ByGrace

Morning Worship in a Victorian Family's Home " Character is always lost when a high ideal is sacrificed on the altar of conformity and popularity." ~~ Charles Spurgeon ~~

Women Sewing at Home by Light from a Window One recent morning as I began my devotions, I felt the need for something from the Lord that would either encourage me or tell me exactly what I needed. I had woken up a little grumpy and every little thing was bugging me, even that early in my day. The tool I'd chosen that morning for my devotions was My Utmost For His Highest . I love older writings because the thoughts are usually much deeper than much of what we read today. The title of that day's devotional was The Worker's Ruling Passion, with 2 Corinthians 5:9 as the Scripture text: "Wherefore we labor that . . . we may be accepted of him." Now, that sounds like Mr. Chambers was advocating works for salvation! But I knew better than that, so I read on. The main thought was that our primary ambition is to please God . Everything we do - winning souls, building a church, keeping a home, working a secular job - is to have as its motivation pleasing God. Not p...

Silhouette of woman praying "We are at this moment as close to God as we really choose to be." ~~ J. Oswald Sanders ~~

"Has He taken over in your heart? Perhaps He resides there, but does He preside there?" ~~ Vance Havner ~~

Antique Dealer There's a huge difference between men and women, in case you didn't already know that. Wes and I are always finding those differences, many times at inopportune moments. The latest was Monday night, just as our guests were arriving for Andrew's party. I had made punch, a punch that requires orange sherbet to be added at the last moment, so that there are pretty little creamy orange balls of sherbet floating on top of the punch. But I had forgotten to take the sherbet out a few minutes ahead of time to soften, so it was still hard. I struggled with it for a couple of minutes, and then my honey came to my rescue. Would I like him to help? Sure! He can whip anything into shape! Wes fought with the sherbet and ice cream scoop for a couple of minutes, and then he did what any sane, reasonable man would do with stubborn sherbet: he ripped the paper container apart and plopped that whole blob of creamy goodness right into the punch! And then he opened the o...

Boy, has it ever been hot this week! We having been breaking temperature records for several days now . . . but I'm glad to say we're about to get some relief. Our highs have been in the upper 80s for the past few days, with today being the hottest at 89. It was 83 in the house. A little bit cooler than outside, but not much. We should have one more hot day today, then tomorrow we'll cool down again to more normal temperatures. I'm ashamed to say that I have been a whiner during this hot streak. Since I developed diabetes 10 years ago, it seems that the heat really zaps my energy, so when it gets hot I just wilt. And I just plain old don't like being hot. But as my husband prayed last night during Bible study, he said to the Lord, "Thank you for the beautiful weather, even though it's hot." That brought home to my heart how unthankful I've been. We get rain over 3/4 of the year . . . and we enjoy the sunshine immensely when it does come. ...