It is good to make plans, set goals and dream dreams, but life has a way of handing us the unplanned.  Many of us could never have envisioned being where we now find ourselves.  A diagnosis, a disease, a death, a divorce, a disappointment, a disaster, and yes, there are many more unplanned events that throw us into changed plans and unchartered waters.  We find ourselves picking up the pieces of that for which we had given our lives.  We nurse wounds, carry scars and bear heavy emotional loads.  Know this: God loves us.  He is for us.  He, who makes flowers and fruit grow from decaying compost and dung, will make us beautiful and fruitful.

“He has sent me…To console those who mourn in Zion, To give them beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness; that they may be called trees of righteousness, the planting of the LORD, that He may be glorified.” Isaiah 61:1c, 3 (NKJV)

You are reading from the book, “Captives of Love”, by H. Lamar Smith