The Connection Corner

See It Like God Sees It

Daily Devotional, Lauren Kitchens-Steward

Romans 8:37 – “No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us.”

Kristie’s favorite compliment was, “You’re a big person.” She would smile every time because she knew exactly what they meant.

She was five-foot-nothing, maybe a hundred pounds soaking wet. But big? Oh yes. She had a heart like a freight train, stubborn as the sunrise, and she never once let anyone tell her she couldn’t do something.

At seventeen, she laced up her boots and stepped into a calling. She wanted to protect and serve, no matter the cost. She never imagined the cost of military service could come so high.

A helicopter crash in Afghanistan shattered her world. She was pulled from the wreckage, bleeding and broken. Face. Spine. Shoulder. Leg. It took doctors three years to piece her back together, and even then, they had to take her left leg.

Still, what hurt more than the surgeries or scars was losing the one thing she had built her whole identity around: her mission to protect others.

But if you think that’s where the story ends, you don’t know Kirstie. It dawned on her that she gets to choose how something slows her down. She can look at this latest journey as a problem or as possibility.

With a prosthetic leg and a fire in her soul, she learned to walk again. Then she learned to climb, to snowboard, and to take on challenges most people wouldn’t even dream about. She did it to raise money for nonprofits that help veterans, children with disabilities, and trauma survivors. She did it because, deep down, she still believed people were worth protecting.

Since then, she has scaled six of the seven continental summits, and somewhere along the way, she stopped seeing herself as broken.

…And that changed everything.

Dear One, you are a big person too! It’s not your size that determines your strength. It’s your sight. How you see your wounds, your detours, and your delays, that makes all the difference. God is not asking you to pretend it didn’t hurt. He is inviting you to see from higher up, and to catch a glimpse of what He sees.

So go ahead. Take that next step. Climb hard if you must because what looks like a dead end from here will look entirely different from the mountaintop.

June 25, 2025/by Lauren Kitchens-Steward

Thriving Through Life’s Trials

Daily Devotional, Heart of the Artist, Stories About Songs

Psalms 42:11 — “Why are you cast down, O my soul, and why are you in turmoil within me? Hope in God; for I shall again praise Him, my salvation and my God.”

The night I discovered I had cancer, I sat down at the piano. That’s how songwriters bleed. We bleed songs. I started writing out my feelings, and a song called “O My Soul” began to emerge.

It captured my inner turmoil—a battle with myself—reminiscent of some of King David’s verses in the book of Psalms.

I felt like I was walking through fog. Everything was loud, disorienting, and out of control. But somewhere beneath all that fear and shock, something inside me held firm. And I don’t say that to sound spiritual or strong. I didn’t feel either of those things.

But what I did feel, buried beneath the panic, was something steady. Something rooted. It was Jesus. He was the same God I had spent years getting to know in the quiet.

Long before the diagnosis, I had sensed God calling me—and our band—to something deeper. Not just to sing about faith, but to live like it was anchored in something that couldn’t be shaken.

That became the heartbeat of our ministry: Thrive.

That’s also the origin of a special line in the song I wrote that night: “There’s a place where fear has to face the God you know.”

I can’t explain it, but those words reminded me that the storm didn’t get to define my story. Fear would have to bow to something greater.

I didn’t thrive that night because I was brave or strong or ready. I thrived because what I knew about God was already rooted deep in my bones.

And now, I want to ask you what I had to ask myself: What are you building your life on?

Friend, if life feels calm right now, this is the best time to get to know Him. Because the storms are coming for all of us. If you’re planted in Him, really planted, you won’t be moved.

Not because you’re strong.

But because He is.

— Mark Hall

Oh My Soul

Oh my soul, oh how you worry
Oh how you’re weary from fearing you lost control
This was the one thing you didn’t see coming
And no one would blame you though
If you cried in private
If you tried to hide it away
So no one knows
No one will see if you stop believing

Oh my soul
You are not alone
There’s a place where fear
Has to face the God you know
One more day
He will make a way
Let Him show you how
You can lay this down

‘Cause you’re not alone

Here and now, you can be honest
I won’t try to promise
That someday it all works out
‘Cause this is the valley
And even now He is breathing on
Your dry bones
And there will be dancing
There will be beauty where beauty was
Ash and stone
This much I know

Oh my soul
You are not alone
There’s a place where fear
Has to face the God you know
One more day
He will make a way
Let Him show you how
You can lay this down

I’m not strong enough
I can’t take anymore
(You can lay it down
You can lay it down)
And my shipwrecked faith
Will never get me to shore
(You can lay it down
You can lay it down)
Can He find me here?
Can He keep me from going under?

Oh my soul
You are not alone
There’s a place where fear
Has to face the God you know
One more day
He will make a way
Let Him show you how
You can lay this down

‘Cause you’re not alone

Oh my soul, you’re not alone

Written by: Mark Hall, Bernie Herms

June 24, 2025/by David Hall

God on Bus 27

Daily Devotional, Linda Meyers

Isaiah 52:7 – “How beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of him who brings good news, who publishes peace, who brings good news of happiness, who publishes salvation.”

Glenda has seen it all.

As a bus monitor, she’s witnessed the kinds of things nobody wants to see. Kids getting dropped off at houses she wouldn’t have sent a stray dog to. Some have stepped on in yesterday’s clothes, carrying no lunchbox and even less hope.

Sometimes she wonders—before they ever climbed onto this bus, had anyone told them they were loved? That they mattered? That they weren’t alone?

So she does what she can. She smiles big. She calls them “honey” and “sugar,” and plays 88.7 The Cross every single morning like it’s a love song on repeat.

Because she sees them. Every single one.

And to her, this has never been just a job.

Bus 27 is her mission field. Her chance to show those kids what steady looks like. She has memorized their names. She knows who likes the window seat, who hums when they were nervous, and who needs a little extra kindness before the sun fully rises.

This morning, “My Jesus” by Anne Wilson rolled through the speakers, and a boy two seats back gives her a grin.

“Miss Glenda, can you turn it up?”

Oh, she turned it up, all right.

When she glances back, even the grumpiest kid is bobbing his head along to the beat. One child’s shoulders drop like a weight is finally lifted. The shy girl—the one who never speaks—is mouthing every single word. And the rest? They are smiling. Like really smiling.

In that moment, that worn-down bus just feels like church.

And though Glenda has seen a lot over the years, She knows she will never forget this morning. Because that moment—that transformation—that’s what she wants for them. Not perfection. Just a glimpse of Jesus.

And if playing one song can make a child feel seen and known, she will keep doing it every day until the wheels fall off.

Because as far as Glenda is concerned, telling people about Jesus?

That’s the best thing she’ll ever do.

Will you sponsor one day of hope—just like Glenda lives it out every morning?

When you give to 88.7 The Cross, you’re putting songs of truth and love into the lives of kids like the ones on Bus 27. You’re reminding them they matter. That they’re seen. That Jesus is for them—even if no one else has ever said it.

Your gift makes moments like these possible. Choose a day that matters to you, or give what you can. Because every single morning, someone is listening… and what they hear could change everything.

GIVE HERE!

June 23, 2025/by Linda Meyers