The Bible NETWork ~ Impacting the World for Christ one post at a time!

Hi to all,
I am new, just joined today on the 16th of March. I am hoping to connect with other ladies in the Lord Jesus. I am 48 yrs old, happily married and mother of two grown children. I love bible study, prayer, homemaking, pencil portraiture, mosaics, cross stitch, houseplants, discussions, reading classic literature. I also enjoy sewing, but have not had the freedom to do much of that lately, though, i am hoping to get me some fabric soon.

nice to have found this site,

Child_of_God
CoG

Welcome Child of God

Your life indeed sounds very full! .... this is a good place to discuss general topics, to discuss anything of a more private nature you may like to join the private women's forum which is accessible only to women who are members.

there are excellent resources for bible study here and also on the bible.org site, we hope you enjoy your time with us and also grow in your knowledge and love of the Lord.

in Christ

Dinah

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Hi Dinah, thank you for your welcome. I will be looking forward to perusing through the threads and finding me some niches to get involved into. I like discussions about Bible, books, issues, and healthy debate somewhat.
Is there a Chat room on the site?

in Christ
CoG

not as such .... but you will see people using topics in a similar way, especially in "Cyber Cafe"

joy

Dinah

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Hi - I'm new here, too. Am a very retired stay-at-home Mom. Have four grown children with 6 living grandchildren. One of my daughters has miscarried two boys and the other miscarried a boy, also. That happened many years ago. But our present situation is that of having our 13-yr old grandson pass away this past October. The family are believers but had been having problems for some years. This death - was brought about by a group of friends from school who had been experimenting with a choking / fainting 'game'. We'd had No clue about this until it happened in our family. Since then we've found reference to it on the Internet -- unfortunately it's all Too common with younger teens. One of the group of friends had tried a new twist to the 'game' and was okay afterwards. Our grandson tried it by himself - on his top bunk - he shared his room with his younger brother. The real tragedy was that when Ben fainted - he slipped off the side of the top bunk -- his brother found him after he'd accidentally hung himself. Early in that evening he was taken to ICU in a children's hospital. By noon the following day he was taken off life-support - far too much brain damage.
Part of the 'problem' is that not many people are comfortable talking about the manner of death. A car accident or illness would be one thing -- but This is something entirely different.
I'm in my early 60's -- live in a small Check / catholic community. We are neither. My husband had wanted to build a house - and back 20 some years ago the tax rate allowed us to build Here. Knowing Nothing about the town except that it had a small Baptist church which we became very active in. But they changed pastors every few years and we discovered Why.
Anyway -- thanks for listening - whomever is Out There

Dear Sue

what a terrible tragedy ..... how all of you must be grieving for the loss of this child.

Do you gather around and grieve together as a family? ... there is great strength in this, and I do pray this for your family.

Is your church family also helping you to grieve? .... you do not really say what kind of relationship you have with your church at the moment.

The Bible calls death "the last enemy" so it is right to be angry, and to grieve and to cry out to God .... but also we must trust God and go to Him for comfort and hope in our grief, knowing that God is good, and that He loves us. For me, the most helpful story is that of Jesus and the death of Lazarus in John 11.

First we are told that Jesus loves Lazarus .... but Lazarus dies and Jesus doesn't come.

The sisters are very understandably very upset, and even angry that Jesus didn't come .... cant you just hear the "Where were you?" in the story ...

Then notice that Jesus does not explain Himself to them .... but He does tell Martha an astonishing truth about Himself ....

John 11:25-26 25 Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life. The one who believes in me will live even if he dies, 26 and the one who lives and believes in me will never die. Do you believe this?” Context (NET)

and then comes the "deal-breaker" ... "Do you believe this?"

Of course, in this story Jesus does bring Lazarus back to life (though he will have to die again one day), but we have to wait till Jesus comes again to see those we love ..... yet, that hope is there and it is so important.

Finally for me, are two important things ... the first is that Jesus was angry, it doesn't come out in our English versions, but in the Greek that is the sense, Jesus was furiously angry at what death does to us.

But the second helps me .... it is the shortest verse, but it says so much

John 11:35 35 Jesus wept. Context (NET)

So .... Who cares? .... Who is listening? ..... it is Jesus Himself ... who loves you and loves your family, and loves your grandson .... Jesus, Who understands your grief and invites you to come ....

Matthew 11:28 28 Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Context (NET)

And we, your brothers and sisters in Christ, we care and are listening also ...

Christ's love to you

Dinah

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Welcome SueD.

My heart hurts for you. Such a hard, tragic thing to cope with. I agree that death is not something our culture is comfortable to talk about very much at all, and suicide is almost a "taboo" topic .... but it is far more common then we want to admit, and always, always so painful for everyone involved. As usual, Dinah has offered wise counsel.

The "early 60s" is a good place to be. But my mind feels 30 something, the body sometimes ... well, nearer 90 ... so the true age somewhere in the middle must be about right. I do know that getting to work and staying on top of it mentally is getting harder, even though I have gone part time this year and have later starts than before. I teach high school History - teenage girls. The biggest challenge at the moment is the 15 year old traumas - depression, boys , family break downs, friendship issues. They keep me on my toes, balancing the need for control and discipline so that some learning can occur, with their need for a loving Christian witness and personal concern.

By the way, there are women around here, not so many actively posting just at the moment though. Jenn (Admin) is obviously a lady. Dinah (dcjoy) and myself are both Aussie women ... and both Moderators (all the Moderators are volunteers) ... but we are all also busy, facing life's struggles, and not always having the time to post as often as we would like. Women seem to come, be very active for a while, then go quiet - maybe life just gets too busy to be spending the time it takes to post in the thoughtful and caring way we women seem to post. All that aside, more topics here in the Garden that we women can relate to, or where we might have a particular perspective, would be great.

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“Lord, in my zeal for love of truth, let me not forget the truth about love.” - Thomas Aquinas
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Hi Ladies -- thank you for your response back - I CAN relate to 'feeling' young in spirit while the body sometimes feels 'old' and we're somewhere in between.
Am trying to find my way around these areas - like the Garden.
Unfortunately we don't get together as a family to remember Ben. Right at first the family Was trying to 'pull together' - but the son-in-law had Guard Duty training being anticipated 'as we speak' in Missouri -- our daughter and the two younger kids are able to be with him / unplanned. The two older girls 16 and 18 are with the other grandma about half an hour from us. And there are differing religious perspectives we are trying to deal with about Ben's death.
Unfortunately it was ruled strangulation due to suicide - which has been Very unfortunate cause it Wasn't suicide. It's true he was by himself and he was hanging - but no one can really verify that he was indeed 'playing around' with the fainting 'game'.
And, you're right - No one is comfortable talking about death - unless someone has been very sick or a bad wreck that couldn't be avoided. So - Ben's 'situation' is Not easily talked about.
You said you're an Aussie - Australian ? Interesting. On the other Forum I've connected up with a person from New Zealand and someone from Lebenon - sometimes the world seems very Small.
Well - This is getting Long - so will close. Been nice chatting

Yes, SueD, Australian.

At various times we have had quite a few here .... we even have our own "room", the Boomerang Cafe in the Cyber Cafe area of the Forum, where every now and then we discuss Australian things .... no one has posted there for ages though, so maybe it is time I did.

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“Lord, in my zeal for love of truth, let me not forget the truth about love.” - Thomas Aquinas
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