What do wayward children, difficult coworkers, and emotionally distant relatives have in common? The true simple answer: Each one of these needs our prayers, understanding, and kindness. (But the true simple fact is: we can’t love one of them even one iota without God’s help.) Our freedom cost Christ His life. Doesn’t it make sense that we now follow the call and bring freedom to others? That’s why I invite you to join me in taking the freedom challenge. I promise it’s better than the coca-cola challenge and the ice bucket challenge, and you’ll feel a lot warmer. To be …
My Big, Fat, Powerful Tongue!
My Bible Study leader looked at us. “Ok, so we’re going to share prayer requests and praises. Cheryl?” I began, “Hmm… Well, last week I had a mastectomy….” Everybody gasped. I gasped. Heat rushed to my face. “Ah – you meant to say ‘mammogram,’ right?” The leader glanced at my chest. “Yes, mammogram!” I said, whacking myself on the head. “Well, they both start with m.” I snorted, then everybody lost it. Only Two Kinds of Mistakes The incident reminded me how there are really only two kinds of slips or mistakes: Mistakes of human denseness (innocent blips like my …
Who’s The Judge?
[box] The Father judges no one, but has entrusted all judgment to the Son, that all may honor the Son just as they honor the Father. He who does not honor the Son does not honor the Father, who sent him. John 5:22-23[/box] The apostle John got me thinking… What could be a better way for the Father to show how much He loves the Son than for Him to give the Son the power to judge the world? Digging into this verse, I saw several things… The Father honors the Son. Love always honors and prefers another. The Father …
The Beautiful Choice
Choices…. [box] God could have made us robots, marching to His heart, forced to love completely, obeying from the start. Instead He made us separate, with built-in modes for choice, so love would prove more precious when we finally hear His voice…[/box] I wrote this as a young teen in the trenches of a choices… I was the girl who believed if someone didn’t like her, there was something terribly wrong with her. Have you ever met someone who was so insecure about relationships that she sometimes controlled, manipulated, and strangled them? Love, by nature, can’t be forced; it necessitates choice. …
Beside My Cross
In truth, be rooted in Easter Love today, light and free as a tree bud, purposed and held together by Divine dwelling in your small, simple swelling. You’re your Branch’s crowning hope-jewel, Heaven’s waving, waiting, merry-making tool. The Easter Seed broke to tell your glory story, singing you to fullness, clothing you in new, death-defying nature, securing all you could ever want to be, simply, in Me. Nothing speaks of our potential and value to God like the cross. The cross is why we have a glory story. Because of Christ’s sacrifice, we can wholly lean into grace, …
Naked Shame Reversed
One day when I was a kid, I saw a mother at the mall accidentally drop her baby. Strange, how these precise moments of horror permanently press themselves in our brains. I’ve never seen anyone actually step on a baby, but I’ve seen the next closest thing: someone step on grace. Like an innocent, valuable, vulnerable baby, the gift of God’s grace was both painful and costly; but we step on it whenever we sin. Why do such a thing? For the same reason many deny Christ: selfishness. The pull of sin is great. To accept Truth means to submit …