365 WORDS...ONE WORD AT A TIME...MAY...HALFWAY GONE!

Wow its been a couple of days...but my journey has continued in spite of. I received 5 jigsaw puzzles from my daughter for Christmas last year and when 2 pieces turned up missing on puzzle number 3 I knew I had to be the one who had miss placed them...you would have to know my daughter to understand why...smiles. I found them later that evening stuck to a piece of tape I had used to make the cardboard stronger since I also received Decoupage to preserve them because they are masterpieces from a famous artist. That said, I moved on to puzzle number 4 and it was small but complicated so I left it alone for about 3 months. A few days ago I needed something to do and it became my mission to complete that puzzle so I could move on to the last one which I knew would be fun. It took almost 3 days to finish it and as it was winding down I kept feeling like all the pieces were not there. A bit frustrating, but it wasn't my favorite puzzle so I conceded to that fact. I had sought one piece almost from the beginning and was perplexed at not being able to find it because it was quite distinctive. Of course at the very end all the pieces were there...except that one piece. I looked high and low, even where I had found the last 2 pieces stuck. It even occurred to me that perhaps my daughter wasn't as perfectly organized as I thought and maybe she had lost the piece...after all 1 piece out of all the thousands she sent me was not inconceivable right? That only lasted a second...I know her too well. After exhausting all of my options, I said a quiet PRAYER...I simply said, "Lord, I would really like to find this last puzzle piece just so that it will not be incomplete. I need your help because I do not know anywhere else to look." After that I forgot about it. This morning I woke up, watched Joyce Meyer, took notes as usual and after it was finished I went back to watching The Today Show. Something caught my attention and I did what I always do, jotted it down. I have a special notebook for that. It was buried under my pillows and some books I am reading so I had yank on it really hard to pull it out. I wrote my note and sat it down on a table that I had set up. For some reason I picked it up and opened the cover and there was the puzzle piece. I saw it but knew that there was no reason for it to logically be there. All I could do was stare at it. There was a big permanent gap between the hard cover and the first page which means it should have fell out. It was there, just like it had been placed there for me to find it. I smiled...God had heard my PRAYER...but more than that, He was letting me know He also heard the PRAYER I said after that one. I praise God for the lesson he taught me with a simple puzzle piece. The problems I have are just one small piece of the puzzle of my life. God will complete my puzzle, one piece at a time...all the while, I am a becoming a beautiful masterpiece. 

Therefore I tell you, 

whatever you ask in prayer, 

believe that you have received it, 

and it will be yours.

~Mark 11:24 ESV