2015 - A Year of...

-Thinking I know something, only to find out that God really knows better.

-Realizing how great it is to give God my worries in exchange for His joy.

     Imagine: God and you hiking up a trail in the mountains. You're carrying a large, heavy pack on your back. You're trying to have a good attitude about hiking up the mountain with a large pack on your back, but in all honesty, you're getting worn out, and the scenery is losing its splendor because all you're focusing on is taking one more tired step. Then you hear a voice behind you.
     "I'll take your backpack," God says. 
     "Oh, no, that's ok - I feel like I should probably carry this," you say.
     The pack gets heavier and heavier.
    "Really - I WANT to carry it for you. I'm happy to do it! Actually, I'll carry it better than you're carrying it right now," He insists. 
     Finally you give in. He puts it on His own back and keeps hiking. It looks effortless. And you feel free as a bird, and you run, and together you laugh. Oh the joy...

-Seeing how, over time, the circumstances that seemed like big ordeals became not so big anymore!

-Learning that God wouldn't ask us to delight in Him unless He was delightful!

-Believing that, if the best choice is A, but I choose B, God will not reject me.

     "If I take the wings of the morning and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea,
     even there Your hand shall lead me, and Your right hand shall hold me." (Psalm 139:9-10)

In 2015 God was big, I was small, but He still liked me anyway.

Thoughts from a Nature Walk in June...

Sometimes, when existential questions won't leave me alone, one of the most comforting messages of the Father's creation is that of simply doing what God created it to do. The warbler just warbling and going about its bird business. The cottonwood leafing out every spring, sending forth its flurries of seed fluff, growing inch upon inch, just doing what God created it to do. The milkweed, growing right underneath that bench. The wild bee balm looking over my shoulder - it didn't know I was going to come sit here and enjoy the scent of its rubbed leaves. But it grew anyway because that's where the seed fell, that's where the rain soaked, and that's where the sunshine warmed the earth. And it responded. All of creation performs to the best if its ability. And that's all I am required to do as well. The Lord won't judge the milkweed for not growing as tall as the cottonwood, and He won't judge the warbler for not singing the cardinals' song.

Grafting

When the farmer grafts a branch onto his tree, or his plant, or his vine, he does so with great hope. He doesn't do it grudgingly; it is a decided choice of his. He wants to graft this branch, and he wants to see what it will do - mainly, bear fruit. He doesn't graft it doubtfully or skeptically or with disapproval for the branch; he feels that the branch holds great promise now that it is grafted into the sturdy stock of the vine or tree, and he also knows that the success of the branch largely depends on how well the farmer takes care of that graft. The farmer has an invested interest in the graft; he went to the work of finding the branch, preparing it, grafting it, wrapping it and tying it tight to the vine. He would never graft it and then leave it alone, never checking on it to see if the graft is taking. He gives that graft everything it could ever possibly need so that it will grow strong and fruitful.

-"I am the true vine, and My Father is the vinedresser...I am the vine, you are the branches..." John 15
-"For if you were cut from what is by nature a wild olive tree, and grafted, contrary to nature, into a cultivated olive tree, how much more will these, the natural branches, be grafted back into their own olive tree." Romans 11

When my little branchy heart is convicted and wanting to turn back to my Father-Farmer, why would I ever doubt His heart to want my good?


***Thoughts from Andrew Murray's book, Abiding in Christ.

Psalm 119

"In Your steadfast love, give me life;

that I may keep the testimonies of Your mouth."

Psalm 119:88

"In Your steadfast love, give me life" ... so that I can do what I want and be happy?
"In Your steadfast love, give me" ... the things I want because I want them?

How often is my prayer, "...give me life; that I may keep the testimonies of Your mouth"?

It would appear as though the writer's focus here is the testimonies of the LORD; they are his concern, his priority. What the LORD speaks is important to him; His words carry significant weight in the writer's world.

A testimony is generally a statement or declaration given with the understanding that it is assumed to be true. More specifically a testimony is uttered under oath in court. Most specifically in the Bible the Ten Commandments are called the testimony. The testimonies of the LORD in verse 88 would be the Ten Commandments, yes - a visible component of God's covenant with His people at Mount Sinai - but they would also be statements that He has made elsewhere throughout Scripture that we can claim as statements of complete truth.

"In Your steadfast love..." The same God who spoke testimonies also gives steadfast love. The testimonies are not apart from His love. The testimonies are given in love.

May my prayer more and more be "In Your steadfast love, give me life; that I may keep the testimonies of Your mouth." Give me life, strength, vitality to cling to Your truthful words, to walk out my days according to what You have said is right - because You are a God of steadfast love.

Guiding Promises

This morning I appreciated reading from Elisabeth Elliot's book, A Slow and Certain Light. In one passage she quotes verses that speak poignantly to me in this season of my life. When sometimes I feel very much like I am standing at a crossroads in the middle of a forest with fog rolling close around and no signs posted to show me where to go, these verses stick.

http://hdwpics.com/images/2316D7C3AA09/Foggy-Path-Through-The-Forest.jpg

"If you can't see the way before you:

'I will lead the blind in a way that they know not, in paths that they have not known I will guide them. I will turn the darkness before them into light, the rough places into level ground.' (Is. 42:16))



"If no way looks possible at all:

'And I will make my mountains a way, and my highway shall be raised up.' (Is. 49:11)



"If you are confused or distressed:

'I will lead him and requite him with comfort.' (Is. 57:18)



"If you falter or are fearing failure:

'Thou hast delivered my soul from death: wilt not thou deliver my feet from falling…?'" (Ps. 56:13)

Little John the Baptists

Reading through Zechariah's prophecy in the beginning of Luke chapter 2:

"And you, child [John], will be called the prophet of the Most High; for you will go before the Lord to prepare His ways, to give knowledge of salvation to His people in the forgiveness of their sins, because of the tender mercy of our God, whereby the sunrise shall visit us from on high to give light to those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the way of peace."

And the thought occurred to me, are not all of God's children, in a sense, little John the Baptists? We are called to prepare the way for Him and His presence and His kingdom as we walk through our life. We are all called to give knowledge of salvation to His people, to everyone wherever we go. And as we do that, His light will begin to shine on those who sit in darkness and shadows of death, and He will guide our feet into peaceful paths.

About Beauty...

"Don’t let Hollywood define it; let the pages of Truth define it: Romance is a long sacrifice.

Say that quiet to yourself at the mirror, over the stove, over the toilet bowls, and let your soul feel the caress of God who knows: Romance is a long sacrifice.

And then it will happen to you, like it happens to all the women who are soul beautiful and loved:

For a beautiful countenance — count blessings.
For beautiful lips — only speak words that make souls stronger.
To carry yourself with poise — carry each other’s burden.
For the most beautiful shape — simply live with one hand receiving all as gift, and other hand giving away the gifts. You becoming the shape of a gift —
Becoming the shape of a Cross.
Go ahead, Girl, run your hands wild through your hair and smile unashamed and be at peace in the fullness of you and pour your beauty out like an alabaster perfume:

Beauty doesn’t live in your skin

Beauty lives in the lining of your heart."

-Ann Voskamp - www.aholyexperience.com