All These Years...By His Grace

When the Lord has touched your life, you cannot help but praise Him and give Him glory. I, by the grace of God, am able to pen this blog for you. Today, I am going to share with you a snippet of my new book that I am having published sometime before July if it is the Lord's will. If you have liked the tone of my work so far, then you will love this latest book of mine. The point of this excerpt today is to remind us all that wherever we are in life, all of our accomplishments, etc. we are there by the grace of God.
This excerpt will touch your heart. Enjoy and be blessed. And yes, I did include a poem for those of you among my readers who are poetry buffs. (smile)

 As the picture says, I was seven years old and being a typical seven-year-old from back in the day, I had my share of curiosity. My mother had gone to work and as was my custom, I was at my aunt’s house waiting for my favorite cousin to finish her lunch so that we could go outside and play. I had a big safety pin in my pocket and took it out and was closing and unclosing the head of the pin. Then I took note of the shiny new receptacle that was at the end of a shiny new pipe. The receptacle was at eye height for me, a seven year old.

 We had been studying about circuits and dry-cell batteries and conducting electricity in my school. My teacher said that copper was a good conductor. I remembered about the dry celled battery and how a piece of copper had turned on a bulb on the other end of it because it made a circuit. So, curious me wondered if the safety pin in my pocket could be a conductor. I knew that electricity was not supposed to go through big old me so, I thought, “Well, wonder what it will do?” Yes readers, I can hear you gasping in your minds and thinking, “Don’t tell me that you stuck that pin in that socket.” Yep, you guessed it! That’s what I did. I stuck that pin in that socket.

  Now, you know that a 110 will hold on to you if that happens. I have found out that now they make them where they throw you across the room. I don’t know about that but I do know that that socket did not throw me anywhere. The lights went out immediately. My cousins all screamed and my aunt, who was known to beat you,  came running in there (the kitchen) with her ironing cord. She had a candle and a book of matches. She lit the candle and she asked what had happened. All my cousins started crying and avowing that they did not know. She held the candle up to the only receptacle in the room and gave a roar while all of my cousins gave a collective gasp. She said, “Who put that pin in that socket?" Nobody said anything and she said she was going to line them all up and start beating until somebody told her who put that pin in that socket.

I thought to myself, “If I can just get by her I’m out of this door like a greased lightning and I’m going home!” I was not going to tell on myself and neither was anybody else because it had been my pin and nobody knew I had it, or so I thought. My cousin who was first in line getting ready to receive her whipping with the ironing cord yelled out without preamble, “I know who had that pin! Louise did because I saw her with it.” I could not believe it, my favorite cousin told on me! My aunt trained her angry eyes on me and yelled, Did you stick that pin in my socket? I was so terrified, I couldn’t answer. I don’t remember what else she said right then, something about whipping me, to which I remember replying, “Please don’t tell my momma on me. She might be mad at me.” My aunt said that she was going to whip me herself. I remember replying something like, “Momma said nobody better not whip me ‘cause I am the only girl she has. Then I started crying in earnest and said again, “Auntie, please don’t tell Momma on me.” I was hoping that she grabbed that and she did! She said, “I am going to tell your Momma and she is gonna beat your backbone!” She asked me, as I was sidling by her, if anything ran up my arm. I said, “No ma’am” to which she told me again what my Momma was going to do to me when she got home.

  I still have not figured out what He saved me for but I do know that, if He is for you, nothing can undo the plans that He has for you. I do know that I walk this earth as a 66 year old because of His grace. I know that I was destined to be a seven year old corpse, but the Lord had other plans.
When Moses, Joseph, Daniel and the Hebrew Boys were in danger of death, God saved them because He had a plan for them. So, I don’t know why He told that electric current,  “Back off!” and sent it running the opposite way back down through the apartment building so that it burned out fuses and wires in several other apartments and I don’t know why I only received the imprint of the pin burned onto the longest finger of my right hand,  but I do know that if God is for you, nothing can be against you. 

 So, I wanted to insert right here, this quick reminder to you. Even if your storm is not over yet, just remember that if the Lord is for you, then your storm will bless you during its duration and after it is over because you endured to the end of it. When you are tempted to feel down, just remember that there is a lady walking around in this world who according to statistics, should be gone, but who is still stepping on because of the grace of God. If you are close to Him, you have that grace, too.                                  (excerpt fromChopping My Row)

Doing What I Can, While I Can
Alma L. Stepping On By the Grace of God Jones

Blog P. S. - Now you know why I am so passionate about my love for Him. It is simple really; His grace has been covering me since I entered this world and will continue to carry me on until I walk as a mortal woman no more.

Auxillo Ab Alto

I know that if I please YOU

I will be exalted in your love

That blessings will rain down on me

Like nectar, from above.

Thank YOU for giving me the poem

That I just now wrote

For sending it to me LORD, as

To YOUR throne I spoke.

Thank YOU for my being a recipient

Of YOUR amazing grace

Because it takes away all of my fears and doubts

And puts serenity in its place

No matter what kinds of trials I face.

I see YOUR justice and righteousness

They, like the sun, come shining through

So, I go where YOU send me

And do what YOU want me to do

Because I know that wherever I go and

Whatever hardships I see

That your amazing grace and winged

Protection will continue to sustain me.

Grace told Death that my time was not yet

Grace snatched me from the jaws of defeat

And laid me gently at my Savior's feet

Without You, my life wouldn't be complete

Grace, God's grace. 

I took the liberty of adding a verse to tie it in more with our post for today.