Psalm 23 is a very well-known Psalm of David.  David had been a shepherd in his youth and had personal experience with the responsibilities of a shepherd.  Dutifully he had to watch over the sheep and take care of their every need…lead them.  He also had the duty to protect them from harmful predators and  keep a watchful eye over any sheep that may be wandering astray.

To be a good shepherd must have been full-time job and an exhausting one at times, I am sure.   From a mother’s view point of taking care of her own little “flock” at home, it’s hard to imagine the responsibility of managing a whole flock of sheep.  A good shepherd would never leave his sheep alone, wandering helplessly. (Would we as mothers leave our little toddlers out wandering down the street alone?)  The shepherd cared for his sheep with compassion.  Ancient shepherds knew each of their sheep by name.   They were familiar with their individual characteristic marks, their peculiarities, their personal habits and tendencies, etc.

To begin the day of leading his sheep, a shepherd’s morning call was a distinctive guttural sound.  In trusting obedience, each flock would rise and follow its master to the feeding grounds.  Amazingly, even if two shepherds called out to their flocks at the same time where the sheep were intermingled, they were able to recognize their own shepherd’s voice.  They never followed the wrong shepherd.

When we realize the great responsibility of a shepherd, we can truly begin to appreciate David’s remarkable statement when he says, “The Lord is my Shepherd.”

There’s three simple points that I would like ponder….

1.  We have a choice to follow.

Our Heavenly Father wants to be our Shepherd, but He gives us a choice to follow.  He did not create us to act as robots upon forced command.  Because Jesus willingly laid his life down upon the cross to pay for our sins, we should willingly repent of our sin and accept Him as our personal Savior, allowing Him to become our Good Shepherd.  (See YourFreeGift.org)

Jesus says in John 10:11,27, “I am the good shepherd: the good shepherd giveth his life for the sheep… My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me.”

2.  When we follow, we do not lack.

For those who scoff at Christianity, claiming it to be a mere “security blanket” to believers, they’re truly missing the absolute  joy of having such a tender, loving, caring Shepherd.  Never do we have to face life difficulties and struggles alone.  Never is there a need or worry that we cannot approach our Heavenly Father and simply ask Him to meet our urgent need.

Matthew 7:11 – “If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children, how much more shall your Father which is in heaven give good things to them that ask Him?”

3.  When we follow, our future is covered as well.

As we take one more quick glance at verse 1, we notice the particular word, “shall“ not want.  The word “shall” may express our near future, our tomorrow (isn’t that what we usually worry about?), but it also expresses what will definitely be done.

We might claim to our neighbor that “tomorrow we might pick blackberries if it doesn’t rain.”  But, when we use the word “shall”, we have obviously mustered up the determination that we’re definitely going to do something whether rain or sunshine…it’s definitely getting done!

God already knows all about tomorrow and our future needs…all our needs “shall” be met…we shall not want!

Matthew 6:8 – “Be not ye therefore like unto them: for your Father knoweth what things ye have need of, before ye ask Him.”

When we let Jesus become our good Shepherd, we do not lack.  Our every need is met….emotionally, mentally, physically and spiritually. Won’t you follow Him today?

Side Note: I grabbed the opportunity to join the Faithful Bloggers writing project which currently is on the topic of the entire chapter of Psalm 23.  I chose to blog about verse 1.

As busy moms, we use all kind of excuses for not praying.  The most common excuse is that “I just don’t have the time to pray!”.  Does that sound familiar to you? Prayer plays a vital role in our relationship with the Heavenly Father.  When we make excuses not to pray we are telling God He is not that important to us.

1 Thessalonians 5:17 says, “Pray without ceasing.“  Prayers do not have to be long or eloquent in words, but we can certainly see that prayer should be very frequently…as a continual state or attitude of prayer.

Keep in mind that prayer is not just a time to ask God for something, but more importantly, it’s a time to praise and thank God for the things He has done in our lives.  We should also pray for others who have needs.  We can pray constantly throughout our day.   A prayer can be something as quick and simple as, “Thank you God for allowing me to miss that traffic accident on the highway” while we’re driving,  or a simple prayer while cleaning house,  “Thank you, Heavenly Father, for giving me strength to clean up that mess.”

You don’t have to speak out loud to pray. Remember God knows every thought in our minds.  Nothing is hidden from Him.  It is easy to say a quick prayer while getting ready for the day, before meals, while driving, or even at the grocery store.  Stuck in traffic?  Use your time to pray!

While the quick and simple prayers are great, you still need to make sure to spend some quality time with the Lord in your prayer closet.  A number of Christians do this first thing in the morning (we often do our top priorities first, and this is one of our top priorities so you may need to rise a a few minutes earlier than normal if you have a busy schedule ahead).

Another great time for quality prayer is before going to sleep at night.  Set aside a few minutes of prayer and do nothing but pour your heart out to God.  Praise Him, thank Him, ask Him.  You’ll also want to choose your quality times to bring out your prayer journal to remember others in prayer. (I’ll write soon about keeping a prayer journal.)

By continually praying you will see your personal relationship with the Heavenly Father begin to grow.  Prayer can help take worries away, reduce stress, and give you peace.  The Lord Jesus wants to help carry our burdens. Having a regular prayer life with the Lord will change your life.

I want to challenge you this coming week to spend more time in prayer.  Please feel free to share your comments about your own prayer time or share about your own answered prayers.  Let’s encourage each other!

Praise ye the LORD: for it is good to sing praises unto our God; for it is pleasant; and praise is comely. ~ Psalms 147:1

The memory verse for my K-5 class at school last week and the theme verses for my Sunday School class this morning were all based on praising God.  And so, continuing this theme I chose this topic for our devotional today.

First of all, consider this simple question, “Who doesn’t like being given a word of praise after accomplishing something, whether it be great or small?”  It seems that it is in our nature to like being praised.  As God made us in His image (Gen. 1:27), I can imagine how pleasing it is for God to hear our praises given to Him.

Here’s 3 simple ways we can offer praises to God:

1.  Sharing our own testimony of what God has done for us.

Therefore will I give thanks unto thee, O LORD, among the heathen, and sing praises unto thy name. (Ps. 18:49)

Who can argue with one’s own personal testimony?  Share what God has done for you. He’s so good to us that I know we could never run out of praises to give to Him.  We honor Him by giving Him the glory for the small and big things that He’s graciously done for us!

2.  Create a praise journal.

Don’t you just love reading and hearing the praises of David in the book of Psalms?  I know David encouraged himself in the Lord.  This is a habit that we can continue ourselves.  It’s extremely hard to grumble when we’re giving praises to God.

Writing down our praises to God and our answered prayers can be encouraging to us in times of trials and distress.  It serves as a recorded reminder of what God has done for us.  Your praise journal would also make a good item to pass down to your son or daughter as a part of their inheritance.

3.  Sing praises to God.

As we sing hymns at church, we may not really focus on the words we’re singing.   We don’t sing in church to simply hear our lovely voices.  Our hymns focus on praising God.  What a wonderful opportunity to focus on singing praises directly to HIM!

Singing praises is pleasant and comely.  I believe it effects our attitude and yields a grateful spirit.  We can sing praises to God while driving our kids to school in the mornings.  We can bellow out songs of praises in the shower.   We can wake up in the morning with songs of praise.  (It’s better than your morning coffee, I guarantee!)

This week, let’s focus on giving Praises to our God above.  He’s worthy of our Praise!

*As always, feel free to share your comments below.

Delight thyself also in the LORD; and he shall give thee the desires of thine heart. ~ Psalms 37:4

I was thrilled this week with a big blessing from the Lord.  On Monday I was cleaning my living room and thought to myself, “You know, it’s high time I did something with these lamps!  They just don’t match the new living room furniture that I got when I moved here (almost 3 years ago).  I’m going to try to paint them this summer!”

I didn’t say a word about this to my husband or anybody.  On Thursday afternoon, my husband mentioned that he had seen some lamps down at the thrift store that I might like.  I really didn’t think they would match (or be in any desirable condition) as my husband really isn’t much into decorating.  But when I saw them, I couldn’t believe how perfect they were for my living room!  I only needed to buy some new shades for them and I would have some real winners for my living room.

Isn’t God so good! I thought it was so very sweet of my husband to think of me…and I felt even more grateful to the Lord who already knew the desires of my heart.

Don’t you just have a fantastic time giving things to your children and seeing their excitement and enthusiasm?  Of course, if one of my sons were very disobedient one day, how silly it would be to say, “Son, you’ve just been so bad today…let me take you out to get some ice cream!”  As ridiculous as that sounds, many expect God to continue blessing them even when they haven’t been obeying His Word.

Delighting ourselves in the Lord would be the state of devoting ourselves entirely to pleasing Him. The will and state of our heart would be totally fixed on obeying, honoring and pleasing the Lord Jesus.  What parent would not want to shower their own goodness on a child who would be so devoted to pleasing and obeying them?

I’m not trying to imply that we focus our hope on being blessed with earthly things.  Dresses, jewelry, furniture and such are lovely things, but we can’t take them with us to Heaven.  The Bible says in Matthew 6:20, ” But lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust doth corrupt, and where thieves do not break through nor steal:”  Let’s win a crown that we can offer at Jesus’ feet!

I believe when we truly want to please the Lord, our desires will be consistent with the Lord’s desires.  We’ll desire His will for us.  Let’s remember, sin can keep us from getting our prayers answered.  The Bible says, “If I regard iniquity in my heart, the Lord will not hear me: ” Ps 66:18.   What a blessing we miss when our heart is not delighting in the Lord!  Let’s focus this week on truly delighting ourselves in the Lord.

Every wise woman buildeth her house: but the foolish plucketh it down with her hands. ~ Proverbs 14:1

I read the above verse to my Sunday school girls this morning. They’re not too young to learn what an awesome opportunity we have as Christian ladies to build our house with our words and our actions.  Sadly, too many married women may make the choice to throw in the towel and wave her hands wearily exclaiming that she’s given up. 

America wails about the trees and the whales…but where are the determined campaigns to save the homes and the broken hearts of the children?

Homes are being torn apart every single day.  According to statistics for America, the divorce rate is constantly climbing.  Statistics show that first time marriages fail at the rate of 41%, second time marriages fail at 60%, and third time marriages fail at 73%.

The price…the broken pieces of these statistics are the children. The article, “18 Shocking Statistics about Children and Divorce” should cause one to realize the worth of the previous statement.

As married women and mothers, we need to dig our heels in the dirt!  We need to determine that Satan will not have our marriage, our children, our home!!!

“A wise woman buildeth her house.“  “Buildeth” is the present simple form of “build”.  It takes constant work.  We need to determine to keep building…plugging away….working at it.  That, of course, means we will have to keep working on our marriage and with determination keep learning what we can do to be a better wife and mother.

Putting God first to become the best Christians that we possibly can be will help us become the best wives and mothers that we can be as well.   Ladies, there’s power in prayer…so keep praying.  Dig in the Word of God…and then dig your heels in the dirt and stay there!

A merry heart doeth good like a medicine: but a broken spirit drieth the bones. – Proverbs 17:22

A friend says something funny, and you laugh so hard you begin to cry. Perhaps this uncontrollable laughter goes on for several minutes. Did you feel the tension dissipate? What you are experiencing is a release of the stress you’ve been carrying for days. The old adage, “Laughter is the best medicine” is true.

Why is laughter your secret weapon to beating stress?

You may be surprised to know that laughter is equivalent to fifteen minutes on an exercise bike.  It not only lowers the blood pressure, but increases the endorphins in your body which contributes to a healthier immune system.

Life is too short to spend it moping around.  As Christians, we have no excuse to stay down and depressed.  Galatians 5:22 says, “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith,”

Take a break from your household chores and just laugh….by simply reading a book of jokes or laughing with a friend or being silly with your kids, you will be amazed how laughter can improve your physical and emotional well-being. Laughter actually distracts you from the underlying stress, and brings you to a balanced and calm state. It is, as they say, infectious.

Laugh daily. Yes, schedule it!  Note to self: Have I laughed today?

It is the cure-all for stress, frustration and, in some cases, depression. Perhaps you’ve used the expression, “One day we will remember this and laugh our heads off.“  By having a positive attitude, and using laughter as a mechanism to celebrate life instead of stressing over it, you’ll become healthier and less stressed when confronting negative events.

With so much going on in our lives, laughter is a precious commodity that can make anyone’s day brighter. As you go through your daily routine, find something to laugh about. Look at the bright side; tell yourself the cup is half full; laugh until it hurts. You may not have control over certain aspects of life, but you can control the stress. Laughter is your secret weapon to beating stress.

Now….go laugh a little!

When my husband was in Bible college, I had two little boys.  One was a wobbly little toddler who was just learning to walk and the other was a baby not yet walking, who totally relied on mommy to tote him around.

My husband went to college during the day and worked from mid-afternoon until 2 a.m. each night.  Rarely did we see “daddy” that much, and during this time I walked to church services (not far across the street) since my husband had to use our car for transportation to and from work.

One Thursday night, the snow began to fall heavily and I remember it being quite icy as well.  I began to fret somewhat as I realized I was scheduled to work the nursery for soul-winning that night at our church.   Our church kept its doors open faithfully, and rarely did we have any weather severe enough that would alter such an occasion.  So without much further thought, I prepared to venture out to fulfill my duty in the nursery.

When I stepped outside of our apartment and realized how terrible the weather had become and how slippery the main street was, I began to be quite afraid.  I certainly did not want to fall while walking my babies across the busy street.  I headed toward the curb to wait, when suddenly an elderly gentlemen appeared.  He seemed quite stable for his age and had such kind eyes.  He offered to help me across the street by carrying my toddler.  I  hesitated a little, never having seen this man around our apartments before, but at that moment I turned, looking back a short distance away I saw an elderly woman who gave me a kind smile with approving eyes as if assuring me that is was okay.  Assuming this to be his wife, I felt peace to venture across.

My heart had so quickly turned from fearfulness to a moment of peace and calmness. God had sent someone to assist me across the street.  We were safe and sound.  Once I arrived at my destination, it was clear that the weather had become so bad that they were going to have cancel our soul-winning night.   A couple from the church drove us home and so once again we escaped the fearsome street.

I know we all face times that we’re afraid.  When we feel afraid, we need to pray and ask God to help us.  Let’s remember the verse, Psalm 56:3, that encourages us, “What time I am afraid, I will trust in thee.” There is no difficulty or obstacle too huge that God cannot overcome.  Let’s venture forward this week and years to come trusting faithfully in the Lord!

I hope you’ve had a marvelous day.  I apologize for being late today on writing.  My boys all have tests on Monday and we’ve had to do some extra studying this weekend in order to prepare.   I only have time to share a quick thought because I have to get ready to serve up some sandwiches before we leave for church.

While studying science with my 12-year-old son,  I couldn’t help but think how complex the universe really seems to be.  What a wonderful job of complete perfection God has created!   Everything seems to be made for a specific purpose.   What’s even more astonishing, God has numbered and named each star.

Psalms 147:4   He telleth the number of the stars; He calleth them all by their names.

If God cares so much about every small detail (even naming the stars), we know that He must love us immensely.  He’s also created us with a purpose.  He know how many hairs you have on your head…He loves you that much!

Luke 12:7     But even the very hairs of your head are all numbered. Fear not therefore: ye are of more value than many sparrows.

As we face the week ahead, let’s walk with thankfulness in our hearts, praising God for all that He’s done for us.  He constantly thinks about us…but can we say that we constantly think about Him?

Perhaps you muddled on through the day responding to others with the shortest answers possible because you just knew the day wasn’t going to get any better.

It’s true that we all have bad days, but we miss the opportunity to be a blessing to others when we sulk about our own circumstances.  I believe we also miss the opportunity to be thanking and praising God for all that He’s done for us.

Aren’t you glad that Jesus wasn’t grumbling and complaining while dying on the cross for us?  He gladly laid down His life that we might have eternal life.  Now that’s a thought that can make anyone’s day better!

The sad truth is that it’s hard to be grateful when we’re grumbling.  On the other side of the coin, it’s hard to be grumbling when we’re grateful!

We need to have a heart of gratitude which certainly yields contentment. 1 Timothy 6:6 says, “But godliness with contentment is great gain.”

I want to challenge you this week to turn your grumbling to gratitude.  Start each morning thanking God for several things He’s done for you throughout your life.

I tell you there’s nothing so satisfying as having a second helping of my favorite dishes, such as homemade chicken and noodle soup (which I made today…and enjoyed thoroughly).  But while we’re encouraged as women to “watch our weight” and cut down on those extra portions, you can feast wholeheartedly on the Word of God.  In fact, feast on it continually!

Ps. 119:57 says, “Thou art my portion O Lord: I have said that I would keep thy words.”   As a child of God, we’re heirs with Him (Rom. 8:17).  We’re no longer slaves to sin, but as sons, we can have victory in our lives.

As heirs, we should strive to keep the Word of God.  It’s our guide and instruction Book…our own personal love letter from God.  Of course, it’s hard to keep His Word if we don’t read it.  We need to continually feast upon it, memorize it  (Pr. 7: 2,3), and hear it (Rom. 10:17)…not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together (Heb. 10:25) by attending our local church.

Wouldn’t it be great if we walked so closely to God that our friends would not be envying our new dress or new hair style, but were simply yearning for a double portion of our spiritual walk with God?

Elisha wanted a double portion…

2 Kings 2:9 “And it came to pass, when they were gone over, that Elijah said unto Elisha, Ask what I shall do for thee, before I be taken away from thee. And Elisha said, I pray thee, let a double portion of thy spirit be upon me.”

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