Welcome to the weekend!
It's been a really fun week as we celebrated my oldest daughter's 9th birthday! We took her friends to a corn maze, and had a wiener roast for supper, enjoying all the vibrance and joy that 9 year old girls have.
We have a last-minute shed building project going on, so my backyard is a construction zone these days. It's messy. Really messy. I am learning that I don't really love projects, especially when they take a long-time and there's just a chaotic, construction mess around me.
So I realized that I am a lot like that in life. I don't like being a construction zone, I just want life to be figured out, neat and tidy, with clear goals and purpose. Yet, who I am in Christ is a work in progress. I am solidly located on His backyard of saving grace, but there are work projects to be done, as the Spirit seeks to pull out the weeds of sin and the entanglements of the world.
It's sitting in the messy chaos, accepting His shaping and molding me, into the woman He is creating me to be.
How do you cope with work projects? Where is God working on your heart lately?
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(This week on the blog: The Diagnosis (Part 10) - A memoir of our daughter's journey through immune deficiency)
Here are a few articles I found this week. My hope is that they encourage and inspire you to a life that abides in the Vine.
You were created to be you; the person God is creating you to be, not anyone else. "Words meant to inspire often exhaust. Can I borrow a moment of your time to give you (and me) permission to lead a quiet, ordinary life?"
An article by Keri Folmar with encouragement to treasure the Word of God.
"People are still meeting Jesus. If the gates of hell cannot stand against the kingdom expanding, then neither can isolation, pandemic, or code red."
"How do you think the families in your church are doing at loving single people?" It's an important question for our churches, how do we relate and include those in our midst.
"I wonder if, in the midst of the uncomfortable differences so palpable these days, instead of a megaphone to voice our own ideas, we should grab the proverbial stethoscope to listen in on the inner lives of others, to meet them halfway in the uncomfortable middle."
Check out these beautiful [FREE] phone screens from Natalie Hilton that will encourage your thought life!!
"We are wired in a unique way to love others, and this uniqueness is what shapes each of our hospitality personalities."
"The restless and dissatisfied feelings inside of us won’t be satiated once our church doors reopen, once the schools take our children back, once we are healed and healthy, once we have a steady paycheck, once, once, once…. God doesn’t wait until conditions are perfect to draw near to us. God’s presence is always with us. We need only to turn toward him."
Here is an author interview with Caroline Saunders, who writes "Better Than Life", a new resource to help teenagers learn and study the Word of God.
**Have a great weekend!!
