On October 10th, the first anniversary of his death, we buried my late husband's ashes at the Cataraqui Cemetery in Kingston, Ontario, Canada. Ernie was buried on top of his mother's grave, with the gravestone marker noting "Beloved Son and Husband". I have made the legal arrangement to be buried on top of the grave of his father, who proudly gave me away at our wedding because I had no earthly father.

Making these burial arrangements has had a huge spiritual impact on me. There's the obvious relief of having legal problems solved. More so, however, this process has made me very aware of the responsibility I feel to live a life that honours the lives of this extremely devout Mennonite family who, having escaped the Russian revolution themselves, took this scarred woman with a history into their family. My generation grew up where their name was often all that a family had. Today our Western culture seems to have lost the importance of this truth:

Proverbs 22:1 – A good name is more desirable than great riches; to be esteemed is better than silver and gold. (NIV)

Having made the decision to have my earthly body lie in death with this godly family, I'm feeling that by bearing their family name, it behoves me to conduct my Christian life in such a way that, when I die, my earthly life will have been worthy of being buried above these people, until Jesus comes to claim our earthly bodies.

Even more than that, however, as Christians, our motivation should be to live lives worthy of the calling that Jesus Christ laid upon us when He saved us from our sins, and set us free to live for Him in an eternal relationship with His Father.

Colossians 1:9b-10 – We continually ask God to fill you with the knowledge of his will through all the wisdom and understanding that the Spirit gives, so that you may live a life worthy of the Lord and please him in every way: bearing fruit in every good work, growing in the knowledge of God. (NIV 2011)

Prayer: Father God, in the name of Your Son Jesus, thank You for people who have the heart and means to take wounded people into their homes, and in doing so, provide them with a safe haven in which to heal. May we all live lives that are a credit to You, for we are all ambassadors for Christ, representing Him within our circle of influence. Amen.

Shortly after I became a Christian, I read that addicts in a rehab centre were each handed a brown paper "God Bag", with a prayer pasted on the outside. This bag was intended for the person to write out a note to God, turning their sins and problems over to Him.

I really liked the idea and incorporated it into my new faith. After a while, though, I didn't much like having this old brown paper bag hanging around where it often got misplaced. I decided to replace the bag with a jar. I wasn't even sure just what this jar would look like, but prayed that God would help me find what would work for me. I found a perfect, hexagonal, smoked glass jar with a plastic-rimmed lid. Being a perfectionist, I got perfectly square small notepaper, then typed out this poem and taped it to the jar:

As children bring their broken toys with tears for us to mend,
I brought my broken dreams to God, because He is my friend.
But then, instead of leaving Him in peace to work alone,
I hung around and tried to help with ways that were my own.
At last, I snatched them back and cried, "How can You be so slow?"
"My child," He said, "what could I do? You never did let go."
       Lauretta P. Burns

As the following will attest, I often didn't write until I'd exhausted all my human efforts to do it on my own. One of my first notes to God was as follows:

Father, I am praying for Ernie to stop smoking. He seems to be seriously considering the move but, I believe, is waiting because of the withdrawal symptoms and how it affects him, me, and our marriage. Please, Lord, take away his fear and give him the courage to take this step. I have nagged him and brought our relationship to the brink with my nagging, so in total humility, Father, I am turning the problem over to You because I can do nothing about it. In Jesus' name. I love You. Evonne

I didn't tell Ernie that I'd turned his smoking over to God. Three weeks later, he came to me and said, "I'm thinking of giving up smoking"! After 45 years of smoking four packs of 25 cigarettes a day, God did what some would consider impossible: Ernie quit smoking, and never again had a craving or smoked during the 25 years before he died.

When we find that we are not in control of a situation, the best thing that we can do is to trust that God is in control, and then to let go and let God, Who has a perfect plan for our lives.

Prayer: Father God, thank You that You have everything under control and that nothing takes You by surprise. Forgive us when we disappoint You by trying to do everything on our own before asking You for help. In the name of Jesus, we pray. Amen.

When I started writing devotionals again last December, I went through emotional agony at the thought of my dysfunctional life hanging out there naked in cyberworld for all to see.

I had felt led by God to write these devotionals. When I tried to ignore His nudges to write my thoughts down, the hound of heaven kept at me until finally, in frustration, I'd give in, just to get Him off my back. I'd often send the devotionals to our editor, Robin Ross, and then write him back to say that I couldn't go through with it. All I wanted to do was to close my door, shut off my computer, and be left alone with my pain, grief, and anonymity. Despite my pleas and prayers to God to help me, there was only silence. I should have known that He was up to something!

The whole mess came to a head one morning just after I'd written the devotional, "In Search Of My Roots". I had wakened feeling fragile, and as I stood in the kitchen making my breakfast, God's message literally convicted me as I distinctly heard Him say, "This is not your life. When you gave your life to Me as you were on your way home to commit suicide, it no longer belonged to you. Your life as it was, and is, no longer belongs to you — not even your life events before you met Me. I kept you safe during that time, and now it's time to use it to help others." Feeling shaken and awed at what had just occurred, I took my bowl of oatmeal and sat in front of my computer to read my e-mails. As if what I'd just been through wasn't awesome enough, there was an e-mail from Robin with the words, "That's because so many people can identify with your struggles. That's why God is urging you to write. Be encouraged! You can do this!"

Since the results of my sharing are no longer up to me, I'm thinking that I should just hang a sign around my neck that says "under permanent construction" and comfort myself with the Scripture, "Anyone who does not take his cross and follow me is not worthy of me. Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it." (Matthew 10:38-39 NIV)

Have you ever considered that since you gave your life to Christ, it no longer belongs to you? You are not your own!

1 Corinthians 6:19-20 – Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own; you were bought at a price. Therefore honour God with your body. (NIV)

Galatians 2:20 – I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I now live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. (NIV)

Prayer: Father God, in the name of Jesus, forgive us when we have human feelings and think it's all about us. Forgive us when we forget that You have us here on earth only to further Your kingdom. Lord Jesus, we pray for the people who will read these words, that they may know that You care enough to assure them that they are not alone in their pain. Amen.

My childhood was difficult and excruciatingly painful, to put it mildly. My older siblings often taunted me by saying that I didn't belong in their family. My mother confirmed this by telling me that the father of me and my younger brother was not the same person that she was married to, but she wouldn't say who. This brother drowned as a teen, so I grew up alone, not knowing just who my father was, while my siblings refused to give any information. Without any resolution of my parentage, it was especially problematic for me, medically.

In March, 1988, I was on my way home on a cold, wintry day to commit suicide, when the world stopped around me. No traffic came down that busy street, and I stood frozen to the ground as Jesus tried to talk me out of killing myself. As a result of that encounter with Jesus, I became a child of God.

After I was saved, Psalm 139 comforted me when I realized that God doesn't make junk, and that despite my not knowing my parentage, He knew me "in my mother's womb" as I was "made in the secret place". In his 1963 book, The miracle of dialogue, the author, Reuel L. Howe, describes how, when we refer to God as our Father, it is innate in us to inter-relate the term to our own earthly fathers. Over time, I came to understand just how blessed I was not to know an earthly father, for in God, I now had a perfect Father, the only Father I would ever need. He is a Father Who will never leave us nor forsake us.

Hebrews 13:5b – God has said, "Never will I leave you; never will I forsake you." (NIV)

Prayer: Father God, in the name of Your Son Jesus, thank You for being the only Father we will ever need, the kind of Father we wish we could have had. Help us to accept that our earthly fathers are both fallible and mortal. Thank You for Your promise of eternity with You in heaven. Amen.

In the late afternoon of October 10, 2013, my husband Ernie went to live in heaven –- and I went to live in another country — a country called Grief. No one wants to visit this country, let alone live there. I had no idea that the move to this country would cause such an upheaval in my life, be so painful, and seem like it would never end. As a citizen of Grief, I thought that I would be able to move back to where I'd lived before, any time I wanted. Not!

For months, I had these thoughts: "What makes you think that you're strong enough to live on your own?" Or "How are you going to live now that you have no money?" Or "The phone isn't ringing — no one cares about you." Or "You have no family or money, so you're going to end up a lonely, old bag lady." Then the biggest of all: "Why don't you just go off the balcony and end it all? Then you won't be in Grief anymore or have to endure all these health problems that have happened since Ernie died." On and on it went.

We can't escape life without knowing people who live in Grief. I had, however, never heard anyone who lived in Grief share that they had suffered from the attacks of Satan. So it came as a shock one night, as I was writing the above thoughts in my journal, to become aware that this was happening to me, when God gently whispered to me the source of my agony. As soon as I realized this, I knelt in prayer to ask for God's protection, and, in His mercy, immediately these horrible thoughts stopped.

The attacks have not totally gone away but, thanks be to God, I now know to banish Satan from my mind and turn to the One Who promises never to leave us or forsake us. I am still in Grief, but in my weakness, I have learned to trust Him more. In turn, He has provided me with His peace, the peace that passes all understanding.

Perhaps God allows us to live in Grief and suffer Satan's attacks so that we will be equipped to minister to others who live there, and let them know that they can pray for God's protection.

Zechariah 3:2a – And the Lord said to Satan, "I, the Lord, reject your accusations, Satan. Yes, the Lord, who has chosen Jerusalem, rebukes you." (NLT)

Prayer: Father God, forgive us when we do not bring our problems to the foot of Your throne. Help us to remember that You are the merciful Comforter, and that You love us and care about every detail of our life. In the name of Jesus, we pray. Amen.

Ernie, my husband of 37 years, died on October 10th. As we gathered in the sanctuary of St. Paul's Presbyterian Church, in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada, on October 19th to celebrate Ernie's life with a memorial service, there was a small Christmas tree sitting on a short table on the platform. Many wondered why it was there until I got up during the service to share some of Ernie's life, which included the story of our Christmas tree.

For years, each Christmas, we have put a small Christmas tree on top of the armoire in our bedroom. Ernie, who had been given two months to live in January of 2011, now spent most of his time in our bedroom. After Christmas last year, I suggested to Ernie that he might like to keep it there all the time, as he often slept with the tree lights on all night. This little 16-inch tree, with its small stuffed birds and other miniature decorations, has two strings of the old kind of miniature lights, all of which go out if one bulb burns out. With God's grace, the top string has never burnt out, but over the year, one by one, bulbs on the bottom string of the tree lights burned out and had to be replaced, until by summer, there were no spares left. I thought of putting a notice downstairs in our apartment building, but, sadly, I did not think to ask God to send me some — but God is good.

One Monday morning last June, I was taking some old clothes to a local Bibles For Missions thrift store. As I went to the back door, I glanced at the stuff that had been left over the weekend and noticed a grocery bag containing Christmas tree lights! There I was, dancing around the parking lot, hands in the air, praising God for His awesome gift! Over the summer, the bottom string burnt out repeatedly and was replaced four or five times, until there was only one string left, which was in an unopened box. That last string continued to burn brightly through Ernie's last days. The little tree went with him for the last four days of his life in the Embassy West Hospice and shone brightly as Ernie, after nearly three years with pulmonary fibrosis and three heart attacks, ascended into heaven to meet his Lord and Saviour, Jesus, in the late afternoon of October 10th. That little tree, lit with its bright lights, stood on the platform of the sanctuary as we gathered on October 19th to celebrate Ernie's life.

Strangely, last weekend, I put up Ernie's tree in my bedroom and plugged it in — nothing. Both of the strings of lights on the tree were burned out!

I've felt nudged lately by the Holy Spirit to share this Christmas tree story about the goodness of God, His faithfulness, and how He gives us gifts without our even praying for them. Even in the poignancy of death, God grants us little touches of His love to soften the blow and let us know that He cares. "Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of his faithful servants." (Psalm 116:15 NIV)

Prayer: Father, in the name of Your Son, Jesus, we praise and thank You for the life of Your faithful servants who have passed to their reward, and for Your promise to us who believe, that we will spend eternity with You. Help us to live each day as if it were our last. As we enter the season of Advent, guide us in our preparations to celebrate the birth of Your Son, Jesus, who died that we may have eternal life. Help us each to remember that Jesus is the reason for the season. Amen.

Recently we'd been in our apartment for a couple of days during a heat wave (smog advisory, humidex advisory, heat emergency), so we decided to go out in the air-conditioned car to do a couple of errands. As we stood in front of the elevator, I had this "nudge" to take a sun hat and change from my sandals to runners.

I usually try to heed these nudges from the Lord, but sometimes I'm in a hurry, they're contrary to my plans, or they just don't make sense to my mere mortal mind. This time, the heat in the hallway was stifling, and I was in a hurry. I justified not heeding the nudge because we were going to a mall, and I would just be dashing from the car to the mall's air conditioning — or so I thought.

On the way home, the car's engine started making an unusual noise, and, within another block, thick smoke started pouring out from under the hood and out of the exhaust pipe. We quickly found a quiet side street to pull into, and, with a sigh of relief and prayers for safety, stopped the car. The smoke had stopped, but all the fan belts were burnt. We'd blown a water pump. From our cell phone we called the Canadian Automobile Association for a tow truck, and were told the wait would be long.

A few minutes later, a city traffic control officer came along in his car and suggested we move the car out of the blind corner where we were parked. We demurred, but he insisted, and offered to help us push the car. Up until then, not one car had turned into this "quiet" street. He helped us push the car half onto the sidewalk. We thanked him, and he left, while we continued to wait. Since we weren't that far from home, we decided that I would walk, so off I started, in all that heat and humidity. I prayed all the way home that He would keep both of us safe. I also asked God for forgiveness for not listening to His nudge to take a hat and change my shoes.

As for my husband, the tow truck arrived shortly after I left, but, before it did, a school bus full of people roared around the blind corner of that "quiet" street where our car had been just a few short minutes before. I shudder to think what would have happened if God had not sent that traffic officer.

Let us always be mindful that we need to be still and listen for God, who speaks to us in the events of our lives and the lives of those we come into contact with.

Prayer: Forgive us, Lord, when we do not listen to Your quiet, still voice, even though we know that You love us enough to be interested in the "small" events of our lives. We ask You to keep our inner spirit at peace so we will be in a space to hear You when You speak to us. Amen.