Anne Graham Lotz

My hope is that this life is not all there is. This life is like preparation for what is coming next, and what is coming next is something so glorious that the Bible says minds can't conceive it, eye has never seen, your imagination could never even enter into all that God is preparing for those who love him.

One misconception is that if we follow God in the life of faith, and that means obedience - that we read His Word, we're obedient, we pray, we go to church, we do the right things - that somehow His blessing means we're going to be okay.

When I put my faith in Jesus Christ as my savior, and I asked him to forgive and to come into my life, and He does - from that moment forward I have established a personal relationship with God that I have to develop, you know, through Bible reading and prayer, and living my life for him.

I don't want to be entertained. I don't want visuals or musicals. I don't want a vacation. I don't want to quit. I don't want sympathy. The cry of my heart is 'Just Give Me Jesus.'

Abraham is such a fascinating figure. Three world religions - Judaism, Christianity, and Islam - all claim him as a patriarch. He was raised in a religious home. And yet he rejected religion in order to pursue a personal relationship with God.

Just like you need to strengthen your core physically with exercise, you also need to strength your core spiritually.

When the storms of life come, if they come to me personally, to my family or to the world, I want to be strong enough to stand and be a strength to somebody else, be shelter for somebody else.

Sometimes when I open my Bible to read, a verse leaps off the page and I know God is speaking to me. Sometimes I read and nothing seems to be illuminated. Sometimes I pray and have the keen sense that He is listening to every word and will answer me. Sometimes when I pray, I have no awareness that He's anywhere around. Sometimes when I go to church or draw aside for some quiet reflection, I have the overwhelming sense that Jesus is right beside me. At other times in the exact same settings, I have no conscious awareness of His presence at all. And I know by each experience _ as I read my Bible and pray and work and worship _ that He is teaching me to live by FAITH, not by my feelings.

The organized church sometimes puts boundaries on us the Bible doesn't. So I'm living my life for an audience of one. I live my life to please God. Some people won't understand, but I don't give an account to some people.