Break up with your bad habits

Story of the day: Break up with your bad habits

Habits. Now here is a word that can either be the greatest thing we ever do in our spiritual walk with God, or can leave you wishing you had dumped them years ago. I was watching Joyce Meyer the other day, and she got my wheels to spinning about bad habits and how we must break up with them.

Have you ever had a past relationship where you knew you had broken up with the person because it was the best thing for you, but it was the most difficult thing to do? The same is true with our bad habits. These bad habits have probably been lingering in our life for some time.  Let’s face it, keeping them around is easier than having the “break up” talk with them because no one really wants to go through that uncomfortable time in their life. After the breakup, it may seem easier to want to go back to them because they were able to fill a void in our life that we think we needed to begin with.

So how do we break up with something so bad that we have defined in our life as good? There is never an easy way to break up with anyone, let alone anything.

Have you ever noticed a vine growing and spiraling around a chain link fence? The fresh growth, the young green vine, is easy to remove with a simple twist of your wrist. But the old, brown, woody part of the vine is very difficult to remove. It takes a lot of time and effort to break it off, and sometimes it won’t come off unless we are willing to also remove part of the fence itself.

Bad habits are like a vine on a chain-link fence. The sooner we get after them (break up with them), the easier they are to remove (let go). But the old ones, the ones we’ve let remain in our life for years, are hard to get rid of (say goodbye to). And sometimes they can’t be removed unless we also remove other parts of our life.

Quote of the day: Lloyd Cory

“The chains of habit are too weak to be felt until they are too strong to be broken.”

Bible verse of the day: 1 Corinthians 11:28 (NKJV)

“But let a man examine himself, and so let him eat of the bread and drink of the cup.”

Prayer:

Dear Heavenly Father,

Today I examine my life and I pray that if there are any bad habits in my life that they be brought to the light. Father, it all starts with a change of heart and mind and today I choose to I break up with any bad habits in my life that are keeping me from living a fully devoted life to You. I love You Father and I thank You for this day!

In Jesus Name I pray,

Amen

Are you pecking?

Story of the day:  Are you pecking?

     I love to look at my grandparents who have been married over 55 years and wonder how they have done it and are still in love.  The way that they talk with one another, the way they still take care for each other.  When we had gone to visit my grandmother, I had noticed something small, but it spoke volumes to me.  She was sitting next to my grandfather and she so gently placed her head on his shoulder.  They didn’t even have to say a word and I knew that their love was so great even after 55 years.  So what is the secret to many marriages that last so long? 

    I found an interesting story that was written about the shuttle Discovery.  It had been grounded, not by technical difficulties or lack of government funding, but by woodpeckers.  Yellow-shafted flicker woodpeckers found the insulating foam on the shuttle’s external fuel tank irresistible material for pecking.

     The foam is critical to the shuttle’s performance.  Without it, ice forms on the tank when it’s filled with the super cold fuel, ice that can break free during liftoff and damage the giant spacecraft.  The shuttle was grounded until the damage was repaired.

     Marriages or any relationship that you are in can be frequently damaged not only by big things– abuse or abandonment–but by the little things.  Criticism, lack of respect, and taking each other for granted, can peck away at the relationship and keep us from reaching the heights of love.  Are you pecking?

Quote of the day: Charles W. Shedd

“Marriage is not so much finding the right person as it is being the right person.”

Bible verse of the day:  Song of Solomon

“My beloved is mine, and I am his.  He feeds his flock among the lilies.”

Prayer:

Dear Heavenly Father,

As I see the love between my grandparents, may I bring into my own marriage the things that have kept theirs going so strong.  They always put You first, which spoke volumes to me as a child, and even now as an adult.  They self sacrifice their own needs to give to one another, and they demonstrate their love with their children.  They recognize their weaknesses, but when they are put together, they have created a bond so great that even through their difficult times, they were able to withstand anything that could tear their relationship apart.  I pray for marriages across this country.  I pray that they put You first in their relationship, I pray for strengthening, and I pray for open communication.  I pray for those that are about to get married or are in a relationship that they too can learn from these things so that they too can have a strong relationship.  I thank You for this day!

In Jesus Name I pray,

Amen

Knowing the right thing to do can help.

Good morning to you all!  I hope you are having a blessed day thus far!  I am excited to introduce a new author that will also be writing for Quote of the day.  Her name is Kim Burke and her Biography can be found under Kim’s Collections.  I know that you will be blessed by her words of wisdom and her heart of giving.  Thank you Kim for stepping out by faith in this new endevour. 

Story of the day:  Knowing the right thing to do, can help.

   Sometimes we may not know what to do in certain situations and that’s okay, but when we do know what to do and choose to ignore the solution, the effects can become more than we may have bargained for.  The following excerpt written by Julie Ackerman from What’s Right  clearly shares with us how knowing the right thing to do can help.  

   “When my computer greeted me one morning with what is ominously referred to as “the blue screen of death,” I knew it was broken, but I didn’t know how to fix it.  I read a little, tried a few things, but finally had to call an expert for help.  Knowing that something was wrong was only a small part of the problem; I couldn’t fix it because I didn’t know the right thing to do.

   The ordeal reminded me of the many pundits who appear on television new programs.  All of them are “experts” at proclaiming what’s wrong, but most are clueless as to what is right.

   This happens in relationships as well.  In families, churches, and workplaces, nothing gets fixed because we get fixated on what’s wrong.  It doesn’t take an expert to know that something is wrong when people quarrel and hurt each other with unkind words and behavior.  But it does take an expert to know how to fix the problem.

   God revealed to Israel’s prophets not only what was wrong but also what was right:  “Cease to do evil, learn to do good; seek justice, rebuke the oppressor; defend the fatherless, plead for the widow” (Isa. 1:16-17)

   Instead of focusing on what is wrong, let’s obey the One who knows what is right.”

Quote of the day:  Huisman

“Like a compass, the Bible always points you in the right directions.”

Bible verse of the day:  Isaiah 1:19

“If you are willing and obedient, you shall eat the good of the land.”

Prayer:

Dear Heavenly Father,

I pray to be obedient to putting into action Your saving work into my life.  Father, help me to do all that You ask of me and be alert and prayerful to every situation that is brought my way.  May I continue to walk in Your light, be ready for opportunities, and respond to these opportunities with courage and faith.  I thank You for this day!

In Jesus Name I pray,

Amen    

Don’t wait until it’s too late

Story of the day:  Don’t wait until it’s too late

     Relationships are so very important.  The time it takes to cultivate them and the energy that is placed within them can be so rewarding, if we allow the time and energy for them.  The people that we hold dear and valuable to us, we should always take that extra time to value them.  We don’t wish to spend our time here in this world alone, yet sometimes we allow words to hurt us, words to hurt others, or to get so focused on ourselves that we don’t always tell those closest to us how valuable they are to us, and our words get lost in the day.  We take it for granted that they are going to be here everyday and that death, although can happen at anytime, is not going to happen to us right away.  And what happens, we wish we had done things more or said what we wanted to say, and wind up regretting it later.  As a person that believes life is so short and that we should treasure the time and people that God has given to us while here in this world, I must say that we shouldn’t let the sun go down on our anger, or get so self absorbed with ourselves that we lose sight of what is important.  

    Clarence Macartney wrote an interesting piece about a man named Thomas who waited too long.  He had “married his secretary.  She was someone that he loved dearly, but he was very thoughtless and absorbed in his own interests and activities, treating his wife as if she were still his employee.

    Stricken with cancer, she was confined to her bed for a long time before she died.  After her funeral, Carlyle went back to his empty house.  Disconsolate and grieving, he wandered around downstairs thinking about the woman he had loved.  After a while he went upstairs to her room and sat down in the chair beside the bed on which she had been lying for months.  He realized with painful regret that he had not sat there very often during her long illness.  He noticed her diary.  While she was alive, he would never have read it, but now that she was gone he felt free to pick it up and thumb through its pages.  One entry caught his eye:  “Yesterday he spent one hour with me.  And it was like being in heaven.  I love him so much.”  He turned a few more pages and read, “I listened all day to hear his steps in the hallway.  And now it’s late.  I guess he won’t come to see me.”  Thomas read a few more entries and then through the book on the floor and rushed out through the rain back to the cemetery.  He fell on his wife’s grave in the mud, sobbing, “If only I had known…if only I had known.”

    Some of the lyrics from a childhood song say it best.  The song entitled In the Living Years, by Mike and the Mechanics says this, “Say it loud, say it clear. You can listen as well as you hear.  Its too late when we die”  Yes, it is too late when we die, so we should tell those we hold so dear that we love them!   And we shouldn’t wait until it’s too late, for we are not guaranteed tomorrow.

Quote of the day:  St. Anthony of Padua

“Actions speak louder than words; let your words teach and your actions speak.”

Bible verse of the day:  1 John 5:4

“For whatever is born of God overcomes the world.  And this is the victory that has overcome the world-our faith.”

Prayer:

Dear Heavenly Father,

I thank You for those that You have placed in my path.  Father they are all such precious souls and I treasure each of them.  I thank You for my family.  God You have blessed me with them and I don’t want to take for granted the time that You have given me with them.  I pray that I use the time wisely and treasure all the times that I am with them.  God, I know that I am only here for so long and I don’t want any regrets while here.  Continue to guide and monitor my time so that it is used wisely.  I pray to not let anger play a part in me not ever saying I love you to someone and I pray that I don’t let the small things eat away at me.  I pray to not let the sun go down on my anger!  I thank You for this day!

In Jesus Name I pray,

Amen