A reminder to the girls: God loves you, find your identity in him

I made her...she is different. She is unique.
With love I formed her in her mother's womb.
I fashioned her with great joy.
I remember with great pleasure the day I created her.

I love her smile. I love her ways. I love to hear her laugh
And the silly things she says and does.
She brings me great pleasure. This is how I made her.

I made her pretty and not beautiful.
I wanted her to search out her heart and learn that
it would be ME in her that would make her beautiful...
And it would be Me that would draw others to her.

I made her in such a way that she would need me.

I made her a little more lonesome than she would like to be...
Only because I need for her to learn and depend on Me.
I know her heart. I know that if I had not made her like this,
She would go her own chosen way
And forget Me...her Creator.

Because I love her, I have seen her broken heart...
and the tears she cried alone.
I have cried with her and had a broken heart too.

Many times she has stumbled and fallen alone...
Only because she would not hold my hand.
So many lessons she's learned the hard way
because she would not listen to My voice.

So many times I have sat back and sadly
watched her go her merry way alone...
Only to watch her return to my arms,
sad and broken.

And now she is Mine again.
I made her, and I bought her...
Because I love her.

I have to reshape and remold her
To renew her to what I planned for her to be
It has not been easy for her or for Me.

I want her to be conformed to My image.
This high goal I have set for her...

Because I love her.

Verse to Commit to memory

To him who is able to keep you from stumbling and to present you before his glorious presence without fault and with great joy—to the only God our Savior be glory, majesty, power and authority, through Jesus Christ our Lord, before all ages, now and forevermore! Amen.
-Jude 1:24-25

Lessons of Love and Service at Gordon

In his book The Four Loves C.S. Lewis says, “There is no safe investment. To love at all is to be vulnerable”. After our unit on love I am convinced that there is a valid connection between love and living out that love through service. Loving those around you is about investing in them by any means possible. Our investment in this case is our time. Time is an investment that shows someone that you truly care. You are willing to set aside your activities and take a break in your busy schedule to do something that is for their benefit and not your own. Although I believe that somewhere along the line serving others becomes a greater benefit to the servant than to the one who is being served. Service teaches us to look beyond ourselves and beyond our sheltered lives to a community and world of people who are hurting and for whom we have the opportunity to serve as reflections of Christ’s love for them. That type of learning can’t be done in the classroom and that is why I feel it is an important aspect of our education at Gordon.

We read 1 Corinthians 13 in our Great Conversation class and some of the attributes that stood out to me is that love is supposed to be patient and kind and is not supposed to be arrogant. Those are all things that are so crucial when it comes to service and our service learning projects give us the chance to live out those aspects of love. If we look to a section earlier in the chapter we see even more about the importance of love in our actions. In verse 3 it says, “ If I give away all I have…but have not love, I gain nothing.” Our attitude towards our service should not be centered around the class or our grade but around love because if love is not our aim then none of what we do is truly worthwhile.

There are so many other reasons to participate in service that reach far beyond it being an investment in humanity or an expression of love, although those are both wonderful reasons to serve. I would say that the most important reason to serve is to become more like Christ. Our Lord humbled himself and came to Earth as a servant to his people to redeem them, minister to them, love them and serve them. Our Savior was the ultimate example of servant hood. In John chapter 13 we see the story of Jesus washing the feet of his disciples. In this day it was the servants who were to wash the feet of their masters and their guests. This was not a pleasant or enjoyable task. You have to understand that the disciples and Jesus walked everywhere and all wore sandals, their feet at the end of their journey would have been covered in dust and dirt and yet there our Lord knelt providing us with the perfect guide for selflessness. He also tells us that in Matthew 25:40 that whatever we do for the least of our brothers and sisters we have done for him.

Providing an opportunity to teach love in a personal way that cannot be taught in the classroom and that extends to the people outside of our sheltered Gordon community is what our service-learning component is all about. It gives us the opportunity to be examples of Christ to those who don’t see or experience that type of love and service everyday. And I should hope that along the way each of us discovers the joy that can be found in the process of serving others.

God calls us to do hard things.....

This is a list that my small group and I came up with at Bible study a few years ago when we were talking about being in the world and not of it and how the things that it takes to be different are really really hard sometimes. Its definitely a challenge to me. Since today is the day of prayer I thought it would be a good day to put out a challenge to myself and to all of you to do hard things!

1. happiness is easy. joy is hard
2. going is easy. staying is hard
3. gossip is easy. holding your tongue is hard.
4. immodesty is easy. modesty is hard.
5. lies are easy. honesty is hard.
6. silence is easy. speaking up is hard
7. judgment is easy. acceptance is hard.
8. frustration is easy. letting it go is hard
9. talking is easy. praying is hard.
10.watching a movie is easy. reading your Bible is hard.
11.spending is easy. tithing is hard
12.ignoring is easy. overcoming is hard.
13.friendship is easy. love is hard
14.distraction is easy. focus is hard.
15.stubborness is easy. compromise is hard.
16.secrecy is easy. confession is hard
17.pride is easy. humility is hard
18.amazement is easy. praise is hard.
19.jealousy is easy. gratefulness is hard.
20. complaining is easy. thankfulness is hard
21. exclusion is easy. inclusion is hard.
22. hanging out is easy. having fellowship is hard.
23. going with the flow is easy. having a higher standard is hard.
24. making a decision is easy, but making a good decision is hard.
25. acting is easy. living it out is hard.