Whispers of Truth

Grace is simple, but it is also an extremely difficult concept to grasp. As our children have gotten older (15-18), we have tried to make Christmas not so much about getting as giving. As a result, we’ve tried to avoid giving meaningless gifts just to give gifts and we’ve tried to give more. As a mom also known as the “Christmas grinch,” I have to admit that it has been rather appealing to me; the older I have gotten, the less inclined I am to enjoy the trappings of commercial Christmas, thus the lack of inclination to put up a Christmas tree and buy an obligatory gift for anyone and everyone has earned me this moniker. I could be pious and say that the cause of all of this is an appreciation of the grace bestowed upon me by Christ, but I won’t because it really isn’t true. The more I learn, the more I realize how little I know about grace. One of the children came home from winter retreat to find that my husband and son had put up a Christmas tree this year (because they liked it and

I have been silent for a long while and with good reason—rebellion is never an easy road to travel, and I’ve been walking on it for a while. This year has brought much change to my life. As the year began, I found a renewed interest in the Word and stepped out and took a risk at the urge of the Spirit and began blogging about what I was reading and what God was working out in me. A short six weeks later, He placed a new call on my family’s life, and I don’t for one minute believe that it was incidental that the call came at a time when I felt the power of the Spirit moving strongly in my life. As a believer, Christ has called me to take up my cross daily and follow Him. Christ struggled under the cross He carried to Golgotha, but for some reason, I expected mine to be a lot easier to bear. Change is never easy, and I didn’t expect that this change would be, but it became overwhelming for me when my focus shifted from the call to the difficulty of carrying out that call. As a result, w