust
- To make each moment of the coming year count; to be aware that moments matter and fill them with purposeful actions
- To be alert to the beauty around me: in nature, in the faces of strangers, in the words on written pages, in the touches and embraces of those I love
- To give more of me than I’ve ever given to relationships in my life
- To invest financially in ways that make eternal differences
- To give more time and energy to the ministries and causes I love
- To cherish the children in my life, those I birthed and those who God allows me to influence
- To be mindful that I am honored to have my parents alive on yet another birthday
- To bless each person that crosses my path with kindness and the love of Jesus
- To use the gifts God granted to me in ways that impact the world
- To take each encounter with another human being as a gift and bless those who cross my path with a kind word, a smile, an affirmation that their life matters
- To proclaim the goodness of the Lord
- To write more often about the impressions of my heart
- To awake on my next birthday with gratitude for a full year, lived intentionally
Here are a few photos of some of my favorite people and things on this my special day!
I could never fully express how this little boy has healed my heart on so many levels and in so many ways. He truly is God’s human touch in my life.
Photograph Credit: Michelle Delgado
Writer in the Window @ The Paris Market in Savannah, GA
Typically English
The English Countryside
So much like his daddy!
With all my heart,
Renee Parris
Hear My Heartbeat 