Dear Ones,
Hope you are enjoying the weekend! Al and I are going to Mora today to meet with our former Board for Canaan’s Rest. We do it once a year and it is a blessing to be with those special friends that shared our retreat vision and helped it come to pass years ago. We are now in a new place, and it is good to hear how the Lord is leading each of us now. 
Devotions from Judy’s heart
  The grace of God is immeasurable and powerful and we need grace every moment of our lives. Where would we be without His unmerited favor and mercy? Like the words of the song by Julia Johnston, “Grace, grace, God’s grace, grace that will pardon and cleanse within”; it goes on to say grace is greater than all our sin and freely bestowed on all who believe. Our part is to believe and then just receive it. We are so far from perfect and can’t earn grace, no matter how hard we try, but Jesus already paid for it on the cross.   As it says in Eph. 2: 8-9 (The Message), “Saving is all His idea, and all His work. All we do is trust Him enough to let Him do it. It’s God’s gift from start to finish.”  He is the One to change us from the inside out and does what we could never accomplish.
 Maybe we try at first to change ourselves and soon find it doesn’t work and discouragement sets in. Our outward behavior may change for a short time, but we find that we are not able to keep it up. We need instead to admit we can’t do it and simply open ourselves up to receive His grace. Then we will find that the Holy Spirit brings the changes within us that we worked so hard and failed to accomplish and yet it comes now with ease. All the credit to the Lord for it is not by our own striving but all by His gift of grace.
  I challenge us all to think of something in our lives that needs to change, and I can think of something right now in my life. Let us just give that to the Lord and ask Him to work the change needed in our hearts by His Spirit and with our cooperation. Then may we listen carefully to anything that we feel He is prompting us to do, and then obey. It could be an idea suddenly popped into our minds or we are faced with a decision, and we have to quickly choose. If it is the Holy Spirit prompting us then we know the grace is there for us to choose the right thing. The other day I felt I obeyed partially in something that needs changing in my life, but I stopped short and could have gone a step farther. I knew the feeling afterwards of missing out on the greater blessing.
Challenge for today: Ask the Holy Spirit to work a change in you that is needed and then ask for grace to respond in obedience.  
Blessings on your weekend and prayers and love, Judy