Luann Prater
"She is clothed with strength and dignity; she can laugh at the days to come." Proverbs 31:25 (NIV)
I was 45 when it hit me. We were on vacation and the hotel had one of those cool magnifying mirrors in the bathroom. Well, it was cool until it showed the truth. It seems my "laugh lines" were running amuck and creeping out of the sides of my eyelids.
"What in the world!" I shouted. "How long have I had these trenches in my face? And when were you going to tell me?" I yelped. My wise husband knew a death trap when he saw it, "Honey, I love your eyes," he replied.
Now that I've hit the fabulous fifties, they don't wait for a smile to show themselves; no, the crow's feet have firmly landed and are forever etched in my face. I knew it was obvious one day when a client who works for a plastic surgeon told me she could get me a good deal, then she patted my face.
No one escapes the fact that we all age. One day we wake up and realize the spring in our step has a bit of a squeak, gray hairs are sprouting in the most bizarre places (like cascading from your chin), and everything that was once perky has headed south. Of course this is the exact moment I see a twenty-something bounce across the television screen and everything in me wants to burrow beneath a blanket on the couch with a warm chocolate chip cookie and pretend this will all go away.
Then I hear my grandkids squeal and run into the room. It's time for another round of "The Gramminator!" I roll to the floor and put on my best Schwarzenegger voice and proclaim, "No one escapes the Gramminator!" and the pouncing and wrestling begins.
It's at these moments I realize how much I love being 50-something. The road to get here was not easy; in fact, those lines in my face were earned. Every gray hair represents a tough time of losing a loved one, stressing over finances or crying over a wayward child. The main lesson I've learned along the way is everything in life is temporary. Deuteronomy 31:6 says, "Be strong and courageous. Do not be afraid or terrified because of them, for the LORD your God goes with you; he will never leave you nor forsake you" (NIV). Whether I'm on the mountaintop or in the valley, neither will last but He will always walk with me.
Today, I choose to laugh and let the lines dig in a little deeper because this is the only day I am guaranteed. We are but dust, here today and gone tomorrow. Besides, my grandson just gripped my face in his sweet little hands and said, "Grandma, you're beautiful." His view is better than the mirror.
Come on, let's embrace this thing called age together and laugh!
Dear Lord, thank You for every gray hair and every wrinkle for they serve as reminders. Each one represents a time of leaning into You for strength. You have provided all I've ever needed. May You always be evident in my life as I laugh at the days to come. In Jesus' Name, Amen.
Related Resources:
Spend Saturday afternoons with Luann on the air at Encouragement Café!
Instill these truths in your child with The Tale of Three Trees retold by Angela Elwell Hunt
Instill these truths in your tween with The Divine Dance: If the World is Your Stage, Who are You Performing For? by Shannon Kubiak Primicerio
Instill these truths in your twenty-something with Authentic Beauty: The Shaping of a Set-apart Young Woman by Leslie Ludy
Instill these truths in your heart with Broken into Beautiful: How God Restores the Wounded Heart by Gwen Smith
Application Steps:
Choose to laugh today. Take every care and give God thanks and praise for already taking care of it. Then find someone to laugh with.
Reflections:
What causes me to frown?
When will I see my age lines as triumphs?
How can I rejoice and not be afraid?
Power Verses:
Joshua 1:5, "No one will be able to stand up against you all the days of your life. As I was with Moses, so I will be with you; I will never leave you nor forsake you." (NIV)
Proverbs 16:31, "Gray hair is a crown of splendor; it is attained by a righteous life." (NIV)
© 2010 by Luann Prater. All rights reserved.
"She is clothed with strength and dignity; she can laugh at the days to come." Proverbs 31:25 (NIV)
I was 45 when it hit me. We were on vacation and the hotel had one of those cool magnifying mirrors in the bathroom. Well, it was cool until it showed the truth. It seems my "laugh lines" were running amuck and creeping out of the sides of my eyelids.
"What in the world!" I shouted. "How long have I had these trenches in my face? And when were you going to tell me?" I yelped. My wise husband knew a death trap when he saw it, "Honey, I love your eyes," he replied.
Now that I've hit the fabulous fifties, they don't wait for a smile to show themselves; no, the crow's feet have firmly landed and are forever etched in my face. I knew it was obvious one day when a client who works for a plastic surgeon told me she could get me a good deal, then she patted my face.
No one escapes the fact that we all age. One day we wake up and realize the spring in our step has a bit of a squeak, gray hairs are sprouting in the most bizarre places (like cascading from your chin), and everything that was once perky has headed south. Of course this is the exact moment I see a twenty-something bounce across the television screen and everything in me wants to burrow beneath a blanket on the couch with a warm chocolate chip cookie and pretend this will all go away.
Then I hear my grandkids squeal and run into the room. It's time for another round of "The Gramminator!" I roll to the floor and put on my best Schwarzenegger voice and proclaim, "No one escapes the Gramminator!" and the pouncing and wrestling begins.
It's at these moments I realize how much I love being 50-something. The road to get here was not easy; in fact, those lines in my face were earned. Every gray hair represents a tough time of losing a loved one, stressing over finances or crying over a wayward child. The main lesson I've learned along the way is everything in life is temporary. Deuteronomy 31:6 says, "Be strong and courageous. Do not be afraid or terrified because of them, for the LORD your God goes with you; he will never leave you nor forsake you" (NIV). Whether I'm on the mountaintop or in the valley, neither will last but He will always walk with me.
Today, I choose to laugh and let the lines dig in a little deeper because this is the only day I am guaranteed. We are but dust, here today and gone tomorrow. Besides, my grandson just gripped my face in his sweet little hands and said, "Grandma, you're beautiful." His view is better than the mirror.
Come on, let's embrace this thing called age together and laugh!
Dear Lord, thank You for every gray hair and every wrinkle for they serve as reminders. Each one represents a time of leaning into You for strength. You have provided all I've ever needed. May You always be evident in my life as I laugh at the days to come. In Jesus' Name, Amen.
Related Resources:
Spend Saturday afternoons with Luann on the air at Encouragement Café!
Instill these truths in your child with The Tale of Three Trees retold by Angela Elwell Hunt
Instill these truths in your tween with The Divine Dance: If the World is Your Stage, Who are You Performing For? by Shannon Kubiak Primicerio
Instill these truths in your twenty-something with Authentic Beauty: The Shaping of a Set-apart Young Woman by Leslie Ludy
Instill these truths in your heart with Broken into Beautiful: How God Restores the Wounded Heart by Gwen Smith
Application Steps:
Choose to laugh today. Take every care and give God thanks and praise for already taking care of it. Then find someone to laugh with.
Reflections:
What causes me to frown?
When will I see my age lines as triumphs?
How can I rejoice and not be afraid?
Power Verses:
Joshua 1:5, "No one will be able to stand up against you all the days of your life. As I was with Moses, so I will be with you; I will never leave you nor forsake you." (NIV)
Proverbs 16:31, "Gray hair is a crown of splendor; it is attained by a righteous life." (NIV)
© 2010 by Luann Prater. All rights reserved.
Labels: Balance, Contentment, God's Perspective, Identity in Christ, Overcoming, Spiritual Growth
11 Comments:
Thank You for The Lord as our God Who always keep us in every condition. All wise Moms with so many wrinkles on their face but rose up their Children success in living with Christ. Proud for them as the name of this web. Proverb 31 Ministries... Thanks for share.
:-)
Dear Lord - thank you for leading me to Proverbs 31 Ministries and for the wise women that give us a encouragement, smiles, tears, and the good news each and every day. After today's encouragement I will wear my crow's feet without fear and instead of thinking the best years of my life have gone by will take today and make it a day to give God honor and glory. Thank you God for each and every day of my life - for my children and grandchildren. Amen.
How great and glorious our God is as He helps us age. This was absolutely wonderful. I loved laughing with you. How comforting that as we see these wrinkles, these weaknesses we are able to laugh and even enjoy the good things about aging such as wonderful grandchildren. Thank you for sharing this.
Luann, could not agree with you more! I pray daily, Lord, help me to keep laughing about all the changes in my body as I age, but help me to take the change within my heart and soul seriously. I truly want to grow older and godlier instead of old and grouchier! Thank you God for the hard things that come with age. They are the things that make heaven become more appealing and more like home. Amen
OH! THANK YOU! Yes, we carry our "war wounds and battle scars" from a life lived with purpose and love....every gray hair and wrinkle earned!
Still earning them with my wayward child and last "fledgling" beginning to try out his wings...
Though the outward (wo)man is decaying...yet still the inward is being renewed day by day....My hope for beauty...His beauty in me....:)
Thank you for the reminder!
Thanks you for this devo. I have sitting here the last month bemoaning the loss of a ywenty-something body--the accompanying aches and pains that seem to be a part of the aging process-or, if you will, a new set of "growing" pains. I fell a month ago and now am impatient for the healing process. But, at the same time, I'm embracing the verse-His strength is made perfect in weakess. It dawned on me, that as long as I can rely on my own physical and mental strength, I really don't need God. I praise Him today for the aches and other "signs of aging", reminding that my true strength and joy, and life, comes from Him. Thanks!!
This was my prayer request of my sisters in Christ yesterday afternoon after I strained my shoulder (the one that will need surgery at some point, even sooner than I had wanted):
I hate that my body continues to tell me in different ways that it's only going to get worse...I am not going quietly into that goodnight, and I'm not ready for this to be happening. It's too soon, and there's too much yet to do.
And they prayed over me, my shoulder, and my thoughts and spirit. And God answered their prayers, not only in me feeling better this morning, but in my reading of todays P31 devotion from you. I am continually amazed how Father God uses the women of P31 and the devotions you all write to reach out to me so specifically...He is SO GOOD, and I am so blessed to have found P31. Thank you for being a part of my sisterhood.
Anna
www.annasplaceofholding.blogspot.com
anna.pamprdchef@gmail.com
I just turned 38!! My hip hurts everyday as though I'm 68. But today....I'm proud to be almost 40. Now don't discount my identifying with you because I'm not 40 yet:) My mantra is, "A Godly woman smiles at her future"! It's amazing how our bodies change, but if our heart changes with it, we're good to go. Your lesson here will show women that. Oh... by the way, I would have put your client in a "Holy Headlock" if she patted my face and offered a surgeon.You know.....and prayed for her after of course. Ha ha ha.
Ha ha! I had to laugh as I began to pray the prayer you wrote, "Thank you for each grey hair" (I also wanted to add, "and thank you for hair dye!") But, you are so right! Our life here is temporary, but with all the signs of age in our bodies come experience, wisdom,and compassion. I am thanking the Lord today for the journey He's brought me on, including the budding crows feet by my eyes -- I wouldn't trade it for anything!
Nichole, that was good...but of course pray for her. lol :+) I am about to turn "fifty" Doing everything I can to keep it moving if you know what I mean...Thank you P31 for your wisdom, your love, and all of your prayers.
Thank you 'older woman' - I am a 'young woman' with four small children and sometimes I get scared about growing old, how will I cope and will I survive the teenage years (they are all girls!). Thank you for reminding me that our Father goes before and no matter what I face and how it changes me inside and out, I will survive in His care. I notice lines too, I want your attitude, the war-wounds to wear with pride! as I know there will be more lines to come! All glory to God who goes before!
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