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The Shock of the Day…
1-10pm
It has been a very nice weekend. After I dragged myself out of bed at lunchtime yesterday, Mike & I went to Clovelly Golf Club and for R40, he hit 50 balls and then had unlimited bunker and chipping practice. It was a lovely day…
Can you see the ball?…
It’s just above the left mountain!. Here’s Mike practicing his chipping…
…and here’s the amazing ball collecting cart….
I love that the driver is caged in, in case he gets ‘klapped’ while he’s collecting!
After that we went out for a steak, then got out a movie called The Trial, which was a courtroom drama. It was quite good by itself but had the added value of a Christian undertone. Look out for it. After the movie, we went for a walk on the beach.
This morning dawned and has turned into a really warm, balmy day…
I had promised Bobbi from the United Evangelical Fellowship in Fish Hoek that we would visit her church one day. Today was the day…
They meet in the Wellwood Chapel. No big band or drums here – rather an keyboardist playing the “organ” and very enthusiastic pianist…
The hymns went down very well. The message was by John Broom and he preached on Romans 10 which was excellent. Meaningful prayer and a missions slot added to the service. The older folk of Fish Hoek will find a comfortable spiritual home here.
Back home, we had an early curry lunch…
The shock of the day was to hear of the untimely death of SABC Morning Live presenter Voyu Mbuli. 
I don’t watch morning TV because I’m on air at that time, but he has been around a long time and I remember him from years ago. Also, from time to time, the CCFm TV will be on and I will see his face in the early morning. He collapsed at a rugby match in Bloemfontein last night, was rushed to hospital and died in the early hours of this morning. The cause of death is not yet known, but it sounds like it could have been a stroke, heart attack or aneurysm. While we enjoy a regular weekend, there are others mourning. It’s a reminder, life is fragile. It’s all we know as earth-bound humans, but that does not mean this is all there is. I saw an excellent illustration on FB the other day, that’s worth reproducing here…
“In a mother’s womb were two babies. One asked the other: “Do you believe in life after delivery?” The other replies, “why, of course. There has to be something after delivery. Maybe we are here to prepare ourselves for what we will be later. “Nonsense,” says the other. “There is no life after delivery. What would that life be?”
“I don’t know, but there will be more light than here.
Maybe we will walk with our legs and eat from our mouths.” The other says “This is absurd! Walking is impossible. And eat with our mouths? Ridiculous. The umbilical cord supplies nutrition. Life after delivery is to be excluded. The umbilical cord is too short.” “I think there is something and maybe it’s different than it is here,” the other replies. “No one has ever come back from there. Delivery is the end of life, and in the after-delivery it is nothing but darkness and anxiety and it takes us nowhere.” “Well, I don’t know,” says the other, “but certainly we will see mother and she will take care of us.” “Mother??” You believe in mother? Where is she now? “She is all around us. It is in her that we live. Without her there would not be this world.” “I don’t see her, so it’s only logical that she doesn’t exist.” To which the other replied, “sometimes when you’re in silence you can hear her, you can perceive her.” I believe there is a reality after delivery and we are here to prepare ourselves for that reality….”
John 3:16 “For God so loved the world, that He gave His only Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life.”
God bless you loads.
In His Grip,
Helga xx 
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At www.helgavan.com, you'll find this blog and a whole lot of other stuff related to my life!
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I’m 48 and 192 days…
12-00
It’s 12 noon and I’m still in my pajamas in bed. Hours and hours have passed since I woke up. What have I done today? I fed the cat, made Mike coffee and we watched the end of a movie we started last night. Then Mike got up and got dressed and went to his home office to do some computer progamming. I stayed right where I am. I did my Bible reading. Then I went onto FB and scrolled through the newsfeed. I read Lauren’s blog on her LCHF journey. I updated the CCFm Rise and Shine Facebook page and I answered some email. Then I did my show prep.
I was hungry so I had some nuts. And now it’s 12 noon.
When I look in the mirror, I see the passing of time drifting across my face. Yesterday, I was at the hairdresser and I asked her if I needed to colour my hair…’No’ she said, ‘Not yet. There are a few grey hairs beginning to pop up but you’ve been very lucky.’ I’m 48 and 192 days. I’m amazingly blessed to be saving on hair colour! But I see the extra lines around my eyes and the sagging of my mouth, although having said that, I had a big compliment from David yesterday. He visited and I was talking about someone who had plastic surgery to prevent the droop around their mouth – creating a permanent smile. It hadn’t turned out all that well, “but I can understand wanting it”, I said, “I’m beginning to see the sag.” David replied, “No Mom, you don’t sag – you smile too much.”
The passing of time is almost insidious…yet it comes upon us suddenly – very quickly, the children are grown and we find ourselves echoing words of our parents so many years ago, ‘where have the years gone?’ I reflect on whether I enjoyed and appreciated the past enough. I wrack my brain for the happiest time of my life and I realise that I enjoyed it all. That God has blessed me all the days of my life – the 27 years I have spent with Mike have been the happiest of all. That while I have been walking with the Lord, I have feared no evil, that He has bought me to pleasant places, that in Him, I have found rest for my soul. Knowing Jesus Christ is the foundation for happiness and contentment. Now that I am 48 and 192 days, I have greater perspective. There have been troublesome times in my life. There has been pain and death and grief and tears, yet overall, it has been an abundantly happy life. The God I serve has met me at the point of every need, has reassured me at the death of every loved one, has strengthened me through the difficulty of every hardship. We won’t escape any of those in this life, but when we have a connection with the Creator, we know we have an answer to our concerns and comfort in our times of trouble.
Yes getting older is not that bad and having a so-called ‘lazy morning’ is maybe just the rest I need to keep perspective in life, to refresh my brain and my body, to embrace the moment and to continue the quest of ‘learning to be content in all my circumstances.’
Psalm 90:1-2 You have been our dwelling place throughout all generations. Before the mountains were born or you brought forth the whole world, from everlasting to everlasting you are God.
And with that having been said, Mike has come up and asked if I would like to go with him to the driving range to hit some golf balls!:-)
Off to make another memory!
God bless you!
In His Grip,
Helga xx
www.facebook.com/ccfmriseandshine
www.ccfm.org.za
At www.helgavan.com, you'll find this blog and a whole lot of other stuff related to my life!
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Why Do We Need Sleep?
8-17am
An early, early blog today but I’ve come back later and posted three pics of Mike & I all dressed up for our dinner. We had a fabulous time…a memorable date indeed! Here I am testing the timer on my cell phone camera…
Mike came home, showered, shaved and got dressed in his suit and bow tie. He looked so good…
Then he escorted me downstairs for dinner. We sat opposite each other giggling like children! It was so funny, all dressed up and sitting at our own dining room table. We really enjoyed the meal. Two things come to mind that I want to blog about in the future – one is the amazing fact that romantic love is ageless and the second is the question of how to be happy. Those are for another day.
For today I am simply sharing an amazing article that my friend Sue told me about yesterday. I looked it up and was so interested to read John Piper’s 1982 assessment of why God created us needing sleep. If you have two or three minutes, it’s a thought provoking read…
(Here’s the source) http://www.desiringgod.org/resource-library/taste-see-articles/a-brief-theology-of-sleep
A BRIEF THEOLOGY OF SLEEP BY JOHN PIPER
At 5:00 a.m. Sunday morning the world is not dark, but there is no color. Everything is black and white and grey, except for the orange light on the garage across the street that shines through my bedroom window. There is no breeze, and the poplar leaves are caught like a snapshot in stillness. The stars are gone but the sun is not up yet; so you can’t tell if the grey sky is overcast or clear. Very soon we will know.
I sit on the edge of my bed trying to develop a theology of sleep. Why did God design us to need sleep? We sleep a third of our lives. Just think of it: a third of our lives spent like dead men. Just think of everything being left undone that could be done had God not designed us to need sleep. There is surely no doubt that he could have created us with no need for sleep. And just think, everyone could devote himself to two careers, and not feel tired. Everyone could be a “full-time Christian worker” and still keep his job. There is so much of our Father’s business we could be about.
Why did God imagine sleep? He never sleeps! He thought the idea up out of nothing. He thought it up for his earthly creatures. Why! Psalm 127:2 says, “It is in vain that you rise up early and go late to rest, eating the bread of anxious toil; for he gives to his beloved in his sleep.” According to this text sleep is a gift of love, and the gift is often spurned by anxious toil. Peaceful sleep is the opposite of anxiety. God does not want his children to be anxious, but to trust him. Therefore I conclude that God made sleep as a continual reminder that we should not be anxious but should rest in him.
Sleep is a daily reminder from God that we are not God. “He who keeps Israel will neither slumber nor sleep” (Psalm 121:4). But Israel will. For we are not God. Once a day God sends us to bed like patients with a sickness. The sickness is a chronic tendency to think we are in control and that our work is indispensable. To cure us of this disease God turns us into helpless sacks of sand once a day. How humiliating to the self-made corporate executive that he has to give up all control and become as limp as a suckling infant every day.
Sleep is a parable that God is God and we are mere men. God handles the world quite nicely while a hemisphere sleeps. Sleep is like a broken record that comes around with the same message every day: Man is not sovereign. Man is not sovereign. Man is not sovereign. Don’t let the lesson be lost on you. God wants to be trusted as the great worker who never tires and never sleeps. He is not nearly so impressed with our late nights and early mornings as he is with the peaceful trust that casts all anxieties on him and sleeps. In quest of rest, Pastor John(Piper)
We all need it…
God’s wish for you…
Proverbs 3:24 If you lie down, you will not be afraid; when you lie down, your sleep will be sweet.
Have a fabulous weekend with lots of lovely sleep!
God bless you loads.
In His Grip,
Helga xx
www.facebook.com/ccfmriseandshine
www.ccfm.org.za
At www.helgavan.com, you'll find this blog and a whole lot of other stuff related to my life!
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We Are Making A Crazy Memory Tonight…
1-07pm
There are already cooking smells floating out the kitchen. Dinner is well underway for our unique ‘date’ tonight. Many times, while watching old movies (or Downton Abbey) where the people of the house ‘dressed’ for dinner, Mike has commented, ‘one day I think we should dress for dinner.’ That day has come! 
I have set aside a floor length – yes! a LONG dress… (believe it or not, I have one), and Mike is planning to dust off his bow tie and find an appropriate jacket and we will come downstairs ‘dressed for dinner’ …. just the two of us mind you!
The table is set…
…and the menu decided…we’re starting with butternut & (orange) sweet potato soup, which is on the stove. Then, I’ll bring out the chicken fillets with sour cream dip…
That’s to be followed by the main course which is roast chicken and roast potatoes with a medley of vegetables and a salad. After that we have a lemon cheesecake for dessert …
There’s sweet cheese and biscuits…
…and finally coffee with chocolate hearts…
So, even though there is no Mrs. Patmore to do the cooking, no Anna Bates to dress me and no Mr. Molesley to serve, we will have a splendid time! Sometimes, you have to do these outlandishly crazy things, just because you can!
“There is nothing better for a person than that he should eat and drink and find enjoyment in his toil. This also, I saw, is from the hand of God”. (Ecclesiastes 2:24)
Plan something fun and find enjoyment in your toil!
God bless you loads!
In His Grip,
Helga xx
www.facebook.com/ccfmriseandshine
www.ccfm.org.za
At www.helgavan.com, you'll find this blog and a whole lot of other stuff related to my life!
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Thank-you Lord, for the faith of Frank Retief…
3-26pm
It has been a great day! Right after the show, I went to Joyce Meyer ministries and picked up a packet of books to give away on Rise and Shine over the next 7 Wednesdays…
Then I went to the Blue Route to buy nuts and settled down at Tribakery to have a cappuccino and do show prep which I did on my cell phone! After that I beetled into town to see Granny. We had grapefruit in the garden. There were a few others sitting in the garden so I went and sat with them. I introduced myself by saying, ‘Hello, I’m Helga and this is my Mother-in-Law, Eve.” “Oh,” said the lady closest to me, “So you’re Helga.” I just smiled. After a minute or so, she added, “I listen to you every morning!” Her name is Shirley and she has been at the Ladies Christian Home for 9 years. She has had a varied life, with one of the highlights, 8 years in East London where she was the curator at Gateway House. She absolutely loved it. I am sure she is a bit of a historian. Here’s Shirley…
I must remember to say good morning to her tomorrow morning! (Pat, if you get to read this, let Shirley know you saw it!)
After I said, ‘goodbye’ to Granny, I headed towards home, stopping
for petrol in Bergvliet, where the attendant, Blessings, looked at my
CCFm sticker and asked if I was a presenter there. “Yes,” I said. “Oh,”
he replied, “I like this radio station!” His name was plural…not one Blessing, but many!
After that came the highlight of my day. There are many men of God
who have impacted South Africans across the decades, who have stood firm
in the faith and remained true to the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Bishop
Frank Retief is such a man. Today, I was invited to have a bite to eat
with the ‘Frank Retief Radio Ministry’ committee…
It was a great pleasure and privilege to meet Frank and Beulah and to be in their home with special people who have committed their time to getting, editing, mastering and distributing Frank’s messages to radio stations across the country. When I first received the new 5 minute slots (which I play on Rise and Shine every Monday at 7-22am), I listened to all 10 of them while driving in and out of town. What struck me was Frank’s humility. He is true to the Word of God; he speaks clearly and simply and he prays humbly. Today, over lunch, I saw the same characteristics. He is a humble man. As he closed our time in prayer, he drew our attention to the big-ness of God and how He uses us, despite our brokenness.
2 Corinthians 4:7 (New Living Translation)
: ”We
now have this light shining in our hearts, but we ourselves are like
fragile clay jars containing this great treasure. This makes it clear
that our great power is from God, not from ourselves.”
Any good that comes out of any work we do for Christ is not from ourselves – it is from God.
“Thank you Lord for the faith of Frank Retief and for the great example he has been to so many people. Please help me follow his example in continually seeking to glorify You in all I do.”
God bless you!
In His Grip,
Helga xx
www.facebook.com/ccfmriseandshine
www.ccfm.org.za
At www.helgavan.com, you'll find this blog and a whole lot of other stuff related to my life!
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