By the time you read this, school will either be a week away or will have just opened.
Families will be busy preparing physically for getting supplies, uniforms, bus schedules and maybe even transition to a new school or promoted.
There will be the anxieties, tears and emotions that always come with the first day of school as surely as the sun rises and sets. There will be wailing in the parking lot and hallways both. This is just the parents. Sometimes the kids even get upset!
What simple Christian discipline can help? What investment of 10 minutes a day as a family can help improve grades…focus… purpose? What can help with clear thinking…promised success…access to wisdom and not just knowledge?
Ready? Scripture memory.
What? Pick a verse per week or one every two weeks and begin to learn it by memory on Sunday and share it daily with one another. It will unite hearts, create perspective and begin to discipline the mind to retain and organize information for easier recall.
How to begin? Find a few key verses you like and write them on cards for each family member. Write in on sticky notes and post around the house. Print it big and put it at the kitchen table. Read over it at night at meal time.
Or, if you have an Iphone, download the free ap called Bible Memory Verses by Woody Hays. Or get the printed Fighter Verses system for $13 from Desiring God.
Why go to all this trouble? God’s promised blessings for memorizing His Word.
You will have good success (Joshua 1:8)
You will have prosperity (Psalm 1:2)
You will excel in wisdom and understanding (Psalm 119:97, 100)
You will have victory over sin (Psalm 119:9-11)
You will have victory over enemies (Psalm 119:23)
You will have victory over temptation (Matthew 4:4, 7, 10)
I challenge you to try this for a month and prove God’s Word faithful.
Sunday, July 24, 2011
Saturday, July 9, 2011
You gotta be Kidding!
An old hymn tells us to “count our blessings, name them one by one.” Want to really grow? Count your buffetings, name them one by one.
Chew on this…God will treat us as gently as we allow or firmly as we demand. We can cooperate when He brings brokenness and healing or we can struggle with Him and delay the process.
Recently, one of my family members had to go back into the hospital two days after their initial surgery. Doctors had to reopen and cleanse an incision. It was not healing properly and was a nest of infection. Now, the incision is being treated with washing with water and medication and redressing every other day by a home health nurse. There is also a device that has to be worn 24/7 to draw the infection out. Oh fun!
The treatment times are uncomfortable if not painful. There is almost a desire to feel bad toward the nurse. But, the end result must be kept in mind. A restoration to health and strength.
There are times God uses people and circumstances to open old wounds so we might see our spiritual infection, confess it and receive His cleansing. He has the desire to press into our lives not only humility which draws His grace, but to develop an attitude of gratitude. The Bible says not just to thank Him IN the difficulties, but thank Him FOR the difficulties. Eph 5:20 says, “giving thanks always and for everything to God the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ.”
Take a moment today and go to the Father and pour your heart out and thank Him for the difficulties.
Psalms 62:8 “Trust in him at all times, O people; pour out your heart before him; God is a refuge for us.”
Poor jobs, tough economics, rebellious children. Thank Him that all these and more remind us deeply of our need for Him and Him only. He will delight when we love to long for Him more than the blessing He bestows His presence is His best blessing.
Chew on this…God will treat us as gently as we allow or firmly as we demand. We can cooperate when He brings brokenness and healing or we can struggle with Him and delay the process.
Recently, one of my family members had to go back into the hospital two days after their initial surgery. Doctors had to reopen and cleanse an incision. It was not healing properly and was a nest of infection. Now, the incision is being treated with washing with water and medication and redressing every other day by a home health nurse. There is also a device that has to be worn 24/7 to draw the infection out. Oh fun!
The treatment times are uncomfortable if not painful. There is almost a desire to feel bad toward the nurse. But, the end result must be kept in mind. A restoration to health and strength.
There are times God uses people and circumstances to open old wounds so we might see our spiritual infection, confess it and receive His cleansing. He has the desire to press into our lives not only humility which draws His grace, but to develop an attitude of gratitude. The Bible says not just to thank Him IN the difficulties, but thank Him FOR the difficulties. Eph 5:20 says, “giving thanks always and for everything to God the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ.”
Take a moment today and go to the Father and pour your heart out and thank Him for the difficulties.
Psalms 62:8 “Trust in him at all times, O people; pour out your heart before him; God is a refuge for us.”
Poor jobs, tough economics, rebellious children. Thank Him that all these and more remind us deeply of our need for Him and Him only. He will delight when we love to long for Him more than the blessing He bestows His presence is His best blessing.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)