We Did It!

Did you notice?  I've been so busy this week that I didn't realize it until this morning.  We survived January!  In fact, in many ways we thrived through January.  This seems worth making note of, even celebrating.  


Like the kids, standing tall, hoping the line behind the pantry door is higher than it was the last time we measured...  They're uninhibited in their joy over the increased height. Their growth brings joy to us because we love them!  Facilitating their healthy growth is one of the most important goals of our lives.  How much more our Heavenly Father?


So I look back and I can see growth and I'm excited!  I see my Papa smiling with me...  It's all by grace.  He's happy too...because all He's ever wanted to do is set us free and help us grow in freedom.  He wants to lend us His strength to conquer the giants we face.  I feel like we conquered January.  It was uphill some days.  For those of us who live well north of the 49th parallel there could be as much winter ahead of us as there is behind us, but there's a change in the air and the days are noticeably longer.  We'll make it.


We bring joy to His heart when we reach for and receive the gifts He's given.  You don't have to be getting every thing "right" today to make Him smile.  You just need to be reaching for Him in the midst of whatever you're facing...and one day soon you'll look back and see that you've grown.

 Don't bargain with God.  Be direct. Ask for what you need. 

This isn't a cat-and-mouse, hide-and-seek game we're in. 

 If your child asks for bread, do you trick him with sawdust? 

 If he asks for fish, do you scare him with a live snake on his plate?  

As bad as you are, you wouldn't think of such a thing. 

You're at least decent to your own children. 

So don't you think the God who conceived you in love will be even better?

Matthew 7:7-11 MSG

Taking January Back

It's funny how when I take the terrifying step of being especially vulnerable in a post I get a lot of responses...

I've had a lot of responses to yesterday's post.  There's a common theme.  January is tough.  There is a myriad of reasons.  A lot of it is associated with the weather--lack of sunlight and outdoor exercise--post holiday blues, sugar low, financial struggles...  It's a long list and each individual is unique.

These factors are very real.  We live in human "mortal" bodies that are influenced in more ways than we know.

I absolutely believe that our Father recognizes this and that He cares...

We don't have a priest who is out of touch with our reality.

He's been through weakness and testing,

experienced it all--all but the sin...

I also believe that we have an enemy who recognizes our weakness and vulnerability, who won't hesitate to take advantage...

Keep a cool head.  Stay alert.  

The Devil is poised to pounce and would like nothing better than to catch you napping...

Catch me napping.  Lull me in to thinking that Vitamin D is my only problem...  What if that enemy can get me to buy into the idea that I'm a victim of all these very real natural forces?  I think he can get me so focused on those facts that I forget there's potential for a greater power to work in my "mortal body."  Before I know it, I've made an agreement with the spirit of heaviness and am effectively bound and chained.

But if God himself has taken up residence in your life...

for you who welcome him, in whom he dwells

--even though you still experience all the limitations of sin--

you yourself experience life on God's terms.

It stands to reason, doesn't it, that if the alive-and-present God

who raised Jesus from the dead moves into your life,

he'll do the same thing in you that he did in Jesus,

bringing you alive to himself?

When God lives and breathes in you (and he does, as surely as he did in Jesus),

you are delivered from that dead life.

With his Spirit living in you, your body will be as alive as Christ's!

I want to take January back.  I don't want it to be a cursed and hopeless month.  It may not be the easy, breezy days of summer, but I refuse to be chained.  I'm going to take my Vitamin D and "stay alert."

If you need a song to help shake off the heaviness, if you want to raise a shout that, "My heart is free, no chains on me," click here.

Hebrews 4:15; 1 Peter 5:8; Romans 8:9-11  MSG