Daily Sheet: Day 142: Righteousness
Family Book: “Noah’s Ark”
Travel: Norway
Tag Archives: Blessings
Day 128: Generosity
Daily Sheet: Day 128: Generosity
Family Book: “A New Coat for Anna”
Travel: Denmark
Song: “Come Thou Fount”- Fernando Ortega (with lyrics)
Day 109: Peacefulness
Daily Sheet: Day 109: Peacefulness
Family Book: “Where the Poppies Now Grow”
Travel: Algeria; Tunisia
Song: “God and Country” – Gungor
“You can take my money, take my land, but not my son!
…Those who live by the gun, die by the gun.”
Day 102: Benevolence
Daily Sheet: Day 102: Benevolence
Family Book: “If the World Were a Village”
Travel: Gabon
Video: “Open My Hands” – Sara Groves (talking about her inspiration behind writing this song)
In Psalm 84:11 we read, “No good thing does He withhold from those who walk uprightly.” Sir Richard Baker comments, “But how is this true, when God so oftentimes withholds riches and honor and health of body from men, though they walk ever so uprightly? We may therefore know that honors and riches and bodily strength are none of God’s good things, and the good things of God are chiefly peace of conscience, joy in the Holy Spirit, fruition of God’s presence, and a vision of His face in the next. These good things God never withholds from the Godly.”
Video: “Open My Hands” – Sara Groves (live acoustic performance)
I believe in a blessing I don’t understand. I’ve seen rain fall on wicked and the just. Rain is no measure of his faithfulness; He withholds no good thing from us.
I believe in a peace that flows deeper than pain, that broken find healing in love.
Pain is no measure of his faithfulness; He withholds no good thing from us.I believe in a fountain that will never dry, though I’ve thirsted and didn’t have enough. Thirst is no measure of his faithfulness; He withholds no good thing from us.
I will open my hands, will open my heart.
I am nodding my head, an emphatic “Yes!” to all that You have for me.
Questions:
- Do you think Sir Richard Baker is right?
- Why does Sara Groves say, “I believe in a blessing I don’t understand”?
- Why, if God is faithful, do people experience drought, pain, and thirst?
- What is our role in all this?
Day 101: Belief
Daily Sheet: Day 101: Belief
Family Book: “I Believe: The Nicene Creed”
Travel: Congo
Video: “Creed” – Rich Mullins (with introduction by Rich)
I hope I would leave a legacy of joy; a legacy of real compassion. Because I think there is a great joy in real compassion. I don’t think that you can know joy apart from caring deeply about people, caring enough about people that you actually do something. But I have a feeling like if my life is motivated by my ambition to leave a legacy, what I will probably leave as a legacy is ambition. But if my life is motivated by the power of the Spirit in me, if I live in the awareness of the indwelling Christ, if I allow His presence to guide my actions, to guide my motives, those sorts of things, that’s the only time I think that we really leave a great legacy. That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is Spirit. My ambition to be a good guy is a fleshly ambition. And when Christ calls us to take up our cross and follow him, a lot of us think that what that means is we’re supposed to lay down our vices, and we’re supposed to cling to virtues, but I think that unless Christ is Lord of our virtues, our virtues become dangerous to us and dangerous to the people around us. I think that when Christ calls us to take up our cross, what He means is you must die not only to whatever vices are in your life, which he will eventually kill out, you must also die to whatever virtues are in your life. Your life is not valuable because you are an articulate speaker, your life is not valuable because you are a generous person, your life is not valuable because of any of that. If we empty ourselves of everything and allow God to be present, then it’s no longer us, it’s Him. Then it becomes a spiritual thing. And that which is born of the Spirit is Spirit. And that’s when I think Christianity really begins to make sense.
Video: “Creed” – Rich Mullins with Third Day (with Croatian subtitles)
Day 97: Tolerance
Daily Sheet: Day 97: Tolerance
Family Book: “The Relatives Came”
Travel: Seychelles; Mauritius
Song: “When It Was Over” – Sara Groves (with lyrics)
Oh love wash over a multitude of things, love wash over a multitude of things, love wash over a multitude of things; Make us whole.
There is love that never fails; There is a healing that always prevails; There is a hope that whispers a vow, a promise to stay while we’re working it out, so come with your love and wash over us.
Questions:
- What are some different meanings of the word “tolerance”?
- What is the difference between tolerance and acceptance?
- What are some things we should not tolerate? Why not?
Day 93: Kindness
Daily Sheet: Day 93: Kindness
Family Book: “The Watcher”
Travel: Zimbabwe
Video: “All the Ways You Wander” – John Spillane
…And if you take the long way, if you take the long way home, down where the magicians and the dreamers roam, through the mountains of morning, through the valleys of night, searching for the island of your heart’s delight,
I’ll wait for you, like a true friend. I’ll wait for you, ’til the very end.
Video: “Kindness”
Video: “12 Year Old Boy Helps Homeless People in Los Angeles”
“I might only have one match, but I can make an explosion.”
Video: “12 Year Old Boy Helping More Homeless People in L.A.”
Video: “14 Year Old Boy Helping More Homeless People in L.A.”
Elliot Katz, the boy in the last three videos above, was inspired in part to form his charity organization, ReachingOutCalifornia, by the following verse:
“And whoever saves a life, it is considered as if he saved an entire world.” – Mishnah Sanhedrin 4:9; Yerushalmi Talmud.
Put in context, the passage reads as follows:
…We find in regard to Cain, who killed his brother, “The bloods of your brother scream out!” (Genesis 4:10) – the verse does not say blood of your brother, but bloods of your brother, because it was his blood and also the blood of his future offspring [screaming out]! [The judges’ speech continues] “It was for this reason that man was first created as one person [Adam], to teach you that anyone who destroys a life is considered by Scripture to have destroyed an entire world; and anyone who saves a life is as if he saved an entire world.”
Questions:
- The Talmud, from which the Mishnah Sanhedrin passage is taken, is a Jewish writing. Compare these verses to Jesus’s words as recorded in Luke 9:24:
If you try to hang on to your life, you will lose it. But if you give up your life for my sake, you will save it. (New Living Translation – NLT)
- “The Watcher” is written as a poem. Describe the format.
Day 91: Acceptance
Daily Sheet: Day 91: Acceptance
Family Book: “Leo the Lop”
Travel: Botswana
Video: “One Faith” – John Michael Talbot & Michael Card
He is the good Shepherd and He’s laid down his life for His sheep, so out of many nations He’s gathered one fold and one faith;
And He has built His church on the rock foundation of faith, on apostles and prophets who shepherd the people in His place.
And He gave to Simon Peter and to all the twelve the keys of the Kingdom so darkness shall never prevail
But some of the shepherds have pastured themselves on their sheep, so He has come out against them and scattered His people of faith.
In good pasture He will shepherd His people; On the mountain top He feeds His sheep. He will heal the poor and afflicted; To the prisoner He brings release.
Yet He’ll not forsake His people; He’ll claim His sheep for His own. He’ll send out His Word to the nations, regather His people back home,
For He is the good Shepherd. He’s laid down His life for His sheep, so out of many nations He’s gathered one fold and one faith.
There is one faith, one hope, and one baptism, One God and Father of all. There is one church, one body, one life in the Spirit now given so freely to all.
Questions:
- What does it mean to “Accept one another… just as Christ accepted you”?
- Put Leviticus 19:34 into today’s terms.
- What does John Michael Talbot’s song, “One Faith,” have to do with acceptance?
- Discuss the significance of John Michael Talbot’s (biography here) and Michael Card’s (biography here) collaboration on this project.
Character core curriculum 
