Fruit of My Spirit Reframing Life in God's Grace

From the moment I began reading the preface of Fruit of My Spirit I chuckled; here was a writer I related to; a real person, close to my age, who responded to life like anyone else, her words not spiritually sugar coated: “I’m impatient whenever life has the audacity to thwart my plans. I get frustrated whenever life presents a detour or a hurdle.” Oh yeah…Amen sister, preach it!

Deanna Nowadnick’s memories of love, marriage, family, her childhood, her teen years and adulthood are down to earth, sometimes funny even embarrassing and I know that many people will be helped by her way of seeing Gods hand in even the most trying times. Her book helped me, and that’s a miracle because I’ve been in the midst of one of the hardest years of my life. It made me happy to start each day, these last 2 weeks, reading a chapter. It was good to look at my circumstances in a different light.

As Christians, Deanna reminds us that to be a Christian doesn’t mean we are perfect, and perfection doesn’t matter because God loves us just the way we are, in spite of our short comings. Anyone who is not a Christian will read her memoir and get insight into those “not so perfect” relatives that keep bugging them to go to church. The thing is, we didn’t just “arrive” in holiness when we said yes to Jesus—we arrive when we enter heaven, all else is the time we spend preparing to be ready, and sharing the love of God. I’m giving five stars to this little book (90 pages) with hope that you will pick one up and let God’s grace touch you through her message. Hurry now, go read Galatians 5:22-23 and find out about the fruit of the Spirit.

*Here's a special note to Deanna...We didn't need to watch Survivor on TV, we survived Blue Birds and Campfire girls... I don't "Do" camping either. Our joke is "my idea of camping is a room in the Holiday Inn in a sleeping bag." ;-)

here's a link to Deanna Nowadnick's Fruit of My Spirit
http://www.amazon.com/Fruit-My-Spirit-Deanna-Nowadnick/dp/0983589720/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1343426450&sr=1-1&keywords=fruit+of+my+spirit

Saint Paul

Catholics around the world are celebrating the life of Paul for the next year, starting June 29, 2008 to June 29, 2009. It is a time of reflection and study on his many writings. He wrote one of my favorite scriptures, well really many of them, but this one is special to me.
"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."
Gal 2:20
In December 1981 I was in a hotel room with two men, I was loaded and had been up for a few days, and I was sick but didn't know it; for my body it was the perfect storm. I overdosed and the two men, who had been fighting with each other, walked out leaving me alone. For years I had tried to change my life, to stop doing drugs by using will power, cults the occult, my mind and anything new I heard about. Nothing worked for very long, and that day I knew I was going to die. But Jesus met me right there, in the hotel room when I couldn't breathe when I felt like my heart was going to explode in my chest and He gave me his breath and his heart and I left that room a new person.

In these chapters of Galatians, Paul is speaking about the law. The law is a stop sign that tells us this far and no farther. The law points out where we have gone wrong, but it can do nothing to save us. All those times I tried to stop doing drugs because I knew it was against the law of our country and the law that was written inside me; I couldn't do it. I thank God that Jesus is the fulfillment of the law. When He died on the cross He took all our sins, all our addictions, all the times we broke the law and gave us the power to walk away and start over. By the power of the Holy Spirit I have been set free from drug addiction for over 26 years. Now I live by faith and I am alive because God came down from heaven to live as a man; to know temptation and not give into it and to conquer sin once and for all.