{"id":23494,"date":"2018-07-16T03:30:00","date_gmt":"2018-07-16T10:30:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lccredding.org\/church\/?p=23494"},"modified":"2018-07-10T13:57:51","modified_gmt":"2018-07-10T20:57:51","slug":"july-16-2018","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lccredding.org\/church\/2018\/07\/16\/july-16-2018\/","title":{"rendered":"July 16, 2018"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"fusion-fullwidth fullwidth-box fusion-builder-row-1 fusion-parallax-none nonhundred-percent-fullwidth non-hundred-percent-height-scrolling\" style=\"--awb-background-position:center top;--awb-background-repeat:repeat-y;--awb-border-radius-top-left:0px;--awb-border-radius-top-right:0px;--awb-border-radius-bottom-right:0px;--awb-border-radius-bottom-left:0px;--awb-background-image:url(&quot;http:\/\/www.lccredding.org\/church\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/06\/July-2018-Devo-Template-2.jpg&quot;);--awb-flex-wrap:wrap;\" ><div class=\"fusion-builder-row fusion-row\"><div class=\"fusion-layout-column fusion_builder_column fusion-builder-column-0 fusion_builder_column_1_6 1_6 fusion-one-sixth fusion-column-first\" style=\"--awb-bg-size:cover;width:16.666666666667%;width:calc(16.666666666667% - ( ( 4% ) * 0.16666666666667 ) );margin-right: 4%;\"><div class=\"fusion-column-wrapper fusion-flex-column-wrapper-legacy\"><div class=\"fusion-clearfix\"><\/div><\/div><\/div><div class=\"fusion-layout-column fusion_builder_column fusion-builder-column-1 fusion_builder_column_3_4 3_4 fusion-three-fourth fusion-column-last\" style=\"--awb-padding-top:40px;--awb-padding-right:10px;--awb-padding-bottom:40px;--awb-padding-left:10px;--awb-bg-size:cover;width:75%;width:calc(75% - ( ( 4% ) * 0.75 ) );\"><div class=\"fusion-column-wrapper fusion-flex-column-wrapper-legacy\"><div class=\"fusion-text fusion-text-1\"><p style=\"text-align: center;\"><em>\u201cSay to them: \u2018As I live,\u2019 says the Lord God, \u2018I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but that the wicked turn from his way and live. Turn, turn from your evil ways! For why should you die, O house of Israel?\u2019\u201d <\/em>Ezekiel 33:11<\/p>\n<h2><strong>Beanie Baby Love<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>When my kids were little, they loved Beanie Babies. Their grandmother sent them and kept sending them until there were large baskets full of them everywhere around the house, and they are still there waiting for a new generation to come play with them some day. Those loved animals served as an example that I used to explain about the Father\u2019s heart to my children.<\/p>\n<p>The Babies belong to you, children, and you love them very much. Now just imagine if those critters had a choice to say, \u201cI don\u2019t want to belong to you any more and I am leaving.\u201d How would that make you feel? Wouldn\u2019t you do anything you could to make them change their mind and come back to you? If your Babies went to another town, wouldn\u2019t you want the other people in that town to encourage them to come back to you? That must be a little bit how the heavenly Father feels about His creation.<\/p>\n<p>God gives us free choice\u2014and what a risk He took in giving us that. When we look out at the sea of people in this world, we need to remember that they are all God\u2019s creation and He feels about them a lot like how a child would feel about their Beanie Babies. God has done all He could do to get His creation back and yet a vast number either don\u2019t know or choose to stay away from Him. It\u2019s our job to encourage them to go home. Total separation from the Heavenly Father for all eternity is a destiny no person has to face. Let\u2019s get busy sending the \u201cBeanie Babies\u201d home.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><em>\u201cHeavenly Father, I ask that You give us a heart for the lost. Time is running short and we want all Your creation home with us. In the name of Jesus, Amen.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div><div class=\"fusion-clearfix\"><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[47],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-23494","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-women"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p92wjD-66W","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lccredding.org\/church\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23494","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lccredding.org\/church\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lccredding.org\/church\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lccredding.org\/church\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lccredding.org\/church\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=23494"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.lccredding.org\/church\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23494\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":23495,"href":"https:\/\/www.lccredding.org\/church\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23494\/revisions\/23495"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lccredding.org\/church\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23494"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lccredding.org\/church\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23494"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lccredding.org\/church\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23494"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}