Seeking Kindness
She opens her mouth in wisdom, and the teaching of kindness is on her tongue.First Seeking Kindness Giveaway!
Happy December!
To celebrate the beginning of this glorious Christmas Season, Seeking Kindness is having a holiday giveaway including some absolutely adorable Christmas Cards donated by Sara’s Art House! (Please go here to browse all of her terrific products!) Sara has a real gift for encouraging, sweet speech which is reflected in her art. You’ll enjoy looking at her offerings, and would likely also enjoy perusing her delightful blog!
The giveaway also includes a few unique Kindness Birds (a Seeking Kindness exclusive) and perhaps some extra goodies….
How might you win this pearl of a prize, you ask? There are just two simple steps:
- Post a link to this little contest on your blog, Facebook, Twitter or other social network (to spread the joy around). (If you don’t have a blog, etc., you can email a friend or two to tell them about the contest and I’ll count that too.)
- Leave a comment to this post telling me where you left your link (be sure to leave a real email address in the email field so I can reach you if you win!) AND include in your comment one idea for teaching kindness to your children or others in your sphere of influence this Christmas.
It’s that easy! The deadline for this giveaway is December 5. Post your comment by midnight PST on that date and you will be automatically entered into a random drawing for these Christmas Card gems.
We at Seeking Kindness surely look forward to hearing all your tremendous ideas!! Have fun!
Refresh Your Heart
Veteran Seeking Kindness readers may remember a treasured series of Monday Morning devotionals by Mrs. Claudia Barba. This godly lady and gifted author (and dear friend!) has now published a new book: Refresh Your Heart: A Woman’s Bible Study.
You have a heart condition. By nature your heart—every heart—is deceitful, polluted,
incurably sick with sin. There is hope for your heart—not in determining to do better, not in resolutions or your own will power, but in God. He redeems old sinful hearts and transforms them into peaceful, serving, forgiving hearts.
Claudia Barba surveys different aspects of the heart, unveiling the heart-changing work of God and explaining how we can participate in the process. Refresh Your Heart will inspire and encourage you in your walk with God.
I couldn’t have said it any better! Consider picking up a copy for a blessed Christmas present!
Don’t Rush Thanksgiving…
Here are a few dramatic ideas for the “day-after.”
Enjoy this beautiful weekend!
Happy Thanksgiving!
Colossians 2:6-7
As therefore ye received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in him, rooted and builded up in him, and established in your faith, even as ye were taught, abounding in thanksgiving.
Grateful Hearts
My dear friend Lydia has written a timely devotional on Psalm 69 in preparation for this week’s Thanksgiving holiday. Enjoy!
Ready to Plan an Activity for Next Thanksgiving?
Try this idea!
First, decorate a special box or journal with a “Thankfulness” theme. Starting this Thanksgiving Day and continuing throughout the next year, write down special blessings, provisions, happenings that God orchestrates in your or your family’s lives on small pieces of paper (or in the journal) and place them in the box. Then, next Thanksgiving, plan a special time to read through the blessings and remember the way God has worked in your lives.“I shall remember the deeds of the LORD; Surely I will remember Your wonders of old.” Psalm 77:11
Thankful for Difficulty
For a tremendous Monday blessing, go here to read Beth Horn’s amazing testimony. God is mightily using her life experiences during a recent battle with cancer to encourage, rebuke and stimulate spiritual growth in me!
Even if you don’t have time to read this entire article, please consider the following excerpt:
Ever so falteringly, I am learning to be thankful for my wise heavenly Father who often overrules my immediate wishes in order to fulfill the true desire of my heart: opportunities to glorify Him. Many times these opportunities come packaged with difficulties that I desire to remove in search of a lighter load or less difficult path. However, God’s help and His upholding are invaluable treasures to us His children.
Excerpt from “Calming Assurance” by Beth Horn, Copyright 2008 Northland Baptist Bible College
Give Thanks
Colossians 3:15-16
Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in one body; and be thankful.
Let the word of Christ richly dwell within you, with all wisdom teaching and admonishing one another with psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with thankfulness in your hearts to God.
A Week of Thanksgiving, Day 7
Day 7
As you have been focusing on thankfulness, have you found some people, items, or circumstances for which it is not easy to be thankful?
Dr. Helen Roseveare, long-time missionary doctor in the Congo, told of a point in her life when she was shamefully mistreated at the hands of rebel soldiers. She described the painful struggle that took place in her heart, as she sought to make some sense out of the humiliation and physical suffering she had undergone. Then she told of the release and peace that came when she sensed God asking her,
“Helen, are you willing to give me thanks for that which I may never give you the privilege of understanding?”
Make a list of past or present circumstances, events, trials, or relationships for which you may never have given thanks. Then, as an expression of faith and an exercise of obedience, say, “Lord, I choose to give You thanks for ________ and ________, which You may never give me the privilege of understanding.”
In so doing, you will be acknowledging that God is the “Blessed Controller” of everything that touches your life, and that you trust Him and His sovereign choices for your life.
Take the time to stop now and make your list of difficult things for which God wants me to give thanks:
Now that you’ve spent a week focusing on gratitude, we’d like to challenge you to make a lifetime habit of giving thanks. In fact, you’ll discover that the whole world looks different, when you learn to see it through eyes of thankfulness!
Devotional by Nancy Leigh DeMoss www.reviveourhearts.com. This Thanksgiving Bible study is also available as a free PDF. Copyright Revive Our Hearts. Used with permission.
A Week of Thanksgiving, Day 6
Day 3
Paul instructed the Ephesian believers to “give thanks always for all things . . .” (Eph. 5:20).
One man of God told of meditating on this verse while he was brushing his teeth one morning. He was challenged by the thought of thanking God for everything! He said, “I began by thanking God for my toothbrush. Then I thanked Him for the toothpaste. Then I realized that I had never thanked God for my teeth!” He went on to ask this probing question: “If tomorrow’s supply depended on today’s thanksgiving, how much would I have tomorrow?”
As you go through this day, try to consciously thank God for all things . . . small things and big things!
Devotional by Nancy Leigh DeMoss www.reviveourhearts.com. This Thanksgiving Bible study is also available as a free PDF. Copyright Revive Our Hearts. Used with permission.
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