One of the central ways we give our children the gift of faith is to base everything we do on the Word of God. –Sally Clarkson, The Ministry of Motherhood

There will likely be a time in our Christian journeys when, like Jacob, we will wrestle with God all night long…But there must eventually come a dawn when we say, “Ok, God, You win…Not my will but Thine be done.  –Gary Thomas

Relying on God has to begin all over again every day as if nothing yet had been done.
                                 -C.S. Lewis

It is the mark of a true saint that his sorrows remind him of his sins, and his sorrow for sin drives him to his God.

                                                             -Charles H. Spurgeon

“God’s commands are not burdensome.  God intends them for our good.”

                                                                   -Nancy Leigh DeMoss

blessings,

dani

If you are willing and obedient, you shall eat the good of the land; but if you refuse and rebel, you shall be eaten by the sword; for the mouth of the Lord has spoken. (Isaiah 1:19)

“It’s funny, the pleasures we deprive ourselves of rather than face our fears.”

                         -from A Sweetness to the Soul by Jane Kirkpatrick

blessings,

dani

Desire realized is a sweetness to the soul. – Proverbs 13:19

“The moment we start to feel worthy of being God’s children, we’re in trouble.  It isn’t wrong to be comfortable with our Father.  But on whose merit does He accept us? Ours? No, we are welcome in God’s presence because Jesus is good, not because we are good.  And we never really understand His goodness unless our souls have first felt the loneliness of spiritual exile.  Grace is for rebels who have known their offenses.”                  -Chris Tiegreen

blessings,

dani

“When you were dead in your sins and in the uncircumcision of your sinful nature, God made you alive with Christ.  He forgave us all our sins, having canceled the written code, with its regulations, that was against us and that stood opposed to us; He took it away, nailing it to the cross.” -Colossians 2:13-14

Other than the family and the farm, nothing was as important to us as the Black Oak Baptist Church.  I knew every single person in our church, and they of course knew me.  It was a family, for better or worse.  Everybody loved one another, or at least professed to, and if one of our members was the slightest bit ill, then all manner of prayer and Christian caring poured forth.  A funeral was a week-long, almost holy event.  The fall and spring revivals were planned for months and greatly anticipated.  At least once a month we had some form of dinner-on-the-grounds—a potluck picnic under the trees behind the church—and these often lasted until late afternoon.  Weddings were important, especially for the ladies, but they lacked the high drama of funerals and burials.

-from A Painted House by John Grisham

blessings,

dani

“May the God of endurance and encouragement grant you to live in such harmony with one another, in accord with Christ Jesus, that together you may with one voice glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore welcome one another as Christ has welcomed you, for the glory of God.” (Romans 15:5-7)