Psalm 23

The Lord is my shepherd, I lack nothing.
He makes me lie down in green pastures,
he leads me beside quiet waters,
he refreshes my soul.
He guides me along the right paths
for his name’s sake.
Even though I walk
through the darkest valley,
I will fear no evil,
for you are with me;
your rod and your staff,
they comfort me.

You prepare a table before me
in the presence of my enemies.
You anoint my head with oil;
my cup overflows.
Surely your goodness and love will follow me
all the days of my life,
and I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever.

It's been a difficult week. But when all is said and done, God is with us. While my peace this week has been shattered and life has been overwhelming, I know now that I have nothing to fear.

He protects. He guides. He loves us.

I refuse to think about what might have happened anymore. Zechariah was hurt earlier this week, and I have been haunted by it for two days. If I had waited twenty seconds longer, I might have been spared the images that have plagued my thoughts these past couple days.

The man with the wheel barrel in my mind has been working overtime. He has forged paths to the memory, and I haven't given him a break. When I started to feel peace, it was as if my mind rebelled and the wheel barrel had to be filled with anxious thoughts, not peaceful happy thoughts. I needed to think about it. I felt compelled to think about it. In the same way when you pass an accident on the side of the road, you try to look away, but your eyes are drawn there anyways. My mind has been on Zech.

I don't want to go into the details of what I saw, but I am convinced my son has angels that sole focus is saving his life and keeping him safe. God has remembered Zechariah. He has not forgotten him or been caught off guard by the things that happen.


This morning I was still struggling with the ruts my mind had dug. I was making myself sick with worry and fear, and I couldn't seem to get past it. My mom told me to pray and ask for a new picture. I tried. I prayed hard. She also witnessed Zech's accident and she understood my haunting fear. She saw it happen from a different angle, but still the trauma was the same. It's really hard to experience that life altering fear, and move past it. The man with the wheel barrel repeatedly filled his barrel with thoughts of ... he could have died. The force of that blow could have knocked him unconscious. It could have killed him. They were horrible thoughts to be focusing on.

Seconds before it happened, my mom was holding Zech. He had a stomachache, and she was praying over him. She held him close and asked God to protect him. She was even reminded at how God had intervened for him in the past. When we talked over lunch yesterday, she shared with me how she wished she had held him a little longer, a little tighter.

There are things we can't go back and change. Bad things happen in life. Things we can't undo. The hard part is living with those things. I am convinced the only way to truly make it through is with God's help. His peace is what I choose to rely on.

As I was doing my dishes today I was trying to get the man with the wheel barrel to walk a new path. I wanted him to walk the road that said, God remembered Zech. Zechariah is okay. He is laughing and playing. Life goes on.

I needed to let go of the darkness I was holding on to. It was not going to comfort me. It never has.

Each week a different kid has Bible study with my mother. They are each assigned a Bible treasure hunt. It might be a verse to memorize, a picture to draw, a verse to write in your own words.

Gabriel had to write any Psalm he chose in his own words. He picked Psalm 23. I haven't felt much like blogging lately, but today I wanted to share his Psalm. It meant a lot to me to hear him reading the paper aloud. I cried. Even though it was written in his words, about his struggles, it was a picture from God. I was changed.

I see where God was, and how He had His hand of protection on Zechariah. I didn't need to be angry anymore. I didn't need to fear what might have happened. I finally have peace in my heart. God protects. God guides us. God is with us. I can let go of my pain and fear. God has a plan for my life. And God has a plan for Zechariah's life. It's different than what I see. I always see perfection. No troubles. No pain. No tears. God sees that trouble, that pain, and He wipes away those tears.

Psalm 23
God is my Savior.
He lets me relax on great days.
He keeps me from peril.
He keeps me from being selfish.
He guides me through the people that are mean to me because of talking about Him.
When I walk through the disappointment God is with me.
He uses His power to save me from the mean kids.
He helps me to stay with him when bullies are there.
My cup overflows with blessings and I will live with God. -From the heart of Gabriel-

Kids Do The Darndest Things

When I walked into the bathroom, I was quite shocked at the sight I saw. There was a water gun floating in the toilet. Both my son and daughter were standing nearby.

“What in the world are you doing? Why is the gun in the toilet?”

Zech could sense there was trouble brewing, and quickly put things straight to me, “Ariel did it!”

I turned to her, “Well, why didn’t you pick it up if you knocked it in. That’s so disgusting to leave it there.”

My daughter, who turned 12 recently, very calmly replies to me, “I was filling it up. I made sure that it was clean. Nobody had gone to the bathroom in it.”

I was totally flabbergasted. “Are you serious? Would you want to get shot with a poop gun? We’re going to have to throw it out now.”

This brought tears for Zech as it was his gun he just received last night. I relented and promised to do some serious sterilizing today.

Apparently, my daughter has never thought about the germs floating around in a toilet. It seemed perfectly natural to her to place a water gun into the bowl. What really got to me was the fact they were even resorting to using it. Whatever happened to filling up a water gun at the sink, which sits right next to the toilet?