Unhappy in my Happy Place? Not for Long!

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Unhappy in my Happy Place? Not for Long!

We just returned from my lovely place…my refreshing place … my longed for place …. my happy place — the beach/ the Jersey Shore/ Long Beach Island and Belmar, NJ.

And we went this year for the epitome of reasons — to celebrate John’s and my 50th wedding anniversary and to have a family reunion of sorts with our kids, grandkids, my siblings and families (aunts, uncles, and cousins to our kids), my 95 y.o. godmother-aunt and my cousin.

And it was much anticipated and planned for over the course of the previous year.

But for me, it began with struggle and stress and hidden tears …. until the Lord met me very early one morning, thankfully at the beginning of the week.

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Beauty & the Beach...in the Winter of Life

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Beauty & the Beach...in the Winter of Life

Even though it is summertime, taking a look ahead toward winter can virtually cool us off and calm our souls. And it also causes us to remember a loved one in those later stages of life and treasure the beauty in a life well lived. May we do the same.

So I am looking ahead and also remembering …

Beaches are beautiful, no matter the season...and that even includes winter-time. There's a calm...an aloneness (not many brave the cold and wind)...a beautiful bleakness!

The winter beach is a silvery wonderland at times

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Ocean Sunrise in Scripture & Song

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Ocean Sunrise in Scripture & Song

For several years before my mom went to Jesus, I spent lots of precious time with her on the coast in New Jersey. One of the highlights had always been my early morning walks along the beach at sunrise.

I’ve just returned to Ohio from our awesome trip this summer to the Jersey Shore. But before I begin writing fresh posts, I’m returning to this blog that I wrote after a sweet summer with my mom at my sister's house in Belmar.

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A Spiritual Father: Abba's Child

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A Spiritual Father: Abba's Child

We are not cowed into timidity by death and life. Were we forced to rely on our own shabby resources we would be pitiful people indeed. But the awareness of Christ's present risenness persuades us that we are buoyed up and carried on by a life greater than our own.

The Christ within who is our hope of glory is not a matter of theological debate or philosophical speculation. He is not a hobby, a part-time project, a good theme for a book, or a last resort when all human effort fails. He is our life, the most real fact about us. He is the power and wisdom of God dwelling within us.

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A Spiritual Father: Bread for my Soul's Journey

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A Spiritual Father: Bread for my Soul's Journey

One of my spiritual fathers was still alive on this earth when I first "met" him. Henri J. M. Nouwen (January 24, 1932 – September 21, 1996) was a Dutch Catholic priest and writer who authored 40 books on the spiritual life.

Our "meeting" came in two ways. A mentor friend of mine pointed me to Nouwen's classic work, The Return of the Prodigal Son. This is an amazing book based on meditations on Rembrandt's painting by the same name.

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A Spiritual Father: Abiding in Christ in Faith-filled Surrender

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A Spiritual Father: Abiding in Christ in Faith-filled Surrender

How do I abide in Christ? How do I live the Christian life if it's by faith and not about "doing?" What is faith? These were questions that circled around, on and on in the midst of my confusion...that is until I "met" Andrew Murray.  Actually, I had read him early in my Christian walk, but that was during the time that "faith formulas" and "to do lists" and "theological systems" were more the answers to my quests than was Christ Himself (although I didn't realize it at the time).


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A Spiritual Father: a Modern-day Prophet

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A Spiritual Father: a Modern-day Prophet

My husband John and I were students at Moody Bible Institute in Chicago in the mid-1970's.  It was during our student days at Moody that we were introduced to A.W. Tozer.  My impression of Tozer at that time was that he was a somewhat controversial Chicago pastor of recent years who had a unique gift for being very sound biblically but at the same time shaking up the conservative evangelical "troops." I bought a set of his volumes entitled, The Tozer Pulpit and enjoyed his fiery words.  He said such things as...

One hundred religious persons knit into a unity by careful organization do not constitute a church any more than eleven dead men make a football team. . . .

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I Have a Father

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I Have a Father

For all who are led by the Spirit of God are children of God. …As we come up to Fathers’ Day, I’m remembering this song. Its a heart-warming reminder of my True Father, and it grabs my grieving soul with its moving music and lyric.

You see, the beautiful person deep inside my earthly father had been often obscured by the abuse of alcohol that trapped his soul and body. (Remembering My Dad)

Oh how sad and painfully tragic! Oh how I miss the real Daddy whom I truly loved yet often “hated” at the same time.

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All of Us are Called to Be "Spiritual Fathers/Mothers"

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All of Us are Called to Be "Spiritual Fathers/Mothers"

If we are followers of our Lord Jesus Christ, siblings in the family of God, we are called to mature into “spiritual fatherhood/motherhood” in the family.

Is that a surprising thought? Let's think together about this idea of "spiritual parenting."

In his first letter, the fatherly, aged apostle John penned a tenderhearted passage on the growth stages in a believer's life.

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Longing for our Father's Blessing

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Longing for our Father's Blessing

… The interesting thing is I had years before read the book The Blessing by Gary Smalley & John Trent. In that wonderful book, the authors explore our human need for approval and validation. They show how this need was met in the Biblical blessings given by fathers to children. But they shared how we could also do this for our children today and for others we care about.

The authors listed 5 elements to the Blessing:


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Your Concept of God Can Look a Lot Like your Dad

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Your Concept of God Can Look a Lot Like your Dad

The parent-child relationship is perhaps the most critical metaphor of our relationship with God. Why? Because it’s in our relationship with our earthly fathers that we begin to form our concept of God our heavenly Father — for good or for ill.

But all is not lost if our concept of God is askew, filled with false beliefs of what God is really like. There is an Abba Father who fathers us with unconditional love and acceptance, tenderness, and the “loving sternness” that comes with parenting in truth.

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The God Who LOVES You is Your Source

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The God Who LOVES You is Your Source

Anyone who is thirsty may come to me!
Anyone who believes in me may come and drink!
For the Scriptures declare, ‘Rivers of living water will flow from his heart.’
My husband is not my source of unconditional love and I am not his source of unconditional love! It’s nice when we hit it right and make each other feel loved, but even that is short lived if we are looking to each other to fill our tank of need for love.

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Weekend Words: There was Jesus

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Weekend Words: There was Jesus

Many of us have gone through horrendous things, not of our own doing. Others of us have made some disastrous choices with very hard consequences. And all of us have had times when we have wondered, “Where was God in it all?”

We need to know and embrace the truth that He was there … every time, every place. And He still is.

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Knowing the God Who LOVES You and Cares even about the "Unnecessaries" of Life

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Knowing the God Who LOVES You and Cares even about the "Unnecessaries" of Life

The big things aren’t too big for God’s power
and
the little things aren’t too little for His LOVE!*

Do you ever feel like nobody cares about you and all the in’s and out’s of your life? And that includes God… maybe especially God. He’s too busy keeping the world spinning to care about your everyday stuff.

But God does care . . even about your little mundane stuff. I’d like to tell you about a time when I learned this in a surprising way.

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My Friend God Sees Me, Loves Me, and Smiles ... You too

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My Friend God Sees Me, Loves Me, and Smiles ... You too

Much of my life I lived under the "frown of God," or so I thought. I wasn't a bad kid; in fact, I was quite religious and moral. But I wasn't perfect for sure. (For one thing, I was a terrible big sister, mean and self-centered toward my siblings.) But I knew God required perfection, so I was always working my way down a spiritual "to do list" of some kind (depending on the Christian group I was with. They each had their own, you know).

In fact even as Christian adult, I made up lists of my own to make me "spiritual," pleasing to God so that He would love me more and not frown so much . . .

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Abba's Little Girls: Mama-sisters

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Abba's Little Girls: Mama-sisters

Motherhood is a Sisterhood...unrivaled by any other (except perhaps, Grandmother-hood). So if you are a mom, you are my beloved sister...

And sometimes we mama-sisters just need to be daughters...Abba's (Hebrew for Daddy) little girls.

So this Mothers' Day, let us hear these restful words of promise from our Abba:

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The Emptying of Motherhood: Alone?

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The Emptying of Motherhood: Alone?

Motherhood is filled with emptyings -- from the emptying of the womb in childbirth to the emptying of self in child-raising to the emptying of the nest, the ultimate goal. The stripping is hard, every step along the way. . . .

For a dear sister of mine, my mama-sister Blondezena, this is a hard one. She has just launched her “baby boy” Michael into military service. Thank you, Michael … but also thank you, Blonde, for YOUR service. May this post be a comfort to you and to all those mamas who are hurting in what could be a very hard time in their mothering.

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Knowing the God who LOVES you and Who is THERE Wherever You Are

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Knowing the God who LOVES you and Who is THERE Wherever You Are

… the name of the city from that day shall be: THE LORD IS THERE.” Ezekiel 48:35

Early one recent morning, John was up, dressed, and on his regular Tuesday morning ZOOM call with his guys’ Bible study group. I was in the kitchen pouring my morning coffee into my favorite mug, ready to begin my own personal devotions and Bible study.

All of a sudden, I heard banging and crashing coming from John’s office….

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