Tag Archives: Grace

Joy Riding

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Moments with My Father ~

 

A rather painful memory comes to my mind this morning as I reflect upon my Father’s Word.  When my daughter was around two years old, one of her great experiences in life was spending time with her father.  He made life exciting, adventurous and fun for her!  One of the things they did together was go for little rides together on our motorcycle.  One day they were getting ready to do such and my husband had the motorcycle all warmed up and ready.  Unknowingly, my little daughter reached out and laid her little hand on the muffler of the bike which was very hot and as a result she was burned by it.  Something that could have been a joy ride in life had turned out to be very painful as a result of her lack of knowledge.  As I think back on that day, I wish that she could have had the foreknowledge needed to have prevented that hurt in her life.  As parents, we could say that we wished we would have had more foresight to protect her, but it isn’t something that we thought about until it happened.  Yikes!!!  We were human and with that reality in mind, we need to extend ourselves grace as our Father does and realize that there was knowledge gained through the experience.  Once we had gained that wisdom, we were able to remind her when she got close to the bike to be careful.  As this memory plays through my mind, my Father reveals to me that as our Father who loves us, He desires to protect us from getting hurt in life and experience life full of joy. Because of this, He, in His perfect abilities, had the forethought to teach us about life through His written Word (the Bible) to help prevent us from the experiences of painful ways of living.  If we listen to Him by the study of His Word, He says we will “live in safety and be at ease, without fear of harm.”  It is out of His great love for us that He shares His wisdom with us for living life well.  It can be a painful life that ends up burning people when His wisdom is pushed away and the choice is made to live life the hard way, on our own, living and learning.  Yikes and ouch!!!   It is when we heed His wisdom, abide with Him, listening to His Spirit remind us of Truths we’ve learned that our joy is complete.  Given all of this, I’m thinking this child is going to seek to learn all I can from my Father’s foresight (His written Word) as I so love joy riding with Him through the gift of life.  He makes life so exciting, adventurous and fun!  How about you?  Wanna joy-ride with our Father?  Got a Bible?

Pr 1:32-33; Jn 14:26, 15:9-11; Ro 12:2; Eph 1:17-19

 

 

Guided with Truth

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Moments with My Father ~

 

It is a great new day as my Father has lovingly guided me with His Truth to a changed way of thinking and thus, set me free.  That is what Truth does – it set us free and that is what our Father’s Spirit of Truth does for us.  He guides us gently, revealing Truth to us and as we experience His kindness and His love in doing so, we are drawn to want to live out His Truth and freedom for our lives out of love.  Our Father is not one who condemns us and brow beats us into submission or a changed life – that kind of cruelty and accusation is from our enemy the devil!  Yikes!  There is no condemnation for us as our Father’s children.  When we believe Jesus died for our sins on the cross, He died for all of our past, present and future sins and there is no performance required to have His unconditional, unfailing love and acceptance.  Just as Abraham was justified by faith, so are we, our Father’s children and it is not by our works! Our Father’s Word says “blessed (happy) are those whose transgressions are forgiven, whose sins are covered.  Blessed (happy) is the man whose sin the Lord will never count against him.”  Oh, I’m a happy gal today knowing my Father never condemns me, only loves me and gently and lovingly shows me His Truths and as He does, my love for Him moves me to new ways of thinking and a heart that gladly desires to follow more closely to being more like Him.  That is what real love is all about.  Happy with you all today for our Father’s grace and love!

Ro, 2:4, 4:1-8, 8:1; Col 1:21-23; Jn 8:31-32, 16:13, Gal 5:1, Rev 12:9-11

Set Free

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Moments with My Father ~

 

Good Friday dear family!  The last few days I have written about struggles with sin and the battle we all face in living victorious from sin in our own efforts.  In the days of Jesus walking on this earth, this was the focus that the people all around Jesus struggled with as well.  Trying to dot all the i’s and cross all the t’s of the Old Testament Law.  What they found, I have found and that is that the Law came to point us to our need for Jesus who on this day many years ago, put His life up on the cross to take the wages of our sin – death.  He paid the price in our place so that we can have victory over sin and death and so that we can have eternal life in a right relationship with our Father.  Now how special is that?  This is a day of forgiveness for us all!  Our Father tells us that if we confess our sins to Him, He is faithful and just to forgive us for our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.  Such a deal!  I have no doubt that I am a sinner needing grace and I’m a happy gal today that my Father forgives me and sets me free!  There is no condemnation for those in Christ Jesus!  Hallelujah!  One of the things that stands out so vivid to me is that Jesus took all the sin of all the world upon Him and how incredible the pain of that must have been, but in the midst of that pain and despite all the anger and tears He experienced by being mistreated as He walked this earth, He had an attitude of forgiveness.  He didn’t hold it against us when He said to the Father “Forgive them, for they know not what they do.”  In honor of Him today, I think how perhaps we all have had and maybe are in the midst of experiencing the sins of others that have caused us pain in our lives and I’m just wondering, can we do the same as Jesus and let an attitude of forgiveness prevail?  Maybe it is ourselves that needs forgiveness.  If Jesus forgives us and sets us free, we are free indeed! I’m a gal enjoying freedom in Christ today.  How about you?  His grace is so amazing – our chains of slavery to sin and death are gone!  As this song says, we’ve been set free.  Christ went through much to set us free! Have you accepted His gift?  Freedom feels so good!

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yrcnZmgYC5s&feature=youtube_gdata_player

Lk 23:26-49; Ro 8:1-4; Jn 3:16; 1 Jn 1:9

Proclaiming Christ

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Moments with My Father ~

 

Talking with my Father and listening to Him as He speaks through His Word is good interaction in order to have a good relationship with Him.  Relationships are very important to our Father and He speaks to my heart this morning that as Christians, each person that He puts into our life, even if it is for just a few seconds, is opportunity to proclaim the mysteries of Christ. Paul understood this and he encourages us in Christ to be wise in the way of acting towards outsiders and to make the most of every opportunity.  Also, to let our conversations be always full of grace, seasoned with salt, so that we may know how to answer everyone.  To this end, Paul says to devote ourselves to prayer, being watchful and thankful and to pray for our Father to open doors for the message of Christ to be proclaimed clearly.  In these modern days that we live in with all of the technology that we have, we have even greater opportunities to proclaim Christ and with all the technology that we have, we also have more opportunity than ever to become lost in unfruitful uses of our time and isolate ourselves from others. To proclaim Christ to a dying world is the most precious use of our time and in making the most of each day’s opportunity will bring eternal reward not only to our lives but to the lives of others.  Our Father’s Word speaks to their being the proper timing in life.  There is time for work and time for play and time for all kinds of things.  My Father asks me today to consider how I am using my time.  Am I making the most of the opportunities before me?  How can I use it more effectively for blessing others?  I’m praying about it as this gal wants to be all that I can to bring blessing.  I don’t want to live with regret.  How about you?

 

Col 4:2-6; Ecc 3:1, 8:5-6; Eph 5:15-17; Ro 12:2; 1 Co 3:10-15

Our Father of Humility and Grace

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Moments with My Father ~

 

Oh, how our Father loves us and desires our love in return.  So much so, that He is a God of humility and grace and is one that recognizes the importance of communication in His relationship with His people. I have heard it said that communication is to a relationship what oxygen is to the body – it is vital to healthy relationships.  Our Father desires to communicate with us and He desires we communicate with Him.  Our Father’s Word says if we confess our sins to our Father when we have sinned against Him, He is faithful and just to forgive us of our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.  If we don’t have that communication or acknowledgement with Him, it affects our relationship with Him.  If only one person extends humility and grace in a relationship, the relationship is not healthy.  Our God is a God who loves us and desires a heart of unity with His people. I so admire that and I so want to be just like Him, not only in my relationship with my Father, but with all people.  To be humble in owning our sin and to forgive as we have been forgiven is a beautiful thing. I’m all about having a beautiful life. I’m stepping out with a heart of grace today.  I pray His grace and peace to you all today as well.  Jesus loves us and showed great humility in order to have a relationship with us when He came to this earth and died on a cross for our sins to give us a relationship with our Father – now how cool is that?  Here is an awesome song that says just that:

 

Jn 3:16; 1 Jn 1:8-10; Php 2:5-8; Col 1:21-23

 

You’re Special

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Moments with My Father ~

 

Birthdays are a time of reflecting on the day that you were born into this world.  They are a day to remember that each of us are individual – separate from others.  You could say special,  or uncommon, noteworthy, particularly favored, confined to or designed for a definite field of action, purpose or occasion. Our Father describes it in His Word as being set apart.  He says that before each one of us was made, that He knew us intimately, meaning in an innermost way, in close association, contact or familiarity, personally or in a private way.  As He told Jeremiah the Prophet, His Word consistently speaks these same truths to each of us individually, that before we were made, He knew us, before we were born, we were set apart and He appointed us into this world with a purpose.  Paul understood this and viewed himself as being set apart at birth and being called by God’s grace to carry out a specific purpose in his life.  It is an amazing thing how our Father has poured out His grace differently upon each one of us, equipping us to carry out the purpose in life that He had in mind before we were even made.  Sometimes it can be scary when we hear the call upon our lives to step out and do as our Father has asked of us.  Yikes!!!  Jeremiah felt the same way.  He told the Lord, I know you are the sovereign Lord, but I can’t do what you have asked of me because I am just a child!  What Jeremiah was missing is that he didn’t understand it wasn’t up to his own ability to accomplish the task given, it was up to God working in him to enable him.  God told him not to say that he was just a child.  He told him he needed to go and do what he was asked to do and not to be afraid because He, God Himself was with him and He would rescue him.  Well, all of these thoughts leave this gal feeling pretty special and a whole lot more confident in stepping out to carry out what my Father has asked of me today.  Wherever and whoever you are, know you are special, too.  God be with you as you do what He has set you apart to do!  Much love to you!

Jer 1:4-8, 29:11; Ps 119:73, 139:14-16; 2 Co 12:9; Jn 15:4-5; 1 Pe 4:10-11; Ro 12:6-8; Eph 4:7-8; Gal 1:11-17

Loved

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Moments with My Father ~

 

I’m a cowgirl feeling loved this morning as my Father reminds me of how great His love is for each of us.  In His kindness and love, He came to earth to save us, not because of righteous things we had done, but because of His mercy.  Believing in Him, we are born again and renewed by His Holy Spirit into new life.  Oh, our Father is so generous to us!  He has poured out His Spirit upon us so generously that we are all justified by His grace, rescued from sin and death, given the hope of eternal life in His Kingdom and we have the closeness of His Spirit within us to help us through each moment of our day.  We don’t have to prove ourselves to be accepted by Him – the King of Kings and Lord of Lords.  He accepts us just as we are with open arms.  That is exactly how He died on the cross for us – with open arms.  Now how cool is that!  I so love the words of this song – give a listen if you can

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2FZW9lEYO4s&feature=youtube_gdata_player

 

Tit 3:4; Jn 3:16; Ro 5:8; Gal 3:24-25; Rev 21:1-4

The Greatest Gift

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Moments with My Father ~

 

Woohoo!  I’m counting down the days ’til Christmas morning with ya’ll.  I feel like a kid at Christmas this morning, probably because I am – my Father’s kid!  As I think back on my Christmas anticipation as a child, I remember how we as kids used to think.  We usually had a pretty good count on all the packages that were under the Christmas tree with a label that read to us and we really got excited if the biggest present under the tree had our name on it.  I chuckle as I envision a small child discovering that and jumping up and down with excitement!  The hardest part was waiting until it could be opened and the secret within laid open!  Well, as my Father’s child, I’m all excited today and jumping up and down because the greatest gift ever given has my name on it and not just mine.  Each one of you has been given the greatest gift ever as well.  It is the gift of Jesus as our own personal Savior from sin and death and great shepherd or best friend in our lives.   He came into our lives not packaged up beautifully.  He had no beauty or majesty about Him to attract us to Him.  He was wrapped in cloths – nothing about His appearance that we would desire Him, but wow, what was on the inside was indescribable awesome!  How cool is it that we have each been given the very best friend anyone could ever have for all of our eternal life?  The gift of Him to us is just full of unfailing love and grace, hope, peace and joy and all of His goodness.  As a small child finds great joy in receiving a gift they have been longing for, each one of us has a heart that longs for His unfailing love – the gift of Him in our lives.  Having now received the gift of Him in my life just has me smiling from ear to ear!  It is sweet to my soul!  We’re talking blessed cowgirl here!  I’m definitely having a Merry Christmas because the greatest gift given has my name on it!  I hope you enjoy your gift of Him as well and that you have yourself a merry little Christmas wherever you are!  All His best to ya ~

Is 53; Pr 13:19, 19:22; Lk 2:7; Ps 33:5, 36:7; Gal 5:22; Ro 8:28-29; Jn 3:16; 2 Co 9:15

Dave’s View of Todd’s Burma Mission

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Todd shares the love of God with a Burma boy.

David Eubank of the Free Burma Rangers writes of Todd’s Mission Trip to Burma:

 

Gifts of Freedom: Rodeo, Baptisms, Dedication of a Child and a Wedding in Burma

 

Dear friends,

 

We thank God for you all, your love, your prayers and your support and we thank God for freedom. Freedom has been the theme of our relief team training and we find as we love and obey God, we do begin to know the truth and to be set free. No sin, army or political force can enslave us when we depend on Jesus. Many in this training are not Christians, but we all agree that we want to serve the God of love and to be freer people, open to all God’s gifts. We have just graduated 15 new relief teams here in Karen State and on the final two days, had Burma’s first jungle rodeo, a sports day, Gospel-centered mule training,  baptisms of seven rangers and a dedication of the daughter of one of our rangers who we baptized two years ago. The rodeo and sports day started with a procession of each relief team led by the small ranger horse cavalry. Todd Pierce of Riding High Ministries in Idaho took our wildest mule and with love, gentleness and perseverance won her heart. She ran in circles and bucked at first, not letting him touch her. But in less than an hour she was following him, being petted and then let Todd ride her. He reminded us that God doesn’t want us trapped by trying to follow a set of rules. God does not want to force us, He wants us to be free. God wants us to know how much He loves us and how He wants us to freely give Him our hearts. We are born wild, but we are created to be free – free from sin and free in a relationship of love with our heavenly Father. Following this, the kids organized bull riding, goat tying and boulder racing. This was followed by football, volleyball, sprints, and different contests of strength and agility. Pete had malaria, but rallied to ride a bull. The bull won. But Pete is now healed, thanks to your prayers and the expert help of John, Mon and the medics here. Seven of our rangers asked to be baptized and when I asked one of them why he wanted to follow Jesus and to be baptized, he said, “Because I like it!” Karen Pastor Edmond, my father, longtime missionary friend Kim K., Paul B. and Todd took part in the baptism, followed by the dedication of one ranger’s daughter. He asked that we name his daughter and after prayer, God gave my father the name “Grace.”  As this word came out, I felt a surge of love and grace in my own heart and tears came to my eyes as I felt God’s presence. After this, one of our medical rangers asked for a wedding ceremony which Pastor Edmond performed and then we all shared in communion. That was a full Sunday! The morning before graduation we had our final leadership class and the entire class got spontaneously on their knees and asked Jesus into their hearts. We felt God’s power and like the feeling that had come over me when we named Grace, we were deeply moved by the closeness of God’s love and presence. I do not know how many of those who prayed will follow this up with a further decision, but we all grew closer in the bond of love. We then came together, students and instructors and as we shook hands and hugged, some had tears in their eyes. This year we had more visitors than we have ever had: my father Allan, Greg G, Chris S, Paul B, Kim K, Todd P, Tera D, Dave M. and Jonathan C. Each of these brought a unique offering of experience, expertise, love and faith to enrich the students and all of us here. One day as I was crossing the river that runs through White Monkey Camp, I looked up to the heavens in wonder of all these excellent people here and all the talent and commitment they embodied and shared with us. I said, “Thank you Lord.  You have brought wonderful people here to share your love and to build us up, drawing us closer to you and to each other. Lord, I am not a man of many talents, but you have brought men and women of many talents here and it is a joy and privilege to be part of this. Thank you for this gift.” Thank you, too, dear reader and friend on this journey of sharing life in God’s world. We are blessed to know you and to be one family in this.

 

Dave, family and all of the Free Burma Rangers

Poor Doubters

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Moments with My Father ~

 

It’s a fantastic new day to experience life with my Father today and my thankfulness that I can do so is in good timing with this being the week of Thanksgiving here in the States.    This cowgirl has so much to be thankful for that I could go on and on about all the blessings in my life, but by far the greatest treasure I have is my relationship with my Father.  As I have spent time with Him this morning, He has laid it upon my heart the importance of being merciful to those who doubt, who do not believe in Him and do not have the precious gift of faith that I have.  I can’t imagine doing life without my Father.  Without His wisdom, His unconditional, unfailing, perfect love and His peace in the midst of trials would be devastating to me.  Can you imagine your life without your faith.  This is what those who do not lelieve in our Lord experience everyday!  Yikes!!!  This gives me a heart that has a whole lot more understanding for them and as I think about this, I recall that Jesus understood this when He was hanging on the cross and spoke of those who did not believe in Him.  He told His Father “Forgive them, for they know not what they do!”  As I step out into my world, I’m looking at those without Christ with a whole new mindset today.  They so need our prayers and to see the reality of the love and grace of Christ lived out before them and I want to be that in my relating to them!  Will you join me in making a difference in someone’s life who doesn’t know our Lord by helping them to see our great God who dwells in us?  Our Father would be so thankful!  May you be filled to overflowing with His love and grace wherever life has you so others might see and have what you have in Him!  Bless you for blessing others!

Jude 1:22; Lk 23:34; Mt 5:16; 1 Co 3:16; Jn 3:16

Self-Haters

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Moments with My Father ~

 

It is a wonderful Wednesday and a new day full of opportunities, including the opportunity to do life with ourselves.  Spending the day with ourselves can be a good day or it can be an awful day, depending on what we choose to believe about ourselves.  My Father reminds me this morning that He loves us unconditionally and with unfailing love.  While He gives us His Word to lead us and guide us for our best and it is good to seek His best for our lives, He is a Father of forgiveness, compassion, mercy and grace when we fail to live up to carrying out His best for us.  Our Father says that even on a day when we feel we are performing pretty good, He says we still fall short in living up to His Holy Standard.  He saw the impossible, in that we would never be able to achieve perfection and therefore, He sent Jesus as our Savior.  Through Him, we wear a robe of righteousness, we are holy, blameless and without accusation.  So if He sees us each this way, why is it that we can often be self-haters, continually beating ourselves up because we fail in our own minds?  As I ponder this before my Father this morning, He has revealed to me that it can be because we put ourselves in God’s place of judgement.  We can be hard on ourselves when we feel we have hurt God, others and even ourselves and we believe that we deserve condemnation.  Everybody is in the same boat.  We all fall short of perfection.  This is why forgiveness is so important.- forgiving each other as God forgives us and forgiving ourselves, knowing everyone struggles with their own failures.   We can put our opinion and often the opinion of the enemy (the devil) over God’s and that is unhealthy for us.  Self-hating is a lack of faith, not believing God when He tells us we are forgiven and accepted just as we are, without performance.  He tells us we are fearfully and wonderfully made.  When we are self-haters, we need to look at the flip side of the coin and look at the ways we are a blessing.  We have been made in the image of our Father and He dwells in us and enables us to make a great difference in the lives of others.  I chuckle to myself as I now visualize someone with this new mindset slicking back their hair, dressing themselves up, standing straight and tall and putting on their best smile all ready to step out into the day called life.  They are thinking “I’m a gift and I’m gonna share myself with the world so the world doesn’t miss out!”  Woohoo!  This cowgirl says “Go, girlfriend!” “Go for it brother!”  Go bless the world with the special person of YOU!  Believe in God in you as you do! Well, going to do the same, so to-da-loo!

Ex 20:3; Ps 139:13-14; Ro 3:23; 1 Pe 5:8-9; Col 1:21-23, 3:13; Pr 11:25; Php 4:6-8; Jn 3:16

Copy Cat Grace

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Moments with My Father ~

 

It is another day of doing life in a world filled with people.  As we go and interact with people, they can bring us joy and sometimes they bring us sorrow.  As I spend time with my Father this morning, He reveals to me that Jesus is someone who understood this.  While He had those who loved Him and were devoted to Him, there were those who were always against Him and stopped at nothing short of crucifying Him even though Jesus had done nothing wrong.   Even those who were devoted to Him sometimes worked against Him because they didn’t have His right understanding.  People are so complex and there are many things we as people can believe that are are not in line with our Father’s way of thinking or we can just get busy and not think and consequently step on toes.  Yikes!!!  Often people react to us negatively because they do not understand the full picture.  They don’t get it.  It is important that we have humility and remember that sometimes we don’t get it ourselves and we hurt other people as a result.  I so admire the way that Jesus handled it.  He prayed for those who crucified Him and said “Forgive them Father, for they know not what they do.” I feel badly for the ways I have hurt people I love because I haven’t gotten it. I have lacked right understanding and this viewpoint helps me to have a whole lot more understanding of other people and extend to them compassion when my toes get stepped on.  I’m putting into practice this mindset as I step out for my Father into the world full of people who struggle to get it just like me.  It  brings me a great big smile knowing that our Father does get it and we can rest in the blessed assurance that He always loves each of us with perfect, unfailiing, forgiving love. His love is always there to comfort us as His kids when our toes get stepped on just as He was there for Jesus when He hung on the cross because those in the world around Him didn’t get it.  Oh our Father – how wonderful is He!  I so want to be a copy cat of His grace and love. Love and grace to ya’s today!

 

Here’s a sweet message – have a listen:

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jBIgOFnLCmU

 

 

Lk 23:34; Mt 6::14-15

 

 

Revelation of Imperfection

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Moments with My Father ~

 

I love the start of each new day as it is a time for a fresh new start and as I always like to begin my day by seeking my Father, part of each morning’s conversation with Him begins with a prayer for forgiveness from past sin and a request for a renewed filling of His Holy Spirit within me. His Word says that because of His great love, we are not consumed, for His compassion never fails. It is new every morning; great is His faithfulness! If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us of our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness. Oh, but I wish that I never had to ask my Father nor anyone for forgiveness. My heart so longs to live a perfect life, but because we live in a sin-tainted world, we all have this struggle until the day we enter into our Father’s new heaven and new earth. A person could choose to hibernate and never step out in an effort to keep imperfections hidden, but as my Father has shown me today in His Word, we would miss out and the people in the world would as well. We see this in the story of a man who had a shriveled up hand in the Synagogue. The Jews saw the man’s imperfection and saw it as an opportunity to bring accusation against Jesus should He decide to bring healing to the man on the Sabbath. Jesus chose to work through the man with the shriveled up hand to work a miracle. As I read this story, I thought about this man with the shriveled up hand and how hard it must have been for him to publicly display his imperfection when Jesus called him to “stretch out his hand.” But bless our Father who gives grace to the humble! I think to myself how sad it would’ve been if this man would not have had the courage to even go to the Synagogue. It would have been a great missed opportunity to do something great for Jesus and experience the blessing of Jesus in his own life as well.  Everyone has imperfections – there are no perfect specimens living on earth that I have ever heard of.  We all have imperfections, not only physically but imperfections in our ability to live perfectly. Even though this is the case, our Father says we should have the same attitude of Jesus who even though He was in very nature God, He considered Himself nothing and took on the very nature of a servant and became obedient to His Father to His death on the cross. Jesus had His eyes on His Father instead of on Himself and as a result of His willingness to step into the world, bearing the shame of the cross by being the total representation of sin and imperfection, He brought huge blessing to the world. Likewise, If we each do not step out into the world and let our Father work through us, even though we are not perfect, the world will forever miss out on the blessings our Father wants to work through us. We must remember that there is a flip side to this coin, in that although we may have our imperfections, we are also blessings! This mindset is to look upon ourselves with sober judgement which is how our Father desires we see ourselves. Our Father lives in us and His Spirit is working through us! Wow! That is amazing! He can bring blessing into our lives and the lives of others not only in this life, but for eternity through our extending to the world who we are – Him in us! There isn’t one of us that is perfect on our own because of the sinful nature, but we have been made perfect through Jesus! Our Father loves us just as we are! It is resting in His love and acceptance of us that needs to be our focus which leads to having a willing heart that will let Him work through us to carry out His great work in a world full of lives that so need us. Did you know that you are a blessing to the world? You are!  Stretch out your hand and share the marvelous gift of you today!
La 3:22-23; Mt 5:14, 12:9-14; Ps 53:3; 1 Jn 1:910; Ro 8:28-29, 12:1-8; 2 Ti 1:6-7; 1 Pe 5:5-6; Ps 139:13-15; 1 Co 3:16;

 

Grace

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Moments with My Father ~

 

New day greetings to you!  I hope you had a great weekend.  Mine was a very busy weekend and my interaction with others led to their sharing with me that their lives were incredibly busy and how in the midst of their trying to do their best at life, they often found themselves feeling beat up by critically-spirited people.  My heart breaks for them as I know it is hard to meet the needs all around us and in trying to do one’s best can often lead to accidentally stepping on someone’s toes. Then the Devil gets involved and turns it into an ugly uproar, making it much worse than it is.   My Father’s Words come to me today “Love is not easily angered and it keeps no record of wrongs.”  I also think of our Father’s attitude towards all of us as we have all sinned against Him, yet He does not treat us as our sins deserve.  He extends to us grace or forgiveness.  This day, I just encourage you that if you have found yourself in a place of being criticized without unforgiveness to remember that you are loved unconditionally by our Father.  Rest in His love.  We can apologize for our mistakes, learn from them, be thankful for the learning opportunity and extend grace.  It is helpful to me to remember that the other person who has offended us is also a struggling soul, probably operating on too many needs around them and perhaps not enough rest as well.  Grace, love and peace to you all this day!  I am thankful for all you do to try to be a blessing to many.  This I know, our Father sees your efforts to bring Him glory and He smiles upon you for that!

1 Co 13:5; Ro 3:23, 5:8; 1 Jn 1:9; Col 3:13

Love Is…

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Moments with My Father ~

 

I love it that we have a brand new day as our Father’s kids and I know from reading His Word that it is our Father’s will that His children love one another.  Jesus said the greatest commandment is to love the Lord our God with all our heart, with all our soul and with all our mind. He then said the second commandment is to love our neighbor as ourselves.  However, different people have different ways of thinking as to what makes them feel loved and what is love.   To truly love someone well, it takes time to know them.  Experience is a great teacher!  As time goes on, you learn more and more what blesses them and what hurts them, but the best way to love them is with Godly love. Have you ever wondered what it means to love someone with Godly love?  Our Father tells us “This is how we know what love is:  Jesus Christ laid down His life for us.  And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers (and sisters).”  In other words, be willing to  sacrifice to love others.  If someone sees their brother or sister in need and has no pity on them, how can the love of God be in them?  Sometimes, though, it can be difficult to truly understand needs – what is best?  It can also be confusing in how to love someone as sometimes we can have overly sensitive consciences and we also have one called the “accuser” who is the Devil who is always placing doubt, guilt and thoughts of failure before us.  Given all of this, there can be the questions of what to do to love someone and are we loving someone too much this way or too little another?  So how do we deal with all that?  Our Father tells us that He is greater than our hearts when they condemn us. He knows everything.   We can rest ourselves in God’s love for us and live in that love and by that love.  His Holy Spirit is our Counselor who lives in us, whose job is to teach us.  He is Truth.  His Word and His Truth are greater than our feelings or our overly sensitive conscience and gives us what we need to resist the Devil. Our Father says that we know He lives in us by the Spirit He gave us who calls out “Abba, Father.”   When we became a believer, we were sealed with His Holy Spirit.  So when in doubt how to love someone, the best thing to do is to ask our Father’s Spirit to guide us. He tells us that if anybody lacks wisdom, they should ask of Him in faith and it will be provided generously without finding fault.  Also, when we ask of Him in accordance with His will (His will is to love with Godly love), He hears us and if He hears us, then we know we have what we asked of Him.  Now that’s a promise that provides me all kinds of confidence to be able to love well the people in my life.   Woohoo!  I’m trusting Him for His Godly love to flow through us all today!  It’s a Godly love thing!

 

1 Jn 3:11-24, 4:7,13, 5:14-15; Ro 12:2; 14:16-17; 2 Co 1:21-22; He 4:16; Eph 1:13; Gal 4:6

The King’s Throne

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Moments with My Father ~

 

Good day, family.  As I begin this day, my Father beckons me to come to Him as He is seated on His throne of grace. In Christ, we are all children of the King of all kings!   We are all part of His royal family, dearly loved and our Father loves having us as His kids join Him and spend time with Him even though He is a King.  He is a Father whom we can share our hearts with freely, One who understands us fully.  He longs to have us talk to Him and He desires to talk to us.  There is always mercy and grace found there to help us in our time of need.  Oh, our Father – how special is He.   He IS perfect love.  After spending time with Him,  I can step out from His throne with confidence, knowing His love is always with me.  May you know His love today as well, no matter where you are and no matter what you may be going through.  His perfect love to you ~

 

Heb 4:14-16; 1 Jn 3:1, 4:16-21

The Perfect Outfit

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Moments with My Father

 

Hi my dear brothers and sisters! I share with you this day the thought that we have been chosen by the God of the Universe to be His to carry out His will, His plan and His purpose for each of us.  What a joy to join Him in His work!  He has made us holy in Christ and we are dearly loved.  That thought inspires me and moves me from my cozy sitting place with Him this morning to my closet to get dressed for the day and as I do, I see He has laid out for me the perfect outfit to wear to bring Him glory.  It is the clothing of myself in compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, patience, forgiveness and  layered over all of these garments of virtue, love which just ties it all together into one unified outfit perfect for walking through this day.  My Father has good taste.  I’m gonna trust in His provision and grace to represent Him well in all He has for me today!  His taste can make me one stylin’ cowgirl and that adds thankfulness, peace, a song in my heart and a great big smile to my stepping out into the world!  I’m seeking to bring glory to His name today.  Oh, by the way, His Designer wear will look great on you, too!

 

Col 3:12-17, Jer 29:11; Php 2:13

 

Stay Tuned – More Good Coming!

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Moments with My Father

 

I’m all inspired this morning by my brothers Paul and Timothy.  Our Father’s Word this morning says that as they thought about the saints around them, they thanked God for them and they prayed with joy because of their partnership in the Gospel from the first day until the present and they were confident that He who had began a good work in them was going to carry it out to completion until the day of Jesus.  That thought brings peace to my heart and excitement about the future!  I feel as they did, feeling right about this because the saints were in their heart and God’s grace was with them all.  God knows how my heart rests in His love and loves you each with all the affection of Christ Jesus. As Christians throughout the world, there is more good coming for us all!  So let’s stay tuned!!!  How can we not be excited about that?  Here is a great prayer to pray – that our love may abound more and more in knowledge and depth of insight so that we may be able to discern what is best and be pure and blameless until the day of Christ, filled with the fruit of righteousness that comes through Jesus  – to the glory and praise of our Father.

 

Php 3:3-11

Grace and More Grace

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Moments with My Father

 

Peace and grace to you this day!  What a blessing it is to feel the peace that comes from extended grace.  Noah was a man who knew the peace and grace of having the Lord’s favor upon him and he was also a man who cared about blessing His Father in return.  He knew what blessed the Lord and he sought to carry that out in his life which in return brought the Lord’s blessing upon him.  This is a healthy relationship when two are working together to bless each other. This reminds me of how our horses sought to do this. They often would stand together, each one scratching each other’s back with their teeth.  While this may not be the best method of showing mutual care and love in our human relationships, it’s a similar concept of two, both having the mindset to bless the other and that’s a good thing when working together for healthy love relationships!  May you feel our Father’s love for you today and know yer sister loves ya, too!

Gen 6:9, 22, 7:1; Eph 4:32; Lk 6:35-36

A Run Way Model

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Moments with My Father

 

Good morning to you all where ever you are!  I’m so excited to tell you after viewing our Father’s Word this morning that I’m all inspired and I’ve decided that I want to be a “run way model!” For those of you who know me, you may be thinking “Well that’s pretty presumptuous and ambitious for a woman not so young any more!” To that I will say that I happen to be a young chick in the eyes of eternity! Paul is the one who gave me this idea as he had the same passion himself. He said that he desired us to make ourselves models for others to follow. So I’m asking myself this morning “What does my life model to others?” People are always watching us as Christians. For some, as I have heard it said before, we may be the only Bible message they will ever see. I’m really hoping that my life is setting an example to others to be run way models as well which means to run His way which is to run in life in such a way as to get the eternal Heavenly prize that awaits us when our life on Earth is done. As I step out with the run way light upon me, I so want it to be His wonderful work that is displayed on my vessel. He is always giving instruction on how to walk just right and I always hate it when I’m a klutz and trip before others.  Yikes!!!  That can be pretty embarrassing, however, when that happens, it can be a good opportunity to draw attention to the clothes of humility and forgiveness that bear the name of Jesus on them as He gives me the grace to model them. These clothes have a high price tag on them. Jesus has a lifetime investment in providing them for me to wear and they cover over this body of flesh so very well. Jesus sees me as beautiful in them! So, wanting to bring glory to Jesus, this old gal is stepping out with confidence in Him to be His “run way model” and taking it one step at a time!

2 Th 3:9; 1 Co 3:10-15, 9:24, Jn 3:16, 1 Jn 1:9; Ro 13:14; 1 Pe 5:5