A 2 Way Street

In our backyard is a lemon tree that loves to give fruit. Every year right after Christmas you will find it loaded with hundreds of lemons. No one has ever done any pruning spraying or fertilizing. It loves where it lives. I have discovered that its secret is in its flowers. Each year in early March when the weather turns warm it is covered with the sweetest smelling blossoms this side of heaven. Every bee in the county knows where our tree lives and lends its help in making sure next year will be a bang up harvest again.

Have you stoped lately to check if the sweet aroma of a relationship with Christ is in our attitudes and words? Is there anemic looking fruit on our branches? Jesus isn’t trying to whip us into action to produce a better crop. He is appealing tp us to just learn to love where we live in Him. If we will delight in the backyard He has planted us in, He promises to fill us with fruit. But without Him there won’t be a single lemon on our tree!

Daily Bread

Tonight my wife was in a baking mood so she decided we are having homemade bread. The aroma of it in the oven is enough to get my taste buds tuned up for the big pot of chile simmering on the stovetop.

When Jesus taught us to pray for daily bread it was not only as a check on our tendency to worry; but also out of a fatherly concern for us to have a healthy spiritual diet. Friends will be stopping by later just to be able to eat a piece straight out of Nancy’s oven!

We need to take more seriously our prayer for daily bead. If we ask Him our Father has promised to provide fresh daily bread. Then maybe folks will stop by not only for my wife’s famous recipe bread, but for also for some bread straight out of God’s own oven!
Those who pray best, pray for today’s not tomorrow’s needs. Our prayers for tomorrow’s needs may be unnecessary because tomorrow might not exist at all” E M Bounds

Preparing a Home

The only thing I knew about my surgeon was His name. I never had so much as sat with him for coffee or met his family. But on date I was given for surgery I obediently came and allowed an anesthesiologist to put me under. When I awoke the procedure was over.

Though I had my fears and questions I decided that getting my vision back was worth the risk. How much more can we trust in Jesus who gave His life for us. He risked His own life to give us the message of God’s gift of eternal life. He healed the sick became the friend of sinners and washed the feet of even His betrayer. Then knowing we would fear what lay beyond our earthly horizon He gave us His promise to prepare a place of safety and love. The eternal world He tells us about is not just a place of mansions and golden streets. It is the address of the house He lives in. He has promised and He has prepared and He is coming to bring us home!