The Power of a Mom's Prayer
- There is no more important job I have to do as a mom for my children than carry them to the Throne of Grace! Who will ever feel compelled to pray for my child more than me? If I’m not willing to make the sacrifice of time to regularly, boldly, fervently, humbly pray for my child, who will? God has convicted my heart in this area recently. When my kids are grown and leave my home, ...more
Leaving Space in your Schedule
- So our journey has begun! Yes, we are off to a slow start, but a start nonetheless! 🙂 The Lord has laid it on my heart to get back to the basics in my Christian walk and we are just warming up with the discipline of creating space in our lives for time with the Lord. In my last post, I mentioned three principles: We covered the first two in Monday’s post HERE. If you missed it, ...more
Creating Space
- So…I had PLANNED to write about the purpose and privilege of prayer to get this little blog series going on the basic Christian disciplines. I had PLANNED to post this weeks ago! However, the start to our summer has not exactly been about slowing down, resting and recharging! Summer vacation actually started five days early when our home was hit with a strange bug that included a high fever. My daughter’s classroom at school had been ...more
Let's Get Going!
- It’s time. Let me be honest, it’s WAAAAAY past time! I’m sorry to say it has been months since I last sat down to write a post for Throne of Grace. If you are a regular around here you know that our family and business survived a big move this year. I know many of you were praying for us and your prayers were felt and answered! The Lord has been so faithful in all His provisions ...more
A Calm in the Eye of the Storm
- I warned you that it might get quiet around the ToG blog for awhile…and indeed my attention has been elsewhere the past couple of months! The Garibaldi family is in the midst of a season of chaos. Crazy times, I tell you! Those of you who know me, know I like to have my ducks in a row. It’s not a wonder where my son gets it! At age one he was sorting cereal on his ...more
Blessed Between a Rock and a Hard Place
- Hello Throne of Grace friends! Our blog has been hijacked today by my super fun, super godly, super real friend and sister-in-Christ, Amanda. I'm going to give her a quick introduction and then let you get to know Amanda for yourself! I know you'll love her! Amanda and I go WAAAY back to the elementary school days...well, maybe even before that! We grew up in the same little church in southern California and have fun memories ...more
Say What, Lord?
- Have you ever wanted desperately to hear from the Lord but it seems you get nothing but silence? Or perhaps you’ve experienced the opposite – messages coming at you from every direction but you don’t know how to weed out the voices of the world from the call of the Lord? Seeking a message from God is a desire that spans all eras, all races, and all religions, really! We all feel a longing to hear ...more
Filling Your Heart and Your Home with Worship - Part 3
- As promised, I'm back with the last half of my list, Molly's Top 10 Worship Recommendations. If you've missed Part 1 and Part 2 of this series, you can catch them HERE and HERE. To recap quickly, here are #1-5. 1. Input is related to output. 2. Get a free subscription to Pandora Internet Radio. 3. Find some worship artists that inspire you and make your heart sing. 4. Keep your worship music selections fresh. 5. Find worship songs that ...more
Filling Your Heart and Your Home with Worship - Part 2
- Before I left for vacation I had shared my thoughts on worship as the ultimate cure to one of “those” days. You know the kind I mean? Nothing is going quite the way you planned and finding a bit of joy is about as easy to do as finding …If you missed that post, you can catch up HERE before joining us for Part 2 today. We talked last time about how worship involves a lot ...more
Filling Your Heart and Your Home With Worship - Part 1
- I had one of “those” days this week. I had been up later than I should have been the night before trying to finish some projects without enough success to warrant the late night. Then I woke up before 5 am, after just a few hours of sleep, and couldn’t fall back asleep after that. Instead, my mind began to swirl with to-do lists, conversations I needed to have, and the worries of the days ...more
Prayer & Praise Monday - Memorial Day, 2013
- Good morning, Prayer Warriors! In honor of Memorial Day, the day that honors our military heroes who give up their freedom so we can have ours, I'd like to lead you in a special time of prayer. Today our prayers will be focused on the men, women, and families who have sacrificed and served in our U.S. Armed Forces. These special people are in need of our prayers - and praying for them is just about ...more
How God Found Me: My Testimony
- I was raised on science. I grew up watching nature shows and reading National Geographic magazines. My home was loving and supportive, but there was no mention of God. Instead, I learned that we had evolved - but look how far we’d come! Humans had become the top of the food chain by using their brains, and now that we were enlightened enough to reject primitive myths and superstitions, science and progress would eventually bring ...more
A Mother's Prayer: A Tribute to my Mom
- I’ve got a perfectly imperfect mother. Those may not sound like “tribute-worthy” words, but they most certainly are! I had the special blessing of spending this past weekend at Forest Home, in the beautiful southern California mountains, with my mom and my sister, Emmy. We attended a women’s retreat and enjoyed wonderful teaching, meaningful worship, and lots of laughs! Mom, Me, and Emmy at camp - blurry phone photo! The theme of the weekend was “No More ...more
Prayer & Praise Monday - April 22, 2013
- Hello, dear Prayer Warriors! This has been a week filled with grief across the nation! Can you recall a time with so much tragedy striking from so many angles?? From bombings to manhunts, explosive fires to earthquakes, grenade attacks in Nigeria, shooting rampages in Russia and Washington state, threats of terror in Canda...each news headline is worse than the last! It is easy for me to want to turn off the TV and internet, retreat to ...more
Don't Miss the Small Stuff!
- You’ve heard the saying, “Don’t sweat the small stuff”?? The thought behind that is that we often get caught up in the minor details of life. We allow little annoyances or even worries about what might happen take center-stage in our hearts and minds and lose sight of the big picture. In a spiritual context, we let our eyes settle in on the temporary trappings of life and fail to trust the Lord who sees life ...more
The Climb Out - Part 2
- Coming down off a Valentine's high? Or was your day not all hearts and roses? Even in the best of marriages, our expectations can fall far short! Whether it is diaper disasters, exhaustion from shuffling kids all over town, schedules that don't seem to jive with our spouse's, family drama, or even some of the heavier burdens of financial stress, medical issues, and the way our sin messes with our marriage - our God can handle it ...more
The Climb Out - Part 1
- Happy Valentine's Day! We've got a sweet treat for you today and tomorrow - a guest post from my friend and former neighbor (sniff! sniff!), Holly Mora. Holly moved on to the block at a precious time in the neighborhood. We had SIX women all pregnant with babies due within 6 months of each other! 5 of the 6 Expectant Mothers in the neighborhood, September 2007 Holly's daughter, Ella, and my daughter, Lucy, ended up being ...more
Blessed in the Waiting
- I think the Lord loves to make me wait. I think that’s the case because I’m often not very good at it! When I’m ready to move forward with something, I’m ready right then! But, God often has other plans for me. My husband and I have now been married for 11 ½ years, but before we met, I felt like I’d been waiting for someone my whole life. I had one boyfriend in high school ...more
Surviving Infertility
- I stood in the back of the church fighting hard not to cry. As people streamed in for the service, they were all congratulating our dear friends who had just announced they were expecting their first child. “Way to pass one by the goalie,” one man quipped as he high-fived the father-to-be. “I must have a really good goalie,” I thought wanting to run away and hide. I had “survived” other friend’s announcements of pregnancy, but this time ...more
Project Blessing Bags: A Recap
- Happy Friday! I've been looking forward to this post all week! Project Blessing Bags Assembly Day has come and gone...and all I can say is, "Wow!" God is amazing. I know that. But boy is it humbling when we get to be a part of something amazing He is doing! He is perfectly capable of working His miracles without any help from us. In fact, probably most of the time, we imperfect and sinful humans just ...more
Swap It Out
- Deb had some great inspiration last week on boxing up all the chaos left in the wake of Christmas. If you missed that post, you can find it HERE. No matter how big or small our home sweet home, I think we can all relate! There just never seems to be room enough! Sometimes all that is needed is a little organization – a place for everything and everything has its place. However, if your home ...more
Night of Darkness
- Pause. In the midst of the busyness, pause. We all need reminders to slow down and pause - especially 5 days before Christmas! It seems like it gets harder and harder to keep the little baby in the manger at the center of it all. There are many ways to stop and remember the reason for the season, but one of my favorites is the Night of Darkness. The Night of Darkness is a tradition we created about ...more
Let Your Light Shine!
- "You are the light of the world. A town built on a hill cannot be hidden. Neither do people light a lamp and put it under a bowl. Instead they put it on its stand, and it gives light to everyone in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before others, that they may see your good deeds and glorify your Father in heaven." (Matthew 5:14-16 NIV) October is here and that means ...more
Let Mercy Win!
- Welcome to our friends from Hungry for More! If you missed it, I had the honor of guest-posting there, on my friend Kandy’s blog, these past two days. You can find Part 1 HERE, and Part 2 HERE. Be sure to read those first! We’ve been talking about MERCY, in the context of James 2:12-13: "Speak and act as those who are going to be judged by the law that gives freedom, because judgment without mercy ...more
Let God be God in the Life of Your Child!
- **If you are looking for our Giveaway Week Question of the Day, read on! You'll have to read the post to be able to answer today's question and earn an additional entry. If you have no idea what I'm talking about, read Tuesday's post HERE with all the details regarding how you can take home one of our new MUSTARD SEED PRAYER JOURNALS for kids - for FREE!** I've got a special treat for you all ...more
God With Me
- My husband and I have a small cabin near Big Bear, which is about an hour and 45 minutes away from our house. Since the drive is a long span of uninterrupted time, we often start to chat together and end up having meaningful conversations about various things we’re thinking about. On our way to the cabin last Saturday, we started talking about our walks with God and about Christ’s return, which has been the ...more
Olympic-Sized Training of the Heart
- We are in the midst of those fabulous two weeks that bring the world together, uniting us around the television screen to cheer on the best-of-the-best Olympic athletes. Much media time has been devoted to marveling at the determination and sacrifice that go into the hours and hours of training these athletes endure. Not to diminish the blessings of winning gold, or the opportunities Christian Olympians have to glorify Christ on the world’s stage, but ...more
Scrub-a-Dub-Dub
- It’s cleaning day at the Garibaldi house! We’ve enjoyed a wonderful week with family visiting and now it is time to get the house back in order. As I was cleaning the bathroom today, my heart was convicted. Admittedly, cleaning the bathroom is not my favorite chore. However, one aspect of the task that I do love is that there is such an obvious reward when the work is done. Clearly the bathroom is grimy and ...more
SHARE God's Word
- I hope our last post inspired some fun around your table this week! At the very least, hopefully we got your creative juices flowing and gave you some encouragement that family meals can be FUN! If you missed our ideas on storing up fun family memories at the table, you can find that post here. It’s not too late to leave us a comment with your family’s fun table games and be entered to win ...more
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