Tag Archives: love

Keep us on Your path!

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We went for a hike about a week ago and my sweet 8 year old and I sat down on a rock for a minute.  On the rock where we sat, someone had carved the words “Hate satan”.  I asked her what she thought about it.  She just sat there for a min and then said, “It isn’t right to hate, especially since that is what he wants us to do, he wants us to hate.  I think the person who carved this should have written, Don’t follow satan”.

I couldn’t have put it better myself!

Lord please keep us on Your path to follow You and only You!

Missing You…

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My friends, I am not sure why but I have been distracted lately.  Jesus hasn’t been at the forefront of my thoughts, instead I have been busy, running around, and missing Him.  We took a yoga class together last night, and usually when He joins me He is helping me through, but last night in my imagination He was sitting there watching me (smiling, but still just watching).  For some reason I have put Him aside instead of welcoming Him in?

As I miss Him, I am thankful for my previous posts that remind me that He is still here watching and waiting for me to call to Him again.

Please pray for me my friends, as you bask in His loving presence, that the veil covering me will be removed yet again, my eyes will be cleansed yet again, and again I will see only Him everywhere and in everyone!

Thy Kingdom Come, Thy Will Be Done!

His tears…

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We have an ornament in the shape of a cross that hangs on our Christmas tree.  It has tiny plastic jewels glued onto it in the shape of teardrops.

A few weeks ago as I was putting our Christmas tree away I found one of the teardrops on the ground.  It fell off the top of this cross as if our Lord was crying.

It made me think of His tears and the sorrow He feels when we are cruel, when we speak to each other without thinking, without consideration, and without kindness.  He cries as He sees the cruelty ripple outward and downward in a revolving cycle of hurt, anger, and gossip.  He cries as He watches His peace slip from our hearts as we lose sight of Him and begin this downward spiral.

I have hurt and been hurt with words.  Many times I have begun this cycle or been swept away by this cycle wasting minutes, hours and days obsessing over an unkindness rather than gazing at You.

Lord please let only kindness pass my lips or nothing at all, please open my ears to Your voice alone calling me out of this spiral, and please open my eyes to You alone so that I might not be a cause for Your tears of sorrow, but instead bring You tears of joy.

There is still more work to be done within me!

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I don’t remember the exact context, but I was praying for my husband last week and part of my prayer was for something to change in him.  He didn’t know of my prayer for him, but within hours of this prayer my sweet husband shared a story of when he was young, a sad story that testifies again to his strength, kindness, consideration and the attention he shows others.  It is a story that he had never shared with me and a sad memory for him that breaks my heart.

Shame on me, shame on me to ever think that the work in me is done and I am ready to ask others to change.

The work we must do here is on ourselves.  We only fully know our own stories.  For everyone else we must have compassion, understanding, patience, kindness and love because no matter how close we are to someone, there is always something we do not know.

Jesus thank you for my sweet husband and for bringing us even closer.  Thank you for opening my eyes to even more of his love, kindness and strength and for gently reminding me that there is still more work to be done within me!

A worshipful life!

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Why do we try to eat healthy and feed our families good food?  Why do we workout and encourage our families to exercise?

For a long time I was trying to eat well and workout to stay strong, to stay healthy, to avoid heartburn, to live longer and most of all because that it is what people do when they grow up, they begin taking responsibility for their health, it is one of our rules.  Right?

About a year ago things started to change.  I didn’t realize it at first, but my workout was becoming a time of worship and prayer.  It was slowly becoming a time for me to empty my head of myself and think of Him, talk to Him, read about Him and sometimes just be silent and listen for Him.  I was becoming addicted to it not for the endorphins the workout provided, but to the time it gave me with Him.

Without realizing it I brought it into my yoga class.  I started imagining our sweet Love helping me breathe and ease into each position.  I imagined Him gently massaging the areas of tension in my legs and my back and then gently helping me ease out of each move.  I imagined Him sitting with me and holding my hand throughout the meditation at the end.  I have fallen in love with yoga and the precious moments it has given me with Him.

I am not sure why He has given me this Grace, but He has changed the intentions of my workout and my health and I have started calling it my worshipful workout.  He has removed my longing for the goals of this world and He has shown me that even through my workout He can and should be my focus and my end goal.

I am longing to change the intentions of every moment of my life as I care for and love my wonderful husband and my sweet girls.  I want every action to be done with Him in mind, for Him and with the intention of glorifying Him, pleasing Him and bringing a smile to His beautiful face.  I want not just a worshipful workout, but a worshipful life!

I want it this way so that someday when I breathe my last breath, He will be my final thought.

The Cross

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Isn’t it amazing that if you are looking for a cross you can find one?

Look at a door, the beams on your ceiling, a window, telephone poles, electric poles, fences, bridges.  They all contain a cross within.

I think our sweet Jesus died on the Cross so that as the years went by and generations passed, reminders of His love for us would surround us.

Through it I think He is whispering, “Remember Me, I love you.  Don’t worry about what she said, what he said, what they did, or what you didn’t do, just think of Me and smile through your tears.”

Melting…

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This morning I woke up and remembered that it was our anniversary!  As I gazed at my sleeping love, he woke up, gave me a smile and then for a moment he became lost as he gazed into space.

I didn’t want to interrupt his waking moment, but I thought to myself as he became lost in thought… only God knows where he is right now.

In that moment, with that thought, I wanted to melt into our one true Love so that my husband and I could be lost together in His infinite ocean of love.  

By losing ourselves or melting into Him we are not lost, but instead find His buried treasure of knowing each other even more deeply. This hidden treasure is wonderful, but even it falls short of a deeper secret waiting for us.

I long to long to lose myself for Him alone.

The blessing of tears…

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The first Easter that I truly mourned for Jesus was two years ago.  I cried as I went to bed on Good Friday as I finally scratched the surface of trying to understand how His disciples must have felt that night.  My sweet husband held my hand as I cried and we fell asleep.

Last year I mourned again and I cried and prayed a lot for Judas Iscariot.  I remember going for a nature walk with my family and my sweet girls holding my hands as the tears flowed.

I am not sure why I have been so greatly blessed with so many tears during Holy Week the last two years, but I pray for tears of true sorrow for my sweet Jesus to flow again this year.  I also pray for you to join me in this great sorrow NOT because misery loves company, but because following our tears we will together rise to great heights of joy on Easter morning as we again celebrate that He is Risen, He is Risen, He is Risen Indeed, my friends.

May all of the glory for ever and ever be given to Him! Amen.

A deeper love

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Last weekend I headed out to an overgrown portion of our yard with a saw in hand and planned to trim a few low hanging branches and cut down a few weeds that were becoming full grown trees.  As I started pushing branches out of the way and worked my way back to the fence I came across some dead branches/vines covered in 1-1.5 inch thorns.  I quickly recruited my sweet husband to spend the next 30 min braving the thorns while digging out this plant.  Unfortunately we did suffer a few pricks during the process and they really hurt!

The thorns and the pricks made me think of Jesus.  It reminded me of His crown of thorns and I tried to imagine these thorns pressing into my head… I couldn’t.

Thinking of this made me wonder why we have elevate the rose to such a high symbol of love when it too is covered in these merciless thorns which pressed into the vulnerable and precious head of our Savior and Lord.

Could it be that the young men of the past longed to present their dear ones with not only a beautiful, soft, sweet smelling flower, but also a flower that required them to brave the thorns before it could be obtained in order to deepen the love they were showing their sweetheart through the gift of the rose?

The soldiers could have mocked Jesus with a crown of twigs, but God placed a bush with thorns nearby to allow Jesus to show us yet another level, an even deeper level of His piercing love for us through His crown of thorns.

Jesus thank You for Your deep love that I don’t understand and cannot fathom.  You call to me, You wake me from my sleep and You long to be with me regardless of my disregard.  Please inspire me to long for You as You long for me, my Love.

Remember our true home!

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I am not usually a cynic, but today after spending too much at the grocery I arrived home, checked the mail and found a magazine that had a picture of probably a $5 million dollar home on the front with the article titled, “Love your home!”, and I thought to myself… seriously?  Do the people writing and publishing this magazine really believe that looking at photos of this outrageously extravagant house will help me and others love our homes?  Seriously… do they really believe this?

I took the magazine straight to the recycling box, because I certainly know that looking at it would not help me to love my home, but I have been wondering why it bothered me so much today.  Most days this wouldn’t phase me or bother me, but it did today.

Maybe my annoyance with this magazine is because, as scary as it is to say or to type, in a way it reminds me of my own expensive home, of my own excess, of my own greed, and of my own issues with envy?  Maybe for a moment I forgot about my true home?

Lord please be with me and remove envy from my heart and replace it with Your generosity and gratitude because I long to always love the home You have given to me while I am here, but most of all I long to always remember that You are my true home.

Please help me, I can’t do it without You, my Love.