Whisper in the Wind

     One of my biggest time wasters lately has been playing crossword puzzles on my phone. If I cannot go to sleep  I play and play until I'm too tire to hold up my phone or the phone falls on my head. As I am going through the list of about 30 different words looking for them in every direction I find one I was looking for. Then I'll find myself stuck on one and cannot find it worth anything. Of course with time being of the essence (to beat my last time), I have to quickly find these words! So I'm searching backward, forward, sideways, and finally.....right there in front of me all the time is the word I've been looking for! There's that twinge of "how didn't see that?", but then there's the joy of knowing  I did find it.
    How many times has God told me something only for me to keep on looking and looking in other places and it's sitting right in front of me. It's like he told Elijah in 1 Kings 19. Elijah was running and the Spirit of God was leading him. Jezebel wanted Elijah dead, and didn't want it any other way. In verse 11 God says to Elijah "Go, stand on the mountan at attention before God. God will pass by." 12 : and after the earthquake fire, but God wasn't in the fre; and after the fire a gentle and quiet whisper."
    How many times in our lives do we want the BIG, the Easy, the Loud exciting things in life that we overlook the mundane things that might do more for God's glory than that BIG thing? Look at David, he was just a shepherd boy, but God chose him to be KING. A little shepherd boy?! Jesus was to come from the town of Bethlehem in a stable; raised in Nazareth to which someone replied "can anythng good come from Nazareth?"
      Are you feeling down today, like no one cares, like what  you're doing isn't enough? Let me assure you that if you are striving to serve the Lord whether you are the Shepherd or the King you will be rewarded in Heaven. Just remember with great privelege comes great responsibility!
 God, father in Heaven, thank you for choosing me to be your Child even when  I haven't always wanted to serve you you still saw the righteousness of your son's blood covering my heart! I need you father, speak to me, whisper in my ear your sayings and your words of wisdom that I might grow in you!
                                      Love,
                                             Your Girl

Made to Be Shade

     As most of you know that read my blog regularly my children are the inspiration for most of my blogs. They say things and do things on a regular basis that spur my thoughts toward Biblical things to write about. The other day, I was reading a story in my homeschool teacher's book from Alpha Omega. In the story a little boy went to the park with his parents, he played on the slide and the swing, then his mother called him to come sit on the blanket for a picnic with her and the boys father. The little boy ended up taking a nap under a big shade tree. When he woke up he asked the father, "Why did God make trees so big?" To which the father replied, "So that we could use them for their shade." We've been talking about shadows this past week in school, and it reminded me that shade is a shadow. That might seem like a no brainer to most of you, but I want you to really think of the spiritual application of this. In our lives we start out as a seed when we accept Christ as our personal Savior. God convicts us, and we grow, God chastens us, and we grow. All this while our tree seed should be sprouting into a small tree. Trials come, the winter causes hardening of branches, but in comes the Spring and the Tree grows. It grows and grows and grows. One day, you look up and the tree has made a large shadow or shade spot to be used for someone who doesn't know Christ to be able to see him in your life. You are becoming more and more like the "tree" your father made you to be.
         "Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the wicked, Nor standeth in the way of sinners, Nor sitteth in the seat of scoffers:  But his delight is in the law of Jehovah; And on his law doth he meditate day and night.  And he shall be like a tree planted by the streams of water, That bringeth forth its fruit in its season, Whose leaf also doth not wither; And whatsoever he doeth shall prosper." Psalm 1:1-3 God has made us in his image. He desires for us to be like him and be that "shade" tree for those to come to the knowledge of him as their Savior. Listen to this Paraphrase in the Message of  2 Corinthians 3:16-18: "Whenever, though, they turn to face God as Moses did, God removes the veil and there they are - face to face!  They suddenly recognize that God is a living, personal presence, not a piece of chiseled stone. And when God is personally present, a living Spirit, that old, constricting legislation is recognized as obsolete. We're free of it!  All of us! Nothing between us and God, our faces shining with the brightness of his face. And so we are transfigured much like the Messiah, our lives gradually becoming brighter and more beautiful as God enters our lives and we become like him." God desires for us to be more like him and be that shade so that others might rest in the shadow of the Almighty just as we desire to. We were Made to BE shade!

God is so good!
Jamie