Don't Jump!!!

I have stepped out recently, no, I don't mean I'm stepping out on J, I mean I'm trying something new.  I come from a long line of women who sew.  Both my grandmothers were incredible seamstresses, making suits and quilts and any number of wonderful creations.  Me, not so much.  I can sew a button on if I have to, and I have even been known to fix a drooping hem, but that's about as far as it goes.  I once made curtains and pillows and covered the cushions of an entire set of outdoor furniture using only my trusty glue gun.  I have decided a glue gun is to a woman what duct tape is to a guy.  Give me enough time and an outlet and I can fix almost anything! lol  Despite my ingenuity with my outdoor decor, I have never taken the time or patience to learn to actually sew.  Recently, though, a dear friend of mine at church started a quilting class.  Something prompted me to sign up so I dragged my butt into gear and my sewing machine out of the closet and went to my first class.  I am hooked!  I loved it!  It's so much fun seeing something come together like that.  Despite the attention to detail needed I am finding it a great outlet for the creativity the Lord has plunked down in my soul.

There are quite a few things I like to put my hands to whenever I get the chance.  You might find me doing needlework, or crochet, or candle making, or even a little painting.  I am really hoping someone decides to teach a class in pottery.  I've always wanted to learn how to do that!  There's something quieting about working with your hands, something so fulfilling to see something spring to life beneath your hands.  No wonder the Lord loves to create!  It's fun!

Anyone who reads my ramblings on a regular basis should know that there is another side to my musings.  You see, I was having some trouble with my quilt block the other day.  I was trying to sew it without using pins to hold it in place before running the seams.  The fabric kept slipping around and making it very difficult to complete the project cleanly.  That made me think. (I hate it when that happens!)   How difficult would it be if a potter were trying to form something on the wheel, but it kept jumping off?  It's a funny image, but that is exactly what we do the the Lord so many times.  We find ourselves on his wheel with the water of the spirit running over us to soften our hearts and as soon as he starts to mold, to form, to work with us, we jump right off the wheel while it's still in motion.  The Lord is faithful, he grabs a spatula, scrapes us up off the floor where we've gone splat, puts us back on the wheel and starts all over again.

How long do you think it will take for the finished product to be usable if we continue to jump off the wheel time and time again?  I know I am guilty of taking that flying leap more times than I would like to admit to.  My other favorite thing to do is to try to mold myself into what I think should be.  How weird would it be if the potter was working his lump of clay and suddenly the lump gave a little grunt and out popped a handle or a spout?  I have to admit the image makes me giggle just a little bit.  Now, we all know that is impossible, but it is what we attempt to do to ourselves.  How many times have we tried to inform the Lord how we should look or just what needed to be changed about ourselves?

There is nothing the clay can do to hurry along the needed changes or to make any of these changes for itself.  Such it is with our own hearts.  The work is the Lord's, not ours.  Sure, we have our part. Our part is to remain on the wheel, to remain in His hands.  It's our job to be open to Him and the work He is doing in our lives and in our hearts. Our job, our focus, should be to stay in and to strengthen our relationship with him.  It is through that relationship that we are changed.  It says in

 2 Cor. 3:18  But we all, with open face beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord. 

When you read the above passage you can see the way we are changed is by beholding the glory of the Lord.  That is when we are changed by the Spirit of the Lord. This speaks to relationship.  It is by spending time with him, beholding him, if you will, that we are changed from glory to glory.  It is not by working at it or exercising self control or willing it to happen. It is simply by resting in Him, by spending time with Him that we are changed.

Philippians 2:13 tells us:
for it is God who works in you to will and to act in order to fulfill his good purpose.

Notice whose doing the work here?  It is God who works in you.  If we allow Him (that's our part in the equation, the allowing part)   to work in our hearts He will make the necessary changes there.  That doesn't mean that we then don't have to walk them out.  I tried and tried to quit smoking to no avail. Then I quit, not smoking, I quit trying to quit!  I stopped trying to do something in my own power that I was unable to do within myself.  I started praying about it, submitting my heart to Him and, one day, He did the work.  I knew the moment it was done and I simply walked up to a trash can and threw away my pack and my lighter and I have been smoke free since.  This didn't happen in the middle of a great and mighty revival service at church. It didn't happen after I fasted and prayed and spent a month crying out to Him. Nope, I was simply sitting in the grocery store parking lot talking to Him about it and BOOM! It was done.  I'm not saying I didn't have to decide to walk it out. I had to make the decision not to buy any more, to not give in to the cravings.  The difference that time was I had submitted it to Him and I was walking in His strength.  He had done the work in me to cause me to will and to act in order to fulfill His good purpose.  It was not accomplished by my struggling against it, the work was done as I simply spent time with Him.  I stayed on the wheel and the potter did His work. 

So this week my goal is to act more like a big ol lump of clay!  I will attempt to remain on his wheel no matter how fast it spins.  I will remind myself of the times I jumped off that wheel only to go splat on the floor. 

I don't know what's going on in your life, but I have a feeling you are probably on His wheel too, most of us are.  I pray that when you start to get dizzy and the world starts to spin and you are feeling Him molding you, forming you, creating you to be what you were meant to be, that you stay put!  Stop trying to will yourself into His image and get to beholding your way into it.  Spend time with Him, rest in Him.  Relaxing into Him is the best way to stay out of His way and let Him work! 

Till next time, I'll be here, beholding, creating, giving my glue gun a work out and trying to stay put on His wheel.  So, the next time someone calls you a dizzy blonde, look them straight in the eye, smile and say "Why thank you very much!"

Soaked in His blessings,
Spokenfor

Eye-liner, Cyndi Lauper and strained peaches

This is another entry in the chronicles of the ridiculousness that is sometimes my life.  I burned myself the other day.  While this statement, on the surface, doesn't seem to drip with the ridiculousness that you've all come to expect from me, let me further explain.  I burned myself on the outside corner of my eye, right where my lashes end and my upper and lower lids meet.  Again, that may not sound all that strange to some, but such are the people I run with.  It was the manner in which I created said burnt that was different.  I blame my eyeliner, well, my eyeliner with a little help from my lighter.

I was in a hurry to get ready to go somewhere (who knows where!) and I was slapping on some make-up.  Ladies, you know what I mean by that, men, just turn away and go about your business.  When I tried to apply my charcoal grey eyeliner I found it was hard as a rock and refused to leave so much as a smudge on my, as yet unadorned, eyes.  So I did what any red blooded American woman who had grown up in the 80's would do.  I set it on fire to soften it.  Just about any lady who came of age in the decade of big hair, leg warmers, scrunchies and black eye liner would know,(and some men as well, it was the 80's after all!). It was the perfect way to melt your liner pencil just enough to make it go on smoothly.  The trick was to time it just right so it was still soft, but not so hot that you burned yourself.  Well, it seems that 25 years later, I have lost my touch.  To make matters worse, it was still so soft it stuck to the skin and kept burning as I jumped around the bathroom half dressed and shouted things I'm glad no one was home to hear!

It was not to be my last foray into the land of eye liner Hades.

A week later, I was, once again, hurry to get somewhere and was, once again, slapping on some make-up.  I found a lovely soft, raisin colored, eye liner that I had not worn in a very long time.  It was lodged in the back of the drawer in the bathroom.  After the debacle of the last time I had tried to apply eye make-up in a hurry, I was glad to see this old friend that I remembered was so easy to put on.  I outlined my peepers, added a little mascara and was out the door.  It wasn't until later that afternoon that I noticed my eyes were a little itchy.  By early evening, they were weepy and starting to swell.  By bedtime they were burning and weepy and itchy and pretty swollen.  The next morning, they were swollen shut!  It seems my lovely, old, raisin colored eye liner was contaminated!  It has been almost a week now and most of the swelling is down, the itching has mostly stopped and the weepiness has abated.  My friend is in the trash bin and I have sworn off all types of eye make-up for anytime in the near future!

You know I can't leave it here. Nope!  I feel like one of those tv hawkers..... "but wait! there's more!! order now and you'll get the other side of the story!!!"

I learned what happens when you return to your old ways, you can get burned.  Stay with me, I've moved on from eye make-up and I'm talking about life in general now, more specifically, life with the Lord.  As we walk with him we are embarked on a journey of discovery, a journey of adventure. It is a journey of fresh discoveries of both ourselves and of Him.  We do not have to stay stagnated in the same place.  What worked for me 25 years ago is no longer the best thing for me, in life and in make up! Just because something worked for your life 10 years ago doesn't mean the Lord wants you to stay there.  The word says  in Is 43:19

Behold, I will do a new thing,
Now it shall spring forth;
Shall you not know it?
I will even make a road in the wilderness
And rivers in the desert.

Now don't get me wrong, I'm not saying throw out all the things you learned of God from years past. Goodness, no!  I'm saying be open to the new things as well.  Look at it this way, there's nothing wrong with baby food. I have nothing against strained peaches and pureed bananas, but I don't want to eat it now!  Give me a nice juicy rib-eye or a yummy, sweet chocolate donut.  I don't want to go back to baby food at this point in my life. I've moved on to something different, something more suited for where I am at this point in my life.  I still have the ability to return to the smashed veggies of the past should the need arrive, (dear Lord, please don't ever let the need arrive!!!!)  but just because it worked so well for me once doesn't mean I need to stay there.  


So it is in life.  Some of the old ways were good ways, and while we will forever retain the ability to walk in those old ways, isn't it exciting to be allowed to walk in the new things the Lord is doing?  The Lord is never stagnant, He never changes, but also is never stagnant.  We serve a multifaceted God we can never fully understand in His entirety.  If we will allow Him to, He will continually show us new sides of His nature, new depths of His character, new aspects of His personality.  Don't get stuck in the old ways so much that you miss other sides of Himself the Lord wants to show you.  


So this week, my goal will be to look forward, to move forward, to journey into the unknown!  I challenge you to join me on the adventure of a life time.  I'll be moving into the fresh, newness that is my Lord. I may be moving a little slowly, though, the swelling isn't quite gone and I don't see so well!  Maybe I need a spiritual seeing eye dog, or at least one who can sniff out when eye liner has gone bad.  I think I saw that on the discovery channel;  When good make-up goes bad, part 3.  


Till next time I'll be here, itching, swelling, but looking fabulous!  Now has anybody seen my legwarmers and my Cyndi Lauper tape????


Spokenfor

Sisters, Starbucks and Playground Games

I am sitting in Starbucks.  I know that a big surprise to those who know me (insert sarcasm here).  It's a common hangout for me whenever I feel the urge to put pen to paper fingers to keyboard.  I am always surprised at how much I can learn about any number of people just by sitting quietly in here and listening to what is going on around me.  For instance, I now know the guy behind me is getting ready to place a large order for some sort of equipment and the two ladies across from me are having trouble with their grown children.  The lady by the door is spilling her guts about her marriage woes to someone on the phone and the two in the corner are gossiping about "that really conservative church over there in that metal building where all the women wear long skirts with their hair in a bun and there ain't nary a drop of make-up among the bunch of them!"

I am amazed on a regular basis how if you give an American a cup of coffee and a lap top they consider themselves in their own little private world with no one else around them.  It's just like most guys when they get in a car.  They think they are invisible to the world around them.  Have you ever just taken time to watch guys in the car in a traffic jam on the interstate?  It can be quite entertaining!

I was pondering this sad state of affairs over my vanilla latte and I came to a conclusion.  It's merely a symptom of today's society.  We all go along so disconnected with each other we have become almost unaware of anyone not directly in our scope of influence.  This wasn't always the case.  In years past, it took community to survive. People got together to raise a barn, to harvest a crop, to build a church, to celebrate a wedding, a birth, a life departed.  People just plain got together.  Now, in this information age where you can find out just about anything you could ever want to know about a person with a click of a button, we, so many times, find ourselves disconnected. 

It's like this, I could know J's birthday, anniversary date, his social security number, where he banks, where he shops, what he drives, even what he has for lunch every day, but if I don't know that it's a Wyoming sunset that moves his heart, that he dreams of owning his own business, that he has a passion for his work with the boys in Royal Rangers, the other means nothing.  If I can't know his heart, I don't know him.  It's very difficult to know someone's heart without spending face to face time with them. 

The fact is, we need each other, we need community.  You see things differently than I do. I can learn from you and you from me, but not if we never take time to learn the other person's heart.   The word says in Hebrews 10:24 -25, and I'm paraphrasing here, but look it up yourself if you don't believe me!   Don't give up meeting together as some are suggesting, but gather together to encourage one another in good works of the Lord. 

Life can be difficult, it can be hard and stressful and down right messy, but it's always a little easier with help.  I have been very blessed to have wonderful friends in my life and my life is enriched by these relationships.  Think of it this way, life is a great big game of red rover, if you have no one to lock arms with, you're in big trouble! lol  Don't find yourself on the playground of your life with no one to come along side and lock arms with you when the enemy comes rushing at you.  Not only that, but it's a little easier to dodge the fiery dodgeballs darts of the enemy when someone has your back. 

All this community stuff takes a little effort on your part, it takes being vulnerable with yourself and others.  It takes opening up your heart and your life and allowing others in.  It can be scary, but it is well worth it.  The playground can be a dangerous place, don't try to walk it alone. 

So this week I challenge you to look around and take inventory of your friend's list, and I don't mean the one on facebook.  I mean the one etched on your heart.  Do you have someone in your life you can be open and honest with?  Are you hiding your heart behind a superficial, business polite approach to any and all who dare to come close?  Ask the Lord to bring that person into your life that laughs at the same people  jokes that you do, that is walking the same way you are, that sees life enough of the way you do that you are compatible, but not so much so that it gets boring, someone you can share your heart with.  J is my best friend, but I find I need other women in my life as well.  He's not exactly the one I turn to when I need to bemoan the rapid approach of menopause, or the great new place I found to get my nails done, or to brainstorm ideas to make walking this "mom thing" a little easier.  I need other women.

So go open up!  Take a chance, find a friend, be a friend! Reach out and up and be wonderfully surprised by what happens.  Your life will be enriched in ways you could never have known.  Meanwhile, I'll be here hanging out with my crew, my posse, my girls, my swap meet (SWAP, sisters with a purpose). 

Just remember, when you hear that old song;  red rover, red rover, send someone right over, lock arms with your sisters, hold you head up high and say " ok life, bring it!"

Till next time, I'm
Soaked in His blessings,
Spokenfor

The Battle of Cinder Block Hill Circa 1983

Don't you just love friends, really good friends that you can share anything with and they don't look at you like you had three heads?  I have been blessed to have a couple of those in my life.  For me they are a rare breed because, usually, I do have three heads at any given time and it's difficult to find someone who can be temporary blind at will.  I was sitting with one such friend recently and the subject turned to our childhoods and the adventures we had back then.  I shared a story with her and I wanted to share here with my on-line friends......

When I was a young teen, my church rented a campground every year up in the north Georgia mountains and we had camp.  I have some really fond memories of those camps, and some not so fond memories, but that's for another time, probably with a good therapist.   It was not a fancy sort of place.  The "cabins" we slept in were, in actuality, long, narrow cinder block buildings with a few mesh covered windows that allowed for zero air movement.  After standing in the August heat in Georgia they were transformed into ovens in which we slowly cooked ourselves every night. 

The showers and bathrooms were also cinder block.  They were one big building divided down the middle by, yet another, cinder block wall, but this wall didn't actually go all the way up to the ceiling.  It stopped a couple of feet short so we could hear everything that went on over on the boys side and they could hear us.  One evening, we were getting ready for bed and the boys were all yelling stuff over at us and we were harassing them back.  All the girls finally finished up and left to go to their cabins except for me.  The boys didn't realize I was there and could still hear them.  I listened as they plotted a water balloon raid on both the girls cabins that night.  I didn't start to get worried until their counselor came in and I was shocked to learn he was in on it.  I stayed and listened like a good spy and heard all the details.

I was so excited! We finally had one up on the boys and could beat them at their own game, or so I thought.  I ran to one of the girls cabins and told them what I had heard.  I explained they needed to shut the shutters on their windows to keep the water balloons out.  There was more hole than mesh on those windows and their beds were right by the windows so they were going to be in mortal danger from boy propelled missiles of water!  I stood there in total disbelief when not one of the believed me.  (I think it may have had something to do with the giant spiders I had managed to slip under a couple of pillows earlier in the week)  I then ran to my own cabin and was met with the same lack of faith there.  Never the less, I went around myself and closed all the shutters while being yelled at and fussed at the whole time by those residing with me in my little cinder block oven. 

Just about the time I settled into bed I heard the first balloon hit the side of the building.  We sat, hot, but dry and listened as they boys relentlessly pummeled our cabin to no avail.  The other cabin was not so lucky.  By the time they figured our I had been telling the truth, it was too late.  Their beds were soaked and so were they!  If only they had listened to the word of the Lord what I had told them!

We laughed, my friend and I, as I retold this story and others about the times I had at the camp in Taccoa GA.  Later, as I thought back on it, my brain did it's own little tilty thing again and I saw it all in a different light.  How important is it to position ourselves in such a place so the Lord can reveal to us the plans of the enemy?  Sometimes, if we are in the right place at the right time, the Lord will pull back the veil and we will see what the devil has in mind for us or for a loved one.  What better way to thwart that than to know in advance what's coming?  This happens if we allow the Lord to guide us, to put us where he wants us, and if we have our ears attuned to hear what we need to. 

Make no mistake about it, we are in a war and our enemy is not throwing water balloons.  He's armed with fiery darts and he doesn't hesitate to shoot them at the beloved of God. (that's us, in case you were wondering....)   How successful would a military campaign be if you knew in advance every move your opponent was planning to make?  So it is that sometimes the Lord lets us see the direction the darts are going to come from so we can get our shields of faith up and ready to defend ourselves and even, when directed by the Lord, what direction to go on the offensive in.  Can you imagine the surprise of those boys if I had been able to convince the girls I wasn't trying to play a joke on them and we had responded with water balloons of our own? 

There's no discharge from the Lord's army and there is no administrative duties either. I know, I admit I have asked for a desk job before!  My goal this week is going to be to try to allow myself to be positioned by the Holy Spirit so when he reveals things I am in the place to hear it.  I don't want to let my guard down and get smacked in the back of the head with a spiritual water balloon because I'm not where I need to be.  Where are you today?  Are you listening hard to the Spirit of the Lord concerning how to proceed in this war we call life?   Do you hear him when the word comes to close up your shutters because there's shelling coming and you need to call in God's napomb?  So stay close, listen up and let the Lord guide you. 

Until next time I'll be here, shinning my shield, collect balloons and planning a revenge many years in the making! 

Soaked in His blessings,
Spokenfor

Baskets, Bubbles and Rusty Bottoms

Yesterday was a strange sort of day.  It was cold and wet and all around dreary.  I found myself, as is often the case on Mondays, sitting and staring out the back window at the fog encased trees; their spindly, leafless branches reaching in vain to a sky that was already falling around them.  Every muscle in my body was achy and tired.  I'd like to say it was from the extreme physical activity I had been involved in.  I'd like to say that, but I would be lying.  By that point in the day I had managed to jump to conclusions, exercise my right to free speech, go round and round the bush with the teenagers, and do quite a few remote control lifts.  I think I had a right to my exhaustion. 

After a tiring period of mental activity (ie my facebook games) I decided that what I really needed was a hot bath.  If a cup of bubble bath happened to fall in and the candles magically ignite, I was not to be blamed.  Of course, Monday's curse was not to be given the slip.  Right as I was stepping into my steaming hot bath of bubbles my foot caught a cute little basket that has been sitting on the side of my tub for a year and - PLOP - in the water it landed.  Now you would not think this would be the end of the world.  After all, it was full of loofah sponges and decorative soaps and other pretty little things you see around the tub.  The problem was, when it hit the water, the water turned brown, a dirty, nasty brown.  There was no way I was getting in that tub now!  I grabbed the basket and pulled it out, but the damage had already been done. 

It seems the bottom of my pretty little basket was made of a metal mesh.  In the year it had sat on the side of my tub it had been subjected to constant dampness and had rusted.  When it hit the water the rust was released and it made one serious mess!  I had to drain the water and start again and, thanks to the fact I have a miniscule water heater, there was no more hot water.  I stood there in my robe, in the cold, with my candles burning and my bubble bath washing down the drain and cursed the basket makers of the world. 

Into this little drama of mine sneaked a thought.  How much are we, so many times, just like that basket?  We look so pretty sitting there on the side of the tub of life.  We even hold all sorts of useful things. But hidden underneath is a dark rusty heart that no one sees.  We may not even know it's there ourselves.  Then the Lord brings the water of the spirit and as it washes over us, the rusty, dirty heart is made clean and new.  After I saw the mess it had caused I moved my little basket to higher ground where it will not rust again. A basket with a metal mesh bottom had no business on the side of a tub constantly exposed to water.  Often times, when we put ourselves in a place we are not fitted for, we risk allowing rust to build up on our hearts. We may continue on for quite a while and everything looks great on the outside, but deep down decay is setting in. 

My prayer this week is for the Lord to know my heart, to search out any places that have become rusty.  I want to re-evaluate my life and ensure I have not gotten myself into situations where I don't belong, places the Lord never sent me.  I don't want to be like the little basket with the metal mesh bottom.  I have enough to worry about with the size of my bottom, I don't need to worry about if it's rusty or not!

So, until next time, I'll be here, unbubbled, but, hopefully, rust free. 


Soaked in His blessings,
Spokenfor

Buggy trees, city lights, and New Zealand

I am one prone to day dream and while this may not come as any surprise to those who know me I'm sure there are those who see me as completely competent, always in control, level headed and right on track.  I'm sure, really, I am sure, surely there's one person who sees me this way!  No?  Well, let me continue to dwell in the land of fantasy where I am mayor and if I don't like you, you don't exist.  But I digress.....

One day earlier this week I was watching "Reflections" on tv.  Now for those of you who aren't familiar with this program, let me explain.  It's a lovely half hour of gorgeous pictures from around the world that is set to beautiful music with scriptures that come and go on the screen.  It's really peaceful and I frequently use it to escape my children refocus after a hectic day as a mom.  On this day there was a segment of pictures taken in New Zealand.  If you've ever seen the movie "The Lord of the Rings", you know how beautiful it is.  There was a picture of a valley where the mountains were so close together they were almost touching.  Covering the sides of each mountain were deep forest, luscious and deep green.  I remember thinking, as I gazed at the picture, "I wish I were right there, right there by that tree. That's it, I wish I were a deer on the side of that mountain, or maybe a squirrel in that tree, yeah, a squirrel, a deer would have trouble standing on a hill that steep.  I'll be a squirrel, or better yet, I'll be a bug, yeah, that's it, I'll be a bug on that tree right there.  It's settled then, I'm a bug on that branch of that tree right there."

As I gazed at the picture before me and I imagined my little buggy self swallowed up in that place, I realized something.  If I were, indeed, a little bug on that little branch of that little tree on the side of that big huge mountain, I would not be able to see it the way I did at that moment.  I wouldn't be able to see much past my own little leaf and my own little buggy home.  My world would not necessarily be one of beauty, at least not to my own tiny bug eyes.  I like a leaf and a branch and a tree as much as the next person, but they couldn't compare to the wondrous view found up higher.

That, my friends, is when the light went on.  How many times have we looked at our surroundings and saw only the same old leaf, the same old branch on the same old tree?  How many times have we seen only what is right in front of us and missed the bigger picture?  Sometimes we need to be reminded that there is, in fact, a bigger picture, a picture we often miss as we live little lives on little branches everywhere.

Sometimes we all need a new perspective, a new view.  I remember one night J and I were treated to a night in a luxury hotel in downtown Atlanta.  I had worked downtown, had been through downtown on many occasions and had never thought of it as a place of beauty.  It was dirty, nasty place with too many cars, too many people, and too much stress.  On this night, though, we were staying on one of the top floors in the high rise hotel and the room had one full wall of nothing but floor to ceiling windows.  As J pulled back the miles of curtains and the view was exposed it took my breath away.  The lights spilled out before us as if the stars had suddenly come loose from their moorings and fell to earth to dance among the streets of the city.  The beauty was spectacular.  I had never, in all my time spent downtown seen the magnificence of the cityscape.  It took a new perspective, it took coming up higher.

It is a lesson I plan on applying to my own life; this idea of coming up higher.  When my life seems less than spectacular, less than appealing and I'm convinced my lot is to live a life of drudgery and compromise, I hope I am reminded of that night, and that little bug on the hill side.  The Lord calls to us to come up higher.  When we allow Him to change our perspective and see with His eyes, we see the beauty that is our life.  Hopefully, we will understand we play a part in something much bigger than ourselves and our own little leaf.

So rise up! Rise up and be blessed!  Blessed by His view of our lives.  My goal this week will be to keep a little bug in mind, a little bug, a leaf, a tree, and a forest covered hillside, but most of all the beauty that encompasses it all.  We are but one piece, may we allow the Lord to lift us up to see the puzzle as a whole and to understand our part in it.

Until next time, I'll be here day dreaming, but this time, not about being a bug, unless it's a bug that has hopped a ride aboard an eagle!

Soaked in His blessings,

Spokenfor

Starbucks, checklists, and a whole lot of "shoulds"

Sitting in my local coffee shop a few days ago, I indulged in one of my favorite not-so-nice habits; I eavesdropped on those around me.  I justify this by telling myself if they wanted privacy they shouldn't be sitting in public having that particular conversation.  Anyway, as I sat there straining to hear the ladies next to me minding my own business I couldn't help but over hear the 2 ladies sitting at the next table.  One lady remarked to the other "well, I just went ahead and read 7 whole chapters from the New Testament. That way, I can mark that off my list for the whole week".  Wow! 7 whole chapters at one time?!?  I was clearly sitting next to a spiritual giant. (sorry, let me wipe that up, I dripped sarcasm all over your keyboard....)  Ok, so I'll be nice.  It was good that this woman was taking time to read the word, but, of course, it made me stop and think. (I hate it when that happens!) 

How many times have I picked up my Bible, read a few chapters and thought "there, that takes care of that for now"?  How many times have I viewed time in the word or in prayer as something to be checked off the list until the next day instead of realizing time spent with my heavenly father is the source of my life?  I heard someone speak recently about the importance of obedience and I cannot argue with that, but I can say I have learned from experience it is not likely that I will be able to "will" myself to obey very often.  Obedience springs from a heart of relationship.  When I was a child, I obeyed my mother, not because I feared her or because of what I might gain from her if I did, but because I love her.  She will never know the things I did not do because I knew if I got caught she would be hurt.  I have learned recently it is the same with my heavenly parent as well.  When my heart is completely in love with him obedience flows naturally out of it. 

Look at it this way, as a mother of teenagers, parenting can be difficult.  Sure, I can take away privileges or find other ways to force obedience, but that obedience is shallow.  It never touches the heart.  It may make life a little more pleasant for me in the short run, but if their hearts are never touched, never changed, what have I really accomplished.  The Lord looks at it the same way.  If we are only practicing our "christianese" because of what we think it might get us, it gets us no where.  There is no currency that can buy the Lord's favor or His blessings, not even obedience.  Sure, God loves to bless us, especially when we obey, but not if that is our motive for obeying.  The word says "see ye first the kingdom of God".

Lets look at that word "seek".  Websters dictionary defines it as "to go in search of, or to try to discover".  This is not a static word, this is an active word.  If we are seeking the kingdom of God, it is an action that denotes intensity, not lackadaisical semi-participation.

What are we really seeking when we practice check list Christianity?  We are seeking to please ourselves.  We are seeking a way to numb the voice down inside that calls us to a closer, more personal relationship with the one who loved us before the foundations of the world.  We are trying to gain favor with God by going back again under the law that Christ came to free us from.  Yes, even Bible reading and prayer can become works of law if our hearts have the wrong motive.  Think of the pharisee the Lord spoke of who prayed so all could hear him.  Do you believe his prayer availed him much?   Do you think the motive of his heart was to come into a closer relationship with the father?   It would seem his purpose was to look good to those around him.  He could then travel on his way with his self-righteous knowledge that he had prayed in the temple so now God was pleased with him.  No! that's not how it works.

There is nothing we can do and nothing we can say that will gain us more or less of the love of God than we already have.  As his children we are righteous and holy in his sight.  Does that mean we just go out and live anyway we want to? NO! That means, as we develop our relationship with Him our hearts are changed and as our hearts are changed so our lives, inside and out, are changed.  If we want to obey because we love him that is a far cry from trying to make ourselves obey so we can be good enough to enter his presence.  The Lord is grieved by this attitude.  We need to do nothing to be granted entrance into his presence except believe on Him.   He longs for us to be close.  The word says "He sings over us".  Does that sound like a God who is watching to see if you're good enough to come close? 

My goal this week is going to be to tear up my check list, to throw out all of the "shoulds" I saddle myself with and simply walk with the knowledge that I am loved, I am desired, I am cherished by the God of all the universe.  If you can ever really get a hold of that concept it is so freeing!  As we walk closer and closer with Him our hearts are changed and so our lives are changed.  That is the key.

So next time you're in the neighborhood of Starbucks drop on in.  I might be there, but I can't promise I won't be listening in. So be careful what you say, you may see it in print one day!!! 

Soaked in His blessings,
Spokenfor