My meditation and reading this morning was about discipline and God’s judgment and His justice.  I went to bed last night pretty discouraged, asking, “How long, O Lord before You judge the evil in this world?”  I had just caught a glimpse of the newspaper with the headlines of a nineteen year old who had tied up and raped a fourteen year old and the judge let him off with probation.  “Seriously?”  I said to myself.  Then God started my morning with Scriptures about His discipline and His judgment.  I needed this today, and I hope it will bless someone who reads it.

The alternative to not being disciplined is unthinkable.  We are blessed when the Lord disciplines us because He is showing His love for us.  We must choose to live a disciplined life after God has shown us the right way.  We are saved, we are being saved and one day we will be saved.  It is a process and a road of discipline of ourselves and our wicked heart that wants to sin.  But we choose daily not to do so…not to hurt others with our own wickedness.  However, there are others in this world who seem to be committing violent acts of wickedness that are unimaginable and yet they seeem to get away with it.  How does this happen?  I lay part of the blame on the fact that we have a corrupt justice system.  Many are in the system just for what they can get out of it.  The Bible calls them corrrupt judges.  And so they are.  Our justice system is broken.  But God’s isn’t.  Here is what He says about His Justice and judgment.

If I am disgusted with the things I see in the news, how much more must our Creator be hurting over the evil that is in man’s heart?  But God has a solution.  One day, He will judge the whole earth.  We will stand before the Lord.  I want to stand before Him justified.  I had a pastor once tell me that means “Just as if I had never sinned.”  Jesus died for me and His blood justifies me.  But I know that I cannot continue to sin because God is a God of justice, not only mercy.  He cannot look on sin, so He judges it.  The ones who are wicked and seem to have “beaten the system” here on earth will one day stand before the King of Kings and then there will be justice.  Don’t get me wrong..I am not an advocate that God send all of these people to hell.  I deserve hell as much as they do; what I am saying is that there is hope for these sinners just as there is hope for all of us.  We have the same hope of salvation and being right before the Lord.  But we have to repent and turn from wickedness, not continue in it. I remember long ago at dinner one night, our oldest son had had a really tough day at school.  There was a particular boy in his class who bulllied him daily.  As a family, we prayed at the table each night and that night it was Scott’s turn.  I still remember his prayer:  “Lord, heap burning coals of fire on his head.”  What?!? Where did that come from?  So, of course we had to talk to him about the Scripture and its context:  Romans 12:20 says : “If your enemy is hungry, feed him; if he is thirsty, give him something to drink.  In doing this, you will heap burning coals on his head.” (NIV) You see, Scott had been kind to this bully, so he expected God to exact judgment on him.  Isn’t that truly what we all want when we see injustice in this world?  But God wants men to repent, to come to Him so that when judgment comes, the justice that is meted is salvation.  I am glad that I am not the judge…I am blessed that I am not the judge, actually.  God who does all things right and in good time will one day judge all the wicked, and I don’t have to be concerned that people are getting away with being evil.  One day….

I want to be one pursuing a virtuous heart and helping others to see the road to discipline, the road to eternal life.  The “how long” is up to God and I trust Him.  I hope that you do, too.

All photos are compliments of Gracie Marchiani. Check out her site at gmarchiani.wordpress.com

The Scriptures were added with the new BIBLE LENS APP. I am loving using it and I thought Gracie’s wonderful photos deserved to be captioned with God’s Word. Let me and Gracie know what you think. In the meantime, go forth in His light and be blessed! ❤️

Every day is a good day to acknowledge and praise the Lord!  That is what God reminded me of this morning.  He is leading me daily on the path He wants me to choose, so I choose to be content on this path and thank him for a new day.

It is a hard day to rejoice, but I am depending on God to get my daughter and her sweet children through it.  She has five living children and one who went to Heaven on this date three years ago.  Little Tessa Serenity is remembered and loved by her mama, her daddy and all of her siblings.  I have ten grandchildren, and one of them is with the angels in Heaven.  Do you grieve with hope as I do?  I know that one day I will get to hold this little one and give her all the love that I missed giving her on earth.  If you need this hope, then turn to the Lord who gives life, love and joy to all who will call on His Name and turn to Him as their Savior.  I will live with Him forever, and I hope that is your choice, too.  I want to meet you in Heaven!

What does it mean to always rejoice?  As I meditated on this during my morning devotions, God pointed me to other Scriptures that opened my eyes to His great goodness, grace and mercy for me…but mostly to His great love.

Every day that I wake up is a new gift from God.  His love has never failed me; He has always been there for me, just as He will be for you.  He provides for me physically, in that there is always food to eat and water to drink.  But, more importantly, He provides for me spiritually with the life-giving water and food from His Word.  Being satisfied with the good things that He has provided is a cause for rejoicing!  God desires to fill all of us with His Word that gives everlasting life. 

Yesterday, I shared how fearful I have been of dying.  This Scripture is God’s answer to me today.  I am flourishing now, here on earth and one day I will flourish in the courts of God.  I am well past the age at which I could have children, but I can still produce fruit for God’s kingdom by sharing His message wherever I go and with whatever means I have.  I am vital…I am necessary right now.  I have a purpose to live, because God says that I do.  I am living and able to share His Word and His great love for the world.  It just so happens that green is and has always been my favorite color, so I like that God says that I will remain green.  That represents LIFE!  I am living my days for the Lord and I want to bring as many others along with me as I can.  That is my purpose and will ultimately lead to my fruitfulness.

Photo courtesy of Laurie Conklin, an online friend and THE BIBLE LENS APP

So, as I go forth to fulfill my purpose each day, this is God’s promise to me.  He is always watching over me and will be with me forever.  Do you need that promise in your life?  God is no respecter of persons and all the promises that He has given to me are for you, too.  Just ask Him into your heart and expect Him to come in because you invited Him in.  It’s your choice…and it leads to a vital life on earth and an eternity with Him.  

As I am aging rapidly, it is natural that I would be thinking about death.  I must admit that at times, a deep fear has entered my heart and each time, God has spoken clearly to me that I do not need to fear.  I have even started reciting the prayer from my childhood each night, “Now I lay me down to sleep…and if I die before I awake, I pray thee, Lord, my soul to take.”  Then I sleep peacefully.  Today, the Lord spoke clearly to my heart that I need not fear and He gave me these words to shelter in.

I am daily putting more of God’s Word into my heart.  It touched me deeply at last week’s funeral when the chaplain proclaimed that although my deceased friend suffered from dementia, he could still recite Scriptures.  He had the Word hidden in his heart so that it was a part of him that even a brain tumor could not take away.

Psalm 91 was my meditation this morning.  I needed to be reminded that God is my shelter, always.  I can rest in His shadow.  Thinking about that, I realized that no one can see me if I am under His wings or in His shadow.  There, I need not fear anything, even my final enemy, which is death.  God is right there with me, putting His everlasting and loving arms around me.  No matter what happens next, He is my shield and refuge.  He is my place of safety.  When I was a small child and being verbally and sometimes even physically attacked by my mom, I remember hiding in what was called the “little bathroom.”  It was really a powder room.  But there, I remember singing to myself, “Jesus Loves Me.”  I was a child and I trusted God to take care of me…as an adult, can I do any less?

God’s faithful promises are my protection.  His Word is true.  I love Him and as a child of the King, I know that He will answer me when I call on Him.  Just as He comforted me as a child, He comforts me today.  In the past, He rescued me from all of my fears.  He will rescue me from all of my fears in the future. He is rescuing me from all of my fears now.  He is the Omniscient, Omnipresent and gracious God.  Now I have reminded myself of these truths.  I hope that those you read these words will be blessed by the presence of God and know that there is NO FEAR for those who  rest in the Lord.  

I missed writing my blog yesterday, but I was traveling to and attending the funeral of a friend from church, a funeral service with full military honors.  As the wife of a retired military member, you would think that I would have attended many such services in the past.  Well, I hadn’t and this experience was so heart-wrenching for me.  You see, my father was a military veteran.  He passed away in a VA hospice last July; my brother got the flag that is presented to survivors and he also has my father’s ashes.  There has never been a memorial service for my father.  The plan was for all of us to get together this past spring, go to sea and bury him, per his final wishes.  That plan quickly fell apart when one sibling moved, another refuses to go any where more distant that an hour away from her home; finally, there is the issue of siblings just not speaking to each other.  For whatever reason, I never got to say a final good-bye to my father, at least not at a memorial service honoring him.  Needless to say, yesterday was hard for me.  As I saw the flag presented to the grieving widow, I pictured in my mind a flag being given to my brother.  As I heard taps, I pictured my father’s face and began to sob.  I was crying for Bobby, but also for my daddy who did not get such a service but deserved one.  Yesterday represented the kind of closure that I needed.  I even got to share with one of Bobby’s sons how and why the ceremony was so moving to me.  So, today, I am sharing “Taps” with you and a Scripture to give hope of seeing loved ones again.  God is always merciful; He is always loving and He always knows just what we need.  I needed yesterday.

May Bobby and daddy Rest In Peace.  I know that they are with the Father and Death has no hold on them.

God doesn’t change.  He is eternal.  He made the whole world and He thought the world needed one of me in it.  Humbling thought, isn’t it?  So, why do we walk though life afraid of what may be around the next corner?  Who is the author of this fear?  Well, for sure, it isn’t God! He wants us to live in total surrender to Him, knowing that He can take care of whatever obstacles we face.  That kind of faith is easier said than done.  It means taking steps daily to believe and know that God is our greatest defender.  He is on our side; He is our anchor and our strength.  His love for us never fails, no matter how many times we turn away and seek help from other sources.  He is our gentle Father, calling us to remember what He has done for us and what He can do for us.  God is eternal:  He has always been and He will always be, long after I cease to walk on the earth.  I can trust Him.

We sometimes need to be reminded that God is absolutely eternal and He is not going anywhere.  He lives inside us through His Holy Spirit, so His presence is as close to us as our next breath.  Our God is an awesome God who loves us so much that He had a plan for our salvation; His Son bled and died for us so that we can have God with us daily, in spite of our sinful nature.  Likewise, God has a solution for all of our problems and all of the enemies we may face in this life.

We may be surrounded by enemies…fear, financial problems, failure, whatever is coming our way.  Stop what you are doing.  Pray to God just as David did and ask Him what He wants you to do about the problem.  God has already conquered all of our enemies.  We just need to hear His voice telling us to go forward, that He is with us.  So many times, we are waiting in the valley of despair for God to speak to us, and He already has.  He has already told us to move into the light of His love and to see our victory that He has already won for us.  We get so busy making our own plans to get out of our problems that we don’t seek God and His solution.  I am encouraging you today, just as I encourage myself, to take the problem to God and ask Him to point you in the way you should go, the road to victory.  God is eternal, and He is our Father and our Lord who gives us the victory!  Hallelujah!  Let His Name be praised!

I am sad to say that I am like many others who give the Lord their burdens and then snatch them back again and continue to travel down life’s road, too heavily burdened to travel the path that God wants for me.  I am trying very hard to purposefully lay my burdens down and then leave them with the Lord, trusting that He is well able to take care of me.

The waiting patiently is what gets me every time, because I have a timetable in my mind.  But my timetable is not God’s and I know that He sees things through the hour glass of eternity.  I am praying to get more of His perspective on my life so that I am not so impatient for His answer. Many times, I have gotten ahead of Him, or like Sarah when she told Abraham just to use the maid to get a son, trying to help Him with the answer and ending up messing up the plans He had for me.  I want to stay right here until He sends the answer, and I must admit, that right here is not a comfortable place for me to be right now.  But here I stay, because that is God’s answer for now.

Thus, I am declaring a freedom from my burdens that others who do not know the Lord cannot understand and a joy and peace that can only come from Him as I trust Him daily to lift the burdens and walk life’s road beside me.  I hope that you know the Lord Jesus so that He can help carry your load, too.