A daily blessing

I'm not sure when or why we got out of the habit of doing daily devotions, but tonight I saw our devotion book, Blessings Every Day, on the bookshelf and picked it up to read to Maddie and Wyatt before bed.

The entries are short and meaningful - just enough of a lesson to stick in their minds and hopefully in their hearts. Sometimes this little devotion is the only scripture I read during the day and I was reminded how much I need to be in the Word and that as a family we need to be covering ourselves in God's word and protection.

It never ceases to amaze me that I can open to a random day (the entries are dated for the days of the year) and feel that the little snippet is speaking directly to me. They are always timely and I know right now that I get much more out of them than Maddie and Wyatt do.

If you're looking for an easy devotional to do with your kids - I whole heartedly recommend this one. It was recommended to me by a mom in one of my online forums (several years ago) and I've shared it with my nieces and nephews as a Christmas present last year. My dear friend Becca also uses it with her boys for morning devotions and prayer time. 

I thought I would share the devotion from tonight - something that I really needed to be reminded of as I'm involved in so much at our church right now and feeling a little bogged down...

July 23

Do it for Jesus

I tell you the truth. Anything you did for any of my people here, you also did for me. Matthew 25:40 ICB

Jesus is God's Son. When he lived on earth, he showed people how to follow God. One of the things he taught is that we need to treat everyone the way we would treat him. If you saw Jesus sitting alone at a playground, you'd go talk to him. If you saw that Jesus was sad or scared or hurt, you'd try to help him. Jesus said we need to do the same for the people around us. Whenever we show love to one of God's people, we're showing love to God, too.

When I help a person who's scared or feels blue, 

It's just like I'm helping Jesus, too.

And one more that is really important to our family, not just because it happens to be Daddy's birthday!

December 18

A New Family

Beloved, now we are children of God. 1 John 3:2 NKJV

Something amazing happens when you love God and trust him. You become one of God's children. You also become part of a great big family of people all over the world. And members of God's family love each other no matter what. They stand up for each other, encourage each other, and help each other. How can you help another of God's children today?

The world is filled with sisters and brothers.

Since we're all God's children, we should help each other.

I'm going to make a point to do our devotions each night before bed - in fact I'm adding a "scriptures" card to Maddie's Accountable Kids chore board tonight to remind her and me. I'm going to write about AK soon - it's amazing and is already changing our little girl into an accountable kid!