At age 9, I bossed my classmates, argued with a girl about the existence of Santa Claus, and organized a club that we called "the Valley Girls." I also befriended a new student in our class. Jennifer's gentle personality drew me in, and I quickly grew close to this friend who helped temper my feistiness.

When Jennifer's birthday approached, she invited several of us to a slumber party. I eagerly relayed this invitation to my mama, who questioned me at length about Jennifer and what I knew about her family. Mama didn't know them and felt hesitant to allow me to sleep over at a stranger's home. I coaxed and pleaded and spoke as much good about Jennifer's family as I could, and, finally, Mama and Daddy agreed to let me go.

On the day of the party, however, Mama sat me down and told me that she and Daddy didn't feel comfortable about letting me stay overnight at Jennifer's. They had discussed it more and decided that I could attend the party, but not sleep over.

Devastated, I unpacked the bag I had eagerly packed the night before. I cried and cried. I wanted to punish Mama for hurting me, for denying me what she had at first agreed to give me.

Mama drove me to Jennifer's trailer that night, and I gave Jennifer the two gifts that Mama had allowed me to get for her birthday. I had fun with the other girls, and then went home when Mama returned to get me.

Perhaps a week later, my friend Janice told me that Jennifer's father had been "touching" Jennifer's two younger sisters. Jennifer heard Janice's whispers to me and said, "I told you not to tell!"

A few days later, Jennifer came to class one last time to tell us that she and her mother and sisters were moving. They planned to leave without telling her father. Sadly, I scrawled my address on a slip of paper and stuffed it in her pocket, asking her to write.

Now, as an adult, I am so thankful that my mom acted on her parental wisdom and refused to let me sleep over at a stranger's home. Mama acted on an awareness of the possibility that bad things might happen to her daughter. I now can appreciate Mama's "no" to my third-grade request.

How much wiser is our heavenly Father! There will be occasions when God must tell us "no," no matter how much we cajole. God acts on His complete, infinite knowledge, knowing full well what our futures hold, telling us "no" because He holds our best at such a high value.

You can explain the concept of the Holy Spirit-filled life using this simple recipe for chocolate milk.

Step One: Add chocolate syrup to a glass of milk.

Step Two: Stir.

In the Christian life, the "chocolate" of the Holy Spirit is added at the moment of salvation. Ephesians 1:13 explains that we receive the Spirit when we trust in Jesus as our Savior. The Spirit never needs to be added again.

However, in milk the chocolate syrup settles on the bottom of the glass until the milk is stirred up. Then the appearance and taste change completely.

Similarly, a Christian cannot experience the sweetness of spiritual change and growth until he or she asks the Holy Spirit to be in control. Then the Spirit produces godliness in a Christian's life, as promised in Galatians 5:22,23.

God adds the Spirit when we become Christians, but we must "stir" Him up in our lives daily.

Challenge a Christian by asking, "Are you settled or sweet?"

Driving my pickup along the highway in Nakuru, Kenya, I came to a section of road flooded with two feet of water. I stopped, waiting my turn to creep through it, when a speeding lorry suddenly hit me from behind. My vehicle shot forward, hit the embankment on the left, and flipped over onto the right side (driver's side), right in the middle of the water.

I found myself crouching on my feet on the driver's door, ankle-deep in muddy water, dazed and disoriented. I wanted to stay there, sitting in the mud, until I could get my wits about me. But people climbed on the vehicle, banging and shouting at me to get out. I tried to stand up, but I was weak and just sank back down again.

"Ngoja, ngoja (wait, wait)," I said. But the people persisted, so I tried again. I stood up, groped until I found the passenger-door lock, and pulled it open. People reached in and pulled me out by the arms. They set me on top of the car, then carried me off on their shoulders, all the way over the lake of water and set me down on dry ground.

A week later, I sat in my room, depressed. I didn't want to go anywhere or see anyone. But I sensed God urging me, Cathy, you don't clear your mind by sitting in the mud. Get up, unlock the door, and I will lift you up and out.

One night, the house of an orphan boy and his grandmother caught fire. As the flames quickly spread throughout the house, the boy was trapped upstairs. His grandmother attempted to rescue him, but she died in the flames. Fortunately, a man who saw the fire heard the boy's cries. He climbed up an iron drainpipe to the lad's window. With the boy clinging to his neck and with a firm grip on the drainpipe, he carefully lowered himself and the boy to safety.

Weeks later, a public hearing was held to determine who should have custody of the boy. A teacher, a farmer and the town's wealthiest citizen all gave reasons why they should be chosen to give the boy a home. But the sad boy only stared at the floor.

Then a man walked to the front of the room and announced his desire to adopt the boy. He slipped his hands out of his pockets and held them up for the crowd to see. His palms bore hideous scars.

The boy cried out in recognition and leapt into the man's arms. This was the man who had saved the child's life! His hands had been scorched when he climbed the hot iron pipe. As the boy nestled in his savior's arms, the other men walked away. Those marred hands settled the issue.

In the same way, our Savior's nail-pierced hands have settled the issue for us. Our Lord's sacrifice saved us and made us children of God. As believers, we are not orphans who are homeless and without parents. We have an incredible parent—a loving Father who cares for us and provides for us each moment of every day. And we have a marvelous home waiting for us in eternity. Even now, we experience comfort, peace and a sense of belonging through our Father's Spirit—the Holy Spirit—who has made our heart His home. We are very important to God because we are His dearly loved children.

He is a loving Father who desires an intimate relationship with us; not some distant architect of the universe who remains light-years away pondering His creation. If we truly comprehend how much God loves us, we will never be the same. He has an amazing plan for us both now and for eternity.

The Bible explains, "Because you are sons, God sent the Spirit of His Son into our hearts, the Spirit who calls out, 'Abba Father'" (Galatians 4:6, New International Version). Our heavenly Father gave us the Holy Spirit as a seal of our relationship with Him. Ephesians 1:13,14 explains, "When you believed in Christ, He identified you as His own by giving you the Holy Spirit, whom He promised long ago. The Spirit is God's guarantee that He will give us everything He promised and that He has purchased us to be His own people" (New Living Translation).

We are so special to God that He permanently marked us as belonging to Him. The Holy Spirit has been placed within us as proof of God's calling in our lives. As the Holy Spirit resides within us, He teaches, guides and empowers us. In John 16, Jesus describes the Holy Spirit as our Counselor and the Spirit of truth. Jesus also promised that the Holy Spirit will be with us forever. He will make the things of God known to us, and He will glorify Christ.

As a believer in Jesus Christ, you are a child of the Sovereign Ruler of the universe! Does your life reflect your noble heritage? Many of us do not understand who we are in Christ. Instead, we must see ourselves as our loving Father sees us. Listen to how much He loves us: "Long ago, even before He made the world, God loved us and chose us in Christ to be holy and without fault in His eyes. His unchanging plan has always been to adopt us into His own family by bringing us to Himself through Jesus Christ. And this gave Him great pleasure" (Ephesians 1:4,5; NLT).

After Vonette and I had been married several years, we learned we were unable to have children. We were heartbroken.

But someone told us a young woman was offering her newborn boy for adoption. I will never forget the day I went to the hospital and held Zachary for the first time. I lost part of my heart, we bonded so completely. It did not matter that he was not our biological child. We had chosen and adopted him, and he was ours.

When I dust in my house, occasionally I use a feather duster. It certainly makes the surfaces look better, but in reality it only moves the dust around. If I really want to get things clean, I need to take some Old English polish, remove the dust and make things shine.

I also have an awesome tile floor that doesn't show dirt. But after a while, it gets so bad that when I walk on it, it crunches. So I sweep it up, and am amazed at the pile of dusty things going on in my home.

We, too, can be pretty good at camouflage and not let the dirt in our lives show. Sometimes it takes something going "crunch" to recognize how much dirt is building up, but God is willing to do a clean sweep when we come to Him for mercy.

He says that He remembers that we are dust (Psalm 103:14). In Psalm 136:23, God tells us that He remembers our lowness. How encouraging to know that God understands how truly weak we are!

Signs of our "dustyness" are everywhere; we are weak, inadequate and sinful. Far more often than we would like, we are guilty of things like envy, gossip, grumbling, lust, anger, unkindness, lying, lack of love, lack of faith—the list goes on.

I'm sure God doesn't even bother with a feather duster on us; He wants to really remove the dirt and make us shine. He knows we are dust because He made us from dust. And He is still in the business of taking the dust of our lives and making it into something beautiful for His glory.