​​When I was in 11th grade, my favorite subject was American history. And while my tests quizzed dates, names, and places, they also required that I memorize certain passages of Scripture that remind us to be in subjection to our authorities. One night I was especially anxious about a quiz scheduled for the next day. I had to write from memory a large portion from the Bible and I had not studied enough. After climbing into bed, I read the chapter several times. Then I said to my sister,

"Brittany, please ‘quiz’ me over this passage. I need to make sure I know it before tomorrow!” She listened as I stumbled through the recitation.

The next morning Brittany was practically laughing as we greeted each other. “You were sleep talking again,” she told me.

“What was I saying?” I asked. (This is my response every time she tells me I’ve been sleep talking.)

“You were trying to quote that passage you’re going to be quizzed on today!” We both had a good laugh, especially after I passed the quiz. 

​This amusing story brings me to a topic I have been thinking about quite a bit lately: keeping God in all our thoughts.

Vegetable gardening can be fun and enjoyable if pests or diseases don't strike your plants before you can harvest your produce. Here are a few tips that might help your garden be successful.

​​When I was a little girl, I had a big imagination. Being the first-born, I was usually successful in convincing my younger brother to join me in make-believe games. One of our favorites was “Grown Up Today,” where we pretended to be grown and married with families of our own. Not content to settle for mediocre, we established a church in the forest, organized a sophisticated home school support group, and founded a delicious restaurant in our family kitchen. Every day we were living our picture-perfect future, and it was exhilarating. (Justin had twenty children. I only had twelve, but that was quite understandable, since my dozen consisted of six sets of twins.) One of our creative ideas was to compile a home school directory complete with family names and children’s birthdays. When I find these childhood memories in boxes in the attic, I laugh...how much fun we had together! But sometimes I sigh...this home school directory shows that my oldest children were born three years ago! (And at the time when I’d figured those dates, that was a “safe” estimation!)

Here I am, hardly able to believe that I, the girl who always considered late twenties “sooo old to be unmarried,” have actually joined the club. And yet I can honestly say as I look back on the past years, I wouldn’t trade any of them. Each day I rest confidently that I am in the center of God’s will for my life and nothing can be sweeter than that assurance. I still hope and pray fervently that the Lord will provide marriage and motherhood in His timing...I still prepare for that and look forward to it very much! And yet, my ultimate desire is to live the life He has ordained for me. It is only there that I have true joy, fulfillment, and sustenance. Proverbs 28:6 says, “Better is the poor that walketh in his uprightness, than he that is perverse in his ways, though he be rich.” I have personalized this in my journal: “Better to be single and within God’s will than married but unfaithful to my Lord.” (Though that isn’t to say marriage is the “rich life” and singleness “is poverty”! :) ) As single girls waiting on the Lord, there are moments when we struggle...but ultimately, we could not be more fulfilled anywhere else, if this is what God has ordained for us right now.

The first step to container gardening is to find the right container for your plants. There are many creative options which are open to you, some of which are: barrels, old tires, buckets, flower pots, boats, children’s toys, wagons, virtually anything that can contain soil.  

​Have you ever been frantically searching for something, only to discover that it was right in front of you? The strap to my laptop bag was missing for months, and I became tired of toting the bag by its handles. I finally voiced my frustration to my brother, telling him that I must have lost it during our house move.

Then while preparing for a road trip, I unzipped an inconspicuous pocket of my laptop bag to stuff a paper inside. Lo and behold, there was the strap! All those times I had lugged around my bag, complaining about its missing strap, I was actually carrying it with me!

​As Christian girls, we plead earnestly for the Lord to reveal His will for our lives...we claim our willingness to travel to the ends of the earth to accomplish it, for His glory and honor.

We are faced with choices every day. From choosing what to wear in the morning or how to spend our free time, to how to handle a difficult situation at work or what to say to someone who is hurting. Cultivating relationships with the people God has placed in our lives is a choice. Just like you can’t have a healthy tree without tending it, you can’t expect to have good relationships without putting effort into them.