In Dire Straits...

It is good for me that I was afflicted, that I might learn your statutes.

The law of your mouth is better to me than thousands of gold and silver pieces.

Psalm 119: 71-72

Dire straits is not such a bad place to be. Hard times stretch our unworn spiritual muscles, make us cling to the Word of God for dear life. God shows me His faithfulness in these times, times where I am being stretched beyond what I think I can take.

The Israelites wandered in the desert for 40 years complaining and grumbling. Then, they did not even get to go into the land, after all that. They died in the desert and their children got to go in instead.

Paul told us in I Corinthians 10 that their story was written for us, upon whom the ends of the ages have come. So I began to think about my life and my own wilderness journey. I have been a Christian for most of my life. But I think nearly forty years of my own have come to pass where I spent a good deal of the time grumbling and complaining.

Grumbling and "venting" feels good for the moment. But it never gets me anywhere, never gives me any solutions, except to commiserate with others who are also struggling. It doesn't build me up, it doesn't build them up either. 

Did you ever think "if only" something was going the way you wanted, you could then be happy? I know I have believed that lie so many times. If only so and so liked me, if only I had done this instead of that, if only I hadn't made that mistake way back when, or was "there" instead of in the place where I am now.

You know what? The list of "if only's" could go on forever. Here is a shocking revelation: I don't have to have any condition outside of myself in which to be happy. Happiness comes from a source way beyond myself, if only I will avail myself of it moment by moment. It comes from one constant unchangeable fact: that God of all Gods looked down from eternity and saw us in our misery and decided to do something about it by taking all of our sins and guilt onto Himself at the cross. He proved beyond a shadow of a doubt that He loved us by dying for us on the cross.

I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. Galatians 2:20

I need to spend the rest of my time here on earth just going and learning what all that really means, unwrapping this wonderful gift of salvation and walking in fellowship with my blessed Lord and Savior. It makes my life worth living. It is the only thing that does. 

If I love Him, then I can I trust Him that He will take the hardest and most trying times of my life and work them together for my ultimate good. It is to this simple fact that I am clinging.

Lately it seems that so many of God's children are going through difficulties. Are you trying to lean on your own understanding? You will never understand why all these bad things happen except that to see that they are the only way that God can get our attention, wake us out of our spiritual stupor and cling with all our might to the Lover of our souls.

Yes, I'm a Mom but...

Somehow today I am supposed to be elevated to almost a godlike status somehow? I am supposed to feel my worth in how well I am treated by my children?

I have often wondered about this. You see, I have three children. Two of them are

still in contact with me but one has sadly left the fold. So days like this one, Mother’s Day, can be difficult for me. It is hard for me not to think of the “what if’s” and “if only’s.”

We mothers are not gods. We have feet of clay, I have learned. I mothered much the way I was mothered, warts and all. Not to say that my Mom is not a great Mom. Guess what? My Mom mothered the way she was mothered, and her mother mothered the way she was mothered.
The apple doesn’t fall too far from the tree, you know.

So what’s the point of making a big deal of Mother’s Day? Well, we take a day to honor and remember the things she did for us, which should not be limited to just one day a year. We are admonished to honor our parents in the Word of God everyday so that our lives would go well with us. There reaches a point in human maturity when one stops blaming their parents for all of their problems and takes on responsibility for their own life. Yes, we all have been handed a raw deal. It is called the fall of man and it started when Eve took the fruit from the serpent. Ever since then, there has been no perfect mother, and no perfect family. Our excuses might sound good before men, but they won’t stand before God. We each will stand alone.

So, on Mother’s Day, I did get very kind thanks from two of my children and I am quite grateful for that. But could I be happy if not even one of them acknowledged me? That one is a tough one to think about, but if I let my mind think with the Word of God, I could say “yes,” I could still be happy.

You see, my happiness should not depend on the kind of card I get, the gifts I get, the adulation from others. It all boils down to this: ONE Person came down from His heavenly abode and all His glory and took on the likeness of human flesh to become one of us, made from dust and dirt. HE loved me enough to hang on the cross for me until all my sins, and everyone else’s too, were paid for. It comes down to these words describing Christ from the book of Galatians chapter 2, verse 20:
“who loved me, and gave Himself for me.” (emphasis added)

Surely that is better than a card or gift on Mother’s Day, is it not? Don’t get me wrong, I am thankful for what I have, but the greatest gift of all that remains is LOVE. His Love, demonstrated by giving Himself for us unconditionally on Calvary’s Cross. It was more of a sacrifice than any mother ever made for her child, it was more than any love one person showed for another, indeed, it was a love that was not from this world.

See how great a love the Father has bestowed on us, that we would be called children of God; and such we are. For this reason the world does not know us, because it did not know Him. I John 3:1 NASB

If a believing mother would happen to read this on Mother’s Day and for some reason is heartbroken for one reason or another, you still can rejoice, no matter what, for you have received the greatest gift of all: the love of God in Christ Jesus!

Because He Loves Me...a Thought for the Ladies

Have you ever played the child's game while holding daisies in your hand, and as you pluck off the petals you say: "He loves me, He loves me not?" But if we played that game and it was Father God we were talking about, then we would be speaking complete foolishness.

For if we read our Bibles, we could never come to the conclusion "He loves me not." The Bible is a giant love letter from one end to the other, revealing God's love revealed to the infinite degree to a lost and hopeless human race who could not earn it or deserve it in a billion years.

"Yes," someone might say. "I've heard that a million times now."

But the real question is, "Do we believe that God really loves us and all that really entails?"

I speak from my own experience. Just recently, I had a chance to go see a doctor for a "free visit" so I thought I didn't need to consult my husband about it. If it didn't cost us anything, I reasoned, then I didn't need to check with him. But deep down, I was afraid that he would say no, so I just went ahead and did it anyway, not staying under his protective covering.

In the Bible, women are told to submit to their husbands for their very own protection. A woman can easily be deceived by the greatest deceiver of all time, as was demonstrated in the Garden of Eden way back in Genesis chapter 3. Eve willingly took the fruit from the serpent because she trulybelieved it would make her wise and be good for her. But Adam took the fruit from Eve because he loved Eve too much to be separated from her. He knew full well what he was doing though.

We women get ourselves into trouble when we don't trust that the Lord has put our husband over us for our protection. I didn't make it up, it is written in the Scriptures! And believe me, the first time I heard I had to submit in premarital counseling, I hated the very idea! In the natural, it does seem miserable and degrading,most certainly going against the grain of today's society.(Yet its commanded in I Peter 3:1, Eph. 5: 22, and Col. 3: 18 and follows in the footsteps of Christ, who submitted completely to the Father's will.)

When I returned from the doc's though, completely convinced that I now had the answer to my health problems and ready to invest a lot of hard earned money, I was ready to recruit my husband. He saw newfound hope for a cure for my problem and he went along with it.

But then I did more exploring. I looked up some names on the back of one brochure they had given me. I didn't like the huge marketing look to it all. I talked to a trusted Christian friend. She directed me to an article to read about the type of testing they did. After I read it, I groaned inwardly. I confessed my sin before the Lord.

All of this could have been avoided. I knew I should have asked my husband, even though it didn't involve money initially. When it got right down to it, I saw the reason I failed this test: I didn't believe that God loved me enough to provide the very best for me, even if my husband would have said NO. His NO would have been for my safety.

Submission is really not about you and your husband anyway. It is about you and the Lord. It is about trusting that He has allowed you to be with your man and that He will sovereignly guide you in your life through your husband. We ladies can battle that all we want, but early in my marriage I heard this Proverb and it froze me in my tracks:

Proverbs 14:1 "The wise woman builds her house, But the foolish pulls it down with her hands."

Do you see how I could have hurt our finances? My husband went along but he told me if I would have asked in the first place he would have said no. We women have great power over our husbands.

Oh how I wish I would have applied Proverbs 14:1 part "a" from the minute I walked down the aisle! Thank God though, that He can redeem our mistakes:

Lamentations 3:21-3 "This I recall to my mind, Therefore I have hope. [Through] the LORD's mercies we are not consumed, Because His compassions fail not. [They are] new every morning; Great [is] Your faithfulness."

Even if we have failed, God's mercies are fresh for tomorrow. Men crave our respect, even though society has ridiculed respect away from many of them. Have you noticed even the commercials make the men look stupid and the women look smart?

But the whole reason we can show respect and listen to our husbands, with God's enabling power, is because we are confident that God loves us and will meet our every need as we stay under the authority God has established for us as married women, and that is through our husbands, even if he is unsaved or ungodly. God is greater than that small difficulty and is still working all things for the good in your life if you are a God lover. (see Romans 8: 28)

Kenneth Wuest, expanded translation of I John 3: 1-3:

"Behold what exotic (foreign to the human heart) love the Father has permanently bestowed upon us, to the end that we may be named children (born-ones, bairns) of God. And we are. On this account the world does not have an experimental knowledge of us, because it has not come into an experiential knowledge of Him. Divinely loved ones, now born ones of God we are. And not yet has it been made visible what we shall be. We know absolutely that whenever it is made visible, like ones to Him we shall be, because we shall see Him just as He is. And every one who has this hope continually set on Him is constantly purifying himself just as that One is pure."

This is not our permanent dwelling place, so we don't have to be so comfortable here anyway. Let us concern ourself more about making sure we will be both close and pleasing to Christ when He comes back for us, and not have to shrink away from Him in shame. Amen?