
Good morning!
Welcome to your evening coffee! May our Heavenly Father remind us today that He disciplines those that He loves! Father, help us to see your discipline as your love. Help us to embrace the lives that you have blessed us with. Help us to throw ourselves whole-heartedly into whatever you have set before us. And us we stray, as we struggle, lay your hand upon our shoulder Father, and in the name of your son Jesus, and by the power of the Spirit, gently correct us and share your delight with us when we listen to you! Amen!
Your Evening Song: "Yes He Can!" by CAIN
Your Evening Scripture: Colossians 3:23-24
Whatever you do, work heartily, as for the Lord and not for men,
knowing that from the Lord you will receive the inheritance as your reward.
You are serving the Lord Christ.
...
Bird poop trampoline.
Let me explain. I sent my kids out to jump on the trampoline yesterday. They get out there and they're laughing and jumping. And...? What is that around their feet, bouncing white against the black of the trampoline? I walked over to look.
Bird poop. A trampoline full of the tiniest little pieces of bird poop that somehow, at the time, seemed so big.
Great. I got the kids off the trampoline. And I start crawling around on that thing, cleaning it. Was I frustrated? Was it gross? Was my heart squeezed tight with a growing bitterness? Yes. With each little piece of bird poop, yes. On my hands and knees I picked up each piece. I scrubbed out the ones that had sunk into the mesh. I cleaned the inside. I cleaned the outside.
And there was a moment, when my heart was heavy with weariness and bitterness. And the Holy Spirit moved. He brought this phrase into my mind, "Whatever you do, work heartily, as for the Lord..." In that moment I stopped cleaning and just laughed. The bitterness was gone and all that I was left with was a sweet, sheepish sort of joy. The kind a son has when his Father gently and playfully corrects him.
Yes. We should work whole-heartedly at all that we do, with enthusiasm, as if we are always working for God, and not for anyone else. We should. But if you're anything like me, you don't always do this. Sometimes it is a struggle. Sometimes there is no struggle at all, because in the moment we have forgotten.
As God's children, when we do not obey this command, He will correct us. He will not condemn us. Are we willing to receive His discipline as His love for us? Are we willing to laugh at ourselves and, by the Spirit, try again? Are we willing to be mindful of our Father's gentle nudges on our hearts and minds in the Spirit as we live our everyday lives?
May we work for the one who made us. May we embrace His correction as the one who loves us. And may we entrust ourselves to His wisdom and correction as the one who will reward us with the greatest inheritance that comes only from Him.
Let's be a people known as "Delights in God's Correction."

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