“So here’s the thing…

One of my favorite christian people (2nd only to Ruth) is a woman named Ellie. She runs the ladies bible study on tuesday morning, and I have such incredible respect for her. Not only does she have a fierce love for God and a strong knowledge of His Word, but she’s also very encouraging, thoughtful, sincere and a complete goofball! When my mom came to my church the first time, Ellie saw us at a table (knowing she’s about mom’s age), sat right down next to mom and started talking to her, showing her pictures of her grandkids like they’d been friends for years. I just love her.

She said something in class this week that made a lot of us stop and think and tear-up. She said (and I’ll paraphrase)

“Sometimes I’ll be driving or watching tv or sitting in church and I’ll just start crying…weeping…sobbing for no apparent reason. I feel so close to God and I just need to ‘get it all out.’ That happened the other day while I was driving and I had to pull over. Then all of a sudden I looked around and noticed how yucky things looked…muddy, wet, cold. He showed me that, just like the snow has melted and revealed what was underneath, I was having a melt-down and was able to see some of the garbage that had been lying around underneath the surface. And now it was time to start cleaning up the place.”

I could sit and listen to Ellie talk for hours. She’s such a sincere person; she has ears to hear and a heart to listen, and she relays God’s messages in beautiful ways.