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Showing posts from December, 2019

Come to Jesus

Come to me all you who are weary and burdened and I will give you rest. Matthew 11:28 For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God—not by works, so that no one can boast. Ephesians 2:8-9 Just moments ago I read a message about the things God could have asked of us in order to secure our salvation.   It made me laugh because of course, the point was that grace is a gift. Grace is not something to be earned, thankfully, because none of us is capable of earning it.   It also made me laugh because of some experiences my husband and I have had at different churches.           In our search for a church home we visited a few places. One stands out as we attended there for several months. We were considering becoming members even though we weren’t quite sure it was the place for us.   Very quickly we would find out that it was not, nope, not at all. We met with the pastor and he outlined the things we wou

Losing My Head

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    “Martha, Martha,” the Lord answered, “you are worried about many things, but only one thing is needed. Mary has chosen what is better and it will not be taken away from her.” Luke 10:41-42   The little lady in the picture is the true representative of what too many of us feel at Christmas time. Every single year for the past four or five years, she has lost her head. (I was going to include the picture of the headless body but that felt a little gruesome.) Each year when I set up her beautiful town house she somehow falls or jumps to the floor, causing the loss of her head. She has friends on her little perch, a young boy and another woman. Neither of them has ever lost a head or any other body part. They remain serenely on the house while poor Sally crashes to the floor.           I call her Sally because it goes with stress and she reminds me of stress. Sally Stressed is freaking out over all that needs to be done while Susie and Sammy Serene serenade the

Make Room

  While they were there, the time came for the baby to be born, and she gave birth to her first born, a son. She wrapped him in cloths and placed him in a manger, because there was no guest room available for them. Luke 2:6-7   No room available.   In reading an Advent devotional I came across this phrase, “Yet when the Son of God came into the world, there was no room for him.” Did you just gasp? I did.   My gasp was not based on events from thousands of years ago but on the state of the world today.   I think it is because of the way the sentence is written, “When the Son of God” (a name/title important enough to be capitalized) “came into the world” (a place in desperate need of help) “there was no room for him.”             No room for Jesus? Why? Who or what could be more important than Jesus? In defense of the inn keeper of Bethlehem, he didn’t know who he was turning away. Can we say the same? No, no we cannot.           Maybe you’re saying to yourself, “I lov