A Renewed Spirit — Even in the most challenging times, listening can be the key to finding your way.

By Caralee Adams

Describing herself as “just a plain ordinary lady” with a high school education, Thrivent Financial member Marj Rossing of Ellendale, Minnesota, says that during difficult times in her life God always has been there to renew her spirit.

She admits there were times when the answers she needed weren’t immediately clear. But God always found a way to show His presence when she needed it most.

Rossing had a particularly difficult time as a young wife in the early 1950s. She was living far away from her mother, with whom she was very close. And she felt abandoned by her husband, who was working long hours. Rossing had three miscarriages and one child stillborn. After her first son was born, Rossing says she suffered depression. “I was in such a mess,” she recalls. “It was in that place that God stepped in and reached me.”

She was at a church meeting when a woman asked if anyone was interested in starting a Bible study. “I was sure someone put their mouth up to my ear and said, ‘That’s what you need.’ But when I looked, nobody was there,” recalls Rossing.

Although she was a lifelong Lutheran and had attended Sunday school, at the Bible study Rossing realized for the first time she didn’t have to be perfect in God’s eyes. “It was amazing to me to find out I was the object of God’s love,” she says.

The experience changed her. Looking at God’s Word in a group Bible study made it come alive. “You would see treasures buried like diamonds in the Word,” says Rossing.

In time, she was asked to teach a Bible study. Although she felt unqualified at first, she plunged in and continues to teach today. “When you are going to present a truth and it has touched your life, you strengthen your life by teaching it. Teaching is like a renewal all the time,” she says. “God has given me the gift of teaching.”

Just two years ago, Rossing felt called to write a devotional book.

“I was vacuuming my living room, and I was talking to God about wanting a daily devotion book that would challenge me. It was as if God stood right beside me and said, ‘Why don’t you just write one?’” recalls Rossing, a widow who had three grown sons (her youngest died in 2003) and one grandson.

The book, “A Daily Devotional that is More Than Milk Toast,” self-published in 2006, encourages readers to grow in their faith through Scripture, stories and prayer. “When I’ve had a great need in my life, the Lord reached down and touched me. His Word had an answer to every question,” says Rossing.

And what about the book’s name? As a young girl, Rossing’s mother would make milk toast, smothered with butter and sugar, for comfort food. “More than milk toast” became a cliché in her home that meant a step above. So, when Rossing was describing to a friend the new book of devotions that she was writing, the familiar phrase just popped out and stuck.

“I wanted something that would feed me day by day,” she recalls, “so I’d get the feeling I was taking a step every day in the right direction.” Prayer, study and writing have sustained Rossing’s faith. “Whatever happens in our life, God can make it good,” she says. “Don’t forget to identify your need and give it to God in prayer—He is more anxious to answer your prayer than we are to ask for it.”

Caralee Adams, a freelance writer in Bethesda, Maryland, specializes in personal finance, education and parenting issues.

First Steps
Log on to www.lutheransonline.com and access links to uplifting daily devotions from your Lutheran church body. You also can find an online community of Thrivent Financial for Lutherans members to chat with about matters of faith.