Have you ever tried to comb your hair with a hammer? Silly, right? The hammer was created for a specific purpose, and when you use it for anything else, you are abusing it. (Not to mention what you might do to your HEAD!) If you abuse something, you use it improperly.

Some people try to use things to make them happy. Some people expect their spouses to make them happy and fulfill all their needs. Some people try to live their lives through their children. I think all of these things indicate abusive behavior, because these things were not intended to be used this way.. If we are not using things (or people --- not that we should technically "use" people) in the right way, we will not have a good result. Whether it is people, or material goods, there is a purpose for each which should not be ignored.

So, what is YOUR purpose? Why are you here? Are you an accident? Personally, I don't believe any one is an accident. You life is precious. It should be precious to you, but it most certainly is precious to God. He loves you, and more than anything, He wants you to realize the purpose for which you were created.

(Rom 11:36 NLT)  For everything comes from Him and exists by His power and is intended for His glory. All glory to Him forever! Amen.

I know a lot of people who have rejected their Creator. They deny the existence of God. Or, maybe they believe there is a God, but they pretty much ignore Him, other than a token visit on Christmas or Easter. Some people never bother with God, until they have a crisis, and then they totally expect God to bother with them! And He does. Because He loves us so.

But I digress...... I was asking you what your purpose is, remember? That scripture from Romans says we are created to glorify God. Yep. We are intended for His glory. That is our purpose. Pretty amazing, isn't it?

When my youngest daughter was about seven years old, she came to me and said, "Mommy, God gave me a song. Do you want to hear it?" I said sure, because that is what a mommy says. I was expecting some cute, little ditty, but she closed her eyes, took a breath and sang ---

I was made for no other purpose but to glorify the Lord.
I was made so He could be worshiped and adored......

I don't remember the rest, but those first two lines knocked my socks off! And you know what? She has always lived her life like she believes what she sang that day. I do believe she DOES give Him glory. She has an amazing voice, and has been a worship leader in quite a few places. She loves God, her husband, her sweet little girls, her family and friends. She lives her purpose, and God is glorified.

(Isa.42:12 NLT)  Let the whole world glorify the LORD; let it sing His praise.

When you know your purpose, life just makes more sense. When you fight against your true purpose, you abuse yourself --- your gifts, abilities --- everything. Making choices is a lot easier when I ask myself, "Will this decision glorify God? If the answer is no, then I have a clear direction. I enjoy life. I love whose I am! I love what I do! You can glorify God anywhere. Love people. Be gentle. Put others first. Lift up the fallen and hurting. Give. Forgive. Be the person you want your children to be. Read His book, and do your best to follow what it says. Be free in expressing your love and gratitude to Him. Show Him reverence.

(Isa.26:8 NLT)  LORD, we show our trust in You by obeying Your laws; our heart's desire is to glorify Your name.

Live your purpose!

One of my favorite songs ever is Great is Thy Faithfulness. God has always been faithful to me! I do wonder why it is we worry, when we have such an amazing and powerful God!

Summer and winter, and springtime and harvest,
Sun, moon and stars in their courses above,
Join with all nature in manifold witness
To Thy great faithfulness, mercy and love.

I love the changing seasons. I think it is hard NOT to believe in God when you see this amazing creation. I am glad I believe in God, because I have Someone to thank for making this beautiful world! I saw a poster on FB the other day that said something like, WHY WISH ON A STAR WHEN YOU CAN TALK TO THE ONE WHO MADE THEM? Why indeed!

You can see the beached boats with the frozen lake behind them.

In the summer months, you can rent a boat and take it out on the lake.

I found some early daffodils on a grave. You know how I like to walk around graveyards!

Although it is still cold, this little kitty found some rocks warmed by the sun.

There are buds on the rhododendrons. That must be a good sign, right?

My eye is so hungry for COLOR! I think I may go to a greenhouse where I can enjoy some flowers. But, this picture is still lovely for all its starkness.

One thing you can always find plenty of in Denmark is moss. I love the way it holds the drops of water.

This pretty decoration in front of an inn caught my eye.

Of course, we do have color inside! Here is some of the rag rug I made for my Danish granddaughter's bedroom. It was much larger when it was finished, and also had several rows of mint green. It was finished with pink. (Her favorite color!)

I have several other rugs going, too. It all depends on what materials I am able to find cheap at second hand shops, and in what colors. I cut the fabric into strips and crochet it with a GIANT crochet hook. The rugs are colorful, thick and fun to make!

My husband supports me in my rug making, because he says, "It keeps me out of trouble."

So, what have YOU been doing to stay out of trouble? 

Who is Jesus to you? Is He an acquaintance that you visit occasionally? Is He someone you only talk to when there is a crisis in your life? Is He someone you remember hearing about in Sunday School when you were a child? Is He a curse or an "old fashioned belief?" Or, is He  your Savior, and a dear friend with whom you enjoy spending time? Someday, all of us are going to have to answer that question. The Bible says after we die, we will stand before God to be judged. He will want to know. Who is Jesus to you?

I have known Jesus since I was a child. Through the years I have valued Him more and more. I like spending time with Him. I appreciate His wisdom. I depend on His comfort. I am most grateful that He redeemed my life by paying for it with His own blood. Pleasing Him is a priority. When you love someone, you want to please them! His will is more important than my own. When I open my eyes in the morning, He is there. When I go about my day, He goes with me. I often ask Him what He thinks about this or that. I always ask Him to guide and protect my family, church and friends. There is nothing I can't talk to Him about. I know He loves me unconditionally, and He will not condemn me. What a friend! What a Savior!

Some years ago, I published a CD of songs I had written. The title of the CD is DO YOU KNOW HIM? It is my strong desire that all should know Him. He has so much to give! If you don't know Him, I would love to introduce you! He has enriched my life in too many ways to count! He has helped me grow and change to become a better person. Wouldn't you like a friend like that?

When I was a little girl, we used to sing this old hymn in our church. I love the words. I hope you do what the song says.

Are you weary, are you heavy hearted?
Tell it to Jesus, tell it to Jesus.
Are you grieving over joys departed?
Tell it to Jesus alone.

Tell it to Jesus, tell it to Jesus,
He is a Friend that’s well known.
You’ve no other such a friend or brother,
Tell it to Jesus alone.

Do the tears flow down your cheeks unbidden?
Tell it to Jesus, tell it to Jesus.
Have you sins that to men’s eyes are hidden?
Tell it to Jesus alone.

Do you fear the gathering clouds of sorrow?
Tell it to Jesus, tell it to Jesus.
Are you anxious what shall be tomorrow?
Tell it to Jesus alone.

Are you troubled at the thought of dying?
Tell it to Jesus, tell it to Jesus.
For Christ’s coming kingdom are you sighing?
Tell it to Jesus alone.

Let's do this. If you read this post, would you fill in the blank to answer this question?

Jesus is _________.  

Do you believe there is power in the name of Jesus to break every chain?  Are there things you have struggled with so long you have finally just given up and accepted them as a part of who you are? Maybe they are things which have been a part of your family history for so many generations that you are tempted to see them as "normal."

As I work with people, it is interesting to see how easy it is for us to make excuses for behavior we think we can't change or, that we are not willing to change. We say things like - "Oh, everyone in my family has a bad temper." or "I know I shouldn't worry so much, but it is just my nature."

These things hold us back from being who God wants us to be. They are weights that pull us down. Sadly, they are often transferred to our children. I saw a poster that said, "Be the person you want your children to be." Do we want our kids to be fearful? Do we want them to struggle with anger all their lives? Are we teaching them to be liars or people pleasers or quitters? Are we training them to grow up with bad habits because they see us doing things we should not do?

At one time there were many, MANY things controlling my life which were not good. Deep inside, I hated myself, but I felt powerless to do anything about these things.  So, instead of changing, I got really good at pretending, hiding, and making excuses. I was not happy. I had no peace.

(Act 3:16 NIV)  By faith in the name of Jesus, this man whom you see and know was made strong. It is Jesus' name and the faith that comes through Him that has completely healed him, as you can all see.

My life is so different now because God set me FREE! No, He didn't make me perfect. There are still plenty of things I struggle with. I still face temptations and have to constantly ask for His wisdom and strength to make the right choice, but that heaviness in my heart is gone. The fear does not control me anymore. I can LIKE myself. My life is no longer defined by my failures.

If you have a minute. This is one of my fave groups, and a really great song.     http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=upLBLppWTj0     (Sorry I couldn't imbed the file. You will have to cut and paste it if you want to hear it.)

Maybe you have already tried counseling or medication. Maybe you have tried a lot of things, and found no help or relief.  There is nothing else like Jesus! If demons have to bow before Him, your problem does, too! Don't give up. Where there is faith in Jesus, there is hope.

 (Phil. 2:9-11 NLT)  Therefore, God elevated Him to the place of highest honor and gave Him the name above all other names, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

There is power in the name of Jesus to break every chain.

The other day I was praying and thinking about all the Christians I know who always seem to have many struggles. They seem to have little victory in their lives. It's a sad thing. I mean, when you think about it, we have it ALL! God's forgiveness, love and acceptance, promise of  help when we ask, strength, comfort, wisdom, joy, peace, eternal security..... yep. We have every reason to be the most joyful, victorious people around. But --- we aren't. Why is that?

So, that's what I ask God. He shows me lots of things and teaches me so much! He said many believers are going to the wrong places for their inspiration and motivation. Hmmm.....  that was sure something to think about. I'll bet you know people who can quote Oprah or Dr. Phil, but don't know much of the Bible, right? They listen to self help tapes, get advice from all over, and read many motivational books, yet they still struggle.

God longs for the attention of His people. He wants to show us things; tell us things. He wants to help us, heal us and fill us with His peace. He wants to come first. He says, "Call to me and I will answer you and tell you great and unsearchable things you do not know." (Jer. 33:3 NIV) 

How often do we call to Him? Many only call out to God when they are desperate -- when they have tried everything else. God longs to be our FIRST resource, not our last. Remember that old hymn, What a Friend We Have in Jesus?  It's a good one.

What a Friend we have in Jesus all our sins and griefs to bear!
What a privilege to carry everything to God in prayer!
O what peace we often forfeit, O what needless pain we bear,
All because we do not carry everything to God in prayer.

Have we trials and temptations? Is there trouble anywhere?
We should never be discouraged, take it to the Lord in prayer.
Can we find a friend so faithful who will all our sorrows share?
Jesus knows our every weakness. Take it to the Lord in prayer.

Have you been looking in the wrong places for inspiration and motivation? It can happen so easily. There are so many thing out there vying for our attention. Not all of them are bad -- but just are not the BEST! He is the best! No one could love us more. Call to Him. He is waiting.

When you hear the word "lavish," what do you think of? I think of something that is just unbelievably over the top special. Excessive amounts of something. The verb is defined as - "to bestow something in generous or extravagant quantities upon."

(1 John 3:1 NIV) See what great love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are! ....

To me, it is the most incredible thing that God loves me. For so much of my life I did not see anything in myself that I felt was worthy of that kind of love. But it is still true. He loves me like crazy! He healed my heart so I could accept that. I don't understand it, but I know it's true.

Every day I feel like God's favorite. Not because every day is perfect with everything going wonderfully, but because I see His blessings all around --- even in the midst of heartache, suffering and confusion. And because I have His promises to give me hope.

Because He has been so lavish with His love for me, I want to do the best I can to give back as lavishly as I can. I know God wants His people to live lavishly; generously -- like we aren't worried about life. I really believe that it is God's love that will change the world. It's not gun control, or lower taxes, or being able to have everything you desire. It is not perfect weather, or perfect storms or perfect hair!  God's love, poured out from the willing hearts of His people is what is needed. Because that love changes people. That love goes deep and is strong.

(Matthew 10:8b  NIV)  Freely you have received; freely give.

When you trust in God's love and care for you, you can live generously. You know WHO is your source. You know as you give, it shall be given to you. There is no need to worry about tomorrow. God will not let you fall.

So, live lavishly today, my friends.

This is one of those days when I am missing my babies a lot. I have two granddaughters in N. Ireland, and two grandsons in the U.S. I love hearing about the things they say and do. Here are three of the grandkids. Lucas is holding his special Bible on his lap. I love that he loves this book. It has Bible stories in it. He takes it to church just like mommy and daddy take their Bibles.

Children look at the world with such innocent eyes. They can teach us a lot. We teach them, and then they teach US!

Once when my youngest was about four, she came outside to see me VERY upset because that nasty little boy down the street had pulled up all my tulips by the roots! Oh! I was so mad, and I was not quiet about it! I was commenting on how his parents did not make teach him to behave, and I may have sad a few other mean things about what I would do if I got my hands on that kid. Abby was watching with big eyes, and listening to my tirade. Then she tugged at my hand, looked into my eyes and said, "Mommy. Jesus wants us to LOVE him."

Oh boy. She was right, of course. I had to apologize to her, and to God....  Together we prayed that Jesus would help me love that little boy.

Here is Sianna with the her little sister, Aliza. Sianna is 2 and Aliza is 4 months. Sure wish I could give them a big hug! I talked to their mommy this morning on the phone. Sianna wanted to play Hide and Seek. She is at that age where she really doesn't get it yet. She doesn't really hide, and she keeps going to the same place to.... not hide! Kind of silly!  It's silly when we try to hide from God, too. He knows where we are every minute. Does that make you glad, or uncomfortable?

It's hard to be a "Long distance Grandma," but I do what I can. I have a couple of little packages here ready to mail to the oldest two. Nothing special, but just some little things that let them know Grandma is thinking about them. Sianna loves Peppa Pig cartoons, and I found some coloring pictures on line, and copied them for her. Lucas loves cars and dinosaurs, and on a trip to the second hand shops, I scored some little ones that are easy to mail.

Well, it's Friday. I hope you are all going to have a great weekend. I have a lesson to study for Sunday, and the usual household stuff that needs doing.

Remember today that God loves you too much to leave you the way you are!

This morning I watched a new video/song by J.J. Heller called "Who You Are." http://nrt.cc/JJHellerPremiere
It made quite an impression. So often we do not understand what is happening in our world. We ask God WHY? And, usually we do not get an answer, or at least not the answer we want to hear! So much of life is just ...... life. Things happen. We lose friends, parents, children, jobs. We question. We struggle. We cry. And, some of us even blame God.

Blaming God never helps, though. The point in the song is that we may not know WHY things happen, but we can still be comforted in that we know WHO God is. He is Comforter. Counselor. He is Prince of Peace. He is Almighty God and Everlasting Father. We want Him to take the pain away. We want everything to be perfect. But, life is not perfect. He wanted our lives to be perfect, too, but mankind messed that up. So, now He promises to come to us in our pain and hold us. He promises strength and grace. He wants us find love and joy for the journey in Him. It would be so much better in the hard times if we would learn run TO Him instead of AWAY from Him.

I used to question why I had to live in a body that was always in pain. I would read testimonies of people who were healed and I would long for that to happen to me. God DOES heal people I know He does. It became the focus of my life for some years. The problem was, it robbed me of joy, because I was always focusing on my hurt, my imperfections and my unhappiness. I wasn't enjoying my relationship with God, I was determined to MAKE Him do what I wanted Him to do. I thought if I quoted enough scripture, went to enough healing services, read enough books, and prayed enough prayers, that God would HAVE to heal me. I was convinced that if I could just find the right formula, I could get what I wanted from God. Yeah... it doesn't work like that. 

Sometimes, the most spiritual thing we can do is accept where we are --- to stop thrashing around trying to force things to change. To just BE who we are; to stop focusing on what we DON'T have, and be grateful for what we DO have. To accept God's grace. Grace. Such an amazing, powerful gift! 

I remember one night I went for a walk and looked up at the sky. The stars were glorious! I asked God, "WHY won't you heal me? I know You could, if You wanted to." I felt God speak to my heart, "I will heal you, child.  I AM healing you. It's just that I see other things more important in your life then your body that need healing. You will have eternity with me to enjoy a perfect, pain-free existence. But for now, just lean on Me. Let Me work through your life. Let My strength be made perfect in your weakness." I felt such peace! And then I just --- gave it up. I decided to stop fighting and trust. I decided to accept myself and allow God to work in my life however He wanted. I decided to choose joy. Every day. Even when it hurt. Even when I didn't understand. Because I know WHO HE IS, and everything I need is in Him.

Whatever you are struggling with, whatever you are going through, whatever you have to face today. God is enough.

Today I was reading in II Samuel of a time when there was a famine in Israel. David was king then, and when he inquired of the Lord why this was happening, God said it was because Saul had wrongly murdered many of the Gibeonites, even though Israel had a treaty with them. So, David ask the Gibeonite leaders what could be done to make this right.

(2Sam. 21:5-6)  Then they replied, "It was Saul who planned to destroy us, to keep us from having any place at all in the territory of Israel. So let seven of Saul's sons be handed over to us, and we will execute them before the LORD at Gibeon, on the mountain of the LORD." "All right," the king said, "I will do it."

Seven of Saul's sons were slaughtered and left on the mountain. This is hard for me to understand, but times were a lot different then. Two of the men killed were sons of  a woman named Rizpah. She went where the bodies had been left and stayed there with them through the entire time of harvest. She scared away wild animals and birds that came to tear up the bodies. This woman could not prevent her sons' deaths, but she was not going to let their bodies be desecrated. In my mind's eye, I see her sitting there, day after day mourning her sons, and scaring off scavengers. When you love something, you want to protect it.

Remember in Luke 8 when Jesus told the parable about the seed? The birds of the air stole the seed which was scattered on the footpath.

(Luke 8:11 -12)  "This is the meaning of the parable: The seed is God's word. The seeds that fell on the footpath represent those who hear the message, only to have the devil come and take it away from their hearts and prevent them from believing and being saved.

These verses made me think of all the people who have heard the word of God, but have not seen how precious it is. They did not bother to "fight off the birds" for it. I have seen the enemy steal truth from so many!  It makes me angry to see God's word trampled on and little regarded.

I want to treasure God's word. I want to fight for it and protect it. It is so easy to take for granted the fact that we have the freedom to own and read the Bible. Some do not have this freedom. I wonder if Rizpah took her sons for granted. Did she perhaps not realize their true value until they were lost to her? I have some friends who smuggled Bibles into countries where it was illegal to have one. They tell of the joy on people's faces when they were able to place a Bible in their hands. Some even kissed it! They saw the true worth of God's word, and they valued it highly.

(Jer 15:16 NLT)  When I discovered Your words, I devoured them. They are my joy and my heart's delight, for I bear Your name, O LORD God of Heaven's Armies.

May God's word be your joy and heart's delight!

When I press in close to God,
I feel small
His vastness overwhelms
But in a good way
Because I feel strong arms holding me
And I am not afraid.

When I press in close to God,
I feel need
To change,  to grow, to know
More of Him, much more
Because His love is amazing
And He is everything

When I press in close to God
My sins show
But I see them covered,
Buried deep beneath
Forgiveness so strong, so pure
And I am encouraged

When I press in close to God
I'm lifted
To a place of sweet peace
I know I'm cherished
My heart swells with quiet wonder
That He could love me so.
                                                       ---mae jones jan. 1213