Category: Whispers (Page 158 of 171)

Dear Ones,

Hope you are having a good weekend. This morning I cleaned our apartment and made Beef Stroganoff  and took a friend here to the Dollar Store. Another mild day and lovely for a walk. 

Devotions from Judy’s heart

How many of us accept suffering as a gift? Really a gift? I’m sure we don’t seek suffering but when it comes our way, do we embrace what it has to teach us or do we quickly try to escape. Most of us would say we like comfort and we are being manipulated today by our love for pleasure and fear of discomfort. It is one of the enemies lies to promise us a life without suffering or any kind of discomfort. Jesus never said that His followers would not suffer and says in Matt. 5:11-12a (ESV), “Blessed are you when others revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account. Rejoice and be glad for our reward is great in heaven.” God can teach us many things through times of suffering if we are open to its lessons. In Rod Dreher’s book, he said that Jesus doesn’t want admirers but followers. Admirers play it safe and don’t want to make sacrifices but followers want to be like Him and willing to pay the cost, no matter what. It is almost hard to read the accounts of those who have paid the ultimate price. When we think of life under communism, people sent to prison were never returned, children were taken away from parents because of their faith, others endured terrible torture.  Maria Wittner is a national hero for fighting the Soviets when they invaded Hungary. She was a teenager and was arrested and sentenced to death row. Every day there were hangings and miraculously God spared her life. She tells us that if our soul is free there is nothing they can do to us. In the end those who are afraid end up worse than the courageous. Our suffering can have purpose even if we are not aware at the time. It can deepen our love for God and for others, teach us patience and kindness, and help us sense true meaning in life. Suffering refines us and also helps us join with others who have grief, for we understand and know that God is enough.  But we must refuse hatred and leave vengeance up to the Lord. We will live most freely when we bear suffering and pain for Jesus, and do not run from it but accept it as God’s severe mercy. Let us live in truth no matter what the cost.

Challenge for today: Embrace suffering as a friend and as a gift that has things to teach you.

Dear Ones,

Hope you have a good weekend wrapped in His peace! This morning I made egg dishes and went downstairs for coffee. It’s been a while. Ann came and we had a good visit before she went shopping.  I am a little sore today from my strength building class yesterday but I aim to go again! 

Devotions from Judy’s heart

Are we known as great lovers…lovers of God, lovers of others and even lovers of ourselves in the Lord? Jesus told us in I John 13:34-35 (God’s Word), “I’m giving you a new commandment; Love each other in the same way that I have loved you. Everyone will know that you are my disciples because of your love for each other.” Jesus didn’t say just love those that agree with you, those that bless you and are kind to you and speak well of you. No, He includes those that persecute us, speak evil of us, and hate us. That is a tall order and we can only do this with the same love He loves us. Today it is so sad to see hate messages on Facebook from Christians who are the very ones called to love and bless others. The enemy rejoices when he sees churches divided, friends separated and families split. Satan has already won if we base our love for others on how well they treat us or if we are in agreement. No, we are told, “Let all be done in love.” That means feeding our enemy, not rejoicing when they fall, repaying evil with good, and blessing our enemies and praying for them. What would happen in our families and our country if we did this… a revival may break out! It is not our place to destroy others. Jesus didn’t retaliate in return for the evil done to Him but He entrusted himself to God who judges rightly. Whatever happens we can give it over to the Lord and let Him right the wrongs. One friend told me recently she almost quit going to church because of the hateful bashing by one of the members. That is a dangerous place to be as the enemy gets a foothold in our lives and evil takes over. So sad as we should be examples of those who love as Jesus did. Do we dare pray that the Lord would convict us of times we have wanted to get back at our enemies and wanted to even the score? Let us humble our hearts and ask Him to remove hateful thoughts and fill us with His unconditional love that brings blessings to others.

Challenge for today: Spend some time letting the Holy Spirit search your heart, repent and fill you to overflowing with His love. 

 

Devotions from Judy’s heart

How does God’s presence manifest in our lives each day? Do we pray and then do as we please, or do we live our prayers and bring His presence to others? Sometimes just a smile or word of encouragement can change the day for someone when we respond to the Holy Spirit’s prompting. I was reading about Thomas Edison who was the greatest inventor of all with 1,093 patents including electric light and power, phonographs, telegraph and telephone etc. He didn’t question if something could be done but always sought to see how it was done. One would have thought he excelled in school and was in a gifted class. But that is not the case. He was the 7^th child in the family and had a hearing problem, which made it difficult for him in school. In fact, when he was 12 years old, his teacher sent home a note for his mom that said, “Your son is addled (mentally ill) and we will not let him attend our institution any longer.” Young Thomas was told not to look at the note but to give it to his mom. When she opened it up, she began weeping and told her son that the school felt he was so smart that there weren’t teachers good enough to teach him and he should learn at home. And that is what his mom did; she began teaching him and encouraging him each day. Thomas felt she was so sure of Him that he didn’t want to disappoint her. Rather than his mom seeing him as one who was dumb and psychotic, she chose to see him as a gifted child and he was. Later in life when she died Thomas found the teacher’s note buried in her closet and read what it really said. He sobbed as he realized what his mom had done for him. Now that is an extraordinary example of how our lives affect others, but each of us can express God’s love to others each day in numerous ways when we are sensitive to the Holy Spirit’s leading. The beloved disciple said in I John 4:12 & 16 (God’s Word), “If we love each other, God lives in us, and His love is perfected in us… We have known and believed that God loves us. God is love. Those who live in God’s love live in God, and God lives in them.”  Love is a choice and an action, and not just a feeling we get. The Holy Spirit gives us the power to love and display God’s love to others. May we live out His love in our lives and reflect it to the world around us. The choice is ours!

Challenge for today: Thank the Lord for His love for you, and ask the Holy Spirit to help you share  that love with others.

Dear Ones,

Hope you are having a peace filled day. This morning I made our favorite bars and some veggie dishes and went to my exercise class. Al has his computer back already and is up and running.  We got just the right Geek as he went right to work on it and had it done in 3 hours. PTL! 

Devotions from Judy’s heart

Know the times! We are in a new time in our culture and we have not experienced anything like this before. We need the Holy Spirit to help us discern the times and to know what the Lord is saying to us.  The other morning, I woke up and saw that the bedroom clock showed it was 4 o’clock, the time I usually get up. So, I began having my devotions and after an hour, I went to the kitchen to put Al’s egg dish in the oven etc. Before long Al got up and asked me what I was doing making noise at 4 am in the kitchen! I thought it was 5, but then remembered our bedroom clock had been unplugged for a while the night before and not set right. I couldn’t believe I got up at 3 a.m. and was all ready for the day. I was not aware of the correct time!  More importantly we need to know God’s time, how to interpret the spiritual signs of our time and to have discernment. Jesus told the Pharisees and Sadducees that came to test Him that they knew the physical signs of the weather by the color of the sky, but they didn’t know how to interpret the signs of the times. Apart from the Lord we cannot really know either. In the Old Testament Daniel knew he needed God’s wisdom, and when he prayed, he was given wisdom to know the times that saved not only his life but that of all the wise men. He said in Daniel 2:20-22 (God’s Word), “Praise God’s name from everlasting to everlasting because He is wise and powerful. He changes times and periods of history. He removes kings and establishes them. He gives wisdom to those who are wise and knowledge to those who have insight. He reveals deeply hidden things. He knows what is in the dark, and light lives with Him.”  We need to be awakened and to get discernment as to the times of our day. Only the Holy Spirit can interpret for us what is really going on behind the scenes and how we are to react and respond. May our prayer be as Paul prayed in Phil. 1:9-11, “I pray that your love will keep on growing because of your knowledge and insight. That way you will be able to determine what is best and be pure and blameless until the day of Christ. Jesus Christ will fill your lives with everything that God’s approval produces. Your lives will then bring glory and praise to God.”

Challenge for today: Ask the Lord for discernment to know the times!

Blessings on your day and prayers and love, Judy

Dear Ones,

Happy weekend to you! I am writing early as I have to bring this computer in and have everything transferred over to my new one. They may keep my computer for a couple days  but hopefully will get it back soon. So you won’t hear from me during this time and will resume when I can. Pray all goes well!

Devotions from Judy’s heart

There are many people hurting and grieving losses of family and friends they miss, situations that have changed dramatically, and sadness for what once was. What do we do with our griefs that seem to be spilling out in various ways?  We can lament! I remember when Al was teaching on lament from the Psalms and how honest King David was before the Lord. One third of the Psalms he wrote were lament. He didn’t sugar coat how he was feeling but just let it all spill out. He said in Psalm 6:6-7, “I am worn out from my groaning. My eyes flood my bed every night. I soak my couch with tears. My eyes blur from grief. They fall because of my enemies.” That’s telling it like it is. Lori Ann Wood wrote an article in Just Between Us magazine on Learning to Lament. Perhaps we all need to do that, especially during this pandemic. She said that lament is a passionate expression of grief and sorrow, admitting to God our pain and confusion. Why God why?  We don’t like what is happening but underneath we still have faith and choose to trust in the Lord. Lori wrote that if we didn’t believe He existed, why would we even complain to Him? And if we didn’t believe He was all powerful, why would we think He could have changed the circumstances and done something about it? She goes on to say we also believe He loves us or why would we think He was listening as we open our hearts and tell Him our griefs?  We don’t have to suffer in silence but we can honestly tell Him just how we feel rather than keeping a stiff upper lip. It is not a failure of faith but an act of faith for we go directly to Him. Lament makes room for God and invites Him into our deepest pains. Jesus himself, experienced so much pain and sorrow in His short life on earth and can identify with us. He enters our suffering and it’s alright to tell Him all. Often, we find that after we have let out our pain and lamented, praise begins to well up in our hearts.

Challenge for today: Tell the Lord how you honestly feel and then leave everything up to Him.

Dear Ones,

Hope you are having a wonderful day. This morning I got shopping and spent some Kohl’s dollars and also delivered a fruit basket from our church to a widow. This afternoon I also hope to shop a little more with Christopher and Banks dollars.  Fun!

Devotions from Judy’s heart

I am very rich and so are you if you know the Lord…that’s because we have an inheritance that is beyond what we can even imagine. As Paul says in Romans 8:16-17 (God’s Word), “The Spirit Himself testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children. If we are His children, we are also God’s heirs. If we share in Christ’s suffering in order to share His glory, we are heirs together with Him.” Many years ago, I inherited a cabin on lake property which was a gift to me because I was a member of the Seburg family. I didn’t earn it, I didn’t buy it, I simply received it from my parents with much gratitude.  It was the same piece of land that we later built a retreat house, Canaan’s Rest. And then the day came when we gave it to our children and they inherited what we had been given at one time and I hope one day they will pass it on to their children. I remember often kneading bread on the counter at Canaan as I looked out over the trees and lake. I was always struck by the beauty before me and reminded of the gift given me… and this was just an earthly gift. Now even though it is a wonderful gift, there is one that is far greater and can’t even be compared and that is our inheritance of eternal life. We cannot earn it, we can’t buy it, we must simply receive Jesus by faith and the inheritance is ours. He makes it all possible because of His sacrifice for us. But as Paul said in Colossians three, we are to respond by doing everything whole heartedly, knowing we will one day be given our inheritance. Whatever we do in this life is really peanuts compared to the inheritance that is ours. There is no reason to see ourselves as paupers for we were chosen and given eternal glory with the Lord forever. Let us live whole-heartedly and gratefully, knowing how rich we are!

Challenge for today: Express your gratitude to the Lord for the inheritance you have been given as His child. 

Dear Ones,

Hope you are having a good day. Al had his Band of Brothers group this morning and soon we are leaving for Hackensack. Our first stop is to see a friend at Birchview which is so wonderful that  it is now open for visitors. I am going to Share and Care before having my hair cut and then on to meet Joe for his birthday and transfer gifts and birthday cake etc into his car. Ann isn’t feeling good so we have to cancel our plans to go to the lake to celebrate there.

Devotions from Judy’s heart

What is your image of God? We all have different images of Him but none of them are inadequate to describe our great God who is so beyond words and our understanding. We try by using visual words such as rock, shepherd, lover, potter, guide, deliverer but none of them can fully capture His greatness. Our image of Him is often formed when we are very young and how we related to our parents. For some it may seem like God is a policeman who is watching us, or a Santa who gives us what we want, or a distant person who we can’t get close to etc. Many images we have are unhealthy and hopefully we grow to see God more like what we find in the Word. Our image of God is important as it has a lot to do with the direction of our spiritual journey and seems to point us in a certain way. In my own life, I think I felt like God was going to require of me things that were too difficult and I remember being fearful. We gest that it was because my mom expected that I would walk by myself from the cabin to the outhouse at night; and at 3 years old, I could only imagine what animals were lurking by, and especially the possibility of a skunk or bear. But hopefully we outgrow the kind of images that illicit fear or limit God and our view of Him changes. He is mighty and great and powerful and yet love! We are influenced also by the teaching we get in our churches, songs we sing, and even the culture we grew up in. On our wall in the dining area we have Rembrandt’s painting of the Prodigal Son returning and notice that the father’s left hand is masculine and his right hand is feminine to help us realize God is beyond male and female in our understanding too. We need to ask ourselves if our image of God brings up feelings of fear and dread or if it floods us with love and grace. One thing we do know is that God is seeking us and wants to bring us into a close relationship. Jeremiah 29:13-14, (The Message) says, “When you come looking for me, you’ll find me. Yes, when you get serious about finding me and want it more than anything else, I’ll make sure you won’t be disappointed.” May we let go of our false images of the Lord, and see Him as our loving Father pursuing us.

Challenge for today: Spend some time picturing yourself as the prodigal son returning home and being welcomed by your loving Father.

Dear Ones,

Hope you are having a good day. Kurt and Bo stopped to see us on their way home this morning and showed us pictures of Kurt on the ice after a sauna with only a towel on. ( And that also means walking all the way from the sauna down the hill too!)  They got lots done at the Silver Chateau and time to relax. I got cookies baked, went to Aldi’s, and getting things ready to go to the Lake tomorrow to celebrate Joe’s birthday. 

Devotions from Judy’s heart

One of my daily prayers is that I would be more aware of God’s presence throughout my day; that I might see the Lord in all that is happening and experience His grace. Some of you know I love greeting cards; I love getting them but I really love to send them. The Lord also knows that, and just yesterday Al took a call from a friend whose lovely Christian mother died and she is going through all of her things. She invited us and others to help ourselves to some things left that she needs to dispense with. I had only 10 minutes before I had to go to an appointment but His gift was waiting for me under a table. What do you suppose I found? Bags of cards of all kinds to send! I felt as if the Lord was smiling and I just gave Him thanks.  Later I went back with a friend, whose health does not permit her to go shopping any more. And she found a whole new wardrobe of clothes that were just her size and even shoes and slippers. I rejoiced even more as I had remarked to Al in the morning that I felt sad for her as I could no longer take her shopping to the Mall. Isn’t the Lord full of surprises? He wants us to be awake and recognize His hand in our everyday life. Sometimes it is peace in the midst of what normally would be a tense situation and we know it is Him. There are many practices that also help us be mindful of Him since we have a tendency to drift and miss what God is up to in our lives. Some feel fasting helps them to be more awakened, humble and open to the Lord. But that doesn’t just have to be fasting from food; it could be from e-mails or the TV or our phones. Some find it helpful to journal as they see a pattern in their life of how God may be leading them. Others practice hospitality or spiritual formation. There are many spiritual practices that help direct us back to the Lord and to wake us from our routines and become mindful. In I Thess. 5:6 we are told to keep awake.  We are to be alert and awake to what God is saying and wants to do in our lives. Each of our journeys is unique and planned out by the Lord, so we have to see what works best for us at this time in our lives. As we grow in Him, we may need to let go of some practices and go on to something that is new to us. But we will know as we will experience His grace and be drawn closer to Him.

Challenge for today: Ask the Lord to help you be mindful and aware of His presence in your life.