Happy 4th of July

I'm taking today off to celebrate 4th of July with my family! I hope you have a blessed weekend celebrating our country's freedom.

Verse to Remember:

John 8:36 -- So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed.

We are a free country, CHOOSE to be free in Christ.

Thankful Thursday

Whoops, I'm late posting. Wow, this summer vacation stuff keeps you busy. :-)
Things I'm thankful for:

1. Having a wonderful cookout on Sunday night with the whole "Truth4theJourney" family (Sonya, hubby & kids). We had a great visit. To give you an idea how long it's been since we've all been together, my 5 y/o Cici had asked me earlier in the week "Do they have a daddy?" That means it had been several years since we've all been together.

2. A playdate with my friend Sue J (Create: Make something of today). We don't see each other as much over the summer, with our busy schedules, so it was nice to get together, and Gigi spent the night with Sue's daughter CJ.

3. We may go to the beach this summer! We weren't planning for a vacation this year, but a "STAY-cation." But my hubby says we may be able to make it work. So we're hopeful.

4. Today I'm taking my kid to a theme park, so we're running around here like crazy getting ready. Thankful in advance for the fun we'll have.

5. I'm still reading Deut, but I'm back at it. I was tired of reading, it so flipped ahead to read a Psalm for inspiration. I randomly picked 106. If you haven't read Psalm 106 - it is simply a RECAP of all I've read so far in the OT! Wow. What confirmation that I'm exactly where I need to be.

What are you thankful for today?

Dream or Vision?

I rarely remember my dreams. I sleep soundly at night, waking up refreshed with no memory of having dreamed.

Do you think God still talks to us in dreams, as he did so many times in the Bible? Joseph (of the colored coat fame), Solomon and Joseph (earthly father of Jesus) were all spoken to in dreams.

As I walked into my garage the other day, I glanced over at the flower pots pictured with this post. These are my flower pots, the painted ones decorated by my preschooler's class. The others, just pots I've used and have in the garage waiting to be used again. But as I saw them, the dream I had the night before came flooding back into my head.

In the dream, I held a pot of dry soil. I was trying to water the soil, but it was so dry, the water wouldn't go into the soil, it just filled the pot and ran over it, not sinking in. As the dream flashed in my brain, I thought the pot with the dry soil represented a person. And of course Jesus is the water, the Living Water, pouring into someone, but just running over the sides, not sinking in. Could Jesus be speaking to me? What could the Holy Spirit be revealing to me?

Am I the pot? My heart can be hard. It's been a reasonable and appropriate safety net for me over the years of my childhood to protect me from more pain. Am I becoming hard hearted to the Word of God?

Is the pot someone to whom I am witnessing? Someone who is not getting the message that I am desparately trying to give them? I don't know the answers to this, but I am thinking about it. And praying for answers.

Do you think it was "just" a dream, or vision? What do you think it meant?

Matthew 13:3-9 -- Then he {Jesus} told them many things in parables, saying: "A farmer went out to sow his seed. As he was scattering the seed, some fell along the path, and the birds came and ate it up. Some fell on rocky places, where it did not have much soil. It sprang up quickly, because the soil was shallow. But when the sun came up, the plants were scorched, and they withered because they had no root. Other seed fell among thorns, which grew up and choked the plants. Still other seed fell on good soil, where it produced a crop—a hundred, sixty or thirty times what was sown. He who has ears, let him hear."