Prodigal: That food drew me in like duck to a water.
Me: I hear you.
This is a short video devotion on proverbs.
Proverbs 15:5 A fool despises his father’s instruction, But he who receives correction is prudent. (NKJV)
Jennifer Van Allen
www.theprodigalpig.com
www.faithincounseling.org
Prodigal: How pretty!
Me: God made all of this out of nothing. He can take care of you.
Prodigal: Amen!
This is from the book The Cost of Discipleship by Dietrich Bonhoeffer
Cheap grace is the preaching of forgiveness without requiring repentance, baptism without church discipline, Communion without confession, absolution without personal confession. Cheap grace is grace without discipleship, grace without the cross, grace without Jesus Christ, living and incarnate.
And they took of the fruit of the land in their hands, and brought it down unto us, and brought us word again, and said, It is a good land which the LORD our God doth give us. Deuteronomy 1:25 (KJV). |
Jennifer Van Allen
www.theprodigalpig.com
www.faithincounseling.org
Prodigal: Nice trophy!
Me: Yes, but don’t worship it.
This is from the book God’s Psychiatry by Charles L. Allen
We are told that “God created man in his own image” (Genesis 1:27). But to live a life in conformity with our creation is difficult. In fact, it is so difficult that all of us fall far short. Thus, instead of being like God, we seek to create Him in our own image. It is so much easier to make God like ourselves than for us to be like Him.
God tells us not to do wrong, but there are some things we want to do, right or wrong. So we create a God who doesn’t care what we do.
If a man abide not in me, he is cast forth as a branch, and is withered; and men gather them, and cast them into the fire, and they are burned. John 15:6 (KJV)
Jennifer Van Allen
www.theprodigalpig.com
www.faithincounseling.org
Prodigal: Harvest day today.
Me: Don’t let the day light catch you in bed!
Today is a video devotion on Proverbs.
Proverbs 15:4
The soothing tongue is a tree of life, but a perverse tongue crushes the spirit. (NIV)
Jennifer Van Allen
www.theprodigalpig.com
www.faithincounseling.org
Me: I like your seagull friend.
Prodigal: Me too.
This is from In the Eye of the Storm by Max Lucado
To the onlookers, some things seem like an empty ritual, when to the person who is informed, they seem more significant than life itself. Take ol’Ed down in Florida. Every Friday evening about the time the sun is the size of a giant orange just about to dip into the water, ol’ Ed comes strolling along the beach to find his way to his favorite pier. He’s carrying in his bony hand a bucket full of shrimp. The shrimp are not for him. The shrimp are not for the fish. Strangely, the shrimp are for the sea gulls. Ed, alone with is thoughts, walks out to the end of the pier with his bucket, not saying a word. But that’s where the ritual begins.
Before long the sky becomes a mass of little dots screeching and squawking, making their way to ol’Ed there on the end of the pier. They envelope him with their presence. Their fluttering wings sound like a roar of thunder. Ed stands there and sort of mumbles to them as they’re feeding on the shrimp. In fact, he reaches in his bucket, and he throws a few up to them. You can almost hear him say, “Thank you. Thank you.” Within minutes, the bucket is empty. And Ed stands, there, almost as if raptured, in his thoughts of another time and another place. Then, without a word being spoken, he quietly makes his way back home.
Who is ol’Ed anyway? His full name is Eddie Rickenbacker. He’s was a captain in World War II. He flew a B-17 Flying Fortress. He and seven other men were sent on a mission across the Pacific to locate General MacArthur; however, their plane crashed in the water. Miraculously, they all made it out of the plane into a life raft.
Aboard their life raft, they fought the sun and the sharks. Most of all, they fought hunger, as all eight of these men ate and drank very little, until finally by the eighth day their rations ran out. No food. No water. They needed a miracle for them to survive.
After an afternoon devotional time, the men said a prayer and tried to rest. As Rickenbacker was dozing with his hat over his eyes, something landed on his head. It was a sea gull. That gull meant food… if he could catch it. And he did.
He tore the feathers off and they shared a morsel of it together. Then they used the intestines for fish bait. They were able to survive until they were found and rescued, almost at the end of their lives.
Later, Billy Graham asked Captain Rickenbacker about the story, because he heard that that experience had been used to lead him to a saving knowledge of Jesus Christ. Rickenbacker said to Billy, “I have no explanation except God sent one of His angels to rescue us.”
Ol’Ed never forgot. He never stopped saying, “Thank you.” Every Friday evening for years until he died, he would go to that old pier with a bucket full of shrimp and a heart full of gratitude for the rescue to say, “Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.”
Grace be to you, and peace, from God our Father, and from the Lord Jesus Christ. Ephesians 1:2 (KJV)
Jennifer Van Allen
www.theprodigalpig.com
www.faithincounseling.org
Prodigal: Perfect place for my poem to be introduced.
Me: I’m ready to hear it.
This is a Haiku Poem, author unknown
Jesus is my Lord
He makes me so happy now
I am grateful, Lord.
The Spirit of God hath made me, and the breath of the Almighty hath given me life.
JOB 33 : 4
Jennifer Van Allen
www.theprodigalpig.com
www.faithincounseling.org
Prodigal: Starting at the crack of dawn today.
Me: I hear you.
This is a short video devotion on Proverbs.
Proverbs 15:3 The eyes of the LORD are in every place, beholding the evil and the good. (KJV)
Jennifer Van Allen
www.theprodigalpig.com
www.faithincounseling.org
Me: We have to go, so don’t dillydally around.
Prodigal: We will make it on time.
This is from the book The Soul Winner by C.H. Spurgeon
Remember, once a favorable atmosphere is created, the difficulty is to maintain it. You notice that I said, “When the atmosphere is created.” That expression reminds us how little we can do, or rather, that we can do nothing, without God. It is He who has to do with atmospheres; He alone creates and maintains them. Therefore, our eyes must continually be lifted to Him, from who our help comes.
And thou shalt be blessed; for they cannot recompense thee: for thou shalt be recompensed at the resurrection of the just. Luke 14:14 (KJV)
Jennifer Van Allen
www.theprodigalpig.com
www.faithincounseling.org
Prodigal: Life is full of choices!
Me: Amen!
This is from Imaginations by James P. Gills,
Life is full of choices. The greatest choice of all is choosing what we will think. We choose how we control our minds. We are responsible for what we think and what we do with our thoughts. And we are responsible for the results of our thoughts. When we decide what we will allow to motivate us, we decide what kind of people we will be.
We choose whether to be positive or negative, angry, violent, depressed, or worried. We choose to either be constructive, using emotions that build us up, or to be negative, using emotions that damage us and and those around us. We choose to be satisfied in God’s promise or to be selfish, filled with worldly desires.
No one can serve two masters. Either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. Matthew 6:24
Jennifer Van Allen
www.theprodigalpig.com
www.faithincounseling.org
Prodigal: Grapes!
Me: Yes, fresh from the vine.
This is a short video devotion on Proverbs.
Proverbs 15:2
The tongue of the wise commands knowledge, but the mouths of fools pour out folly. (ESV)
Jennifer Van Allen
www.theprodigalpig.com
www.faithincounseling.org
