Lost and Don't Know It?

Grandmama and either my brother, Mark, in 1953 or me in 1956
( Fourth quarter and first quarter)

"How blessed is the man who does not walk in the counsel of the wicked, nor stand in the path of sinners, nor sit in the seat of scoffers! But his delight is in the law of the Lord, and in His law he meditates day and night. He will be like a tree firmly planted by streams of water, which yields its fruit in its season..." (Psalm 1:1-3)

        Life is like a football game - birth to 20 being the first quarter, 20-40 the second quarter, 40-60 the third quarter, 60-80 the fourth quarter, and after 80, we're in overtime! And that's the "gospel truth": "As for the days of our life, they contain 70 years, or if due to strength, 80 years...for soon it is gone and we fly away" (Psalm 90:10).

        Today, I'm heavy-hearted for multitudes of poor, deceived souls who sincerely believe they're heaven-bound, but in reality walk a path of darkness. 

         Jesus said, "Enter through the narrow gate; for the gate is wide and the way is broad that leads to destruction, and there are many who enter through it. For the gate is small and the way is narrow that leads to life, and there are few who find it...Not everyone who says to Me, 'Lord, Lord,' will enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father who is in heaven will enter. Many will say to Me on that day, 'Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in Your name, and in Your name cast out demons, and in Your name perform many miracles?' And then I will declare to them, 'I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness.'" (Matt. 7:13-14,21-23)

           How can one know for certain that he's destined for heaven?

"This is the message we have heard from Him and announce to you, that God is Light, and in Him there is no darkness at all. If we say that we have fellowship with Him, and yet walk in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth, but if we walk in the Light as He Himself is in the Light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus His Son cleanses us from all sin." (1 John 1:5-7)

"By this we know that we have come to know Him [and Him to know us] if we keep His commandments. The one who says, 'I have come to know Him,' and does not keep His commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him; but whoever keeps His word, in him the love of God has truly been perfected. By this we know that we are in Him: the one who says he abides in Him ought himself to walk in the same manner as He walked." (1 John 2:3-6)

Are you lost, didn't know it, but now you do? There's good news! Repent - change your mind and turn from darkness to Light! Call upon the name of Jesus for the forgiveness of your sins and the free gift of eternal life. Then walk in obedience to His commands down His path of righteousness!

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My Own Personal Missionary

Back Row L-R: My Ben, me, Elaine, Larry, my dear mother-in-law, and my dear father-in-law
Front Row L-R: my Rebecca, and my Dan
(mid 1990s)

"For God is not unjust so as to forget your work and the love which you have shown in His name, in having ministered and in still ministering to the saints." (Heb. 6:10)

          For seven months between December, 1988 and July, 1989, I was sent to the mission field in Centre, Alabama. I was not the missionary, however, I was the mission! Elaine Hanson was God's missionary.
          Due to a failed business and catastrophic financial losses, our family - my sweet husband, three young children, and a scared and discouraged me - moved into our relatives' cabin on Weiss Lake to regroup and search for God's path forward. By divine appointment, at a Wednesday night supper at First Baptist Church of Centre, we met Elaine and her husband, Larry.
          Never in my life had a met any person who loved Jesus, the Bible, and people more than my new friend, Elaine. During that brief season years ago, she was the vessel through which God poured His love, encouragement, truth, and hope into me.
          Last week, my beloved Elaine suffered a massive heart attack and now lies in CCU awaiting open heart surgery. If God chooses to bless the world, Elaine will be healed and will continue to carry out her loving purposes in the land of the living. If God calls His daughter home to Himself, I have no doubt that Jesus will run to meet her at those pearly gates and with outstretched arms cry, "Well done, My good and faithful servant! Enter into the joy of your Master" (Matt. 25:23).

        Life on earth is very temporary! Life after earth is forever! May all that we say and do today and every single day remaining all be to the glory of Jesus Christ, the Lord of lords and King of kings!!! Lord, make us your missionaries!

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Storybook Spring Sale

My first storybook

My second storybook

"You will be able to tell wonderful stories to your children and grandchildren about the marvelous things I am doing..." (Exodus 10:2)

         I believe my storybooks are at their best when read together - parents and children, grandparents and grandchildren, or teachers and students. I invite you to not just read the stories but to apply them to your lives by means of thought-provoking "Reflections" at the end of each chapter. These pages take you to Scripture verses related to the chapter's theme and offer valuable personal application of Biblical truths.

The Schoolhouse and Secrets of Shiloh are now on sale for only $9.99 at Double Oak Mountain Pharmacy off Hwy. 280.

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A Future Generation

My Rebecca and grands at Southwood Elementary School
Pine Bluff, Arkansas

"...so that you can tell a future generation: 'This God, our God forever and ever - He will always lead us!'" (Psalm 48:13-14)

        In December, I asked the Lord for a trip to Pine Bluff, Arkansas - a place we lived years ago. God graciously granted my request. So last week, Rebecca and the grands met my sweet Phillip and me there. What a blessing to fellowship with old friends and walk old paths through our former neighborhood, former church, and our kids' former schools.
        Twenty-some-odd years ago, I was the young mother with three small children; now a "future" generation walks among us. And should the Lord tarry, another generation will soon follow.

        As I work week after week through teaching and writing responsibilities, I find myself asking, "Lord Jesus, why does the world need yet another Bible study, blog, or book?"
       Quietly tucked within the songs of Psalm, I found His answer: "So that you can tell a future generation: This God will always lead you!"
       "Selah! That's all I needed to know."

        May all our God callings enable a future generation to know Him!

"...and reaching forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus!" (Phil. 3:13b-14)

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Inner Peace in Outer Storms

"Peace"
 (photo taken in Honduras by my Ben)

"O Lord, You are my God...For You have been a defense for the helpless, a defense for the needy in his distress, a refuge from the storm, a shade from the heat..." (Isaiah 25:1,4)

       This morning, as we studied joy in the midst of difficult circumstances from the New Testament book of Philippians, my phone rang three times with "stormy" news - coincidence or opportunity to practice what we preach?  

       In the Pauline epistles, many of which were penned within the confines of a cold, dark prison, the old apostle repeatedly spoke of God's peace and salvation's joy. Five times this man received 39 lashes from the Jews, three times he was beaten with rods, stoned once, shipwrecked thrice, and even bitten by a viper to boot! How in the world were joy and peace possible for Paul through such great pain and tribulation? In the world, joy and peace weren't possible. But instead of in the world, Paul was in Christ, and the very Spirit of Christ was in Paul.

      Every believer receives a deposit of the Holy Spirit, but only those vessels emptied of self and filled with the Spirit of Jesus bear His fruit - love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control - regardless of the external state of affairs.  

       Want peace? Want joy? Succumb self to the withering power of the Holy Spirit and then ask Him to fill you up to overflowing!

"So be careful how you live. Don't live like fools, but like those who are wise. Make the most of every opportunity in these evil days. Don't act thoughtlessly, but understand what the Lord wants you to do...be filled with the Holy Spirit." (Eph. 5:15-18) 

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White Flag

Sunset over Chancellor Ferry Tree Farm
(photo by my Ben)

"God comes from Teman, the Holy One from Mt. Paran.  Selah 
His splendor covers the heavens, and the earth is full of His praise...Though the fig tree does not bud and there is no fruit on the vines, though the olive crop fails and the fields produce no food...yet I triumph in Yahweh; I will rejoice in the God of my salvation! Yahweh my Lord is my strength; He makes my feet like those of a deer and enables me to walk on the mountain heights!" (Hab. 3:3,17-19)

       According to wikipedia, the white flag is an internationally recognized protective sign of truce or ceasefire, but it's also used to symbolize surrender.
       Over the course of the past two Selah weeks, when the Lord said, "Hear, Jill, and I will admonish you; if you would only listen to Me! Let there be no strange god among you; nor shall you worship any foreign god" (Psalm 81:8-9), I discovered that my "strange god" was me, myself, and I! 
        "Look, my King, I'm vigorously waving the white flag! I surrender! You are the One true God and Potentate - worthy to rule - and besides You, there is no other!"
        I've joined chorus with Charles Spurgeon singing:

"If our Lord and King is exalted, then let other things go whichever way they like. If He is exalted, never mind what becomes of us. We are a set of pygmies, and it is all right if He is exalted. God's truth is safe, and we must be perfectly willing to be forgotten, derided, slandered, or anything else that men please. The cause is safe, and the King is on the throne. Hallelujah! Blessed be His name!" 1

"He must increase, but I must decrease." (John 3:30)


1 Charles Haddon Spurgeon, Holy Spirit Power (New Kensington, PA: Whitaker House, 1996), 157.

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Selah

Me, age 2 1/2, 1959

"You are my hiding place; You preserve me from trouble; You surround me with songs of deliverance. SELAH. I will instruct you and teach you in the way which you should go; I will counsel you with My eye upon you." (Psalm 32:7-8)

               Over seventy times in the Book of Psalms, we find the word "selah" - a musical term indicating suspension of the music or a pause. The Amplified Bible translates selah as "pause and think of that." Moreover, I believe this term is best interpreted as God saying, "Stop and listen to Me." 

              Many of you know that I'll have surgery next week to remove a small malignancy from my body. God is my hiding place, and His peace within me well exceeds my understanding. During this unique season, I believe the Lord has instructed me to selah for the next two weeks - to stop teaching and writing and listen to Him.

               So, the Lord willin' and the creek don't rise, I shall return foot-loose and cancer-free to this wonderful family storybooks blog  on Monday, March 24th. God bless you, dear friends! See you in two weeks!

"The Lord watch between me and thee, when we are absent one from another." (Gen. 31:49)

   

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God-ordered Steps

My beloved kiddos, 1993

"The steps of a good man are ordered by the Lord, and He delights in his way." (Psalm 37:23)

Summer of 1993, Phillip's job required a family move from Pine Bluff, Arkansas to Shreveport, Louisiana. So with Phillip at the wheel, our kids in the back seat, and my Bible in my lap, we headed southwest in search of the new home God had for us.

God-ordered step #1:

The first decision was whether to live on the east side of the Red River in Bossier City or the west side in Shreveport. Before we searched those cities, however, we searched the Word of God and found:

 "Your eyes have seen all the great acts of the Lord which He did. Therefore shall you keep all the commandments which I command you this day, that you may be strong, and go in and possess the land...by the way where the sun goes down" (Deut. 11). 

The sun goes down in the west, so we headed to Shreveport.

God-ordered step #2:

"Lord, where should we look in Shreveport?" 

"But the land, whither you go to possess it, is a land of hills and valleys, and drinks water of the rain of heaven" (Deut. 11:11). 

Shreveport's Cross Lake drinks water, so we looked near it.

God-ordered step #3:

After searching all day to no avail, I closed my eyes and prayed, "Lord, what should we do now?" When I opened my eyes, the billboard right in front of my face said: Need direction? Come to Willow Point Baptist Church. 

So we exited the freeway and pulled into the parking lot of that church just as Sonny DePrang, the interim pastor, was locking up to go home that Friday evening. Pastor DePrang prayed for us, encouraged us with the Scripture: a house is yet a small thing in the sight of the Lord (2 Samuel 7:18-19), and then instructed us to come to the worship service that Sunday. He said that God would show us what to do. 

We went to Willow Point that Sunday, and at the end of the worship service, Pastor DePrang announced that a family was in need of a house and if anyone had one to rent, come meet them at the altar. Someone did. And we moved to Shreveport a few weeks later.

The End of this amazing God-story? NOPE!

God-ordered step #4:

After living in Shreveport a mere three weeks, on the very day I finished unpacking and carried the last of the boxes to the curb for pickup, Phillip called from the office and said, "You're not going to believe this. I've been transferred to Birmingham, Alabama!"

"But the Lord clearly led us here!" I argued.

In Sunday school that Sunday, the focal Scripture verses were James 4:13-15: 

"Look here, you who say, 'Today or tomorrow we are going to a certain town and will stay there a year. We will do business there and make a profit.' How do you know what your life will be like tomorrow? Your life is like the morning mist - it's here a little while, then it's gone. What you ought to say is, 'If the Lord wants us to, we will live and do this or that." 

The next week, we moved to sweet home Alabama.

Need direction??? Talk to God and read the Bible!

"Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light for my path." (Psalm 119:105)

 

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Mama Said

My Ben, late 1980s
(That boy's a natural born fisherman)

"She opens her mouth in wisdom, and the teaching of kindness is on her tongue." (Proverbs 31:26)


           Mama said, "Jill, never learn to clean a fish.  For when you do, cleaning fish will become your job." And I never learned.
           On troubled nights, Mama said, "Things will look better in the morning. They always do." And she was right.
           Mama said, "This too shall pass." And it does.
           When Mama was a child, angry words shot across her household like arrows toward the bull's eye. Mama said, "When I grow up, my home will be different." And it was!

           Twenty years from now, what will your kids remember that "mama said"?

"Let no unwholesome word proceed from your mouth, but only such a word as is good for edification according to the need of the moment, so that it will give grace to those who hear." (Eph. 4:29)

Mama and me, 1978

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Tested, Tried, and True

My Dan, 2008
Tested, Tried, and True Marine

"He knows the way I take; when He has tested me, I shall come forth as gold." (Job 23:10)

From Streams in the Desert, L. B. Cowman, March 4th:

       "An old village blacksmith once said, 'In order to strengthen a piece of steel, I must first temper it. I heat it, hammer it, and then quickly plunge it into a bucket of cold water. Very soon I know whether it will accept the tempering process or simply fall to pieces...I realize the Lord tests me in the same way: through fire, water, and heavy blows of His hammer. If I'm unwilling to withstand the test, or prove to be unfit for His tempering process, I am afraid He may throw me unto the scrap heap.'"

          I'm in a time of testing. Are you? May the Holy Spirit of God enable us to pass the tests of God to become honorable vessels of God, meet for His use, and prepared for every good work, all to the glory of God!


The Village Blacksmith
By Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Under a spreading chestnut tree
The village smithy stands;
The smith, a mighty man is he.
With large and sinewy hands;
And the muscles of his brawny arms
Are strong as iron bands...

Week in, week out, from morn till night,
You can hear his bellows blow;
You can hear him swing his heavy sledge,
With measured beat and slow,
Like a sexton ringing the village bell,
When the evening sun is low...

And children coming home from school
Look in at the open door;
They love to see the flaming forge,
And hear the bellows roar,
And catch the burning sparks that fly
Like chaff from a threshing floor...

Thanks, thanks to thee, my worthy friend,
For the lesson thou hast taught!
Thus at the flaming forge of life
Our fortunes must be wrought;
Thus on its sounding anvil shaped
Each burning deed and thought.

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Best Compliment Ever!

Five of my ten kids :)

               "Her children stand and bless her." (Prov. 31:28)

           I asked Rebecca's family to read my third storybook, Hoot Owl Hollow, as I work and work and work to buff and wax and smooth and polish its manuscript. After reading the first couple of chapters, the grandkids made me smile when they said, "Memaw really is an author. Reading this book is just like reading any other real book!" 

O Lord, please help us to bring good to You, our families, and our world all the days of our lives. 

"Her husband can trust her, and she will greatly enrich his life. She brings him good, not harm, all the days of her life...Charm is deceptive, and beauty does not last; but a woman who fears the Lord will be greatly praised." (Prov. 31:11-12,30)

Sneak-peek into Hoot Owl Hollow:

When she reached the edge of the mountains north of Atlanta, Andi stopped on the shoulder of the highway to lower the convertible top and studied the layers of smoky-gray slopes stretched across the skyline. Just knowing that she stood at the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountain chain holding her beloved Grandfather Mountain energized her. With the wind in her face and a smile in her spirit, the determined doctor skillfully maneuvered the snaking mountain road through the Chattahoochee National Forest. She understood why the Cherokee Native Americans had named these beautiful woodlands “Sah-ka-ná-ga” meaning “The Great Blue Hills of God”. 

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