to welcome or to judge

      Everybody you meet (in the mirror and elsewhere) is weak or needy or sick in one way or another. The only question is whether you’ll choose to welcome or to judge.

“Welcome the one who is weak or needy or sick, granting access to your heart. . . .” Romans 14:1

“Why do you judge. . . ?” Romans 14:10

make yourself at home

      The more you make yourself at home in God’s love today, the freer you’ll be to enjoy the folks around you (instead of using them).

“I have no desire to fill my God-sized hole with you.” Unknown

“Make yourself at home in My love.” John 15:9

true listening

      Once you get a taste of listening like someone who is being taught, you probably won’t want to go back to make-believe listening.

“An essential part of true listening is . . . the temporary giving up . . . of one’s own prejudices, frames of reference and desires so as to experience as far as possible the speaker’s world from the inside. . . .” M. Scott Peck

“The Lord . . . wakens my ear to listen like someone who is being taught.” Isaiah 50:4

gladly give

      If you see today’s twenty-four hours as your possessions, you’ll parse them out (or not) as it suits you. If you see them as a gift, you’ll gladly give.      

“[F]rom possessiveness to hospitality. . . .” Susan Currie

“God so loved . . . that He gave. . . .” John 3:16

would you?

      If you could trade toxic-and-sickening for truly-healed, would you?

“Envy is . . . toxic and sickening. . . .” Cornelius Plantinga

“Envy is like cancer. . . .” Proverbs 14:30

“Heal me, Lord, and I will be truly healed.” Jeremiah 17:4

the gift of finding

      Pay close attention today.

Serendipity: the gift of finding unexpected, beneficial events

“[S]uch highly-unlikely beneficial events happen to us all the time, quietly, knocking on the door of our awareness no more dramatically than the beetle gently tapping on the windowpane.” M. Scott Peck, MD

“Pay close attention. . . .” Mark 4:24