Something Said In Haste

I had left our house a short time before the phone call came. My husband took it. The person on the other end asked an insensitive question. My husband was upset-to the point of being physically ill.When he told me about it sometime later, I could hear the pain in his voice.

He hung up the phone. Fifteen minutes later, he called her back and told her how hurt he was by her remark. She said the usual “I’m sorry.” But that didn’t seem to ease the pain.

I, too, have been put off by this woman’s insensitiveness-many times. She is a relative of some very dear friends of ours. These friends are preparing to relocate out of state. The purpose of the phone call was to invite us to a small party to see them one last time before they move. I probably will be going with or without our son. And, most probably, my husband will not attend because of this insensitive question that has been asked.

As God’s children, we are to watch our tongues. Contrary to what we have been taught, words do hurt and we can’t take them back.

James 1:26 “If anyone considers himself religious and yet does not keep a reign on his tongue, he deceives himself and his religion is worthless.” (NIV)
James 3:5-7, “Likewise the tongue is a small part of the body, but it makes great boasts. Consider what a great forest fire is set from a small spark. The tongue also is a fire a world of evil among the parts of the body. It corrupts the whole person, sets the whole course of his life on fire, and is set itself on fire by hell. All kinds of animals, birds, reptiles, and creatures of the sea are being tamed by man., but no man can tame the tongue. It is a restless evil, full of deadly poison.” (NIV)

I am angry about this. Angry that the thought was so insensibly worded. Irritated that this woman caused hurt to my husband. This hurts me because it hurts him. I am not planning on sharing this with our friends because I don’t want to continue the cycle of hurting others because of our being hurt.

I will have to ask the Lord what to do about the issues involved in all of this.

God-With Us Always

After having three unusual days of not following my daily plans, I have relearned something. God was with me when I had to listen to the doctor's office give me my lab results. I got a couple of answers. That's what I had been seeking and praying for. God was with me when my husband decided to not keep an appointment to have surgically-implanted hardware removed from his ankle.

Yesterday, I went to a funeral of a lady from church. I knew her husband and son better than I knew her. I was going to support them. I turned in off the street, drove up the hill and saw the black hearse sitting under the car port roof. (It is an extension of the roof that allows cars to pull in and drop off their passengers.) When I saw this vehicle sitting there, something came over me- a sadness. I was reminded of John Donne's words.

No man is an island, entire of itself every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the mainif a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe is the less, as well as if a promontory were, as well as if a manor of thy friends or of thine own were any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls it tolls for thee.

John Donne (1622)

Devotions on Emergent Occasion (written 1623-1624)

God was with me when I had a headache most of yesterday after noon. He was with me when I tried to save some pictures e-mailed to me. I had the wrong kind of disk. Our son had bought the wrong kind. He had the right kind, but I didn't know of any of this. Jesus was with me when I couldn't get to sleep until 4:00 this morning. I found out at breakfast the headache is a side effect of one of those new pills and the sleeplessness is one for the second new medication.

God was with me when I realized I hadn't paid one of our monthly bills due a few days ago. Husband didn't react on that one (He had over something earlier.) The lady at that office wasn't too upset about it. She said she would have called us if they had gotten a cut-off message.

I am reminded almost daily of God telling us he will be with us "always, even until the end of the age. "I also remember Him saying, "I will never leave you nor foresake you."

I have never have been as conscious of this as I am now

Poor Visibility

Fog surrounded the street as I prepared to leave for church. The sun shone through it displaying a beautiful but eerie picture. As I approached the stoplight I realized the mist had parted as I moved through it.

As I turned onto another street, the fog had lifted. I could see for a couple of blocks, up to my where I would turn again. After this second turn, the mist briefly enveloped my car.

I realized this scene I was living, had a Spiritual parallel. As humans we all live through times when we didn’t know the outcome. We have to trust God to resolve it.

In life we experience serious events over which we have no control. These circumstances can beat us down. But they don’t have to. God can clear a path through the situation. We need to apply the scriptures to our lives.

We need to ‘Trust the Lord (y)our God with all (y)our heart(s) and lean not to (y)our own understanding. Acknowledge Him in all . . . and He will direct (y)our paths. (Proverbs 3:5-6)

"Have You Prayed About It?"

Have you ever worried about an issue only to find yourself getting sick? All of us are susceptible to this consequence. You know what I mean. The list of these illnesses runs from migraine headaches, to eye twitch, to soreness in the backbone, to upset stomach and its aftermath. Sometimes we find ourselves so emotional we cry and cry for a long time.

Children of God have a resource to combat these illnesses. He even taught us how to use it. Jesus modeled it for us. It’s called prayer.

We don’t utilize prayer enough. People need to pray first. If we would pray about a need or a circumstance in our lives when they begin to be in our lives, we would have the strength to withstand the force of anything this world could put in our path.

The Apostle Paul tells us to ‘pray about everything’. (Phil. 4:6) He also says we should be ‘faithful in prayer.’ (Rom. 12:12) Even when he and Silas were imprisoned, they were ‘praying and singing hymns to God’. (Acts 16:25)

This is our Christian heritage. We should continue the practice of our Spiritual ancestors and pray. It also behooves us to pray first, before things overwhelm us.

Your Debt’s Been Paid

As we finished eating our meal at Bob Evan’s this afternoon, our server came to our table and announced, “Another customer paid your bill.”

My husband and I looked at each other, stunned. The server described the person and his wife, telling us where they had sat. We realized who it was. Our neighbors had been at that table, the same table we saw them at the last time we were there. Only this time Hubby was the one who saw them. My back was to them.

These neighbors were living here when we moved in almost 33 years ago. He worked at the factory with hubby. He has always been a helpful neighbor. He takes care of his wife who is critically ill. The server and the cashier told us this couple eat there every day.

I got to thinking about another bill we have outstanding against us. The debt of sin. Once we give our hearts to the Lord, Jesus pays that bill for us. I wonder if we are as appreciative for Jesus’ paying our debt of sin for us as we should be.

Because Jesus paid the debt for our sins, we are saved from an eternity in hell. There is an old chorus that goes: I had a debt I could not pay;He paid a debt He did not owe.

The Holy Spirit in Our Lives

When Jesus tells his disciples he will leave them soon, He tells them he will ask the Father to send a Counselor to help them. (John 14:16) The Couselor, the Holy Spirit,whom the Father sends in His name, is to teach the disciples all things and remind them of what Jesus said to them. (John 14:26) Jesus told the disciples he had to depart from them in order for the Holy Spirit to come to them.(John 16:7)

We 21st Century Christians see the Holy Spirit working in lives today. We witness this work in healings, in reconciliations, in the advancement of the Kingdom. In order for people to see and understand the workings of the Holy Spirit they have to be open to Jesus.

Being open to Jesus and to the Holy Spirit, simply put, means we have to have a vital relationship with Him. This can only be achieved through the practice of prayer, meditation and Bible study. We should also invite Jesus’ Holy Spirit into our corporate worshipour church services. At the bottom of our church’s bulletin every week is the following sentence. “ The service is subject to change by the leading of the Holy Spirit.”
And a lot of times the service does change.

Sometimes our lives change because of the Holy Spirit’s leading. One day, just over six years ago, I had turned my day over to the Lord. My husband had been talking about getting an additional car. I wasn’t sure about this. But the day I turned my activities over to God, we bought a carand it took most of the day.

This past Saturday I took part in auditions for a Christmas play. I am not in the play, I will be helping direct that play. Those of us who are helping direct it were quite pleased with the turn out and especially the attitudes of the one trying out. But it was a long day. I was not very active yesterday after church and Sunday school. But this morning all the tiredness of Saturday must have caught up with me. But then He knew I would need the rest.

My week’s activities have been altered. My hubby and I are planning to take a trip to the southern part of the state, where he grew up. He is facing possible surgery to remove some pins and a plate from his ankle he broke in January. As I was making out my week’s schedule and my writing schedule yesterday, I had no idea he was thinking about doing this. And Friday is his birthday, so I am altering my week’s plans.

Grace

We all have heard about grace, one of the dearest terms of Christendom. But what is it, actually? As I see it, grace is likened to a precious stone having many facets.

Back in the early 1970's I asked my then-pastor's wife what was meant by grace. Her answer was interesting. She used an acrostic to explain it: God's Riches At Christ's Expense. I have since reasoned that all we have from God has been granted to us only because Jesus Christ went to the cross in our place.

One facet of grace is the idea of love of which we are unworthy. The fact that God loves us in spite of who we are or what we have done amazes me. The idea He loves the hardened criminal as much as He loves the sanctified soul sitting in the pew each Sunday and Wednesday night blows my mind. But God does love us equally.

Can we see grace in today’s society? Yes, we can but we have to use discernment in order to recognize it. We extend grace to another person when we forgive them for hurting us. We also practice grace-giving when we do a good deed for a friend.

How can we describe grace? Hymn writers have used words like amazing, and wonderful, and marvelous. Where would we be without God’s grace? We all would be lost and headed for the lake of fire.