Week's end with thanks
- Trip to the zoo with friend of 31 years. All of us into our car. Five carseats and five loud happy children. Good times.
- All five children making it happily all the way through the zoo. Success!
- All the animals out! Crazy otters playing, all the lions right up close, turtles pressed up to glass, both giraffes out to play. Thanking God for the kiss for my kids.
- Hearing my husband preach. Love that man.
- Two children perched on two knees. Love those kids.
- Two little hands tucked in mine.
- Friends who just love us so.
- Laid-back bday party at the park. No banners and balloons, just banana muffins and smiles.
- Preparing for Bible study. Every year wondering, “Why did I think this was a good idea?” Then seeing faces, eager hearts and thirsty souls. Love love loving the Word and God and remembering, “Ah yes, this is why.”
- Coming home after, mind mush and blissfully happy.
- Playing Legos all afternoon.
- Homemade salsa with tomatoes just picked.
- First day of jeans after summer’s heat. Love that feeling.
- My favorite kid recipe for “yummy bars”: Every random item I have in the house including 4 overripe bananas, a canister of quick oats and an entire jar of unsalted peanut butter. Mix it all together, bake for 30 minutes and voila! … “yummy bars.”
- Afternoon playing pirates in the yard. Throwing nerf soccer-ball “canonballs” at Dutch in his ship, pelting him over and over and over and him, laughing hysterically and insisting, “Again! Again! Again!”
- Whoops! Mommy pelting Heidi in the face. I really did try not to laugh…
- Hearing Dutch singing along to the worship songs even though he didn’t know the words.
- My boy in a clean white t-shirt and faded jeans. I’m biased but he’s so stinkin’ handsome!
- Mentor Retreat!
- My parents who give up their home and sleep in their motorhome so we can use their house. Those folks of mine are amazing.
- First laundry load in the dryer. I love my clothesline but there’s something about fluffy towels and sheets and pressing my face into everything warm and clean.
- Kneeling in front of the dryer, folding. Good things happen when we get on our knees.
- Kids carrying laundry baskets.
- Pulling down fresh hand-me-downs for the new season. 3T pink sweatshirts and 5T cargo pants. How did these kids get so big?
- Smiling as I survey the holiday outfits we’ve been given. Heidi will need to attend seven Christmas parties … (Just kidding! We’ll give some away!)
- Home church services. Dutch on the bench-stage, playing his guitar and preaching.
- Heidi’s prayers.
- Heidi’s first searching questions as read about the cross: “Mommy, why God haffa die?”
- Grace.
- Veggie Tales outtakes.
- Great New Seasons SALE this week on all our favorite items! The cashier laughed at my 20 blocks of cheese, 10 dozen organic eggs, five bags of organic oats and fourteen cans of organic tomatoes but it was a steal! Fun to remind my kids about God’s amazing provision. Just when we were out of everything He provided steal-deals on our favorite foods. Thank you, Father.
- Family Date Night. Yes, it was just pizza at the Costco food court, but our kids were in seventh heaven!
- Daddy’s day off: Picnic lunch at George Rogers park.
- These seven mentor-girls who bless my life.
- Women’s Ministry team that’s beautifully knit and feels like a comfortable sweater of friends. How blessed are we?!
- YOU. Thanks for dropping tender lines that breathe life again and again.
- Heading out to Riversong.
- Crawling inside books.
- Quilts.
- Down comforters.
- Jeans that fit just right.
- Just-washed hair that swings and shines.
- Anticipation.
- Expectancy.
- Hope.
F is for Five things to fill your cup each morning
Fourteen precious souls sat in a circle — we, a small group of women, part of a large group of women, adventuring through the book of Galatians. We talked, shared our desire to remain faithful each day in spending time with God in His Word. But a common theme surfaced through almost every voice:
“I’m not a morning person.”
Have you ever said those words?
If you have it’s totally fair, the claim is legit. Research shows that our Circadian Locomotor Output Cycles Kaput (CLOCK) genes affect whether we prefer mornings or evenings. It does seem strange to me that everyone I meet claims they are not a morning person, but hey, no one knows you like you know you!
However, whether we like it or not, mornings happen, so we better figure out a way to make them work and make them work well.
Insert Tsh Oxendreider.
The girl is just so stinkin’ helpful, that’s what she is. If you’ve ever read her stuff, none of it is rocket science, it’s just that she presents her ideas in a fresh, creative, easy-to-implement way that makes you nod and say, “Yeah, I can do that!”
Her latest e-book, One Bite At A Time ($5) gives you 52 easy-to-do projects for simplifying your life. One of my favorites?
Establish your 5-part morning routine.
She explains:
A methodical morning routine is a great way to treat yourself to a little soul care. Instead of starting your day by responding to the stimulus around you, you’re proactively creating the day you want to have. When you wake up and do the most essential things first, you get a good start to your day. Your mind is better focused on the rest of your day’s tasks. And you’ll do a better job taking care of the people you love most. In short, you’re on top of things. Treat yourself to a little order and sanity before the chaos of life begins.
I like this. And while I already had an established routine for quiet time and Bible study, this helped me work a few other things in, such as exercise and showering . It also helped me work a few things OUT, such as checking my email. Listing out my five things helped me see that the way to get it all done in the morning was to be more disciplined about not letting the outside world into my world until I’d already nourished my body and soul. I look at it as the five things that fill my cup each morning. These are things that FILL, not drain. There will plenty of draining that happens all day, we need to start being FILLED!
Here are some ways you might choose to fill your cup: Take a shower, pray, read your Bible, drink a glass of water, journal, stretch, exercise, listen to a particular song, go for a walk, make your bed, take vitamins, sit outside with a cup of coffee. Pick five and fill on up!
There’s no perfect morning routine, and I don’t share my routine because it needs to be yours. If you really cannot think in the morning perhaps you do your Bible study later in the day but just take 5 minutes to get on your knees and thank Him for life? Or perhaps you listen to the Bible on audio while you’re still in bed? Do what fills your cup. This is my cup, and I’d love to hear about yours — perhaps we can inspire one another and live our days brim full. {Thanks for reading…}
—
The five ways I fill my cup each morning…
1. Get face-down and thank God for the gift of another day of life.
2. Make coffee or tea 🙂
3. Quiet time, Bible study, prayer
4. Exercise (a run or work-out video)
5. Shower
(In case you’re wondering, yes I must begin this early in order to be done by the time my little monkeys rise. But it’s worth it because when I see their faces I can smile wide and say, YES, I’m ready for you!)
Sola Gratia, Sola Fide, Solo Christo
Sola Gratia, Sola Fide, Solo Christo:
The gospel is salvation by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone.
{Want to join along in the book of Galatians? There’s always room for another hungry soul!}
The book of Galatians begins with a bit of backstory: The Apostle Paul was not one of the original 12 disciples, but a Jewish Pharisee, or religious person, who persecuted the early Christians, even having them put to death. He was then miraculously saved when Jesus Christ (after his resurrection) appeared to Paul in a blinding light and commissioned him to go preach the gospel to the Gentiles (non-Jews). So he did, and he traveled throughout modern day Greece and Turkey and Italy establishing churches and spreading the gospel to the whole known world.
One of the places he preached the gospel was the region of Galatia, (in Acts 13 & 14 called Pamphylia, Pisidia, Iconium, Lystra, Derbe, Antioch. Mentioned as Phrygia & Galatia in Acts 16 & 18), to the Galatians and they believed him. They were new believers, vulnerable, and as a people they were easily tossed to and fro by different ideas and doctrines. One minute they were into this thing and the next minute they were into that. (Sound familiar?)
They were an inconstant people who changed their minds easily. They lackedspiritual discernment and steadfast determination. They lacked deep-seated convictions about divinely revealed truth, a conviction that can be formed only by careful thinking and unwavering faith in the Word of God. They were new converts with sincere desire, eager beavers who were very susceptible to believing what others told them they must do. Steadfastness is an exhortation again and again.
So after Paul had preached the gospel and left, these other religious leaders, called Judaizers came in and began telling these new believers that even though they’d received Christ as their Savior, they still had to abide by all the OT laws and continue the ceremonies and traditions of the Jewish faith.
Judaizers were messianic Jews who considered the Jewish law essential for a believer in Jesus Christ. They were Jews who made a superficial profession of Christ but turned back to Judaism and sought to make Christianity an extension of their traditional system of works righteousness.
Galatians is an argument against identifying primarily with a certain religious tradition and a particular nation. It urges us to be shaped by Christ apart from inherited standards of behavior or national allegiance.
Further, Galatians is a summons to be less attuned to the pressures and pleasures of our social context and more aware of the presence of Christ in our midst.
So, slowly the Galatians began to follow the Judaizers and turned aside from the pure and simple gospel. The gist of the book of Galatians is Paul’s exhorting them to return to the true gospel and stand fast in the freedom of Christ Jesus. To identify more with the gospel of Christ than social, national pressures. It’s a challenging but refreshing opportunity to step back and ask ourselves why we do what we do. Is it an outworking of the gospel of Christ, or a cultural or religious practice to which we’ve been subconsciously tied to without knowing why?
This is a fighting epistle. Paul writes with deep emotion and strong feeling. His heart laid bare. He has on his war paint. This is the Emancipation Proclamation of Christianity. This is Martin Luther’s favorite book, the masthead of the reformation. It’s the strongest declaration of justification by faith in or out of the Scriptures. Sinners are not only saved by grace through faith plus nothing, but the saved sinner lives by grace through faith. Grace is the way to life and the way of life.
Paul does not correct conduct (like Corinthians) but doctrine. Much more severe than the former. Paul has no word of commendation, praise, or thanksgiving. The harshness and severity of this book indicates how very dangerous this subtle corruption is. At first it seems strange that Paul would have words of commendation for the worldly, divisive, immoral and immature Corinthian believers and yet have non for the saints of Galatia. (1 Cor 1:4-7). The difference was that, as bad as the Corinthian situation was, the major problem there did not pertain so much to right doctrine as to right living. In the Galatian churches, on the other hand, the very heart of the gospel was being undermined by false teachers, the gospel of grace was being trampled, and in its place was being offered the gospel of works, which is no gospel at all but a distortion of God’s truth that leads to bondage, not salvation.
He had warned them about false teachers in Acts 20:28-30. There will always be an enemy of the gospel. The world will always hate the cross, because the cross is the END of man’s self-effort, the end of pride, the end of pull-yourself-up-by-your-bootstraps religion. The end of earn your way to salvation. The cross is central to Paul’s gospel and inextricably linked to righteousness by faith. He’ll make the argument that if we are saved according to our works then the cross is superfluous, unnecessary.
Galatians is a book of contrasts: Legalism vs. Love, Religion vs. the Gospel, Works vs. faith, law vs. grace, Flesh works vs. Spirit’s Fruit, World vs. Cross, true gospel vs. another gospel, bondage vs. freedom, Old covenant vs. New covenant.
Love is characterized by cooperation. Legalism is characterized by competition.
Legalism is the most popular substitute for spiritual living that we have in our churches today. Millions of believers think they are “spiritual” because of what they do and don’t do, who they follow and don’t follow. Warren Wiersbe says, “When the Holy Spirit takes over, there will be liberty, not bondage – cooperation, not competition – glory to God, not praise to man. The world will see true Christianity, and sinners will come to know the Savior.”
These Judaizers were legalists, they lived by the law, loved the “do” passages. Some of us can relate to that, right? Loved to read those passages and make them into lists, with boxes next to them. Numbered lists. And that way they could be checked off, right? That way they could judge themselves. That way they could count. Legalism loves to keep track. Love gives. Legalism calculates.
Paul is preaching the end of legalism and insisting that “the just shall live by faith” Habakkuk 2 is quoted 3 times in the NT: Romans 1:17, Hebrews 10:38, Galatians 3:11.
Faith plus law was the thrust of Judaism. Faith plus nothing was the answer of Paul.
Living a life of faith in the gospel is a life of freedom. We’re always in danger to being either in bondage to works or in bondage to sin. That is, we are in bondage to the law or in bondage to the flesh.
John 8:36 “If the Son therefore shall make you free you shall be free indeed!”
Galatians is the exhortation – STAND FAST IN FREEDOM. We do well to heed his words today as well…
{Thanks for reading.}
"I do" moments
‘Til death do us part …
I do.
It sounds very romantic. I suppose that’s the point, right? It’s a wedding. They’re vows of love. And I said them. I said them gazing starry-eyed up into the face of my man.
I won’t lie to you — my steady man and I have a wonderful marriage. I love that man and can’t imagine spending forever with anyone else. I’m spoiled rotten by being married to the most laid-back, easy-to-please, adoring husband in the world. I always joke that I could hand him a pile of dirt for dinner and he’d gobble it with thanks and praise me up and down and ask for more.
But we’re human. We have down days. Sometimes I don’t smile. Sometimes he doesn’t listen. Sometimes, like last week, we both carry weights of ministry and when we lean hard into each other for help we’re apt to bark back, “Hey, carry your own load!”
*Sigh*
But remember, the gospel of grace. Grace changes everything. And when my phone beeps and the text comes through I lay down my pirate sword and read it and smile:
“I love you. Having a great day. Sorry you always get my down moments.”
I ignore the kids for just a moment, thumbing back my love and remembering my vows:
“When I said “I do” it included the down moments too.”
Who of us doesn’t have down moments? Who of us doesn’t have days where the fog doesn’t lift? And if each moment is a grace-gift, from God, given for us to bow, empty-handed, and receive, then won’t we have plenty of this grace-gift to give to those most near?
Our husbands. Our children. Whoever sees us brushing our teeth — isn’t there grace enough for them as well?
When we say ‘I do’ we say yes. Yes to this life, these moments, even the down ones.
Yes to humanness.
When we drink deep of God’s extravagant grace, each day, we can smile easy and say, “Here, have some — I’ve got plenty to share.”
Here’s some grace for humanness, some grace for when you’re weak. Some grace for the down moments, for ‘I do’ moments.
Because that’s when we need it, right?
In the moment.
We need the grace-well to be full, to the brim. So when down moments bump, it spills, happy grace to cover human frailty.
Sisters, we need grace!
Grace to say ‘I do’ in whatever moments we face this day.
{Get in His word, bow at His feet, drink deep of His grace. Get full, and say ‘I do.’ Thanks for reading.}
