A One Way Street

My Mother-n-law and myself are in Michigan, near Bay City. We brought Riley to camp up here so we are hanging out, this week. Last evening we decided to find a unique restaurant for dinner. In the process of looking we pasted a food place that looked fun so we decided to find a spot to turn around and go back. I came to a corner and started to turn right when all of a sudden all these cars start honking at us. We quickly discovered that we were trying to turn the wrong way into a one way street. I hurriedly corrected that and we went on our way. Those people can forgive us, I hope, because we had an out of state tag on our car. Made for a good laugh, that's for sure.

You can bet we learned where not to turn as we head back into Bay City today. 


This morning as I am looking through some scriptures and I come across this passage....


Psalm 19:11-12

11 There’s more: God’s Word warns us of danger
and directs us to hidden treasure.
Otherwise how will we find our way?
Or know when we play the fool?
Clean the slate, God, so we can start the day fresh!


How appropriate these verses are considering our last night's blunder. 

God, if we listen to Him, is like all those honking cars. He wants to show us the correct direction to go in this life. He wants to keep us safe. He wants to keep us from doing foolish things. I do know that when I listen to Him I feel like a weight is lifted and relief sets in because I know that I am not alone in all this world of one way streets. I find that I when I am going in the right direction for me, anxiousness becomes calm, stress becomes peace and the feeling of lostness is gone.

I hope you find a peaceful, safe direction to travel in today.

Blessings

Spills Gone!

Today we had the carpet in the church and the parsonage cleaned.  There were a couple of spots in both locations that I was positive would not come out. But to my surprise they did. The gentleman who was the carpet cleaner didn't even seemed surprised. He knew he would be able to make the evidence of the mistakes, that caused the spots, go away, like they never even happened.

Makes me think of Christ and what He can do for us. If you ask, He can take away our mistakes too. He will make it so we are clean and sin free. He can do it in a heart beat.

1 John 1:9

Common English Bible (CEB)

9 But if we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and cleanse us from everything we’ve done wrong.

Our house, with the carpets clean, feels so fresh. It is such a nice feeling. It actually seems like even the air is cleaner. 

Imagine how good it feels when your soul is clean. Imagine how much better you will feel, how much fresher you will feel. 

Unlike carpet, that will get dirty again and need to be cleaned again, our lives, our souls stay clean. God does not see you as a sinner ever again. 
  

Psalm 103:12

Common English Bible (CEB)

12 As far as east is from west—
    that’s how far God has removed our sin from us.

Like the verse says our sins can't rule us again because, just like a sunrise doesn't cross with a sunset, neither will our human, sinful side, be in control of our actions and thoughts again. 

It feels so peaceful to have this promise. It's like taking a deep breath of the freshest air. Peaceful like a walk by a trickling spring. Peaceful like when you are listening to the waves as you drift off to sleep in a room beside the ocean.

I hope with all my heart that you have received this peace. If not, all you need to do is believe and ask our Savior for this peace and it will be yours.


Blessings!!!

Are we healthy?

Our Riley has been sick for the last three days. I took him to the clinic last evening and he has an ear and a sinus infection. He always gets sick after the first few days of a new school year. His immune system has to get used to the germs of others around him in his classes. Once he does get used to them he usually stays well most of the rest of the school year. Just has to toughen up and get his immunity's strong.

This got me to thinking about a couple of things we as a people need to become stronger against. Things that make us sick and weak in our moral fiber. The list could probably go on forever but here are a few I thought of....

First, I believe, is the lack of preserving our Sabbath. We have so many children's sports teams that require the children to play on Sunday mornings. Also people are just choosing to stay home. Siting that this is the only morning to be together as a family. Sad thing about this choice is, that going to church, as a family, really goes along way at making the family unit stronger than ever. I know that in Mine and Rodney's life there was a time when work in our store took us away from our Sunday worship. We had a restlessness in our beings knowing that this was not putting God first. We had to work this situation out and when we did our relationship with the Heavenly Father came back into line and peace in our family returned...... 



Romans 14:6-9
The Message (MSG)


6-9 What’s important in all this is that if you keep a holy day, keep it for God’s sake; if you eat meat, eat it to the glory of God and thank God for prime rib; if you’re a vegetarian, eat vegetables to the glory of God and thank God for broccoli. None of us are permitted to insist on our own way in these matters. It’s God we are answerable to—all the way from life to death and everything in between—not each other. That’s why Jesus lived and died and then lived again: so that he could be our Master across the entire range of life and death, and free us from the petty tyrannies of each other.

Another thing I think that keeps us weaker is our lack of respect for human life. Abortion is up and the government and our insurance companies have started picking and choosing who gets treatment when we are ill. Which usually makes it harder for our senior adults and our special needs people to get the services they need. 

Even our children seem to not understand the importance of protecting life. There is a theory that this comes from the violence in their video games and the lack of respect for life in their favorite TV shows. I think the saying "garbage in, garbage out"  is pretty true! The scriptures are quite clear on how we should treat one another.....

Galatians 5:13-14

The Message (MSG)

13-14 It is absolutely clear that God has called you to a free life. Just make sure that you don’t use this freedom as an excuse to do whatever you want to do and destroy your freedom. Rather, use your freedom to serve one another in love; that’s how freedom grows. For everything we know about God’s Word is summed up in a single sentence: Love others as you love yourself. That’s an act of true freedom.

God loves us so much and desires for us to have a healthy life in a world that remembers who our creator is. If we keep our priorities in the order that keeps God first and for most in our lives we will stay strong in our immunity's to the sicknesses of our world. Our morals will show who we truly follow. We will love others around us and feel the importance of life. And a peaceful healthiness that you may never have known before will settle in.   

If we all would remember and follow this scripture our land would be stronger and healthier than ever before.... 

Proverbs 14:34
The Message (MSG)


34 God-devotion makes a country strong;
God-avoidance leaves people weak.

Here's to strong immunity's in each and every one of us!

Blessings!