ANCHORED BY HOPE

I just love it that our newest grandson's nursery decor is both nautical and spiritual.

In fact, it's as if those aspects are intertwined.

Adoption can be tedious as we've learned with our newest grandchild. 
An up and down roller coaster of sorts. 

Exhilarating but risky!

But God, in His love and mercy is keeping us anchored in hope by the prayers of friends!!

Friends who are warriors for us in the spiritual realm!

How grateful we are for each of you.

CHOOSE: FRUCTIFICATION OF FAITH

Wordsmith's unite. Do they ever!
Word-A-Day Flip calendars. YouVersion verse of the day. A.Word.A.Day which comes right to your email in-box. K-Love's Encouraging Word via radio waves. 
Wannabe wordsmith's even have their own twitter accounts and URLs.

Wordsmiths choose words that are not normally in their speaking vocabulary and learn from them. Sometimes one wordsmith will challenge another.
I, a fledgling word nerd, took the challenge though I am VERY weak in the spiritual "wordsmith" community, compared to my challenger. 

"Fructification." I started with my old stand-by, my hard copy American Heritage Collegiate, 2nd edition. (a gift from my Aunt Dot Seay)

Fructification--noun, the process of fructifying. (Wow, that was "un"-enlightening.)

More research opened my eyes to a synonym of growth. In the spiritual realm, that made sense. 
Growth in grace and knowledge of truth = fruit bearing in my faith.

Starting with knowledge of God and accepting Christ as the cornerstone of one's faith many Christlike virtues begin to take root. A new believer often begins studying God's word and seeking God's grace in order to grow in his faith.

Do your best to improve your faith. You can do this by adding goodness, understanding, self-control, patience, devotion to God, concern for others, and love. If you keep growing in this way, it will show that what you know about our Lord Jesus Christ has made your lives useful and meaningful. (2 Peter 1:5-7)

In my own faith walk, after I added knowledge, it was in the midst of struggles that God "ripened" my faith." Faith growth for me hurt deeply at times. 

Yet, for me, the real fructification of faith began when I chose to share my faith with others. 
Fructification of faith is, at its best, when it bears fruit in others.

Faith that was my anchor in my cancer journey gained strength as I shared it to encourage others.
Faith continues to give me strength and courage when I have no control in life's "hard places," knowing I can lean in to God's goodness in each new struggle. 

Sharing is a new branch/off shoot of choosing fructification of faith with each new struggle.


Before posting this blog entry, I opened my All to Jesus, devotional book for March 22 and read, 'The gospel....has come to you....bearing fruit...and growing all over the world, just as it has among you since the day you heard it.' (Colossians 1:6)

Not only was the "CO"incidence affirming, but it opened my eyes to the One who did the "choosing" for my "word" for today---certainly strengthening my faith as together He and I choose: fructification!