I found some notes I had written in an old journal when I was working on one of my books. I had hoped to have three chapters done by Christmas but only had one and a half completed. By the middle of January, I had progressed to chapter three.

In her book Extravagant Worship, Darlene Zschech, writer of the song “Shout to the Lord,” told of having a miscarriage when she was twelve weeks pregnant with a child they had waited on for a very long time. Three days before she was to leave on a tour with her worship group, she and her husband Mark went to the obstetrician and learned that the baby had just died in her womb.

The Hebrew word “fast” means to cover the mouth. In fact, a fast of words is one of the fasts in Isaiah 58. Isaiah 58:9b lists not pointing fingers in judgment and not speaking malicious words as conditions of great blessings.

When John and Isobel Kuhn served in China as missionaries to the Lisu, the church was struggling despite all the Kuhns’ efforts. Three different clans were fighting each other for a choice piece of property. So Isobel wrote to her small prayer group in Great Britain and said, “Would you pray that Jesus would come to our Lisu?”

Recently while reading in Matthew’s Gospel, I was stopped by the phrase, “he saw a man.” The man Jesus saw was Matthew, a tax collector, probably a man hated by those around him. The people had no use for tax collectors.

Judy remembers one particularly dark time that affected her spiritual life. "I couldn't pray, and I couldn't find anything in scripture. It frightened me because it was so severe. I searched for days and found nothing.

It was difficult for my friend to have extended time to pray during the day, so she said, “Lord, if You’ll awaken me, I’ll get up and pray.”

While I stood outside an airport waiting for my ride, I saw a lady carrying a colorful bouquet of mixed flowers and thought, She wants to greet someone she loves carrying a gift of flowers.