Jesus is The Melody of my Heart

For some reason today, I've been thinking of a special loved one.  

My Grandma Maime who went home to be with the Lord in Jan 1990.  We would take trips to see her in Tennessee when I was very young and I remember, when one of us grand kids would sin (be mean to one another, call each other names, etc.,) she used to say, "Now stop being ugly."  The "ugly" referring to our "sin" not how we looked.  I have never forgotten it.  Try it on your kids sometime and watch them do a "Kodak Moment" double take!

She and I were close, but mostly from my early teens until my mid 20's, mostly through cards, letters and little gifts we would send each other like little knick knacks that had been hers, which meant the world, all my children's Christmas Stockings which she crochet herself, and I would send regular photos, and specially framed photos of the babies and more as they grew.  I would send her flowers just for no reason on occasion to show her how much she meant to me and we just had the best relationship.  We talked on the phone over the years as much as we could afford, or she would call me on my birthdays and such.  But as she got older, it got less and less, but I always kept her in  my prayers because she told me once during one of those phone calls when she was getting towards her mid 70's that she had prayed for me every day of my life and that she wouldn't stop until the Lord called her home!  That thought, hearing her say it....will bless me till the day I am called to go and be with Jesus.  I'm sure she'll be the first one there to greet me with that "Hello there Darlin. Now come give me some suga!"  She had the most calming and assuring voice. 

When she passed away, I felt like I'd lost my best friend, and still do.  She was a faithful Christian and once on one of our trips when I was little,  I went to church with her.  After church, she showed me the church's garden and taught me how to smell the roses without getting pricked by a thorn.  She talked about how I should always be thankful for the Garden's because God lives in each one!  I think the "ugly" we are seeing around us today would make her glad to be at home with the Lord, for the flowers are still blooming and beautiful, but the people in the midst of those beautiful gardens are rotting in sin worse than ever and they are hurting, maiming,, murdering, stealing the innocence of children and the list goes on, and oh...how she would grieve and pray for the lost and the horrible "ugliness" they were perpetrating against others.

God Bless you Grandma Maimie!  I know you're watching & listening in one of God's many beautiful Garden's in heaven.  You are one of the most precious gifts God ever gave me which I thank Him for on a regular basis, for without your prayers for me all my life,  I might not even be alive right now if not for your faithful prayers and while I may have been born and raised in California it feels so much like I was born and raised in Tennessee and I think that is because of you! 

You were and still are the most faithful Christian woman I feel that I will ever know and I think of you very often.  This one is just for you.

I love & miss you dearly.