Happy New Year 2011

I hope you had a wonderful Christmas and New Year and got to spend quality time with family. I love the time that I had all my kids here together. It's a rare occasion any more and I try to treasure those moments.
As with most people the first of the year it makes us all question what will my New Year resolution be - what will be the one thing I hope to focus on? This morning Bo (our preacher) challenged us all to spend every single day in God's Word - to ask what is this saying about God and then ask the question what is this saying to me? Meditate, taste God's Word.
On K-love I cannot remember who it was but is was a song writer that ask that we read God's Word not to finish..... but to read it and be changed.
This struck me so - I wrote it in my Bible - to always remember when I am doing my Bible study homework that I am doing it not just to finish the days homework - but I need to be doing it to be changed, transformed.

In my study time I came across this lesson and I wanted to share with you some thoughts that I have been thinking on (some of this is a direct quote from the Max Lucado book) - In Luke 24 the story of the two men walking on the road to Emmaus - the lesson talked about how the men were feeling so disappointed and grieving. They thought Jesus was to be their king on earth - they didn't understand.
Despair not only clouds our vision; it hardens our hearts.
There is a fine line between disappointment and anger. Between hurt and hate, between bitterness and blame. You have to ask yourself how long am I gonna nurse this hurt?
At some point you have to heal. At some point you have to let Jesus do for you what he did for these men that were on the road to Emmaus. Jesus came to them.... and He will come to us too.
He met them at their point of pain. Though death had been destroyed and sin annulled, he has not retired. The resurrected Lord has once again wrapped himself in flesh, put on human clothes, and searched out hurting hearts. I loved the above statement - I had not thought about it like that - Jesus does love us so much.
Jesus listened to them and then He gave them the answer to their problems - starting with Moses and finishing with himself He told them the greatest Bible story ever told - and why?
To remind them that God is in control - We need to hear that it's not over until God says it's over. We need to hear that life's mishaps and tragedies are not a reason to bail out. They are simply a reason to sit tight. In God's Word is every answer we need when we are hurting, feeling disappointed, confused..... we can find the hope, and see the love that God has for us, and most of all if we truly seek.....we will find the One and only.
luv ya, pl