Hope For Today

Dear Friends, I love my children and will sometimes say to them "You are my favourite son/daughter."  The response I usually get from them is a groan or rolling of the eyes and "Mu-um, I'm your only son/daughter."  I tell them, "Yes, but you're still my favourite!"  It's my way of letting them know how much I love them, how precious, how special they are to me.  For me, it's a picture of how I believe God loves each one of us.  He loves me in such a way that he says to me, "You're my favourite!"  And I believe he loves you in such a way too and says "You're my favourite!". God loves each one of us with an incredible, incomparable, unconditional love.  A love that goes beyond the ordinary.  A love that is pure and selfless.  A genuine love.  A love that is beyond our understanding.  He loves us each individually and considers us all his favourite. I love words and I love the word used to describe how Go...

Dear Friends, There's one word I could use to sum up how I've been feeling lately - frustrated!  I've been so frustrated by my own limitations.  Fed up and frustrated by chronic migraines and frustrated by the M.E which has recently taken a nose-dive making me feel weak, sick, tired and in pain. To put the icing on the cake of frustration I've been having particularly bad pain in one upper arm for around 2 months which has not got any easier despite doing the exercises my GP recommended.  This week I had an appointment for an injection in my shoulder but I saw a different doctor who gave me a different diagnosis and told me it was not frozen shoulder but a muscular problem in my upper arm.  As I've weaned myself off daily pain medication he prescribed me some anti-inflammatory gel and told me to rest my arm as much as possible and not put too much exertion on it.  Are you kidding me?  It's my right arm, the one I use to do everything!...

Dear Friends, Last week, my family and I went to Spring Harvest (a family bible week).  The theme was "Immeasurably More" based on Ephesians 3:14-21 (NIV) "14  For this reason I kneel before the Father, 15  from whom every family in heaven and on earth derives its name. 16  I pray that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being, 17  so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, 18  may have power, together with all the Lord’s holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, 19  and to know this love that surpasses knowledge —that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God. 20  Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, 21  to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus ...

Dear Friends, "Early on Sunday morning, as the new day was dawning, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary went out to visit the tomb... 5  Then the angel spoke to the women. “Don’t be afraid!” he said. “I know you are looking for Jesus, who was crucified. 6  He isn’t here! He is risen from the dead, just as he said would happen."  Matthew 28:1,5 (NLT) On Easter Sunday we celebrate the truth that God raised Jesus from the dead.  As Christians, this is where our hope lies - in a living God with whom we can have a relationship.  "And this hope will not lead to disappointment. For we know how dearly God loves us, because he has given us the Holy Spirit to fill our hearts with his love."  Romans 5:5 (NLT) In his letter to the Corinthians Paul says " Let me now remind you, dear brothers and sisters,of the Good News I preached to you before. You welcomed it then, and you still stand firm in it. 2  It is this Good News that saves you if you continue to ...