Kirby Pines Retirement Community | The Pinecone

• 8 • The Pinecone | July 2026 Congratulations to our CHAMPION of the Month MARY HERNANDEZ Medical Housekeeper - Environmental Services Mary is always a team player and she gets along with her coworkers very well. She is dependable, loyal and does a great job. She is very friendly and is always asking what she can do to help me and everyone else. We are very happy to have Mary on our team. - Lavonica Brown, Supervisor, EVS Describe Your Family: My family is loving and caring. Describe yourself in five words: Friendly, hardworking, respectful, honest and a team player. Your favorite thing about your job: I like helping everyone. Do you have any hobbies: I love to cook. What do you do for fun: Take my kids to the movies. Favorite food: Tacos and Rice. Favorite song: We Are The World by Michael Jackson. What is something you are proud of: My kids. What would you like people to know about you: I’m friendly, nice and enjoy helping people. Growth is not accidental - it is intentional, purposeful. There are leaps which we make unconsciously, and great strides in development often come as by-products. Primarily, however, we make the decision to grow. This is not to say that we manufacture growth. We don’t, no more than a doctor manufactures healing. We simply become persons open to the possibility and give ourselves to the conditions in which growth takes place. What are these conditions? Most of us will probably have to begin by changing the focus of our life. We have lived either in the past or in the future. The past drags us down and fear of the future immobilizes us. Many are able to free themselves of the past. The forgiveness of God becomes a reality and they are able to leave the burdensome yesterdays behind. They look freshly to the future, but the uncertainty of it petrifies them. Reflections Maxie Dunnam By There may be an even more common problem than either of these. Not a morbid memory of the past which drains our energies, or a fear of tomorrow which paralyzes us, but anticipating the future as the time of real possibility this is the false focus. It is as though we were saying, “I’ll begin to live tomorrow!” Tomorrow can look so inviting, so challenging, so alluring. We are seduced by distant horizons that beckon us, and life is never really lived. We need to change our focus to today, to now. This is the moment God has given us. It is the only moment over which we have any control. The past is history. We cannot affect it or change it. What is written is written! The future is unreal, because it is not yet ours. Today is the only real time. July Vesper Services 6:30pm | Performing Arts Center July 2: Dr. Jimmy Latimer Senior Pastor, Redeemer Evangelical Church July 9: Jerry Roberts Lay Speaker, Second Presbyterian Church July 16: David Love Senior Adult Pastor, Ridgeway Baptist Church July 23: MatthewMitchell Pulpit Minister, Woodland Hills Church of Christ July 30: Hal Hall Care Ministries Pastor, Christ Methodist Church GROWTH IS NOTACCIDENTAL