Monday, May 19, 2008

Friday, May 09, 2008

Spiritual truths are beginning to sink in!

You never know when your little ones can make practical application of spiritual principals.

I was standing at the sink, washing dishes (It's amazing how many of my stories start with me washing dishes.) and teaching a lesson on temptation. It went something like this.

"The Bible says we need to resist temptation, and the God gives us a way to escape it. Think about temptation this way; Let's say Mommy made up a plate of cookies, left it on the counter, and said, 'don't touch the cookies' on my way out. Then you were standing in the kitchen thinking, 'MMMMM! Those look good! I want one! I want to take one!'

That's temptation, and you should resist it. Say, "I'm not going to disobey!" Tell yourself a Bible verse that can help you like 'Children obey your parents...' and then go find something else to do. Pray and sing a song, and that temptation will stop."

As I was finishing up the last of the dishes, David came up to Ruth, who was standing on a stool helping me. He began making a general pest of himself, pulling at her socks and her dress and whining. Suddenly Ruth shouted, "MOMMY! IS THIS TEMPTATION?"

"Why, what do you want to do?"

"I want to kick him in the face!"

"YES! That's temptation! DON'T DO IT!"

Ruth jumped off the stool and said firmly to David, "I'm NOT going to kick you!" Away she flounced whistling a tune.

Nice to know the lesson made a difference!

Thursday, May 08, 2008

Joy In Heaven!

A young lady came to me several weeks ago, concerned about the state of her soul. She was young, but you don't need to have a college degree to understand the gospel of Christ. That she was under conviction was no doubt. She told me that her sins were going to take her to a place called hell. She wanted to know what she needed to do in order to be saved. I had been dealing with her for a while, helping her to understand these things, and now I could see that the Lord was opening her eyes. I felt a strong check not to tell her to pray. Instead, I showed her from the Bible how she needed to call upon the name of the Lord, confess the Lord with her mouth. She asked me what she should say, so I asked her what she wanted Jesus to do for her. She said, "I want him to take away my sins so I can go to heaven!" I asked, "Do you believe He will do this?" She looked uncertain. I said, "That's what it means when it says 'whosoever believeth on him shall have everlasting life'. You believe Jesus saves you, and you repent, or turn away from your sins." After a moment of thought, she asked, "Didn't you tell me Jesus hears my thinking?" I perceived that the one thing that was holding her back was being embarrassed to pray out loud. I said the first thing that came into my mind, which was from Matthew 10:32, "You know, one day Jesus is going to confess my name to the Father when it's time to judge my sins, and He's going to say, 'That's Sarah! I saved her and paid for her sin to be removed with my blood!' Why wouldn't I speak His name with my mouth when I asked Him to save me?"

I waited and she did something extraordinary. She laid down flat on her face and clasped her hands in front of her nose and began to pray loudly and earnestly. The only problem was, I couldn't understand what she was saying because her face was pressed so close to the ground. But Someone did hear her, and He understood her perfectly! She got up after about thirty seconds of prayer, and her face was shining. I asked her what happened. She said delightedly, "Jesus saved me!"

There is joy in Heaven over one sinner that repents, and there is much joy in our house at the salvation of this soul, because we are called to win our own children to Christ every bit as much as we are to reach the souls of Mexico for Him. I'm so thankful my Ruth has found peace with Christ. Our Lord is good, is He not?