Marsha's Blog

Good morning from Hong Kong! And Happy (Chinese) New Year!  I promised I’d find some internet and catch you up to what’s going on, so here goes: Our cruise finally finished on Saturday.  We had a truly blessed time, meeting some nice Christians and even a couple or men who have Tony’s same cancer problem, and, what are the chances, have had the same treatment, which seems to be working well. It was all so encouraging.   Cruise goals: We focused on the “Three R’s”  Reading, Riting and Reflecting.  It’s been a good couple of weeks.   So what I’ve learned about Chinese New Year.  I have to say that while it’s floated around me the many years we’ve lived in Asia, I’ve never experienced it first hand.  Japan celebrates New Year with the Western world on January First, complete with their own special traditions of Red Beans, House Cleaning and Church services, but The Lunar New Year, aka Chinese New Year, follows the cycles of the moon instead of the Calendar. Our Vietnamese guide

Hi everyone, if you get this, please thank the Lord, because we’ve been in port all day here in Viet Nam and there’s NO INTERNET whatsoever, as we suspected, but we may have figured out a little trick.  Here goes: Hope you’re all well and happy as we are. When we first boarded the ship, we noticed that there’d be a “passenger led” Bible study.  Of course we were curious, so we showed up in the chapel at the appropriate time……..and there was just one other lady. We got to chatting, waiting for the ‘leader’ because we agreed none of us were going to lead it, and then, an hour later, we left with enough stories of God’s faithfulness to keep us going for a while.  What fun!  She’s a youngish single lady from Germany by the name of “Uttu” (bad spelling, but close to phonetically right), and of course she speaks English.  I think she’s a self-funded adventurer for God.  Her tales of His faithfulness are enough to keep us going for quite awhile, and believe me, it’s good for us

It’s come to my attention that there’s a new book sweeping across at least America's attention called “The Boy, the Mole” and something else that escapes me. I’m not sure what I think of it, since it’s only new, but while I was putting a hold on it at my library app, I looked at some of the illustrations. One jumped out at me, striking a chord in my heart long forgotten.   “What do you want to be when you grow up?” asked one of the characters.   The boy’s answer was, “Kind”. I remember answering this question in a Bible Study many years ago in an adult Sunday School class, and the lyrics popped into my mind of an old hymn from my childhood. Some of you will remember it:  “Out of the highways and byways of life, many are weary and sad”, ……………..and it goes on to the chorus: “Make me a blessing, make me a blessing …………to someone today”.   Apparently that song had stuck in my mind, because I popped out the answer without thinking, “I wanted

As we’ve looked back over the things we’ve learned over the years, today I’d like to share with you a very wise nugget of wisdom:   Never try to rope a cat. This bit of wisdom all started in the early 70’s when Tony and I decided we needed a pet. After all, we were barely subsisting, sinking deeper into debt and wondering where our next meal would come from. What better time to add another mouth to feed? Off we went one bright Saturday morning to the animal shelter. Actually the term was a bit of a misnomer. The place wasn’t so much a “shelter” as it was a holding tank for cats and dogs until such time as they could be euthanized. Abandoned animals were kept for a specified period of time, then they were ‘put down’. We knew it, and I think in some perverse way, the animals knew it too.   We came into the shelter that day intending to find a smallish dog. Tony’d grown up with Beagles, and since we were pretty much living in the country there in eastern Colorado, we were convinc