4 Lessons Learned While Walking a Hard Road with a Friend ~ Titus 2 Tips {on Thursdays} A Guest Post

When Rebekah asked me to guest post for this series, I decided quickly that I was going to write about teeth.

I wasn’t sure how it would fit into Titus 2 . . . maybe somewhere around drinking too much wine – red wine stain doesn’t polish off easily!! I could make it work. I am a dental hygienist. Talking about teeth is easy, it’s safe and it comes naturally to me. Blogging is scary, hard and something I have never done before.

But God. I have spoken those words to myself dozens of times over the past few days as I knew he was calling me out of my comfort zone to share from my heart.

But God. Those words have carried me through the past 2 years as I have watched my closest friend face trials that I can’t even begin to understand. I have walked through all of my adult life with this woman. We’ve talked on the phone until 2am, stood at the front of the church when each other got married, held each others babies in their first hours and even by the grace of God raised our families on the same street for a few years. We have discussed theology until it was too late to think straight, texted each other out of bed at 6am to read through the Bible and tried to be spiritually accountable to each other. It’s been a blessing to learn and grow alongside her but its been truly amazing to stand and marvel from the sidelines as I have watched God bring her faith to life like never before over the past 2 years. There have been many doubts and fears in the process But God has proven Himself faithful repeatedly even as He has chosen to deepen the trials in her life beyond what she could have ever imagined. Any of you reading this blog has read my friend's story and can’t deny that God Himself penned it from page 1. 

I have told her story to many people. Sometimes to encourage them and sometimes to ask for prayer and I get excited every time I get to tell of all the ways that God has shown Himself so undeniably real in her life. You see God loves to write stories like this. Life stories that seem to glorify Him even more every time we tell them and that He can use to glorify Himself in others and teach them about Himself.

I have learned many lessons these past two years.

Watching Rebekah’s story unfold God has taught me that I really can trust Him fully with my future, an area I have struggled in fear with letting go of for years.

He has taught me that His Word is sufficient for any trial He may choose to take me through. At one point Rebekah asked all of us not to try to understand what she was going through but just to always point her to the Word of God. She taught me an important lesson in those words.

She has taught me that it’s ok not to always understand - a difficult lesson for my analytical mind to learn and that it’s ok to cry but the best way to cry is with your hands lifted high. I have taken this literally many early mornings on my way to work (one hand still on the steering wheel of course) as I have ached for the pain that she has been called to experience.

She has taught me that even in suffering God gives us a special strength to minister His love to all the others hurting around us and that maybe entering into their suffering makes our own a little easier to bear . . . Oh how mysterious are His Mercies!

I think I can speak for all of your friends, family and blog readers Rebekah when I say that we thank God for you and the things He has used you to teach us. We are honoured that you have invited us to walk parts of this hard road with you. We love you and we are praying daily for you as you face the next steps on this road. We love recounting the deeds of the Lord in your life, we are thankful for the peace that he promises you and we are confident that we can trust Him in the coming days and wait in expectation to see how He chooses to glorify Himself in you next.

Melanie lives with her husband Matt and 4 children in Haliburton, Ontario.  When she is not busy at home raising her young children She works as a Dental hygienist in a private dental clinic and also volunteers regularly at the Haliburton Volunteer Dental Outreach Clinic a non profit organization that provides free dental care to local adults in need.  Her family is active in their local church and enjoy serving the Lord together in their local community.

Titus 2 Tips I am honoured to host these guest posts in this series on women mentoring women.   Some weeks you may find tips from the kitchen or healthy recipes, tools other women have used to grow spiritually, hints to help us build up and love our husbands, and lessons they have learned as they have walked along with their children to teach them to love God wholeheartedly, habits they have developed in keeping their home, ways they have worked on to keep their behaviour respectful, or rhythms that allow peace and rest in the home and hearts that dwell there within. You will find all the posts in the series here.  "Older women likewise are to be  reverent in behaviour,  not slanderers or slaves to much wine.  They are to teach what is good, and so train  the young women to love their husbands and  children, to be self-controlled, pure, working  at home, kind, and submissive  to their own husbands, that the word of God may not be reviled." {Titus 2:3-5}

A Fine Balance ~ Titus 2 Tips {on Thursdays} A Guest Post

If you know me at all, if you’ve even read a small portion of the words that I’ve written in my little corner of the world wide web you will know how much I have grown to love community.

I have written post after post about how we were made to live in community with intention and purpose. We were meant to be breaking bread with each other, encouraging one another and wrapping our arms around those who weep and shatter.

I believe to the core of my being we were intended for the purpose of living in community. Gospel is lived out by daily embracing those whom God has seen fit to fill our lives. We were not meant to live this life in an amoebic state, thinking only and solely about our own well-being.

There is a fine balance however, that often tips the scales from living in community to living from community. It’s all about the preposition; community is something we enter in to, not something we use for our own gain.

Living in community is about the Christ in me recognizing the Christ in you and coming together without fear of abandonment. Living in community is about accepting one another as integral parts of the Body, each relying on the other as means of seeking God’s greater purpose in the world and then moving as one toward that purpose.

Living from community is about looking to others for your happiness, your reward, you purpose. Living from community is about not recognizing yourself as a beloved, not recognizing that God is all you require and He is enough.

It’s hard in a world that seems to spin on the axis of social media, when our lives are lived out in Facebook posts, Instagram feeds and the wittiest Tweets we can fit into a 140 characters. I know it’s hard because last month God showed me how my online interactions were beginning to replace my relationship with Christ.

It all begs the question: How do we move within the balance of maintaining an intimate relationship with Christ, seeking Him as our only source and engaging in the deep relationships that make up our communities, whether they be in real life or on-line?

The answer is in the question: Seeking Him as our only source. Anything else is suspect and lacking, anything else clouds our motives and our desires.

“We can serve people only when we do not make our total sense of self dependent on their response.” – Henri Nouwen

Think about that for a moment, just take a minute right now to re-read those words and think about the consequences of relying on other messy, fallible and broken people as your identity.

For a time we’ll find comfort in the words that soothe our egos and manifest themselves as misplaced praise. For a time our hearts will feel lighter, happier; for a time we will be satisfied.

We will be satisfied until we realize that those words come from the messy, the fallible and the broken. We will be satisfied until we realize that nothing absolutely nothing can replace the whisper of hope that cups our weariness, the voice of Christ calling us, Beloved.

This does not mean that we shouldn’t be issuing words of encouragement to each other, that we shouldn’t extend a word or thoughtful gesture in hopes of making someone’s day brighter. It also does not mean that we should not expect those things for ourselves. What it means is that we need to remember in Whom our identity lies.

“… our identity can find its basis only in Gods’ word to us that we are beloved not on the worlds’ fickle promises.” – Henry Noun

Just like Moses confronting his own humanity and recognizing his own inadequacies at the burning bush, we too must confront our humanity in the deep and lasting relationships that we build with one another and remember that He is “I AM” and that it is sufficient.

“Community, then, cannot grow out of loneliness, but comes when the person who begins to recognize his or her belovedness greets the belovdeness of the other. The God alive in me greets the God resident in you. When people can cease having to be for us everything, we can accept the fact they may still have a gift for us.” - Henri Nouwen

We must remember that when God calls us to community He is first and foremost calling us Beloved and until we can look in the mirror and believe it we will struggle with finding the Beloved in others.

We must remember that we are intended to live IN community, each of us a gift to one another and, not FROM community where our primary motive is for our own desires or self-gratification.

Can I encourage you today soul sister, to seek out your community, seek out those whom you love and respect and let the Beloved in you recognize the Beloved in them?

Tonya is the wife of 22 years to one good man and the mother to Mikayla (19) and Dylan (16). She is learning that even though her and husband are entering their "empty nest" years the beautiful task of mothering is never ending. Tonya loves Jesus and hunts daily for the gifts of His grace. She writes over at Stone to Heart in hopes of having others recognize the beauty of their own story despite life's circumstances.  Tonya and her family along with their two cats and one dog make their home in Southwestern Ontario, Canada. You can find her on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.

Titus 2 Tips I am honoured to host these guest posts in this series on women mentoring women.   Some weeks you may find tips from the kitchen or healthy recipes, tools other women have used to grow spiritually, hints to help us build up and love our husbands, and lessons they have learned as they have walked along with their children to teach them to love God wholeheartedly, habits they have developed in keeping their home, ways they have worked on to keep their behaviour respectful, or rhythms that allow peace and rest in the home and hearts that dwell there within. You will find all the posts in the series here.  "Older women likewise are to be  reverent in behaviour,  not slanderers or slaves to much wine.  They are to teach what is good, and so train  the young women to love their husbands and  children, to be self-controlled, pure, working  at home, kind, and submissive  to their own husbands, that the word of God may not be reviled." {Titus 2:3-5}

4 Habits that Prevent Burnout ~ Titus 2 Tips {on Thursdays} A Guest Post

Are you tired?

Are there some days when you’d like to disappear, rather than get out of bed to deal with your to-do list?

I must confess that I almost burned out on ministry. I lost my passion and joy. For a long time, I thought I had it all together. I was juggling many responsibilities and doing it with flair. But, one day those tasks started to get heavy – the weight of all that I was carrying became too much, but I still struggled to let go. Everything seemed too important to surrender over to someone else, so I trudged on burdened down by own self-imposed expectations for ministry.

Looking back now, I see where I failed to make healthy choices about how I would use my time, talents, and treasure. I invested in Kingdom business, but I did not invest in myself. I forgot that I am important to the kingdom as well. I am God’s holy temple, and I am called to be a steward of my physical, social, mental, and spiritual well-being.

If I could sit down with 20 year old me, I would tell her that there are essential habits that will prevent ministry burn out.

1. Sabbath is a commandment, not a suggestion. If you don’t give yourself time to refresh your spirit, your spirit will start to get bitter. Take time to sit in the quiet and let God speak to you. Linger at His feet, listen up, and learn what His agenda is for you.

2. Keep a journal or notebook where you write down how God has worked – prayers He has answered and battles He has won in your territory. Cultivate thankfulness by noting down every day blessings. When you are in the middle of a difficult ministry season, you will need to refer back to your notes often. Besides a journal, I also created a “happy box” where I saved cards, pictures, and mementoes – Revisiting this time capsule at the end of a tough week always put a smile on my face.

3. Put fun on your to-do list. Spend time with people who energize you and encourage your heart. We are not meant to do life alone. Pick up the phone and invite a friend to join you out for coffee or dinner at least once a month. You need to make time for this – if your ministry schedule is too busy for fun, then you are too over committed.

4. Remember that you are serving as unto the Lord. People will disappoint you, but you are not serving people. You may never see the results of your efforts here on earth, but you are called to be faithful to Him. He sees you in the trenches, and your labor is not in vain.

Taking care of yourself is vital to a healthy ministry life. It’s not wrong to slow down and cross some things off of your calendar in order to create space for renewal in your life.

Sometimes, saying no is not unselfish. It’s wise.

Rest cannot and should not be an after-thought on your priority list.

Lyli Dunbar enjoys road trips with her husband, connecting with women through Bible study, and reading way too many books. A disciple, wife, educator, and mentor, Lyli is just a girl working to keep the faith day by day. She writes about life lessons and faith at 3dlessons4life.com.

Titus 2 Tips I am honoured to host these guest posts in this series on women mentoring women.   Some weeks you may find tips from the kitchen or healthy recipes, tools other women have used to grow spiritually, hints to help us build up and love our husbands, and lessons they have learned as they have walked along with their children to teach them to love God wholeheartedly, habits they have developed in keeping their home, ways they have worked on to keep their behaviour respectful, or rhythms that allow peace and rest in the home and hearts that dwell there within. You will find all the posts in the series here.  "Older women likewise are to be  reverent in behaviour,  not slanderers or slaves to much wine.  They are to teach what is good, and so train  the young women to love their husbands and  children, to be self-controlled, pure, working  at home, kind, and submissive  to their own husbands, that the word of God may not be reviled." {Titus 2:3-5}

Be You, Only Braver {10 Ways to Live Brave} ~ Titus 2 Tips {on Thursdays} A Guest Post

All good things cast shadows.

That’s what Barbara Brown Taylor says, anyway.

And I imagine she’s right as the sun wakes up behind me, casting shadows all over my corner of the world.

I sip my morning cup of joe and I entertain the shadows that splay long and lean into the room. They grow smaller as the sun rises ever higher, the light pushing back the darkness.

I turn pages in my journal, running my fingers over the ripples in the marked paper and the word brave is found on nearly every page. I trace all the words. Brave is scrawled out next to fear and on top of doubt. Brave is written in red in the margins next to callings and tasks and invitations to go deeper.

And in the pages of my journal, I see what this wise woman knows:

All good things {calling, purpose, invitations to go deeper still}, do indeed cast shadows {fear, doubt, restlessness}.

I smile as I flip the pages of two years worth of living, and I push back the shadows as they become thin slivers around my feet.



I’ve been living the word BRAVE for the last seven months. And when I say living it, I mean Jesus has taken my word of the year and raised it to places I never anticipated going. I’ve spent months beating back all sorts of shadows as I’ve pressed on to the good things He has invited me to.

And here are the things I’ve learned when it comes to BRAVE living. These are listed in no particular order and my prayer is that you make BRAVE your word of the year in 2015. You won’t regret it!

1.) Lead yourself well. Examine your heart and your soul. Seek out a mentor to hold you accountable to your life in Christ, to your family, and to yourself. Be self-disciplined. Be a lifelong learner. Understand that life is a marathon and that soul care is necessary to finish the race well.

2.) Show up to your life. Look people in the eye. Reach across the street or across the table and touch someone’s arm. Ask hard questions. And then listen with your whole body.

3.) Do what you love to do, but belong to Jesus. The whole world is an altar and you’ve been gifted with things this world needs you to give away. So find out what you love to do, go do it, and belong to Jesus. Amen.

4.) Have a vision for what God is doing in your soul. Your worth is not found in what you do. It is found in Christ alone and He cares more about your soul than anything you can do. It takes tremendous bravery to stop the crazy and zero in on the one part of you that only Jesus sees.

5.) Fall on grace. Try things and love people. You will stink things up on occasion. And grace will catch you-every single time. Don’t waste your life waiting on a pure heart. You aren’t ever going to have a perfectly pure heart this side of heaven.

6.) Get still and quiet. Withdraw to a lonely place and sit with yourself. Become acquainted with who you are when still and quiet. And invite Jesus to find you there.

7.) Speak honestly about what you need and then let people in. Talk to your people and tell the truth about your hang-ups, your hurts, your deepest needs. And then let them in to the nitty grity parts of your life.

8.) Say no to the good things so you can say YES to the best things.
9.) Embrace your humanity. Let yourself wear skin! Be tired. Be hungry. Be sad. Be giddy. Be compassionate with yourself. When you show yourself compassion, you give others permission to do likewise.

10.) Don’t mind your own business. Know others. Tell them who they are. And then let Jesus love them through you.

Now, be you, bravely.

Lori Harris is a Southern-born girl rearing six children in a neighbourhood some would call the ‘hood.  She and her husband, Thad, have planted a church on the wrong side of the tracks where poverty and racism run deep. She coordinates a city-wide MOPS group, passes out PBJs to the neighborhood kids, and writes at loriharris.me.

Titus 2 Tips I am honoured to host these guest posts in this series on women mentoring women.   Some weeks you may find tips from the kitchen or healthy recipes, tools other women have used to grow spiritually, hints to help us build up and love our husbands, and lessons they have learned as they have walked along with their children to teach them to love God wholeheartedly, habits they have developed in keeping their home, ways they have worked on to keep their behaviour respectful, or rhythms that allow peace and rest in the home and hearts that dwell there within. You will find all the posts in the series here.  "Older women likewise are to be reverent in behaviour, not slanderers or slaves to much wine. They are to teach what is good, and so train the young women to love their husbands and children, to be self-controlled, pure, working at home, kind, and submissive to their own husbands, that the word of God may not be reviled." {Titus 2:3-5}

How Did You Do It? ~ Titus 2 Tips {on Thursdays} A Guest Post

I sat on our back steps watching the two of them work together - my husband, who has always been strong and the one everyone leaned on and my son, fully grown and married. 

They talked and laughed as they assembled a new barbeque. What else would men be putting together outside on a summer afternoon? 

My husband was recuperating from a bout with strep pneumonia which had kept him hospitalized for a few days. The roles were slightly reversed this Saturday as he needed the help of our son to do the things which ordinarily would have come easily.

Where was the little boy? 

We had raised our son hoping there would be days like this. Days, when you fully realize, the depth to which relationship has been forged.

I have often been asked ... "How did you raise your children so they turned out so well?" And my answer has most times been ... "I have no idea!"

We married young and had our children young. Looking back, we were so inexperienced with not only child rearing but with life in general. We made so many mistakes along the way. Two imperfect people. We stumbled and bumbled our way through the days and here we are, years later, a little bruised and scarred, feeling deeply and greatly blessed. 

As I sit watching them work together, His Word begins to stir in my heart and mind. It comes back to me.

Those mornings, for years, in which I rose early and turned the radio on, ever so softly, to hear the familiar and comforting voice of Chuck Swindoll. He became a "friend" and a "mentor" although we have never met. I hung on every word, taking notes on any scrap of paper or spiral notebook I had handy. I will never forget the day he shared this Scripture ....

Fix these words of mine in your hearts and minds; tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads.
Teach them to your children, talking about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. Write them on the door frames of your houses and on your gates, so that your days and the days of your children may be many in the land that the Lord swore to give your forefathers, as many as the days that the heavens are above the earth. (Deuteronomy 11:18-21, NIV)

And so, to answer the question of how I did it, may I offer these five suggestions I learned that very day:

Be sure to tend to your own heart and mind.

Make time each day to quiet yourself with God. I know it is hard as the kids demand much of your time. You may be exhausted. But do it anyway even if it is only for a brief ten minutes. You will be amazed at the difference it will make in you. And in them.

Be authentic.

Notice we are to teach our children as we talk sit,walk,lie down,and get up. In other words, it is during the normal daily occurrences of life. More often than not, it is through life's circumstances our children will begin to notice how real our faith is to us.

Be with your children.

If we are going to talk, sit, walk, lie down and get up with our children, we must be with them. With their life. With their friends. Exhausting? Yes! Worth it? Most definitely!

Be fully engaged.

When with them be fully engaged with them.Try not to be distracted with your cell phone or the internet or the television. Let them have your full attention. Divided and distracted time is truly not time spent with them.

Be ever praying.

Pray about everything concerning their lives—their friends,their education, their protection, their minds, their future spouses, their jobs, their teachers. Leave nothing uncovered. Keep praying. And don't stop, even after they are married!

"How did I raise my children so they turned out so well?" 

The answer truly is - by His grace!

And with His help. And He will be there to help you as well.  

Joanne recently celebrated her 35th wedding anniversary.  She has two adult married children and her two granddaughters {whom she watches full time while their parents work} call her "Mimi". She loves to read and write and began blogging several years ago so that her family would always know her thoughts as she processed life. God's written Word comes alive to her as she views it through the simple daily occurrences. It is her joy to share with others in the hopes they, too, would find encouragement in His Word. Joanne writes on her blog, Days & Thoughts and you can find her on Facebook and Twitter.

Titus 2 Tips I am honoured to host these guest posts in this series on women mentoring women.   Some weeks you may find tips from the kitchen or healthy recipes, tools other women have used to grow spiritually, hints to help us build up and love our husbands, and lessons they have learned as they have walked along with their children to teach them to love God wholeheartedly, habits they have developed in keeping their home, ways they have worked on to keep their behaviour respectful, or rhythms that allow peace and rest in the home and hearts that dwell there within. You will find all the posts in the series here.  "Older women likewise are to be reverent in behaviour, not slanderers or slaves to much wine. They are to teach what is good, and so train the young women to love their husbands and children, to be self-controlled, pure, working at home, kind, and submissive to their own husbands, that the word of God may not be reviled." {Titus 2:3-5}

Family Time ~ Titus 2 Tips {on Thursdays} ~ A Guest Post

Family Night is a precious and protected evening in our home - but it is also one of the harder things to show up to. It is a matter of remembering that intentional moments set aside to play together are of more importance than the endless list of to-do. Knowing that investments take time to mature, and that investing in our children is worthwhile. And then just doing it, regardless. There is always something pressing, something that must be done, something that needs attention - and yet I am a firm believer in preserving special time for the family unit and spending intentional time laughing, growing, and bonding together.

Family Night has been a significant night in our week for a few years now, generally just a movie and popcorn on an evening that we could squeeze it in during the week. Sometimes board games took the place of a movie. It was the perfect balm to our hectic life and it was a special time for the four of us to laugh and enjoy one another.

Near the end of 2013 the kids got me thinking about doing a little bit more for our family night through 2014—something with a bit more intention and purpose and on a set date each week. After some talking we settled on Monday nights being set apart for our family night—and while we have been able to keep that date pretty faithfully, we figured that with making it Monday night we had a lot of days left in the week if we had to reschedule!

We brainstormed over 60 ideas that were low cost and wrote them all down at the beginning of the year. Each week we revisit the list and choose an activity for us to do as a family. Some take more time than others. Some require more energy than others. Some are season based.

The kids know that Monday night is set aside for family night and truly some weeks it would not happen if it weren't for their enthusiasm and push. Those extra-hard nights are usually the simpler activities, like enjoying a bonfire in the backyard, or watching a movie from our childhood.

We are half way through the year now and have missed only one week - and that was because we were at camp as a family. It has been a wonderful experience for us so far - because of the list of ideas we are not falling back on the same old movie or game idea (which we thoroughly enjoyed in years past!) and being stretched to do new things is fun. It has also added to our conversations and jokes. One of our sillier family nights was playing the Flour Game and it has made for some good laughs months later.

We have no set time limit to spend for family night - the flour game lasted all of twenty minutes and campfires can last for hours. The point is undistributed time together, doing something a little out of the ordinary, building memories, strengthening ties.

Our year of family night activities are being documented here throughout 2014 if you want to follow along!

"Jessica was married at 19 to her best friend, and now they are prayerfully raising their two sons.  Jessica shares about their love of books, adventures, food, and offers encouragement for moms at jessicalynette.com."

Titus 2 Tips I am honoured to host these guest posts in this series on women mentoring women.   Some weeks you may find tips from the kitchen or healthy recipes, tools other women have used to grow spiritually, hints to help us build up and love our husbands, and lessons they have learned as they have walked along with their children to teach them to love God wholeheartedly, habits they have developed in keeping their home, ways they have worked on to keep their behaviour respectful, or rhythms that allow peace and rest in the home and hearts that dwell there within. You will find all the posts in the series here.  "Older women likewise are to be reverent in behaviour, not slanderers or slaves to much wine. They are to teach what is good, and so train the young women to love their husbands and children, to be self-controlled, pure, working at home, kind, and submissive to their own husbands, that the word of God may not be reviled." {Titus 2:3-5}

An Invitation to Rest ~ Titus 2 Tips {on Thursdays} A Guest Post

Are you weary, exhausted, stressed, fried, bombarded, and hanging on by a thread?

I saw this quote via (in)courage the other day, “God is not asking me to number my days to increase my pace but rather to examine my route” (taken from Pursue the Intentional Life by Jean Fleming).

What does your pace look like? If you are like me, it is pretty frantic. Even if there are not a lot of things on the calendar, I often feel frantic on the inside. Can you relate?

Last year our family theme was “Be Still.” A friend told me that being still has more to do with our state of mind and heart than it does with abstaining from activity. I liked that. Our souls can be at rest, and correctly postured, through trusting God and believing that “He's got this.” He’s got the whole words in His hands, remember? That means you too.

As women we often find ourselves too busy and often depleted by all the bustle and hustle of everyday life. Some of the scurry is our own doing, and it might be time to examine our pace and our route. But, some of the busyness may be unavoidable too.

Today, I want to give you an invitation to rest . . . permission to slow down. Release your grasp and choose to really live. In case you forgot, you are human. It is okay not to be superwoman—let that unrealistic expectation go! Jesus has you covered. If you are His, then you can rest under His wings and operate with the strength and grace that He provides.

Are you eating regularly or rushing through your day?

Are you taking a 20 minute power nap or falling into bed exhausted from getting just one more thing done?

Are you taking a few extra minutes in the shower to breathe deep and prepare your mind for action or are you skipping the essentials in the name of service to others?

Preaching to myself here, and maybe to you too?

What does your route look like? Who sets the agenda for your day? Is it you or your Loving Heavenly Father? Are you trying to keep up with the woman who has 20,000 followers and somehow manages to make flawless Pinterest dishes while her man brings her flowers and her children sing her praises? Or are you following the lead of Love? Are you letting Jesus guide you down the unique course that He has set before you?

Dear woman, I want you to know there is freedom to slow down. Unless you are lazy, which I am guessing you are not, take a deep cleansing breath and be mindful of your pace. Allow the Lord to show you how much He loves you and longs to walk with you as you serve and bless those around you.

"Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light." Matthew 11:28-30 

Resting in His Promises,

Katie

Katie Reid is a recovering perfectionist, who is learning to slow down and breathe deeply, as she fumbles to receive and extend grace in everyday moments. She delights in her hubby and four children and their life in ministry. Studying God's Word, singing/songwriting, blogging, photography, and heartfelt conversations are a few of her favourite things.  Katie would love to connect with you on her website www.echoesofmyheart.com and on facebook and twitter @ImprintsKatie.

Titus 2 Tips I am honoured to host these guest posts in this series on women mentoring women.   Some weeks you may find tips from the kitchen or healthy recipes, tools other women have used to grow spiritually, hints to help us build up and love our husbands, and lessons they have learned as they have walked along with their children to teach them to love God wholeheartedly, habits they have developed in keeping their home, ways they have worked on to keep their behaviour respectful, or rhythms that allow peace and rest in the home and hearts that dwell there within. You will find all the posts in the series here. "Older women likewise are to be reverent in behaviour, not slanderers or slaves to much wine. They are to teach what is good, and so train the young women to love their husbands and children, to be self-controlled, pure, working at home, kind, and submissive to their own husbands, that the word of God may not be reviled." {Titus 2:3-5}