A Dose of Encouragement

One of the things that really bugs me these days is the way Satan messes with my mind about aging.  Since I will be 62 in February, I feel as if I am pressured to make life-changing decisions.  I really don't let myself get all worked up about it, but it seems it is always there in my sub-conciousness.  Yesterday I was reading from a book called "Daily Grace For Women" and was really encouraged by the reading.  I would like to share this story that was part of what I read with you:

   "Anna Mary Roberts was a farmer's wife who raised five children.  She loved to embroider but after her husband died, arthritis overtook her hands and prevented her from continuing that hobby.  Not one to be kept down, Anne switched to painting.  In 1938, an art collector was fascinated by the paintings he saw in a drugstore window--colorful scenes of country life.  As a result, Anna Roberts was "discovered" and showed her first exhibit in New York when she was neary eighty! 

   Although you may not recognize her by her given name, you are surely familiar with Grandma Moses, one of the most famous folk artists of the twentieth century.  She was still painting when she was a hundred and reportedly produced twenty-five works during the last year of her life!  Anna completed over 1500 paintings in her twenty year career as an artist.  Her motto?  "Life is what we make it, always has been, always will be." **

   That article did me a world of good on a day Satan was trying to convince me that getting old would change my effectiveness in this world.  After reading the story of Grandma Moses, I just have one thing to say to that old devil:

   Go to Hell Satan!!!!

The righteous flourish....In old age they still produce fruit; they are always green and full of sap.  Psalm 92: 12, 14 NRSV. 

(I am claiming this verse since I know lots of people who would tell me I am full of something!)

**from the book Daily Grace For Women , Bordon Books, 2005.