An Elijah Moment

 We all have a social media wall. You know that screen we put up so nobody else can see what our lives truly look like? We post clean smiley kids, perfectly posed family photos, successes and shout outs. I'm here to challenge you to share the REAL today because we're not doing ourselves or anybody else any good by pretending.

The last year (plus) has been rough. I won't tell you terrible stories because everyone's is different and this isn't a contest. Six weeks ago I reached the point where I had to let go of something in life before I self-destructed (I think I would have blown up like a potato in the microwave). I said good-bye to my job of twelve years and literally spent the first week off sleeping. I wouldn't say it was a leap of faith because honestly it was more of a "Lord, I am so tired, this is what I'm doing." It was an Elijah moment. If you want to know more about what that looks like you'll find him in 1 Kings. "1 Kings 19:4 Then Elijah walked for a whole day into the desert. He sat down under a bush and asked to die. “I have had enough, Lord,” he prayed. “Let me die. I am no better than my ancestors.” 5 Then he lay down under the tree and slept."

Since then, I can't tell you how many times I have seen God provide. I'm doing something I enjoy and sleeping at the end of the day. The bills are getting paid. There's food on the table. It's truly been a manna in the wilderness experience because that's the only way I can describe it.

I am putting this out there today because I know there are more people than I can count who are at the end of their rope. Elijah was done. He sat down under a bush and literally asked to die. He had no strength of his own left. Then something happened he wasn't expecting, God sent him what he needed to physically get going again. Food, water, and a long nap. "Suddenly an angel came to him and touched him. “Get up and eat,” the angel said. 6 Elijah saw near his head a loaf baked over coals and a jar of water, so he ate and drank. Then he went back to sleep." After Elijah had regained some physical strength, God did one more thing, He showed him again who He was and He gave him a helper (Elisha) 1 Kings 19:21 "Elisha left and followed Elijah and became his helper."

God's not dead. You might not see Him right now because a snack, a nap, and a friend don't look the same as mountains moving but He's right there. You are not alone under that bush and He is going to send you exactly what you need today. I am confident in that.

There you go.

102Todd Delp, William W. Stewart and 100 others

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I Will Meet Them In The Wilderness

 I like to pray while I'm walking the dog. Nobody interrupts me except an occasional squirrel or two. I was enjoying the blue sky and praying for the kids and the Lord spoke this to my heart: "I will meet them in the wilderness". Then I talked to the dog. "Hey, Hammie, what does that mean?" Dogs are not real great for interpretation, but his ears went up.

When searching "wilderness" in the online Bible lots and lots of references came up for the time when Moses and the Israelites wandered in the desert. There was so much complaining going on and it sounded a lot like long trips with the family. ARE WE THERE YET? I'M HUNGRY. WHO DIED AND MADE YOU QUEEN? Yet God continued to provide for them. Light, fire, food, water, clothes that didn't wear out. Really. Read the whole thing, I can't type it all here. You know what happened next? They all rejoiced and thanked God, right? Nope. They spit in God's face.

We have all had our personal trips through the desert this past year, and we are still standing in the hot sun waiting for the promised land. We're tired, and complaining, and we want what we had before. TAKE US BACK TO EGYPT. ENOUGH, WE'D RATHER BE SLAVES. WHAT THE HECK ARE WE HERE FOR?

"I will meet them in the wilderness", He said. I believe it was a reminder to me that God is here. He is here with me on days when I want to shake the sand from my toes and crawl into my tent and not come out. He is there with my children as they navigate this broken world. He is with you in whatever place you are currently wandering. Stop being so noisy for a minute and look around. God continues to provide for his people. Grieving? God is here. Sick? God is here. Unemployed? GOD IS HERE. Not a single one of us is abandoned. God stands before us as a pillar of fire in the darkness. Quit trying to put out the flames.

Go read Isaiah 35. Right now. Go read it.

35:3 Strengthen the feeble hands, steady the knees that give way; 4 say to those with fearful hearts, “Be strong, do not fear; your God will come,...

35:7 The burning sand will become a pool, the thirsty ground bubbling springs.

35:10 and those the LORD has rescued will return. They will enter Zion with singing; everlasting joy will crown their heads. Gladness and joy will overtake them, and sorrow and sighing will flee away.

This End Up

Mom went home to Jesus months ago and I stand here jealously staring at a cardboard box. THIS END UP. Even the box knows how to orient itself in life. It fits neatly on a shelf next to all the other boxes that are snuggled up with no gaps. I long for that feeling. 

I wonder some days where I fit now? I feel my sides bowing out and my tape coming loose and the label printed with my name seems to have rubbed off.  

I don't dare send this post out into my little world for fear of all of the kind backlash. "She went home to Jesus, she's free from all of her pain." Like somehow I have forgotten that Heaven is a beautiful place and I deserve a good dressing down for grieving.  

I understand sackcloth and ashes now. If the temperature were conducive to burlap you would find me settled in the raised bed next to the cabbages. A rabbit might come by and nibble on my toes. Does it have a mother? Perhaps it would like to join me for a while here in the cool soil and we will stare at the trees gently moving in the wind. I'm listening for her voice. I'm looking for those signs people told me she would leave now and then but I can't find them. 

Do I lack faith? No. Have I forgotten her peace and joy at being present with Jesus and reunited with her family? No. I am only sad and lonely, wishing for her companionship both physically and in prayer and incredibly jealous of this stupid box. I think I will burn it. 

. 

No gone is too far gone

 "But God demonstrates His own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us."

God and I have long discussions while I'm walking the dog. Mostly I rant about life and He listens, and I imagine He nods His head because He's heard this from me the last 365 days. So, in my musings and rantings and questions this past week God reminded me of the above verse (Romans 5:8).

Did you ever really think about what that says? WHILE WE WERE STILL SINNERS, CHRIST DIED FOR US. I mean, who does that?! Who looks at the lowest of the low and says "I would die for you"? Mostly, we look at someone like that and say "you don't deserve to live". Miserable, sinful, wretched human beings that we are.

Think about it. During every humiliation, every pain inflicted upon Jesus on His way to the cross, He KNEW who He was dying for and every blasted ugly thing they'd ever done or would do. If that doesn't make you throw yourself on the ground and plead for forgiveness, I don't know what will.

Maybe you are stuck in a sin pattern and you are convinced you will never be free, you're too far gone for God to redeem. I want to remind you that you are NEVER too far gone for God. He knew you were this far gone when He died for you.

#repent

He Never Stops Watching The Road

 You know, they don't tell you in childbirth class that when your baby is born, a piece of your heart goes with him and forever walks in a place where you have very little control. Will it keep beating? Is it happy? Does it feel pain? When it strays, will it come back home?

Such was the life of the father in the "parable of the lost son", a.k.a "the Prodigal Son". I never thought much about him until I became a parent. We mostly focus on the son, and the fact that he went out and squandered daddy's money, got himself into a real mess, then managed to turn it around in the end. Happily ever after, right?

What about the father? He's been dealing with this child for a while. You know how I can tell? Because he gave him what he wanted, and let him go. What parent hasn't reached the point where they have tried everything they know to bandage their broken offspring back together only to reach the point where there is nothing else to do but let them fall?

Off goes junior with dad's money and a backpack full of bad ideas, and then the story focuses on him for a few verses. What about the father? We don't get much of a glimpse into his life until later. I'll tell you what I see him doing in my mind's eye. He watched the back of that kid go down the road until he could no longer see him from his highest perch, and then he sobbed. Long, grief-filled, agonizing cries for that boy. Maybe it lasted for days before he could pull himself together enough to eat, or work. How much time went by? Who knows? But that dad never stops watching for his child. Never. Luke 15:12 says “But while he was still a long way off, his father saw him and was filled with compassion for him; he ran to his son..." He was looking for him every moment, every breath. Feed the cattle, check the road. Tally up the week's earnings, check the road.

Are you there? Are you spending sleepless nights on worn out knees pleading for your child's soul?

I want you to know you are not alone. God has never stopped watching the road.

Luke 15:11-32

The Prodigal Son Suite: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N3TYkAWRdU4

God Loves Me From My Head To-ma-toes

I have beautiful tomato plants ready for the garden, so today I took them out on the porch to start the whole hardening off process. I think I could hear them talking. "Oh, man, what is THIS?! Something's not right. It's cold. It's windy. TAKE ME BACK IN THE HOUSE!!!!"

Earlier this week I took twelve of the smaller tomato plants, who had also never seen the outdoors, and plopped them out on the porch thinking they'd love a little sunshine. Know what happened? They died.

Are you going through a really rough time right now? You can't understand what's happening, and it feels scary and unfair. Anxiety has wrapped around your insides, and you'd really like to yell "TAKE ME BACK IN THE HOUSE!". I know. Life was way better in the sun on the window sill. It's a rough world out there in the raised bed. It rains, storms rage, the wind blows, the temperatures change. You know what? This little time of uncertainty and growth on the back porch is strengthening my plants. Maybe it's doing the same for you. Maybe it's making you strong enough to bear fruit.

James 1:2 Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, 3 because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance. 4 Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything.

My Anchor Holds

I remember, way back in 1998, when I placed my newborn daughter in her great-grandmother's arms she looked at her and said "I wonder what her life will bring". It was a somber moment from a woman who had seen what life does bring. At that time, it caused a brief sense of panic. I wanted to take my children and run. I didn't know where, but there had to be safety somewhere. Safety from the times of grief, and chaos, and consequences coming. Safety from all that life wishes to take from them including their very breath.

God reminds me daily that this is no place to live. That the fear of "what might happen" should not overshadow the "what is". He reaches out and wants to take all of these burdens I choose to carry, but some days I cling to them like anchors.

Whatever the past year has brought, whatever the next year will bring, God is there. Is. Not was, not will be. Is. He is behind us and before us fighting battles for us we haven't yet seen. He is present in this very second as you cry out, and He is present in the heartache coming in your future. He's already there.

Deuteronomy 31:8 The LORD himself goes before you and will be with you; he will never leave you nor forsake you. Do not be afraid..."

Psalm 139

"God before us, God behind us,
God above us, God beneath us.
We on your path, O God.
You, O God on our way.
In the twistings of the road,
in the winding of the path,
be with us by day, be with us by night,
be with us by day and by night."
~John Philip Newell