Keep the Heart

BONUS BIBLE SERIES: Build Your Bible Habit!  Do you struggle to get into Scripture daily? You're not alone, but this problem can be fixed and we'd like to help. For years, people have used the Proverb-a-Day system to build a daily Bible reading habit, and it has been very successful in helping people to develop a daily habit of reading and Bible study. If you've been repeating the same mistakes an...

Welcome to a REPLAY REFRESHER from Keep the Heart! "Don't Be Fooled" first aired in January of 2023, and thousands of downloads later, people are still clicking this episode. These are confusing times, and we need more wisdom and discretion to be alert to the hazards of falling from the truth of God's Word.  Have you ever listened to someone who was trying to sound like they knew what they were ta...

BUILD YOUR BIBLE HABIT with daily Proverbs Are you still trying to develop a habit of daily Bible reading? Here's an easy way to begin: one daily Proverb. In less than five minutes per day, you'll be on your way to building a Bible habit that will lead you from reading to studying and more! Here's another practical tip: quit putting it off. Enough with the delays and excuses. Grab your ear buds an...

Wouldn’t it be great if we could have advance instructions from God for the day? I mean, what if God could warn us in writing, guiding us to the right way to handle stressful situations that often catch us off guard? Wouldn’t that be grand? God already does this. He gives us instructions in advance, but we don’t always read or heed them. Instead, we try to live the Christian life on our own terms,...

BUILD YOUR BIBLE HABIT with daily Proverbs The beginning of the year is a great time to build a habit of daily Bible reading. Listen while you read along, or take a walk and "ponder the path of your feet" as the Scripture feeds your soul. "Ponder the path of thy feet, and let all thy ways be established." (Proverbs 4:26) Join Francie a chapter at a time in this Audio Proverbs Library: Audio Prover...

Build Your Bible Habit is the popular audio Proverbs series, available in a complete library here: Build Your Bible Habit Audio Proverbs Library By reading along or listening to a daily chapter of Proverbs, you will develop the habit of being in the Word daily. Soon, Proverbs won't be enough. You'll want more. The Bible is bottomless! BOOKS IN THE SHOP AT KEEP THE HEART Ponder the Path: A 31-Day D...

Christmas Replay This episode, "Minimizing Strife at Family Gatherings" is one of the most-replayed episodes in our podcast library. There's something about "the most wonderful time of the year" that tends to bring out the some of the least wonderful qualities in people. How can we have gatherings with loved ones who have strongly held opinions that differ from ours without things turning into a w...

BONUS BIBLE SERIES REPLAYS: Welcome to Proverbs chapter 14 on Build Your Bible Habit. This chapter covers the wise, the foolish, the scorner, the backslider, the angry person and more! Once again, God has given us instructions on the right and wrong ways to live. It’s like being served a meal where there are things that we really like mixed with things that we’d rather not eat, even though they’re...

How many of you love it when things go according to plan? Most of us do, but real life inserts some strange changes when we least expect it. In fact, that’s part of our problem: we expect things to go normally all the time. Things may go way off script: The wedding wasn’t supposed to be called off, but suddenly it was. The doctor appointment was supposed to be just a routine check-up, not a fright...

Welcome to Teachback Tuesday, where we replay the most popular episodes from previous seasons. This episode, The Empty Chair and Other Firsts of Grief is approaching the 10,000 download mark, which tells us something we already knew: grief is an ongoing rotation in life. Some of us are in the roles of comforters, while others need comforting. When it's our turn to grieve, we experience how deeply...

Are you in a disagreement with someone you love because you stand on opposite sides of an issue where God's Word is clear? This is becoming increasingly common. It is challenging to live biblically in an antagonistic society that questions God's existence, let alone His authority. Proverbs 29:27 reminds us that "An unjust man is an abomination to the just: and he that is upright in the way is abom...

Do you feel pressured to convey a certain image because of what others expect of you? Are you afraid to disappoint others, so you hide your honest opinions and thoughts so that you can be accepted? Are you angry because you feel pushed around by others, but you haven’t been honest with others or even with God about it? You’re not alone. You’re in a huge club called “The People Pleasers.” What is a...

We're moving the podcast from Tuesdays to Thursdays. The episodes will upload overnight on Wednesdays and will be ready for you immediately if you are a subscriber. (We are based in the central time zone in the USA, so if you're oversees, this podcast will land two days later than previously.) Thanks for listening, and remember:  "Keep thy heart with all diligence; for out of it are the issues of...

Welcome to Teachback Tuesday, where we play the most popular episodes from previous seasons. This episode, “Be the First to Apologize” addresses a common but sometimes complicated matter. Leaving situations in an awkward holding pattern where you can tell there’s “funny air” between you and someone else is not a strategy for reconciliation. When we’ve hurt someone, even if it was unintentional and...

My daughter-in-love and I were rolling my luggage through the garage to load into her car. She was driving me to the airport for my flight. As we were leaving the garage, I saw that the “CatchMaster” sticky board was upside down, and there was a tail snapping back and forth out from underneath the sticky board. Oh oh. Time for some courage steps. I made an executive decision to leave it there unti...

Welcome to Teachback Tuesday, where we replay the most popular episodes from previous seasons. This week, we’re revisiting an episode that touched on a common yet complex topic: “Facing the Gray Area Decisions.” Whether you’re a new listener or you’ve been with us since the first episode, we hope that these suggestions will provide some insights for those who are facing decisions on matters not di...

Have you ever almost side-swiped a car because they were in your blind spot? According to the National Safety Council, "On average a car has two main blind spots. These are generally on the back left and the back right side of the car. These are the areas where the driver cannot see clearly by using their mirrors.” When new cars added the Blind Spot Warning system to vehicles, it really helped dri...

Welcome to Teachback Tuesday, where we play the most popular episodes from previous seasons. Have you ever wondered, “Why didn’t God answer my prayer? It’s not uncommon to think like this, but underneath this question is another question: Did God fail to answer your prayer, or did He answer it differently than you requested it? We may be praying more than ever, but are we praying with a right spir...

Welcome to Teachback Tuesday, where we play the most popular episodes from previous seasons. What does it take for you to jump to the irritated default mode? Getting stuck in traffic when you’re already running late? New policies at work? A last-minute change in plans that you don’t like? Even those who are usually very tranquil have things that can push them beyond their emotionally calm boundari...

(Rebroadcast from January 2022)   Are you able to listen to someone sharing a problem without trying to fix it? In other words, can you just listen, or are you formulating a solution as you listen, waiting to blurt it out as soon as the other person stops talking? Listening to someone tell you that they’re about to make an unwise decision is really hard. We may want to try to talk the person out o...

Rebroadcast from August 2021 (2023 Summer Season Rerun) You’ve done or said something wrong and now your friend or family member is upset with you. It was an accident, but the outcome was the same as if you’d had done it on purpose. You felt really bad about it at first, until you started analyzing the situation. Was it really all your fault, or was this person just being thin-skinned? Come to thi...

Rebroadcast from November 2021 (2023 Summer Season Rerun) Do you have friends who help you in ways that make life lighter and brighter? Today's guest host is that kind of friend in my life. Veteran radio host, Janice Wolfe from Faith Music Radio is covering for me while I'm out battling illness. Janice's inspiring show, eleven2one , airs on Faith Music Radio from 11am-1pm, Monday through Friday. Y...

Rebroadcast from June 2021 (2023 Summer Season Rerun) Have you ever prayed and asked the Lord to reveal any sin in your life, only to have Him point out something that you really didn’t think was wrong? We don't see things as clearly as God sees them. Our vision is imperfect. There's a good chance that someone listening to this episode has a secret life and you’d probably prefer that it would neve...

You’ve probably known of people who used to be friends, but something went wrong and instead of repairing the problem, they turned against each other. Both friends felt like the other person caused the issue, so they were both waiting for the other to apologize. It was a very long wait. They went to the same church, had an overlapping friend group, and things were awkward for anyone who knew them....

Have you ever faced a sudden event in your life that made you wonder, "What just happened here?" Heartbreaking events create a pressure in life that is like an explosion.  First, there is shock as a person processes information that knocks them off their feet, and then the pain begins. As pain transitions into a cold numbness, it leaves behind side-effects that take time to resolve. Explosions in...