Just For Today

Reading Jonathan Cahn's devotional book, The Book of Mysteries, has truly been one of the highlights of my life.

Every day I look so forward to it and it always includes THE MISSION for the day which is a great biblical challenge.

Yesterday's devo was entitled The Apostasia and was about "the great falling away" before the end of the age.

Ephesians 6:13, Philippians 2:15, 2 Thessalonians 2:3 and 2 Timothy 3:1-4 address this prophecy.

The devotional includes this paragraph--"In the age of departure from the Word, you must hold all the stronger..   You must commit to hold all the more strongly to the Word, the faith, and the stand.  And the more you hold the Word, the more you will find your stasis, the person you were created to be....And you will stand."

The Mission:  Take a command from the New Testament and fully carry it out today.  Commit to live your life all the more by the Word of God.

So, just for today, I will hold on tight to God's Word and commit to live my life all the more by it.  I chose a specific command from the New Testament to live by for the day.  Was I totally successful?  No, but every time I "blew it," I was immediately convicted and asked God to forgive me.

I think this is a great way to grow in His Word and that is what I truly desire.

I hope this is an encouraging word for you and that you truly grow to discover the person you were created to be.  God knows YOU and has a wonderful plan for YOUR life--Live it to the fullest.  God bless you all.

© ALL ART, PHOTOGRAPHS AND TEXT PROPERTY OF ELIZABETH DIANNE UNLESS OTHERWISE NOTED, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED, 2008-2017.

The painting above was done about a month ago and is in my entry hall.  It is 3 ft by 3 ft.

The Weathered Old Barn

Astranger came by the other day with an offer that set me to thinking.

He wanted to buy the old barn that sits out by the highway.

I told him right off he was crazy.

He was a city type, you could tell by his clothes, his car, his hands, and the way he talked.

He said he was driving by and saw that beautiful barn sitting out in the tall grass and wanted to know if it was for sale.

I told him he had a funny idea of beauty. Sure, it was a handsome building in its day.

But then, there's been a lot of winters pass with their snow and ice and howling wind. The summer sun's beat down on that old barn till all the paint's gone, and the wood has turned silver gray.

Now the old building leans a good deal, looking kind of tired. Yet, that fellow called it beautiful.

That set me to thinking. I walked out to the field and just stood there, gazing at that old barn.

The stranger said he planned to use the lumber to line the walls of his den in a new country home he's building down the road.

He said you couldn't get paint that beautiful. Only years of standing in the weather, bearing the storms and scorching sun, only that can produce beautiful barn wood.

It came to me then. We're a lot like that, you and I.

Only it's on the inside that the beauty grows with us. Sure we turn silver gray too... and lean a bit more than we did when we were young and full of sap.

But the Good Lord knows what He's doing.

And as the years pass, He's busy using the hard wealth of our lives, the dry spells and the stormy seasons, to do a job of beautifying our souls that nothing else can produce.

And to think how often folks holler because they want life easy!

They took the old barn down today and hauled it away to beautify a rich man's house. And I reckon someday you and I'll be hauled off to Heaven to take on whatever chores the Good Lord has for us.

And I suspect we'll be more beautiful then for the seasons we've been through here... and just maybe even add a bit of beauty to our Father's house.

 -- The Weathered Old Barn poem, author unknown

Happy Wednesday, Folks--

© ALL ART, PHOTOGRAPHS AND TEXT PROPERTY OF ELIZABETH DIANNE UNLESS OTHERWISE NOTED, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED, 2008-2017