Every Day Light

[frawin]

Judy, that is a good one, I need to print that one off and read it to myself at least once each day. Myrna has always treated me so  good and always put the family and me first, I am so thankful that I have had her with me this past 45 years. I know I am not a very patient person and I know I need to improve on that. I know that I owe whatever successes I have had in life to her, she has always encouraged me to go for whatever my dreams were and she would always be there no matter the outcome. Thanks again for the reminder.

[dnalexander]

Uncle Frank and Aunt Myrna that is truly a touching story.

If you all missed it I think you should read this post from Judy she needs our inspiration and prayers.

http://www.cascity.com/howard/forum/index.php/topic,4306.msg65467.html#msg65467

[Judy Harder]

September 11



A Check-Up for Wives
For reading & meditation - 1 Peter 3:1-12
"Wives, in the same way be submissive to your husbands ..." (v. 1)

Yesterday the men were asked to examine themselves using a simple questionnaire as to how they were doing as husbands. Today a similar opportunity is extended to wives. 1. Are you depending on the Lord to meet your basic needs for security, significance, and self-worth? (YES/NO) 2. Can you meet financial disasters bravely without condemning your husband for his mistakes, or comparing him unfavorably with others? (YES/NO) 3. Do you dress with an eye for your husband's likes and dislikes in color and style? (YES/NO) 4. Do you keep up your own personal prayer life so that you may meet everything that arises with poise? (YES/NO) 5. Do you avoid daydreaming or fantasizing about other men you might have married? (YES/NO) 6. Are you sensitive to your husband?s moods and feelings and know when, and when not, to bring up delicate issues? (YES/NO) 7. Do you respect your husband? (YES/NO) 8. Are you careful never to criticize your husband in front of others? (YES/NO) 9. Do you keep track of the day's news and what is happening in the world so that you can discuss these with your husband? (YES/NO) 10. Are you a "submissive" wife? (YES/NO) A score of 7 to 10 yes responses - excellent. Below 7 yes answers - it's decision time.
Prayer:

My heavenly Father, I realize the tender relationships of home can be a shrine, or they can be a snarl. Keep my inner shrine from all wrong attitudes and from all worry. Let me approach today's challenge in the knowledge that "I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me" (Phil. 4:13, NKJV). Amen.
For Further Study
Prov. 31:10-31; 1 Tim. 3:11; Esther 1:20
1. What are the characteristics of a virtuous woman?
2. What do her children call her?

[Judy Harder]

When Broken by Stress
For reading & meditation - Psalm 71:1-24
"You have let me sink down deep in desperate problems. But you will bring me back to life again, up from the depths of the earth!" (v. 20, TLB)

Another major cause for brokenness in human life is stress. Often I get letters from people saying something like this: "I feel I am on the verge of a breakdown. No one thing seems to be responsible for it, but I just can't cope. My doctor says I am suffering from stress. Can the Bible meet this need?" I am bold to say that it can. God can take a person overcome by stress and build into their lives insights which will enable them to live above and beyond its paralyzing grip. What exactly is "stress"? One doctor defines it as "wear and tear on the personality which, if uncorrected, can result in a physical or mental breakdown." Donald Norfolk, a British osteopath who has made a special study of stress, claims that it comes from two main causes: too little change, or too much change. To function at peak efficiency, we all need a certain amount of change. However, when changes come too fast for us to cope with, the personality is put under tremendous stress. Dr. Thomas H. Holmes measures stress in terms of "units of change " For example, the death of a loved one measures 100 units, divorce 73 units, pregnancy 40 units, moving or altering a home 25 units, and Christmas 12 units. His conclusion is that no one can handle more than 300 units of stress in a twelve- month period without suffering physically or emotionally during the next two years. Holmes, of course, was speaking from a strictly human point of view - with God "all things are possible."
Prayer:

Father, You have taught me much on how to turn my weaknesses into strengths. Teach me now how to handle stress. I cannot change my surroundings - but I can change my attitude. Help me to do this. For Jesus' sake. Amen.
For Further Study
Luke 10:38-42; Phil. 4:6; Ps. 127:2; Matt. 6:25
1. What was Jesus' response to Martha?
2. How did it differ from His response to Mary?

[Judy Harder]

September 13



What a Waste!
For reading & meditation - Philippians 4:1-13
"Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God." (v. 6)

We continue meditating on the principles we can use when our lives are threatened by stress: Recognize the symptoms of stress. No alarm bells ring in our homes or offices when we are suffering undue stress, but there are adequate warning signs. People under stress generally become irritable and overreact to relatively trivial frustrations. They show a change in their sleep patterns, and become increasingly tired and restless. They derive less pleasure from life, experience no joy while praying or reading the Bible, laugh less, and become plagued with feelings of inadequacy and self-doubt. They sometimes develop psychosomatic complaints such as tension headaches, indigestion and other things. Some people have what is known as "target organs" - physical organs that are the first to suffer when they are under stress. Harold Wilson confessed that whenever he had to fire a colleague, he suffered acute stomach pains. Henry Ford suffered cramps in his stomach whenever he had to make an important business decision. Trotsky, when under pressure, used to develop bouts of high temperature, and frequently had to spend time in the Crimea recuperating. One businessman I know always has a glass of milk on his desk from which he takes frequent sips in order to calm his nagging peptic ulcer. Are you able to recognize your own particular patterns of stress? You owe it to God and yourself to find out. The waste that goes on in Christian circles through believers channeling their energies into coping with stress, rather than into extending the kingdom of God, is appalling.
Prayer:

O God, sharpen my ability to recognize the things I do that contribute to stress in my life, so that all my energies can be channeled into spiritual activity, not self-activity. For Jesus' sake. Amen

For Further Study
Luke 12:15-34; 2 Tim. 1:12; 2 Cor. 11:22-33; 12:7-10
1. What was the key to Paul's trust under stress?
2. List six reasons Jesus gave for not worrying about tomorrow

[Judy Harder]

September 14



Stop and Smell the Roses
For reading & meditation - Matthew 6:25-34
"... Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow ..." (v. 28, RSV)

Another principle that helps us cope with stress is this: Seek to overcome any rigidity in your personality. You can best understand rigidity by comparing it with its opposite - flexibility. A more formal definition of rigidity is this: "The inability or refusal to change one's actions or attitudes even though objective conditions indicate that a change is desirable." The rigid person clings to certain ways of thinking and acting, even when they are injurious to the personality and burn up their emotional energy. Someone described it as similar to driving a car with the brakes on. Take the housewife who worries herself into a migraine attack because she cannot maintain a scrupulously tidy home while her grandchildren are visiting. Or the businessman who triggers off another gastric ulcer because he falls behind with his schedule when his secretary is away sick. Inflexible goals can be crippling fetters. It's no good saying, "But there are things that have to be done, and if I don't do them, they just won't get done." Perhaps you need to rearrange your priorities, adjust your lifestyle and learn to say Ono." As someone put it, "We must not drive so relentlessly forward that we cannot stop and smell the roses by the wayside." You may be caught up in the midst of one of the busiest weeks of your year, but pause for a moment and ask yourself: am I driving, or am I being driven? Am I in control of my personality, or is it in control of me? Today, decide to take a step away from rigidity by pausing to "smell a rose."
Prayer:

O God, I am now at grips with the raw material of living; out of it must come a person - Your person. Help me to be rigid only in relation to You, and flexible about everything else. For Jesus' sake. Amen.
For Further Study
Gen. 1; 2:1-3; Heb. 4:1-11; Ps. 37:7; Matt. 11:29
1. What was man's first day?
2. How can we enter into God's rest?

[Judy Harder]

September 15

Don't Push the River!
For reading & meditation - Ecclesiastes 3:1-4
"There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under heaven ..." (v. 1)

Refuse to be obsessed with time. It is right to be concerned about time, but it is not right to be obsessed with it. Do you live life by the clock? Then you are a candidate for stress. When filmmakers want to create tension, they show a clock relentlessly ticking away. Such tactics are pointless when applied to the ordinary issues of everyday life. Nervous glances at a watch will generate tension when you are caught in traffic, but they will not make the traffic move any faster. Fretting will do nothing to alter the situation. So learn to relax, and do not become intimidated by time. Some people live life as if they are on a racing track, and set themselves rigid lap times for the things they want to accomplish during the day. Two motorists were given the task of driving for 1,700 miles. One was asked to drive as fast as he could without breaking any speed limits; the other was told to drive at any comfortable pace. At the end of their journeys, it was found that the faster driver had consumed ten gallons more gas and doubled the wear on his tires; by driving at a speed which, in the end, proved to be only two miles per hour faster than the other driver! A man said to me in a counseling session when I advised him to slow down: "The trouble is that I'm in a hurry - but God isn't!" Learn the wisdom of letting things develop at their own pace, and follow the maxim that says: "Don't push the river - let it flow."
Prayer:

O Father, save me from being obsessed by time. Help me to see that I have all the time in the world to do what You want me to do. And when I am overconcerned, I am overwrought! Help me, dear Father. Amen.
For Further Study
Eph. 5:1-21; Col. 4:5; James 4:14
1. How can we redeem the time?
2. To what does James relate this?

[Judy Harder]

September 16


Keeping Fit for Jesus!
For reading & meditation - 1 Timothy 4:1-12
"... physical training is of some value, but godliness has value for all things ..." (v.

We spend one last day meditating on the ways by which we can overcome stress in our lives. This final principle is: engage in as much physical exercise as is necessary. One laboratory experiment took ten underexercised rats, and subjected them repeatedly to a variety of stresses: shock, pain, shrill noises, and flashing lights. After a month, every one of them had died through the incessant strain. Another group of rats was given a good deal of exercise until they were in peak physical condition. They were then subjected to the same battery of stresses and strains. After a month, not one had died. More and more Christians are waking up to the fact that God has given us bodies that are designed to move, and the more they are exercised, the more effectively they function. Studies on how exercise helps to reduce stress are quite conclusive. Exercise gets rid of harmful chemicals in our bodies, provides a form of abreaction (letting off steam), builds up stamina, counteracts the biochemical effects of stress, and reduces the risk of psychological illness. The Bible rarely mentions the need for physical exercise, because people living at that time usually walked everywhere and therefore needed little admonition on the subject. In our world of advanced technology, however, common sense tells us that our bodies need to be exercised, and we should not neglect it. It may not be a spectacular idea, but often God comes to us along some very dusty and lowly roads. We must not despise His coming just because He comes to us along a lowly road.
Prayer:

Lord, help me not to despise this call of Yours to exercise my body. Forgive me that I am such a poor tenant of Your property. From today I determine to do better. For Your own Name's sake. Amen.
For Further Study
1 Kings 19; 1 Cor. 3:16-17; 6:19
1. What caused stress in Elijah's life?
2. How did God help him?

[Judy Harder]

September 17

Transformed!
For reading & meditation - Psalm 32:1-11
"Blessed is he whose transgressions are forgiven, whose sins are covered." (v. 1)

We come now to speak of all those who have been broken, or are on the verge of being broken, by the memory of some deeply grievous sin. I am not thinking so much of those who have committed sin and have not come to Christ for forgiveness, but of those who, though they have been forgiven by God, are unable to forgive themselves. A man came to me recently at the end of a meeting at which I had spoken, and told me the details of a particularly horrendous sin in which he had been involved. He said, "I know God has forgiven me, but the memory of what I have done is constantly with me. It is quietly driving me insane." This brought to mind a story I heard many years ago of a father who taught his son to drive a nail into a board every time he did something wrong, and then to pull out the nail after he had confessed the wrong and had been forgiven. Every time this happened, the boy would say triumphantly, "Hurray! The nails are gone!" "Yes," his father would say, "but always remember that the marks made by the nails are still in the wood." The message I want you to get hold of and build into your life is this: the Carpenter of Nazareth can not only pull out the nails, but can also varnish and beautify the wood so that the marks become, not a contradiction, but a contribution.
Prayer:

Lord Jesus Christ, You who once were known as a carpenter's son, take the stains and blemishes of my past and work through them so that they contribute, rather than contradict. For Your own dear Name's sake. Amen.

For Further Study
1 John 1; Ps. 103:3; Acts 5:31; Eph. 1:7
1. How can we know full forgiveness?
2. Why not ask for it today?

[Judy Harder]

September 18

Grace - Greater Than All Our Sin!
For reading & meditation - Romans 5:12-21
"... where sin abounded, grace did much more abound ..." (v. 20, KJV)

We are meditating on how to recover from the brokenness caused by the memory of some deeply grievous sin. By that we mean a sin which God has forgiven but which, for some reason, still burns in our memories. The first principle is this: realize that God can do more with sin than just forgive it. I heard an elderly minister make that statement many years ago, when I was a young Christian, and at first I resisted it. I said to myself: "How can God use sin? Surely it is His one intolerance?" Then, after pondering for a while, I saw what he meant. God uses our sin to motivate our will toward greater spiritual achievement, to quicken our compassion toward sinners and to show God's tender heart for the fallen. We must be careful, of course, that we do not fall into the error which Paul refers to in Romans 6:1-2: "Shall we continue in sin, that grace may abound? God forbid" (KJV). If we sin in order that God may use it, then our motives are all wrong and we fall foul of the eternal purposes. If, however, we commit sin, but then take it to God in confession - really take it to Him - then He will not only forgive it, but make something of it. Is this too difficult for you to conceive? Then I point you to the cross. The cross was the foulest deed mankind ever committed, yet God used it to become the fulcrum of His redemption. It was our lowest point - but it was God's zenith. Hallelujah.
Prayer:

O Father, I am so relieved to know that You take even my sins and make them contribute to Your purposes. Grace turns all my bad into good, all my good into better and all my better into the best. Hallelujah!
For Further Study
Heb. 10:1-22; Isa. 43:25; 44:22; 55:7
1. What will God not remember any more?
2. What is the "full assurance" we can have?