Grace Notes

Freefall to Fly:  A Breathtaking Journey Toward a Life of Meaning by:  Rebekah Lyons Tyndale House Publishers, Inc. Copyright 2013 Freefall to Fly is a raw, emotional, honest look at what happens when you let go and let God take control.  How do you find the meaning and purpose in your life, or is life wrapped up in your family and day to day responsibilities?    Over the course of two years Rebekah Lyons dealt with panic attacks and had to face the reasons of why she was having them.  For a season they stopped, and then they returned.  What was the cause?  She had a fear of mental illness, because her father was debilitated and in assisted living because of all the drugs he had been prescribed over the years to deal with his own mental illness.  Rebekah discovered that her panic attacks stemmed from the fear of letting go.  Not willing and not knowing how to turn complete control of her life over to God.   Rebekah tells how the short online documentary Boatlift: An Unto

Dandelions on the Wind By:  Mona Hodgson WaterBrook Press Maren came to America from Denmark as a mail order bride, right at the beginning of the American Civil War.  Her intended was a friend of her family, and she felt safe in knowing she would be cared for and would have the opportunity to bring her remaining family to America once she was married.  However, no one counted on the fact that Maren is going blind.  A wife who has difficulties seeing is not what her groom had intended, so he escapes to the war.  Maren takes various jobs, but eventually settles in with a grandmother raising her four year old granddaughter, Gabi, alone.  The girl's mother had died during childbirth, and the death of his beloved wife was more than Rutherford, otherwise known as "Woolly", could take.  So like Maren's intended, he joined the war and has not seen his daughter or his mother-in-law since the day of Gabi's birth. The war is now over and soldiers are coming

       

Tuesday morning I listened to a great story on Troy Public Radio entitled " He Helped Discover Evolution, and Then Became Extinct ", a story about Alfred Russell Wallace.  I have an insatiable curiosity and love hearing about nature and new things, so I listened with interest, although caution. One comment in particular caught my attention:  By 1855, Wallace had come to the conclusion that living things evolve. But he didn't figure out how until one night three years later. He was on the island of Halmahera, ill with a fever, when it came to him: Animals evolve by adapting to their environment. While I believe that plants and animals can adapt to their environments, I firmly believe this is limited to the characteristics God has given to the plant or animal.  As a Christian I wanted to yell out, questioning them as to why God couldn't have just made these creatures this way, specifically for this area of the world. It's good to get the opinions and belief