Category Archives: Devotional

WFW ~ John 13:1, 14-15

 

Photobucket is holding all my photos from 2007-2015 hostage and they have blacked them all out. I’m slowly working at restoring my posts without their help. Such a tiresome bother!

John 13:1 ~ “It was just before the Passover Feast. Jesus knew that the time had come for him to leave this world and go to the Father. Having loved his own who were in the world, he now showed them the full extent of his love.”

“Now that I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also should wash one another’s feet.” I have set you an example that you should do as I have done for you.”

For more Word FIlled Wednesday click here.

I took this photograph yesterday in Thousand Oaks, California at the Gardens of the World.

The Gardens of the World is privately owned and operated by the Hogan Family Foundation.

Encouragement ~

I Thessalonians 5:11 ~ “Therefore encourage one another and build one another up, just as you are doing.”

I Thessalonians 5:14 ~ “And we urge you, brothers, admonish the idle, encourage the fainthearted, help the weak, be patient with them all.”

Romans 1:11,12 ~ “For I long to see you, that I may impart to you some spiritual gift to strengthen you – that is, that we may be mutually encouraged “by each others” faith, both yours and mine.”

Romans 15:5 ~ “May the God of endurance and encouragement grant you to live in such harmony with one another, in accord with Christ Jesus, that together you may with one voice glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.”

Hebrews 3:13 ~ “But encourage one another daily, as long as it is called Today, so that none of you may be hardened by sin’s deceitfulness.

Hebrews 10:25 ~ “Let us not give up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but let us encourage one another – and all the more as you see the Day approaching.”

So here’s what I heard yesterday in our church service (we went to the Saturday evening service) that I found encouraging and want to pass along to you. Our hope looks forward to our inheritance. When Jesus was resurrected and was seated at the right hand of the Father we became heirs with Him (Romans 8:17, Gal. 4:7).  Our inheritance is unfading, death proof, sin proof, time proof. We will have a new body (I Cor. 15:50-58), a new home (John 14: 1-3), a new world (2 Peter 3:13), a new job (Matt: 25:21-23), a new relationship with God (Rev. 21:3-4). The Holy Spirit is the pledge of our inheritance (Ephesians 1:13,14).

We need to keep looking to what Jesus has done for us and what we have to look forward to in Him in order to be grounded in our faith and anchored in this topsy turvy world. We don’t look at what is happening on the outside but what is happening in our inner man, daily renewal. We keep looking to what Jesus has accomplished for us. This is where our hope is, our living hope. We can’t focus on this life. I’m going to work on memorizing these next verses over the next couple of weeks. Do you want to join me? 🙂

2 Corinthians 4: 16-18 ~ “Therefore we do not lose heart. Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day. For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all. So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.”

My hope is that this will be encouraging to you…

ht: Steve Larson, pastor E.V. Free Conejo Valley

WFW ~ Hebrews 10: 19-23

 

“Therefore, brothers, since we have confidence to enter the Most Holy Place by the blood of Jesus by a new and living way opened for us through the curtain, that is his body, and since we have a great priest over the house of God, let us draw near to God with a sincere heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled to cleanse us from a guilty conscience and having our bodies washed with pure water. Let us hold unswervingly to the hope we profess, for he who promised is faithful.”

For more Word Filled Wednesday click here.

Spring Reading Thing ~ 2008

Welcome to Spring and the Spring Reading Thing!

 

I participated last year in the Spring Reading Thing. It was my first blog carnival venture because I had just started my blog in March of 2007. Time flies when you’re blogging!

So many books to choose from to read.

Here are my choices so far. (subject to change at the whim of this reader)

Before Green Gables – The prequel to Anne of Green Gables ~ by Budge Wilson

I’m in the process of re-reading/reading for the first time some great classics. I finally just finished reading Anne of Green Gables so I’m excited to read this new book. It is also the 100 year anniversary of Anne so I thought it was a good time to read about her instead of just watching her story.

Scarlet ~ by Stephen R. Lawhead

This is the second book in the King Raven Trilogy. The first book was Hood which I read and enjoyed. Lawhead has an interesting and rich way of bringing you history in his fiction.

Inkspell ~ by Cornelia Funke

Again this is the second book in a series. I read Inkheart a while back and it kept me engaged. Funke has been compared to Rowling.

Gentian Hill ~ by Elizabeth Goudge

Elizabeth Goudge is one of my favorite new/old writers. I am trying to get my hands on all her books. This will be my 5th book of hers I’ll have read. She is another author who develops her characters well. I compare her to George MacDonald in the way he brings a persons faith and relationship with God into the everyday.

Whose Body ~ by Dorothy Sayers

If you read mystery and haven’t read Sayers, you need to. Check out her Lord Peter Wimsey Series. This series was writtten from 1923-1935.

God is the Gospel ~ by John Piper

and right now I am finishing The Wind in the Willows by Kenneth Grahame

This again is in my quest to read some classics that slipped by me…

Head over to Callapidder Days on thursday morning to see more Spring Reading Lists or to join in…

WFW ~ Mathew 6: 25-27

 

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Mathew 6: 25-27 ~
“Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more important than food, and the body more imortant than clothes? Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life?”

For more Word Filled Wednesday head over to The 160 Acre Woods

Word Filled Wednesday ~ James 1: 5-7

James 1: 5-8 ~

“If any of you lacks wisdom, he should ask God, who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will be given to him. But when he asks, he must believe and not doubt, because he who doubts is like a wave of the sea, blown and tossed by the wind. That man should not think he will receive anything from the Lord; he is a double-minded man, unstable in all he does.”

For more Word Filled Wednesday visit Amydeanne at The 160 Acre Woods.

Thankful Thursday ~ Compassion

 

I am thankful for God’s compassion for us.

Before he formed us in our mother’s womb, before his creation multiplied on the earth He planned a way for us to be made alive with Christ. His compassion for the lost world because of sin sent His son to the cross to suffer and die for us. Without the sacrifice on Jesus’ part on behalf of us we would still be dead in our sins, separated from God, utterly lost. We are redeemed through Christ’s blood.

Thank you God for your compassion.

Thank you Jesus for your sacrifice.

Thank you Holy Spirit for your work in our lives to help us to be a compassionate people who love like God and sacrifice like Jesus.

Ephesians 4:32, 5: 1-2 ~

“Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another as God in Christ forgave you.

Therefore be imitators of God, as beloved children. And walk in love as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us, a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.”

Praying that God through His Spirit helps us to be a compassionate people who see the world through His eyes…

For more Thankful posts visit Iris at Sting My Heart.

Tuesdays In Other Words

This week, Elisa is hosting “In ‘Other’ Words” at her site, Extravagant Grace. She has chosen a quote from the Anne Ortlund’s book “The Disciplines of a Beautiful Woman.” This week’s quote is:

“But remember, for all your adult life you’ll be a woman. And how you live your life as a woman, all by yourself before God, is what makes the real you. Nothing on the exterior can touch or change that precious inner sanctuary, your heart, his dwelling place unless you let it. And God, who loves you very much has tailor made all your outer life, your circumstances, your relationships, to pressure you into becoming that beautiful woman he’s planned for you to be.”

~ Anne Ortlund ~

So here is where I went for “in other words.”
~
Titus 2: 1, 3-5 ~
“You must teach what is in accord with sound doctrine.
“Likewise, teach the older women to be reverent in the way they live, not to be slanderers or addicted to much wine, but to teach what is good. Then they can train the younger women to love their husbands and children, to be self-controlled and pure, to be busy at home, to be kind, and to be subject to their
husbands, so that no one will malign the word of God.”
10 – 15
“….so that in every way they will make the teaching about God our Savior attractive. For the grace of God that brings salvation has appeared to all men. It teaches us to say “No” to ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright and godly lives in this present age, while we wait for the blessed hope – the glorious appearing of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ, who gave himself for us to redeem us from all wickedness and to purify for himself a people that are his very own, eager to do what is good.”
~
I’m just beginning a study with some women at my church on Titus 2. We are using the book Feminine Appeal – Seven Virtues of a Godly Wife and Motherby Carolyn Mahaney. Here are some quotes from the 1st chapter of the book to follow-up on this passage from Titus.
“Our conduct has a direct influence on how people think about the gospel. The world doesn’t judge us by our theology; the world judges us by our behavior. People don’t necessarily want to know what we believe about the Bible. They want to see if what we believe makes a difference in our lives. Our actions either bring honor to God or misrepresent His truth.
….As verse 10 [in Titus 2] says, we can “adorn” the gospel with our lives. To “adorn” means to put something beautiful or attractive on display – like placing a flawless gemstone in a setting that uniquely shows off its brilliance. The gospel is like the most valuable of jewels.
…Make no mistake, by adorning the gospel, we are not enhancing or improving it.  The gospel cannot be improved! But by cultivating the feminine qualities listed in Titus 2, we can present the gospel as attractive, impressive, and pleasing to a watching world.”
~
The truth that is presented in Titus 2 for us women is a dependable model of what God has planned for women to be in this world. What is truly beautiful is a women who adorns the gospel inside and out…
~
For more Tuesdays In Other Words click over to Extravagant Grace.

Tuesday, In Other Words ~ Tozer

“I want deliberately to encourage this mighty longing after God. The lack of it has brought us to our present low estate. The stiff and wooden quality about our religious lives is a result of our lack of holy desire. Complacency is a deadly foe of all spiritual growth. Acute desire must be present or there will be no manifestation of Christ to His people. He waits to be wanted. Too bad that with many of us He waits for long, so very long, in vain.”
~A.W.Tozer~

I am going to be bold and say in other words that this very desire to want the Lord in our lives will have to come from Him. We naturally will not have this desire or the ability to drum it up on our own. We need to start asking daily that God will give us this desire. We need to say each day to Him “not my will but thine”.  Help me Lord today to desire You, to listen for You, to love you more. Teach me what it means to abide in You. We need to recognize the importance of the Holy Spirit in our lives. God the Spirit who teaches us, testifies, guides us, convicts us, comforts us.

We need to open our Bibles daily, read, meditate, listen, and respond to His leading.

Ezekiel 36: 25-27

“I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you will be clean; I will cleanse you from all your impurities and from all your idols. I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my Spirit in you and move you to follow my decrees and be careful to keep my laws.”

II Corinthians 5: 17

“Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come.”

John 7: 37 -38

“On the last and greatest day of the Feast, Jesus stood and said in a loud voice, “If anyone is thirsty, let him come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture has said, streams of living water will flow from within him”.  By this he meant the Spirit, whom those who believed in him were later to receive. Up to that time the Spirit had not been given, since Jesus had not yet been glorified.”

May I encourage you and me to speak to God today like we would speak to a real person. Let’s ask Him to give us the desire to grow closer to Him and to give us the awareness of all the Holy Spirit is in our lives.

For more In Other Words visit Debbie at Chocolate and Coffee.