God’s word says in Ecclesiastes 3:1 There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under the heavens:

During the pandemic we pulled our dining room table into our living room and started having weekly family meals.  It was during one of those meals that I asked my father-in-law what kind of clock was wound with a key, chimed every fifteen minutes and was small and shaped like a bell curve.  He told me it was a mantle clock and that he thought he could get one for me.  I told him that I didn’t need one.  I explained that I only wanted to know because I was trying to write out my story and my Grandpa Sessions had a clock like that that he kept high on a platform overlooking the living room.  When I was only a baby my mother moved back in with her parents (my grandparents) and I remembered the chiming of the clock.

On my fiftieth birthday  3/28/2023 I had an open house and through out the day friends and family members stopped by to celebrate.  My father-in-law gave me a mantle clock.  It was an unexpected gift and it was so very special.

About eight days after my birthday I was in bed telling my husband how much I love the clock and hearing the chimes.  That’s when I experienced the stark realization that I didn’t recall hearing the chimes that morning. I jumped out of bed to discover that the clock had stopped.

I pulled out the key and wound it.  I reset the time and the clock started to chime.  Much to my dismay the clock wasn’t chiming the correct time.  Tears started to well up in my eyes and I called down the hall towards my bedroom.  “I think I broke the clock your Dad gave me.  It’s not chiming correctly.”

My husband was still in bed and in his deep steady voice he assured me.  “We’ll figure it out!” He said.

I got on the internet and started googling what I should do.  In my searching I found a website that said they give out free name plaques for your clock to commemorate a special occasion.  It was very significant that my father-in-law had given me the clock for my fiftieth birthday.  We had a huge falling out the year before the pandemic.

When I navigated to the webpage explaining about the plaque I saw the most interesting picture.  There on the website was a picture of a grandfather clock.  It had my Father-in-law and mother-in-law’s first names and said 25th Anniversary.  I was so amazed that I took a screenshot with my phone and texted it to my father-in-law.  Later in the day we talked and he helped me figure out how to get the clock chiming at the correct time.

We both marveled about the website with the grandfather clock and the sample plaque that had his and my mother-in-law’s names.  I told him that things like that happen to me all of the time.  I told him that I thought it was God trying to get our attention.  He pointed out that the odds of that happening seemed unreal and I agreed and in my opinion it furthered my point about God.

Sometime after that I was shopping at Wings which is one of my favorite thrift stores.  The proceeds go to helping victims of domestic violence and back in the year two thousand they had approved for me and my two oldest children to move into one of their emergency shelters.  I ultimately didn’t have to move into the shelter because by God’s grace He worked a miracle for me and my kids to move into an apartment in Chicago.

In any case while I was shopping at Wings I saw a grandfather clock and I felt the Holy Spirit prompt me to buy the clock and pray for my Father-in-law whenever it chimed.  I bought the clock and brought it home.  I didn’t know how to set it up so I called my father-in-law and asked him if he would help me.

I was so surprised and excited.  I told my Father-in-Law that God was fighting for our family with bells and bells are a sign of Holiness to the Lord.

We talked all day.  He showed me how to change the time and set the weights.  He showed me how to level the clock.  He showed me how to take off the hands on my mantle clock which was all a part of oiling it and maintaining it.  That day he sat and listened to me give my testimony.  I told him that I loved him and that I had missed him.  He told me stories from when he was a little boy and I experienced a swell of compassion especially regarding a scary story from when he was only five years old.  A lot of healing happened that day and I was grateful.

Some months later I came home and the clock had stopped.  Immediately I reached out to my Father-in-law.  He came over and we oiled it and leveled it.  Something was off during that visit.  He asked for some shims so we could get it leveled.  I thought it was strange that it didn’t have adjustable feet to level it.  When he left our home that day the shims were sticking out and I thought to myself that can’t be right.  We can’t just leave it like that.   I tipped the clock to adjust the shims and I realized that the clock actually did have adjustable feet.

I mentioned it all to my husband.  We both agreed that was out of character for his Dad but no one addressed it with him.  Again some months went by and the clock stopped again.  I reached out to my father-in-law but he didn’t respond at all.  He didn’t respond to my voice messages nor did he respond to my text messages.

I stood there looking at the clock and tears welled up in my eyes.  I had been praying for my father-in-law every time that clock chimed and the silence brought me into the reality that one day my father-in-law’s time on earth would be up.  I have been crying out to the Lord for the longest time hoping that somehow my father-in-law would respond to Jesus calling.  I reached out to my father-in-law but he didn’t answer any of my texts or phone messages.  In fact he is still not talking to me.

I was non functioning for a few days because quite frankly I love my father-in-law.  The grief was overwhelming when I thought of an eternity without him.  Somewhere in my grief and googling I found a website with an article called Bob’s Clock Stopped Here.  My father-in-law’s name is Bob but the article was about a man named Bob Jones and the website explained that we are all basically here on earth to learn how to love and it posed the question, “Have you learned how to love?”  In my grief I realized that yes I most definitely learned how to love.  I was devastated at the thought of losing Bob.

Later that week I was back at WINGS Resale and I saw a small Howard Miller Clock.  I decided to buy it for myself to help me deal with my grief over my father-in-law not talking to me again which was compounded by my awareness that I knew he had not accepted Jesus as his savior.  The grandfather clock was broken and so I wasn’t able to pray when it chimed. I figured the small clock could work as a prayer prompt until I figured out how to fix the grandfather clock.

I strongly believed my father-in-law would have seen God’s hand moving on his life but to my disappointment he was unresponsive.  With tears in my eyes I explained all of this to the cashier at the store.  She gave me a card for a father in son duo who had been donating the clocks.  She said they volunteer regularly and that they could potentially help me get the grandfather clock working.

I looked at the business card.  The father’s name was Bob and the son’s name was Tod from “Somewhere in Time Clock Repair.”  I called and spoke with Bob and he had his son Tod call me back.  Later that week Tod came out and fixed my clock.  While Tod was fixing the clock I told him that I have a brother-in-law named Todd and he said, “Well I only have one d in my name just like God.

Tod fixed the clock and he gave me a one year warranty on the clock.  The diagnosis was “Won’t Run.”  Quite frankly it reminded me that I had given my father-in-law a Run for God hat as a Christmas gift.  We are all either running for God or we aren’t.

Before Tod left he told me that one of his favorite movies was a movie called “Somewhere in Time.”  So of course I went and borrowed it from the library.  That’s when we realized that one of our good friends was actually in the movie.  In fact I worked with my husband and father-in-law doing construction in his home during my first year living in Chicago.  I have many stories and fond memories of my work there. I will never forget that I was standing on his roof when September 11th shocked the world.  Overall it was a special time for me because during that season I was daily interacting with men that weren’t trying to hurt me.  When I realized my friend was in that movie I marveled at the detail and intricacy of God.  The connections are surreal!

Awhile back I wrote about a post called Home of the Sparrow  and in it I explained how  I had acquired a jar of jewelry where I found Masonic jewelry inside.  It was as if there was a spirit attached to that jewelry and I’ve since gotten rid of it.  But inside the jar there was also a pocket watch. If you’ve ever seen the movie “Somewhere in Time” this would make sense to you.  Seriously this is a God orchestrated story.

The next time I saw my father-in-law was at a get together at my Aunt and Uncle’s house.  When I walked in I saw a Howard Miller Grandfather clock.  I never noticed it before but it was apparently always there.  The clock wasn’t running and I asked why.  My Aunt said that she didn’t like the sound of the chimes.

If I remember correctly I believe according to the date on the  plaque on the inside of their clock it was a Christmas clock.

Last summer when our daughter Alissa graduated from high school her graduation ceremony coincided with the 2024 ICHE Homeschool Conference: Hearts Encouraged!  The conference started on May 30, 2024 and ran through June 2, 2024.  One of the keynote speakers was Jim Mason.

Normally we drive back and forth each day but this year we decided to stay in one of the dorms.  When we got there they gave me a key it had the numbers “25 – 73” inscribed on it.  I looked at that key and said, “I think this is my Christmas Key.”  The young woman told me that if I lost the key there was a replacement cost.  Then she gave me the address which was 443 Grand Ave.  I looked at that address and realized that when God gave me an apartment in Chicago my address was 443 W. Webster Ave. in Chicago.

I moved into the apartment in Chicago with my two oldest kids right before Christmas in the year 2000.  It was an absolute miracle that the Lord provided a place for us to live.  We had been slated to move into a WINGS shelter where they house victims of domestic violence.  But God instead opened the way for an apartment.  I had no job, no money and bad credit.

God has been taking me back to areas of trauma in order to heal me.  Healing can be painful and when we walked into that dorm room the stress was palpable.  When the weekend was over I went to return the key and there was an older woman at the desk this time.  Her name tag said Lynne and I noted that it was the same as my mother-in-law.  I told her I think I’m supposed to keep this key.  I know it sounds crazy but I feel like this is my Christmas key.    She looked at me and said, “We like to keep the keys.”

“Yes of course you do.” I told her.  It made perfect sense to me. I tried to explain that God has called me to give my testimony and that it is a beautiful story of survival and rescue but she wasn’t interested.  Lynne didn’t want to hear my testimony

If you will recall that at the beginning of this post I had asked my father-in-law what kind of clock is shaped like a bell curve and chimes every fifteen minutes.  At that time I had never seen the above photo.  It’s a photo of my Grandfather Archibald dancing with my Grandmother Gladys at my parents wedding reception.  The wedding reception  took place at their home at 29 Dover Ave in LaGrange Illinois.

On 7/17/2023 I purchased a Christmas Tree off of Craigslist from Grandma & Grandpa’s House. It was an amazing experience and I wrote God’s Road To Salvation for my Family after that.  In all the years since my mom died I have carried around some photos that quite frankly I’ve never been able to look through because I have always been in survival mode.  But the day I came home with that Christmas tree I set it up, decorated it with hearts and put the picture of my Grandparents with the mantle clock right into the tree.  God is completely sovereign.

Christmas has always been hard.  I have walked through Christmas’s where I needed to participate in The Salvation Army Angel Tree program.  The absolute BEST gift ever is Jesus Christ! But I still like to bless my family with gifts.  The Angel tree program helped me to offer something to my kids rather than nothing.

We have rescued a lot of animals in unexpected places and ways.  When God started unfolding this very large Christmas story he practically handed us a cockatiel.  I was outside training for Run for God and my daughter heard the bird crying out.  It wasn’t the normal sounds birds in our neighborhood make. She spied it in a neighbors pine tree and through a group effort we actually captured her.  Once inside our home she flew around and around and landed at the top of a small Christmas tree I had displayed on a table in my living room. That’s how we ended up naming her Angel.

God’s word says that to enter the Kingdom of Heaven you must be born again.  I wrote a post called, You Have To Have A Birthday. On 7/25/2023 I felt prompted by the Lord to drive to my father-in-laws house and told him that he needed to have a birthday.   I brought him a birthday card and a gift. It wasn’t his birthday nevertheless he seemed receptive to me.  We took pictures together. It was a good conversation.

Remember when I said the Grandfather clock stopped? All those months ago when the Grandfather clock stopped one of the websites I came upon in all of my googling a piece of writing written by Missionaries of Prayer called  Prophetic Word – I Stopped The Clock for You.

This article helped me so much because I have really tried to be faithful to the Lord but somehow I’ve been finding myself behind.  God is not bound by time.  God can stop or start the clock whenever He wants.

So the sun stood still, and the moon stopped, till the nation avenged itself on its enemies, as it is written in the Book of Jashar. The sun stopped in the middle of the sky and delayed going down about a full day. Joshua 10:13

As has just been said: “Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts as you did in the rebellion.” Hebrews 3:15

There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under the heavens: a time to be born and a time to die, a time to plant and a time to uproot,  Ecclesiastes 3:1-2

We are all going to die but when a Christian dies it is more like a graduation into glory.  Instead of being afraid to die you are able to experience a great adventure!As the rain and the snow
    come down from heaven,
and do not return to it
    without watering the earth
and making it bud and flourish,
    so that it yields seed for the sower and bread for the eater,

so is my word that goes out from my mouth:
    It will not return to me empty,
but will accomplish what I desire
    and achieve the purpose for which I sent it. Isaiah 55:10-11