Hi! You may now read my reflections by going to fanintoflame.substack.com.
I will continue to write uplifting reflections based on the Scriptures, as I've been doing nearly every week since December 2020. The only thing that has changed is the platform.
Please go to fanintoflame.substack.com to read my latest reflection. Thank you!
Peace,
Photo credit: Free-images.com
I’ll never forget the first time I saw Lake Superior. After setting up camp in Muskallonge Lake State Park in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula, we and our kids walked across the street from the campground and then followed a trail that led to Lake Superior. When we emerged from the lush trail and stepped onto the beach, the sight of this gorgeous Great Lake took my breath away. As I gazed at the expanse of beautiful blue water and multi-colored stones covering the beach and extending into the clear lake, the song “How Great Thou Art” welled up inside me. I remember feeling convinced that anyone who’s an atheist has never stood on the shores of Lake Superior.
We don’t have to travel hundreds of miles to experience the wonders of God’s love. Sometimes all it takes is a conscientious effort to look for the amazing blessings that He’s showering upon us right here. Sometimes, we just have to see what’s already in front of us.
For example, this time of year we can look beyond the corn in the field and the tomatoes in the garden and see God’s loving hand behind them. We can use our imagination to picture Him dreaming up and designing all the different vegetables to feed our bodies with His loving, joyful creativity. Also, we can see our family and friends as gifts from Him to feed our souls and look at them with renewed gratitude. Sometimes we just have to look around with fresh eyes and try to begin to grasp how great God is.
When we seek God – when we look for expressions of His unconditional love – we move closer to Him. When we acknowledge how He provides for us, we begin to trust Him more. Sometimes, when we look for Him in the beauty of nature and the people we care about, we may experience His presence – not on an intellectual level but sensing with our heart that He’s with us. Sometimes, when we seek Him, we may get just a taste of the magnificence of His goodness. All of this brings us deep joy, as I experienced on the beach of Lake Superior that summer day. And so we keep seeking, drawing nearer to Him, trusting Him, and opening our hearts for a greater understanding and experience of His love.
God’s goodness is all around us. Let’s seek Him; let’s look for the many blessings He’s gifted to us – in the wonders of nature and the people we love. Let’s let a song of praise rise up to Him from the depths of our hearts for the immeasurable love He has for us.
“Taste and see the goodness of the Lord.” – Psalm 34:8
Let everything I do be with You, for You, and because of You.
Thank you for reading my reflection. All thanks to God for giving me the ideas and guiding my words! © 2025 Gina Bedell
Through these reflections, I invite you, the reader, to reflect on a given topic and then seek deeper answers through prayer, additional spiritual reading, and/or consultation with clergy or other qualified persons in order to grow in your faith and understanding of God’s love and will for your life.
Please share this with your friends by clicking on one of the icons below. Comments are always welcome!
If you or someone you know would like to receive these writings directly, please email me at ginabedell1@gmail.com and I will add you to my ‘BCC’ email list.
You can also find my posts on my Facebook page!
P.S.
Pray for peace at home and around the world. Donate to a cause that tugs at your heart. Take care of those around you; take care of our planet. Pray for the people around the globe whose lives have been torn apart by war and natural disasters.
Photo credit: Free-images.com
They say that change is constant.
A caterpillar being transformed into a butterfly is the epitome of change. It’s good to keep in mind, though, that this change doesn’t come easily and it doesn’t happen overnight. The caterpillar eats voraciously, and nearly continuously, to grow strong. After she builds her chrysalis and is transformed into a butterfly inside it, she has to work to emerge from it. Her struggle to break through the hard shell is necessary for her to develop strong, healthy wings. Some people have tried to ‘help’ butterflies emerge, but this actually harms them: The caterpillar’s and butterfly’s respective work is what lets her reach her ultimate goal. In all stages of the butterfly’s development, there’s no stagnation. There’s constant work and constant change.
The same is true for us in our spiritual life. We’ll become stronger in our faith when we resist stagnation – when we work at our spiritual growth and ask God to work with us. We’ll grow stronger in our faith by learning, through prayer and experience, how God wants us to express that faith. We’ll discover how we can show our love for God and for our neighbor with our personalities and talents and all the other resources He’s given us. What God asks of us may very well change with the seasons of our life. As we mature and as our faith grows stronger, we’ll learn to follow God’s promptings and change as He guides us to. And over time, we’ll be transformed – we’ll live with and for Christ more and more. We’ll become kinder, wiser, more patient, more generous, more compassionate, more charitable, more forgiving, more loving, and more prayerful. We’ll become more and more focused on God and less on ourselves. We’ll become more like Him.
To let our Lord accomplish all of this in us, we have to be open to change; we have to allow ourselves to be changed by the One Who created us. To become more like God, we have to become a new creation – we have to become the people He created us to be.
This doesn’t happen overnight, and it doesn’t happen without effort on our part. So, let’s ask our Lord for the grace to open our hearts to Him, and to help us see how He wants us to change. Let’s ask Him to help us identify and abandon our old, stagnant ways. Let’s ask Him to draw us closer to Himself and to help us take advantage of opportunities to spend more time with Him during our day. Let’s ask Him to show us how we might find new ways to show His love to the people in our family and in our community.
Let’s ask God for the courage to let Him transform us into the people He created us to be.
“So whoever is in Christ is a new creation...” – 2 Corinthians 5:17
Let everything I do be with You, for You, and because of You.
Thank you for reading my reflection. All thanks to God for giving me the ideas and guiding my words! © 2025 Gina Bedell
Through these reflections, I invite you, the reader, to reflect on a given topic and then seek deeper answers through prayer, additional spiritual reading, and/or consultation with clergy or other qualified persons in order to grow in your faith and understanding of God’s love and will for your life.
Please share this with your friends by clicking on one of the icons below. Comments are always welcome!
If you or someone you know would like to receive these writings directly, please email me at ginabedell1@gmail.com and I will add you to my ‘BCC’ email list.
You can also find my posts on my Facebook page!
P.S.
Pray for peace at home and around the world. Donate to a cause that tugs at your heart. Take care of those around you; take care of our planet. Pray for the people around the globe whose lives have been torn apart by war and natural disasters.
Photo credit: Facebook/Unknown
In the picture above, Jesus is asking the little girl to give Him her precious teddy bear. She can’t see that He won’t take it from her without giving her something in return. She can’t see that He has something better to give her if she gives up what she’s holding onto.
Jesus offers us the same kind of exchange. If we give up our self-centered, sinful ways and follow His Way, and if we set aside our will to do His will, He’ll bless us with something immeasurably better: His immense joy and deep, lasting peace.
We mistakenly think that having everything we want to have and doing whatever we want to do will bring us the joy we intrinsically long for. But Christ tells us to ‘seek first (the Father’s) kingdom and His righteousness, and all these things will be provided to you’ (Matthew 6:33). In our narrow minds we think, ‘I want to do things my way. How can denying myself make me happy?’ But God promises that when we give up our self-serving, worldly ways and seek first His Way, we’ll be rewarded with more than we could ever imagine.
When we pursue what we want even when we know it goes against His will, we block our hearts from receiving His many gifts. When we insist on doing things our own way, the happiness we find is hollow and fleeting. Proof of this is that we’re not satisfied; we keep pursuing the next ‘better’ thing.
However, when we give up our will for His, God rewards us greatly with everything good He desires to give us, including His love, grace, patience, strength, and wisdom. When we give up our selfish ways and seek what He wants for us, we end up finding what we were seeking all along: We find not just happiness but His deep joy and His lasting peace, which we cannot obtain through worldly pleasures. For He says, ‘Peace I leave you, My peace I give you; not as the world gives, do I give to you’ (John 14:27).
What God wants for us is always life-giving. Like the little girl in the drawing, though, we can’t always see what He has in store for us. We might not understand how following His Way can make us happy. We may be afraid of losing more than we’ll gain. But when we trust Him enough to give up what we want in favor of what He wants, we receive from Him all He desires to give us, plus the profound joy and peace we’re longing for.
When we give up what we want and accept what He offers us, we receive what we wanted – and much, much more.
“Whoever loses his life for My sake will find it.” – Matthew 10:39
Let everything I do be with You, for You, and because of You.
Thank you for reading my reflection. All thanks to God for giving me the ideas and guiding my words! © 2025 Gina Bedell
Through these reflections, I invite you, the reader, to reflect on a given topic and then seek deeper answers through prayer, additional spiritual reading, and/or consultation with clergy or other qualified persons in order to grow in your faith and understanding of God’s love and will for your life.
Please share this with your friends by clicking on one of the icons below. Comments are always welcome!
If you or someone you know would like to receive these writings directly, please email me at ginabedell1@gmail.com and I will add you to my ‘BCC’ email list.
You can also find my posts on my Facebook page!
P.S.
Pray for peace at home and around the world. Donate to a cause that tugs at your heart. Take care of those around you; take care of our planet. Pray for the people around the globe whose lives have been torn apart by war and natural disasters.
Photo credit: Free-images.com
During recess, adults who serve as playground monitors tend to stay in the background. They don’t interact with the kids much but are ready if a child needs help. Sometimes, especially if a big kid is chasing him, a small child will run over and stand next to one of these adults. He knows she’ll protect him as long as he’s standing close to her. The playground monitors are always present but, until they need help, the kids don’t pay much attention to them.
We can take this image and expand it, and apply it to God. Though we’ve heard it many times, we sometimes need to remind ourselves that God is always with us; there’s never a time when He’s not with us. Unlike the adults on the playground, though, our Lord isn’t a distant bystander. He’s not watching us with indifference until we need a favor from Him. Rather, He’s watching with a loving, burning desire for us to acknowledge His presence and ‘stand close to Him.’ He wants us to come to Him many times throughout our day to share with Him not only our fears and concerns but also our joys, as we do with a dear friend. He wants us to include Him even in the ordinary happenings of our lives. He wants us to see every moment as an opportunity to stand close to Him.
What does this look like?
In the morning, we thank Him for His loving presence and ask Him to show us what He wants us to do as we go about our day. We’re mindful of Him as we work, whether at home or outside the home. Being mindful of His presence with us, we look for ways to go out of our way to be kind and compassionate – to show Him to the people around us. Before we make a phone call or join a meeting, we ask Him to guide our words and help us listen with an open heart. When someone does or says something to us that’s kind or helpful, we thank God for that person. Even while we’re driving or doing a mundane chore like folding laundry or mowing the lawn, we talk to Him honestly about whatever is on our mind. Talking with Him about it draws our hearts closer to His. When we do these things, over time we’ll get to know better, first-hand, His deep Love for us; we’ll want to align our will with His, and we’ll find joy and peace in doing so.
Let’s remember that God is always with us, not as an indifferent bystander but as our loving companion, friend, and confidant. Let’s do our part to look for Him and stand close to Him, not just in times of trouble but in every moment of our day.
“Know that I am with you… I will never leave you.” – Genesis 28:15
Let everything I do be with You, for You, and because of You.
Thank you for reading my reflection. All thanks to God for giving me the ideas and guiding my words! © 2025 Gina Bedell
Through these reflections, I invite you, the reader, to reflect on a given topic and then seek deeper answers through prayer, additional spiritual reading, and/or consultation with clergy or other qualified persons in order to grow in your faith and understanding of God’s love and will for your life.
Please share this with your friends by clicking on one of the icons below. Comments are always welcome!
If you or someone you know would like to receive these writings directly, please email me at ginabedell1@gmail.com and I will add you to my ‘BCC’ email list.
You can also find my posts on my Facebook page!
P.S.
Pray for peace at home and around the world. Donate to a cause that tugs at your heart. Take care of those around you; take care of our planet. Pray for the people around the globe whose lives have been torn apart by war and natural disasters.
Photo credit: Free-images.com
When Jesus appears to the apostles after His resurrection, Thomas isn’t with them. Thomas refuses to believe that they’ve seen Jesus alive and even insists, “Until I see the mark of the nails in His hands and put my finger into the nail marks and put my hand into His side, I will not believe.” The following week Jesus shows Thomas His wounds and Thomas exclaims, “My Lord and my God!” Then Jesus says, “Have you come to believe because you have seen Me? Blessed are those who have not seen and have believed.”
First, we might ask, “Why wasn’t Thomas with them?” Maybe he was afraid of what would happen to him if he was with the others and their hiding place was discovered. Maybe he wanted to grieve alone. We don’t know. What we do know is that the rest of the apostles stayed together; they understood that they needed each other. By distancing himself from them, Thomas not only missed out on their support but, even worse, he missed out on seeing Jesus alive at that time.
The apostles knew, as we know, that community is important. When we distance ourselves from others or don’t feel part of a community, we miss out on the support that a community can provide. We also miss out on seeing how the power of God’s Love, which is infinitely stronger than human love, can work wonders when we open our hearts to Him.
Also, when Christ said, ‘Blessed are those who have not seen and have believed’ He was talking about you and me. We’d like to think we would have believed the apostles. So this might be a good time to ask ourselves, ‘Do I really believe that the Lord is alive, and lives in me, today? Do I believe that His Love for me is more profound, and therefore more powerful, than any human love I could ever experience? Do I have the courage to invite this Love to permeate my soul; direct all I think, say, and do; and transform me and help me to become the person He created me to be?’
We don’t see Jesus walking around now. It takes courage to believe that He’s alive, that He’s alive in us, and that He wants to take over our hearts. It takes courage because belief demands a response. When we dare to believe He’s present with us, right now, and we dare to open our hearts to Him, we dare to let ourselves be transformed by His Love.
Let’s ask our Lord to give us the courage to believe, deep in our hearts, that He’s alive – and act on that belief.
“Blessed are those who have not seen and have believed.” – John 20:29
Let all I do be with You, for You, and because of You.
Thank you for reading my reflection. All thanks to God for giving me the ideas and guiding my words! © 2025 Gina Bedell
Through these reflections, I invite you, the reader, to reflect on a given topic and then seek deeper answers through prayer, additional spiritual reading, and/or consultation with clergy or other qualified persons in order to grow in your faith and understanding of God’s love and will for your life.
Please share this with your friends by clicking on one of the icons below. Comments are always welcome!
If you or someone you know would like to receive these writings directly, please email me at ginabedell1@gmail.com and I will add you to my ‘BCC’ email list.
You can also find my posts on my Facebook page!
P.S.
Pray for peace at home and around the world. Donate to a cause that tugs at your heart. Take care of those around you; take care of our planet. Pray for the people around the globe whose lives have been torn apart by war and natural disasters.
Photo credit: Free-images.com
My dear mother-in-law often said that God uses the weather to remind us that He’s in charge. Her words rang true on a recent camping trip that Ted and I took. On Day 1, the wind fought us setting up our tent. Two days later the heavens dropped so much rain and wind that many campsites flooded and tents came down (not ours). We found ourselves checking the forecast frequently on our phones. The evening of our last night of camping, they predicted rain and calm winds starting at 9:30. Then, it seemed as if God said, ‘Watch this.’ Shortly after 9:00 the sky turned black and dumped buckets of water on us. The wind screamed. The rain flew sideways as we fought to keep the tent upright. After a few minutes, Ted called out to me, “How long is this supposed to last?” I pulled my phone from my raincoat pocket and glanced at the radar. “About an hour.” What I didn’t tell him was that this storm was supposed to continue for an hour and then we’d get more, off and on, for several hours.
The oddest thing was that I felt calm. God, in His great mercy, had graced me with a sense of peace even during this storm. I prayed for His help; I knew we couldn’t fight this wind ourselves. I asked Him over and over again to keep us safe.
Then, about 20 minutes after it had started, the storm… stopped.
When we dared to breathe, we and our neighbors made sure each other was OK. Then, knowing we were in for a long night, we lay on our cots to try to rest. During that calm I read the words, ‘The Lord hears me whenever I call Him’ and also ‘I will lie down in peace and sleep comes at once for You alone, Lord, make me dwell in safety’ (Psalm 4:1, 8). I kept repeating those phrases. Sleep didn’t come to me at once but the Lord did put words from hymns in my heart, traditional hymns like ‘Holy God we praise Thy name’ that spilled from my heart in profound, continuous, joyful thanks. Our God, Who controls the wind and the rain, Who commanded the storm to stop while the apostles’ boat tossed in the waves – He cut that storm short.
I awoke to seagulls squawking, songbirds singing, and my beloved loons calling to one another. After that violent storm at 9 pm, there were no more storms and no more rain the rest of the night.
Some might say these events are just part of nature. But God created nature and is still alive among us. Let us praise Him, thank Him for His goodness, and even sing joyful hymns to Him. He is in control.
“Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good, for his mercy endures forever.” – Psalm 106:1
Let all I do be with You, for You, and because of You.
Thank you for reading my reflection. All thanks to God for giving me the ideas and guiding my words! © 2025 Gina Bedell
Through these reflections, I invite you, the reader, to reflect on a given topic and then seek deeper answers through prayer, additional spiritual reading, and/or consultation with clergy or other qualified persons in order to grow in your faith and understanding of God’s love and will for your life.
Please share this with your friends by clicking on one of the icons below. Comments are always welcome!
If you or someone you know would like to receive these writings directly, please email me at ginabedell1@gmail.com and I will add you to my ‘BCC’ email list.
You can also find my posts on my Facebook page!
P.S.
Pray for peace at home and around the world. Donate to a cause that tugs at your heart. Take care of those around you; take care of our planet. Pray for the people around the globe whose lives have been torn apart by war and natural disasters.
