A Sunday with Many Blessings

We made it to our local church for liturgy this morning.

The kind elderly gentleman was back in church,

he is still looking for a new home and we need to keep praying...

***

Had a nice lunch at home...

And lovely black tea with milk!

And Mr Husband listened to the first CD and some of the
second CD of the Tolkien Ensemble that

Gretchen Joanna blogged about last year

and OH! it's so very lovely!!!

Some of the first songs sing of such joy

that must be at the true centre of things,

of all the good, all that is of God,

the joy, the hope, the wonder that children have

and that adults often forget that they can

have, at least in part, if only a scent that makes

the heart rise and the hope within fly to the

surface, seeing everything with a sudden

dew grassed wonder of drops that look like crystal

of green lands with fresh breezes of life,

of fragrances that breath life into everything...

Mr Husband and I talked about it,

how this joy, this sense of delight,

it cannot be bought or even sought for itself

but only awakened or remembered, as if 

waking up from a bad dream or an adult life

of dreary day grey days to find that

there is this patch of sunshine that is making 

everything light up with this joy

that is suffusing everything,

that which children glimpse or even see

but that we forget is really there...

***

I told Mr Husband about a woman I knew years ago 

who years before that had this incredible experience in 

Church, I think it was an experience of God's love,

and afterwards, she saw later, she was trying to 

recreate the experience and in so searching for the

experience itself (and not God who gives it),

she ended up in a very bad way,

with deep troubles

because of how she was trying to fill her life up

with what she once experienced...

***

So these times, we must remember them

and rejoice in such music that can suddenly awaken the

memory of the joy that is still part of God's reality,

we must not seek the experience but the one who

the experience is from and is in...

This came up because Mr Husband was telling me about

Tolkien's book the Silmarillion and how the jewels that are so 

beautiful in it are sought and by so doing destroy the seekers... 

***

Anyway, after this our far-away church priest came and it was 

wonderful, we have the short unction service with anointing for healing

and then the blessing of our home! 

With Holy Water splashed everywhere (my sewing machine,

with cover on, was blessed too!) and my Christmas tree and lights shining,

and then we walked over to our dear friends house 

and their house was blessed

and then we had such a lovely meal,

so delicious!

My pie was good, but it got quite watery,

I need to figure out why.

I am not sure but thankfully it still tasted quite good! 

And Trader Joe's French Vanilla Ice Cream added

that last bit of deliciousness! 

***

And so it was all so lovely

and hard to have end, as we love 

seeing friends so much...

***

Our home, when we return to it newly blessed,

always seems not only so clean but new, 

like we just had Christmas and our home is happy

and clean in a way that only can come by 

prayer and blessing... 

***

Our friends young daughter did her prayers

and thanked God for the Father-priest and his blessings, and for 

the Matushka (priest-wife) and then for Mr and Mrs Husband and

Mrs Husband's (my) hair (which newly washed was curly and long).

Isn't that the cutest thing?!

***

Our home, when we return to it newly blessed,

always seems not only so clean but new, 

like we just had Christmas and our home is happy

and clean in a way that only can come by 

prayer and blessing... 

***

Tomorrow I hope to go with Mr Husband to NYC,

he back to doctor, I doing errands.

We are hoping that Mr Husband is on a 

healing trajectory.

Thank you everyone for your comments about

asthma, etc, they have been truly most helpful and kind,

thank you!

And thank you everyone for your kind comments and prayers!!!