Live in His Word

          One of the very first game shows on radio and then later on TV was a show called Truth or Consequences. On the show the contestants were asked a question- if they got the answer wrong, there was a consequence- usually a funny stunt they had to do.   When I was reading about the show, it said people would often get the answer wrong on purpose because they wanted to do the consequence.                       Sometimes I feel that our lives feel almost like a game of truth and consequences, but instead of consequences it is Truth or circumstances. Every day we have circumstances that happen around us and sometimes those situations can be almost overwhelming. Have you ever been through a season in life that just seemed overwhelming and you felt completely hopeless? Maybe you are in a situation like that right now.             There is a story of someone dealing with this kind of situation in Luke 7:12-17.   A funeral procession was coming out as he approached the village gate.

          I have this issue. It is called soda. I tend to drink it way more than I should. I am doing better. I really am. I know that I need to quit, but it is just so hard sometimes. I mean it is never really a good week to quit drinking it. I will think I am going to quit drinking it, but then I am so tired that I need the caffeine. I also have another issue. It is called going to bed at night. Every night I think I should go to bed, and then I think “but I really want to or should do this”. If I can be real with you, I may also have another issue and that is exercise. I think I will exercise every day, but some days I just can’t seem to make myself cooperate. Looking at this I realize that I have a “but” problem.           Do you know anyone with a but problem? Maybe you even have one. How often do we say “I know I shouldn’t do this, but” or the opposite “I know I should do this, but”. Those but’s just get in the way! I have been trying to make a concentrated effort to pay at

          When my kids were younger, we spent quite a bit of time riding in the car back and forth to school. When you have siblings in the car, together, for any length of time they tend to find things to “discuss”. Sometimes the discussions could be loud and start to make mom very annoyed. When this would happen, I would often put on my pretend happy mommy voice and say, “Look a diversion!” This would usually stop their discussion as they quickly looked out the window to find the diversion. I did not realize until the kids were older that they thought a diversion was another word for cows, since we live in rural Oklahoma and almost every time I said that, there were cows out the window. They weren’t even aware what a diversion was, but it would distract them so that they forgot what they were doing.           In this case, a diversion or distraction was a good thing, but have you noticed how easy it is to be distracted from what we are supposed to be focused on? The devil is a

            Now that my kids are teenagers, I think have officially reached the “not cool” zone. I kind of thought it wouldn’t happen to me. I think I am pretty funny most of the time and since I had a sister 10 years younger than me, she kept me up to date on a lot of things, but now I am finding out there is a lot of things I just am not cool about anymore. One thing I have found is that there is a new vocabulary that I have never heard of, and if I have heard of it- I am not supposed to use it. For instance recently I had heard that two people were referred to as a ship. I knew people could go on a ship, but didn’t realize they could be a ship. I found out that if two people are a ship it means they are in a relationship with each other- which I guess makes sense.             Sometimes the new phrases are fun, but there is one word in particular that I am not a huge fan of or at least not the way it is used, and that is YOLO- you only live once. Really it could be a good reminde

          We recently celebrated Easter, one of the two times of the year that people stop and think about what Jesus did. At Christmas we celebrate his birth, on Easter we celebrate his resurrection. Even people who don’t take their Christianity seriously pause on these two days to think about what Jesus did. So why did Jesus come and do what he did? John 3:16 is a verse that most of us know. It says, “For God loved the world so much that he gave his one and only son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish, but have eternal life.” If you grew up in church, you probably have that verse memorized. It is a classic verse and even people who aren’t church people know it. They put it on signs at sports games; some athletes even put it on their body. We see in this verse that Jesus came so that we could believe in Him and have everlasting life. Not as familiar is the next verse, verse 17, that tells us that God sent His son into the world not to judge the world but to save th