Dear Ones,
Happy weekend!! Hope you have time for R&R! Al has an appointment this morning and hopefully he will be home in time for me to get to mine right afterwards. What beautiful fall weather we are having and the walk on the Paul Bunyan trail will just continue to get more colorful.
Devotions from Judy’s heart
If we have been estranged from a family member or friend, or even the Lord, how good it is to be reconciled and share our hearts again. When I read about the children of Israel, I see that time and time again, they wandered far from the Lord and got into worshipping idols etc. and suffered the consequences. And then the Lord would send them a prophet to plead with them and they often would return to the Lord and experience his love and favor again. I just finished the book of Hosea and Hosea was a living parable of God’s love that he enacted in his life. In fact, the Lord told him to marry a prostitute and have children with her. Just as he went after his wandering wife who kept returning to prostitution, the Lord comes after us to bring us back to Him again and again.

 In the last chapter of the book of Hosea, he tells Israel to prepare their confession and pray to God and return to Him. They have wandered off again just as his wife had but he received her back. Israel makes confession and the Lord responds, starting in Hosea 14:4 by saying, “I will heal their waywardness. I will love them lavishly. My anger is played out. I will make a fresh start with Israel. He’ll burst into bloom like a crocus in the spring…from now on I am the One who answers and satisfies him. I am like a luxuriant fruit tree. Everything you need is to be found in me.” The Lord never gives up on us and shows us His unconditional love, just like Hosea did to Gomer, his wife. He also gives us a fresh start over and over again and gives us everything that we need out of His abundance.

Hosea concludes with saying, “If you want to live well, make sure you understand all of this. If you know what’s good for you, you’ll learn this inside and out. God’s paths get you where you want to go. Right-living people walk them easily’ wrong-living people are always tripping and stumbling.”  Let us not turn our backs on the Lord but respond to his voice that keeps calling us back to Him with a fresh start.

Challenge for today: Thank the Lord for the times He has brought you back and shown you His love and ask Him to help you not to wander but stay close to Him.
Blessings on your weekend and prayers and love, Judy