DYSMAS CONDUIT
FREE FOOD
(Isa 55:1)
FRIDAY, JANUARY 29, 2010
Question for the day:
Can we effectively perform more than one task at a time?
What can we pray with YOU about today?
Good morning,
This is just a reminder that every day, while we are studying God’s Word to add to our website, someone from our ministry, Dysmas Conduit, is holding you up before the Lord in prayer. May He greatly bless you today as you pursue His will and He is glorified through you.
God’s blessings, our love,
George & Sidney Granger
CURRENT PRAYER REQUESTS:
Lauren Gibbons: Please pray for healing for my baby granddaughter Baylee. She has congestion and is coughing a lot and was diagnosed with a touch of pneumonia last night… all on top of an ear infection. Pray for strength for parents also. Stressful and tiring for all. Lauren requests prayer for wisdom and faithfulness. Thanks so much!
Thank you for your prayers. Harmony, the little girl for whom we have been praying for who was born without a spine among several other physical difficulties, went home to be with her Lord peacefully on Thursday. We thank the Lord that He took her quickly to minimize her pain. Christine Babel-Henderson’s daughter in law, Tonya, the baby’s aunt, is taking it hard and needs our continued prayer, as does the remaining members of the family. May the Lord comfort each according to their need, and flood them with His peace.
Good Morning,
God’s Mercies are new to us each and everyone morning. Thank you God for this morning as the Haiti mission team left the Fort Pierce Airport at approximately 9am.
They will land in Haiti sometime around noon with a quick stop in the Bahamas for refueling. God bring the team safely to Haiti. Fill them with your Spirit.
Bring the Haitian people hope and healing this day! Amen.
Please continue to pray for Billy Hamburg. He had another surgery and two more tumors were discovered. Discussion is forthcoming concerning bladder removal. Please pray for the Lord’s Hand to help him overcome his anxiety as well as the cancer.
ENCOURAGEMENT FOR TODAY
January 29, 2010
Multi-tasking Mayhem
Karen Ehman
"But I trust in you, O LORD;
I say, 'You are my God.'
My times are in your hands;
deliver me from my enemies and from those who pursue me."
Psalm 31:14-15 (NIV)
Devotion:
"Mom, quick…look at that lady!" My fourteen-year-old-in-driver's-education-child shouted at me as we were headed down Michigan's US-27 interstate on an errand-running Thursday afternoon. "She should not be doing that," he added for emphasis.
I glanced over at the car next to us, expecting to see someone without her hands gripped properly at the ten and two o'clock positions like my by-the-rulebook-boy does when he is behind the wheel. Instead, I nearly ran off the road while gawking at what my resident Driver's Ed patrolman had spotted.
Next to us was a woman who was doing all of the following: talking on a cell phone by cradling it on her right shoulder, holding an open fast-food salad container in her left hand, ripping open a salad dressing packet with her teeth and her right hand…all while steering her car with her knees! What in the world!? My boys and I thought surely, if she kept up this multi-tasking method of driving, she was going to cause a crash.
"I would NEVER attempt to do all of that when I drive", I smugly thought to myself. "Entirely too dangerous and probably against the law." Yep, when it comes to being a safe-driving etiquette expert, the apple doesn't fall far from the "Honey-you-didn't-use-your-blinker-back-there" maternal tree.
It wasn't until later that night that it hit me. Yes, I may not try to dangerously multi-task when it comes to driving my car, thereby putting myself and others at risk of a collision. But what about in my day-to-day life? In my schedule? In my "sure-I-can-take-on-one-more-responsibility-so-everyone-will-like-me" way? Well, I sometimes dangerously multi-task to the point where I too am headed for a crash.
God nudged my heart a few years back, after dealing with some stress-related medical conditions that would not go away, that I needed to do a major plate scraping in my life. Taking on too many responsibilities, no matter how "good" they may be, can often render people ineffective for service to God. He knows our limits. He understands are capacities. He is willing, if we will ask Him, to help us navigate the waters of busyness and activity that often drown many a woman.
On one of my so-busy-I-couldn't-breathe days, I read today's verse. While I'm sure that the author David was talking about actual physical enemies -- men who could chase you, catch you and ultimately hurt you - I thought that day of busyness as the enemy. Too many activities and responsibilities outside of my four walls were about to do me in. They chased me, they cornered me and worst of all, they were about to go in for the kill.
Thankfully, God rescued me from the barren life of busyness. And He can do the same for you. He's longing for us to hold our too-full plates up to Him, scrape off all the activities and responsibilities, and then, place back on our plates only the items HE longs for us to possess.
Then, we can create white space in our calendar and places of sweet respite in our days where we can connect with the God of the universe who is just waiting for us to slow down and sit still; to listen and learn from the very Creator of time itself.
So, how about it friend? Is your rubber spatula ready? Let's start scraping before we crash and burn!
Father, forgive me for allowing busyness to overtake my life, crowding out others and worst of all You. Help me as I purpose to place only those items on my plate that You long for me to have, in Jesus' Name, amen.
Application Steps:
List on paper all the commitments you have said yes to outside of your job or home responsibilities. Catalog approximately how much time you devote to them each week. Pray about what you discover.
Reflections:
What activities and responsibilities have I said "Yes" to that I know in my heart I shouldn't have?
How can I thin out my optional tasks and duties, freeing up more time for the places where God wants me to focus my efforts?
Power Verses:
Matthew 6:33-34, "But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you. Therefore do not be anxious about tomorrow, for tomorrow will be anxious for itself. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble." (ESV)
Genesis 2:2, "And on the seventh day God finished his work that he had done, and he rested on the seventh day from all his work that he had done." (ESV)
YOU TUBE SONG FOR TODAY
I Can Only Imagine
MercyMe
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0xwzItqYmII
I can only imagine
What it will be like
When I walk
By your side
I can only imagine
What my eyes will see
When your face
Is before me
I can only imagine
I can only imagine
[Chorus:]
Surrounded by Your glory, what will my heart feel
Will I dance for you Jesus or in honour of you be still
Will I stand in your presence or to my knees will I fall
Will I sing hallelujah, will I be able to speak at all
I can only imagine
I can only imagine
I can only imagine
When that day comes
When I find myself
Standing in the Son
I can only imagine
When all I will do
Is forever
Forever worship You
I can only imagine
I can only imagine
[Chorus]
I can only imagine [x2]
I can only imagine
When all I will do
Is forever, forever worship you
I can only imagine
…and…
Taking a trip on the Bible Bus
Hebrews 9:25—10:24
Hear the word of the Lord, you Israelites,
because the Lord has a charge to bring
against you who live in the land:
"There is no faithfulness, no love,
no acknowledgment of God in the land.
[2] There is only cursing, lying and murder,
stealing and adultery;
they break all bounds,
and bloodshed follows bloodshed.
[3] Because of this the land mourns,
and all who live in it waste away;
the beasts of the field and the birds of the air
and the fish of the sea are dying.
[4] "But let no man bring a charge,
let no man accuse another,
for your people are like those
who bring charges against a priest.
[5] You stumble day and night,
and the prophets stumble with you.
So I will destroy your mother--
[6] my people are destroyed from lack of knowledge.
"Because you have rejected knowledge,
I also reject you as my priests;
because you have ignored the law of your God,
I also will ignore your children.
[7] The more the priests increased,
the more they sinned against me;
they exchanged their Glory for something disgraceful.
[8] They feed on the sins of my people
and relish their wickedness.
[9] And it will be: Like people, like priests.
I will punish both of them for their ways
and repay them for their deeds.
[10] "They will eat but not have enough;
they will engage in prostitution but not increase,
because they have deserted the Lord
to give themselves [11] to prostitution,
to old wine and new,
which take away the understanding [12] of my people.
They consult a wooden idol
and are answered by a stick of wood.
A spirit of prostitution leads them astray;
they are unfaithful to their God.
[13] They sacrifice on the mountaintops
and burn offerings on the hills,
under oak, poplar and terebinth,
where the shade is pleasant.
Therefore your daughters turn to prostitution
and your daughters-in-law to adultery.
[14] "I will not punish your daughters
when they turn to prostitution,
nor your daughters-in-law
when they commit adultery,
because the men themselves consort with harlots
and sacrifice with shrine prostitutes--
a people without understanding will come to ruin!
[15] "Though you commit adultery, O Israel,
let not Judah become guilty.
"Do not go to Gilgal;
do not go up to Beth Aven.
And do not swear, 'As surely as the Lord lives!'
[16] The Israelites are stubborn,
like a stubborn heifer.
How then can the Lord pasture them
like lambs in a meadow?
[17] Ephraim is joined to idols;
leave him alone!
[18] Even when their drinks are gone,
they continue their prostitution;
their rulers dearly love shameful ways.
[19] A whirlwind will sweep them away,
and their sacrifices will bring them shame.
Listen to Scripture at
http://www.audiotreasure.com/webindex.htm
Listen to Thru the Bible
Dr. J. Vernon McGee
http://www.oneplace.com/ministries/Thru_the_Bible_with_JVernon_McGee/
Please send your prayer requests to
dysmasconduit.@gmail.com
