I will give them an undivided heart and put a new spirit in them; I will remove from them their heart of stone and give them a heart of flesh. Ezekiel 11:19
I've been thinking about this verse lately. You see, about four years ago my husband came down with a very serious virus that attacked the lining of his heart. It took more than a year for his doctors to determine a diagnosis, and then months of deciding what course of treatment to follow. During those many months the lining of his heart thickened, hardened, and adhered to the heart muscle, shrinking it to fifty percent of its normal size and working capacity. As he became more and more ill, it was finally determined that our only hope for his survival was to have the lining stripped from his heart slowly and carefully, bit by bit.
His surgeon spent six hours with his ...
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We are so very excited to have another grandson on the way. I have been teased many times for having been blessed with excessive amounts of the "mom" gene. I may be slightly little people addicted. Maybe it is a blessing that we struggled with secondary infertility or our home may have looked like the shoe in which that little old lady lived! LOL
This is a first baby for our firstborn. She is experiencing firsthand the miracle of Psalm 139:
You made my whole being; you formed me in my mother's body.
I praise you because you made me in an amazing and wonderful way.
What you have done is wonderful. I know this very well.
You saw my bones being formed as I took shape in my mother's body.
When I was put together there...,
It's funny how often we sometimes take for granted the workings of our bodies, that is of course until something stops working, hurts, ...
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My dear husband, Blake, shared this story during his Sunday morning message:
It was the summer between second and third grade. He awakened that morning to what he described as the perfect day. The sun was shining and he had no worries, no responsibilities, and no problems. As eight year old boys were prone to do, he rushed through breakfast and raced out the door and down the street to spend a day of adventure with his best friend, John. Their favorite place to explore was a nearby creek. They would use sticks, weeds, and rocks to try to dam up the water and make a small swimming hole or spend hours searching for treasure.
On this particularly perfect day, treasure to these eight-year-old boys was an enormous bull frog! However, neither of them had anything with which to catch it. John ...
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But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law. Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the sinful nature with its passions and desires. Since we live by the Spirit, let us keep in step with the Spirit. Galatians 5:22-25
I participate in an on-line Bible Study that has been working through the characteristics of the Fruit of the Spirit. We are spending two weeks on each sweet Spirit inspired attribute, and I am feeling more than a little convicted.
Life Application Bible notes say this about verses 22 and 23: The Spirit produces these character traits that are found in the nature of Christ. They are the by-products of Christ's control - we can't obtain them by trying to get them without ...
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My Bible reading this morning was chapter 37 of Ezekiel, where God takes Ezekiel to the middle of a valley filled with "dry bones."
Evidently, they had been there a while because Ezekiel notes that they are "very dry." Then God asks him:
"Son of man, can these bones live?"
The thought that popped into my head was "No," even though I have read this account dozens of times.
How often do we do that? We look at our current circumstances and say "No" to God. We are frustrated and discouraged and we think:
My marriage is never going to get better.
My child is never going to return.
My illness is terminal.
My friend will never believe.
Ezekiel replied the way I would like to answer God's question:
"O Sovereign Lord, You alone know."
Following Ezekiel's repsonse, God told him to command the bones to come ...
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I wish I could say that there is no truth to the saying, "If Momma ain't happy, ain't nobody happy!" However, I remember more times than I would like to mention the influence my mood has had on my entire family.
A specific time was during the years my dear husband and I suffered with secondary infertility. That longing for another child would translate into several days of mourning each and every month. Many vacation days, family days, holidays, and even just your everyday-normal-days were affected by my sadness. I have since asked for my family's forgiveness, and they have been wonderful in extending their love, forgiveness and encouragement. By God's grace, the years of struggle were followed by many years filled with happy family memories with the addition of our youngest through the blessing of ...
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A very dear friend just emailed this sweet story to me:
A Child's View of Thunderstorms
A little girl walked to and from school daily. Though the weather that morning was questionable and clouds were forming, she made her daily trek to the elementary school. As the afternoon progressed, the winds whipped up, along with lightning. The mother of the little girl felt concerned that her daughter would be frightened as she walked home from school and she feared the electrical storm might harm her child.
Full of concern, the mother quickly got into her car and drove along the route to her child's school.
As she did, she saw her little girl walking along. At each flash of lightning, the child would stop, look up, and smile. Another and another flash of lighting followed quickly and ...
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This is what the Lord says - your Redeemer, the Holy one of Israel: "I am the Lord your God, who teaches you what is best for you, who directs you in the way you should go. Isaiah 48:17
With summer break here in much of the United States, teachers and students alike are breathing a sigh of relief . . . thankful to leave the classroom for a couple of months. As a former teacher, I remember this time of year as being bitter sweet. I loved the slower pace of the summer, the extra time with my own children, and of course not having to head off to work every morning. Yet, it was difficult to say good-bye on that last day of school. I know I am not the only teacher to shed tears as students ...
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Genny Heikka
