Sunday, July 5, 2026

250…

 250….. 


Yesterday was a day of remembrance and thanksgiving…the 250 birthday of America…what a delight to be alive for such a birthday…to watch and listen to historical speeches from so many…to remember what our forefathers went through to build this country, to honor those who fought for this country…the rich, the poor, the aspiring, the dreamers, the everyday people who trudged through history not knowing they were even making  history.


This past week I have watched segments about the “State Fair” in our capital, visiting state exhibits showing their stuff with proudness,  plus going to various places and their celebrations with the finale last night at the US a capital, the music, the rain, the interviews of heroes from past wars, interviews of everyday people who wanted to celebrate the nation’s birthday…I heard speeches about people who dreamed of freedom, who built, who designed…the history of our flag and places it has gone…

Then the fireworks…


Reading again in John 17, Jesus praying for us…people who want the truth…who will fight the evil one in their time, who will take the Word throughout the world…unity in the faith…seeing his glory…

Us, whom he planned for, who each have a divine plan given by the Creator of the universe….

We celebrate Jesus who loves us, died for us, rose for us, transforms us…


Thank YOU….


John17:14 I have given them your word and the world has hated them, for they are not of the world any more than I am of the world. 15 My prayer is not that you take them out of the world but that you protect them from the evil one. 16 They are not of the world, even as I am not of it. 17 Sanctify them by the truth; your word is truth. 18 As you sent me into the world, I have sent them into the world. 19 For them I sanctify myself, that they too may be truly sanctified.

Jesus Prays for All Believers

20 “My prayer is not for them alone. I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message, 21 that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me. 22 I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one— 23 I in them and you in me—so that they may be brought to complete unity. Then the world will know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me.

24 “Father, I want those you have given me to be with me where I am, and to see my glory, the glory you have given me because you loved me before the creation of the world.

25 “Righteous Father, though the world does not know you, I know you, and they know that you have sent me. 26 I have made you known to them, and will continue to make you known in order that the love you have for me may be in them and that I myself may be in them.”


Thank YOU for blessing America, but more for blessing those who believe and have put their trust in You…

Countries will rise and fall, but You are my…


Firm Foundation…


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aFMp8oYkhdw&list=RDaFMp8oYkhdw&start_radio=1

Saturday, July 4, 2026

John 17…

 John 17…


This has to be my favorite chapter in the whole Bible…and I have said it in the past, I know…but, it still is…there are so many thoughts in it….


But this verse hit me this morning…John 17:13…”I am coming to you now, but I say these things while I am still in the world, so that they may have the full measure of my joy within them. “


“Joy is a common theme in Christ’s teachings…he wants us to be joyful..the key to immeasurable joy is living in intimate contact with Christ, the source of all joy.when we do we will experience God’s special care and protection and see the victory God brings even when defeat seems certain.” Bible study notes…


Psalm 16:11 You make known to me the path of life;
    you will fill me with joy in your presence,
    with eternal pleasures at your right hand.


Psalm 30:11 You turned my wailing into dancing;
    you removed my sackcloth and clothed me with joy


Nehemiah 8:10 Nehemiah said, “Go and enjoy choice food and sweet drinks, and send some to those who have nothing prepared. This day is holy to our Lord. Do not grieve, for the joy of the Lord is your strength.”


John 15:11 I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete. 


John 16:24 Until now you have not asked for anything in my name. Ask and you will receive, and your joy will be complete.


There are so many “joy” verses! Reading them lifts the darkness that can descend on dark days…

Jesus wants us to experience his joy! A full measure…not just a little bit…abundantly….


There are days I need to call on those promises….cling to them…until my heart and soul  are lifted again…


Thank YOU….


Joy of  the Lord…


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mmFoSOyr6vo&list=RDmmFoSOyr6vo&start_radio=1


Friday, July 3, 2026

 Losing to gain…


None of us like to lose a loved one….

Jesus said in John 16:20 b, “You will grieve, but your grief will turn to joy”…as he was telling his disciples of his departure…he had to leave for their  good, his departure let the Counselor come …


None of us like to get hurt…but, yet doctors will say, this is going to hurt, but you will be better afterwards…ugh…I hate to hear those words and I have heard them many times in the last few years…


Or going through trials can deepen our faith…why can’t we deepen our faith without the trial? Hummm…


Things will get better…


Jesus was trying to encourage the disciples, but it still hurt, there would still be grief before the “better” part… 


John 16:5 but now I am going to him who sent me. None of you asks me, ‘Where are you going?’ 6 Rather, you are filled with grief because I have said these things. 7 But very truly I tell you, it is for your good that I am going away. Unless I go away, the Advocate will not come to you; but if I go, I will send him to you. 8 When he comes, he will prove the world to be in the wrong about sin and righteousness and judgment: 9 about sin, because people do not believe in me; 10 about righteousness, because I am going to the Father, where you can see me no longer; 11 and about judgment, because the prince of this world now stands condemned.

12 “I have much more to say to you, more than you can now bear. 13 But when he, the Spirit of truth, comes, he will guide you into all the truth. He will not speak on his own; he will speak only what he hears, and he will tell you what is yet to come. 14 He will glorify me because it is from me that he will receive what he will make known to you. 15 All that belongs to the Father is mine. That is why I said the Spirit will receive from me what he will make known to you.”


Psalm 30:5b weeping may stay for the night,
    but rejoicing comes in the morning.


Just think, that if Jesus hadn’t left, we would be without the Holy Spirit…I can’t even imagine…where would we get truth, understanding, counsel…who would speak to our soul?

But, of course,  God may have worked a different way…


Thank YOU…


There’s a sweet sweet spirit …


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CM7Iym4u9QY&list=RDCM7Iym4u9QY&start_radio=1

Thursday, July 2, 2026

Count it…

 Count it…


Was reading this passage this morning…when you add the other passages…just think about it…the promises…


Jesus said…

John 15:18 “If the world hates you, keep in mind that it hated me first. 19 If you belonged to the world, it would love you as its own. As it is, you do not belong to the world, but I have chosen you out of the world. That is why the world hates you. 20 Remember what I told you: ‘A servant is not greater than his master.’ If they persecuted me, they will persecute you also. If they obeyed my teaching, they will obey yours also. 21 They will treat you this way because of my name, for they do not know the one who sent me. 22 If I had not come and spoken to them, they would not be guilty of sin; but now they have no excuse for their sin. 23 Whoever hates me hates my Father as well. 24 If I had not done among them the works no one else did, they would not be guilty of sin. As it is, they have seen, and yet they have hated both me and my Father. 25 But this is to fulfill what is written in their Law: ‘They hated me without reason.’


John 16:1 “All this I have told you so that you will not fall away. 2 They will put you out of the synagogue; in fact, the time is coming when anyone who kills you will think they are offering a service to God. 3 They will do such things because they have not known the Father or me. 4 I have told you this, so that when their time comes you will remember that I warned you about them. I did not tell you this from the beginning because I was with you, 


James later wrote…

James 1: 2 Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, 3 because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance. 4 Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything. 


Paul later wrote…

Romans 8:28 And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose. 


“We should consider our personal trials and sorrows joy because of what they allow God to do in us…if we let our trials break us, God can’t use us…but if we go into those trials knowing that God is going to do something great with us, something for which he has to strengthen us in advance, it all comes into perspective.”

Terri Blackstock…

What a comfort in trials…something good will come, perseverance, maturity…completeness…


Thank YOU…


Count it all joy…


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lKlmA1nhTNU&list=RDlKlmA1nhTNU&start_radio=1

Wednesday, July 1, 2026

 


Fatherhood…


I had a great dad, kind and gentle…oh, he had his quirks just as I have mine, after all he was human, but for the most part he was a good dad…


Over the years, I have seen great dads, awful dads, horrible dads…and a bunch of other descriptions…both in secular life and in the church life…


Then over the years our culture has emasculated men as stupid, weak if they show gentleness, kindness…which is hard to watch…


Thinking about yesterday’s blog, a welcoming father who loved his daughter through so much…until she realized that he was emulating his God the Father…how we want to be loved like that…how we want to love like that just touched my soul so much…


Romans 8:14-39 speaks of Gods fatherhood so much…




“The fatherhood of God is a central theme in the Bible, illustrating His intimate relationship with humanity.

Biblical Definition
God's fatherhood signifies a relationship characterized by authority, care, and love. In both the Old and New Testaments, God is depicted as a loving and protective Father, guiding His people much like a father guides his children


Key Aspects

Love and Care: God's fatherhood reflects His deep love and commitment to His creation, emphasizing His protective nature


Discipline and Guidance: Just as earthly fathers discipline their children, God also guides and corrects His people for their growth


Covenantal Relationship: The fatherhood of God is often linked to His covenant with Israel, portraying a special bond between God and His chosen people


Theological Implications
Understanding God's fatherhood helps believers grasp the nature of their relationship with Him, fostering a sense of belonging and security in faith.

This concept encourages believers to approach God with trust and reverence, recognizing His role as a loving Father who desires a personal relationship with each individual.


Key verses:

1 Corinthians 8:6 yet for us there is but one God, the Father, from whom all things came and for whom we live; and there is but one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom all things came and through whom we live.

This verse establishes God as the source of all creation…

John 1: 12 Yet to all who did receive him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God— 

This emphasizes the relationship believers have with God as their Father…


Attributes of God’s Fatherhood…

Provider. Loving discipline. Comfort and support…”

AI answer from the Web…(two different days…)


Thank YOU…Father..


https://biblerepository.com/bible-verses-about-the-fatherhood-

of-god/


https://africa.thegospelcoalition.org/article/comforting-truths-found-in-the-fatherhood-of-god/


https://www.spurgeon.org/sermons/the-fatherhood-of-god


Good, good Father…


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qlsQrycKKsY&list=RDqlsQrycKKsY&start_radio=1

Tuesday, June 30, 2026

 I am  not trying to sell this book or study . 


I just wanted to share this story..many of us have lived  or are living in desperate times…who do we turn to?


God as our father will welcome us home , feed us and continue to love us…


Thank YOU…


Ruth Graham fled her marriage 24 hours after her wedding day. She drove home expecting her famous father, Billy Graham, to say "I told you so." He said two words instead, and they changed her life.


Most Christian women would never guess that the daughter of Billy Graham, the most famous evangelist in modern American history, has been married four times.


That her first husband was unfaithful for years before she found out.


That her rebound marriage lasted three months.


That her third marriage was to the love of her life, who told her ten years in that he didn't want to be married anymore.


That her fourth husband was a man she calls, in her own words, "a narcissistic sociopath."


If anyone had reason to feel like a Christian failure, it was her.


The daughter of America's pastor. Quietly carrying the kind of story most Christian women would be terrified to tell at a Bible study, let alone on national radio.


But she tells it.


She tells it because at some point in the middle of all of it, she made the drive that changed everything.


She had married her second husband against her parents' direct advice. Within 24 hours of the wedding, she knew she had made a catastrophic mistake. She had to flee the state. She had to go home.


She tells the story like this.


"I wondered what were they going to say to me? What was I going to say to them? Would they say we told you not to. You made your bed, now you have to lie on it. 


We're tired of fooling with you. And as I rounded the bend in my parents' driveway, my father was standing there. 


When I got out of the car, he said welcome home."


Welcome home.


That was it.


No lecture. No I told you so. No conditions. No silent disappointment radiating off him while he held his tongue.


Two words.


Welcome home.


She said it changed her life.


She said it gave her, for the first time, a picture of what God was actually like. Not the stern stick-wielding judge she had carried around in her head her whole life. The Father in the driveway. Waiting. Already loving her. 


Already glad she came back.


And here is the part of her story that I cannot stop thinking about.


For most of her adult life, before that drive, she would have told you that Jesus was her security.


That's what she said. On national radio. In her own words.

"I would have told you Jesus is my security. But that wasn't true deep down where the secrets are kept."


Read that line again.


I would have told you Jesus is my security. But it wasn't true deep down where the secrets are kept.


How many Christian women feel exactly that.


You would say the right answer. You would even mean it on Sunday morning, when the worship is good and the sermon is hitting. But deep down, where the secrets are, where nobody can see, where you can't even let yourself look most days, you know something isn't right.


You're a Christian. You've been a Christian for thirty years.


And you're still chasing security in the wrong men.


And you're still chasing approval in the wrong rooms.


And you're still chasing peace in the bottom of a wine glass or the bottom of a shopping cart or the bottom of someone else's life that you're trying to fix.


And you would never say any of that out loud.


Ruth Graham did. She said the quiet part out loud. And it's the reason her story is one of the most healing stories any Christian woman can hear.


She didn't say it from a place of being lost. She said it from a place of being found.


But here's what most Christian women never figure out, and what nobody in church seems willing to say out loud.


The reason "Jesus is my security" doesn't feel true in the secret place isn't that you don't believe it.


It's that you don't actually know him.


You know about him.


You've heard about him your whole life.


You've sung the songs and quoted the verses and taught the lessons.


But you've never actually sat with him long enough, on the page, in his own Word, to know him well enough that "Jesus is my security" stops being a Christian answer and starts being a fact you'd bet your life on.


Because here's what the Bible actually shows you, page by page, when you finally read it slowly enough.


A God who stands in the driveway.


A God who watches the prodigal coming a long way off and runs to meet him.


A God who tells Hagar, when she's run away into the wilderness alone and hopeless, that he sees her.


A God who tells David, when David is at his absolute lowest in the Psalms, that he is not done with him.


A God who tells Peter, the night after Peter denied him three times, to come have breakfast on the beach.


A God whose entire Bible from Genesis to Revelation is one long welcome home.


But you cannot know that God by reading three chapters and closing the book.


You cannot know him by Googling a verse when you need one.


You cannot know him by listening to sermons about other people's relationships with him.


You have to actually go in. Slowly. With context. Week by week. Until the woman in the secret place finally hears the same two words Ruth heard.


I know because I was that woman.


I went to church every single Sunday for my entire adult life.


I had a Bible that I genuinely tried to read.


I started reading plans in January more times than I can count.


I made it through Leviticus barely holding on, wondering what animal sacrifices have to do with my life.


I read Romans and closed the book not being able to explain a single thing I had just read.


I read the Psalms and felt comforted in the moment but couldn't tell you two days later what I had actually learned.


Year after year, the same cycle.


Start in January. Slow down by March. Quietly stop by April.


And carry that shame, that quiet guilt of being a Christian woman who still didn't really know her own Bible, all the way back to December.


When I'd tell myself again that next year would be different.


And the whole time, just like Ruth, I would have told anyone who asked that Jesus was my security.


But deep down, where the secrets were kept, I knew it wasn't true.


I was looking for security in everyone but him.


I was looking for love in places he had already promised to be.


I was looking for a welcome home in driveways that didn't have him standing in them.


The problem wasn't my motivation.


It wasn't my discipline.


It wasn't my faith.


It was that I had never actually met the God of the driveway on the page.


That's when I found something that changed everything.


A 52-week guided study that walks you through the entire Bible, one theme at a time, from Genesis to Revelation.


Before you read anything each week, it gives you a short explanation of exactly what you're about to get into.


Who wrote it.


When.


Why.


What was happening in the world at the time.


And how every page connects to the God who has been standing in the driveway waiting for the woman reading it.


Genesis: not just the story of how it all started, but the story of how God showed up for hurting, ashamed, hiding women from the very first page.


Psalms: the actual prayers of people who would have told you, on a good day, that God was their security. And the prayers they prayed on the bad days when they had to find out if it was actually true.


The Gospels: who Jesus really is. Not the Sunday school version. The Jesus who told Peter to come have breakfast. The Jesus who told the woman at the well her whole story without flinching. The Jesus who stands in the driveway every single time.


For the first time in my life, I read my Bible and I met the God Ruth Graham met in that driveway.


For the first time, "Jesus is my security" stopped being a Christian answer and started being something I actually felt deep down where the secrets are kept.


I'd open it in the morning and not want to close it.


I'd read something and think about it all day.


Verses I had read dozens of times suddenly meant something completely new, because I finally had the context to understand what they were saying.


And slowly, week by week, something shifted.


I stopped chasing security in places that couldn't give it to me.


I stopped trying to outrun my own shame.


I started to actually feel, in the secret place where it counts, that God was the Father standing in the driveway.


Ruth Graham says it like this.


"He gave me unconditional love. And that's what everybody wants to feel. Unfortunately, so many people don't have that father. That's why he is a picture of what God is like. We can come to him, run to him, in his arms, battered, bruised, broken, sinful, and he just welcomes us."


Battered. Bruised. Broken. Sinful.


That's most of us, on most days, whether we admit it or not.


And the God of the Bible is in the driveway.


But you'll never feel it deep down where the secrets are kept until you actually go meet him on the page.


This is what finally helped me close that gap.


Right now it's up to 62% off, and every order comes with a free pen pack.


Don't spend another year being a Christian woman who would say Jesus is her security but doesn't believe it where it counts.


Don't spend another year carrying secrets you're afraid to bring home.


This is what Ruth Graham figured out in a driveway. The God of the Bible has been saying it on every page the whole time.


Welcome home.

Here I am…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_GkNY89jt6I&list=RD_GkNY89jt6I&start_radio=1


Tap below and grab yours before they sell out.


Learn more

Monday, June 29, 2026

Love…

 Love…


Was reading through these verses…usually we study them separately, but adding them together is profound…


Thinking about the fatherhood of God…our relationships with one another…the basis…what we need to exhibit….


John 15:9 “As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Now remain in my love. 10 If you keep my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commands and remain in his love. 11 I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete. 12 My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you. 13 Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. 14 You are my friends if you do what I command. 15 I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master’s business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you. 16 You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you so that you might go and bear fruit—fruit that will last—and so that whatever you ask in my name the Father will give you. 17 This is my command: Love each other.


1 John 4: 7 Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. 8 Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love. 9 This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. 10 This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. 11 Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. 12 No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us.

13 This is how we know that we live in him and he in us: He has given us of his Spirit. 14 And we have seen and testify that the Father has sent his Son to be the Savior of the world. 15 If anyone acknowledges that Jesus is the Son of God, God lives in them and they in God. 16 And so we know and rely on the love God has for us.

God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in them. 17 This is how love is made complete among us so that we will have confidence on the day of judgment: In this world we are like Jesus. 18 There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love.

19 We love because he first loved us. 20 Whoever claims to love God yet hates a brother or sister is a liar. For whoever does not love their brother and sister, whom they have seen, cannot love God, whom they have not seen. 21 And he has given us this command: Anyone who loves God must also love their brother and sister.

1 John 5

Faith in the Incarnate Son of God

5 Everyone who believes that Jesus is the Christ is born of God, and everyone who loves the father loves his child as well. 2 This is how we know that we love the children of God: by loving God and carrying out his commands. 3 In fact, this is love for God: to keep his commands. And his commands are not burdensome, 4 for everyone born of God overcomes the world. This is the victory that has overcome the world, even our faith. 5 Who is it that overcomes the world? Only the one who believes that Jesus is the Son of God.


1Corinthians 13:4 Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. 5 It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. 6 Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. 7 It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.

8 Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away. 9 For we know in part and we prophesy in part, 10 but when completeness comes, what is in part disappears. 11 When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put the ways of childhood behind me. 12 For now we see only a reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.

13 And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.


Thank YOU…


The love of God…


https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=NafJoD8Mt94&list=RDNafJoD8Mt94&start_radio=1&pp=ygUedGhlIGxvdmUgb2YgZ29kIGlzIGdyZWF0ZXIgZmFyoAcB


https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=2LapBD802O0&list=RD2LapBD802O0&start_radio=1&pp=ygUQdGhlIGxvdmUgb2YgZ29kIKAHAQ%3D%3D