Category: Uncategorized (Page 1 of 3)

Dear Ones,

Happy Labor Day! Hope you take time to celebrate. We are home now after a fun time at the lake. We enjoyed a wiener roast with about 20 relatives one evening, went to our former church and dinner at Ann’s afterwards, and then headed home when the thermometer reached 100 degrees! 
I am making egg dishes and cookies and then we are going for our walk on the trail early before it heats up again. 

Devotions from Judy’s heart

Happy Labor Day to you! Perhaps today each of us will give some thought to the work we do and also rest on this national Holiday from our work. This morning I read about what Mark Roberts of Fuller Seminary writes about work beginning with how God was the first worker in creating the heavens and the earth and all that is in it, including us…and it was all good! God worked 6 days but then on the seventh day He rested from His work. He left us a great rhythm for us to follow also.

Dear Ones,                                                                                                                                                   

 Hope you have a wonderful day! The apartment is full of aroma as I just finished making more cookies on a stick and egg dishes. Soon I am going to Aldi’s and my exercise class. Then tonight is Bible study at church.                                                                                                                                           

   Devotions from Judy’s heart                                                                                                                       

  As followers of Jesus, the telltale sign we belong to Him is to live a life of love. Our greatest joy is found in knowing God loves us and it should be evidenced in the lives we live.  We can do all sorts of sacrificial things for the Lord, but as it says in I Cor. 13, that if we don’t do it out of love, it is useless and accounts for nothing, nada!  Like Paul says in verse 3 that if we give away everything we have, but don’t have love, we gain nothing! But if we do it with love our actions will cause others to be blessed and bring glory to the Lord. So let us pay careful attention to our attitude in giving.     

  I was reading in the book, “Reclaiming Love”, and Ajith Fernando writes of ways we often give even sacrificially but yet without love. Perhaps we will see ourself in what he has to say. We might be like the one who gives for merit and to earn favor, with the expectation to prosper and reap more in return. That is not love! Or maybe we give out of a sense of duty and obligation, that is not love. We do the right thing in helping others but with a judgmental spirit towards them. We can’t call that love. Or maybe we give without identifying with the very ones we serve, making the other feeling inferior by our attitude. Not love either!  Or are we giving at times to avoid getting involved? It seems easier to give our finances than to actually spend time helping someone learn how to budget and live within their means etc. Fernando also says we shouldn’t give for recognition from others, like having our name on a pew or a plaque on a building. Or giving with a competitive spirit to outgive someone else. Is that love?  There are also times, we are not to give even though asked. Just as a child demanding something and getting his way if he cries loud enough, there are times it is more loving to withhold for their own good. That is love.                                               

  We must remember that all that we have is from the Lord and it belongs to Him and we should willingly give to others as He directs us. We can never ever repay the debt of love we owe the Lord for He gave everything for us.                                                                                                                                     Challenge for today: Ask the Lord how and when you should give and let it be motivated by His love.                                                                                                                                      

Blessings on your day and prayers and love, Judy

Dear Ones,

Hope you had a wonderful weekend and if you are a father, that you had a blessed Father’s Day. Our sons all called yesterday and tomorrow Al and I are going to Duluth for the day to celebrate both Father’s Day and our Anniversary. 

Devotions from Judy’s heart

  For Father’s Day I wrote a devotional to fathers as we all had a father; one that may have been very good or could be one that failed. I read an article on Crosswalk.com by Lynette Kittle who wrote to fathers who know they missed the mark. Sadly, we are getting to be a fatherless culture as there are an estimated 24.7 million children under 18 that have no father in the home. It seems like the role of father is being devalued and men are not stepping up to the plate. They may feel that they don’t make a difference in the life of their child or maybe mom has chosen to be a single parent and shut out dad. Some fathers abused their kids, ignored them or abandoned them altogether. Many did not show affection or give affirmation and are ashamed. Even if they have regrets, they may not know how to restore the relationship.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                        One day the children will need to forgive them. Kittle gives a prayer for them to pray to help them forgive their dads. Part of the prayer is: “Dear Father, Help me, Father, to forgive my father for his failures and shortcomings and how he hurt and disappointed me. I also ask you to help him to receive forgiveness for his falling short in my life. Soften his heart, Lord, to turn towards You and receive forgiveness. Let us both walk in the forgiveness You give to us. Help me forgive him for his failures in my life and help my father to find forgiveness for how he failed me. Pour out your love over us, O Lord, to bring healing and reconciliation into our relationship. Help me to recover from the wounds of the past and to be willing to open my heart to forgive my dad for the past. Strengthen both of us to move forward to restore our broken relationship. In Jesus’ name, Amen.”  If you are reading this and your father failed you, it is important that you forgive. May you also know that you have a Heavenly Father that is for you, will never abandon you and loves you most of all. David said in Psalm 68:5 that “God is a father to the fatherless and a defender of widows.”

Challenge for today: Forgive your father for any failures and then thank the Lord that He is your perfect Father and cares for you.   

Blessings on your week and prayers and love, Judy                                                                                                              

Blessings on your weekend and prayers and love, Judy

Blessings on your Easter weekend and prayers and love, Judy

Blessings on your week and prayers and love, Judy

Dear Ones,

Oh the snow out my window today…so beautiful and so welcome if you don’t have to go somewhere. Some brave person went and got the donuts early this morning and tomorrow we hope we can get to Costco for the birthday cake. I have made 2 batches of cookies this morning and this afternoon we have Bible Study.  

Devotions from Judy’s heart

How good are we at offering forgiveness to others? Perhaps that is the most precious gift we can give them. We may be often hindered in forgiving others by not seeing our own sins but instead judging theirs.  The Greek word of forgiveness is aphiemi and means to let go to divorce, leave, or send forth. We let go of the need to judge or punish and instead we offer forgiveness. That includes forgiving even before the other person is sorry or desires to reconcile.

   The longer I know the Lord, the more I see my need for mercy and forgiveness. Often during the day, I lift a prayer confessing my sin of that moment or a sin from long ago and ask for forgiveness. I like to then thank the Lord that He has forgiven me as the enemy likes to bring old things up; instead of chastising myself that I didn’t respond differently etc., I like to thank the Lord for His forgiveness and that my sin is now drowned in the depth of the sea! We have the wonderful promise that as we acknowledge our sins, that He is faithful and just and will forgive our sins and cleanse us from every wrong doing. (I John 1:9) A good verse to memorize in our arsenal against the enemy!

  I love John Michael Talbot’s picture of forgiveness. He said forgiveness is like a constant fall of rain from God and we are like cups lying upside down. God’s rain of forgiveness and love continues to fall but we can only benefit from it if we turn our cups right side up and let them be filled. Otherwise, we cannot receive, for we lack repentance.

   We must also be quick to forgive others and Talbot mentions that they should be able to sense forgiveness by looking into our eyes of love rather than the scorn of judgement. When we don’t forgive it binds us up, and them, and sometimes even a whole church or community.

   Let us all ask the Lord for humility to see our own sins and not judge others but to show the precious gift of mercy.

Challenge for today: When we see the sin of others be quick to say, “There, but for the grace of God, go I.”

Blessings on this snowy day and prayers and love, Judy

 

 

Dear Ones

Hope you are having a good weekend. It is a cold day so may be walking in the underground as we did yesterday. This morning I cleaned our apartment and hope to shop this afternoon. We are having our Thanksgiving service tomorrow night and having lots of pies afterwards. Al can hardly wait!!

Devotions from Judy’s heart

   Where are the people of integrity today? There is so much falsehood and twisting of the truth to fit agendas that we don’t know what to believe or who to believe. But that should not be so if we are a child of God, He calls us to be truthful, to be honorable, and to have a pure heart, not to be false.

   Purity is important to God for it is mentioned many times in the Bible. Of course, only the Lord is pure, faultless, and without any contamination. But God wants us to be like Him and reflect His image; He wants us to also have pure hearts that seek to know Him intimately. In His Sermon on the Mount, He told us that blessed are the pure in heart for they shall see God. (Matt. 5:8) God is so holy that we can only come before Him in Jesus’ righteousness. As it says in II Cor. 5:21 (ESV), “For our sake He made Him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God.”

   The truth is we can’t live pure lives on our own but only come to Jesus in faith and ask forgiveness and cleansing. Then we are washed clean and the Lord looks at us as if we have never sinned…that means all of the sins we have ever committed and remembers them no more. Wow!

   When the word purity comes up, we often think first of chastity, refraining from premarital sex, even though the culture is saying anything goes. And if married, purity would mean not cheating but keeping ourselves only for our mate. It is God’s will that we honor Him with our bodies and that includes our thought life, our speech and our actions as well. In I Peter 1: 22 we are told to “Love one another earnestly from a pure heart.” It is helpful to spend time in the Word together and to pray together and to put the Lord first and others second and selves last. The world’s way of thinking of yourself first, doesn’t work as we see the mess our culture is in. Let us remember David’s words in Psalm 24:6-8, “Who shall ascent the hill of the Lord? And who shall stand in his holy place? He who has clean hands and a pure heart, who does not lift his soul to what is false and does not swear deceitfully. He will receive blessings from the Lord and righteousness from the God of His salvation. Such is the generation of those who seek Him, who seek the face of the God of Jacob.” Let us be people of integrity with hearts of purity that shine out in the darkness of our world.

Challenge for today: Put God first in your life and ask Him for a pure heart like His.

Blessings on your weekend and prayers and love, Judy

Blessings on your weekend and prayers and love, Judy

Dear Ones,

Hope you are having an enjoyable weekend. Al is better now but it is going to take longer for me as I didn’t get sick right away like he did. I’m not doing a lot of work so am getting lazy! 

Devotions from Judy’s heart

What is the first thing we do upon waking from a long night’s sleep? Is it to groan and quickly fill our mind with all the things we need to accomplish during the day; or is it to greet the Lord and thank Him for a night of rest and a new day before us, full of promise and of course, His presence.

I smiled when I read what my cousin e-mailed me about their dog Buddy who is a Golden Doddle and looks just like our grand-dog, Cali! Both of them are so friendly and like to greet everyone. Buddy recently returned from a month-long trip with my cousin and her husband who traveled with another couple and pulled their Teardrop camper, Every morning, right after they got up, Buddy wanted to go to their friends’ camper to greet them; he wouldn’t do anything until he had done that. When a yellow bandanna was put in their window, it meant they were ready for Buddy to come and say good morning; afterwards he came back all set for the day.

I was immediately reminded of how it pleases the Lord when our first thoughts of the day are on Him and we have his promise in Ex. 33:14 (ESV), “My presence will go with you, and I will give you rest.” Perhaps children find it easier to just trust that the Lord is with them and  not to worry about what the day holds.

We just returned from visiting our grandsons in North Carolina and our hearts were so blessed by how they are growing in the Lord. One night I had prepared slips of paper with instructions and put them inside plastic eggs. We went around the table and each one of us had to do whatever was written on the slip of paper in our egg. Lots of laughter as compliments were given to someone on their right, or a song sung by someone on their left etc. When we finished our grandsons, asked if they could write the instructions and went away to do so. I though oh boy, we are going to be running around the house or doing strenuous feats but we were so pleasantly surprised. John Mark is only 12 and one of his slips he wrote said to give 3 Bible verses by heart and tell how they impact your life. He happened to get that one and proceeded to share the importance of following the Lord etc. Tears came to my eyes to see one so young who is so wise in the ways of the Lord. A.J who is only 8 rattled off all the books of the Bible as his brother and mom did push-ups. Both have so many scriptures stored up in their hearts.

How wonderful to start the day with the Lord and then to rehearse His promises throughout the day when we need them.

Challenge for today: Before you step out of bed, greet the Lord and give your day to Him.
Blessings on your weekend and prayers and love, Judy