Inspirations

My children and I have some of our best conversations in the car.  Maybe it is because we are not as distracted by other things, so we actually focus on talking with the other person.  Sometimes it is just a word or two and they really get me thinking.  I had a conversation like this with our middle daughter the other day.  As I was driving, I turned to her and said, “My goal is to survive life”.  My daughter looked at me laughed and said, “Mom no one survives life”.  We both laughed, but as I thought about that very short conversation realized how right she was.  I thought about how often I let the cares of this world invade and steal my peace and joy.  God reminded me through my child that there is nothing in the world worth worrying about.  In fact, I had been doing that very thing right then.    Unless Christ returns before we die, none of us will leave this world alive.  That means I do not have to worry about whethe...

I love amusement parks!  Every summer I take one day and go to a local amusement park.  We always have a memorable time.  When I was young, I absolutely loved the thrill rides.  As I got older, I didn't ride them as much as I did.  Why?  Well the main reason was fear. I may get hurt, or “gasp” die.   Over the past few years, God has been showing me that my fear is ridiculous.  So I faced my fears and began to ride the thrill rides again.  There has been one ride called the exscream that I've held out on riding. I couldn't make myself ride it.  It was too “scary”; I still had too much fear.  This past summer, when I went to the amusement park, I decided to bite the fear monster.  As I watched the ride, I could see that it was pretty simple; it lifts you in the air and lets you fall, but it always slows you down before you get to the ground.  So I decided that it was pretty safe, after all I knew how it ended.  A...

Some time ago, we had to replace the roof on our house.  It started out as a minor leak when the rain was heavy.  Gradually, it would leak every time it rained.  By the time we got it fixed, we had to replace not just shingles, but the boards underneath, and the ceiling too.  What a disaster!  It would have been relatively easy to fix when it was a small leak; but because of finances, we had none, and the massiveness of the task we let it go; because, for a while, we could put it out of our mind until the next rain storm.  Then it would rain, and we would say, “We need to do something about that roof”.   Sometimes we do the same thing in our life also.  We give the devil a foothold because we fail to take care of small things.  Rather than correct the wrong attitude, or thoughts.  We let them go because it’s a little insignificant thing and we can “fix it later”, and it easier to let it go than it is to deal with the problem....