appointed prayer

week of October 5

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Almighty and everlasting God, you are always more ready to hear than we to pray, and to give more than we either desire or deserve: Pour upon your church the abundance of your mercy, forgiving us those things of which our conscience is afraid, and giving us those good things for which we are not worthy to ask, except through the merits and mediation of Jesus Christ our Savior; who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

Wednesday, June 11, 2008

Anna, Isaac, and Haley the Christmas dogSolomon tells us that “a happy heart is good medicine and a cheerful mind works healing” (Proverbs 17:22, AMP ). God undoubtedly has a sense of humor; we need only look at some of the animals He created (it’s hard not to smile at the sight of a hippo, a monkey, or a puppy). Or think of some of the married couples you know: don’t you think God was smiling at the wedding as He looked ahead to the interaction of the wildly different personalities that will be living together?

And as if often the case, medical science is proving the wisdom of Solomon’s Spirit-inspired words.

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Posts Tagged ‘motives’

some thoughts on blogging as a Christian

Saturday, July 22, 2006 · meditations, quick take · 2 responses · comments closed

Adrian Warnock lists some markers of blogging success (hits, visitors, etc.) but ends the list with something I’ve been pondering myself lately:

How much of an impact positively or negatively you have on your readers.

It is that last point that I feel we should most focus on as Christians. You see, we need to be loving towards our readers and leave them with a positive impression… Do we blog in such a way that we follow Lloyd-Jones’ guidelines to “blog the truth in love?”

He goes on to say, “We are blogging ultimately for an audience of One, who reads everything we say and will hold us accountable for every idle word.” And then, “For the Christian, one of the challenges of blogging is how to make sure that our motives are right.”

I’ve wrestled some with motives — successfully, so far (I hope). I’ll hear something at church or read something in a blog and think, “that’s wrong; I should blog about that and show why that’s totally stupid!” But then I think “what would that accomplish?” and “is that life-giving?” That causes me to stop and either figure out an appropriate (loving and life-giving) way to blog about the topic or choose a new topic.

Thanks, Adrian, for a gentle reminder of the true marker of our success.

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