Alzheimer’s is a horrible disease. When a love one is diagnosed with this disease the air goes out of you for you know that you will very slowly lose the one you love.

In my case it’s my mother who has this disease. She first started showing symptoms of the disease back in 2015. Since then we have been slowly losing her.

She lost her freedom to drive which meant she could no longer go where she wanted to go and when she wanted to. She became dependent on others for her shopping, attending church, going to various activities, etc.

She slowly lost the ability to cook. The matriarch of the family was no longer able to host holiday meals. She also needed help cleaning the house, doing laundry, etc.

She lost interest in fishing and boating trips with my father and friends.

She had to drop out of the hand-bell choir at church and other activities at church and in the community.

She forgot how to sew quilts. This meant the two great grandchildren born after she stopped sewing would not receive a personalized baby quilt from her.

Holding conversations with her has become increasingly difficult as the disease has taken away her short term memory. This has also caused her to stop reading . Her Bible, which was read daily, now sits in a drawer forgotten due to this disease. I’m dreading the day that I walk into the room and she no longer recognizes me.

In 2018 the Pasco County the Florida Gulf Coast Chapter of the Alzheimer’s Association had their first annual “Walk to End Alzheimer’s.” I created “Team Jeannine” in honor of my mother to help raise funds to end this horrible disease.

This year I’ll again be walking to end Alzheimer’s. The walk is Saturday, October 23rd at Sims Park in downtown New Port Richey.  Will you please help me fight this horrible disease by either joining my team or making a donation of any amount.

Here’s the link to my fundraising facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/donate/291844172458163/

Here’s the link to my donation page on the local  Alzheimer’s Walk page: https://act.alz.org/site/TR?team_id=673813&pg=team&fr_id=14382

Please help end Alzheimer’s so the next generation will not have to suffer from this horrible disease!

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

 

In my last blog, http://musingsofasenior.com/s-i-n/ , I wrote about how sin separates us from God. At the end of the blog I left us separated from God. It’s a gap that we can not bridge on our own. We can do good deed after good deed and it will not do anything to counter our sin and bridge the gap. It’s not a balancing act where our good deeds outweigh our bad deeds and thus we bridge the gap and earn our way to heaven. So if we can’t bridge the gap ourselves then how can it be bridged?

The good news is that it is by God’s gift of grace that we are saved and the gap is bridged. Ephesians 2:8-9 says ” For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— not by works, so that no one can boast.” If we could earn our way to heaven then we could boast that it was our works that gained us access to God. That would take glory away from God.

What is grace? An acronym for “Grace” that I heard a very long time ago: God’s Riches At Christ Expense. It was the blood of a sinless Jesus on the cross that paid the penalty for our sins.

Romans 5:8 “But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.”

Romans 3:25 “God presented Him as a propitiation through faith in His blood, to demonstrate His righteousness, because in His restraint God passed over the sins previously committed.” (propitiation means: to appease)

Jesus Paid it All

The following verse may be one of the most well known Bible verse: John 3:16 “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.”

1 John 1:9 “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.”

Romans 10:9-10 “If you declare with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For it is with your heart that you believe and are justified, and it is with your mouth that you profess your faith and are saved. “

Repentance: the action of repenting; sincere regret or remorse. We also need to repent of our sins and ask God for forgiveness. Part of repentance is a change in our lives, a 180 degree change.

Acts 3:19 “Therefore repent and return, so that your sins may be wiped away, in order that times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord ” When we do this the chains of sin are gone and we are set free.

Amazing Grace (My Chains Are Gone)

John 14:6 “Jesus said to him, ‘I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father but through Me.’ ”

There are NOT many ways to God. The ONLY way to bridge the gap is through Jesus! If you would like to learn more about the Good News of God’s Grace please send me a message.

This is a very small word but is one that is nearly tabooed and will not grab headlines and readers. Many people become uncomfortable and offended when a preacher talks about “sin” whether in a church or on a street corner. People want to avoid this topic and not talk about “it” especially when it’s in reference to their own sins. They become offended when someone brings up this topic.

The definition of sin: an immoral act considered to be a transgression against divine law. More simply it is anything that one thinks, says or do that doesn’t please God.

What does the Bible say about “sin”:

Romans 3:23 “for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.”

We all sin. Not one of us is without sin. Not one of us is righteous. Romans 3:10 “There is no one righteous, not even one.”

Habakkuk 1:13 “Your eyes are too pure to look on evil; you cannot tolerate wrongdoing.”

One may think, “I’m not a sinner. I’m basically a good person. I haven’t murdered anyone or robbed a bank.” The problem is that ANY sin, even the smallest one, will separate us from God. He is Holy and does not tolerate sin and it can not be in His presence. Since all have sinned we are all separated from God. It doesn’t matter what the sin is. Any sin is wrong and separates us from God.

Romans 8:38 Those who are in the realm of the flesh cannot please God.

Isaiah 29: 2 But your iniquities have made a separation between you and your God, And your sins have hidden His face from you so that He does not hear.

I haven’t listed any sins because we have a tendency to focus on the “big” sin and look at other peoples’ sins as worse than ours and overlook or minimize ours. We have to realize that any sin is one too many in the sight of God. This doesn’t please Him so will separate us from Him now and for all of eternity.