daddy4ms

Can I go back to the ocean?  This song is a great reminder of who God is.  And it reminds us about how we can go deeper in relationship with Him.  Enjoy this powerful song on this wonderful Sunday!

We are finishing up our series on Jesus Is ______ by Judah Smith this weekend.  I have enjoyed our discussions on who Jesus is which better equips us to worship Him.  Our next series is based on the book One Way Love by Tullian Tchividjian.  We will be focusing on how understanding God's One Way Love frees us up to serve God and others.  If you have not read the book, it is excellent for many reasons but especially the explanation of grace and law.  Pick it up at your local Christian bookstore.  As you know, I recommend Faith and Life Bookstore in Newton.

After attending the Liberate Conference this year, I purchased the book Thoughts that Make Your Heart Sing by Sally Lloyd-Jones.  As I have posted before, I highly recommend The Jesus Storybook Bible to all parents.  However, I had not read any of this other book. About a week ago, Molly (my 6 year old) and I were reading one of the stories.  It is the story about faith as small as a mustard seed.  Picture from the book is below.  What amazed me was how I had focused so often on the size of my faith (mustard seed) rather than who our faith is in.  All of a sudden a light bulb came on for me.  It is about faith in Jesus and who He is and His power, not how much faith I can work up or muster.  The Holy Spirit can use many different tools including a children's book to help us go deeper.

If you walk into Hesston MB Church, you will find these posters.  This is our challenge to our church family in 2014.    I thought I would share what I am doing individually and as a family.  I struggle with memorization so we as a family are using games such as Sparkle to help us memorize verses from the book of John.  So far, we have completed John 1:1 and John 1:14.  I have also encouraged the kids to be reading through John and sharing a Life Book with someone.   Because of my personality, I love to meditate on God's Word so I am continuing on that as well as reading through John in 2014.  My focus this year as it was in 2013 is not to read through the whole Bible, but instead to let God's word sink into my head, heart and hands through reading smaller sections. I am also praying for opportunities to share God's Word with others.   How are you going deeper in your relationship with Jesus in 2014?    

In Authentic, by James MacDonald, he discusses several disciplines for the Christian life.  I am sharing a few thoughts from him about prayer today. Get this: the secret to prayer is prayer in secret. God loves you and me, yet do we approach Him like we believe it?  Prayers do not inform God. Prayers exercise faith in God.   The essence of the Lord's Prayer is an attitude of expectation that God does hear, He draws near, and He does answer. Practicing godly anticipation is one of the disciplines of a sincere faith.  

Pastor Brad gave me the book pictured for Christmas.  We are going through this book as a church on the third Sunday of the month helping people go deeper in their relationship with Jesus.  I look forward to the discussions.