Hopeful Hearts Ministry

Each moment of the day offers some sort of opportunity, lesson, or gift.  As many of you know I testify to this as a FACT.  This morning is no exception.   In preparing for a 4 mile run at 5am (on my own) I was frustrated to find that my iPhone seemed to have crashed.  The night before I tried to install an update and when it was done it wouldn’t begin.  I had to plug it into iTunes.  When I woke up this morning the download didn’t complete because it said the internet ‘timed out’.

So I hit ‘restore iPhone’ again and saw it would take another 2 hours to upload.  So here I was in need of a run because we are getting closer to the 1/2 marathon date and my running partner wasn’t available to go with me.  I would have to go for a run without someone time talk to or any music! 🙁

It turns out, this moment was a gift.  I took the time to say a rosary, pray for the Women of Worth program I was going to be speaking at later in the morning and spend some time with God.  Before I knew it my run was over and I managed it without falling. 😉

The Women Of Worth program went well (in my opinion at least).   I like to judge the outcome by if at least one person mentions how the program made a positive impact then I know God wanted me to speak to that one person.  One is all I need and by the grace of God the others that follow are like putting extra icing on a cupcake.  I wish I could have taken pictures with the ladies that were there or even share the stories I heard in the end but it was a more intimate group that in giving one example it would violate trust and anonymity with the others. 

What I can say is that it was a successful day full of cupcakes piled high with extra icing. 😉  What made it that much more sweet is that I had to manage this sans faith.  It wasn’t that I couldn’t talk about my faith but I couldn’t allow that to be my focus and point of the message.  This is hard to do!  I did it… I don’t really like to do that because I lose a bit of my ‘fire’…but thankfully God gave me the words to speak that managed the same overall message –  “Their past experiences though traumatic and tragic are a part of them but don’t define them nor do they steal their ‘power’.  To be empowered and move beyond their past into who they are meant to be.”

It’s a message we can all embrace daily. Below are a few pictures one of the ladies took for me because I needed something to include in my Hopeful Hearts Newsletter.  She kept snapping away and I get a kick of how much I speak with my hands!