Gravel Road Musings

  So let me start by saying that if you made it through the last round of review books and are still following, you deserve a prize. I am trying to catch up on review books, so that combined with the fact that I don't really enjoy writing the reviews that much and you have a procrastination problem that results in a stack of six books waiting to be written about. But now I am caught up and ready to write something else. Yesterday, I dug out my geraniums that I had stuck in a box in the basement. It's such a sad combination of dead leaves and albino looking shoots of new growth, but hidden away in that box was that bloom you see above. How does that happen? How in the darkness and cold of a cardboard box can beauty spring forth? It's amazing to me that shoots will start to grow, but a flower?  And what about  me? Do I bloom in the darkness or do I become like the dead leaves: brittle, easily unhinged, and ugly inside and out? This is a question I am not sure I want to eval...

  Big Lessons from a Little Donkey on Faith, Friendship, and Finding Your Path Rachel Anne Ridge is the author of Flash, another inspirational book about a donkey. I highly enjoyed this book and was happy to see her write another book. It did take me a long time to get to reading it. Since Flash, the first donkey showed up on their farm until Henry came to join them, a lot of things had happened, hard things that caused Rachel to question a lot of things. It would seem like she started from scratch to rebuild her faith and figure out what she believed. While I don't think she ever doubted God and His existence, things had happened that shook her foundation. My biggest negative about this book is that it seems that the foundational element of Creation was also shaken in this book and I cannot agree with her current perspective, especially not related to some of the resources she cited in the back of the book.  That being said, there were some good things in her book. She starte...

  "For with God, nothing shall be impossible." Luke 1:37 The picture has nothing to do with anything, except I think it's a pretty blue sky in the picture. I've been thinking about this verse off and on over the last six weeks or so. We love this verse. Something comes up "Nothing is impossible with God" slides glibly off our tongue. I mean, really God has got this and I don't even need to show up, or do I? I think we miss a crucial part of the context here.  What does verse 38 say? "And Mary said, Behold the handmaid of the Lord; be it unto me according to thy word...." Now, I'm no Bible scholar and I stand corrected here, but didn't Mary have a part to play in God's impossibilities?  Suppose the angel had said, "Mary, nothing is impossible with God." And Mary said, "Allrighty then, prove it, because I am going to stand here with arms crossed waiting to see." Or "I'll believe that when I see it." O...

  A One-Year Guide to Reading and Understanding the Entire Bible That sounds like a very lofty statement. Understanding the entire Bible? Is that really something  you can do in one year? I think after reading the heart of Tara-Leigh Cobble her desire is for us to understand it better and to enjoy Bible reading. She talks about the mistakes she made in reading the Bible and how once she was able to read the Bible as a story in chronological order helped her to make sense of the confusion she often felt when reading it. This is what she says about it: "I spent years trying to build my life around a book I hadn't read about a God I didn't know. But now that I really know Him, I want to help others know Him better too!" I have not read the entire book. I already had plans for this year's devotions and decided not to change, but I am looking forward to using it perhaps next year. I have heard quite a bit of good about this book from someone I follow on Instagram and s...

  Finding God in the Disruptions of Life I'm struggling to come to grips with this book. It was so very helpful for me; I thoroughly enjoyed it all the way through. The timing was providential; written in 2019, but released in October, 2020 in the midst of a very tumultuous year and you can't help but believe that God was orchestrating all of this. But then I read the epilogue and Shelly talks about Co-Vid yes, but she also talks about her cancer journey and how the very things she writes about she is now needing to put into practice. It made the book come alive for me a bit more. After finishing the book, I did some digging and discovered that Shelly died less than a month after the book was published. I didn't know you could grieve someone you didn't know, but this feels like a loss to me. Good writers shouldn't die young and yet Shelly is now experiencing the certainty she wrote about looking for. And I want to grab ahold and claim God's truth and cling to Hi...

Living Joyfully through Allegiance to King Jesus This book stabbed me in a few uncomfortable places. It's the most fun to read books that just agree with how you are living life; it's less easy, though more worthwhile to read books that challenge you and convict you.  This book did that. Am I bowing to King Jesus or to self-allegiance? Do I have false allegiances that I am clinging to because it's too scary to give them up? Why is it so hard to give full allegiance to Jesus and to trust Him to meet all my needs. Christine tackles some common areas of self-allegiance: control, escape, approval, comfort, and  more.  But can't you see in those four how this book might be applicable? I like approval, I certainly like to be comfortable. If I can be in control, I can feel a sense of security that I can handle what life is bringing my way. But none of these things leave room for Jesus to be the King on the throne of my heart and so they must go if I truly want to love Go...

Embracing the Mysteries of Providence "Situations that seem confusing and chaotic to us are actually plot threads He is weaving together to create a story...a beautiful, compelling work of art." "Your life and your story actually matter. They have meaning as you view them against the backdrop of God's ultimate Story." This book is full of stories, stories of financial difficulty, marriages gone awry, sickness, death, and grief. So many stories were shared in these pages and to me, that made the book so much more readable and relatable. You can say all the right things, but until you have lived it, it is hard to know if those principles you claim hold weight in your real life. This book is about people who lived the hard things and walked victoriously through them. It didn't mean their lives turned out right in the end; there were sons who still lived away from family togetherness, spouses who were still unfaithful, health was still lost, and people s...

Prayers for Women This is a collection of 40 prayers and sitting here during Co-Vid 19, there were many that were quite applicable. "We also know You well enough to know our days are numbered; we do not know what tomorrow may bring. This knowledge is in Your safekeeping that we might trust You above our own abilities to control, as we are so prone to do."  How much I need this right now. I know that God is in control, but I need the reminder that my future is in His safekeeping. Just so many fitting prayers. Quite a few of the prayers offered an explanation at the end as to what prompted Barbara to write the prayer in the first place. I can relate to the writing of prayers, sometimes I feel like I can pray better, stay for focused if I write my prayer down and then read it. It can feel like a deeper connection, in some way, more meaningful perhaps, I'm not sure how to describe it. Another quote that I wrote down was this: "...but doing the ordinary can tarn...

Finding Soul-Deep Strength in a Skin-Deep World I picked this book because a friend had talked about getting it and I was curious what it was about. The title is catching and makes you wonder what the author is meaning to talk about. Well, it turns out, that that is exactly what the author wanted to address: Stop calling me beautiful. In an age, where women strive for beauty, where we give lip service to God and tell our fellow sisters that they are beautiful and God loves them and now all their troubles should be over, Phylicia comes with a different message. She brings a message of change, but also one of lasting hope. She encourages women to move past the "pink fluff" of being beautiful in God's eyes, which while true can hide a lot of sin, and to purse lasting change, to pursue a real relationship with God.  "Being told we're beautiful in God's eyes is a surface response to a soul-deep problem. That problem is our own sinfulness." "A wor...

Why I traded two dream jobs for a life of true calling. It's not about what you do, it's about who you are.  If I could sum up this book in one sentence, I think that is the sentence I would use. Paula Faris used to co-host The View, Good Morning America Weekend, and do anything else she was asked to do. She led a crazy work schedule to the detriment of her marriage, her family, her children. Failure was a real fear and always felt just a misstep away.  Then God started getting her attention through some unfortunate events and she started to listen and hear what He was saying. She made some potentially career-ending choices and started a faith podcast with the ABC network. Today, she has more time with her husband, she's home most days when her children come home from school and her podcast is bringing her more fulfillment than she ever imagined.  I hope that is not too much of a spoiler, I am assuming that since this book is true and Paula is a journalist, a lot of...

Discovering Grace, Freedom, and Wholeness Where You Never Imagined Looking I'm not sure why I picked this book to review, because I wasn't sure I wanted to read another book like this, but I am so very glad I did.  It was just what I needed right now. Let me start by saying it's a pretty book: one of those smaller-sized books with a hardcover, but no book jacket. It looks like a book you could sit down and read in just a few short hours. It doesn't look as daunting as the normal paperback, standard size inspirational books can look. It begs to be opened and read and read it I did in just a few days. Let me also add that the title is so appropriate for this day of "Safer-At-Home" orders during CoVid-19. Staying is definitely what I have been doing these days, but the meaning behind this title is so much deeper than just a physical staying. What does it mean to stay in your pain, in your disappointments and work through them to find healing rather than...

Experience the Deep Delight You Were Made For First off, is that not a pretty cover. I think that drew me in at first. It's just a spring-looking, happy cover and makes you want to pick the book up. "There is a direct relationship to our view of God and our experience of all He's promised us." That is the premise of the book. I think if the word happy bothers you, it can be easily interchanged with joy. This is  not a flippant happiness, but a happiness that comes from knowing who God is and who you are in God. It's a happiness that comes from focusing on God, following His will, depending on Him and being surrendered to God as King. This is an excellent resource for someone who is new in their Christian journey or for someone like me, who has been a Christian for years, but needs the reminder that there is more to this journey than just following a list of dos and donts. I needed to hear that "Focusing on God is not a one time action, it is a lifel...

Stamp! Stamp! Stamp!  The deposit stamp clunks down on the checks as I prepare them for deposit. I can predict that I will soon hear a pattering of feet and animated requests of "Do my hand" Do me".  All because one time, for fun, I stamped the back of their cute, little hands and now every time they hear it, they come running. It's a ritual now, one I question if I should bring to an end, but....I think it will end on its own soon enough and all that will be left will be the faint memory and silent longing for those "littles" days.  So, for now, I let them run around with a stamp on their hand that says, "For deposit only --------" But the thought struck me this week as I yielded to their request: what if it really were that easy? Just a stamp and they were secure. The stamp guarantees that that check will be deposited into our church's bank account. How handy would it be if we could just stamp little pudgy hands and it would guar...

7 ways to find calm in the chaos "I wonder what would happen if we begged God to change us with the same desperation we ask him to change someone else?"  Okay, with quotes like that, my toes are thoroughly stomped on. The purpose of this book is to help us learn to live in REST, to rely on God completely and learn to bask in His presence all the time. If I have it right, it's to live in the eye of the tornado, where chaos is swirling around us, but we are not upset or frustrated by it. The concept is good, I think a lot of the points are spot on and made me say wow, that is good.  I think someone who is living on the edge and frustrated and grasping would gain a lot of benefit from it. I would say for myself, it wasn't necessarily the right season. It's wintertime, life is a bit slower for me right now, I don't feel fully caught in the chaos of life. I can certainly go there, I do feel like right in this immediate timeframe there is a lot of stuff go...

365 ways to improve your life, career, and relationships. "Relationships are like batteries. Both positives and negatives keep things charged."  Dean goes on to explain that the negatives, the conflicts, can bring new depth to the relationship if they are worked through. "Profanity is nothing more than a momentary lapse in creativity."  I love this quote because it can seem so true. I don't swear, but I still have my list of words I tend to repeat and I love the challenge to use different words to describe situations. "A shortcut rarely is" There are 363 more quotes like this in this book. Yes, I numbered that right because "It's always good to go beyond what others expect of you." These "shifts" as Dean calls them cover a wide range of topics from listening, to careers, to relationships, to goals and much more. Read over a week they can all start to muddle together, so I would highly recommend just reading one or tw...

Building Traditions that Breathe Life into Your Home "Traditions are a planned determination to remember, celebrate, and value what is important." "Traditions offer security. Traditions provide comforting memories. Traditions make life sparkle. Traditions remind us what matters. Traditions connect us to others. Traditions shower love. Traditions are worth it." I debated getting this book because it just felt like another to-do list, another reminder of how much I fail as a mom to make life fun and interesting for my children. But I'm also a sucker for books like this that are brimming with ideas and to-do lists, so I got it. Jessica has some really good things to say. She understands the busy mom who doesn't have a lot of margin in her day.  She doesn't ask every mom to go out and plan a big five-course dinner every night of the week because that is what your children will remember. She does stress the importance of food in a child's ...

A Journey of Letting Go, Hanging on and Finding a Peace You Almost Forgot Was Possible The first thing I have to say about this book is just Go Read It!!  I really want to shout it at you in all caps, but I have the sense to realize that just because the book hit me between the eyes and I highlighted extensively on my Kindle version (I don't think I could highlight a paper copy), does not mean it will hit everyone the same way. I was reading this book at a time in my life when I really needed to surrender control, to be obedient to God's call, and to also be willing to accept help. These are all things that Jennifer talks about in this book. Jennifer was a news reporter and loved it until God kept pulling on her control strings and asking her to give up that job, then she taught news reporting until God asked for that job too. Now she writes about the greatest story of all: Jesus and following Him and does an amazing job of it as well. I think this is the first book I hav...

Hope for Today from 12 Women of the Bible Eve, Noah's wife, Sarai, Rebekah, Hagar, Lot's wife, Rachel, Leah, Dinah, Potiphar's wife, Tamar, Zipporah, all women with dreams I am sure, visions of how they thought life would turn out, all disappointed. I guess we could look at this list and say Eve started it all and really she did, but it's pretty pointless to go there. Sin happened and now we are left to deal with the results of living in a broken world. And since our world is broken, we will get hurt and we will hurt others. Look at Rachel and Leah. Rachel and Jacob loved each other dearly but were crushed by Laban's decision to force Leah into the mix. And we often don't think about Leah's feelings in all of this. Jill brought out a different aspect in this book. Did Leah secretly love Jacob too? Was she a willing conspirator in becoming the bride of Jacob or was she forced into the deception too? Either way, she suffered a lot in her life because of ...

9 Keys to Building a Positive Lifelong Relationship with Your Kids What is my why in parenting? This is the question I take away from the book, the one I want to think about occasionally. Michael Hyatt said, "People lose their way when they lose their why." And to quote Mike Berry, the author, "When we don't know why we are doing something, when we've forgotten our purpose, we get lost." "Remember that you are in this because you love your child, and ultimately you want to raise a human being who lives with character and integrity and who leaves a lasting impression on the world."  That sums it up well, that is why I try to be consistent, that is why I listen and try to answer 10,000 questions a day, that is why I am trying to teach obedience and respect and responsibility.  But it is easy to lose the long-term focus and just see the day and all its pressures and frustrations and lose heart and patience. Mike offers some good practical soluti...

John 3:16   (link to video) I've been working on memorization for Amber. She is a sponge and can recite portions of her story tapes, so why not use her ability to memorize and fill her brain with Scripture? So we decided to learn John 3:16, which took her a matter of days and she could say it, with one problem. "For God so loved the world that he gave his only forgotten  son....."  Oops, that's kind of a big deal, huh? But then I thought a bit more: forgotten Son, hmm, how many times do I forget Him? How many times do I go through my day acting as though I know nobody by the name of Jesus? Acting as though He is an impersonal being and has no effect on how I speak, how I live, or how I act? I may have mentioned this on here before, I can't remember, but one thing that has been a huge blessing to me this year, 2019, is I feel a real desire to know God more. Yes, I have always said I want to know God more and I did, but this year, this sea...