Growing in Grace

Love and faithfulness keep a king safe;  through love his throne is made secure . -Proverbs 20:28 Let's apply this proverb to our own realm. No, we are not literal kings - or queens. But we do have areas of influence that the Lord has entrusted to us, and we need to have God's perspective on success and true security. Love and faithfulness are given as the most important factors to make us safe and secure. That is not exactly how things are portrayed in the media. For a person to be safe, it's said he/she needs to look out after self first. We must defend our rights at any cost. But we can look at all the broken homes and lonely lives to see this is a formula for disaster, not success. In the Bible, Queen Esther is the perfect example of doing a risky thing for love's sake. Her predecessor was Queen Vashti. She was beautiful and powerful, but she used her rights to defend her rights. This cost her both her position and her marriage. Later, when Esther beca

Whoever curses his father or his mother, His lamp will be put out in deep darkness. -Proverbs 20:20 These are sobering words. There are some instructions in the Bible that can be hard to understand. But God's command to honor your parents is not one of them. Why is it then that so many, even Christians, have allowed themselves to completely disregard this? Some people wonder, Do we really need family relationships? It is sometimes a lot easier to love people from afar or short term. Can't good friends fill the family gap? Chuck Swindoll said, "A family is a place where principles are hammered and honed on the anvil of everyday living." Yes, there are challenging times and personalities. That's when we must rely upon the Lord to help us love them through the good and bad. Have you let your parents' flaws get under your skin? Be aware: if you can't let something go, if you can't resist the urge to be rude or unkind, it really reflects back o

They think the whole world revolves around them! - Ezekiel 38:12 In the early sixteenth century, Nicolaus Copernicus, a Polish astronomer, developed a sun-centered system of astronomy, rejecting the Ptolemic theory of the earth as the center of the universe. Copernicus argued that all the planets revolve around the sun and that the earth rotates on its axis once every day. Because of his groundbreaking work many consider him to be the father of modern astronomy. Photo Credit False religions revolve around something other than God. They may revolve around nature, self, a philosophy, a set of rules, or a prophet. Christianity is centered on the person of Jesus Christ. But even believers have to struggle against our human nature, which thinks that the world revolves around us. Christ must be at the center of our life. Only then are things in the proper order. -From  The One Year On This Day  by Dianne Neal Matthews; May 24