Today's post is by guest writer Laurie Moyer.
 
This world is full of amazing diversity. I have to smile at the nature books which claim to be a “Complete book of” anything because even when they seem packed with accurate information, they still end up leaving some things out. This serves to illustrate how varied the people around us can be. Even identical twins are not alike in every way. Romans 12 details how Christians, as many different members, still form a unified body that functions together. This was no accident. Ephesians 4 tells us that these differences are placed there in order to strengthen the body of Christ when each part does its share. It should not surprise us that variation in judgment also occurs between and even among families.

You were raised with certain rules and experiences that have made you into the person you are today. Some things you want to copy in your own life, and others you may have chosen as deliberate differences in an effort to change the outcome for your children. Your spouse most likely was raised with different applications of some of those same rules, if not different rules, altogether. The two of you must come to an agreement on what the guidelines and practical applications will be for your own family. Many grandparents would like to have a say in what those rules will be, but in the final picture, you are the ones who have the right to determine what happens in your house. Wise grandparents will respect the fact that these are your choices. You do not have the experience to know how all those decisions will play out, so listen to the advice of older parents who have been there, done that, and have an end result you wish to copy. This is also a mark of wisdom. Do not, however, allow others to intimidate you into pleasing them if you have a clear focus for your own family unit.

Conversely, the decisions you make for your family will probably not be just the same as those of your friends. For different reasons you may choose to make other applications, but neither of you should feel you owe the other a defense or issue debate propositions to justify the judgment call you have made. Be careful, not arrogant. Don’t be stubbornly unmoving but be steadfast in the things you are prayerfully convinced of. This does not need to spoil friendships.

Having said all of that, do not rush to judgment regarding the parental standards of others. Each family has the right to determine what they will and will not allow their children to do. Each family has the right to set standards for punishment as a teaching tool. I would not be justified in calling CPS (Child Protective Services) because I disagree with another’s standards when the life of the child is not at risk. I know that sounds harsh, but I can see it no other way. Some parents are foolish in their judgments, but that is not criminal. They may not act consistently with their intentions, but that also is not criminal. Sometimes I cry over what thoughtless parents do, but if those individual parents do not have the right to choose the rules that govern their own household, then who does? We do not live in a fascist state where those decisions are made for us. As much as I hate the unfortunate times that this has negative results, I am far more grateful in the long-run that each of us possess those rights individually.

You can have nightly devotionals with your children because that is your right to determine. You can teach them to pray, sing Bible songs, memorize Scripture, and do all the things an activist atheist hates to know you do. You can do this because of your liberty. Value the right you have to lead the spiritual education of your children. If you do not it may not remain your call to make. To be sure there are plenty of child psychologists who believe you are doing harm. They would love to be given clearance to “fix and protect” your children from “fanaticism.” I pray God will never allow that to happen. It is the age-old problem of free will all over again. If someone has the ability to make the correct choice, then they also have the ability to make the wrong one.

What can you do? Speak kindly to those you fear may have misjudged the appropriateness of what they do. Do not condemn them or impugn their motives. Try to calmly persuade. Pray for them and the children involved. Protect life but allow parents to parent their own children.

Laurie Moyer

Taken from Searching Daily, a blog by Doy Moyer

I am often amused by our insistence on certain words to the point that we are willing to make them a test of fellowship, while making up our own words and phrases which can be found nowhere in the scriptures.  In fact, the thing we are describing often has scriptural phrases that we steadfastly avoid.  By imposing our words on the concept we often miss connections that had a profound impact on the people who first heard them. 
            I grew up hearing the phrase “rolled forward.”  Imagine my surprise when I checked half a dozen translations and could not find that phrase in any of them.  Because we understand that “the blood of bulls and goats cannot take away sin,” someone created this phrase to try to explain how sin was dealt with under the Old Covenant.  Why do we do that when the scriptures explain things plainly enough?
            Thus shall he do with the bullock; as he did with the bullock of the sin-offering, so shall he do with this; and the priest shall make atonement for them, and they shall be forgiven, Lev 4:20.
            And all the fat thereof shall he burn upon the altar, as the fat of the sacrifice of peace-offerings; and the priest shall make atonement for him as concerning his sin, and he shall be forgiven, 4:26.
            And the priest shall burn it upon the altar for a sweet savor unto Jehovah; and the priest shall make atonement for him, and he shall be forgiven, 4:31.
            And the priest shall make atonement for him as touching his sin that he hath sinned, and he shall be forgiven, 4:35.
            And he shall offer the second for a burnt-offering, according to the ordinance; and the priest shall make atonement for him as concerning his sin which he hath sinned, and he shall be forgiven, 5:10.
            And the priest shall make atonement for him as touching his sin that he hath sinned in any of these things, and he shall be forgiven, 5:13
            And the priest shall make atonement for him with the ram of the trespass-offering, and he shall be forgiven, 5:16.
            And the priest shall make atonement for him concerning the thing wherein he erred unwittingly and knew it not, and he shall be forgiven, 5:18.
            Funny how I grew up thinking the word “forgiven” was found nowhere in the Old Testament.  Guess what?  I found it well over a dozen times before I decided that was enough for me to understand that those people were forgiven, just not forgiven the way we are.  They understood that, too, without someone thinking he had to improve on God’s words with a manmade phrase. 
            For the law having a shadow of the good things to come, not the very image of the things, can never with the same sacrifices year by year, which they offer continually, make perfect them that draw nigh. Else would they not have ceased to be offered?... But in those sacrifices there is a remembrance made of sins year by year, Heb 10:1-3. 
            Those worshippers understood that forgiveness in their time would not last forever, that every year God would once again remember them.  And not only did he remember the sins of the past year for which they had offered sacrifices, he also remembered the year before that, and the year before that, and the years and years before that.  Every year that weight grew heavier and heavier on every soul.   
            That made the promise of the New Covenant much more precious.  Behold, the days come, says Jehovah, that I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel, and with the house of Judah: not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day that I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt;… But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says Jehovah: I will put my law in their inward parts, and in their heart will I write it; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people… for I will forgive their iniquity, and their sin will I remember no more. Jer 31:31-34. 
            Now forgiveness would include forgetting. That weight of guilt would be lifted forever.  Imagine the relief they must have felt.  If there were no other spiritual blessing under the New Covenant, that one alone would make serving God worthwhile.  How often do we completely miss the importance of that blessing by refusing to use the words the Holy Spirit did?
            It is not that we cannot comprehend an Old Covenant forgiveness that does not forget.  We have a habit of practicing that very thing. We practice Old Covenant forgiveness when we say we forgive yet every time a certain person’s name comes up we say things like, “I’ll never forget what he did to me.”  The remembrance of their sins against us gives us away.
            Jesus told his disciples they were to expect the same forgiveness from God that they gave to others.  His blood of the New Covenant has power beyond the power those Old Covenant people experienced.  But New Covenant forgiveness only works on us when we practice New Covenant forgiveness to others.
 
Put on then, as God's chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience, bearing with one another and, if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other; as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive. Col 3:12,13.
 
Dene Ward
 
 

When you have sat in the offices of doctors ranked in the top five worldwide in their fields, you often see some very sick or horribly injured people.  When they call the top gun out of surgery to look at you, or three of them squeeze you into their schedules at a moment’s notice, each running the same tests over and over, then staying late to discuss your case, you become more than a little frightened.  When two doctors have presented you at half a dozen medical conferences and another is writing a paper about your case for a journal, you are grateful not only for getting this far, but for every morning the light seeps through the blinds and you can see it.

When you need a specialist of that caliber you learn words with entirely too many syllables, and you enjoy instant name recognition at the clinic with a direct line to the doctor.  You find out just exactly what horrible things they can do to you while you are awake and still live to tell about it.  Once they put you to sleep, you really don’t want to know too much about what they are doing.  And you discover that no matter how tough your situation is, someone else always has it worse.

There is one disease we all suffer from, no matter how beautiful, how wealthy, how popular, how healthy we are; no matter how many times we manage to twist events so it looks like we are always right; no matter how many times we pat ourselves on the backs for keeping all the “rules;” no matter how many we visit or homeless we feed.  Sin has infected us all and only one Specialist has the medicine we need.

This is a time of year when we customarily take a moment to examine ourselves and try to become better people.  Take that time today to check your vitals, to honestly assess whether you need to see the Doctor.  The good news is that there is a 100% cure rate for those who take their medicine and alter their lifestyles as He orders.  You do not need insurance because His fee is more than reasonable—it’s free.  The same is true for those affected by a relapse-even a second or third—or hundredth.

As amazing as it sounds, not everyone takes advantage of His care.  Perhaps they do not understand that this is a terminal disease.  Maybe it’s denial, maybe it’s pride, maybe it’s sheer perversity.  Whatever it is, do not let it describe you.
 
As I live, says the Lord Jehovah, I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked; but that the wicked turn from his way and live: turn, turn from your evil ways; for why will you die, O house of Israel? Ezek 33:11.
 
Dene Ward