Keep on keeping on....

Every day, all year 'round there are many reasons to guard my mind. It requires some discipline to marinate it in the Twenty-third Psalm and the Lord's Prayer.  Both pretty much wrap up the basics. I babble a lot to my Father, knowing that the Holy Spirit and Jesus interpret my meanings.

If you have followed my blog you know that I was raised "tough"...actually plowing through snow drifts up to my shoulders from the time I was five years old in order to get to the one-room schoolhouse where Mrs. Ethel, a widow with a son urged me to read, listen, think and learn. When the country school was closed I entered town school. Mrs. Ethel moved to town too and was my teacher for two more grades!  Years later I became a Christian. Mrs. Ethel's son Bob came to Minneapolis to Ted's and my  wedding,  He in turn led his mom to Christ. Mrs. Ehel and I  wrote and talked on the phone across the miles until she died at 95!  Did I bring blessing to her later life?  Of course!

Why am I telling you about Mrs. Ethel?  Her investment in me brings to mind the scripture: "Train up a child in the way she could go and when she is old, she will not depart from it."  Mrs. Ethel encouraged me to read, listen,  think and learn,  The same principle goes for a brand new Christian. Even if that new believer is an adult they are a child in their new Life in Christ.  Please don't just invite that dear new family member to church. Open the Word of God with them. Love and invest in them. Of course it will be a sacrifice, but the word "love" means absolutely nothing without "sacrifice".  I didn't have any idea how to disciple the new Christian teenagers that were coming to Christ in our first ministry.  I opened to the Book of Ephesians and the Holy Spirit took it from there.  ...one verse at a time. Many of the disciples that date back decades show up in my life regularly. We cannot "outgive" God.

Some of my remaining family are coming today.  I am so excited! Jeff and Carla are staying overnight. ...then after they leave ten teenage boys are coming for an air-gun birthday party. Today a half dozen men are ripping off the deteriorating shingles from my roof and putting on new ones. With every whack of the hammer I hear owed dollars accumulating.  ...and then I am reminded: ""The Lord is my Shepherd,  I shall not want."  Everything on this Planet rots or leaks and my body is no exception. ...but meanwhile, there is...

                            POWER IN THE BLOOD

Would you do service for Jesus your King?
THERE'S POWER IN THE BLOOD; POWER IN THE BLOOD.
Would you live daily, His praises to sing?
There's WONDERFUL POWER IN THE BLOOD.

THERE IS POWER, POWER, WONDER-WORKING POWER
IN THE BLOOD OF THE LAMB.
THERE IS POWER, POWER, WONDER-WORKING POWER
IN THE PRECIOUS BLOOD OF THE LAMB. 

Love, Jo

Good for you, Franklin and Ann Graham. ...just like your dear daddy,  you are giving us incentive to keep on keeping on.