Canaan's Rest

Canaan’s Rest represents a quiet place “set apart” for the purpose of hearing God's voice, growing in intimacy with the Lord, and being renewed in soul and spirit.

Month: February 2025 (Page 3 of 3)

February 8, 2025

February 8, 2025 / / 0 Comments
Dear Ones,
Happy weekend to you! Thankfully Al is feeling better each day. I am going to clean the apartment and make some snackies for the Super Bowl. We are sad not to be celebrating in KS but grateful Al is better.
Devotions from Judy’s heart
By nature, I think we would all say we are selfish and not naturally loving but more concerned about ourselves than others. That is not the most joyful way to live, and we need God’s love flowing within us to change us into giving and loving people who care for others. Jesus said in John 10:10 that He came to give us life, abundant life! Abundant life is ours as we crucify our flesh nature and let the Holy Spirit dwell within us (Gal. 2:20). Others will know we are Jesus’ followers by our love that flows out to others. Would that we would all desire God’s love to bubble up within us and manifest in our actions.

I am writing today to ask for prayer for our friend Susan, who many of you have prayed for in the past. She is legally blind and lives in Assisted Living and has no family around; only a son and grandson who live in the northwest and visit her once a year or so. She has so little in worldly goods, but she is grateful and content. She could use prayers as she is leaving Sunday at 6 a.m. to be taken to Duluth where she will have a mastectomy early Monday morning, on her birthday. I talked to her last week, and they had a flu bug at Assisted Living and no visitors allowed. I prayed that she would be able to celebrate her birthday in some way before her surgery. I had made her favorite chocolate cookies on a stick, since her hands are deformed with arthritis it is easier for her to hold. I also put a chocolate cake in the freezer that had lots of chocolate frosting and bought her chocolate candy, root beer and a couple new shirts. But how was I going to get them to her and so I prayed. I definitely know the Lord watches over Susan as I see the evidence so many times as He meets her needs.

The Lord answered my prayer as I woke from a nap and found out that our daughter Ann was stopping by in 5 minutes and would meet me downstairs since Al was sick. I asked her if she would leave off these gifts for Susan at the desk as she goes by her place going home. I had a feeling a call would come from Susan later and she was so happy she could hardly talk. She said even the aides that brought her the bags of gifts were almost as excited as she was. Susan loves to give to others, and I know she will share the cake and cookies, particularly with a special friend. God’s love beams in her life and her gratitude overflows. It isn’t that she has a lot, but what she has she is grateful for. I loved that the Lord wanted her to be able to celebrate her birthday for it will be a long time of recovery as she goes to a Nursing Home in Duluth following surgery. I promised her I would ask you all to pray for her!

Challenge for today: When you see a need pray and ask the Lord if He wants to use you to meet that need and let His love flow through you.
Blessings on your weekend and prayers and love, Judy

February 7, 2025

February 7, 2025 / / 0 Comments
Dear Ones,
Hope you have a wonderful weekend! I plan to spend time in the kitchen and make some of Al’s favorite dishes. He seems better and we are thankful.
Devotions from Judy’s heart
Right now, my husband is sick and I am hoping not to get whatever he has; we are doing all we can to help his body get well. Maybe as you are reading this you have a different kind of illness and you feel empty, depressed, and without hope. God’s love is the one thing that can restore our lives and give us joy and peace and hope and that comes through relationship with Him. If you have never received Jesus into your heart, He invites each of us to confess our sin and to ask forgiveness and then He does the rest; He forgives us, fills us with His Spirit and pours out His love into our hearts. When we respond to Him it begins a walk in love and our lives are forever changed.

We will also find that along with a changed heart, our mind gets renewed, and love is now the force that directs our actions, thoughts and words. We become joined with other believers and receive encouragement through fellowship together. Since we know we now belong to a family of believers, we no longer feel alone and depressed. We practice love and seek to find ways to encourage others. Paul said in Romans 5 that we have been justified by faith and have peace with God for God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit. This love is not just a feeling, but it is a person, God is love! If you want to know more of what the love is like read I Cor. 13 for it is enduring, patient, kind, not self-seeking and bears up under anything.

Let us ask ourselves what is our greatest love? Is it for Jesus or is it for pleasures, wealth, fame? Hopefully it is for Jesus, and we are experiencing His selfless love that He has placed inside of us that enables us to reach out to others and to know them and love them. I am sure we will also find that in the process we are filled with indescribable joy and peace.

Challenge for today: Ask the Lord to be first place in your life and share His love however He leads you.
Blessings on your weekend and prayers and love, Judy

February 6, 2025

February 6, 2025 / / 0 Comments
Dear Ones,
Hope you have a joy-filled day. Al is sick so someone else is doing the Bible study today.  I plan to surprise him with pumpkin pancakes and bacon today. I am also loading him up with lots of vitamins and healthful foods. I have my treatment this morning and I think my feet are getting better. PTL! I
Devotions from Judy’s heart
Each day it is important that we are led by the Spirit and not just doing our own thing. He desires to be the initiator of our actions rather than us off running on our own and then say, “By the way Lord, bless what I am doing and hope you will tag along.” No, we must wait to know what God is up to and agree to join in with His plan. Proverbs 16:1 and 9 say, “Mortals make elaborate plans, but God has the last word…We plan the way we want to live, but only God makes us able to live it.”

Jesus Himself was willing to wait for God’s plan for ministry. I wonder if it was easy for him to wait 30 years, working as a carpenter with his dad, before He was launched out to do His Father’s miraculous work. But He waited for His Father’s timing that brought marvelous results! In our lives when we let Him set the agenda and do things His way, some surprising things happen that that wouldn’t otherwise happen. We may all wonder what things we have missed by jumping in too soon with our plans or delaying what God has asked us to do and realize too late that the timing is off.

There have been times when we have planned to visit friends or our kids and grandkids, and then at the last minute we have to change plans. This is such a time as we planned to go to Kurt’s tomorrow in KS for the Super Bowl and have to cancel as Al is sick and has that bug that seems to be going around. We have prayed and hoped but Al is not well enough to go and we don’t want to bring unwanted sickness either. Disappointing but we learn that God’s timing is best, and it is perfect, even if we never find out why we are at times blocked from doing what we think are great plans.

Let us desire to know the Lord’s plan for each day and to see the mark of His hand in all that we do.

Challenge for today: Start your day out in prayer and asking the Lord to set your agenda.
Blessings on your day and prayers and love, Judy

February 5, 2025

February 5, 2025 / / 0 Comments
Dear Ones,
May you wake to a peace filled day. This morning, I plan to bake cookies and go to my exercise class and then craft class this afternoon.
Devotions from Judy’s heart
Recently while having my quiet time with the Lord, the song began playing in my heart that comes from the scripture Psalm 139:23-24, which David wrote. (verse one)
  1. Search me, O God, and know my heart today,
    Try me, O Savior, know my thoughts, I pray;
    See if there be some wicked way in me;
    Cleanse me from every sin, and set me free.
  2. I praise Thee, Lord, for cleansing me from sin;
    Fulfill Thy word and make me pure within;
    Fill me with fire, where once I burned with shame;
    Grant my desire to magnify Thy name.
  3. Lord, take my life, and make it wholly Thine;
    Fill my poor heart with Thy great love divine;
    Take all my will, my passion, self and pride;
    I now surrender, Lord, in me abide.
  4. O Holy Ghost, revival comes from Thee;
    Send a revival, start the work in me;
    Thy Word declares Thou wilt supply our need;
    For blessings now, O Lord, I humbly plead.

You have probably sung this song written by James Edwin Orr in 1936 after a revival took place when he preached in New Zealand. He was only 24 at the time and so many people came to know the Lord that he had to have midnight services to accommodate all of them. The key was the public confession of sins, and believers reconciling with one another. The revival spread across this whole nation as the Holy Spirit moved with great power. As James was leaving to go home, 4 Maori girls sang to him their native song of farewell. He was taken by the tune that he wrote the words of this song on an envelope and later it became the very song we sing today.

Perhaps these words can touch us deeply today as we ask the Lord to search our hearts and cleanse our very thoughts. He wants to set us free and fill us with His love, but we need to surrender each day our will, passion, self and pride. May revival start with us and spread far and wide.

Challenge for today: Ask the Lord to see your own heart’s need for cleansing and to send His purifying fire to burn away all that is not of Him.
Blessings on your day and prayers and love, Judy

February 4, 2025

February 4, 2025 / / 0 Comments
Dear Ones,
Hope you have a day of contentment! I often thank the Lord during the day for He has blessed us so much. I especially am thankful for our warm apt. on cold days. I have Women’s Bible Study later this morning and plan to do some food prep first.
Devotions from Judy’s heart
How many of us are content and would say we have enough, and we don’t need more to be happy. I would suspect that most Americans have what Oliver James called the Affluenza virus, meaning “the placing of high value on money, possessions, appearances and fame.” We think we must have lots of goods and fame to be happy, but it is quite the opposite. We become more selfish and emotionally distressed as we store up more. Contentment can be had with a simple life since more does not equal happiness.

I read about avarice which is called one of the deadly sins and defined as the insatiable desire for more than we need. Most Americans would say they are weighed down by all their many goods that leave them with bursting closets and drawers. We have so much more than we need. Scripture warns us about riches and the love of money, and wealthy King Solomon who had everything said, “He who loves money will not be satisfied with money, or he who loves wealth with his income; this also is vanity.” (Eccl. 5:10} Scripture has over 2,000 verses on money, so we need to pay attention lest it rule us rather than be a tool to help us in giving to the needs of others.

We all have need of shelter, food and safety but when is enough, enough? There is a lot of greed as people desire more material possessions and money and what other people have.  Advertising on TV puts longing in our hearts that we never would have otherwise. So how do we guard against “Affluenza”?  What happens to just being satisfied with our needs being met? We need gratitude! Gratitude is realizing we have received help and gifts that God has given us and we are thankful. All that we have is a gift from God and if we have abundance, doesn’t it make sense that we share. The more we earn the more we can give. Let us be generous and we will experience that giving does actually make us happier than receiving.

Challenge for today: Uproot avarice from your heart and give generously without expecting in return.
Blessings on your day and prayers and love, Judy

Leaky Tires

February 3, 2025 / / 0 Comments

In early 2010 ,James Houston wrote an article entitled “The Independence Myth” with the subtitle “Only our soul friends can show us the ecology of evil within us.”  Dr. Houston asks, “Could a new understanding of such terms as spiritual direction provide pointers to what is needed in our congregational life?  Could it be that in our search for ‘revival,’ making our pastoral care more holistic would save us from what seems like a constant need to pump air into leaky tires.”  He goes on to identify three such leaky tires. Men, do we have a leaky tire.

First, he mentions, the “mistaken notion that if only we preach and teach enough the congregation will ‘know the truth.'” Instruction alone maintains  Dr. Houston, “is no substitute for the relational inspiration and the quality of life we can give each other in “soul friendships.'”  “As long as we assume that ‘talk’ automatically leads to living the gospel, there will be spiritual leakage.” 

A second leak “has to do with our confused identity as Christians.”   It is “fatal to Christian ministry to find one’s identity in being the pastor or elder or deacon, instead of being ‘in Christ Jesus.'”  Thirdly, Houston identifies the “moral leakage among us.” He sees a “nation of the morally stillborn,”  who are more like “the morally retarded,” showing little behavioral difference from the culture.   

These leakages reveal the lack of the discipline and ordering of our emotional lives, attitudes and motives,  which need to be incorporated in our teaching.  We often can be blind to the depth of original sin.  Houston observes, “If sin is self-deceiving, then I need a soul friend to give me insights into the ways I am deceived, or insensitive, or hardened by sin within me.”  A true spiritual friend helps us to see “the inner ecology of evil” in our heart.  

Dr. Houston sees the need to prioritize the “emotional education of our inner lives.”   An “over rationalized faith” can lead to more talk then walk.   ” {When} authentic spiritual guidance” notes Houston. “reveals the reality of human sin, and the relevance of Christ’s lordship and redemption to our emotions and our minds, then it will help expose the intrinsically self-deceiving character of sin in our lives.”   Those who are most rational in control of their lives, will “scorn the relevance of soul friendship.”   However, a sincere soul friend can expose our inner ecology of sin.  

Houston, asks why is prayer so neglected among believers?  His answer is intriguing.  “It reflects our general fear of intimacy, which in turn is responsible for our lack of deep friendships, and indeed for the whole undernourishment of the relational life.”  One of the aims of spiritual guidance and direction is to help with our life of prayer.  Spiritual friend can be  encouraging in our struggle with prayer.  

Finally, Dr. Houston reminds us, the life of the Christian is grounded in the mystery of the Trinity.  “We all need to see the divine Trinity as the archetypal reality of our expression of community, communion, and spiritual life together.”  Each person of the Trinity is “for-the -other.” each having “identify-in-the-other,” but yet one God.  “Spiritual  friendship means the friendship of those who are the prayerful companions of God.”  With spiritual friends we can experience “a comfortable walking with God.”

Houston warns there are no “paid friends” who are experts, rather”these qualities only appear when the Spirit of God blows softly over dry bones as the prophet saw in his vision.  And therein lies our hope.”  

My advice, find a male spiritual friend.  Make it a priority.  Don’t be a spiritual “Lone Ranger.” 

February 3, 2025

February 3, 2025 / / 0 Comments
Dear Ones,
Hope you had a great weekend. We took in the movie, Green and Gold, at our nearby theater and enjoyed it. Our pastor will especially like it as it has to do with the Packers. This morning, I am going to make egg dishes and go to Aldi’s and exercise class.
Devotions from Judy’s heart
Are we self-sufficient or do we depend on the Lord in all our circumstances? Hopefully it is the latter for we were meant to live our lives in complete dependence on the Lord, not on ourselves. Even though we may hear a teaching about depending on Him or read about it, or see examples of it, it still is not easy to practice. Most people in our culture prize ourselves with being strong and self-sufficient and not needing others, or even the Lord. But the Holy Spirit wants to help us to be humbly dependent on the One who designed us and follow His pattern for our life. After all who would know better than the One who uniquely created us in the first place.

Now I would like to learn in a classroom what it means to be fully dependent on the Lord rather than in life’s circumstances but most of the time we learn through adverse times. Troubles come and God uses them to expose our weaknesses and to show us our need to tightly hold onto His strength, not our own. There are things that happen in life’s circumstances like a job loss, and we find out how we depended on our income rather than the Lord. Or maybe our marriage comes to an end, and we find ourselves lost without support and need His. There are also times God uses our circumstances to show a weakness in our character. Maybe we have experienced doing or saying something that we later thought, “I can’t believe I said that! I can’t believe I did that!” I’m sure Peter didn’t know he would deny the Lord three times, but he did. We all have weak areas, and the Lord wants to expose them so we can trust Him and draw our strength from Him.

When facing our troubles it will either make us become bitter or better. If our focus is on the big “I”, our ego, we become bitter. But when we look to the Lord, we will become better and stronger in Him. If our focus is on what we will learn from it, it can be character building, as we will grow through the hard times and become more like Him. Paul wrote in Phil. 1:21, “For to me to live is Christ and to die is gain.” Let us die to self so we might live for Him.
Challenge for today: Instead of trying to get out of your hard situations, ask the Lord to help you learn what He is trying to teach you through them.
Blessings on your week and prayers and love, Judy

February 1, 2025

February 1, 2025 / / 0 Comments
Dear Ones,
Happy weekend to you! We had fun time celebrating the January birthday’s yesterday with an awesome cake and ice cream, and bouquets of roses on each table etc. Today I am going to clean the apartment and make a crock pot of stew and soon the aroma will fill this place.
Devotions from Judy’s heart
Our thoughts are important and whatever we allow to occupy our minds will eventually determine our feelings. Scripture says, “As a man thinketh in his heart so is he.” Proverbs 23:7 Our thoughts shape our character and our speech and our actions, so we need to take care of what we let our thoughts dwell on for we are what we think and believe. How we talk to ourselves influences our mood and feelings. If we dwell on negative, depressive and anxious thoughts it changes even our brain chemistry. Wow!

We read today that the majority of people suffer from anxiety and so many live in despair and resignation. What can we do? So many people believe there is no purpose or meaning to life, so they live for instant satisfaction, trying to get more and more etc. But it doesn’t work and one psychologist, Edmund Bourne, said it is fertile ground for panic attacks and phobias. We need a larger purpose to life. We need belief in God who gives us meaning and helps us overcome our anxious thoughts. Only He can give us inner peace, purpose and unconditional love. When we come to love and depend on Him then we can look beyond ourselves and also serve others

We live in a fallen world and there are times we do suffer. But Bourne says we can seek to let it form us rather than deform us. We don’t need to waste it but let it humble us and deepen our dependence on God and strengthen our relationship with Him and others. We can always come to the Lord and pray in faith for healing and trust for however He will bring healing to us. If we are hanging on to a sinful practice, we need to let it go. There may even be some that don’t want to get well as it gains them attention from others. God knows the timing and sees our innermost needs and will work things for our good and not give us more than we can handle.
Challenge for today: Be honest before the Lord and express your feelings, anxieties and questions and then move on to rehearse His faithfulness and trust!
Blessings on your weekend and prayers and love, Judy
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