Corona Devotionals

Do we feel like life is dragging ? Or maybe more specifically...it's as if we are lagging ? We want to be further along than we are today, and yet. Here we are. Not as far along as we wanted to be. Not as developed/accomplished/ finished as we wanted to be. Slow. Slow. Slow. Slow. The time, the healing, the progress, the maturity, the fruition is not here yet. We are still in the journey. The slow....sometimes arduous...sometimes mundane journey. Every day brings...another day, and we are moving in the right direction but so slowly, Lord! We never thought it would take this long. ~~~ This morning our son noticed a trail in our backyard grass. Can you see it too? A second glance outside showed us who had trudged that path... s-l-o-w-l-y. A painted turtle had made-his-way to our back patio and as we enjoyed watching him for a few minutes, I realized that he was not sad, frustrated, or disappointed with how long it had taken him to move through our big back yard....

I was at an on-campus university event with our son yesterday, and after the session, audience Q&A and tour, we had enjoyed a fruitful and enlightening visit, and we began to make the walk to our car. But in a hallway, I met my "twin" in the form of a current university student.  We weren't twins by appearance, as I am 5'8" and she said she was 4'5".  I am light-skinned, and she was dark.  I was walking and she was in a wheelchair and missing one leg.  But besides those things, as she spoke, I found that  we were exactly the same! She was chipper, and kind, and full of life.  I liked her from the start.   And as she warmly engaged us, we found out that t his young lady had just finished her first year of college, and at (about) age 20, she then went on to give a lmost every piece of college advice that I give to my children, except  she said it in a young, fun, hip, engaging way.   Just a few of her words-of-wisdom to our son i...

Seek the Lord , all who are humble,  and follow his commands.   Seek to do what is right  and to live humbly.   ~Zephaniah 2:3 ~~~ Let's keep it simple today.   God uses the Bible to speak to us , and to speak into  us.  Today He is using Zephaniah  to speak to us, and Z's words explaining the Lord's instruction are not difficult.  In fact, Zephaniah's words today are so simple that they are beautiful...and easy...and calming...and possible. Seeking our Savior can be steeped in simplicity.   Let it be so today, Lord.  Amen. Are we ready?  Ready to be simple in our spirituality, and humble in our approach of our Savior? Take a deep breath.  Exhale it slowly and let's be humble as we stumble toward the Lord today.   Seek the Lord , all who are humble, and follow his commands.   Seek to do what is right and to live humbly.   ~Zephaniah 2:3 ~~~  Seek the Lord , all who are...

My husband and I were pretty conservative parents when it came to introducing "scary" stuff to our children. Even though I grew up watching "Scooby Doo" cartoons, we withheld (even) those cartoons from our children when they were small--too many ghosts, goblins, and spooky things that we just weren't ready to fill their minds with when they were young. And the same was true for Halloween. Our oldest is almost twenty years old, but he can still recall his elementary years and (obediently) closing his eyes as we would drive by the houses decked-out with skeletons and gravesites in their front yards. The "scary" of life is always available...and will be learned, but (my husband and I) were never in a hurry to introduce it. Which brings me to God's Word today. I would prefer to skip-the-chapter of Revelation 9 , or at the very least close-our-eyes, and drive right by it. But every word of God is pure;  He is a shield to those who put their t...

It's an uphill battle, for sure: this life lived for the Lord.   Some days (most days?) we can feel alone in our pursuit of God's holiness.  Everyone around us is in pursuit of themselves , it seems, and if this is a war that we are waging with the world, many days it feels as if we are losing. Self-focus/Self-pleasure/Self-truth: these breed and bring  violence  (when people do not get their  way).  Evil deeds  rise and run rampant.  People without God and without His purposes are miserable and they produce misery  for others.   Do we feel like we are an army of one (for the Lord) today?   Habakkuk did too. Haba- who ?   Habakkuk .  He was a prophet of the Lord, and he begins his book of the Bible lamenting the brokenness of the world, but not just  that people are broken, but that these (Godless) people are mean, evil, destructive, argumentative, and wicked  to us. Ever feel the same?--As if...