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SNEAK PEEK: Dandelions on the Wind by Mona Hodgson

March 2, 2013

Tattered relationships and broken hearts, like a quilt, can be pieced together by God’s love.

Click here to download chapter one of Dandelions on the Wind.

When Maren Jensen took a job on Elsa Brantenberg’s St. Charles, Missouri farm, she never expected to call the place her home. As she grows to love Mrs. Brantenberg and her granddaughter, Gabi, Maren is transformed from a lonely mail-order bride-without-a-groom to a beloved member of the Brantenberg household.

Click here to download chapter one of Dandelions on the Wind.

Holy Fire

March 1, 2013

In ancient cultures, the most important thing a household did was to never let the fire go cold. In rural Korean cultures the same ancestral fire burned for centuries, and when they moved they took the fire of their forefathers with them. When your fire went out, it was thought, you lost your connection with heaven. Would that Christians were as careful about tending spiritual fire as these ancients were about natural fire. We are to nourish the spiritual fire, and we do that by prayer, obedience, mission, devotion, and study.

Holy fire is warming. In the words of the nineteenth-century New England poet Lucy Larcom: “If the world seems cold to you, / Kindle fires to warm it.” How many fires will you kindle today with the flint of faith?

Excerpted from Viral by Leonard Sweet

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As Personal as it Gets

February 28, 2013

“Why doesn’t God just show himself to people?”
The waiter had walked off with our dessert plates. I had resisted the urge to scrape mine with my fork as I usually did at home. Waiting for coffee, I decided it was now or never to get some of my remaining questions about God and life answered. This one seemed like a decent place to start.
Jesus wiped his mouth with his napkin and returned it to his lap. “What would you have me do?”
“I don’t know – appear to everyone personally.”
He chuckled, and seeing the irony in my statement, I couldn’t help but join him momentarily.
“No, seriously,” I said. “Most people don’t get a dinner invitation.”
“I did appear to humanity. I became one of you. That’s about as personal as [ … ]

NEWS: Author Hilary Alan blogs that “Obedience is NOT ‘Radical'”

February 27, 2013

 

Hilary Alan, author of Sent: How One Ordinary Family Traded the American Dream for God’s Greater Purpose, writes that people often comment that her family’s move to Southeast Asia was such a “radical” example of obedience to God’s calling.

She writes, “Obedience is NOT radical. Its a response. A response that comes from love.”

To read her full blog post, click here.

How One Ordinary Family Traded the American Dream for God’s Greater Purpose – See more at: https://waterbrookmultnomah.com/results.php?q=sent&source=catalog#sthash.hkF8QXz8.dpuf
How One Ordinary Family Traded the American Dream for God’s Greater Purpose – See more at: https://waterbrookmultnomah.com/results.php?q=sent&source=catalog#sthash.hkF8QXz8.dpuf
How One Ordinary Family Traded the American Dream for God’s Greater Purpose – See more at: https://waterbrookmultnomah.com/results.php?q=sent&source=catalog#sthash.hkF8QXz8.dpuf

 

Renew Where You Are

February 27, 2013

Martin Luther was once approached by a man who enthusiastically announced that he’d recently become a Christian. Wanting desperately to serve the Lord, he asked Luther, “What should I do now?” as if to say, should he become a minister or perhaps a traveling evangelist?

Luther asked him, “What is your work now?”

“I’m a shoemaker.”

Much to the cobbler’s surprise, Luther replied, “Then make a good shoe and sell it at a fair price.”

In becoming Christians we don’t need to retreat from the vocational calling we already have. Nor do we need to justify that calling, whatever it is, in terms of its spiritual value or evangelistic usefulness. We simply exercise whatever our calling is with new God-glorifying motives, goals, and standards – and with renewed commitment to performing our calling with greater excellence and higher objectives.

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Money

February 26, 2013

Money is the currency of Christian Hedonism. What you do with it—or desire to do with it—can make or break your happiness forever. The Bible makes clear that what you feel about money can destroy you: “Those who want to get rich fall into temptation and a snare and many foolish and harmful desires which plunge men into ruin and destruction” (1 Timothy 6:9).

This passage teaches us to use our money in a way that will bring us the greatest and longest gain. That is, it advocates Christian Hedonism. It confirms that it is not only permitted but also commanded by God that we flee from destruction and pursue our full and lasting pleasure. It implies that all the evils in the world come not because our desires for happiness are too strong, but because they are so weak [ … ]

SNEAK PEEK: Gone South by Meg Moseley

February 25, 2013

The charm of the South drew her back to her family’s roots. But when the town’s old resentments turn the sweet tea bitter, can Tish find a welcome anywhere?

Click here to download chapter one of Gone South.

Leaving frosty Michigan for the Deep South was never a blip in the simple plans Tish McComb imagined for her life, dreams of marriage and family that were dashed five years earlier in a tragic accident. Now an opportunity to buy her great-great-great-grandparents’ Civil War era home beckons Tish to Noble, Alabama, a Southern town in every sense of the word. She wonders if God has given her a new dream— the old house filled with friends, her vintage percolator [ … ]

God’s Plan

February 25, 2013

God sees the beauty and value of all His children. His love is the reason we are here, and that is something you should never forget. You can escape the hurt, the loneliness, and the fear. You are loved. You were created for a purpose, and over time it will be revealed to you. Know that where you feel weak, God will give you strength. All you have to do is put faith into action by reaching out to those who love you, those who want to help you, and most of all to your Creator by asking Him to come into your life.

Reject self-destructive thoughts. Shut them off. Replace them with positive messages or prayer. Let go of the bitterness and anger and hurt, and let God’s love into your heart. The spiritual realm is very real. The [ … ]