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Category: Books

My favorite reads of 2019

Courage Dear Heart by Rebecca Reynolds - this was by far my favorite book this year. It met me right where I was. It is one of those books I want go back and reread. It is incredibly well written...but what I love the most about it is the heart with which Rebecca wrote. She … Continue reading My favorite reads of 2019 →

merckaylin Books, Joy-Sharing 3 Comments January 1, 2020January 1, 2020 3 Minutes

Do-It-Yourself Reading challenge (and a few tips to improve your reading life)

(Más abajo hay un audio con este blog en español en caso de que no puedas leer en inglés). I have loved reading ever since I am a little girl. Books are my favorite gift to receive and to give away. But I have found that my reading life has had ebbs and flows through … Continue reading Do-It-Yourself Reading challenge (and a few tips to improve your reading life) →

merckaylin Books, Joy-Sharing 5 Comments December 29, 2019December 29, 2019 2 Minutes

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A Tool To Disciple our Kids in Reading and Studying God’s Word
Mama, you are free to apologize
On FIFA & Hebrews: some thoughts on not losing heart
My favorite reads of 2019
Do-It-Yourself Reading challenge (and a few tips to improve your reading life)

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(In English below) 🇪🇸 Mañana mis hijas y yo empezamos el reto de #100capitulos100dias, en una jornada a través de la historia de la redención en las Escrituras. Si quieres saber más y unirte a nosotros, puedes ir a mi blog aylinmerck.com para saber cuál es el plan y la motivación detrás de este reto. ¡Usemos el hashtag para animarnos mutuamente!! Me ha sido de mucho ánimo ver a los que ya se han unido el reto. No tienen que empezar mañana para unirse, lo pueden hacer en cualquier momento del verano. ///// 🇬🇧 Tomorrow my daughters and I will start #100chapters100days Bible reading challenge from @zonderkidz. We are going on a journey through redemptive history from Genesis to Revelation. If you want to know more you can go on my blog to find out more! Feel free to use the hashtag to encourage another. Link in profile

Many (many!) years ago, I learned to read. And as soon as I did, my dear parents gifted me a Bible, a Reina Valera 1960 edition (in Spanish). I still remember the excitement and wonder I felt, holding that book. I felt so grown up… amazed that I could read it for myself, all by myself. I slept with that Bible the first nights after I got it. . The kindness and compassion of the Lord astounds me now: that He, the Almighty, Infinite God would come near a 6 year old little girl and create in her delight in His words and in Himself. . In His grace my Father took that early love for His Word and has grown it over the years. Now I am a mom (with a 6 year old daughter of my own 💛) and one of my greatest joys is to teach my kids to read and study the Bible. My prayer & hope is for God’s Word to be the food my kids crave, the treasure they seek, the place where they meet with their Father over and over again. . I can't give them that love, only the Spirit can create it. But I can shape my kid's appetite. . This summer I am excited to read through the Bible in a way that provides both the direction and the tools they need. I will read with them using a Bible reading challenge from @zonderkids. I love that the selection of passages on this reading challenge takes the kids through the whole storyline of redemption from Genesis to Revelation. . The challenge from @zonderkids will provide direction. And I created a tool to introduce them to inductive Bible study and teach them how to feed themselves from God’s Word. . I am sharing this tool on the blog for those of you who might want to join us in doing this! Even if you wanted to read through the Bible with another plan, this tool simplifies the inductive Bible study method for younger, elementary kids. It is not meant to be a straight jacket! Just hopefully something that can provide some structure or inspire ideas of your own. I pray it is useful. . May we know and love the Lord more after summer of 2020! Yes, Lord, may it be so! . Click on the link on my profile for the Bible reading challenge & the tool to guide those times together. (Está en español en el blog!)

MAMA, YOU ARE FREE TO APOLOGIZE// . I don’t want to sin against my kids. But I do. I don’t want to sin in front of my kids. But again, I do. . The Father in his kindness has provided a way for the mama who is in Christ to point her kids to His goodness, even as she sins in front of them: through the confession of her sins to her kids. . Apologizing to our kids isn’t always easy. There are many reasons for that. Some of them may even be rooted in suffering. Maybe you grew up in a home where that wasn’t modeled. Maybe when you apologized, it was used against you. Maybe your parents were never wrong and you were always considered the one at fault. You learned to protect yourself from that hurt by never accepting you could actually be wrong. Or, because of abuse in your life, you have only experienced the dark side of being vulnerable. If that is your story, I am so, so sorry. . The truth is confessing sin doesn’t come naturally to anyone. Admitting we are wrong can make you feel unsafe. It can also be offensive to a proud heart. . Forgiving one another is a mark of life in community (Ephesians 4: 32). People that belong to each other speak truth to one another (Eph. 4: 25), including the truth about our neediness, our sins and the deep joy of having a Savior that rescues us continually. This truth-telling is an important part of our discipleship as parents. We can’t teach our kids to treasure the gospel, if they don’t see us treasuring it and confessing our own need of grace. . And yet the truth is even now as saints, we still sin. And when we do, not only are we to confess our sins to the Lord, but He also commands us to confess our sins to another (James 5: 16). . So where do we find help to become moms who regularly apologize to their kids? Well, as with every single part of our lives, our oneness with Christ has a decisive impact on the spiritual discipline of confessing our sins to our family. Here are three ways our union with Christ is both our hope and help//go to the link in profile to read the whole article. . . . #risenmotherhood #bedeeplyrooted #instagramforChrist #forgiveness #byfaith #desiringgod #gospelcentered #gospelliving #unionwithchrist

On a day like today joy & sorrow coexist. The kindness of the Lord is overwhelming on one hand, and on the other, unfulfilled longings make us weep. We taste the privilege of mothering others even if we haven't had any kids of our own, AND we feel the sting of loss, brokenness & emptiness. We rejoice in the precious lives entrusted to us AND we feel our deep inadequacy for the nurturing Christ has called us to. And so as I go to bed tonight, this song from @cityalight is close to my heart: . "Come you weary heart now to Jesus Come you anxious soul now and see There is perfect love and comfort in your tears Rest here in His wondrous peace Oh the goodness, the goodness of Jesus Satisfied, He is all that I need May it be, come what may, that I rest all my days In the goodness of Jesus Come find what this world cannot offer Come and find your joy here complete Taste the living water, never thirst again Rest here in His wondrous peace Oh the goodness, the goodness of Jesus Satisfied, He is all that I need May it be, come what may, that I rest all my days In the goodness of Jesus Come and find your hope now in Jesus He is all He said He would be Grace is overflowing from the Saviour's heart Rest here in His wondrous peace Oh the goodness, the goodness of Jesus Satisfied, He is all that I need May it be, come what may, that I rest all my days In the goodness of Jesus" Dear sister, I am praying that the goodness, deep goodness of Christ satisfies you today... May you rest all your days in the endless grace He provides. May his nearness be your perpetual good.

I re-read these words yesterday & they resonated so deeply within me. I needed these reminders, maybe you too? . "The redeemed woman who has been strengthened in her inner being to know that God has made a place for her in His heart will sing with the psalmist, 'Lord, you have been our dwelling place in all generations' (Psalm 90:1). Her soul is secure with Jesus' promise that 'if I go & prepare a place for you, I will come again & will take you to myself (John 14:3).' . "She has been rooted and grounded in love; so she rejoices in her historical and global connection to God's children and she understands that she lives out that connection locally in the church where God has called her to serve... She is willing to risk her comfort to love her husband and children, to spiritually mother other women, to defend her family in prayer, to care for and support the weak & the needy & the fearful... . "Because God's heart is her home, there is a rootedness that stabilizes her to be a place of grace for those God has chosen to be her family." -- Susan Hunt, Women's Ministry in the Local Church, p. 155 O Father, through Jesus you are our safe place & place of rest. Help us to know deep in our bones that you alone are home. Stabilize us in you so we can be a place of grace for the people you have given us to love. May our daughters also know you as their home, rooted & grounded in your love. We are not enough to meet all their needs but you are. Open our eyes to the privilege to lead them and go together to you, who alone are the God of Living Waters. Satisfy us with your love that is better than life. We can't wait for Jesus to come and take us home with you forever. In the meantime we praise you that He does all things well. Amen . . . . #susanhuntforever #desiringgod #instagramforchrist #theologymatters #bedeeplyrooted #redeemed #risenmotherhood #alifeoverseas #globalnomads #expatlife #tckmom

On my mind tonight: 👉To be truly sane is to acknowledge continually our "unrockness" to the only one who is our Rock. // Our quarantine has been marked by sickness. Every two weeks one of our kids has come down with same symptoms that last longer than a week. Nights are especially hard with hours awake trying to comfort and alleviate them. . This past week was filled with such nights. The demands of life have continued even in the exhaustion of cumulative sleepless nights: cooking for our family's health needs, training a 2 year old little boy (boy mamas, you know what I mean 👦) and learning/studying arabic. . Yesterday afternoon I felt I couldn't keep going. I found myself fighting self pity, and telling the Lord, "I have come to the end of my reserves. You are asking me to keep going. But I don't feel I can." . The Lord took me to Psalms 61 and 71: . "O God, listen to my cry! Hear my prayer! From the ends of the earth I cry to you for help when my heart is overwhelmed." . "Be to me a rock of refuge to which I may continually come." . It is as we come with faith (he really does hear our cry!) and name our exhaustion, self pity and unbelief, that he also gives us faith to get up and cook that next meal, be up again with our sick child, or clean the house. He doesn't always take away the hardship but he does strengthen our souls (Psalm 138: 6). . Take heart, friend: 💛We never outstay his welcome or outneed his ability to be our Rock. . 💛We don't ever outgrow our neediness and yet - he never runs out of commands to save us. 🙌🙌 . Friend, if that is true, to come to Him continually is the sane, human thing to do. It was the way that Christ, the man lived. . So, where you feel that your strength is spent, when your heart is faint - do the only sane thing left to do: cry out to the Lord. Watch how he will strengthen you because He can't ever put to shame those who put their hope in Him.

A PANDEMIC THAT DIVIDES// . I wasn't expecting this: that with the pandemic we would also face division in the church. . Some think this is serious. Others think it is an overreaction. Our political persuasions are suddenly influencing how we view all these things. Now opinions have moral weight & defending our rights is a priority. . Christ's kingdom is not of this world. To align ourselves with a specific political persuasion so strongly that we are more committed to it than we are to Christ and his people, that is sin (and I am speaking here to all parties). . Is it possible that different perspectives have value? Can we hold in tension two realities as true? There are people dying and at risk that we long to protect AND people who are losing their jobs and needing to feed their families? . I have seen pride in my heart and my own capacity to say things that don't bridge our differences. . Friends, please - we need John 17 more than ever. Christ's heart for his church hasn't changed - we reflect His glory in the same measure we are pursuing unity with one another. . Are we listening to others with different perspectives & trying to understand their plight? Are we counting others as more significant than ourselves? Even as we count others as more significant, we may land in different camps. But let's make sure it is love that is taking us there... And not us pursuing our own interests. . Friends, we have supernatural strength and power from the Risen Christ Himself to prize Christ's bride, love people around us and put to death self interests. . By faith in the Son and his ability to live through us, let us value life, defend the weak, provide for the needy, and submit to authority. Let us not mock the one who makes choices that are different than ours just because they are different. . We have the humility of Christ to recognize these are hard times where solutions are not obvious, & when there is a lot that we really don't know. . O, Church, let's not grieve the spirit by turning against one another. We belong to Christ. Let us show to the World the love of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit by the way we love one another. His glory is at stake.

It is day 34 of lockdown/curfew and oh friends, I am TIRED. . My guess is most of you are too. Homeschooling (with monkeys ..er cute toddlers on your back), working from home, studying, all the cooking & cleaning, with little reprieve... it is all exhausting. . And maybe if you are like me, there are really hard things that will not change after all this is over. That thought – the thought that life won’t necessarily get easier once lockdown is over – has made me feel weak to my knees. . Over the last couple of weeks, at times I have felt like I am losing heart. The ground beneath my feet feels wobbly, I easily tear up and sometimes cry. . I have been praying for a clearer sight of Christ that would renew my hope. . And today the Lord reminded me of a FIFA Club World Cup match my husband and I went to a few years ago. The teams were competing for second place. The stadium was vibrant as the fans cheered the players on with their drums and chants. I was struck by how invested they were in every play. Their energy was contagious. The players were on the field and the spectators were at the edge of their seats, excitedly watching their every move. It occurred to me then that this is how the witnesses of Hebrews 11 &12 must be. . The image that the author of Hebrews has in mind is exactly that of a race in a stadium. The witnesses from Hebrews 11 &12 ran before us by faith. They are now surrounding us, cheering us on as we race on to the finish line. They see us facing temptation, difficulty and all kind of opposition. They see our weariness, our impatience and the thoughts of giving up. And they whistle and shout and carry us on – “You can do it!! Keep going! The end is near! It is so worth it! And Jesus – oh man, Jesus is SO worthy!!” . What blows me away is to see Christ as the main witness in Hebrews. He is at the head of the trail since He blazed it for us as our forerunner. There is a Man in Heaven guaranteeing our victory, because as our Champion, He went there ahead of us (Heb. 6: 20). No one is more invested in us than Him: “You can do it!" He yells, "because I already did it for you and in you!” //for more thoughts on FIFA & Hebrews, link in profile :)

WHEN WE CANT CARRY EACH OTHERS' BURDENS// More than ever before I am so grateful Christ is not overwhelmed by all the burdens of His children. . I had the thought today that this is a hard time to carry each other's burdens. We each have heavy burdens - job loss, wondering if we will have enough food to feed our children, family with underlying health conditions, isolation, etc. But then we also know about dear friends & family working in the front lines of the health care system, of friends who don't have income & about other friends who are seriously ill. . We know specific people that die and now they are not just cases. They have a name, a face, and a grave. And all of a sudden it is too much. It is too much for us to bear. We weep and want to shut the world out. . But our Shepherd - he is not overwhelmed by our neediness in this season. He is serving us by his constant prayers for us. He is unchanging, self sufficient, near & oh so so kind. . As we come to him weary and heavy laden, he gives us rest... And then enables us with His strength to continue carrying the burdens of those suffering around us. . "Now may the God of peace, who brought up from the dead our Lord Jesus — the great Shepherd of the sheep — with the blood of the everlasting covenant, equip you with all that is good to do His will, working in us what is pleasing in His sight, through Jesus Christ. Glory belongs to Him forever and ever. Amen." Hebrews 13:20‭-‬21 HCSB . Thankful for my friend @amyfrederick2000 sharing this verse with me and for the Lord sending this flock of sheep right by our house so that I wouldn't miss his shepherding heart.

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