by Dona Hake

Loyalty is characterized by faithfulness to commitments and obligations.  God has promised to be loyal to us with His love, forgiveness, help, …oh my!…there are so many things that He promises to be to us.  Jesus said in His Word that He would NEVER leave us or forsake us.  Our Lord has promised to remain faithful, from one generation to the next.   The loyalty of our Lord should be precious to us for He can always be depended upon.

At the end of many days I may look back on my day and wished that I would have said or done things differently but praise God  He faithfully forgives me,  and He promises to help me do better as I lean upon Him for all wisdom and strength.   Because of His loyalty and steadfast love, He promises to be there for me tomorrow and give me the wisdom that I need to do better.  One of the first things I try to do each morning as I greet Him is remind myself and thank Him that His mercies are new every morning.  My day is a fresh canvas, and I try to purpose myself to walk closer to Him than the day before, and seize the opportunities He prepares just for me! 

I have a decorative slate in my kitchen.  Every so often I will write a thought or scripture on it and it reminds me of something I am meditating on.  I can remember one  evening I was trying to do some different cursive handwriting with the chalk and I kept messing up.  I was glad I could just erase it and start over and work at it till I had it exactly the way I wanted it.   This made me think about how my Lord helps me in my mistakes, and blesses me with fresh new opportunities if I do not get it right the first time around.  So it is with the Lord’s mercies, they are new and fresh each morning.  Thank God we have fresh starts each day and we can learn from our yesterdays.  He is there to help us to keep working out those things that we are trying to get right in our lives.  Thank God that our mess ups are forgiven and wiped away with the blood of Jesus!  Praise the Lord today for His loyalty to you!

by Dona Hake

Have you ever felt forgotten?  Maybe there has been a time that you are walking through some rough circumstances, and you just wished someone would inquire how you are doing.  I think we can all honestly say that we have walked through such times.  I have heard people speak at times when they are going through a very rough time, and their words are revealing that they even wonder if God sees what they are walking through.    Today, let us meditate upon the fact that our Lord NEVER takes His loving eyes off of us.   

May we never lose sight and purpose to keep our hearts and minds renewed in the fact how much God loves us, and He is concerned about the smallest of details in our lives.  As we keep this fresh in our minds we will be strong in this truth as we walk through difficult times.

Luke 12:6-8  (NLT)

“What is the price of five sparrows—two copper coins?

Yet God does not forget a single one of them.

And the very hairs on your head are all numbered.

So don’t be afraid; you are more valuable to God than a whole flock of sparrows.”

I have been watching my sparrows come to my feeders every day, and it has been a joy watching them feed their little ones.   Honestly though  they can be aggressive little things.  They are pushy with the other birds, and they seem to want to take it all.  They almost seem to be perfect little analogies that we can learn from.   Even though we have faithfully seen our Lord’s provision we still have times that we are fearful of our future.

When we get into fear of our future or we feel we are facing things alone, we too can act irrationally, pushy and try to work through things in our own ability.  God has His eye on the sparrow and He does not forget one of them.  Out of all the parts of our body the writer speaks of the hairs on our head.  When is the last time you tried to count the hairs on your head?   I would say that God is really keeping track of us if He has our hairs counted!

 Let us be reminded that God knows and sees every detail of our life.  He sees our concerns and worries and as we look to Him, He will take care of us.  I just want you to remember that many times our prayers are answered differently than what we expected.  All is good in the hands of God!

Psalm 138:8 (KJV)

“The Lord will perfect that which concerneth me: thy mercy,

O Lord, endureth for ever: forsake not the works of thine own hands.”

Have you ever have something happen to you that was above and beyond what you ever dreamed?   We have all had those times we have heard…”This is just too good to be true!!!”   These are experiences that serve to bless us with a special memory that lasts a lifetime!    Sometimes experiences such as these are hard to articulate as you try to share them with others.    Times such as these are marked with great joy!

Today I was reading Psalm 139:1-6 and the last words are what really stuck out to me.  “…too glorious, too wonderful to believe…”   These words explain the acts and nature of our loving Heavenly Father.

Psalm 139:1-6  Living Bible

” O Lord, you have examined my heart and know everything about me.  You know when I sit or stand. When far away you know my every thought.  You chart the path ahead of me and tell me where to stop and rest. Every moment you know where I am. You know what I am going to say before I even say it.  You both precede and follow me and place your hand of blessing on my head.  This is too glorious, too wonderful to believe!”

What an awesome thought to ponder.  God examines and knows our hearts.  As we trust Him as our Great Physician  we can put our life in His hands for we know that He is the Lord that is able to heal and keep us.    He knows our whereabouts at all times and every thought is known whether it becomes words or not. We are all on a path and He knows the footsteps of each of us.  He is there when we succeed and He stays by our side  if we  fail.   His loving hand holds us tightly and He  remains our faithful friend even when we feel we do not deserve to be loved.   He sees our future and understands what is ahead.   He sees the things that we have no clue that we are going to face, and He promises wisdom and direction.     This is just way too glorious and wonderful to believe but it is true…He is so wonderful!    To God be the glory for all the good things He has done!

by Dona Hake

Yesterday I shared with you a devotional on “The Virtue of Patience”.    This is a fruit of the Spirit that is a powerful one to possess.   It is so  vital that we continue to walk patiently with those we live with and work with.    There is also the whole realm of patiently waiting for circumstances to change in our life, but how many times do we think about being patient with ourselves?  I am sharing a quote today that I found interesting…

Interesting isn’t it?    As we pursue to grow in God’s love and in His Word sometimes we focus too much on what we are NOT rather that how far He has brought us.  With any work that needs done in us there needs to be a time of waiting for His loving hand to work, and mold us with His loving hands.  I guess there are all times we wished He would work a bit faster, but His wisdom encompasses more than we will ever understand. As He works, He promises that the transformation will indeed happen, but remember sometimes we can tend to be impatient in that which we have to wait for.

Proverbs 19:11 (ERV) 

 “Experience makes you more patient, and you

are most patient when you ignore insults.”

I especially like this translation of Proverbs 19:11 because I think the more we go on in life and we walk through experiences we begin to understand things more deeply. In any trying situation IF we allow the Lord to teach we, we will walk away with more wisdom under our belt.  I leave you with this scripture to meditate upon, and you think upon His patience developing in you!

Proverbs 19:11 (MSG) 

“Smart people know how to hold their tongue;

their grandeur is to forgive and forget.”

by Dona Hake

 “My help comes from the Lord,

Psalm 121:2  New English Translation

I look at all the beautiful things around me, and daily I praise Him for His wonderful and beautiful works.   We serve a breathtaking and amazing God.  Now let us meditate upon  how the Creator of Heaven and Earth sent His Son to die that we might be set free.   Our Lord has promised to never leave us, and He desires that we call upon Him for the help we need.  Our help that we need should always come the Creator of heaven and earth.

I think about how Jesus has promised to stay by our sides and be our  help.  The question I am pondering now as I write this is do I only ask Him to be my helper  in the difficult and impossible things.  I can only imagine that our God really wants to help us more than we would ever realize at times no matter how big or small our needs are.  When someone offers to help you they are desiring to give or provide what is necessary to accomplish a task or satisfy a need.  Face it…all too often we really do not know what to do or which way to turn and God, and the maker of heaven and earth knows exactly how to handle our problems along with the simplest of matters.   I love seeking His wisdom in ordinary things!  His loving hand can take the ordinary and make it extraordinary!

by Dona Hake

Psalm 23:3 (VOICE)
“He makes me whole again,
steering me off worn, hard paths

David wrote this Psalm with his sheep in mind.  He understood that sheep have a tendency to want to walk the same paths to the point they are in ruts.   Because a sheep stays in a favored spot, they wear it down, and it becomes barren.  These type areas can tend to become infested with parasites which are very dangerous to the health of sheep.  We too can tend as humans to desire a comfort zone.  We can tend to fall into ruts with our thinking and behavior.  These things can keep us from walking in the freshness of His will for our life.

Today, let us remind ourselves to look to Him for direction in every area of our life.  As we do, our lives will be a testimony as it echoes and honors His Name!

“SURELY goodness and mercy SHALL follow me all the days of my life.”

His goodness and mercy should not only follow us but we should have it flowing through us as we abide in Him.   I believe that we can be vessels of His goodness and mercy even to those that you may feel are undeserving of it.   Remember…we can do nothing to feel that we are deserving of all that He has lavished us with for it is not by works that we are saved.  

I leave you with two questions to ask yourself and ponder…How do you deposit the blessings you have received into the lives of others? And can others see that you are  being followed by His goodness and mercy?  I find these two questions very challenging and I want to think about them on a regular basis in order to keep my heart challenged…how about you?

by Dona Hake

“…I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever.”

Today we are meditating upon where we are dwelling.  To dwell in a place means to  live or continue in a given condition or state.  God desires that His children never  leave the beauty of His presence.  He desires we never stray or entertain thoughts of the “grass being greener on the other side.”    As He follows us all the days of our lives, He so longs for our love.  He longs that we give Him everything.  He longs that we stay close to Him and dwell in Him forever.

Oh that we would remind ourselves as much as possible of the abundance of blessings we possess in Him.  Let us declare that we belong to Him and live to please Him in every way we can today.  We should delight to give testimony of what He has or is doing in our life. 

 I encourage you to look for opportunities to share the wonderful things He has done for you as you dwell in Him all the days of your life!

By Dona Hake

 One day I can remember that  I was trying to sort through my different Bibles and favorite books, and  I pulled out a slip of paper from one of my Bibles, and on it I had written the following scripture:

Psalm 42:8 (AMP)

“Yet the Lord will command His loving-kindness

in the daytime, and in the night His song shall be

with me, a prayer to the God of my life.”

Sometimes when I am reading there are words that just come alive and jump off the pages and I love writing them down and reading over them again. When I write scriptures down it was because something very special stood out to me and spoke to my heart.

 As I found this paper it reminded that God is good and He speaks to me through His Word. It is important to remind ourselves of  the truth that God IS good and this truth can be fresh and new every morning. At the end of a day He has a song for your heart. Even though there may be things in your day that you encountered and they seemed to rob you of your joy, He brings a song to your heart as your lie down to sleep.     Today I encourage you to think about the goodness of your God!