Labor of Love

As I was laying down today wishing I could let my mind stop thinking about everything and take a short nap before Anna would wake up I decided to read some scriptures with the youversion bible app (which is free). Upon reading I discovered this verse in 1 Thes. 1:3

³ remembering without ceasing your work of faith, labor of love, and patience of hope in our Lord Jesus Christ in the sight of our God and Father,

I thought it was odd to have the words 'work' and 'labor' next to each other. I thought how repetitive. So I used the Blue Letter Bible app (which is free as well) to look up the Greek meaning. What I found was crazy! So the word for work means your actual place of business or whatever you do for a living pretty much. The word for Labor means to cause one trouble or intense labor along with trouble and toil! I thought to myself, holy cow, that is so true. Let's be real...sometimes it is really hard to love people. 

Why is it so hard to love?

I think it is because it is such an intense emotion that you get caught up in. It makes you vulnerable to be hurt because you put so much effort into showing your love. And as a christian we are called to love and most of the time it coincides with our flesh, (our own will, earthly nature vs. spiritual nature) I think it is really easy to forget what manner of spirit we are. I was letting anxiety of 'what I don't want to do' overtake me. I realized that Loving others doesn't always involve what I want but esteeming others over myself. This could apply in friendships, family relationships, marriage, you name it! 

I think this verse brought perspective in my life and reminded me that love isn't always easy. It's hard work. Paul was admonishing the church of Thessalonica for their Faith, Love and Patience. Now those are three really neat things to be known for. And let's just say for the Holidays I think those are 3 important things to live by and be thankful for.

Work of faith--- May your faith be evident at your place of employment, business, house, and in everything you do.
labor of love-- May you love out of the overflow of God's love even though it will be painful and intense at times to love those closest to you or far away from you. May you continue to show grace and God's lovingkindness in the hardest times. 
Patience of hope--- May you not grow weary, but continue with patience knowing the hope of God's calling. 

Entering into Thanksgiving and Christmas, May your life be a testimony of your Faith in God, may you love even when it gets tough, and may your patience of hope in God sustain you. 

Love vs. Fear

"For you did not receive the spirit of bondage again to fear, but you received the Spirit of adoption by whom we cry out, "Abba, Father." -Romans 8:15 NKJV

I keep reading this verse over and over and you know what word keeps ringing in my ears? The word 'again'. This one word stands out to me because it means to fall back into something or to repeat. This word implies that at one time we were enslaved to fear. This happened due to the fall of man in the garden of Eden. We all know we are in a constant battle, as Ephesians 6:12 talks about, not against flesh and blood but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this age, against spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places. There are two things at war, love and fear. 

You see, when Jesus died on the cross, He took away everything that happened with the fall of man in the Garden of Eden. Jesus fulfilled the Law and gave us His righteousness, He took our place. Yet we still find ourselves battling against fear. Fear tells us that we are not good enough, that God is mad at us, and that we are unworthy of love and of live. Fear keeps us quiet, it silences our voice, and can haunt and taunt. BUT We Are NO Longer under fear. We are adopted by love. We have LOVE on our side! 

The Spirit of adoption tells us we are loved, accepted, pleasing to God. God chose you and wanted you. It's amazing to me every time I see a picture of what Jesus went through on the cross the scripture always come to my mind, "and for the Joy set before Him, He endured the cross." You give God joy as His daughter. You are His Joy! He did everything for you. I know that God doesn't want you enslaved to fear. He gave us a spirit of Power, Love, and a Sound mind not of fear. 

He is your father, it doesn't matter what your past is or what line of heritage you came from, you have been adopted by love. When fear tries to overtake you, remember love. When fear tries to silence your voice about your Faith in God or about anything, remember Love. Remember how loved you are by your Abba, Father. There is freedom in Christ. Love has set us Free. I encourage you to Read Romans 8 and really ponder and meditate on what God is speaking to you. 

A Dirty Love

I hope my title caught your attention to read this post! I am trying to think of creative titles :) You are probably really curious why the title is "Dirty Love" especially in today's world. Take the time with me to revisit a story that can easily be skipped over. It's the story of creation...


Genesis 1 talks about how God spoke everything into existence and "It was Good." God thought of something, said a word, and there it was. Move ahead to Genesis 2 and we see how God formed man from the dust. 


                   I want you to get the right image here, so visualize with me. God is forming man with His hands and creating man in His image. I wonder what words and songs God was singing or thinking while He was forming, creating man. Then God looks at His creation and breathes a breath of life into the man's nostrils (verse 7). To breathe into someone's nostrils you have to be face to face and with that breath of air man awakened to life. I wonder what that moment looked like when God saw his creation face to face, eye to eye and his creation looked back at Him. What a sweet, intimate moment. I wonder what their first words were. I wonder what happened in those sweet moments. How joyful God must have felt to see the longing of His heart living and breathing before Him. Then God placed man into the Garden of Eden. 


You see, this image is so sweet because beloved, you are more than just a word spoken or a thought. God in His greatness took the time to form you. You truly are fearfully and wonderfully made. Take Genesis chapter 2 and pair it up with psalm 139 and get the right image of how much God loves you. I have to write out ps. 139 because it is too sweet to pass up. (for my notes on ps. 139 check out the post "my favorite")

Psalm 139

1 O Lord, You have searched me and known me.

2 You know my sitting down and my rising up; You understand my thought afar off.3 You comprehend my path and my lying down, And are acquainted with all my ways.4 For there is not a word on my tongue, But behold, O Lord, You know it altogether.5 You have hedged me behind and before, And laid Your hand upon me.6  Such knowledge is too wonderful for me; It is high, I cannot attain it...

13 For You formed my inward parts; You covered me in my mothers womb.14 I will praise You, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made; Marvelous are Your works, Andthat my soul knows very well.15 My frame was not hidden from You, When I was made in secret, And skillfully wrought in the lowest parts of the earth.16 Your eyes saw my substance, being yet unformed. And in Your book they all were written, The days fashioned for me, When as yet there were none of them.17 How precious also are Your thoughts to me, O God! How great is the sum of them!18  If I should count them, they would be more in number than the sand; When I awake, I am still with You...

God placed Adam into the Garden of Eden because He made him in the secret place and adam was skillfully wrought in the lowest parts of the earth. Just like all of God's children. From the beginning God was showing us how much He loved us by how He created us. This psalm is so dear to my heart because of the passion and love exuberayting from it. 

Encouragement: I pray you would reread this love story of how God created man and you would see your story in it. You would see how much God is in love with you and how much He desires and cares for you. You aren't just a word or a thought but formed by the very hands of God. Everything God makes is good. You are good. You are created in His image. You are created in Love. You are created for Love. You are created to walk with God. He is a good Father. He loves you. 

What does it mean to be a child?

I am sure you all are wanting to know more about my book. So this post will be more on topic of the book. 


"...Let the little children come to Me, and do not forbid them; for of such is the kingdom of God. Assuredly, I say to you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God as a little child will by no means enter it." Mark 10:14-15 (emphasis mine)


A father cannot be a father without having a child. So we need to really see ourselves as God as our father and us as His children. Now, I don't know about you but I have always wondered what it meant by receiving the kingdom of God like a child. I love being around children they are a lot of fun. One thing I noticed about children is that they will believe anything you tell them! Have you ever wondered why they will? It is because of innocence they believe. A young child's brain hasn't developed to understand the difference between reality and fantasy or abstract thoughts: They don't analyze a situation. They trust and follow because of love. I really believe God is looking for us to have pure innocence before him to trust and follow Him because of love. Because He loves us. 
     Innocence means to be free from moral wrong. Jesus gave us back our Innocence when He died for us. It is by his blood that we are made clean and pure. You can't earn it. It is a free gift, called grace. 


Because of Love, Jesus gave us grace. Grace gives us innocence. Innocence lets our minds be pure from evil and moral wrong so we can believe. Belief allows us to trust. Trust allows following. And we follow because of Love. God is always the Alpha and Omega. The beginning and end. He is LOVE. Love will always be the beginning and the end. It was for Love God made man. It was for Love God gave Christ to redeem us. And it is for Love He is coming again. Everything He does is Love because it is who He is.


Have you ever watched little children imitate their parents? It is because they love and admire them so much and they want to be just like them. Think back to the authorities you had in your life growing up. The ones who showed you genuine love and respect were so much easier to listen and obey and you wanted to be like them and not disappoint them. I think that is why Jesus always did what He saw the father doing because He wanted to be just like him. Love is the greatest key to life. Love is why we exist. It was all for LOVE and will always be. 

Love gives grace, restores innocence, causes one to believe and trust which leads to obedience and following what their father does. 

Encouragement for the day: Know the Father loves you. You are His and He is yours. You are His child. He longs for you to spend time with Him. How do you spend time? Read His word, meditate on it, and worship. Listen and be still and know GOD IS IN LOVE WITH YOU. He doesn't see the mess ups and the screw ups. He sees His sons' blood washing over you because you are HIS. You are pure and innocent before Him because He loves you.   So...          "Fall in Love with the Love of God today!"

My Favorite

I have MANY passages in the bible that I love but I think my favorite chapter would be Psalm 139. I absolutley LOVE that chapter! I copied this from the New King James Version and used www.youversion.com by the way youversion.com is an excellent FREE resource for multiple translations of the bible AND Devotionals!!! Check it out!

I am going to break this chapter apart and insert my notes :) When you read this ,though, I want you to think about every word and what that means to you. Take your time reading this chapter and put yourself in it, like if you were the one telling this to God. !

Psalm 139

God’s Perfect Knowledge of Man

1 For the Chief Musician. A Psalm of David. O Lord, You have searched me and known me.

2 You know my sitting down and my rising up;
You understand my thought afar off. I really love this, God knows you. Sometimes we don't know ourselves, but God KNOWS you. He knows the depth of your heart and what you long for. AND he even understands your thoughts! In the New Living Translation 'afar off' is similar to when you are far away. You may not even feel like you were as close to God as you once were but He still understands your thoughts! I like to think of it as God is always listening to us!

3 You comprehend my path and my lying down,
And are acquainted with all my ways.

4 For there is not a word on my tongue,
But behold, O Lord, You know it altogether. Sometimes I wonder if we would change the way we talk if we knew Jesus was visibly there with us in person? Would your vocabulary change? Would your conversation go another direction? Would you still Gossip about that girl or talk bad about your parents? It's a crazy thought! Even though Jesus might not be visible to us, He is still there.

5 You have hedged me behind and before,
And laid Your hand upon me. What a great Dad, a protector. I love this because I know that wherever I go God is watching over me.

6 Such knowledge is too wonderful for me;
It is high, I cannot attain it.

7 Where can I go from Your Spirit?
Or where can I flee from Your presence?

8 If I ascend into heaven, You are there;
If I make my bed in hell, behold, You are there. This is powerful stuff!!! Have you ever made your bed in Hell? I know I have, I like to call them pity parties. OR if not pity parties, moments or days of despair. I think it is interesting to note that it isn't anyone else who makes the bed but yourself. And no matter where you choose to make your bed God is still there!!!!! I love it.  

9 If I take the wings of the morning,
And dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea, Fun thought: what would it look like to take the wings of the morning? I imagine it would be beautiful and breathtaking! To see the sun rise and be in the clouds taking in all the beautiful colors that light up the earth!! To dwell in the deepest part of the sea, now that would be scary!!! I would much rather be in the sky lol.

10 Even there Your hand shall lead me,
And Your right hand shall hold me. The author is showing that no matter where we are we are never to far from God.

11 If I say, “Surely the darkness shall fall on me,”
Even the night shall be light about me;


12 Indeed, the darkness shall not hide from You,
But the night shines as the day;
The darkness and the light are both alike to You. I love how the darkness and light are the same to God! isn't that mind boggling! I love it. There is nothing Greater than God!  

13 For You formed my inward parts;
You covered me in my mother’s womb.


14 I will praise You, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made;
Marvelous are Your works,
And that my soul knows very well.


15 My frame was not hidden from You,
When I was made in secret,
And skillfully wrought in the lowest parts of the earth. I love knowing God formed us, created us exactly how He wanted us. Nothing was hidden from Him. I also love the fact that we were made in secret. Far away from destruction and negativity. It was just you and God. I love holding newborn babies because I look into their eyes and think, you have spent 9 months starring at the face of God and now I can hold you and look into the eyes that have gazed upon God.



16 Your eyes saw my substance, being yet unformed.
And in Your book they all were written,
The days fashioned for me,
When as yet there were none of them.

17 How precious also are Your thoughts to me, O God!
How great is the sum of them! These two verses get me everytime, God saw everything about you. He even wrote a book about you! He saw it ALL and yet He is captivated by you. His thoughts are precious toward you. He doesn't look at all the mess ups we make. Whenever we ask for forgiveness Jesus' blood covers our sins and washes us clean!! CLEAN---God doesn't remember them!!! It's difficult to comprehend because we are the ones who still remember our sins but Jesus took our sin and SHAME on the cross, so we could live in righteousness (being right before God).

18 If I should count them, they would be more in number than the sand;
When I awake, I am still with You.

19 Oh, that You would slay the wicked, O God!
Depart from me, therefore, you bloodthirsty men.

20 For they speak against You wickedly;
Your enemies take Your name in vain.

21 Do I not hate them, O Lord, who hate You?
And do I not loathe those who rise up against You?

22 I hate them with perfect hatred;
I count them my enemies. I don't think this could have been a psalm without talking about the enemy lol. I think these passages show the authors passion toward God. You know the feeling whenever you hear someone defy (deny, criticize) the name of God. Something rises up within you.

23 Search me, O God, and know my heart;
Try me, and know my anxieties;      ...and to close us out, the prayer of opening up our lives to God to teach, guide and cleanse us.

So now you see why Psalm 139 is my absolute favorite chapter in the bible. It shows the definition of How much God loves you and this was written even before Jesus came to die on the cross for you!!! God loved you from the beginning!

As a christian we will never understand who we truly are until we understand that we are deeply loved by God, not because we love Him but because He first loved us.  (1 John 4:19)