This is being published today on the MySA.com website. If you like it, it would mean a lot to me if you'd leave your comments there: Sandi's Blog

Fiesty Miss Manners" has the day off. She's an annoying little thing, isn't she?

Guest writer for the day? Miss Sappy, Menopausal, Nostalgic Mom. After a wonderful week with my granddaughters, a week of wagon rides, zoo trips and train rides, swimming, silliness, and Sea World, the house is curiously empty.

And quiet.

And quiet.is.over-rated. That's been my slogan for about ten years. That, and "Being a grown-up is hard."

I've had the blessing of being a part of one church (San Antonio First Baptist) for twenty-seven years, and for most of that time, I've taught Sunday School classes to older high school girls. I have love them all, each and every one. This time of the year, graduation time, has always been difficult for me. I'll let you in on a well-guarded secret.

I don't like change. Not this kind.

For 27 years, I've watched as our youth choir filled the loft and sang, marking time by noting each graduating senior, noting how much I love them, how much they'll be missed as they leave for college. The very idea rips at my heart, and this year is no exception.

So, for just a moment, I'm going to address the FBC-SA Class of 2009.

I love you - every one of you. I've loved many of you, perhaps most of you, since the very day you were born. I've loved your parents, I went to baby showers for you and cheered when I heard you had greeted this world. In my mind, you're still in booster seats, eating Wendy's chicken nuggets. And, the rest? I can't even remember when you became a part of the family, you just eased into the group as if you'd always been there.

God, our loving Lord, has great things planned for you. His will is best for you. My experience teaches me that the quicker I find what He wants for me and get to that place, the better my life is. Actually, it's the BEST. He's real, He loves you. You may spend some time in the future testing that, doubting that. It does not change Him. He is ever the same, yesterday, today, and forever. The scripture you've learned and sung is true. Lean on Him.

Make quiet time and church attendance a priority. Honor God in your language. Find a ministry of your own.

Develop relationships with people who make you better. Befriend someone who needs a friend. Date in a way that glorifies God and will leave you with no regrets. Become the woman or man that will attract the kind of person that I already know that you deserve. Many of you will meet your spouse during the next four years.

If called to stand for Christ in a class or on campus, be strong and courageous. Testify, stand for Truth. Be the person that your peers would expect you to be.

Be diligent in your studies, even the boring or easy ones.

Never, never take a shortcut that would harm your personal integrity and reputation.

GO TO CLASS!

Try to be a tidy roommate. You'll be a better friend and student.

Don't get into the gossip loop, never get involved in coarse or negative speech about someone. Your friends will rightly assume that you speak of them in those ways.

Find a way to serve someone, in big or small ways, every day. We are, of all people, most blessed, most privileged. Pay that forward. Be a blessing.

HAVE FUN!!!

Be gentle with your parents. I'll let you in on a little secret: they feel like their hearts are being ripped out of their chests. They look at you and still see the little man or woman you were 10, 15 years ago every time you pull out of the driveway. The idea of this journey with you, or at least this chapter, is over is almost more than they can bear. Cut them some slack. They don't mourn your growing up - they raised you for this. They mourn the loss of being Mommy and Daddy in these chapters of your life. They've loved those roles. They'll adjust, we almost all do.

I will be there for you, as you enter this next chapter of my life. Ask me at church, I have these cool little business cards printed with my AIM screenname, my phone numbers, the works - just for your use. You may come to a time when you need to talk to a trustworthy adult who's not your Mom or Dad, to cry or scream or vent or be homesick or whatever. Maybe you need advice, or someone to pray for you. Maybe you just need a cup of coffee and some face time. While I have no odd pyschological need to do that for you, I do really LOVE doing that, just as I have (and likely will before today's end) for so many who've graduated and left their nests before you. References provided.

I'm so proud to call you friends. And so, to you, the FBC-SA Class of 2009, I'm thanking my God as I remember you now and type your names: Aubrey, Samantha, Hayley, Kelsey, Daniel, Becca, Adam, Mary Haley, Judy, Mark, Paul, Keilah, Sharon, Courtney, Neil, Winter, Tommy, Christy, Heather, Roni, Evan, Millie, Ansley, Abby, Ryan, Madeline, Briggs, and Sam. And now I'm teary. I love you all.

All God's best to each of you. May you find and follow God's will. May you know the fulness of joy in your life. You've left your impression on our lives. Live worthy.

Love,
Sandi

Good Morning, Everybody!

This week will be full of sweetness, I'm confident of that. On Friday, we head up US281, one of the most beautiful drives in the nation, to cross the Red River and visit with Jenn, Wes, and the two most wonderful granddaughters in the world (as attested to by my husband!) - Ana and Emma. If you're not reading her blog, over at www.xanga.com/okinawaana , then you're missing a day-lifter! Wes blogs at www.wesleyfaulk.blogspot.com , we're so challenged by his musings... At the end of next week, Gabe and Marla Taviano, along with their 3 little girls, will be spending a few days, visiting the San Antonio Zoo and Sea World. We're so excited about the company! Quiet is over-rated, y'all.

Having a very difficult day today. Trying to choose joy. This season of life can be full of melancholy anyway. I don't want to give in to it, not today. He is the God who sees.

I'm going to ask you for a favor today. If you have a friend who works for a campus ministry, like Campus Crusade for Christ, Young Life, Campus Life, Fellowship of Christian Athletes, pray for him or her right now. If you don't know someone, will you pray for the offices that serve the area in which you live? And, if the Lord prompts you, please call one of those people - again, if you don't know who he/she is, Google the website and search for the office nearest you. Let them know you're praying for them today. The downturn in the economy is having a dreadful impact on these ministries, in spite of what God is doing on campuses and in lives through them. Campus ministries usually get the "scraps off the table" of giving. Many corporations and small businesses who have been generous to these in the past are finding it very easy to eliminate "faith-based" organizational giving, or are just having to stop donations altogether. Churches who have supported these ministries have done similarly, needing to protect their own programs. You can imagine the results for the folks who serve in these ministries. One last request - if you possibly can, wherever you are, and as God prompts, give something to one of these ministries. You can't imagine how good a $5 or $10 check looks to these folks right now. If you can commit to doing that monthly and will, you'll be helping to sustain a ministry and be an unbelievable encouragement to someone this week. Sorry, end of sappy rant. No, I'm actually not sorry.

Using Random.org, lucky number SIX has won her choice of Marla Taviano's books! Rebekah, if you'll email your full name and address to me at auntmommie@aol.com, along with which book you'd like, I'll get it out to you!

I will praise Him in this storm.

**Edit - after careful analysis, I'm collecting research - what is YOUR favorite "true romance" story? Leave it here, I'll collect them for "my girls".**

I really believe that, as women, we're hard-wired for romance. For as long as I can remember my now-almost-93 year old grandmother (I know! She's a great-great grandma of 5.) has carried a romance novel like an extension of her arm. When she comes for a visit to Texas, half of one of her suitcases seems dedicated to them. I've never even read a romance novel, but I'm telling you I'm a sucker for romance. I think we all are, as women.

I have a passion for teaching the scripture, and godly living, to teenaged girls (stay with me, I'm headed somewhere here.). When I taught Sunday School, I liked telling them on our first class day that I really believe that God's will for every area of their lives will make them the happiest, most fulfilled, joyful, satisfied, and so on - and that anything else will just leave them empty. And I tell them that MY job is to open the scripture to them and watch the Lord convince them.

Part of my passion for teaching girls is teaching purity - I've spent years accumulating my own material - a curriculum, I suppose. And, I'm to-the-bone frank, in this area I don't have a lot of filters, and I so want women to find and follow God's will for their sexuality, so I don't mince words. We talk frankly about decorum (I have a list of decorum tips), dressing, good/bad dating (if they choose to date at all), how to date in a way that screens for potential husbands, how to marry the man of your dreams and stay married the rest of your life, and so on... I always allow any questions, privately or in the group, and I promise to answer them truthfully. And we cut to the bone on issues of propriety.

But, you know how these girls are drawn to wanting God's will about this, like moths to a flame? By romance. If they watch Tommy Nelson's Song of Solomon for Teens (which I love!), their eyes just glaze over when he talks romance with his wife, or when he explains the SOS in plain terms. The guys? They watch it separately, and they're NOT seeing the romance of married sex. Not like the girls do, at least. They just yearn for a man to love them for the rest of their lives, like Tommy Nelson loves Theresa, or like the lover in SOS. I love just thinking about seeing them so turned toward God's will for their future - how they yearn for a godly man to love them for the rest of their lives! I actually cannot wait to teach this again...

Now - to today. My friend Marla Taviano, over on Marla's Blog , tells a wonderful story about her Grandma Yoder. You scurry on over there to read it, then come back. I'll wait....
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...Are you back? Well, how romantic was that little story??? "You never turned me down."!!!! You see, Grandma and Grandpa Yoder GOT IT - for a lifetime! A woman like that is truly beautiful, and most of Hollywood will never tell a story so romantic. Made me cry, I tell ya'll. And it made me think of some other romance stories, real-life ones, that I love to tell "my girls", and I'd like to tell them to all y'all now.

First, I'd introduce you to my friend Candy, and her husband Marshall. I'm hoping that her daughter will mosey on over here and read this - I taught HER in Sunday School too; she's a lovely wife and mom now. Anyhoo, the first time I met Candy was just a week or so after we'd joined our church. She was maybe forty or so years old, and was just recovering from a massive stroke that left her substantially paralyzed on one side. She was learning to get around with a walker, and gave some of us new members a tour of our church plant, one of those "when we say this building, this is where it is, and here's the gym" - your basic orientation. I could tell by looking that she had "been" a beautiful young woman. I can tell you now, after knowing and watching her for over 25 years, that she IS a beautiful woman, part of her face still drawn by the effects of that stroke, and now in a wheelchair and in less-than-ideal health. And Marshall? A handsome, handsome military man, still handsome today. They had two young children, great great kids.

Here's the story I tell these girls. Candy prayed and prayed, as did a lot of others, for the Lord to restore her paralyzed side. She is a pianist. She had 2 children. She played piano for different children's Sunday School classes. She would tell me, "I can still feel what that hand is supposed to play, I just KNOW He's going to give it back to me". In God's sovereignty, He never did.

Marshall was a YOUNG man. With "needs". And very few people would have held it against him, perhaps, if he had decided to leave Candy, just decide to take care of her financially. I've known other Christian men who've done similarly, and after a little shock, everyone just went back to normal relationships, and seemed to justify it in their minds. But, he DIDN'T. He STAYED, he kept loving Candy. He adjusted his life and his schedule. He started getting his kids to school and church and activities, did the cooking and the laundry (I'm sure), learned how to help put pantyhose on his wife, work a curling iron or hot curlers or blow dryer and help her with dressing and makeup. And I have watched them be INSEPARABLE for over 25 years since her stroke. What a testimony!! There has been so much happy laughter and love for Marshall and Candy, and we who've watched on have learned more life lessons than we knew existed to be learned. For all the years that we didn't have an elevator in the SS building, Candy dragged that uncooperative leg up the stairs to play the piano, with one hand, for children's classes. They've cruised around town in one fast sports car after another, after they were empty-nested. Would a nice van have been easier? Sure, but not as much fun, not as...well, romantic. WHICH ONE OF US GIRLS DOESN'T WANT TO BE LOVED LIKE THAT???
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Here's another story. My mom met my dad when she was still in junior high. They met on an ice skating rink in San Antonio, Texas. Neither of them ever dated or kissed another person. Even their own siblings and peers will talk about how strong, how powerful, how unusual their love for one another was. Mom and Dad received Christ on the very same Sunday morning, walked the aisle of SA First Baptist Church - where they were baptized, they were married, where their grandsons were all baptized, where one of their grandsons was married. They married before my mom graduated high school. I came along about 3 years later. Sister was born 3 1/2 years later. Our memories of home are filled with watching my mom and dad smooch (kiss, make-out, neck) RIGHT IN FRONT OF US, watch tv with Daddy's head resting in Mommy's lap, and knowing what a priority "the girls" were - right behind each other. They fought, to be sure, but if their arguments upset us, Daddy would come in and say, "I love you girls, and I love your Mommy. We are a family. We don't ever go to bed mad, and we're never going to split up. Don't worry - go to sleep.".

And they never did split up. Daddy found out that he had terminal cancer, and he started - from day one - to make plans for Mom to live alone. He sold his fancy sports-truck convertible and her car to buy her a new fancy SUV that would serve her well for lots of years. He began to talk to "the girls" about what his wishes were, while he could. He began to comb his Bible to prepare for his funeral with Jim (my husband). And Mom? She.served.Daddy. When he had his surgery, she made sure that she went into recovery looking gorgeous, all her hair and makeup in place, tears non-existent that he could see. Cindi and I watched as she went into him after we'd heard the worst news we'd ever heard from the surgeon and our family physician - she marched herself in there, held his hand, and looked into his eyes like he was her prom date or her groom on her wedding day. She served him when the cancer made him unreasonable and cranky, when the cancer made him weak and demanding and incontinent. She combed and cut his hair and bathed him. She took care of him almost single-handedly until just a very few days before he went to be with Jesus.

And my Daddy kept his promise to his girls. He didn't leave. When he was diagnosed, just 3 months after Wes and Jenn's wedding, , I told him he had to fight, because Jennifer and Wes were wanting to start a family. The Lord gave us so many incredible months after that day - he fought. Mom took him to doctors and chemotherapy. He had a stretch of pretty-good health, and was able to return to church (Mom drove and got him in and out), and to an occasional restaurant! He was able to attend Wes' ordination service. In the last weeks, over a year post-surgery, Ana Katharine was born. Holding that little girl began to be his goal. His strength just about gone, the cancer had (unbeknown to us) invaded his brain; he slept a lot and started to ask, "how long until those kids will be here with that baby?". About three weeks after Ana was born, the young Faulks came to San Antonio for her baby dedication at FBC, for Daddy and Mom to see Ana, before they left for Japan. Mom placed Ana in Daddy's weak arms and helped him hold his first great-grandaughter. He wept, said, "I'm just overwhelmed". This picture of that moment sits right next to my mom's chair. My aunt Jerry, his sweet big sister, came and stayed with him so that Mom could be at the church service that day. Daddy got to watch Ana's dedication on television. He worked so hard just to stay awake and conscious for that.

After that, he just gave in to what might or should have happened so much earlier. He'd fought so hard to stay with us because we'd asked him to. That was Sunday, early that week he was transported to the Hospice facility, and he was in heaven by the end of the week. All of Daddy's grandsons participated in his memorial service, as hard as it was. Jim "officiated". He shared that he'd gotten alone with Dwight, and asked him - what do you want me to tell Mom? "Tell her I love her." What about the girls? What about the grandsons? He'd left instructions - take care of your mother, keep doing right, don't quit making him proud. WHO DOESN'T WANT TO BE LOVED LIKE THAT?

That's true romance, y'all. Love that commits. Respects. Serves. Provides. STAYS.

More romance stories later.