Unveiled Graces

The other morning my son came into my bedroom as he does every morning.  After a momentary greeting, I told him to wake his sister by turning on the light and saying good morning to her.  Now, every morning, he turns on the HALLWAY light, which then wakes my daughter.  Therefore, I did not feel the need to specify which light he was to illuminate.  A few moments later, I hear a high-pitched squeal, "That was SO MEAN!"  Apparently, my son decided to turn on my daughter's bedroom light in order to see that she awoke at the proper time.  I quickly jumped up and apologized to my little girl.  My assumption cost my daughter a rude awakening. So often, we carelessly throw our words around through either idle chatter, careless assumptions, or other forms of hurtful speech.  The Bible has much to say about how our words matter.  Proverbs 21:23 states, "Whoever keeps his mouth and his tongue keeps himself out of trouble."  This small vers...

The other day, I asked my children to help clean the house.  As they were cleaning, I continued to hear them use a phrase over and over again.  When I asked one of them to pick up a particular toy, their response would be, "It's not mine.  I'm not doing it."  The defiance surprised me, as my children normally are very helpful.  I began to pray about the situation.  Later in the afternoon, I started hanging up my husband's dress shirts, still thinking about my children's lack of cooperation.  Suddenly, an image of Jesus on the cross appeared in my mind with the caption, "It's Not Mine."  I paused at the enormity of the image. I gathered my thoughts and then called my children together.  I asked them if they ever noticed me picking up items around the house that were not my own, to which they nodded their heads.  I then asked them why they thought I did these things.  My daughter replied that it was because I loved them....

My son, Daniel, recently had a school project where he had to build an ecosystem. I head with him to PetSmart thinking we would get a goldfish or a beta fish, place it in a bowl, add some gravel and a plant and voila, an ecosystem.  My son had other plans in mind. An hour later, we come home with a terrarium, a tree frog, the makings of a forest, and canned crickets.  My son names his new pet, sets up his ecosystem and we are well on our way to lasting pet bliss.  That is, until the frog refuses to eat the dead crickets. We take the frog to school and Daniel frets over the pet for another day.  I look online and discover that tree frogs like to eat their crickets alive.  So, today, Valentine's Day, I travel to two bait shops and then finally back to the pet store to purchase LIVE crickets for the tree frog. I arrive at my son's school and take the tiny creatures to his classroom.  He runs up to me with the biggest smile on hi...

Yesterday, I learned a lesson about choosing the most important thing.  My daughter's grade had their annual showcase at their school.  She was very excited to share all she has accomplished so far this school year with me.  Typically, I teach music lessons on Thursday nights.  In the past, I would not have wanted to rearrange my schedule out of fear of seeming unprofessional or disappointing my clients.  However, as continued to think and pray about the upcoming event, God started to reveal to me that asking my students to reschedule might be an inconvenience.  However, to not show up for my little girl would send a message that would resound within her heart much longer. I quickly began to phone my clients and explained the situation.  Everyone was gracious and my daughter was overjoyed that I made time to come to her performance.  Throughout the night my daughter beamed as she danced through the hallways, sharing the inne...

The other day, I noticed that our fish tank needed water added to it.  As I was filling up a container, my husband reminded me not to mix the new water with the old because of the temperature difference.  So, I let the water sit for a while, added the dechlorinator, and poured the water in the tank.  I then noticed that the tank still was not full.  My impatience however took control.  I felt of the water and estimated the same temperature with the new water. I then added this new mixture to the tank.  The following day, we had a dead fish.  Within a week, we lost two more fish.  Now, I don't KNOW that it was my impatience with the water that killed half the fish, but I have a good suspicion.  Proverbs 19:2 says, Desire without knowledge is not good—      how much more will hasty feet miss the way!   This small verse carries much wisdom!  It basically says when we want to do something wi...