“O God, You are my God; Early will I seek You…” Psalm 63:1 (NKJV)
I never expected the Lord to use the hound dogs next door to bless my life. They are just your everyday, ordinary hounds…the kind that get to howling in the middle of the night and that bark their heads off at anything that moves during the day. I had never paid them much attention, that is until one particularly cold, winter morning.
I held a delightfully warm cup of coffee in my hands and gazed out my kitchen window. As I sipped and pondered what I should do next with my day, I noticed the dogs.
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Written on
January 17, 2011 by
Amy in
Blog
Ever had those days when you felt you were throwing up emergency prayers that seemed unimportant in the big scheme of things? You know the ones. “Lord, please let me find my car keys or I’m going to be late, again.” “Lord, please let me find a parking place close to the door, because I have to get these children and all this stuff in that store quickly in the rain.” “Lord, please let my child sleep through the night, because I have to get some sleep.”
If you are a mom, I’m sure you’ve prayed one or more of these prayers on some occasion.
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Written on
January 14, 2011 by
Mary in
Blog
“Pblllltttt”
“Moooom! He’s spitting!”
I don’t know about you, but I don’t have any patience for tattling. If someone is in imminent danger of physical harm, I want to know about it, but otherwise, deal with it or drop it.
I’ve tried to empower my kids to let someone else know when they’re breaking a rule or doing something they shouldn’t; they don’t need me to intervene for every random thing. At least, that’s my theory.
I thought I’d outgrown tattling a long time ago. “Deal with it or drop it.” But how often do I sit in church and think, “So-and-so really needs to hear this,” or fill my prayers with, “Lord did you see…?”
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When our children were at home I would often awaken them by singing, “Rise and Shine and Give God the Glory!” We even had actions that went with it, although it was often hard to get them to join in first thing in the morning. LOL
Isaiah 60:1 reads: “Arise, shine, for your light has come, and the glory of the LORD rises upon you.
How has “rising and shining” been going for you? It’s hard to arise shining in the middle of January. It’s dark and cold, and here in our part of the world most days are covered with clouds.
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And Jesus grew in wisdom and stature, and in favor with God and man. Luke 2:52 NIV
From the very first moment I found out that I was pregnant with my first child, I just “knew” that I was going to be a “boy mom.” I don’t know how or why, but I just knew that God knit me together to raise boys. The exciting, adventurous, rowdy days could be a challenge, but the sense of purpose was like a mission for me.
Twenty-two years old, married less than a year and completely overwhelmed with this next stage in my life, I cried out to the Lord and asked Him into my heart.
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As charcoal to embers and as wood to fire, so is a quarrelsome man for kindling strife. Proverbs 26:21 NIV
“I can’t find the thing,” I spat into the phone.
“Which thing?” my husband questioned me.
“The thing. The thing! The thing that tightens the car seat!” My patience thin, I shouted into the phone while my husband tried to explain how to install my daughter’s car seat.
I hunched in the back of the van, stepping on toys and castaway cereal, heat dripping down my face, trying for the life of me to find the magical tightening strap for baby Grace’s seat.
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WHAT? How come I put the peanut butter on first?
This morning, as I was making my son, Brennan, a sandwich, he looked up at me and asked me the peanut butter order question. As I stood there with a knife loaded with peanut butter, I didn’t know what to say. I had never thought about why I put the peanut butter on before the jelly. I’ve just always done it that way.
So I told him that I didn’t know and that’s the way I always do it.
His response? “Maybe you could try to do the jelly first sometime?”
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As I’ve sat and reflected on the coming New Year, there are a few goals I would like to accomplish. I have always been one to make resolutions — a resolution to lose weight, spend more time with my family, be more organized, simplify, eat better, sleep more, and be more patient and loving. But as each year has come and gone, I have found that, for the most part, my resolutions remained unmet, and I was left confused, angry at myself, and unmotivated to continue the journey.
I have always been an “all-or-nothing” person. And when I fall short, I can tend to be hard on myself.
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