tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3289982053810023732024-02-07T05:24:10.109-06:00...into this graceThrough Him we have also obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in hope of the glory of God. Romans 5:2Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07031208937165388116noreply@blogger.comBlogger29125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-328998205381002373.post-32003964402252785312017-10-09T15:39:00.003-05:002018-03-07T17:41:05.147-06:00It's Like a Honeymoon but with 60,000 Brand New Love-of-my-Lifes<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
Love of my Lifes? Is 'lifes' a word? Or should it be lives? That doesn't seem right. I only have one life, but a whole village of new loves.<br />
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<i>Loves of my Life.</i> That's it.<br />
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I have watched a bajillion videos of people in Togo. Right now I think they are the most beautiful people in the world and I want to know all about them. What they eat, where they live, what music they like, what makes them laugh, what they call their grandmas. Everything. What are they afraid of? What breaks their hearts? What are their hopes and dreams? Yes, I have romanticized this trip a little bit and I am not ashamed.<br />
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This is the part where all you seasoned missionary types roll your eyes at me and say, "Awww, that's so cute. But how will you feel when you find out these 60,000 new loves-of-your-life snore all night and squeeze the toothpaste in the middle?"<br />
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Loving people is hard. I get it.<br />
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But I don't care. Honeymoons are important. They're where we build bonds and shared memories that see us through ugly arguments about money and in-laws. While God may love us perfectly despite our wholly unloveable selves, we are not so good at loving each other that way. Romance is a gift that helps us love each other better.<br />
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So I'm going to pray and study and prepare for this trip as best I can, but I'm also going to gaze at your picture and wonder what you're thinking. I can't wait to come to your wild and beautiful country and meet you.<br />
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I hope that my crazy romanticized honeymoon love makes you see yourself the way Christ sees you... as His Bride.<br />
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Oh, and just so we're all upfront about everything, I squeeze from the middle.<br />
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<i>For as a young man marries a young woman, </i></div>
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<i>so shall your sons marry you, </i></div>
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<i>and as the bridegroom rejoices over the bride, </i></div>
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<i>so shall your God rejoice over you.</i> </div>
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<i><span style="font-size: x-small;">Isaiah 62:5</span></i></div>
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<i>If you have stumbled onto my blog and are wondering, "What the heck is this chick talking about?" start <a href="https://beverlybowdensmith.blogspot.com/2017/10/folks-im-going-to-africa.html">here</a> and work your way forward. There is logic in this madness, I promise.</i><br />
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07031208937165388116noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-328998205381002373.post-79472901675869097182017-10-03T21:13:00.000-05:002018-03-07T17:44:36.107-06:00Power and Love in the Face of Fear<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
Yesterday was a terrible day. A man opened fire on an outdoor concert in Las Vegas and killed 58 people.<br />
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I've had just those first 5 words on this page since 8 am this morning. I have so much to say and yet I don't know what to say. It feels like we said it all the last time. Because sadly, there was a last time. And a time before that. And also before that.<br />
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It's so easy to ask, "What is this world coming to?" Truth is the world is what it has always been. Very, very broken.<br />
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This is what evil does, my friends. The enemy is for real and he is the prince of this world. He came to steal, kill and destroy, and he does exactly that <i>every single day.</i><br />
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The urgency and the burden I feel for the Gospel right now is palpable. People are walking through this broken world with no <i>hope. </i>What a pity it would be if the people who know that hope are too consumed to share it.<br />
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My sister-in-law gave me this cross for my birthday last week. I was really touched by this gift because no matter what I've said before, I may have a little fear about this upcoming trip. And she said that's exactly why she picked it.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiXZD7UBng7HgjvHlbV_AdLfbvqi1rjp_hyphenhyphen_AwW1m-xn2bQzbeDsT7tTbn3atE7A08_ogkOVzbgnbqfxj9R-kyCnkbzdnPM3sxKHERs6UTNH9FT-C9BIPuxHTXaj-QteaxrqZR1Y9LOAG4/s1600/IMG_1111.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1345" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiXZD7UBng7HgjvHlbV_AdLfbvqi1rjp_hyphenhyphen_AwW1m-xn2bQzbeDsT7tTbn3atE7A08_ogkOVzbgnbqfxj9R-kyCnkbzdnPM3sxKHERs6UTNH9FT-C9BIPuxHTXaj-QteaxrqZR1Y9LOAG4/s320/IMG_1111.JPG" width="269" /></a></div>
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I've spoken these words many, many times- over other people and over myself. I always stopped short though. "The Lord did not give us a spirit of fear," and that's it. Now I see the really good stuff comes after that.</div>
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God has not given us a spirit of fear - no! He has given us a spirit, <i>His Spirit</i>, of power and love and self control! Think of yourself walking in this Spirit, powerful and strong, full of holy and righteous love for your neighbor, all filtered though the wisdom and sound judgement of being perfectly aligned with will of your Heavenly Father.</div>
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Be discerning. A spirit of fear is not from God and it's no surprise that fear is the root of much sin: apathy, selfishness, hard-heartedness. Anger. Disunity. Grasping and striving to get what's 'ours'. Who would desire to sow those seeds in the midst of yesterday's death and chaos?</div>
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I wonder....</div>
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There is another prince though, a good prince. The Prince of Peace. </div>
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Jesus. </div>
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And He has already defeated the prince of this world. Let the whole truth of that sink in.</div>
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Now take your Spirit of power and love and go spread hope in the face of fear.</div>
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<i>act justly. love mercy. walk humbly.</i></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07031208937165388116noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-328998205381002373.post-61475356010873305492015-04-03T12:00:00.000-05:002016-04-24T14:13:35.912-05:00Give a Penny, Take a Penny.<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Have you ever made a sacrifice for someone who really hurt you?</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">That's the question I'm asking myself this Good Friday morning. And I'm having a hard time thinking of one. It's a shame.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">That's a level of forgiveness that I'm afraid I do not know.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">There are people from my past that I've forgiven, and I have genuine compassion for them in my heart. Given the chance, I'd like to act on that compassion, to let those people know that they are loved and forgiven and released, that it's all good because <i>Jesus made it so</i>. I earnestly pray for glorious things for them and for God to gift us with reconciliation. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">But there are a couple of people that I cannot seem to forgive. If I saw them today, I don't know that I could even sacrifice a courteous word out of my mouth in their direction. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Sometimes, I'll find a little shred of compassion for them lying around. I'll pick it up and hold it in my pocket for a while, but my pockets are shallow. My compassion for them eventually slips its way out like a forgotten penny, and lays lost and sticky on a dirty sidewalk.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Give a penny, take a penny, right? Give forgiveness and take it back.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">That's not what God meant for us at all</span><i style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; text-align: center;">.</i></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Jesus had so many opportunities to take our forgiveness back. 33 years worth of opportunities, really, but He never did. Never once. He kept trudging toward that hill, every faithful step forward, stooping to pick up our discarded pennies along the way and redeeming every single one of them.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><br class="Apple-interchange-newline" />Along the way, they met a man from Cyrene, Simon (the father of Rufus </i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>and Alexander), who was coming in from the fields; and they ordered him </i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>to carry the heavy crossbar of the cross. And so they came at last to the execution site, a hill called Golgotha, which means the "Place of a Skull." </i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>-Mark 15:21-22</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">But at the very end, He needed help. Not eternal Jesus, the only son of God- no, He is <i>never</i> weak, but the fully human package that He offered Himself in? Broken and faltering. It was Simon of Cyrene who carried the cross this last part of the journey.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">It feels blasphemous to type those words, but they are true.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Matthew 16:24 tells me to take up my cross and follow Jesus. How do I carry that heavy crossbeam on my shoulders every day when I can't even carry a penny's worth of forgiveness in my pocket? My human self is very, very weak.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">I need a cross-bearer to carry what I cannot. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">I need a savior who knows my human frailty </span><i style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">first hand</i><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"> and still stands up for me. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">And I need to admit that I am wrong. </span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">I need to quit taking back my forgiveness and entrust it to Jesus instead.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">The selfish part of me would just rather lay pinned on the ground under my cross than let Jesus carry it for me. As long as I have <i>my</i> <i>hands</i> on it, then I believe I can exact justice <i>the way I see fit</i>.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">However, if I leave my justice to Jesus, my enemies could have the same fate as me- redemption. Sometimes that's a hard pill to swallow.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">So my original question misses the mark. Have I ever made a sacrifice for someone who really hurt me? Of course not. Because, truthfully, I am not capable. None of us are really. Only Jesus redeems.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">God, though, knows how stubborn we are. In His mercy and grace, He draws the way to Himself over and over. Through creation. Through His word. Through His Holy Spirit. Through the person of His son. And through the story of His people.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">So, this is the God-picture that Simon of Cyrene paints for me, that God will lead me to a time when I can't make it on my own anymore. Then I'll have to make a choice. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">I can lay crushed under my own unforgiveness.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">I can leave it to litter the way for everyone else around me.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Or I can give it to someone stronger to carry. </span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Jesus show me how.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><i><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">For Jesus is not some high priest who has no sympathy for our </span></i></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><i><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">weaknesses </span></i></span><i><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">and flaws. He has already been tested in every way that </span></i></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">we </span></i><i><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">are tested; </span></i><i><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">but He emerged victorious, without failing God. </span></i></div>
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<span class="s1"><i><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">-Hebrews 4:15</span></i></span></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07031208937165388116noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-328998205381002373.post-68816936958281379882015-02-26T20:15:00.001-06:002016-04-24T14:15:18.260-05:00Melting Grace<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
It snowed today. Not much, but it did snow. It's been 17 years since I've seen any winter weather more than a dusting. I was happy but, let me tell you, the boy was <i>ecstatic</i>. His little Alabama heart thought we had moved UP NORTH. <br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjGOnWoE2PFuhgial9wS3Xpn0KFzPIt69R0hhhGPZVQJ7B9tqc6BsiNa7yGYK4yKJeItpKkjWopc2xAIA9MmJW3_MzfLDg0wg_zSvYRkvLj1Nz08giMk3ekZ_-9hOjTYKIPT_uOHCbTxzA/s1600/IMG_0835.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjGOnWoE2PFuhgial9wS3Xpn0KFzPIt69R0hhhGPZVQJ7B9tqc6BsiNa7yGYK4yKJeItpKkjWopc2xAIA9MmJW3_MzfLDg0wg_zSvYRkvLj1Nz08giMk3ekZ_-9hOjTYKIPT_uOHCbTxzA/s1600/IMG_0835.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>
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He had us all snow-creamed, eskimo-cloaked and scaling this frozen tundra well before 8 am this morning- good thing too because this slushy snow is melting fast. <br />
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I love the <i>perfectness</i> of snow. The pure, clean stillness of it. The glittering silence. That <i>close-your-eyes-and-take-a-deep-breath</i> smell. It clears the air and shushes the chaos in my yard and in my mind.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2lsI-Dc4HmjSzJ_2aDv28AV2t4pu0WWuqPZ4XREudYYSaZUVO3xOhzoDi9Z8soGGuo7izYOYa30hgBrcDSNVaTZZ1e7xeSafTUMT33Y1MfhOLk4xKdvX5prfTQt6w-ibW2tBkvHXAUBk/s1600/IMG_0837.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2lsI-Dc4HmjSzJ_2aDv28AV2t4pu0WWuqPZ4XREudYYSaZUVO3xOhzoDi9Z8soGGuo7izYOYa30hgBrcDSNVaTZZ1e7xeSafTUMT33Y1MfhOLk4xKdvX5prfTQt6w-ibW2tBkvHXAUBk/s1600/IMG_0837.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>
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The snow in my backyard covers all the worn things new again; dry grass dug raw by my dog is powdered and soothed. Our broken fence and its fallen birdhouse are made quaint. That shameful pile of bricks I knocked over in the driveway last fall...redeemed into a gleaming miniature Mt. Everest.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhPoH-9LmJH7zx-Bda8QvSyNU9g9RoGjJrk5ycUCd23xnfK7QRZl5rNmia9iV8kWVMwX0NmikmNAdwxJsEBQhDpBACGACz9bJHZ1SyIvlTwzrS8VRvSDsS5nSy9jHMNJHXYyRlSqqj8AZE/s1600/IMG_0886.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhPoH-9LmJH7zx-Bda8QvSyNU9g9RoGjJrk5ycUCd23xnfK7QRZl5rNmia9iV8kWVMwX0NmikmNAdwxJsEBQhDpBACGACz9bJHZ1SyIvlTwzrS8VRvSDsS5nSy9jHMNJHXYyRlSqqj8AZE/s1600/IMG_0886.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>
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Can I just stay in this moment?<br />
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Do you know why winter air smells so clean? Because frigid temperatures slow down the molecules that make up all the smells we smell. Dirt and grass and slug trails, all those smells that we don't even register, are blanketed down by the cold so we can fill our senses with fresh nothingness.<br />
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I like to think of God's grace as being like the snow, covering all my rough and broken places, capping shame with glory. It restores order to the chaos and sets things right.<br />
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When God created the heavens and the earth, he saw that each part was good. Not because he sat for endless hours polishing and buffing and covering them with clean, white snow, but because, <i>by his very nature, God defines good</i>. And when Jesus sits at God's right hand and whispers our names in his ear, God sees us as good too, flaws and all.<br />
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I walked outside this afternoon for one last breath of that winter air, and the sound of water overwhelmed me. Water dripped from trees and trickled from the eaves. It poured from the downspouts and pooled on the rocks below. It sloshed under my feet, wetting my shoes, and I realized then that my desire for picture perfect grace has sold this grace very, very short. <br />
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Unlike the snow, this grace doesn't disappear in a day. Or paint a study in perfection for us to stand back and watch. And it would never, ever fill us up with nothing. Instead, this grace is melting into living water all around us. It seeps into broken places and soaks through rough patches. It funnels deep within and nourishes new growth in dark hollows. It moves and flows, swirling in and under and all around. It changes us, washes us all clean, and because of this grace, HIS grace, God sees us through the lens of his son Jesus, and calls us good.<br />
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<i>But when the goodness and loving kindness of God our Savior appeared, he saved us,</i></div>
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<i> not because of works done by us in righteousness, but according to his own </i><i>mercy by the </i><i>washing </i><i>of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit, whom he poured </i><i>out on us richly </i><i>through Jesus Christ our Savior, so that being justified by his grace we </i><i>might </i><i>become </i><i>heirs according to the hope of eternal life. Titus 3:4-7</i></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07031208937165388116noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-328998205381002373.post-83403116664832364942014-11-19T07:10:00.001-06:002015-11-13T11:04:36.129-06:00The Good Soil<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">I’ve wrecked my car 3 times in the past 6 months.</span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"> </span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">In my own driveway.</span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"> </span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">Twice I hit one car with the other and once I knocked over a brick retaining wall.</span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"> </span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">All because I can’t get my mind on what I’m doing.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">I can’t remember things anymore either. I miss appointments all the time, even when I write them down because I forget to look at my calendar. </span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span><br /></span></div>
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">I forget birthdays. I forget prescriptions. I forget the laundry in the washer. Forget to cook dinner. Or even grocery shop for that matter.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span><br /></span></div>
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">I forget to record that odd check I wrote too… that’s always fun.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">A few weeks ago, I forgot my dog in the car for a good part of the day. Thank God it was cool outside and he was ok.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">If ever there were a woman in need of rest, it is me. The past two years have been filled with stressful events and it has taken a mighty toll on my soul. The woman who used to juggle all-the-things with productivity to spare now measures any day that includes a shower as a good day.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">I’m not sure where my old self went. We even uprooted our family and moved 4 states away and I still can’t quite find her. I think she’s gone and someone new is taking her place.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Someone humbled. Someone less invested in this world. Someone slowly r<i>elenting.</i></span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Our new home in our new town has the most beautiful trees. I’ve never seen fall like this before, brilliant oaks and maples encircle our yard like a warm city wall. Orange and gold carpet the lawn as far as I can see. And each time the wind blows, more leaves drift down like autumn butterflies and rest quietly on the ground.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">It’s like they’ve relented too. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Seasons change. Spring grows. Summer abounds. Fall, however, is expected to yield her harvest to the Sower and make way for winter’s good rest.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">The leaves are much more at peace with this process than I am. It’s hard to watch beautiful things fade. It’s hard to give up the red maple wonder of a season to the million little deaths that mark it’s end. I know that winter rest brings spring growth, and we all need that time. But I don’t rest. I mourn the leaves when the leaves don’t mourn themselves.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Instead, the leaves trust that this season is their natural state. This place is where they belong. They know that only when they fall and crumble to the earth can the Sower make them into something new. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">The glorious, the brilliant, the withered - even the moth-eaten - He washes them all, one by one, with cool living water. And dries them with the breath of life.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">So these things are not lost, my friend. In the palm of His hand, they become the very things that make the good soil.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><i>But some seeds fell into good soil - soft, moist, </i></span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><i>free from thorns. These seeds not only grew, </i></span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><i>but they also produced more seeds, a hundred </i></span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><i>times what the farmer originally planted. </i></span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><i>If you have ears, hear My meaning. -Luke 8:8</i></span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><i><br /></i></span></span>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><i>A special thank you to The Boy who helped me write this. He has quite a way with words...</i></span></span></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07031208937165388116noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-328998205381002373.post-57517492515102965272014-10-20T20:11:00.002-05:002015-11-13T11:04:36.061-06:0031 (ok-18) Lessons from 31(ish) Women (and one little boy): Failures<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I set a goal for myself this month- to blog everyday. I wanted to participate in this blogging challenge at write31days.com. But then life snickered at my big plans and I made it to day 6 before I quit writing.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">This is the point where I would normally call myself a failure and give up. But not today. Turns out, all the cool people fail.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Oprah was once fired and called "unfit for television". </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Marilyn Monroe was told that she'd never make it as a model. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Louisa May Alcott was told by a publisher that she'd never succeed as a writer.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Florence Nightingale's family considered her nursing career just a notch above prostitution. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Suze Ormon started her finance career because she was bankrupted by a failed restaurant. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Vera Wang was once a figure skater who didn't make the Olympic team. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Bette Nesmith Graham invented Liquid Paper after <i>years</i> of correcting her typos with white tempura paint.</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Princess Diana and Coco Chanel both dropped out of school. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Beyonce lost on Star Search. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And Julia Child burned dinner. Probably a lot.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Just this summer, my son learned to ride a bike. He's ten. Ten is late for bike riding and he knows it. But God wired this child up a little differently, and gross motor skill deficits and balance issues are a real thing for him. Riding a bike is the single most difficult thing I think he's ever tried to do.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And it was hard, <i>hard,</i> to watch him struggle up and down the long driveway in the summer heat, all rage and tears and bloodied knees. In his black-and-white mind, you either do it or don't. There is no in-between, and so each fall told him that he was a bike-riding failure. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I contemplated success and failure those days on the stone steps by our driveway, and I wondered what all this trying would be like without the world inside our heads pressuring us to get it right. We'd be free to try as many times as we wanted, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">our hearts </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">never once nicked by failure. Trying only becomes failing when the world is watching for it. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">My little blogging 'failure' has made me think a lot about goals and what I really want to do. I want to write. That's it. Write about grace and what it's done for me. And I want other women to read what I write and be encouraged. It would be nice to be a published author or popular blogger, but that's not really what I want. I just want to write for Jesus. He's my audience of one.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">God plants seeds inside all of us to go and do great things for His kingdom. Sure, sometimes He plants those seeds for a specific time and place, but mostly I think He just wants to see what we'll do with them. He wants to see us grow in grace and knowledge, and that can take a long time trying. But that's ok. It's time spent with Jesus.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><i>"For I know the plans I have for you," declares the Lord, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future." Jer 29:11</i></span></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07031208937165388116noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-328998205381002373.post-27446698287281726042014-10-07T07:24:00.001-05:002015-11-13T11:04:35.995-06:0031 Lessons from 31 Women: Lydia of Thyatira<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Lydia of Thyatira only gets a few brief mentions in the book of Acts. She almost seems like background noise. It's easy to miss her, but don't. She's a trailblazer.</span><br />
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<i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">On the Sabbath day, we went outside the city walls to the nearby river, assuming that some Jewish people might be gathering for prayer. We found a group of women there, so we sat down and spoke to them. One of them, Lydia, was a business woman originally from Thyatira. She made a living buying and selling fine purple fabric. She was a true worshiper of God and listened to Paul with special interest. The Lord opened her heart to take in the message with enthusiasm. She and her whole household were ceremonially washed through baptism.</span></i><br />
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<i>Lydia: If you believe I'm truly faithful to the Lord, please, you must come and stay at my home.</i></span><br />
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<i>We couldn't turn down her invitation. </i><i> -Acts 16:13-15</i></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">A few verses later, after the most spectacular jailbreak (which you simply must read for yourself in Acts 16:16-39), Lydia is mentioned again as hosting the first Christian church in the city of Phillipi in her home. That's it. That's all we know about her.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">We don't know who her family is. We don't know if she was married or not. We don't know anything about her personal sin history or if she fell victim to any of the usual suspects of tragedy</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">like childlessness or widowhood</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> that plague Biblical women. We know none of that.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Which is kind of nice. We just get to know Lydia for herself.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I'd like to have coffee with Lydia. Oh, she might would tell me about all the brokenness in her past, how she's divorced or she lost a child- we all have those stories. But I think she would tell me more about Jesus and the hope she finds in him. The difference in Lydia is that she's not defining herself by the brokenness. She's defining herself by the Lord. And that gives me hope too.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Thank you Lydia. We need strong women to go first.</span><br />
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07031208937165388116noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-328998205381002373.post-55007176719249493012014-10-05T20:45:00.001-05:002015-11-13T11:04:36.044-06:0031 Lessons from 31 Women: Sarina Leigh<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span class="s1"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Each Wednesday afternoon, the boy and I get to keep his little 8 month old cousin, Sarina. She is such a joy. One of her favorite things about our house is that we have four cats. She just loves to watch the kitties.</span></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">One day we were playing on a blanket in the living room when one of the cats snuggled up right next to Sarina and began to purr. Sarina was very happy to finally get up close and personal with one of these mysterious creatures. She immediately reached out a chubby hand to touch the kitty’s face. She did not expect to first encounter whiskers.</span></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">She drew her little hand back in surprised delight. She looked at her hand and then looked at the cat. She reached a second time; again the whiskers tickled her palm. This time she broke a wide smile and patted the whiskers. She marveled there a while before moving on to touch the sleek fur, the delicate ears, that little pink nose. All the while, kitty sat warm and soft, purring patiently beside her new friend.</span></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">It was a sweet moment to behold. I’m glad she shared it with me.</span></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Today offered a different kind of sweet moment as beautiful Sarina Leigh was dedicated to the Lord at church this morning. It was a privilege to gather around her with family as the pastor prayed over her. I cheated during the prayer, though, and peeped one eye open to see what she was doing. Her family may have been deep in prayer, intent on the great spiritual battle that rages all around us, but Miss Sarina was completely relaxed in her daddy’s arms, leaning back and looking around as if she didn’t have a care in the world.</span></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">“That’s right, baby girl,” I thought. “You just sit back and enjoy- we got this.”</span></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">At a another baby dedication a few weeks ago, the pastor explained that really we are dedicating ourselves to lead and pray for this child as she begins her walk toward the narrow gate. Just as I sat beside Sarina to guide her safely through her first encounter with a kitty, we all have a very serious responsibility to shepherd the children in our lives through the wilderness and right to the foot of the cross.</span></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">So you are safe and loved, Sarina. Protected and blessed. My prayer for you is this, that you will reach your little hand to Jesus with bold wonder. He is full of delightful surprises; grace and mercy abound in His presence. You can reach right out to him, close enough that His whiskers will tickle your hand. He is your friend, your personal savior, and He will sit patiently beside you for as long as you want.</span></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><i>Children are a gift from the Lord; they are a reward from him. Psalm 127:3</i></span></span></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07031208937165388116noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-328998205381002373.post-68027907988721101242014-10-04T07:44:00.000-05:002015-11-13T11:04:36.088-06:0031 Lessons from 31 Women: Martha, part 2<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">So I may have been re-reading yesterday's post looking for typos (because I've seen y'all mock people's grammar on Facebook) when I saw something that was so good, I had to come share it with you. We are going to have another visit with Ms. Martha this morning.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Let's read part of her story again:</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><i>Jesus continued from there toward Jerusalem and came to another village. Martha, a resident of that village, welcomed Jesus into her home. Her sister Mary, went and sat at Jesus' feet, listening to Him teach. Meanwhile Martha was anxious about all the hospitality arrangements. </i></span><i style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Luke 10:38-40</i><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Whoa. She invited Jesus into her home <i>and then kept right on worrying and doing all the same things she'd always done.</i></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Mmmm.... I had to chew that one for a while. And it was hard to swallow. I might have done that too, Martha. Once. Or twice. Ok, everyday. For like the past ten years.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">There are so many verses that I could quote here, verses about not being anxious about anything and how Jesus' burden is light. Or dying to self and submitting to God's authority. But what I want to tell you about is the power we have in the Holy Spirit.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><i>The Father is sending a great Helper, the Holy Spirit, in My name to teach you everything and to remind you of all I have said to you. John 14:26</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Only two days ago, I was telling my husband that I wished I could hire a mother's helper for just one day a week. She could tutor the boy while I run errands and make phone calls. I could get bills paid on time and go to the grocery store by myself. I could <i>finish a whole shower without anyone asking me for anything.</i></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Now imagine an even better mother's helper, one who would "...teach me everything and remind me of all..." That's like having Mary Poppins <i>in my house</i>, guiding me through every single step of this wife and mother business every single day. I would be all over that. I certainly wouldn't ignore her- no ma'am. That would be crazy! I'd ask her so many questions, Mary Poppins would think she had three Beverlys on her!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And yet here I sit with a helper better than even Mary Poppins, a helper ready and willing to teach me everything I need to know and remind me of all the things that Jesus said. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I have this wonderful helper, but most days, I don't even stop long enough to hear to what He has to say. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I'm just like Martha.</span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Verdana, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 24px;"><br /></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">So here's the part that's tough to swallow: stopping to hear the Holy Spirit is a choice we make. So no matter the circumstance, no matter the baby crying or the in-laws coming or the looming deadline at work. No matter how many unforeseen disasters strike, no matter how many balls </span><strike style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">we have</strike><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> we put in the air, we are responsible for making the choice to listen or not. <Gulp></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">By the way, when you listen, you'll probably hear this:</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><i>And God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that having all sufficiency in all things at all times, you may abound in every good work. 2Cor 9:8</i></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">All grace. All sufficiency. All things. At all times. Because He loves you.</span><br />
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07031208937165388116noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-328998205381002373.post-63313313648828786862014-10-03T09:44:00.002-05:002015-11-13T11:04:36.078-06:0031 Lessons from 31 Women: Martha, part 1<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Today is one of those crazy-busy days. I have too many things to do: take the dog to the groomer's, grocery shop, make my house presentable and clean the bathroom that hasn't been cleaned in ~ahem~ week(s). Then I have to cook dinner for guests tonight- something amazing and delicious of course because <i>Pinterest</i>, and, you know, I have to represent.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">At some point I need to go hold the hand of my poor heartbroken mother who has, bless her, been rescuing stray animals all summer long and now is having to give them up one by one. Which reminds me, I also need to catch the last of her stray kitties and take him to a shelter because he's tripped her four times in the last week and she is limping and covered in bruises. Oh, and then we have a full day of school today, including the daily Asperger meltdown over math. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">While I'm at it, I'll make a list for tomorrow. Paint the boy's room. Cook a month's worth of breakfast mini-quiches to freeze. Mop <i>all </i>the floors. All while being a fun mom because <i>Saturday. </i>Oh wow. Tomorrow might be even worse than today.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">So, right now I am feeling <i>so dang glad</i> that I made this commitment to blog everyday through the month of October because <i>jumping in the deep end. </i>I'll be blogging all month about 31 amazing women and the deep and spiritual lessons they bring (because I know <i>anything</i> about that- HA!), and, of course, I'll be blogging about them in perfect prose without using the word 'by' for 'buy' like I did yesterday while Blogger puts white boxes around random things I italicize for no discernible reason. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">By the way, do you know how many women I had on my list Wednesday when I started this crazy quest? One. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Awesome. I'll just be over here doing some research. Because <i>free time.</i></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Do you see me getting bitter?</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><i>Jesus continued from there toward Jerusalem and came to another village. Martha, a resident of that village, welcomed Jesus into her home. Her sister, Mary, went and sat at Jesus' feet, listening to Him teach. Meanwhile Martha was anxious about all the hospitality arrangements.</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><i>Martha (interrupting Jesus): Lord, why don't You care that my sister is leaving me to do all the work by myself? Tell her to get over here and help me.</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><i>Jesus: Oh Martha, Martha, you are so anxious and concerned about a million details, but really, only one thing matters. Mary has chosen that one thing, and I won't take it away from her. Luke 10:38-42</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">How about that? Martha had the gall to interrupt Jesus himself to ask Him to tell Mary to get up off her hiney and help. I think she was bitter too.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I know we are all supposed to be Marys in a Martha world, but I have always questioned that just a little bit because at some point, people need to eat and wear clean underwear, and you just can't <i>know</i> when your mother's orphaned squirrel is going to come down with pneumonia and you have to drop everything and take it to the hospital. Somebody has to do all this stuff. See what I mean? Bitter.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I don't think it's the work, though, that makes the Marthas (and the Beverlys) bitter. I think it's our skewed perspective.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">We can guess all the many reasons that Martha might have been working so hard. Maybe she was a little bit of a control freak. Maybe she was prideful in how well her house was run. Maybe she was spending too much time pinning recipes and tablescapes instead of cleaning her kitchen. Maybe she was secretly avoiding Jesus. Maybe she (I) was all of these.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The one clear thing though is what she (I) <i>wasn't</i>. She (I) wasn't working for the glory of the Lord. </span><br />
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<i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; line-height: 24px;">Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; line-height: 24px;">human masters, Colossians 3:23</span></i></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">When we start throwing words like 'work' and 'master' around, we don't readily glean a picture of freedom, but Jesus as master <i>is</i> freeing. He doesn't care about your grammar or your bathrooms. He's not going to size you up or critique your performance. He's not going to look down on you because your pot roast is always dry. He cares about you. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Yes, there are tasks to be done, but he wants you to do them not for duty, but for love, not even for your family, but solely for Him. When you do things for His glory, He gets to be in control and you get to be in...peace.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And when you do that work for His glory, guess what else? You're doing the work and sitting at the feet <i>all at the same time. </i></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Which is good for us Marthas because we sure love to multi-task...</span><br />
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07031208937165388116noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-328998205381002373.post-53154680945305774272014-10-02T07:29:00.002-05:002015-11-13T11:04:36.039-06:0031 Lessons from 31 Women: Miz Bailey<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">When I was a little girl, I had a babysitter named Elsie. Elsie and her husband, Cliff, were my parent's good friends. Their two sons were the same age as my two brothers, and they lived across the road from us beside a little fishing lake, down in what can only be described as a <i>hole</i>, with the steepest driveway you ever saw.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Cliff was retired Air Force man, and he knew a little something about everything. Elsie was his graceful, and sometimes flustered, wife. Cliff had a commanding presence; Elsie's strength was more gentle, the kind that raises three children with a military husband and a war in Vietnam. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Cliff fished and fixed stuff. Elsie kept children in her home. I remember that they used to take me and Miz Bailey to Hardee's and buy me french fries. Miz Bailey was Elsie's mother.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I don't know Miz Bailey's real name. Her brown weathered skin had long since earned her the title 'Miz' like all good southern women of her generation. She was small and stooped, subtle</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> like her daughter, but also strong. She had wrinkled and bent hands, capable hands that knew how to make strawberry jam and pat a baby to sleep just right on an aproned lap. I remember her as joyful, always smiling under her silver glasses. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">When Miz Bailey 'set up housekeeping' during the Great Depression, she had a chair. It was a maple chair with turned legs and a scalloped backrest. Simple and pretty, it was smaller than any chairs made today- people were smaller then- but it had a nice wide seat, curved just so to make it comfortable. It was, by all accounts, a fine chair.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And when Miz Bailey outlived her second husband and moved into a little trailer beside the lake-in-a-hole, she had no place for her fine chair. So she gave it to me, the little red-haired four year old who played dolls in her daughter's living room.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">That chair was my inheritance. It sat in the corner of our living room while I was growing up. No one really ever sat on it because it was an antique. But I did sometimes. And every once in a while, my mother would tell me the story of how that chair was mine because Miz Bailey had left it to me.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I loved that the chair was mine. In our rented home where we just got by, this chair was real and solid. It brought weight and history and craftsmanship into my un-rooted world. This fine chair was an heirloom. It had belonged to someone. And that meant that the little girl who sat privileged upon it belonged to someone too.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The lesson here is to never underestimate the legacy we leave for the ones coming up behind us. Those legacies tell us whose we are.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I wonder what stories that chair could tell, what family history it has witnessed? Did it entertain little Elsie while she read Hardy Boys novels? Did it pause for Miz Bailey each morning to sit and slip on her shoes before the day's work? Did it push up to the table on Thanksgiving day to make room for just one more cousin? Did it hold the tired or the grieving when life got too heavy, and they needed a rest? I know that it did all of these things because it is a fine chair.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Now that I have set up housekeeping myself, that chair resides with me. It sits under the table in our homeschool room and has become the favorite chair of my 10 year old son. He likes it because the seat is wide and smooth, and he can rest his feet on the floor. He also likes that it creaks when he wiggles which means that poor chair creaks A LOT! If it survives 5th grade math, I will leave it for him. And I will tell him all the stories it has borne so he will know whose he is.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><i>We will not hide them from their children, but tell to the coming generation the glorious deeds of the Lord, and His might, and the wonders that He has done. Psalm 78:4</i></span></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07031208937165388116noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-328998205381002373.post-53079089932878405862014-10-01T07:55:00.003-05:002015-11-13T11:04:36.030-06:0031 Lessons from 31 Women: Gerda Weissman Klein<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span class="s1">If you have not read </span><span class="s2"><u>All But My Life</u></span><span class="s1"> by Gerda Weissman Klein, you must stop what you’re doing right now and go read it. Beautiful, amazing story of human strength and perseverance, the kind of story that scoops out your soul and grounds you in things that matter in this life.</span><span class="s1"></span></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Today, Gerda is a noted author and much celebrated human rights activist, but in 1939, she was just a girl when Nazis invaded her hometown in Poland. She spent the next 6 years living under Nazi rule, removed from her home, losing first her brother, then her father and mother, before being sent to a series of concentration camps. She was tortured and starved- worked nearly to death for three years- and then forced to march 350 miles through the winter forests of Eastern Europe. 4000 women started that cold journey. Only 120 survived. </span></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">In the last days that Gerda and her father were together, Julius Weissman insisted that his daughter take her heavy winter boots when she was called to the concentration camps. His request didn’t make sense to her. It was the heat of June and they had said the 'work camps' were only temporary, but her father knew better. </span></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Those boots would save her life.</span></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I can’t imagine being a father and and having to release my teenage daughter into the worst of the world with no better preparation than a good pair of shoes. Just the thought tears my very heart from my chest. Gerda didn’t know what trials waited for her, but her father was wise and he sent her out ready as best he could. </span></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The boots, yes, were crucial, but maybe more important was the fact that her father loved her and valued her enough to provide them for her. Through those long years of unspeakable suffering, something kept Gerda hopeful in the face of the worst kind of degradation. I can only imagine that thing was the peace of knowing that somewhere out there, she was loved. Someone had provided for her.</span></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Stand firm then, with the belt of truth buckled around your waist, with the breastplate of <span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span><span class="Apple-tab-span"> </span>righteousness in place, and with your feet fitted with the readiness that comes from the gospel of peace. Eph 6:14-15</span></i></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">“…your feet fitted with the readiness that comes from the gospel of peace.” I always struggled with that one. In the armor of God, all the other pieces make so much more sense. My faith shield and my spirit sword- I know what to do with those. But what about those peace shoes?</span></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">More and more, I am coming to understand that the gospel of peace is the foundation for it all. All the grace and borrowed righteousness are no good to us if we are afraid to walk in them. We have to be grounded in them. We have to know them in our souls.</span></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">So know this, sweet friend, the gospel of peace is yours. God provided it for you.</span></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Know that the gospel of peace is confidence in who you are in God’s sight. You are crafted by his hand, that same strong hand that has your name tattooed right on it. </span></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Know that the gospel of peace is freedom in the finished work of Christ on the cross. You are free to walk this cold winter wilderness on a path that is <i>fully</i> redeemed. </span></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Know that the gospel of peace is God's assurance that you are not left on your own. He sent Jesus to prepare the way for you. Just for you.</span></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">You may not know the trials ahead, but your Father is wise. He sends you out ready as only He can. He has cobbled peace for you, and His son Jesus, <i>footwashing King Jesus</i>, leaned down from the cross and forever tied that sweet peace on your feet. </span></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">How beautiful on the mountains are the feet of those who bring good news, who proclaim peace, who bring good tidings, who proclaim salvation, who say to Zion, "Your God reigns!” Isaiah 52:7</span></i></span></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07031208937165388116noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-328998205381002373.post-26945351311466088912013-09-09T21:40:00.001-05:002015-11-13T11:04:35.990-06:00Perfect Weakness<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">My boy was a Blues Clues boy, through and through. Loved it. Watched it everyday. He didn’t much care for Sesame Street or Barney (Phew!), but ‘Clues Clues’ was IT. If he found a piece of paper on the floor, he would declare “Blue skadoo, me can too!” and jump onto it. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">I hear the sound of it as clear as day, sweet bare feet on hardwood floors and crumpling paper. That littlest voice, so innocent and believing. The innerworks of my mother’s heart tick these echos.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">The good old days. Sigh.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">So, if you’ve ever watched an episode or two of Blues Clues, then you know about Steve-time. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Ask a question. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">A very slow question. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Then pause for an answer. And wait. And wait.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">And wait... </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">We adults don’t tend to like the wait. Waiting is doing nothing; we have to <i>do</i> something. We ask again. Or we ask another question. Or we just fill in the blanks ourselves and give our own answer. Expound and add to. Pile on. But not pause. No, we’re not good with the pause.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">When we’re doing something, we feel like we’re in control. We feel strong. Pausing is doing nothing. And doing nothing feels weak.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">But our Father says <i>be still and know that I am God. </i></span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Be still. <i>Pause.</i> In Hebrew, the verb ‘be still’ comes from the word <i>rapha</i> which can be translated as ‘let yourselves become weak’. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">When we let ourselves become weak, when we pause to cede control, we allow His power to be made perfect. Perfect in our weakness.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">And then we <i>know</i> God. We don’t assume God or guess God. We don’t take Him for granted or dismiss Him. We <i>know</i> Him because we allow him to be seen. Less of us. More of Him. God shines through our weakness. Shines perfect.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Be still, and know that I am God. I will be exalted among the nations, I will be exalted in the earth! Psalm 46:10</span></i></span></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07031208937165388116noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-328998205381002373.post-46001170662456085432013-08-26T11:09:00.000-05:002015-11-13T11:04:36.015-06:00The Grace-Smeared Face<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I had a lovely lunch date with the boy Friday. A monkey-bar jumping off incident led us to the doctor’s office for a sprained foot. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">“I don’t think that was a wise decision,” said the boy. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And thus we were gifted a short school day and three hours of stolen moments between doctor’s appointments. Just us. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Stolen moments are the best because they come without expectation. Really, though, they are not stolen, but graced, as all good gifts come from our Heavenly Father. A true gift by nature is always unexpected. You can’t ask for it. Then it wouldn’t be a gift. You can’t dictate it or control it. It has to be given freely. All you can do is accept it. And love it back.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Linger in it and be contented.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I watched the boy gobble up the good gifts that God had given us this day on the patio of Zoe’s Kitchen. Steak kabobs skewered with sweet peppers. A warm breeze sliced by a sunbeam. The quiet companionship of kindred hearts. No need to talk. I just watched him enjoy these small gifts with unselfconscious abandon. It satisfied my soul.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">He looked up at me sticky sweet </span></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">with </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; letter-spacing: 0px;">greek marinade. He paused and smiled a little.</span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">“There’s the look,” he said with soft surprise.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">“What look?”</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">“The look on your face,” he said. “The one that makes me feel like this world is an awesome place to be.”</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">That boy melts my heart every time.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I wonder what would happen if we consumed God’s gifts to us with such gratitude and trust. What if we ate up Holy Spirit fruit until the juice ran down our arms? If we accepted salvation-our own and each other’s-accepted it at face value and just <i>loved it back?</i></span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">What if we wholly lingered in God’s warm grace and were simply <i>contented?</i></span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Shame, though, will glut our bellies and leave</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> us nibbling at the smallest crumbs of grace. </span></span><i style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">How can we ever expect to be content if we can’t consume the grace right there on our plates? </span></i><br />
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></i></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; letter-spacing: 0px;">We were never meant for crumbs.</span><i style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; letter-spacing: 0px;"> </i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; letter-spacing: 0px;">Jesus invited us to linger at the banquet. Linger in His presence and savor Him until our hearts are full, not act as if He begrudges to look the other way while we raid the dumpster out back.</span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Shame marinates in the idea that grace can be somehow deserved. And it can't. Ever. That’s not a statement about the depth of our wretchedness. It’s a declaration of the depth of God’s love for us, the immeasurable depth of a love that freely sacrifices not itself, but it’s own son. <i>It’s own son.</i></span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Do you see? It will <i>never, ever </i>matter the depth of our failures because <i>God’s grace is sufficient </i>for even the<i> greatest depths </i>of our sin<i>. </i>The <i>greatest</i> <i>debts</i> of our sin.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">There is no condemnation in Christ. He gave us the full gift of Himself and He wants us to love it back. Love it all the way.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">You, sweet friend, are free to feast at Christ’s banquet until your belly is warm and full. Dig in. With both hands. And when grace smears your face, when it runs over your cupped hands and spills down your shirt, stop right then, <i>right then</i> and see Christ’s face. It will let you know that His kingdom is an awesome place to be.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The people brought children to Jesus, hoping he might touch them. The disciples shooed them off. But Jesus was irate and let them know it: “Don’t push these children away. Don’t ever get between them and me. These </span></i></span><i style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">children are at the very center of life in the kingdom. Mark this: Unless you accept God’s kingdom in the simplicity of a child, you’ll never get in.” Then, gathering the children up in his arms, he laid his hands of blessing on them. </span></i><i style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">-Mark 10:13-16, The Message</span></i></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07031208937165388116noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-328998205381002373.post-71753377322693902372013-08-06T20:40:00.001-05:002015-11-13T11:04:36.102-06:00The Still Small Voice<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">I heard God’s voice today.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">I haven’t heard it in a long, long time.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Technically sound travels better in the desert- something to do with the dry air and lack of obstructions that absorb sound. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Not so in the spiritual desert. In the spiritual desert, <i>there just</i> <i>is no sound</i>. None, at least, but the sound of our own sufferings and dried up prayers. And the shuffle of one dusty footstep dragged after another...</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Meanwhile, the moment we get tired in the waiting, God’s Spirit is right alongside helping us along. If we don’t know how or what to pray, it doesn’t matter. He does our praying in and for us, making prayer out of our wordless sighs, our aching groans. </span></i></span><i style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Romans 8:26, The Message</span></i></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Last week I begged, not prayed, but <i>begged</i> God, through tears and desperation, to let me hear Him. <i>Please speak to me. Speak to me in a way that is so clear I cannot possibly miss Your voice.</i></span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">All I got was <i>listen harder</i>.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Not the message I wanted. But He is God and I am Beverly. He does not cater to my weakness, but endeavors to lift me out of it. If I will let Him. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Listen harder.</span></i></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span><br /></span></div>
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">For over a year now, I have been in a season of refinement, one of taking away and paring down, of accepting and forgiving. It’s been a season of truths revealed, hard truths, some drawn painfully from deep, deep places. And all of it sandwiched between two diagnoses that changed <i>everything</i>. At each turn I think, “Surely this is the last.” But it is not. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">This morning I went to sit down with a cup of coffee and spend some time with my husband before church. But as I was folding my legs under me to settle in my chair, I somehow dislocated my right knee. There it was, in a moment, my walk was broken.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">So now, we add to this season crutches and an orthopedist. We just did this 3 years ago with my left knee- two surgeries and months of rehab. It was hard. I don’t want to do it again. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">All the way to the ER I cried, but not from pain or dread. I cried because I surely must be the most stubborn child of God. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">How broken do I need to be before I will listen?</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">In the waiting room of the ER, I saw a couple huddled together. She was in a wheel chair, bundled in blankets with an oxygen tank. He leaned close and held her hand. She was fear and precious frailty. He was strength and utter compassion. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">She could not talk, but cried pitifully and wailed in her small voice. Her words were unintelligible, but he looked in her eyes and nodded. He understood.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><i>Wordless sighs, aching groans. </i>Is this how we sound to Jesus?</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">And as soon as I asked the question, God whispered to me, <i>“Yes. Go and pray with her.”</i></span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">And so I did, one broken footstep dragged after another across the waiting room to lay my tainted hand on God’s beloved and speak her suffering.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">His voice did not bluster or the shake the earth. It did not blaze and smoke. It simply compelled. In peace and rightness, it compelled. And I knew it to be truth.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">I then understood that I miss His voice because I listen for it in this <i>life,</i> and He simply wants me to hear it in this <i>moment</i>. In each moment. Every moment. One at a time.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><i>Listen harder.</i> <i>I am always speaking.</i></span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Yes Abba, I hear You.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">My sheep respond as they hear My voice; I know them intimately, and they follow Me. John 10:27, The Voice</span></i></span></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07031208937165388116noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-328998205381002373.post-25105117370571750652013-07-15T17:41:00.000-05:002015-11-13T11:04:35.985-06:00The Mustard Seed and the Rain<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Today is a good day.</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">My husband, who usually works from home, left early for a long day of business travel, leaving me and the boy alone for the day. The boy crawled in bed with me at 5:00 am, and we have done absolutely nothing since.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">We slept till 10:00. We ate Cheerios for breakfast <b>and</b> lunch. At 5:30, we're still in our pj's, side by side </span><span style="font-size: large;">with our laptops </span><span style="font-size: large;">on my husband's desk. Doing nothing. </span></span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">We haven't even opened the blinds.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">"Today is so relaxing that it's like a rainy day," says the boy.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">"Yes it is, son." <i>Healing rain.</i></span></span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">It's a stark contrast to yesterday. Yesterday, I came home from church and went straight to bed until this morning. I was sad.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">"Your depression is getting worse. What we're doing isn't working. We need to do something else."</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: large;">I know.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: large;">"It's hard for me and the boy too."</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: large;">I know.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: large;">"I miss my family. I want my wife back."</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: large;">I know. I <i>know.</i></span></span><br />
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<i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Crying is better than laughing. It blotches the face, but scours the heart. </span></i></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Ecclesiastes 7:3</span></i></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Consider my heart scoured. Steel wool raw and tender new. Depression has always been a fact of life for me, but this year has been hard. Very hard.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">"I won't be the same person when this is done," I tell my husband. "Nothing is the same as it was."</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">I can't walk out of this wilderness unchanged. But I can walk through it with the hope that the change will be good.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><i>"The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed, which a man took and planted in his field. Though it is the smallest of all seeds, yet when it grows, it is the largest of garden plants and becomes a tree, so that the birds come and perch in its branches." Matthew 13:31-32</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">The mustard seed is not scared of change. It just rests in the soil right where it falls. <i>Rests. </i>It does not struggle, but simply soaks in the rain. <i>H</i><i>ealing rain</i>. In time, <i>when the seed is filled with the living water</i>, it's hardened shell will yield. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><i>This is my story.</i> Do you recognize it? Maybe it's yours too. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">A mustard seed, that's all. We can do that. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><i>May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in Him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit. Romans 15:13</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8FXLo3aCkuQ">You're Not Alone</a></span></div>
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<i><br /></i>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07031208937165388116noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-328998205381002373.post-5560458566902835422013-07-07T19:14:00.000-05:002015-11-13T11:04:36.052-06:00The Alabaster Jar <br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">When I read stories in the Bible, I try to put myself in that character’s place, to try to really understand what they are thinking and feeling.</span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"> </span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">Honestly, I have to do that because there are just so many details left out.</span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"> </span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">What </span><i style="letter-spacing: 0px;">exactly</i><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"> did they say?</span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"> </span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">And </span><i style="letter-spacing: 0px;">how</i><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"> did they say it?</span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"> And what were they <i>wearing</i> when they said it? </span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">This lack of pertinent details drives me crazy.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span><br /></span></div>
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">In Biblical times, perfumed oil was a big deal. Sometimes women would wear these small bottles of oil around their necks, right there next to their hearts. And they were quite expensive, worth even a year’s wages. Twice in the new testament, women washed Jesus’ feet with their perfumed oil and then dried them with their hair. <i>Really?</i> To just pour a year’s wages out on<i> someone’s feet</i>? Now that’s crazy! </span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-size: large;">And don’t even get me started on Bible feet. These people had no socks, no proper shoes, no $30 pedicure at Nail Star over by the Walmart. Bible feet are scary feet. I’m just sayin’...</span></span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span><br /></span></div>
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">In Luke 7: 36-50, a ‘sinful’ woman, probably a prostitute, followed Jesus into the home of a wealthy Pharisee and anointed his feet while he ate. She cried openly, letting her tears wash the road dust from his feet and then dried them with her hair. Then she poured her expensive, precious perfume on them. That very jar of oil she kept right by her heart. </span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span><br /></span></div>
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">In John 12: 1-8, Lazarus‘ sister Mary anointed Jesus’ feet with expensive perfume while he dined in her home just a week before his crucifixion. She prepared him for his burial before it was time, despite admonitions of extravagance and waste. “You will always have the poor, but you will not always have me,” Jesus said. Maybe Mary knew that somehow her gift would be magnified if poured out at Jesus’ feet. Maybe she knew that without him, we are the poor. </span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span><br /></span></div>
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">These stories are fascinating to me. How much these women must have loved their savior to bow at his feet and serve him with such humility! How willing they were to sacrifice all that they had, even expensive perfume worth a year’s wages, to give honor to the son of God.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">I think if I had an alabaster jar of perfume worth a year’s wages, I would do the exact same thing. Break it open and pour it right out on Jesus’ feet, right then, right there. Simply for his glory and because he has done so much for me. I would do it. I would.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span><br /></span></div>
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Of course that’s easy to say since I don’t actually <i>have</i> one of those.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span><br /></span></div>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">And if I did, what would it really be worth to </span><i style="letter-spacing: 0px;">me</i><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">? Most days, I’m just happy to have time for a shower. Forget about perfume! It makes me sneeze anyway. I guess I could put </span>my fancy<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"> jar on a shelf, but I’m not really a chotzky kind of girl - too much to dust. I could sell it and use the money, but where in the world do you sell something like that? That’d take a lot of effort and research- might not be worth it.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span><br /></span></div>
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Nope. I’d pour it out for sure. Just like Mary and that sinful woman. After all Jesus did say give all you have, sell all you have, and leave all you have and follow him. I could pour out my treasure. And then <i>my</i> sacrifice would be just as big as the sacrifice made by these two women whom <i>Jesus himself </i>praised. </span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span><br /></span></div>
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><i>Right?</i> </span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-size: large;">Wrong.</span></span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-size: large;">Because the truth is that I do have one. And it’s full of things that I like to keep right there next to my heart. Some are good and pure, and some are...not. I keep my family in there, my husband and my son. I keep my home in there and my friends. I even keep my church and all the ministry that we do there tucked inside my jar.</span></span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">But deep, deep in the bottom, I keep the secret things that I hold on to the tightest - my sense of worth in the world, my reputation among my peers, other people’s perceptions of me. Respect. Admiration. Prestige. What’s all that worth to <i>me</i>? More than a year’s wages, to be sure. And yet worth absolutely nothing unless I’m willing to pour it out at the foot of the cross.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span><br /></span></div>
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Unless I’m willing to give Jesus everything I’ve got. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-size: large;">Everything.</span></span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i><span style="font-size: large;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>So therefore, any one of you who does not renounce all that he has cannot be my disciple. </span></i></span><i style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-size: large;">Luke 14:33 </span></i></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">We all have an alabaster jar tucked next to our hearts. Let’s break them open. Pour out the contents at Jesus’ feet. Let our gifts be scented with Jesus and released. Let His grace cover the fetor of our sin. Let our homes and our lives carry the fragrance of our Savior and pray that it will linger long after we depart, drawing others into the sweetness of His presence.</span></span>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07031208937165388116noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-328998205381002373.post-37015810146864117472013-07-01T16:49:00.002-05:002015-11-13T11:04:36.010-06:00You Will Be Loved...<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">So I’ve been participating in this little Twitter project called Armchair Theology for a few months. We read a chapter of the Bible each day and tweet about it, and there are 5 or 6 of us who tweet regularly. We are just about to finish Deuteronomy.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">I don’t know that I would have had the patience to read straight through Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy without this group, but the promise of a retweet is a strong motivator for me. Pavlov’s bird, I guess. </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">but they delight in the law of the LORD, meditating </span></i></span><br />
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">on it day and night. Psalm 1:2</span></i></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Um, that’s not me. As far as I’m concerned, there is no tedious like Old Testament Law tedious. It’s right there next to listening to my husband talk about binary tedious. Endless sequels of <i>The Land Before Time</i> tedious. Going to Walmart with my mother tedious.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">And to be honest, it’s tedious because I don’t get it. It doesn’t mesh with my New Testament, God-is-love spiritual milk perspective. If God is love, then why are there so many rules? And such harsh consequences?</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">So many reasons for Him to not love me. I will never measure up.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">My husband came home from Bible study last week completely perplexed at a statement someone made. They were discussing the mechanics of sin nature and perfect grace, and one man became totally offended at the conversation.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">“You make it sound like we don’t even deserve to be saved.”</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">“Well of course we don’t deserve to be saved. That’s the whole point of grace,” was my husband’s nice logical answer.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">There is no logic in wanting to be loved and the whole conversation made me cry. I <i>hear</i> what that man is saying. My heart wonders that same thing. Every. Single. Day. I just want to know that it’s ok for me to take up space in the world. I need to be sure that God wants me.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">My husband grew up remarkably undamaged. He accepted that he was loved at face value and moved on from there. I had a different experience. Love for me was always out of reach. Never exactly withheld, but never freely available. Love at my house was tired a lot, and irritable. It worked all day and fell asleep early. It was distracted and needy and overworked. It tried, but it just didn’t have <i>enough</i>.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">It had to choose and I could not be first choice. Must’ve been something I did.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><i> </i></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i>And this is how things will end up: Just as God once enjoyed you, took pleasure in making life good for you, giving you many children, so God will enjoy getting rid of you, clearing you off the Earth. He’ll weed you out of the very soil that you are entering in to possess. Deut 28:63</i></span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Wow. What kind of love is that? Love that can be taken away because I fail to keep some vague and nearly impossible rule of conduct? Nice. </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">But I’m pretty sure that’s the love God has for me. And He <i>enjoys</i> it, too. That’s what really gets me. I <i>must</i> be bad.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">If I could be charming enough, easy enough, pleasing enough, then I could be loved. But if I’m too much trouble, well, then it’s the crabgrass treatment for me, rip up my shallow roots and leave me to wither in the sun.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">In the world, love is too often saved for the worthy. And worthy turns on a dime. </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Or a fair weather friend. </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;">Or a fickle spouse. </span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Or a tired parent.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">“You make it sound like we don’t even deserve to be saved....” Well, we save what is dear to us, so really the question is “Could I deserve<i> </i>to be <i>loved</i>?” Because I really, really want to be. </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Can God love me if I am wretched and He is vengeful? Is He love or is He wrath? </span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">He is both. </span></span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">His nature is holy and perfect. He cannot mingle with sin, not even a little bit. He cannot be duplicitous, not even for love’s sake. God is perfectly just and justice must be served. </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><i>For the wages of sin is death... Romans 6:23a</i> </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Where there is sin, there must be death. God set the law in motion and, as He holds the whole world in His hands, it must be so.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">But He is also love. Perfect love. </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">...but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord. Romans 6:23b</span></i></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">He loved us, you, me, all of us, enough to pour his wrath on someone else. He poured it on His only son. So much wrath that He had to look away. </span></span><i style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Don’t miss the beauty of it. </i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">It is the </span><i style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">wrath</i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> that gives measure to the </span><i style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">love</i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">.</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; letter-spacing: 0px;"> </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">God is perfectly just, rewarding the good and punishing the bad, always consistent and never changing the rules. He will not mock us or set us up to fail. <i>Christ is for real.</i></span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">And He is perfectly loving, without reason and without limit, no matter where we go or what we do. He is never fickle or tired. And He will not quit us in hard times. <i>Christ is for you.</i></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><i>...Living then, as every one of you does, </i><b><i>in pure grace</i></b><i>, it’s important that you not misinterpret yourselves as people who are bringing this </i></span></span><i style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; letter-spacing: 0px;">goodness to God. No, God brings it all to you. </i><b style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; letter-spacing: 0px;"><i>The only accurate way to understand ourselves is by what God is and by what he does for us, not by what we are and what we do for him. </i></b><i style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; letter-spacing: 0px;"> </i></span><br />
<i style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-size: large;">Romans 12:3</span></i></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><i>Thank you Father that it is not about me, but only about You. I am nothing and yet You love me.</i></span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Stop wondering what you deserve. Don’t even think about your worthiness. <i>Don’t you see that none of that matters? </i>You are defined by who God is and what God did for you and He, my friend, has already saved you.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Accept that you are loved and move on to the promised land.</span></span></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07031208937165388116noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-328998205381002373.post-46473531006733699182013-06-14T00:14:00.000-05:002015-11-13T11:04:36.019-06:00Victory<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">I ran away one day a few months ago. I dropped the boy off at school and then drove around aimlessly for a few hours, turning at any old crossroads, not caring where I went, just not wanting to be where I <i>was</i>. </span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span><br /></span></div>
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">I’d been in the desert all year. The dry bones desert. But on this day, I ended up in front of a little white clapboard oasis, the Dogwood Baptist Church. Surely there was water there, for the sign out front said <i>through Christ we already have victory for every challenge that we face</i>.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span><br /></span></div>
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Every challenge. Every. Challenge.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span><br /></span></div>
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">I wonder a lot what victory in Jesus looks like in the day to day stuff of life. Because, I’ll be honest with you, I don’t always see it. I guess it’s my attitude, but it seems like I spend more time than not feeling frustrated and hurt. </span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span><br /></span></div>
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">I sat in a Bible study once, several years ago, and listened to a woman explain how she always prays for a good parking space when she goes shopping. And she always gets one. <i>Really?</i> A parking space is your victory story? Mine’s a little deeper than that.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span><br /></span></div>
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">I resent pollyanna Christianity. You can't polish up victory like it's a lucky penny. Jesus is not that cheap. Not my Jesus.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span><br /></span></div>
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">My Jesus is real. My Jesus has tangled hair and dusty feet and the rough hewn hands of a carpenter. He is sweat and heat. Salt and light. Muscle and sinew. </span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span><br /></span></div>
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">He walks beside me every tired step of this desert journey. </span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span><br /></span></div>
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Worn. </span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span><br /></span></div>
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Aching. </span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span><br /></span></div>
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Persevering. </span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span><br /></span></div>
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">He KNOWS. He suffered it all and yet comes back to walk the parched sand with me. He carries the cross again and again, up the long road to the place of the skull. Carries it for me. And for you.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span><br /></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">I am poured out like water, </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">(indeed the spirit of God lives in me)</span></i></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">and all my bones are out of joint;</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">(governed by the Spirit, I yield to you)</span></i></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">my heart is like wax; it is melted within my breast;</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">(He who searches my heart knows the mind of the Spirit)</span></i></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">my strength is dried up like a potsherd, </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">(I am weakened by the flesh)</span></i></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">and my tongue sticks to the roof of my mouth; </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">(intercede for me, Holy Spirit)</span></i></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">you lay me in the dust of death.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">(we are considered as sheep to be slaughtered)</span></i></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Psalm 22: 14-15, Romans 8</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span><br /></span></div>
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">The victory is that we are not ever-confined to a parking space. In fact we are not parked here at all, only passing through. <i>Do not confine God to that small space. </i>If you do, you will miss the vastness of the One who was and is and is to come.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span><br /></span></div>
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">And that day to day victory- what is it? Simply <i>manna.</i> The stuff of life to sustain us in the desert. But the real victory, the milk and honey victory, is that He loves us enough to walk us home.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span><br /></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons,</span></i></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"> neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor </span></i></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from </span></i></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord. </span></i></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Romans 8:38-39</span></i></span></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07031208937165388116noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-328998205381002373.post-8590809454897455732013-05-20T12:44:00.000-05:002015-11-13T11:04:36.137-06:00The Train Wreck Perspective<br />
<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">There are times when I can just feel other parents disapproval at the way I parent my child. It burns right through me. Stabs me in the back sometimes, but no matter. I have been tasked with raising this child to be a Godly man and that is what I will do. Like it or not.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span><br /></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><i>Fathers,</i><b><i> </i></b><i>do not exasperate your children; instead, bring them up in the training and instruction of the Lord. Eph 6:4</i></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span><br /></span></div>
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">I negotiate with my son. I engage him and listen to his opinions. I seek to understand why he does things. I let him speak his feelings freely to me. I do this because we are knit together from the same cloth and I <i>get</i> what he needs. My son will not trust the daily bread if it burns too hot. For that reason, for his <i>good</i>, I am willing to see from his perspective.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span><br /></span></div>
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">But then... there are times when my perspective trumps his. Times when he's chasing butterflies down the tracks and only I see the train in the distance. He's smaller and most often absorbed in his day. I am bigger. I can see past the trees. I know what's coming. </span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span><br /></span></div>
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">I've seen the train before.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span><br /></span></div>
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">In these times I say, "Stop!" and I expect him to stop. No negotiations, no opinions. Just stop. <i><b>This</b>, child, is the line you should not cross. Trust me. The train is coming. You must not go further.</i></span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span><br /></span></div>
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">It takes trust to accept the Father's perspective. Trust like a child. Small and humble.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span><br /></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Let us humble ourselves before the Lord, and he will lift us up. James 4:10</span></i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span><br /></span></div>
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">I've seen the train before because I am the train wreck, chasing butterflies and wrapped up in my own little world.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span><br /></span></div>
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Yesterday I got schooled in the ways of trust and obedience by a child, young woman really, just graduating high school, who was sent to deliver a God-breathed message to my church on a very difficult day. </span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span><br /></span></div>
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">She shared with us her trials from the past year: worrying over her grades, arguing with a friend, confusion over the future. She said that no matter what we are going through, there's a Bible verse for it. And she said it in wide-eyed, utterly trusting belief, the belief of a girl who had simply rested her small grasp in her Father's knowing and let him lead her safely across the tracks.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span><br /></span></div>
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">We could easily dismiss her words. It's too simple. It's high school. We're bigger. Our problems are bigger. Our consequences are bigger. It's not the same.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span><br /></span></div>
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Or is it? That is a matter of perspective.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Because from the perspective of the throne of the One Holy God, we are all children misbehaving- looking to others for approval, not getting along, not trusting in His wisdom.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Stop child. The train is coming. You must not cross that line.</span></i></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">But we cross. And we crash. And we suffer for it.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">There is hope. From the train wreck perspective, we are all the same- low and on our knees. From the train wreck perspective, our eyes are closed and we see only what the Spirit reveals. From the train wreck perspective, the hem of His robe does indeed fill the temple. From there, <i>and only there</i>, can we reach to touch it and be healed. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><i><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">She said to herself, “If I only touch his robe, I will be healed.” Jesus turned and saw her. “Take heart, daughter,” he said, “your faith has healed you.” And the woman was healed at that moment. Matthew 9: 21-22</span></i></span></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07031208937165388116noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-328998205381002373.post-82211198991709597822013-05-12T19:48:00.000-05:002015-11-13T11:04:36.116-06:00Motherhood and New Life <div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">My son was born on Mother’s Day.</span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"> </span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">He is nine now and he carries my whole-heart in his pocket, right alongside treasured rocks and found pennies.</span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"> </span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">He is a beautiful and amazing boy, but he is not the greatest gift I have ever received. </span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"> </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the </span></i></span><i style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows. James 1:17</span></i></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Every little girl wants to grow up to be a mommy. Or most do, I guess. I certainly did, and I had a pretty good idea about how the whole thing would work. Get a big white dress and marry Prince Charming. Buy a dream house and a pink convertible. Have a perfect little baby who is just like you and keep your tiny little waist and glamorous job as a Charlie’s Angel (it was the 70’s after all.) So, at the tender age of 6, I took the first step toward motherhood- I married my Barbie off to her beloved Ken and set her about the business of becoming a mommy. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Now, I was savvy enough to know that there was a process to all this baby-making. Determined to keep it real, the polyester wedding dress and snap-on tuxedo were dropped in the proverbial ‘pile in the floor’ and Barbie jumped in her orange plastic bed with her beige plastic man. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">“Well, this is weird,” I thought. It was not at all romantic. Nothing like <i>The Love Boat. </i> No sweeping musical crescendos, just a stiff-armed embrace and two dolls grinning wide-eyed at each other despite Ken’s obvious anatomical deficiencies.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">“How are they going to <b>sleep</b> like this <b>all night long</b><i>?</i>,” I wondered. “If they roll over, they’ll fall out of the bed!!!” </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">An unexpected obstacle indeed. And that is how reality trickled in and began to crack my little mommy’s heart. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Fast forward 18 years when I got my own big white dress and married my own Prince Charming. We settled for the ‘dream apartment’, though, and a hand-me-down Ford Taurus. No Charlie’s Angels either, but store manager jobs for Gymboree and The Sports Authority weren’t too terrible. We spent the next 6 years in newly wedded bliss. But something was amiss. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">I always thought we’d have 2 or 3 children, at least one boy and one girl- a little Rocky with blue eyes and a little Beverly with red hair. He’d play football and she’d take dance lessons. I could be a stay at home mom just like the ones who shopped in my store. We’d live our days happy, with finger paint and sugar cookies, zoo trips and play groups, bedtime stories and lullabies. Sunny days chasing the clouds away....</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Infertility, however, was an unexpected obstacle. Reality flooded this time and tore my mommy heart wide open.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">It took nearly 18 months to conceive our son. 18 months of tests, procedures, drugs and medical bills. Eighteen months of appointments and disappointments and desperate wanting. Eighteen months of negative pregnancy tests piled on top of six years of waiting. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">The process of trying to conceive is unimaginably stressful. It’s a nightmare of charts and calendars, pills and shots, tests and procedures. A nightmare of medical jargon that you don’t understand and your insurance company is not going to pay for. A nightmare of hope springing eternal and then drying up repeatedly in neat little 28 day cycles. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">I gave my heart to my future family when I was just a little girl. Before I ever grew up. Before I ever got married. Before I ever got pregnant. Before all of that, I loved them. I loved them <i>whole-heartedly</i>. And when they didn’t come, it broke my whole heart into pieces.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">During the time that we were working so hard to conceive, I became fascinated with my boss’s family. He probably thought I was weird because whenever I went in his office, I would look (ok, <i>stare</i>) at the picture he had on his desk of his wife and two daughters. It was Easter. She was beautiful and they were adorable. All pastel dresses and little white sweaters. I wanted those sunny day smiles for myself. When he dragged himself in late every morning, citing the previous night’s chaos of musical beds and cheese in the DVD player, I wanted that chaos for myself. I wanted to tell funny kid stories around the water cooler. I wanted to put their pictures on my desk. I wanted to fall asleep with my 3 year old’s head heavy on my shoulder and smell her strawberry hair. <i>Good night stars. Good night air. Good night noises everywhere. </i></span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">I wanted it like water in the desert. But I didn’t think it was for me.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">I realize now, ten years later, that there was something much, much deeper behind my Sesame Street desperation. You see, way back when, while little Beverly played Barbies in her room, the world began to whisper in her ear.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">You’re not good enough for the life you want. </span></i></span><br />
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">You don’t deserve the dream house. </span></i></span><br />
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">No one will ever treasure you. </span></i></span><br />
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Your needs are not important. </span></i></span><br />
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">There is something disgraceful inside you.</span></i></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">And as I grew older, those whispers became shouts and the mark of my inherent shamefulness was stamped on me in the most personal way. One day I will share that story too, but not today.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">This story, however, has the happiest of endings, a gift still to come that was, and is, far greater that the honored title of <i>beloved mommy</i>. In August of 2003, I got my wish. All the trying, waiting and testing was done. We were pregnant! It was pastel baby-booted bliss, twinged with nausea and clothed in maternity pants. Pregnancy and motherhood. The unexpected became <i>expecting</i>.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">For me though, prolonged stress means ‘major depressive episode’. And eighteen months of reproductive endocrinology is definitely prolonged stress. What I had waited and hoped for had come, but it did not bring peace. My joy was battered with insomnia, panic attacks and uncontrollable crying spells. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">In 1 Samuel, the Lord had closed Hannah’s womb. It wasn’t that she just couldn’t have children, but <i>the Lord closed her womb</i>. She cried for a son for years. To not bear children at that time was a source of shame, and Hannah was ridiculed her for her barrenness. She needed a son to bring her redemption.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;"><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; letter-spacing: 0px;">She made a promise to Him. She said "Lord, you rule over all. Please see how I'm suffering! Show concern for me! Don't forget about me! Please give me a son! If you do, I'll give him back to you. Then he will serve you all the days of his life. He'll never use a razor on his head. He'll never cut his hair." 1 Samuel 1:11</span></i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large; letter-spacing: 0px;">The Lord closed Hannah’s womb until she came to a place of relenting and gave Him all that she had.</span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">So now I am glad to boast about my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ can work through me. 2 Cor 12:9</span></i></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">One night, in the middle of my pregnancy and in the darkest part of my depression, I came to a place of relenting and gave Him all that I had. I had always believed, but never understood, claimed but never submitted. But that night, on my knees in front of our second-hand sofa in our cheap little apartment, I cried out to God and he sent me a son to redeem me.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Not my son, but His. And then He whispered in my ear.</span></span></div>
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">I will give you eternal life.</span></i></span><br />
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">I have a room for you in My house.</span></i></span><br />
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">I treasure you so much that I numbered every hair on your head.</span></i></span><br />
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">I will meet your needs according to the riches of My glory.</span></i></span><br />
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">My grace is sufficient for you. And I will fill you with it until your cup runs over.</span></i></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">It’s in the broken places that we give way. What I wanted was a family, to give me love and belonging, and to cover what was the shame of me. I would have settled for the dream house, and used it to bind my own heart up whole again. Bind it tight and close it forever. But water in the desert comes only from <i>the rock- </i> it was my wounded heart that allowed living water in to wash me through. And with it rained steadfast love and plentiful redemption, a new mercy every morning, and the honored title <i>of beloved daughter.</i></span></span></div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07031208937165388116noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-328998205381002373.post-82640311974379439652013-04-28T21:09:00.000-05:002015-11-13T11:04:36.120-06:00I Feared Anyway<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Supposedly God says “Do not fear” 365 times in the Bible, once for every day of the year.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">I feared anyway.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">My husband just took the shortest Emmaus Walk in the history of the world- 22 hours from start to finish. The Emmaus Walk, if you don’t know, is a Christian retreat tradition that dates back to the 1960’s. It’s 4 days in the woods with nothing but solitude and Jesus. No phone, no lights, no motorcars. No way to call your wife.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">I cried the whole time he was gone.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">I made it 16 hours before I called the camp. I was mad. I was hurt. This was just not the right time for him to go away. We have too much stress in our lives right now- heavy, caustic burdens that I can’t bear by myself. And I had to tell him right then because I knew that if I suffered the weekend, it would take months to bind the wounds.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">But I couldn’t say any of that. I could only cry and say <i>you left us.</i></span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">He came right home.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;">Last July, he was diagnosed with testicular cancer, a very aggressive but relatively easy cancer to treat. Four months from diagnosis to cure– bloodwork, CT scans, surgery, port catheter, IV’s, drug cocktails, shots. 80+ hours of poison dripping into my husband’s veins. A pulmonary embolism. Chemo and third grade started in the same week. His goatee fell out on his 37</span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><sup>th</sup></span><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"> birthday. I saw it, a clump of hair missing from his chin when I was giving him a cupcake. He was too weak to blow out the candle and too nauseated to eat the cake. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">That’s cancer.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">But now he is cancer free. Divinely touched by Yahweh-rapha<i>,</i> <i>God who heals</i>, and sent back to life. Emails to answer, homework to check, grass to cut, dog to walk, bills to pay. Life.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">It’s been 206 days since he last sat in that chemo chair. On every one of those days, God has told me not to fear and I did it anyway. I feared that my husband would die. Everyday. I just didn’t realize it until he went away. I don’t want to spend a weekend without him, much less a life. I fell utterly apart. </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">But that was all yesterday. Today, I’m safe and loved in a cabin in the Smokey Mountains with both of my boys. Nobody left. Nobody died. Instead we retreated <i>together.</i></span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">I’m now on the sofa writing with the dog at my feet, and the boys are playing pool in the rec room below. In the cabin next to us,<i> </i>5 musicians unpack. One of them plays his trumpet on the balcony. <i>Surreal.</i> And God watches over all from above, just as he said he would.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Earlier this morning, my husband called the boy and me outside to look at the clouds. In the distance, we could see the blue horizon of the mountains covered under an endless blanket of clouds. <i>Covered.</i></span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">There was one wisp of a cloud that had descended to settle in the valley below. Just one wisp.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Behold He comes</span></i></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Riding on a cloud</span></i></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Shining like the sun</span></i></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">At the trumpet’s call</span></i></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">I am in the valley, but I am not alone. A trumpet calls desolate and Jesus descends, gentle in the mist, to sit with me.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death,</span></i></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"> I will fear no evil, for You are with me; </span></i></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Your rod and your staff, they comfort me. Psalm 23:4</span></i></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Thank you <i>Abba</i> for telling me every single day not to fear. Keep telling me. Keep telling me. </span></span>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07031208937165388116noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-328998205381002373.post-80449591302946314102013-04-19T10:01:00.002-05:002015-11-13T11:04:36.111-06:00What God Sees<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">When you got out of bed this morning, did you see Joy?</span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"> </span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;">Were you filled with possibility or stifled by your list before you even opened your eyes? </span><span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"> </span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span><br /></span></div>
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">When you got dressed, did you see Holiness? Did you clothe yourself in fine linen and purple because <i>you are a temple</i> or did you shame the dwelling place of the Holy Spirit for its cellulite and hide it under black stretchy pants?</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">When you ate breakfast, did you see Manna? Did you nourish yourself with goodness or did you feel fat and guilty for every bite? Or did you even <i>feed yourself at all</i>?</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">When you dressed your kids, did you see Love?</span><span style="font-size: large;"> </span><span style="font-size: large;">Did you see capable hands that fed and clothed and nurtured?</span><span style="font-size: large;"> </span><span style="font-size: large;">Or did you see clumsy fingers that cling when they should let go and sometimes <i>neglect to hold at all</i>?</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-size: large;">When you hugged your husband good bye, did you see Desire? Did you pause to love and <i>be</i> <i>loved</i> or did you pull away because, honestly, it just reminds you of your failure to be beautiful?</span></span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">When you looked in the bathroom mirror this morning, did you see your <i>Self</i>? Or did you long since hide her away, sealing her heart shut with resignation and pursed lips? </span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-size: large;">What did you see?</span></span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><i>Let me tell you what God sees.</i></span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">God first made the heavens and the earth, the dark and the light, and He saw that it was good.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">But that wasn’t enough, so He made the sky and saw that it was good too.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Still He wasn’t satisfied, so He added land and sea and plants and trees. And He saw that it was good.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span><br /></span></div>
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">But the sky was dark. So He hung the moon and the sun and the stars to make it bright. Again, He saw that it was good, but still....</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span><br /></span></div>
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">He filled the sky with birds and the water with fish. And these too He saw good, but there is more.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span><br /></span></div>
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">He set animals on the land to roam and to graze, each according to their kind. Also good, but not yet complete.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span><br /></span></div>
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">He formed a man from the dust and breathed into him His very own breath of life. And all of this He saw was very good. But the Creator of the universe yearned for one more thing.... </span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span><br /></span></div>
<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">And so He made <i>you, </i>daughter of Eve.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">And then He rested.</span></span><br />
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">You created the deepest parts of my being.</span></i></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">You put me together inside my mother’s body.</span></i></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">How You made me is amazing and wonderful.</span></i></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">I praise You for that.</span></i></span></div>
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<i style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: large;"> </span>Psalm 139:13-14</span></i><br />
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<i style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">This blog post inspired by the book <u>Captivating</u> by Staci Eldredge. Great book! <u>Wild at Heart</u> by her husband John is even better...</span></i></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07031208937165388116noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-328998205381002373.post-74001196348315277162013-04-15T10:24:00.004-05:002015-11-13T11:04:36.107-06:00Throwing Rocks<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">When I was a kid, I lived out in the country. I didn’t really have a lot of other kids to play with, but there were two particular playmates that I will never forget because these two kids left a mark on my heart.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Brother and sister, a couple of years younger than me, they were a little bit of a neighborhood enigma. Their family moved into the ‘big’ house on my tired country road, the one with the terraced front yard and cool modern staircase, the one brick dot on a map of trailers and old farmhouses. They didn’t live there long, maybe a year, and they didn’t go to public school. I can’t tell you one thing about their parents, not one single thing- what they looked like, where they worked- nothing except that they were <i>religious</i>. </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">We, however, were not. We went to church for weddings and funerals. We said grace at Thanksgiving. We breezed past Jesus on the way to see Santa Claus, but that’s about it. </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">One good thing, though, about my churchless upbringing is that <i>The Hymnbook for Christian Worship</i> was totally lost on me. As a child, this ignorance would nearly condemn me, but today I love traditional hymns. They're new to me. Their simple worship makes my striving heart stand down. This is one of my favorites:</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">What can wash away my sin?<br />
Nothing but the blood of Jesus;<br />
What can make me whole again?<br />
Nothing but the blood of Jesus.</span></i></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Man, I feel those words in my soul. Me - made right with the One who set the sun in the sky, bathed in the balm of merciful love and made whole - all of it done amidst the spite of 6 year old Pharisees and their misguided exhortations. </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Back then, I didn’t know church songs, didn’t know Bible stories, didn’t know about rainbows or talking donkeys or the belly of any fish; and I certainly didn’t know about the drenching grace of a savior who loves me.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">I wasn’t about to learn it from these kids either.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">One summer afternoon, they decided to evangelize me. Right there at the end of my dusty driveway, two barefoot prophets ate Squirrel Nut Zippers and preached hell-fire and damnation to a freckle-faced little sinner.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">“Is your dad a Christian? Our dad says you’re not Christians.”</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">“Um, yeah, my dad’s a Christian.”</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">“Are you saved?”</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">“I don’t know. I guess so.”</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">“If you had Jesus in your heart, you would know it. Do you go to church?”</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">“No, we don’t go to church.”</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">“Why don't you go to church? Do you even know the words to <i>Amazing Grace</i>?”</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">“No.”</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">“Well, then you're not a Christian. You need to go to church and get saved. If you don’t repent, you’ll go to hell.”</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span><br /></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Well, I let them know exactly how un-sanctified I was with a few choice words about shutting up and kissing my butt, surely heathen words if ever I’ve said any. Then I ran home. And they threw rocks at me.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Yep. They stoned me because I didn’t know grace.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">30-some odd years later, I know that if I were the only person on Earth who couldn’t sing <i>Amazing Grace</i>, Jesus still would have died for me. No rejection I could suffer was not first suffered by him. I know that he KNOWS and it’s ok.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><br />
<i>He heals the brokenhearted and binds up their wounds. Psalm 147:3</i></span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Sadly, though, some lessons are too soon forgotten.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">I’m still a freckle-faced sinner, but now all grown up and full of myself in Jesus’ name. I play nice with the other mommies at the park until it comes to the one who can’t sing grace - you know the one, twice divorced with wild kids and a worn out heart. When it comes to that mom, I'm likely as not to eat up all my mercy like sticky, sweet candy and throw rocks at her instead. </span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">It lays my heart open raw to think of some of the hurt I’ve judged into being. Some things I can go back and apologize for. Some things I can fix. But some things are too far gone.</span></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Jesus please fix the hearts I’ve broken and bind up their wounds too.</span></i></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Nothing can for sin atone,<br />
Nothing but the blood of Jesus;<br />
Naught of good that I have done,<br />
Nothing but the blood of Jesus.</span></i></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">When we put our sins at the foot of the cross, it’s not just for our own atonement. We give them to Jesus so he can make all things right. <i>All things</i>. </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i></i></span><br /></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">This is all my hope and peace,<br />
Nothing but the blood of Jesus;<br />
This is all my righteousness,<br />
Nothing but the blood of Jesus.</span></i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i></i></span><br /></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">He still claims me. He pries open my self-righteous fists and lets the rocks fall to the ground. And then he washes my dirty hands clean.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"></span><br /></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><i>I can clean the mud you sling just as surely as I have cleaned you,</i> He says.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px;"><i></i></span><br /></span></div>
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<span style="letter-spacing: 0px;"><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Glory! Glory! This I sing—<br />
Nothing but the blood of Jesus,<br />
All my praise for this I bring—<br />
Nothing but the blood of Jesus.</span></i></span></div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07031208937165388116noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-328998205381002373.post-52372096623525695352013-04-12T09:18:00.001-05:002015-11-13T11:04:36.024-06:00The Enemy <span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;">I want to share something that my husband wrote about 2 years ago. Today is our 16th wedding anniversary. Thank you for building our house on the Rock. The boy and I could not have a better husband and father to take care of us!</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: large;"><i><br /></i></span>
<span style="font-size: large;">(And if you're reading this and you don't know me, my husband's name is, ironically, <i>Rocky</i>....)</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: large;"><i><br /></i></span>
<span style="font-size: large;"><i>The Enemy walks toward the edge of the cliff overlooking the sea. As he looks down he takes note of every detail. He wants to affix this moment in his memory forever. He has planned this moment for years.</i></span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: large;"><i><br /></i></span>
<span style="font-size: large;"><i> </i><i>He looks below at the small home that contains the source of his contempt. Finally he will gain the victory he has sought. </i><i> </i><i>He feels the breeze pick up and he pulls the hood back from his head so he can take in the coming storm with all of his senses. He smells the storm on the air now and he knows it will not be long.</i><i> </i></span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: large;"><i><br /></i></span>
<span style="font-size: large;"><i>A knowing smile creeps onto his visage as he looks down once again. He knows that there is no way for the family below to predict the kind of storm he has set in motion. He smiles wider as he recalls all the preparation for this one event. Each step along the way was a deception to build the coming storm.</i><i> </i></span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: large;"><i><br /></i></span>
<span style="font-size: large;"><i>The wind is biting now and cold. The first few raindrops begin to sting his cheeks as he lifts his head to the sky in victory. He has seen this play out before. The storm will wreck the home below. The waves will claim their prize, scatter those within, and the wreckage of the home will float out to sea. The family will be destroyed.</i><i> </i></span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: large;"><i><br /></i></span>
<span style="font-size: large;"><i>The rain is falling hard now and he has to concentrate to see the home below. He knows the home has only minutes before it is claimed by the storm. The wind is assaulting the beach and the cliff but the real danger is building. The waves are crashing on shore now and he knows they will soon reach the home.</i><i> </i><i>He looks out to the sea and notes the swelling waves. </i></span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: large;"><i><br /></i></span>
<span style="font-size: large;"><i>With each flash of lightning he can make out the increasing danger. The waves are now crashing against the base of the home. </i><i> </i><i>The Enemy smiles more broadly now. This is his favorite part. For he craves most not the power that is being displayed but the destruction that it will bring. </i></span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: large;"><i><br /></i></span>
<span style="font-size: large;"><i>He recalls the countless storms he has set in motion and the destruction they have caused. He waits to hear the creaking and cracking sound that announces that the sea has claimed the home.</i><i> </i><i>He can see now with each lightning flash the intensifying waves and then he spots the one, the wave that will engulf the home completely. He watches it violently come ashore and crash over the home. He notes with some pride that this storm is proving to be more destructive than most. He leans over the cliff and listens intently for the sound of the home being crushed.</i><i> </i></span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: large;"><i><br /></i></span>
<span style="font-size: large;"><i>As the wave breaks over the home his smile falters. </i><i> </i><i>He realizes that he heard no sounds of destruction. By the next lightning flash he can see why. The home is still standing!</i><i> </i></span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: large;"><i><br /></i></span>
<span style="font-size: large;"><i>He thinks to himself that this storm will soon claim this home. The very beach is being assaulted by the ocean. He can see the sand being torn from the beach by the violence of this storm. </i><i> </i><i>Another wave crashes over the home. There is still no damage.</i><i> </i></span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: large;"><i><br /></i></span>
<span style="font-size: large;"><i>His smile is gone now. It has been replaced by a look of puzzlement and a slight hint of fear. He knows the storm is exceptionally violent. He takes a closer look as a third and fourth wave crash over the home totally engulfing it in the angry sea.</i><i> </i><i>As the water resides and the sky is lit by a brilliant flash he sees his failure. The storm has washed away the sand and revealed solid rock! </i><i> </i></span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: large;"><i><br /></i></span>
<span style="font-size: large;"><i>As he watches the storm rage he knows that he has failed. For all of his preparation and cunning he failed to realize that the home was built upon the rock.</i><i> </i><i>The rage the enemy feels is growing. With his anger and hatred also comes an empty feeling of impotence. He knows that once a home is build upon the rock it will draw strength and power from the rock. The home can break any storm because the rock can break any storm.</i><i> </i></span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: large;"><i><br /></i></span>
</span><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><i>The storm is fading now, as all storms must. </i><i>The enemy looks to the east and notes the rising sun. He quickly pulls his rain soaked hood over his head to protect him from the light. </i><i> </i></span><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">As the first rays of light shine on the home on the rock the enemy retreats. He has been defeated and he knows it is so. </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"> </span></i></span>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07031208937165388116noreply@blogger.com0