Integrity comes from years of practicing living with godly character. Integrity is a lifelong fruit of determining to live faithfully. Christ is the model for what it looks like to have perfect integrity. But integrity brings the reward of living well into your life and watching God faithfully produce eternal fruit through the pages of your story.
Just when all appears dead and there are no signs of life in the world, daffodils pop up, as if out of nowhere, to proclaim there just may be surprise and life ahead.
There is no one right way to live life in a home. No one size of routine or rules or order fits all. Homes with young children will be quite different from a single-adult home. Elderly adults will order their lives by different life rituals than will single adults, young marrieds, or university students. But the more carefully we plan our days, the better our homes will provide us with freedom and enjoyment as well as purpose and accomplishment.
Today, Lanier and I talked about the process of living by faith in times of chaos. Moving to a place of restoring is a walk of perseverance and we have both learned this through many seasons of our lives.
Chaos often invades our lives when least expect it. The Covid Virus has turned all of our worlds upside down. Yet, having lived through many a heart-breaking disappointment or even just a cancellation to my plans, a loss of control of our lives, I know that waiting on God in faith will show me, in time, that He had never left me, that He was always walking with me through every trial, every season. His faithfulness never fails.
In this episode, Sally and Kristen discuss how to impart a love of community and friendship to our children. They encourage moms to model how to serve in friendship themselves, as the first model their families will see, and explain what it looks like to serve in friendship through trust, loyalty, empathy and encouragement. They share how to become an invitation to others in everyday life, and how to teach your children to be a friend through:
-Trusting the Holy Spirit
-Training them how to share and live generously
-Teaching them HOW to create community
Ultimately, Sally and Kristen encourage and equip moms to cultivate their own hearts for service and love, while becoming a living example of how to put others first.
Then, they are joined by special guest and friend, Elizabeth Foss who shares her own testimony of trusting God even when we feel weary. Reflecting on her cancer journey and the community knit in her own family mothering nine children, Elizabeth reminds us all that there is nothing that we face that Christ has not also endured. She's also sharing about a special new project that we are excited to share with you called Take Up and Read
Nathan has always been larger than life and had on his heart the desire to be a hero. We saw Nathan‘s spirit early on and even while struggling with learning disabilities and an out-of-the-box personality we encouraged Nathan into the story God had for him to tell. We wanted to instill in each of our children the the values of a loving and good God and the belief that they had a work on the world We believed forward into their lives.
Which is why I am so excited that Nathan is releasing his first solo book called Good Man, it’s a collection of Nathan‘s stories, thoughts, and insights from his journey of discovering who it was God created him to be.
One of the most profoundly important gifts we can give to our children is a life of faith, a life of believing God in the small moments of life, the large challenges, a life given to believing in His reality. Without faith, we cannot please God. No works, performance, giving will cover over a lack of faith and faith living.
Joy is one of my favorite people in the world. Today, we took time to record many of the rhythms, food, practices that we have both been practicing in our home to make it through these challenging days. I hope you will love it as much as Joy and I enjoyed being together across the miles in a FaceTime recording.
You can find all things Joy @Joyclarkson.com and you would be so entertained and inspired to connect with her on Instagram @joynessthebrave
Happy Tuesday! We are thinking about you all and praying for you!
In the busyness of our activity-oriented world, it is tempting for us to measure the value of lives by accomplishment or position. Yet, in this time of the covid virus, we are all re-evaluating our priorities. As I look back on the years with my precious children, I found myself seeking to understand how important it was to lay heart foundations, an imagination for living for God, an understanding of truth before I worried about the academic accomplishment of my children.
Perspective is something I have had to learn about the last many years of my life. In the workaday world, busyness can take over and often I have the illusion that I can control my life. The Corona Virus has taken all of us by surprise and has shaken up our expectations of life. Finances are at stake for many of us, illness, disappointment, confusion. But, I have learned that my God is stable, secure, and loving and He is always in control—even when we do not understand or feel secure.
On my podcast today, my friends and I came up with countless ideas of the ways we have created and nurtured life-giving memories with our own. I hope our ideas will inspire you.
We wanted to share with all of you what we filled our hearts and minds this weekend and to give some history and encouragement about how such deep friendships are developed over time. Actually, we talked about lots of important things on the podcast and I hope you will find life and encouragement from our time together that might be a light in the midst of a crazy week.
Fear, weariness, concern, cynicism, frustration seems to define the mood and emotions of many today. We hear of war and violence, corona virus, financial crisis, devastating storms and tornadoes, moral collapse amongst youth, a loss of faith for many young adults, and we are tempted to tremble in our boots, or to be filled with despair.
Yet, scripture speaks to us over and over again about God’s desire to protect us, to be present with us, to respond to our prayers, to crush the wicked. Over 80 times in scripture we read, “Fear Not!” and the verse above is one of my favorite “fear not” verses that I learned when I was a very young believer.
Young children are watching, imitating, learning from us every moment of their early life. The attitude we have when we change diapers, the way we talk to our friends, neighbors, husbands, becomes their models for how to speak to others, whether or not we value other human beings.
Motherhood was designed by God to be a role of honor, sacred, to help keep His purposes alive in the world. We must remember that to be a mother who serves God is not simply a choice but a mandate.
There are times that we all just have to take a break! On our sober club nights, we always do something that we want to do that is just for us--sometimes we even ask friends to join us--go to dinner, a movie, a walk in the mountains, take a drive to see the city lights--music blaring, windows down--just cruising and trying to relax. We do something different--go away from the stress, from the kids. We do not talk about any of the problems or money or stress or ministry. We just relax, have fun, get away and lighten up.
Psalm 4:3 But know that the Lord has set apart the godly man for Himself; The Lord hears when I call to Him.
“A woman who reads is a woman who knows she must act: in courage, in creativity, in kindness, and often in defiance of the darkness around her. She understands that life itself is a story and that she has the power to shape her corner of the drama.”
― Sarah Clarkson, Book Girl: A Journey Through the Treasures and Transforming Power of a Reading Life
Never under-estimate the power of kindness to help someone make it through. A vase of flowers, an email, a cup of tea or coffee, a candle, a short visit, a cleaned house, all of these can shift the mood and place of emotional havoc to one of “I think I can make it.”
I hope you enjoy our chat today and prepare a place and a time of kindness for yourself or someone you love.
You can find my wonderful friend and her books at: https://www.instagram.com/shellymillerwriter/
Kristen was on her way for a weekend trip with her husband, but we raced to Joy’s apartment and quickly recorded some thoughts we had all been sharing. Her desire to help women live a healthy life-style, to live strong is contagious. She is in the process of putting together all sorts of inspiration that I know will encourage you, so be sure to follow her at for more to come. https://www.emmerandearth.com
God has created human beings to have a great capacity to use their brains to understand, learn, study, comprehend, create, invent, debate. And so one of the stewardships we have as moms is to take responsibility for our children's minds. God will hold all of us accountable for how we were faithful to shape and train their minds for his glory. It is one of the equal ways we are commanded to worship God. It is a glory to God when we seek to fill and expand our brains to be superior in thinking skills
The secret to becoming content and to cultivating happiness in your story is learning to make a plan to flourish right where you are, as a habit. Today, I speak about practicing holy attitudes that will serve you well as you grow and mature and live well in this long journey of life. I pray it inspired you.
Seems we all have lots of meantime when we are waiting for something to happen when we will be happier or freer or more fulfilled. I have learned that waiting for any other circumstance or person to fulfill all the felt needs of your life is a wrongly directed expectation. It is a process to learn, but only as we learn how to flourish in all those meantimes when we are waiting, (for a spouse, for enough money, for children or for children to be out of diapers or out of teenage hormones, or a new house or whatever), it is possible to flourish. Today, I am speaking about how to flourish while you are waiting. I have learned it over many years and was not always patient, but it has served me well.
Today, as you contemplate Him, and His work, may you decide to keep fervent and patient and strong in His call to use you in your life time to bring His kingdom work to bear on a world that is desperate for His touch and redemption.
Your faithfulness matters. Your choice to trust God is ringing out cheers in the heavenliness because it is so rare.
Join me today and be encouraged in your own life to live faithfully.