Joyful, Patient, Faithful

Jun5

A little word study for today:

“Be joyful in hope, patient in affliction, faithful in prayer” (Romans 12:12).

Hope: The feeling that what is wanted can be had or that events will turn out for the best.

Joyful: full of  joy, as a person or one’s heart; glad; delighted.

“But may the righteous be glad and rejoice before God; may they be happy and joyful. Sing to God, sing praise to His name, extol Him who rides on the clouds–His name is the Lord–and rejoice before Him (Psalm 68:3,4).

Patient: bearing provocation, annoyance, misfortune, delay, hardship, pain, etc., with fortitude and calm and without complaint, anger, or the like.

Affliction: a state of pain, distress, or grief; misery

“I wait patiently for the Lord; He turned to me and heard my cry. He lifted me out of the slimy pit, out of the mud and mire; He set my feet on a rock and gave me a firm place to stand. He put a new song in my mouth, a hymn of praise to our God. Many will see and fear and put their trust in the Lord” (Psalm 40: 1-3).

Faithful: steady in allegiance or affection; loyal; constant

Prayer: a spiritual communion with God . . . as in supplication, thanksgiving, adoration, or confession.

“To the faithful You show Yourself faithful, to the blameless You show Yourself blameless, to the pure You show Yourself pure” (Psalm 18: 25, 26).

Thanks to God’s Word through the New International Version (1984) and Dictionary.com.

Thankful today for:

348. the sound of the wind chimes

349. quiet

350. dictionaries

What Yard Work Taught Me About Sin

Jun4

If you don’t have borders, even good things can turn bad.

Sin is attractive sometimes. Knowing the roots and fruit are essential to telling the difference between the real beauty and the junk.

If you try to root out all the sin in one day, you’ll get discouraged and never want to tackle it again.

Sometimes you find sin in unexpected places, even in the middle of something that’s good.

Work with another person to control the sin in your life–it’s so much more fun.

It doesn’t work to just cover up sin, the roots are still there and eventually, the truth will come out.

Some roots go a lot deeper than you think, and sometimes you just need professional help.

Sin never, ever totally goes away. We are never free from it and it’s a constant battle to keep it at bay.

Life is messy and hard and it hurts, but it’s worth it for the beauty in the end.

 

 

 

Thankful today for:

345. Flowers

346. the first full day of summer break

347. photographs

 

Take the Leap

Jun3

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Every year at our church, just before school lets out for summer, a family hosts all the kids in Sunday school at their house for a lake party. They break out all the water toys they have, load on the life vests, ask everyone to bring snacks to share, and then let everyone have hours of fun in the water.

One of the highlights for many of the kids is jumping off the rope swing that hangs from a tree near their neighbor’s dock. You climb high up on this dock, grab the rope with a hook, and jump off, letting go of the rope just in time to land out in the water, deep enough to not get hurt.

That’s the goal, anyway.

So, wanting to be the cool mom, one year I let my “friends” and my kids talk me into giving it a try.

I’ve never been more terrified in my life.

It didn’t matter that I had watched others take that plunge many, many times; when it came to talking myself into stepping off of that incredibly high dock holding onto that incredibly thin rope and dropping into that incredibly deep water, I. Was. Terrified.

I let 6-year-olds go in front of me.

Here’s the thing: Had I been jumping off high docks my whole life, I wouldn’t have even given it a second thought. I would have taken that rope and jumped gleefully, trusting that I would land in that water and not suffer any consequences. But I have lived a safe, uneventful–some might call it a boring–life. Extreme sports are not my thing.

Faith is like that. If I live a safe life, my need for great faith seems to be very small. Taking that leap when I need to see God do extreme things is very, very scary. But if I trust Him daily for all the huge things that He is capable of doing, faith–stepping off that dock–is just like walking on solid ground.

“And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to Him must believe that He exists and that He rewards those who earnestly seek Him” (Hebrews 11:6.)

Thankful today for:
339. An afternoon at the lake
340. A faithful God
341. Singing
342. Faithful old men
343. Talented people
344. Technology

Character Counts

Jun1

Tonight, our school, Trace Academy, will hold our graduation and awards ceremony. Unlike other schools, we don’t give individual awards for attendance, or service or scholarship. Those often are just compiled by the few. Instead, we give each child an award for character. Each teaching team spends a lot of time praying and pondering on each child and what we have seen in them this year. We want to encourage those things. We pick a character trait that we have seen in them such as honesty or good friend or resourcefulness and present them with that at the ceremony, along with a ribbon and a magnet with that word and a Bible verse that goes along with it.

Character counts. It’s who you are when no one is looking. It’s not the persona of an athlete or a scholar or a good citizen who picks up trash or feeds the homeless or collects money for the starving children in Africa. Those are all good things. But in the dark, where only God can see you, are you humble and gentle of heart? Do you pray for the salvation and needs of the world? Do you love others like Jesus loved? Are you honest and pure?

I will be up on the stage tonight, handing to my  10 second graders blue ribbons and magnet cards, but what I really hope to hand to them is encouragement to keep letting God build in them good character, which is only produced by perseverance.

“Not only so, but we also rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope. And hope does not disappoint us, because God has poured out his love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, whom he has given us” (Romans 5:3-5).

Thankful today for:

333. summer break!

334. our Incredible Journey plans coming together

335. the opportunity to sleep in, even if it doesn’t happen

336. my friend Sheryl, celebrating her birthday today

337. tonight’s event

338. sweet gifts and cards from my students

Doing Things Well

May30

My son posted this status on his Facebook page today: ‎

” A normal person practices until he gets it right, a Ranger practices until he never gets it wrong.”
– Ranger’s Apprentice Series, John Flanagan

Something to think about, isn’t it?

Thankful today for:

327. the youth ministry at our church

328. Netflix

329. silly movies

330. the last day of school

331. games

332. fluffy white clouds