Hearts in Service

Psalm 19:12-14 ~  But who can discern their own errors?      Forgive my hidden faults. Keep your servant also from willful sins;      may they not rule over me. Then I will be blameless,      innocent of great transgression.     May these words of my mouth and this meditation of my heart      be pleasing in your sight,      Lord , my Rock and my Redeemer. I sat mulling over the situation and I started to have an imaginary conversation in my head with the person involved.  I thought, "I should have said this in response."  Then I imagined what the person would say and my response to that. On and on it went until the next thing I knew I was really angry at the person and we hadn't even talked!  Years later, it still makes me laugh when I think about it. This is something we've probably all experienced. Wandering thoughts can lead you down some bad paths in your mind.  A thoug...

The past few years, I  have been deliberately looking for beauty in my daily life. Because there is so much that is ugly and broken in this world, I find that those glimpses of beauty restore some sense of order.  The sun rises and sets each day, plants grow, leaves unfurl, and the rain falls from the sky. Things flourish and bloom and then die off as the season progresses. Each season follows the same pattern and time marches on. There is a consistency that happens each year regardless of the chaos going on around us. Looking for things I'm thankful for each week is a way to put a bit of peace in my day. All around me turmoil is happening and I've been continuing to look for beauty. So this weekly exercise of offering thanks continues. Taking the bits of beauty in each day, pulling them together in a list each week to bring a multitude of hope moments into the mess of the world. This week I'm thankful for the following things. 💗 A quiet and tranquil forest less than an ho...

I went grocery shopping last week and came away feeling discouraged at the cost of everything. Prices keep going up and that doesn't seem to be stopping any time soon. I am thankful that I've learned to make ends meet and the value of being frugal. It's easy to slip out of that, but seeing the increasing cost of everything is making me realize I need to readjust where our money goes. The past month we have been hit with a huge tax bill and the promise that next year it will be higher. We've also had to do costly repairs on two of the cars. So I'm rising to the challenge and taking a look at our budget and see where we can cut costs. The first way was this summer I planted a small garden with lettuce, spinach, swiss chard, radishes, peppers and herbs. The chard didn't really take off but everything else is doing well. I should say all except my pepper plants which for some reason the deer are enjoying!  I love fresh greens and it's nice to go out and pick wha...

Ephesians 3:14-21 (HCSB) ~ For this reason I kneel before the Father   from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named.   I pray that He may grant you, according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened with power in the inner man through His Spirit,  and that the Messiah may dwell in your hearts through faith. I pray that you, being rooted and firmly established in love,  may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the length and width, height and depth of God’s love, and to know the Messiah’s love that surpasses knowledge, so you may be filled with all the fullness of God. Now to Him who is able to do above and beyond all that we ask or think according to the power that works in us—  to Him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and ever. Amen. My guys love superhero movies, which seem to be a popular genre nowadays. They all have one thing in common. The hero of the story has this unknown ...

At 3:00 a.m. I woke up with a very distinct and forgotten memory of sitting slumped in the back seat of a car as a child. My dad was driving after having spent the day drinking. He was depositing us back home to our mother and had ended a torrent of words in tears. My father wasn't an angry drunk, he just wallowed in self-pity.  He sobbed out the words, "Nobody loves me, not even you kids." What is a ten year old supposed to do with those words? The adult in my life was telling me that I was responsible for the angst he was going through. I did what any normal ten-year-old would do who had spent most of her life listening to these type of things. I took on a responsibility that I should never had been burdened with. My mission in life was to make sure that no one around me was ever upset, ever angry and ever stressed. And if they were, it was sure to be my responsibility. That's a heavy load for a child to carry. It's a heavy load for an adult to carry. And yet, s...

Psalm 68:19 (HCSB) ~ May the Lord be praised! Day after day He bears our burdens; God is our salvation Matthew 11:28-30 (HCSB) ~ “Come to Me, all of you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.  All of you, take up My yoke and learn from Me, because I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for yourselves. For My yoke is easy and My burden is light.” With noses bent to the ground, we carry our burdens. Each one's burden is different. It may be the burden of worry about a chronic illness, or the burden of caring for a sick family member.  It may be the heavy load of financial issues.  Or perhaps we carry the fear, loneliness and anxiety. Whatever it may be, that burden weighs us down, bends our heads and shoulders, and it is difficult to carry. Yet, God wants us to give that burden to Him.  He is standing beside us, offering to carry it.  But we wave Him away.  We say, "It's okay."  "I have it."...

There is a vulnerability that comes in revealing your hurt and brokenness with others. You open yourself up to criticism, to misunderstanding and are exposing a part of yourself that is fragile and delicate. When you lay open those inner layers of your heart, there is opportunity for others to either be a healing balm or to further wound. It's frightening to be transparent and vulnerable.  But there is also healing in the vulnerability. Healing for the one being brave enough to say, "This area is not okay." and healing for the ones listening. The healing comes when others realize that they are not alone. Those wounded places have been shared by others. And there is healing when others can listen and speak words of encouragement and love to the hurting one. Yet so many of us walk through life with a mask on. The mask hides the pain and sorrow we feel. It keeps people from coming to close. What if someone sees the real me, hurts and all, and rejects me? The mask prevents fu...

Dan and I have always tried to live a fairly simple life, both in possessions and lifestyle.  But there are times when I think we get away from that and at times, make things more complicated than they need to be. When that happens, we readjust and get back to the basics. The same is true in my walk with the Lord. Sometimes, I make it very complicated. Timothy gives us a better and more simplified picture of what our Christian walk should look like.  2 Timothy 4:7 (HCSB) ~ I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith. Can those three things be said of you?  When your life comes to an end and people look back at it, will they be able to strip everything down into these three components. 1.  I have fought the good fight .  Ephesians 6 tells us that our battle is not against flesh and blood but against the spiritual forces of darkness.  Are you remembering that as you go through your struggles and battles?  I forget...

About 5 years ago I made both lemon and orange extract. It required lemon peels and orange peels and vodka. I made a jar of each and then never used it, because I discovered I don't bake anything that requires those extracts. If I am making something with lemons or oranges, I prefer to use the zest and fresh juice. Fast forward to this week. I was cleaning out some things and came across these two jars. I didn't really want to waste them by tossing them. Then I had a thought.  I use a lot of natural cleaners because they are cheaper and also don't use a lot of harsh chemicals. However, when it comes to the bathroom I tend to stick with commercial cleaners because well.....bathrooms are gross! But the problem with store bought cleaners is they are harsh and bother the eczema on my hands even when I wear gloves. I know alcohol is a natural disinfectant so I decided to make a bathroom cleaner out of these. I strained out the peels and put the extract in a spray bottle. Then I ...

  I love the fact that even though we live in a city, there is nothing but farmland and forests surrounding us. I only have to drive ten minutes in any direction to find wide open spaces and the things that restore my soul for a time.  I go a few times a week to the local Audubon center to walk. Because it is so close it only takes about an hour of my time and sometimes Dan comes with me, and other times I go alone. It's always a great opportunity to see something unexpected. On Mondays I like to look back over the previous week and pause to thank the Lord for how He is working in my life. Some weeks are harder than others, but I'm thankful no matter what my circumstances I can see Him at work. Some weeks the unexpected happens for good or bad, but no matter what, I am thankful that God uses these things to help me stretch and grow.  This week I'm thankful for the following: ❤ My husband having the privilege of marrying a young couple from church. Rehearsal ❤ Spendin...

 John 15:9 - As the Father has loved me, I have also loved you. Remain in my love.  I have some questions for you this morning. I've read this verse thousands of times and yet, have missed something here. How does God, the Father, love Jesus the Son? What does that look like? How do you remain in God's love? Don't just gloss over it. Dig deep and wrestle with the key meaning behind these words. I love the Lord and I long to continually go deeper in my understanding of His word and His love. However, I often feel like I am just scratching at the surface.  I don't know about you, but I was saved from a life that was headed the wrong direction. And I know many of you have the same story. Yet, we often can walk around in misery when we should be rejoicing. We have a head knowledge of God's love, but don't really understand what that looks like.  When my children were little they used to snuggle down in their daddy's arms. God is our Heavenly Father and yet, if I...