Consider Your Ways | Firm Foundation Inspiration Minute #238 for September 30, 2026

Tuesday, September 29, 2026 Bryan Hudson 0 Comments


“Consider Your Ways” 


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Haggai 1:1 In the second year of King Darius, in the sixth month, on the first day of the month, the word of the Lord came by Haggai the prophet to Zerubbabel the son of Shealtiel, governor of Judah, and to Joshua the son of Jehozadak, the high priest, saying, 2 “Thus speaks the Lord of hosts, saying: ‘This people says, “The time has not come, the time that the Lord’s house should be built.' ” 3 Then the word of the Lord came by Haggai the prophet, saying, 4 “Is it time for you yourselves to dwell in your paneled houses, and this [a]temple to lie in ruins?” 5 Now therefore, thus says the Lord of hosts: “Consider your ways!

Haggai 2:1-9, In the seventh month, on the twenty-first of the month, the word of the Lord came by Haggai the prophet, saying: 2 “Speak now to Zerubbabel the son of Shealtiel, governor of Judah, and to Joshua the son of Jehozadak, the high priest, and to the remnant of the people, saying: 3 ‘Who is left among you who saw this temple in its former glory? And how do you see it now? In comparison with it, is this not in your eyes as nothing? 4 Yet now be strong, Zerubbabel,’ says the Lord; ‘and be strong, Joshua, son of Jehozadak, the high priest; and be strong, all you people of the land,’ says the Lord, ‘and work; for I am with you,’ says the Lord of hosts. 5 ‘According to the word that I covenanted with you when you came out of Egypt, so My Spirit remains among you; do not fear!’ 6 “For thus says the Lord of hosts: ‘Once more (it is a little while) I will shake heaven and earth, the sea and dry land; 7 and I will shake all nations, and they shall come to the Desire of All Nations, and I will fill this [d]temple with glory,’ says the Lord of hosts. 8 ‘The silver is Mine, and the gold is Mine,’ says the Lord of hosts. 9 ‘The glory of this latter temple shall be greater than the former,’ says the Lord of hosts. ‘And in this place I will give peace,’ says the Lord of hosts.”

I Am By Grace | Firm Foundation Inspiration Minute #237 for September 23, 2026

Tuesday, September 22, 2026 Bryan Hudson 0 Comments


“I Am By Grace” 


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1 Corinthians 15:9 For I am the least of the apostles, who am not worthy to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God. 10 But by the grace of God I am what I am, and His grace toward me was not in vain; but I labored more abundantly than they all, yet not I, but the grace of God which was with me.



















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We Always Triumph in Christ | Firm Foundation Inspiration Minute #236 for September 16, 2026

Tuesday, September 15, 2026 Bryan Hudson 0 Comments


“We Always Triumph In Christ” 


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“Now thanks be to God who always leads us in triumph in Christ, and through us diffuses the fragrance of His knowledge in every place. For we are to God the fragrance of Christ among those who are being saved and among those who are perishing.”
2 Corinthians 2:14–15 (NKJV)


Watch or Listen to Message from Sunday, September 13




















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Matters of the Heart: Let Peace Be Your Umpire

Sunday, September 13, 2026 Bryan Hudson 0 Comments



Colossians 3:15, And let the peace of God rule in your hearts, to which also you were called in one body; and be thankful.

Matters of the Heart: Let Peace Be Your Umpire teaches that the condition of the heart shapes the direction of our lives. Rather than allowing hurt, fear, disappointment, or other emotions to make the final call, believers are called to let the peace of God rule, like an umpire, guiding our thoughts, decisions, and responses through the Holy Spirit and the Word of God.


Closing Confession of Faith

I will allow the peace of God to rule my heart. Peace will be my umpire. Peace will decide what I will do or not do

When I am facing a challenge, I won't try to reason my way around it without the help of the Holy Spirit and Scripture. As a matter of the heart, I will go to the heart level to address things that I don't fully understand.

God is Spirit, so I must worship and live through him in spirit and in truth. 

According to 1 Thessalonians 5:23, I will allow the God of peace to sanctify me completely so that my whole spirit, soul, and body will be preserved blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.

I will live, according to the order of spirit, soul, body. Not the reverse order of body, soul, spirit.

Peace will govern my heart and mind, not mindsets and emotions such as hurt, trauma, disappointment, things that have not worked as I expected, envy, unforgiveness, bitterness, resentment, and entitlement.

Jesus Gives the Peace That Umpires my life

I agree with what He said in John 14:27 "Peace I leave with you, My peace I give to you; not as the world gives do I give to you" 




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The Grace of Remembering God's Instructions | Firm Foundation Inspiration Minute #235 for September 9, 2026

Wednesday, September 09, 2026 Bryan Hudson 0 Comments


“The Grace of Remembering God's Instructions” 
 

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Psalm 119:93, I will never forget Your precepts, For by them You have given me life.

Watch or Listen to Message from Sunday, September 6














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Pilgrim or Traveler? How to Go From Strength to Strength

Monday, September 07, 2026 Bryan Hudson 0 Comments




Tribute to Elder Horace Hudson at the end of the message

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Psalms 84:5-7, Blessed is the man whose strength is in You, whose heart is set on pilgrimage. As they pass through the Valley of Baca, they make it a spring; The rain also covers it with pools. They go from strength to strength, each one appears before God in Zion.

This Scripture text presents the believer’s life as a pilgrimage of purpose, not merely a journey of personal experience. Our strength comes from God, and even when we pass through difficult “Valleys of Baca,” He enables us to turn those hard places into sources of strength for ourselves and others. To go “from strength to strength” means more than receiving greater strength personally—it means using what God has given us to strengthen those who come behind us. A traveler seeks experiences; a pilgrim seeks purpose, service, and legacy. Ultimately, the Christian pilgrimage is about following God’s will, blessing others, and leaving something within people, with Jesus Christ as our supreme example.


CONFESSION OF FAITH

I am a Pilgrim, not only a traveler. My heart is set on pilgrimage, moving with purpose to places of purpose, service, communion, and fulfillment of the will of God.  I do not travel alone, but within covenant community.

I am not a traveler who seeks satisfaction in the moment. I am a pilgrim whose heart seeks purpose for a lifetime.  Pilgrimage is a long journey of purpose. It is not only a destination, but a journey.

When moving through a valley of Baca, God helps me transform the difficulty into a resource for others.

By the grace of God, I go from strength to strength, not only gaining more strength for myself, but creating springs and pools as resources that add strength to others.

As a pilgrim, I move with purpose to leave a legacy. Legacy is more than inheritance. An inheritance is what we leave to people. A legacy is what we leave within people.

My example is the pilgrimage of the Lord Jesus Christ, Who makes every good thing possible.




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Liberty vs. Responsibility | Firm Foundation Inspiration Minute #234 for September 2, 2026

Wednesday, September 02, 2026 Bryan Hudson 0 Comments


“Liberty vs. Responsibility”   

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All things are lawful for me, but not all things are helpful; all things are lawful for me, but not all things edify. Let no one seek his own, but each one the other’s well-being. (1 Corinthians 10:23-24)










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The Lord is Your Refuge (Safe Place)

Friday, August 28, 2026 Bryan Hudson 0 Comments



Encouragement for you from my devotional reading for August 28..

Psalm 142:4-5, Look and see, there is no one at my right hand; no one is concerned for me. I have no refuge; no one cares for my life. I cry to you, Lord; I say, “You are my refuge, my portion in the land of the living.”

David expressed a feeling that we sometimes have. He was emotionally distressed and experiencing profound isolation.

Do not succumb to despair or self-pity. Understand that the care and concern you need may not come from the places you expected. The Lord is your refuge (safe place) and He will bring forth the people who truly care for your soul.

Zechariah and Mary: How to Handle God’s Promise | Firm Foundation Inspiration Minute #233 for August 26, 2026

Wednesday, August 26, 2026 Bryan Hudson 0 Comments


“Zechariah and Mary: 
How to Handle God’s Promise”  

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“For with God nothing will be impossible.” ~ Luke 1:37

“Behold the maidservant of the Lord! Let it be to me according to your word.” ~ Luke 1:38




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Ordered Steps & Victorious Stumbles | Firm Foundation Inspiration Minute #232 for August 19, 2026

Wednesday, August 19, 2026 Bryan Hudson 0 Comments


“Ordered Steps & Victorious Stumbles”  

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Psalm 37:23-24, The steps of a goodman are ordered by the Lord, And He delights in his way. 24 Though he fall, he shall not be utterly cast down; For the Lord upholds him with His hand.


Psalm 37:23–24 teaches that God establishes and strengthens the steps of those who walk with Him, but ordered steps do not mean a trouble-free journey. We may encounter hardship, make mistakes, or stumble along the way, yet those moments do not mean God has abandoned us or that His purpose has failed.
The same God who orders our steps also upholds us when we fall. His faithfulness is not demonstrated by preventing every stumble, but by sustaining us, helping us rise again, and even using difficult circumstances for our growth. With God, the stumble does not have the final word.
We are victorious when we walk, and we can even be victorious when we stumble, because God’s hand remains with us throughout the journey.




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Thankful and Tired: A Caregiver’s Reflection

Sunday, August 16, 2026 Bryan Hudson 0 Comments



I do not regularly journal. My usual practice is to make notes in an app called Evernote. Most of these are reflections that I keep to myself. I sometimes capture interactions with ChatGPT, since it has stored many of my questions and reactions on particular subjects. Much of this is part of my process of gathering information, fact-checking, and seeking insight on subjects with which I am unfamiliar.

Lately, I have been inquiring a great deal about issues related to my father's health challenges. I have been checking the effects of medications while also consulting with my father's primary care physician and neurologist. One thing we must guard against is what might be called self-medicating, self-diagnosing, or, worse, playing doctor with somebody else's life.

What I have not considered enough is the toll all of this has taken on me. There is the understanding that this experience is not uncommon for caregivers, but while that knowledge is not comforting, it does prevent any expression of “woe is me.”

Since January 2024, when my father got lost while driving his car (the fourth time) and later experienced a severe urinary tract infection that required four weeks of hospitalization and rehabilitation, I have been intimately involved with his care. In 2024, it did not require a great deal of my time on a daily basis, only the need to pay close attention, because he was still able to manage many things for himself at home with help from caregivers a few hours each week.

Fast-forward to July 13, 2026, when my father had hip replacement surgery. The surgery itself was successful, and my father no longer has the debilitating pain from bone-on-bone osteoarthritis. However, an unexpected outcome of the surgery, the hospital stay, which included delirium, being placed in restraints, and other post-operative challenges, was that he became more delirious than clear-minded. He is not eating normally and needs to be fed. He has also become incontinent.

On Monday of last week, my father had two days of calmness and clarity. We viewed this as him finally "turning the corner." He even asked when he needed to go to the restroom, something he did more frequently after returning home from the hospital. Unfortunately, we've not seen continued progress from those two days.

As difficult as it is to have to change and clean up after bowel movements from a grown man—something I have learned to do almost as quickly as his caregivers, it would be manageable if it were not for the delirium, which sometimes makes helping him more difficult. For a soon-to-be 90-year-old man, he is still very strong, especially his grip.

As difficult as all of this is, the hardest thing is watching the decline of my father, someone whom I have always regarded as Superman, and someone who has been independent ever since my mother died 23 years ago.

I am an only child, and accustomed to doing things alone and living somewhat in isolation with respect to handling his affairs. Lately, however, I have been overwhelmed by that isolation, in particular times of struggling to help my father when he is not cooperative. The bright spots have been my wife and my father's caregivers. My youngest son is also able to help for a couple of hours one day a week, as he is raising his own family and is a schoolteacher with leadership responsibilities at his high school.

People from my church family are willing to help, but my dad has reached the point where he needs more than someone sitting with him, offering conversation and companionship. He has arrived at a place where sustained conversation is no longer possible. There are mostly exchanges in which he is sometimes coherent and conversational.

The most difficult emotion I have is guilt for allowing him to have the surgery.

Before the surgery, even with the extraordinary pain, he was able to do some things for himself. He needed 3,000mg of Tylenol every day to help manage the pain, and sometimes even that did not help. He could not take anything stronger because stronger medications interfered with his dementia.

Of course, there is no way I could have anticipated this outcome from the surgery, and no one specifically advised me that complications could occur to this extent. Nevertheless, looking at my father every day, sometimes visiting his house three or four times a day, reminds me that what he is experiencing was an unintended consequence of the surgery. I know I will have to live with feelings of guilt, even though I made the decision based on what we knew at the time and with the hope of relieving his severe pain and improving his quality of life.

Of course, we continue to hope for his return to something called “baseline.” This is the condition a person was in before a major event such as surgery and a hospital stay. My research indicates that older adults sometimes do return to that baseline, but it can take anywhere from a few weeks to months. The other data point is that some people never return to baseline.

As of this writing, we are five weeks post-surgery, and he does not seem to have made significant progress overall. Then there are the moments when I go into his room in the middle of the night and find him moaning, speaking incoherently, sometimes singing, pulling on his sheets, and throwing pillows off the bed. Sometimes all of this happens after he has urinated or had a bowel movement, which requires cleaning him in the middle of the storm of delirium. 

To offset the cost of private-pay care because of inadequate and reduced Indiana Medicaid attendant-care hours, I take some day, evening, and overnight shifts caring for my father. (This video highlights the Medicaid issues)  During some of those caregiving times, my father's behavior makes him almost unrecognizable from the person I have always known him to be. 

My heart is broken. I am tired, often feel unable to help, and that feeling is compounded by a lack of emotional relief. So I pray that he improves and is able to experience the better quality of life we anticipated following his hip replacement surgery. We continue to trust in the Lord's help, rely on the expertise of the home care team and health professionals, and make the best possible decisions.

But I recognize that caregiving is not only about what is happening to the person receiving the care. Something is happening to the caregiver as well. I take day trips to refresh myself and do some enjoyable things. I take bicycle rides and do astrophotography as the weather permits. Taking multi-day trips has not been possible for many months, but again, these are not uncommon challenges for caregivers such as myself.

I remain thankful and hopeful.

Hard Things Are Hard | Firm Foundation Inspiration Minute #231 for August 12, 2026

Tuesday, August 11, 2026 Bryan Hudson 0 Comments


“Hard Things Are Hard”  

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2 Timothy 2:3 You therefore must endure hardship as a good soldier of Jesus Christ. 4 No one engaged in warfare entangles himself with the affairs of this life, that he may please him who enlisted him as a soldier

From President Obama's replica of his desk and the oval office at the Obama Center







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A Better Way to Live | Firm Foundation Inspiration Minute #230 for August 5, 2026

Tuesday, August 04, 2026 Bryan Hudson 0 Comments


“A Better Way to Live”  

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2 Corinthians 5:15, And He died for all, that those who live should live no longer for themselves, but for Him who died for them and rose again.”

AN AFFIRMATION OF FAITH

I am living the Legacy of Love provided by almighty God and His Son, Jesus Christ 

What I have received from God is not only with me, what I have received from God is within me.

I am moving away from lesser motivations to greater motivations.

The greatest motivator is the God kind of love.

The Love of Christ compels me, controls me, and motivates me.

When Jesus died, the old me died. When Jesus died, my lesser motivations died.

Jesus died so that I no longer have to live for myself, but for him who died for me and rose from the dead for me to experience new life.

God's legacy of love for me is my GPS. My direction, and re-direction comes from the Lord. God's love motivates me to live beyond what I want, what benefits me, how others see me, what makes me comfortable, or trying to control everything

"I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me."




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Legacy of Love: The Greatest Motivation

Sunday, August 02, 2026 Bryan Hudson 0 Comments



Summary of the Message

2 Corinthians 5:14, For the love of Christ compels us, because we judge thus: that if One died for all, then all died; 15 and He died for all, that those who live should live no longer for themselves, but for Him who died for them and rose again. 

“Legacy of Love” teaches that God’s love, revealed through Jesus Christ, is not merely something believers receive but a transforming power placed within them. The love of Christ compels, controls, and redirects their lives like a spiritual GPS, moving them away from selfish and lesser motivations toward lives of faith, sacrifice, service, and purpose. True legacy is more than what we leave to people; it is what we leave within them through our character, influence, values, and example. Because Christ died and rose again, believers are called to live no longer for themselves but for Him, passing God’s legacy of love into the lives of others.



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Labors of Love | Firm Foundation Inspiration Minute #229 for July 29, 2026

Wednesday, July 29, 2026 Bryan Hudson 0 Comments


“Labors of Love”  

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1 John 3:18–19,“My little children, let us not love in word or in tongue, but in deed and in truth. And by this we know that we are of the truth, and shall assure our hearts before Him.”

The Apostle John teaches us that genuine love is more than a feeling and more than words. 

The God kind of love is always active. It is always a labor of love.

A labor of love is not motivated by convenience, recognition, or personal reward. It is always rooted in concern for another person. Sometimes a labor of love is joyful and uplifting. At other times, a labor of love requires actual labor—and sometimes it is extraordinarily difficult.
I am experiencing this in a very personal way through the journey of helping my 89-year-old father, who has dementia.

As his only child, I carry the responsibility of helping manage his life and making decisions for his care. Recently, he underwent hip replacement surgery. Although the surgery was successful, his hospital stay was complicated by severe delirium. Since returning home, I have spent many hours helping him recover physically and cognitively, organizing caregivers, managing medications, responding to confusion, and staying with him overnight for the past several nights.

There are moments when he does not fully understand what is happening. There are many moments when he is restless, frustrated, and uncooperative.
This journey is physically tiring, emotionally challenging, and financially demanding. But it is also a labor of love. Anyone who has been a caregiver understands the journey. Those who will become caregivers should practice loving in deed so that, when the season to labor in love comes, they will be able to do it.

Love in truth means recognizing that real love is not always comfortable. As a feeling, love can become a fantasy, but love in truth, expressed through deeds, will bring you back to reality. Or, as someone said, “There are things that jerk the slack out of love.” Much of our love is very slack, but labors of love bring us closer to Jesus and give us a greater appreciation of what love looks like.

This text reveals a significant benefit of loving in deed, or what we are calling the labor of love.

John wrote, “We know that we are of the truth, and shall assure our hearts before Him.”
Our labors of love become evidence that the life and truth of Christ are working within us. There are many things that we are unable to do in our own strength. We reach our limit, we hit the wall, and we feel like we have nothing left.

However, your labor of love is actually empowering. When operating in the love and grace of God, you always receive more than you are giving.

Second Corinthians 9:10 reads, “Now may He who supplies seed to the sower, and bread for food, supply and multiply the seed you have sown and increase the fruits of your righteousness.”

God gives seed to the sower. He gives strength to those who labor in love.

Labors of love bring greater assurance of our relationship with God because we are identifying with Jesus Christ, who is the Lord of all the laborers in love.

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