In the Word: Break Through Grief
Welcome to Hope Mommies In the Word devotionals. Over the next few weeks, we will be meditating on Psalm 19 together. As we study these truths together, we’d love you to use the comments as a place to dialogue with us about what you are learning and share your answers to the questions below. We pray that you hearts will be encouraged as you dig into God's Word each week with us.
“More to be desired are they than gold, even much fine gold; sweeter also than honey and drippings of the honeycomb.”
Psalm 19:10
READ:
As you return to your life, and take steps ...
Letting Go of Entitlement
I sat in the waiting room at the OBGYN office. A few weeks earlier I had received the devastating news that the precious heart cradled in my womb was no longer beating. My body still had not recognized the loss. Each week my uterus continued growing and my hcg levels remained steady. And yet, every subsequent ultrasound yielded the same results: there was so heartbeat.
Throughout my wait, multiple women coming and going from their own prenatal appointments loudly complained about the inconvenience of pregnancy. As I listened to them grumble about the sacred gift of being ...
Blessed Are the Peacemakers
For the past several weeks, we have been going verse by verse through the beatitudes that mark the beginning of Christ’s “Sermon on the Mount,” recorded in the book of Matthew. Each week we have unpacked what it looks like to live in such a way as these verses describe—poor in spirit, spiritually morning over our sins, meek, hungry for righteousness, merciful, and pure of heart.
Today we come to the seventh beatitude:
“Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God.”
-Matthew 5:9
Oh! But peace can be so hard to achieve in the tumult ...
Sheri’s Story
My husband, Ron, and I have been married for 14 years. We first met in 2003, and we knew instantly that God had brought us together. We were married four months later. We had discussed children and always said it was in God’s hands if or when we had any. When Ron was 18 he had a brain tumor. He had surgery, chemo and radiation—and is completely healed. Because of the chemo and radiation, he was told that chances were pretty high that he wouldn’t be able to have children.
Fast forward eight years, and I wasn’t surprised that we hadn’t conceived yet. We just ...
He Holds It All Together
It’s been a messy week.
I’m not talking about piles of laundry, sticky spots on the kitchen floor, the layers of dust that have settled on every surface in the house, or the ongoing war in my basement between craft supplies and dress up clothes, (although, all of those things happen to be true).
Not the desperately-need-to-vacuum-my-car messy. No, I’m talking about the dish-out-the-ice-cream-so-you-don’t-dish-out-the-guilt sort of messy.
Rushing through my Bible reading because I have somewhere else to be
Responding curtly to my husband when he gets ...
Blessed Are the Pure in Heart
“Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God."
Matthew 5:8
Life is hard. And if you’ve lost a child, life will be hard all of your life
I didn’t put a period at the end of that sentence because it isn’t the end. It is the beginning—the beginning of a life where you trust in and rely on Jesus.
How can we Hope Mommies trust in and rely on a “God that let us down?” We can because we are Hope Mommies—we hope in the Lord. He is our only hope.
"This hope is a strong and trustworthy anchor for our souls,"
Hebrews 6:19
Our reality is one of ...
In The Word: That Which Endures
Welcome to Hope Mommies In the Word devotionals. Over the next few weeks, we will be meditating on Psalm 19 together. As we study these truths together, we’d love you to use the comments as a place to dialogue with us about what you are learning and share your answers to the questions below. We pray that you hearts will be encouraged as you dig into God's Word each week with us!
“the fear of the LORD is clean, enduring forever; the rules of the LORD are true, and righteous altogether.”
Psalm 19:9
READ:
Because Christ bore my sins on the cross and gave ...
He Meets Me
In the drawer of my nightstand you will find a copy of The Power of a Praying Wife. I have been praying through one topic from this book before I go to sleep each night as a way to make spiritual deposits in my marriage. A few nights ago, I prayed these words over my husband: “May Your presence be like a delicacy he never ceases to crave.” For the past several days I have not been able to get that sentence out of my mind. Something about those words have been touching a very raw part of my heart.
I realized this morning that amidst the bustle of my everyday life, I ...
Blessed Are the Merciful
"Blessed are the merciful, for they will be shown mercy."
-Matthew 5:7
Isn't that a nice verse? I really like the second part. I want God to show me mercy when I mess up. However, the first part, that's not my favorite. Sometimes, I don't want to show mercy. There have been times when people have really hurt me, and extending mercy to them is the last thing I want to do. So, is it really fair for God to ask us to show mercy all the time? And what about those people who don't even acknowledge that they've wronged you? Is it really necessary to be merciful to them?
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Marli’s Story
I once heard grief explained as if it were an ocean. We walk along the shore admiring the waves and then they unexpectedly brush against our feet. Sometimes the waves stay around our ankles, sometimes they carry us out waist deep, and sometimes they overwhelm us as if we were drowning; but at the end of the day we always end up back upon the shore being carried by our heavenly Father.
I have always clung to Esther 4:14, “For if you keep silent at this time, relief and deliverance will rise for the Jews from another place, but you and your father's house will perish. ...
