Calm My Anxious Heart By: Linda Dillow

Many women today are nearsighted, not in their eyesight but in their life focus. They don't know why they're here or where they're going. They drift like a ship without a rudder. Dr. Swenson, author of Margin, says that aimlessness is common: "Americans are notoriously shortsighted. We live in a state of myopic (nearsighted) mania that blurs the future. The horizon is never visible in the middle of a dust storm. But we must have a vision that extends beyond tomorrow. Living only from week to week is like a dot-to-dot life."

Often women without direction live not only dot-to-dot but on hold, waiting--for the right job, the right man, a baby. Waiting for the baby to grow up and leave home--waiting for something to give their life meaning. Their faulty focus makes contentment an impossible dream.

Psychologist William Marston asked three thousand people, "What do you have to live for?" He was shocked to discover that 94 percent were simply enduring the present while waiting for the future. Because I desire to be a woman of purpose, I often ask myself, "Linda, are you living life with a myopic focus? Are you in a waiting mode?"...

It was spring but it was summer I wanted; the warm days
and the great outdoors.
It was summer but it was fall I wanted; the colorful
leaves and the cool dry air.
It fall, but it was winter I wanted; the beautiful snow
and the joy of the holiday season.
It was now winter but it was spring I wanted; the warmth
and the blossoming of nature.
I was a child but it was adulthood I wanted; the freedom
and the respect.
I was twenty but it was thirty I wanted; to be mature and
sophisticated.
I was middle-aged but it was twenty I wanted; the youth
and the free spirit.
I was retired but it was middle-aged that I wanted; the
presence of mind without limitations.
My life was over but I never got what I wanted.

(written by a 14 yr old boy; quoted in message by Dr. Charles Swindoll, "Who gets the glory?"; quoted from Calm My Anxious Heart by: Linda Dillow)

That's the opposite of what God envisions for us. The Scriptures exhort us to walk wisely through this life.

Live life, then, with a due sense of responsibility,
not as [women] who do not know
the meaning [and purpose] of life but as those who do.
Make the best use of your time, despite all the evils
of these days. Don't be vague but grasp firmly
what you know to be the will of the Lord.
(Ephesians 5:15-17, PH)

We must live as women who know the meaning and purpose of life. As Goethe, the German philosopher, put it: "Things which matter most must never be at the mercy of things which matter least". If we haven't chosen what we are living for, we're living life by default, acting out the scripts handed to us by family, other people's agendas, and the pressures of circumstances. This is not living as a woman who knows the meaning and purpose of life. But it's never too late to change your faulty focus.

From: Calm My Anxious heart by: Linda Dillow

For Whose Sake?

http://lejardinfeerique.blogspot.com/2008/07/for-whose-sake.html

Bird nest from mom's yard

My parents have a bird, a wren, they believe, that tirelessly comes back every year and builds a new nest under the lid of their gas tank. The eggs have long since hatched and the birds gone from the nest, but the beautiful nest remains as well as one lonely egg that never hatched. The pics are of the nest and also we opened up the nest to see what we could see. A head was slightly recognizable and we could actually see some very small feathers.

The Courtship of Sarah McLean

Yeah!  I got the other books from Castleberry Farms Press in this week and just finished reading The Courtship of Sarah McLean.  

I had suspected this book would give an even better introduction to courtship.  I was not disappointed!  It does a very good job of explaining the idea of courtship.  The story is great too.

Sarah McLean is 19 when the book begins.  We see her interact with someone who is interested in dating her and see how she handles explaining to him that she believes in courtship instead of dating.  As in Jeff McLean:  His Courtship, we see a situation that doesn't lead to courtship and how it is handled.  The story follows Sarah as she struggles with her own person growth, trusting God's timing and honesty in the life of a christian.  When a courtship finally starts for Sarah, there is honest, realistic conversation between her and the young man who courts her.  They talk about spiritual leadership in the home, having children, their own personal strengths and weaknesses.  They attempt to think through a marriage relationship, not get caught up in a ceremony the way many so often do.

I think what is best about this series, is just like in this story, many of us know this is what we want for our children, but do not have families we know who have "gone before us", examples for us and for our children.  Therefore, it is hard to imagine what the process might look like.  These fictional stories do that for me.

I would not "PICK" my children's spouses for them.  What I want is for them not to think of "trying out" relationships with every person who interests them, but really praying and seeking the will of God in the person they will marry some day.  (Despite my own mistakes in this area, I know God was preparing my husband for me all along.  I remember the time in my life that I began to pray for him, years before we met).   I also want them not to make this decision based purely on emotion, though attraction and love do play a part.  Instead, to be honest about themselves and a prospective spouse, their compatibility to marry and most importantly that person's relationship with the Lord and seek Godly advice!  Lastly, to not allow themselves to be in compromising situations with someone they are not married to that they will regret later on.

This series of books gives me hope.  That God can be glorified as our children wait for the spouses God might have planned for them.  That they do not have to make the mistakes so many others make and regret.  That the whole process that leads to marriage can be beautiful!

July 3, Edges of His Ways by: Amy Carmichael

Exodus 24:12 : Come up to me...and be there.

When Moses went up, a cloud enfolded him. In that cool darkness he heard words which afterwards he spoke to the people in the heat and glaring light of the plain. So, day by day, as we look forward into the hours which seem to rush upon us, we see not clearness but a cloud. Then a Voice that we know calls softly, Come up to Me, and be here; the Cloud of the Unknown becomes for us then the very over-shadowing of the wings of the Lord; we sit down under His shadow with great delight, and His fruit is sweet to our taste. And this fruit, tasted first in the dark alone with Him, will be ours for others. "What I tell you in darkness", He says to us still, "that speak ye in light."

July 2, Edges of His Ways by: Amy Carmichael

Exodus 13:21 : The Lord went before them...in cloud and in fire.

So cloud and fire are bound up with thoughts of guidance. Each day for each Israelite began with the sight of the impenetrable Cloud. What was the day to bring of journeying or of waiting? He did not know. He saw the Cloud, that was all. So do our days begin. We may have a time-table, even so, we face the Unknown. We know not what a day may bring forth, but if we are following our Leader we know that we shall be led. The symbol of that leading is a Cloud, through which we cannot see.

Great Leader, guide me by cloud or fire,
Let me be loyal to Thy heart's desire.
And lest I falter if the way be long,
O let Thy joy be strength to me and song.

Devotional- Thomas a Kempis

Vanity therefore it is, to seek after perishing riches, and to trust in them.

It is vanity to hunt after honors, and to climb to high degree.

It is vanity to follow the desires of the flesh, and to labour for that which thou must afterward suffer more grievous punishment.

Vanity it is, to wish to live long, and to be careless to live well.

..."The eye is not satisfied with seeing, not the ear filled with hearing" Eccles. 1:8

Endeavor therefore to withdraw thy heart from the love of visible things,
and turn thyself to in invisible.

For they that follow their lusts, do stain their own consciences...