I’m reading this to prepare for our ladies’ ministry this year.  The Lord has directed my heart to have our ladies study it together.  Before I ask them to go through this book, I thought I’d read it through.  So on this past Monday afternoon, on my husband’s day off, we headed to the mountains to rest and read for a few hours in a beautiful spot. 

 Not long after we got here we sat and watched a thunderstorm roll in slowly like a tip-toeing toddler.  We witnessed the sky change from sunny to dark gray with heavy sheets of rain being introduced by rolling thunder.  Then in time, the skies changed back to brilliant blue with clouds that looked like piles of cotton candy sitting atop the mountain peaks.

After the rains passed we moved to a higher spot where we could watch the sun set.  Again, the sky changed constantly – both in color and substance.

It was an unbelievable afternoon and evening.  It was not only beautiful, it was also amazingly quiet on this mountaintop. It was a quiet that allowed me to listen – not to nothingness, but God’s voice.

Reading Having a Mary Heart in a Martha World  in that setting was so appropriate.  This book is about the story we read in Luke 10.  You remember the story of Mary and Martha – Mary was sitting at Jesus’ feet while her sister Martha was rushing about preparing a meal for Jesus and his disciples.  In her frustration Martha asks Jesus, “Lord, don’t you care that I’m serving while my sister is sitting?”  Jesus gently rebukes her by telling her that Martha was worried and troubled, but that Mary had chosen the better part – worship. The book is all about how to learn to sit at Jesus’ feet; how to have a quiet heart of worship instead of an anxious, worried one. 

With the rain and then stillness all around me, the Lord spoke to my heart so sweetly as I read. “Be still – even in a storm.  Leave the heavy things that I don’t intend for you to carry.”  He knew I would need these truths.  He knew I would need to be reminded not to be troubled, because trouble came even before we left the mountain.  But God had spoken in the quiet, and now I was running back to those truths as an anchor for my heart. One truth from the book was this quote: “Worry magnifies the trouble.  Prayer magnifies God.”

“This is your burden, Lord.  I’ll let you carry it.  I choose to pray and magnify you instead of worry.”  As the sun was setting over the mountain, my husband and I clasped hands and did just that – we prayed and gave the care to the One who had also brought the thunderstorm and allowed it to pass.  “This too shall pass away,” I thought.

“In the meantime, Lord, give me a Mary heart that I may worship at your feet instead of being distracted by a storm.”  I returned to our parsonage home with a quiet heart – a Mary heart in this Martha world. 
Thank you, Lord.

From inside my parsonage window,

Imagine that you are on your way home and are super hungry and in need of something to eat now.  You stop at the grocery store, dash in and, not wanting to take long to get something to eat, you head right to the check out line.  There you find an assortment of sweet things – candy bars, M&M’s, mints and chewing gum.  Knowing that this will at least ward off your hunger, you purchase a couple of your favorite candy bars and head out to the car.  Eating the candy bars on your way home, your hunger is pacified…at least for a bit.

We’d call the stuff they sell at the cashier lane “fluff”.  It’s nothing substantial.  We’d never go get our grocery cart and buy a weeks worth of candy.  Why not?  It won’t promote growth or health and it won’t satisfy.

If we won’t do that consistently for our body’s sake, why do we often live off of “fluff” in our spiritual lives?  We dash into God’s Word, get a quick little something sweet and dash back out again, having satisfied our need for something spiritual.  However, it’s not lasting.  It won’t promote growth or spiritual health. 

Where do you have to go in the grocery store for things of real substance?  We go into the depth of the store for those things – back where the meats and dairy products are, also the produce and grains.   Proverbs 8:21 is speaking of the Wisdom we find in God’s Word and it says,

• Stop before you open your Bible and ask the Lord to teach you today.  
• Sing a song of praise to the Lord.  Worship Him.  Sit at His feet.
• Slow down.  Read slowly and contemplate what you’re reading, just as you would contemplate each item you put into your grocery cart. 
• Study a verse that you don’t understand by using a commentary.  Matthew Henry commentaries are available on-line and are a great resource.
• Script it.  Write down what you learn. 



Green Tomato and Vidalia Onion Gratin



I learned this great tip for cutting corn off the cob.  If you place it on the middle part of a bundt pan, the corn doesn’t wiggle everywhere while you cut it off. Also, the corn falls into the pan instead of all over the counter.  It works great!  To have this corn ready in a jiffy for Sunday dinner, I cooked it on the cob Saturday night, let it cool, then cut it off.  Sunday I put it into a skillet with a little butter and warmed it up.

Ready for the oven

The herbed-roasted turkey (also a new recipe) was so flavorful.  You mix together a paste of the herbs and olive oil  and put in on the turkey breast, as well as under the skin. I roasted it slowly in the oven while at church, then bumped up the heat to brown it a bit once I got home.  The gravy from a turkey is so good.  I just added a little chicken broth to the pan drippings and thickened it a bit with corn starch. 

I will look forward to eating these leftovers!  Mmmmm!

What’s been cooking in your kitchen?

This following is part of a script from a challenge presented by Nancy Leigh DeMoss.  I heard this the other day on Revive Our Hearts and had to stop what I was doing and bow before the Lord to repent of my proud heart.  Read on if you dare; it’s quite eye-opening and convicting!

Proud people focus on the failures of others, but broken people are overwhelmed with a sense of their own spiritual need. Proud people are self-righteous. They have a critical, fault-finding spirit. They look at everyone else’s faults with a microscope but their own with a telescope, and they look down on others. But broken people are compassionate. They can forgive much because they know how much they have been forgiven. They think the best of others, and they esteem all others better than themselves.



Proud people have an independent, self-sufficient spirit, but broken people have a dependent spirit and recognize their need for others. Proud people have to prove that they’re right, but broken people are willing to yield the right to be right. Proud people claim rights and have a demanding spirit, but broken people yield their rights and have a meek spirit. Proud people are self-protective of their time, their rights, and their reputation, but broken people are self-denying.


Proud people desire to be served, but broken people are motivated to serve others. Proud people desire to be a success, but broken people are motivated to be faithful and to make others a success.


Proud people desire for self-advancement, but broken people desire to promote others. Proud people have a drive to be recognized, to be appreciated. They’re wounded when others are promoted and they are overlooked. Broken people have a sense of their own unworthiness. They’re thrilled that God would use them at all in any ministry. They’re eager for others to get the credit, and they rejoice when others are lifted up.


Proud people have a subconscious feeling, “This ministry is privileged to have me and my gifts.” They think of what they can do for God, but broken people have that heart attitude that says, “I don’t deserve to have any part in this ministry.” They know that they have nothing to offer God except the life of Jesus flowing through their broken lives.


Proud people feel confident in how much they know, but broken people are humbled by how very much they have to learn. Proud people are self-conscious, but broken people are not concerned with self at all.


Proud people keep others at arm’s length, but broken people are willing to risk getting close to others and to take the risks of loving intimately. Proud people are quick to blame others, but broken people accept personal responsibility and can see where they were wrong in the situation.


Proud people are unapproachable, but broken people are easy to be entreated. Proud people are defensive when criticized, but broken people receive criticism with a humble, open spirit. Proud people are concerned with being respectable. They’re concerned with what others think, and they’re working to protect their own image and reputation. But broken people are concerned with being real. What they care about and what matters to them is not what others think but what God knows, and they’re willing to die to their own reputation.

Proud people find it difficult to share their spiritual needs with others, but broken people are willing to be open and transparent with others as God directs. Proud people, when they have sinned, want to be sure that no one finds out. Their instinct is to cover up, but broken people, once they’ve been broken, they don’t care who knows or who finds out. They are willing to be exposed because they have nothing to lose.


Proud people have a hard time saying, “I was wrong. Will you please forgive me?” But broken people are quick to admit their failure and to seek forgiveness when necessary. When confessing their sin, proud people tend to deal in generalities, but broken people are able to deal under the conviction of God’s Spirit to acknowledge specifics.


Proud people are concerned about the consequences of their sin, but broken people are grieved over the cause, the root of their sin. Proud people are remorseful over their sin, sorry that they got found out or caught. But broken people are truly, genuinely repentant over their sin, which is evidenced in the fact that they forsake that sin.


When there’s a misunderstanding or conflict in relationships, proud people wait for the other to come and ask forgiveness, but broken people take the initiative to be reconciled. They race to the cross. They see if they can get there first, no matter how wrong the other may have been.


Proud people compare themselves with others and feel worthy of honor, but broken people compare themselves to the holiness of God and feel a desperate need for His mercy. Proud people are blind to their real heart condition, but broken people walk in the light. Proud people don’t think they have anything to repent of, but broken people realize that they have need of a continual heart attitude of repentance.


Proud, unbroken people don’t think they need revival, but they’re sure that everyone else does. Whereas humble, broken people continually sense their need for a fresh encounter with God, for a fresh filling of His Holy Spirit.

Will you need to do as I and simply fall before the Lord and ask forgiveness for being proud?  The blessing of it is, He hears the prayer of the broken!

With love,