What Girls Get Wrong

You may be familiar with the Parable of the Prodigal Son found in Luke 15:11-32 .   Basically, the younger of two sons asks his father to have his inheritance now, and then goes and wastes it.   When he is broke, eventually he repents of his foolishness and asks his father to take him on as a servant.   The father, being overjoyed that his son returned, throws a party for him.   There’s a lot of food, and everyone’s having a good time. Except the older brother. When he hears of it, the older brother gets mad, and won’t go in to the party or greet his brother.   He’s angry that his father has thrown a party for his foolish, sinful, wasteful brother.   Here he has been good, well-behaved, hard-working, and yet his brother’s getting a party, not him.   It doesn’t seem fair. Instead of rejoicing that his sinful brother has come to his senses, that he’s repented and reconciled to the family, the older brother feels cheated. He’s so much bett...

A lot of us want to do something big for God.   We feel like we’re not serving enough, not doing enough, and we want to push ourselves to do more for God and His kingdom. I don’t think there’s necessarily anything wrong with that.   It is good to desire to serve God.   But I think we get it wrong with what exactly it means to serve God in a big way. Sometimes, serving in a big way means serving in little ways.   Sometimes doing great things for God means doing the small things. Take Ruth for instance. She is called a virtuous woman ( Ruth 3:11 ).   Her praises are sung by the local women.   These women call Naomi blessed to have such a daughter-in-law, better than “seven sons” ( Ruth 4:14-15 ).   Ruth is one of the most highly-praised women we read about in Scripture. What was this marvelous thing she did?   Surely she served God in a mighty way.   She must have had a three-album deal while being the soloist of her chur...

I've been thinking again about how much God loves us. His love is so strong, so pure, He's willing to watch us suffer. Let me explain what I mean. When things happen to us which are painful, we tend to beg and pray that God will resolve the problem quickly, or make it go away. The situation will be really difficult.  Someone we love will be dying.  We'll be down to our last ten dollars, our last rent money.  We'll be struggling with a health issue. We'll be in agony over it, and we let our human perspective blind us. We begin to doubt God, that He is good, that He cares about us or our situation. But the amazing thing, if we take the time to consider, is that God never stopped loving us, or caring about what we're going through.  The Bible is full of verses declaring His love for us. God loved us so much: 1. He sent Jesus to die for us ( John 3:16 ; 1 John 3:16 ).* 2. He calls us who have accepted Christ's sacrifice and Lordship His child...

Some time ago, I wrote a post about how dangerous it is to compare ourselves to others .  Whether your comparisons make you feel bad about yourself, or whether they cause you to feel superior to someone else, the comparing game causes pain. At least, when we're framing it in a me versus you format. Why did God include so many stories of people in the Bible?  If we shouldn't compare, why did He write of Esther and her courage, of Ruth and her diligence, of Tamar and her seduction, of Mary and her obedience, of Naomi and her bitterness? The Bible is ultimately the story of God, His creation, the first man and woman's betrayal, His undying love and sacrifice, and His rescue of mankind from their sin and complete victory over evil.  But along the way, we read of many people, both good and bad, both repentant and in denial. What was the reason for all of these stories?  Was it just to make the Bible longer?  Did God have a word count He wanted to hit, and so ...

We are quick to judge people. We're fast to look at someone who's overweight and think they're a glutton, without considering that while they could overeat, it could also be they suffer from a medical condition that makes their body gain weight easily. We look at someone who is sickly, and think they're living an unhealthy lifestyle filled with junk food and devoid of exercise. And while that could be true, we rarely acknowledge that they could also be suffering from food intolerences yet undiscovered, that they could be trying their best to take care of their bodies to little or no effect on their condition. And I'm sure all of us girls have had that friendship with a girl who looked pretty and maybe was even popular, who seemed kind and likable, the perfect friend. But we soon found out that, while she might be a good friend for someone, it wasn't a good friendship for us, either because she was a horrible person or we had nothing in common. Some of u...

"You will keep him in perfect peace, Whose mind is stayed on You, Because he trusts in You." ~ Isaiah 26:3, NKJV This verse has been running through my head a lot the past couple of weeks. When my heart has been anything but peaceful as I watch the health of two of my three cats slowly fail. Letting go of them, who I love so much, have had for so long, it hurts. And besides that, there have been other things going on in my life which tear at my heart and fill my mind with doubt and fear. Chances are, fear and doubt are plaguing you too. Maybe you're watching a parent or a grandparent's health fail. Maybe your parents are going through a divorce. Maybe you're going through a divorce. Maybe you're struggling with school or work or illness. Maybe what's bothering you is something else. I think about when Isaiah penned this verse, under the inspiration of God. He started his ministry in the same year King Uzziah died (Isaiah 6:1). He lived throug...

We all know what a trap comparison is, we've heard enough about how we shouldn't compare our lives, looks, etc to other girls, that Facebook inflates what our lives look like. But I haven't heard nearly as much about comparing our faults to those of others. That is a trap I've recently discovered in my life. I've always had an issue with comparison, if I'm honest. I think most of us do. We live in a sinful world, and from babyhood we're taught to look/act/be a certain way. We're indoctrinated with comparing ourselves every time we turn on the T.V. pretty much. We've used comparison lots to tell ourselves where we lack. We also use it a lot to pat ourselves on the back, to convince ourselves we're doing okay. But whereas we know by now how dangerous it is to compare ourselves to others as a standard of what we lack, the dangers of comparing our faults and mistakes to those of others to make ourselves feel better is much more slippery. ...