Andrea O. Freeman

 It is a beautiful Spring evening here, and as usual I am up late and my mind is buzzing, can't sleep.  I am thankful for the reminder tonight in my devotional time that God is incredibly patient and gracious with me, even when I am at my absolute worst.  I'm doing better with my stress and what seems to be a slow grief that I have learned I simply just have to manage.  Dad and I talk a lot, the reality that we are all dealing with a level of anxiety we hadn't planned for.  Nobody plans to have a loved one with alzheimers/dementia, so when it happens, well it hits like a really bad dream that you just can't wake from.  It's one Mom will never wake from.  I haven't seen her in months, hope to go with Dad in the next couple of weeks.  The last few weeks he says she hasn't been very responsive, just sits and stares at the tv.  She seems to be responding positively to the activities they are doing especially music, which is a comfort knowing how ...

 'My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever.' Psalm 73:26 It's my birthday month.  I'm about to hit 51 with all I've got.  And all I've got is not much, but God.... Years ago I met this amazing person.   I wasn't expecting him to cross my path, but God had something in mind for me that I was not prepared for.  I am thankful for God's absolutely perfect timing, how He knows so very well and so very precisely what I need.  I was reminded in my quiet time tonight as I read those two words in the scripture 'but God', that no matter the depth of my inadequacy....He fills me.  He is my rock, my strength, my source, my anchor, my portion, my all in all.   I still get the feeling now, not much different than I did 15-20 years ago....I'm not enough.   28 years married to my true Love, and I question it from time to time.  My oldest child is approaching 26 this year, and my youngest w...

  ‘A thrill of hope, the weary world rejoices…..’ I know a lot of you share this sentiment for the year of 2022…..I’m  weary .   If there’s a word I would choose to represent this year, it is just that.   My humanity threatens at every turn of this road called life to call it done, give up, throw in the towel, wave the white flag.   I.can’t.even. I can’t really pinpoint one thing, it’s a cascade of “things” that this life has thrown in our path.   At the end of the laundry list of “things” I could list for you here, I can point to one “thing” that has held me steady somehow.   Jesus .   He is Jehovah Jireh, forever enough, always enough, more than enough.   I am going to continue to age, ache, stumble through everything this life hands me, but He is steady and unchanging.   When it seems He is far from my reach, it’s hard to swallow the reality, the truth of the matter:   I am the one who has wandered.    His presenc...

  Psalm 91:1-2  Whoever dwells in the shelter of the Most High will rest in the shadow of the Almighty.  I will say of the Lord, "He is my refuge and my fortress, my God, in whom I trust." The year end is rapidly approaching, and as we approach the Thanksgiving holiday, I am aware of how quickly time is moving forward.  This past year has been full of moments of unexpected experiences.  We lost Ryan's Mom in early January, and while we knew she was not going to be with us much longer due to a number of health issues, it's just something you can't be fully prepared for.  We had blessed time together gathering family and sweet friends to honor her life and praise God for our time with her, how she left her loving, gracious mark upon all of our lives.  As we stepped into those first few months of the year, the stress and demand of work, and for Ryan finishing out his degree at MSU, it was like a glaring neon sign in our faces that we could not avoid....

 The reality that we are nearing the end of October, and just 2 months away from the end of 2022, is kind of hard to believe when I think about it.  I'm going to be brutally honest here:  2022 has been hard.  My Mom's health has declined significantly as the Alzheimer's/Dementia has progressed and takes away more and more of the amazing person I have known her to be my entire life.  The doctors, nurses, hospice care team have helped us know what to expect along the way, but it's a heartbreaking thing to watch unfold.  I haven't been able to shake it completely, some days are worse than others, the grief of losing her slowly hangs over me like a fog.   I'm struggling to go to sleep tonight, too much on my mind and heart, so I'm hoping I find some sense of relief and release as I type out the words of this blog entry.  My family has experienced some significant highs and lows this year, and in recent weeks more of the latter.  I have had a...

  If you have had a conversation with me the last couple of months, you know things are - for lack of a better word - INTENSE in my house.   We just celebrated Ryan graduating MSU in May with his Bachelor's in IT CyberSecurity.  Our oldest daughter Rylee has been offered a full time teaching position, teaching English at Nixa High School just outside of Springfield this Fall.  We are in the countdown to her move into her first apartment in a couple of weeks.  Our older son Bailey has ventured into a new job this summer with a friend, and is loving it.  Our younger son AJ started his first job this summer at Taco Bell.  Our youngest daughter Chloe is living her best pre-teen life this summer hanging out with her bff's, swimming, sleeping in, etc.  Ryan is hard at it on the 'hamster wheel' of job hunting post graduation:  apply, interview, wait, get passed over, and repeat ......That last piece has been quite frustrating and disappointing ...

  I'm currently in the middle of a beautiful Lent devotional study "Waymaker: Finding the Way to the Life You've Always Dreamed Of" by Ann Voskamp.  She has become one of my favorite authors the last few years, among several that I cherish in my daily devotional times.  She speaks both in tone and context in a way that is incredibly comforting and clarifying, and entirely necessary as I am journeying forward in this life God has given me.  I shared at a recent women's breakfast event with our church about a piece of this devotional that has been speaking into my life, and today I was struck once again by the focus she is delivering to us through her writing.  Her writing inspires me also to write, to share out of the abundance God is pouring into my own journey along this treacherous and blessed pathway unfolding ahead of me day by day.   Therefore, do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself.  Each day has enough trouble of...