Women of Promise

            January 21 was "Sanctity of Human Life Sunday" across many churches. But often the whole month of January is devoted to this topic. I am revisiting some thoughts that I shared a few years ago on this important issue that Christian shy away from far too often.        It hurts my heart that our young children even hear about such atrocities as abortion and euthanasia. As my husband and I  attempt to answer candidly, yet age appropriately, our primary focus has been to show our children that all human life, from conception to rightful death is precious in the eyes of God.       Unfortunately, even Christians are influenced by the world's views on this matter.  On the matter of the sanctity of life, Christians should be on the frontline of the battle.   Increasingly, we are at best complacent and non-committal.  Often this is simply from a lack of a Biblical world-view.  Whe...

       A favorite Bible story of mine, as a child, was the story of Naaman. This short story is found in 2 Kings chapter 5.  I was pointed to meditate on Naaman's wife's servant girl this past week in a book. This little girl is memorialized in the Bible for speaking one sentence. What an impact that one, small act of faith made on all of History!     This girl is "young" from the description we are given in 2 Kings 5:2. She was taken captive by "bands of raiders from Aram" and ended up as a servant girl to Naaman's wife. Naaman was the commander of the army for the king of Aram. I cannot imagine the fear and trauma that this girl endured as she was ripped from her home by strangers. Who knows what all she was subjected to during that event? All we know is that she had faith that Elisha could heal Naaman. Despite the fact that Naaman was her captor, she had compassion and desired to help him. She speaks up and says, "I wish my master would go see th...

       Most of us have chosen a Bible-reading plan for the new year.  Maybe you plan to read through the Bible this year, or in two years. It may be chronologically, or one of many different Bible-reading plans that are freely available to you from a variety different sources. That is a wonderful first step to learning about the God we are blessed to serve! But is there more to studying the Word of God than just reading?     Yes! We must allow our hearts, minds and lives to be changed by this Word that we are reading, or it is relegated to just another good piece of literature on our bookshelf. I recently watched a reel on Instagram.  It quoted a Jewish man who stated that the Bible he studied guided his life down to his eating habits. He stated he didn't want to study a Bible that was not applicable to every area of his life -- this was his way of rejecting Jesus. This was convicting to me.  The whole Bible IS applicable to our lives, but I ...

       Our bodies need a variety of nutrients to operate well.  A diet consisting of only fruit would not be very good for anyone's health -- even though fruit is a delicious and healthy food that God has given us to enjoy and use. A baby may drink only milk for a time, but it needs something more substantial as it grows. As we learn more about how our individual bodies function, we learn how important it is to eat at least something from most of the different food groups. Each one provides essential vitamins, protein, fiber, or cell-building elements that help our bodies operate as God intended. Children tend to have a few select foods that they will eat, but most expand that selection as they grow (some more than others!!). If we are convinced of the vital importance of a certain food, often we can even develop a taste or desire for it that we may not naturally have.      This analogy applies to the Word of God. The whole Bible is God's Word and...

   Happy New Year!      I hope you have had a wonderful time of rest and fellowship with your family and friends over the past week or two as we have celebrated the birth of Jesus and welcomed in the new year.      As we embarq on a new (or old) set of goals and resolutions for 2024, I came across a really fascinating tidbit of information I wanted to share with you.     Apparently, in Hebrew, every fiftieth letter in the book of Genesis spells out the Hebrew word for Torah. The Torah is the term for the first five books of the Bible, also known as the Books of the Law.  So the very first letter is Tav, 49 letters later is Vav, 49 letters later you will find Reish, and 49 letters later you will find Heh.  Putting those Hebrew letters together is the TORH, or in English, Torah.       This is exactly the same in the book of Exodus!! Starting with the first letter of the book, and moving by groups of 50, you wi...