Today I'm halfway to fifty! Never did I think I'd have almost 3 children by the time I was 25, but blessed is the one whom God corrects (Job 5:17) and I am so incredibly glad for that! So as today is a celebratory day for me and my family, I also can't help but to remember that a year ago today one of my dearest friends passed away. I wanted to share a few Psalms I've been focusing on this week in remembrance of Drew. To not look on today as an anniversary of death, but a celebration of salvation! Thinking about the day he met his God and what that all means for us.
"A single day in your courts
is better than a thousand anywhere else!"
~Psalm 84:10
The truth is just one day in heaven with our God is better than a thousand days at our favorite destination.
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"Teach us to realize the brevity of life, so that we may grow in wisdom." ~Psalm 90:12 God, help us to remember each day that this life is short and to be cherished.
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"Because you are my helper, I sing for joy in the shadow of your wings. I cling to you; your strong right hand holds me securely." ~Psalm 63:7-8 On the days we're struggling, we still have God as our help, and we can take great comfort in that.
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Lastly, thinking on Heaven, salvation, and the incredible story of how Drew prayed to the Lord with two of his closest friends several weeks before he passed, I tuck Ephesians 2:8-9 deep into my heart to hold on to.
"God saved you by his grace when you believed. And you can't take credit for this; it is a gift from God. Salvation is not a reward for the good things we have done, so none of us can boast about it." Thank you, God for your amazing grace and gift of salvation; the only thing that really depends on us is our belief and trust in You.
One of the unconsidered joys of living in an old farmhouse surrounded
by horses and fields is the occasional mouse that comes wandering in
looking for shelter. I guess I figured they were probably around, but lately it’s
become more than obvious (i.e. - when
one stops right in front of me and stares for a while).
A few months back,
when I saw the first gray blur scurry past me one night, I screamed so loud that
I woke the kids, and Baileigh came running downstairs. I was standing on top of
the dining room table, so she just joined me. Doug was out coaching that night,
and we actually stood and even slept on the wooden table for almost 3 hours
until he got back. After that incident I hadn’t physically seen one in a while,
but just the other week, Doug and I rented a movie, sat down to relax after the
kiddos were down, and this then little
guy ran out in front of us then ran away then came back again. I stood on top
of the couch hysterically crying, covering my eyes, yelling at Doug to just
tell me when it was over. (We ended up waking up the kids and sleeping at Mima’s
that night because Mommy was unstable.)
So needless to say, this has always been a horrible phobia
of mine. It might have slightly settled down a bit once I became more acquainted
with these guys. But if being 8-months pregnant isn’t enough to keep you awake
at night, a chilling scritch-scratch sound behind the old walls will certainly
do the job. I’m exhausted. After trying every humane, home-remedy (traps, oils,
buzzing machines), we finally taped up the gaping farmhouse holes and got an
exterminator. So I’d say the problem is finally under control, or at least
we’re on the winning side at this point in the game. Plus, literally facing
this fear of mine has toughened me up quite a bit.
Of course, even mice issues bring me back to God though. At
some point, I realized there wasn’t much my husband could do to protect me. I
had spent at least 100 bucks on “best-selling solutions”. And the exterminator, while a relief, said after
his 10-minute treatment to “give it a
week or so.” So who was going to help me? I wasn’t sleeping. I was completely
paranoid, even out in public. And my day-to-day essentials, like going to the
bathroom or cleaning around the house, were becoming an exhausting mental
battle.
So I got down with some raw, impromptu prayer - no fancy
words, not on my knees, not even with my eyes closed (they haven’t been closed
in weeks, this was no exception, too vulnerable). Think wide-eyed, slightly psycho-sounding
mumblings instead.
·“Jesus, protect me, protect me. Give me
protection.”
·“Give me peace of mind, Lord. Calm me down. I’m
freaking out!”
·“Help me function. I’m running on nothing. Please,
God! Please, please, please.”
And while they may just be mouse-in-the-house type prayers,
they were some of the realest prayers I’ve prayed in a while because I was so
desperate! I’ve personally seen time and
again that out of desperation, God delivers. I’d also say it’s a humbling
state to be shaking over something furry and smaller than my fist. Humbled and Desperate makes for good
prayer!
I realized too that
everything I was praying for at 4 a.m. was Bible-backed, God-guaranteed.
·Protection
·Peace
·Strength
…some of the main promises of God. And when I cry out to Him for these things,
in desperation and with expectation, I
know I’ll be heard and answered. Thank goodness. I just don’t know why I
far too often go to Him as my last resort. After I tell the hubby, after I
browse the internet, after call the professional, then I think, oh hey, did I even take this to God yet? He needs to be my number one emergency contact,
regardless of the emergency. God cares about something as small as a mouse in
the middle of the night because it’s big to me and I am His child.
“Cast all your anxiety on Him
because He cares for you.”
A turning point for me in my walk with God was realizing the
only nuggets of wisdom I needed, the main source of advice, and the greatest
encouragement came from my Bible. Self-help type books, 5 easy step fix-its,
and inspirational quotes without God’s voice in them suddenly seemed useless.
Often times they even contradicted each other – something that I hadn’t been
able to identify before I really began to study and cherish the Word. But then
it quickly became easy to decipher…this is what God says, this is what the
world says. We all have the choice of who we are going to listen to. Often we can’t listen to both, especially
when they’re opposing each other.
With that being said, I didn’t expect to be moved by a
fortune cookie the other night. They tend to be a dangerous blend of ancient
Chinese proverbs, Biblical blurbs, psychic predictions, and pop song lyrics.
But my husband’s strip of wisdom read, “Courage
is grace under pressure.”
Lately, I’ve been praying for grace… to give it, to choose
it, to recognize it and pass it. And I’ve been feeling under pressure, just the
day-to-day kind, surrounded by squabbles and young defiance mixed with some my
own fatigue and irritability (plus an extra 25 lbs out front can put on some
real pressure too). But if courage
equals grace under pressure, thenis
courage actually what I’m in need of?
Courage and Grace – two words that frequent my Bible and two
promises that God has gifted us. I did I quick Google search to see if this quote
may have actually been from the Book of Proverbs or something along those
lines. After all, it fit the theme. But in fact it was Hemingway who said it.
Ernest Hemingway. Probably one of the only authors from my school days that I
could still remember the titles, plots, and themes of some of his novels and
short stories. I always enjoyed his overly simplistic, yet somehow thoroughly
detailed writing style. A great author
for sure, but not exactly God.
With this on my mind, I went to the Word. These verses were
still perfectly fitting Hemingway’s concise definition, yet from God’s frame of
reference. I learned what this housewife, mom, everyday-doer may been lacking
is ever-present courage - the ability to give grace under pressure.
1 Corinthians 16:
13-14 instructs us to:
-Be on guard.
-Stand firm.
-Be courageous.
AND do everything with love.
Grace is just that. Courageously doing everything with love while
standing firm and on guard despite the pressures around us. Emphasis on doing everything with love. God’s personal way of doing things, isn’t it?
Then Psalm 27:14 brings up another aspect. It says,
“Wait patiently for
the Lord. Be brave and courageous. Yes, wait patiently for the Lord.”
So courage = grace under pressure.
Grace under pressure = doing everything with love + waiting patiently.
The equation makes clear what I’m asking for and what I
need, but the cookie was missing one key part that makes it all possible…God.
Titus 2:11-12 says,
“For the grace of God has appeared
to all men. It teaches us to say ‘No’ to ungodliness and worldly passions, and
to live self-controlled, upright, and godly lives in this present age…”
The grace of God that has appeared and who teaches us to use
self-control, even under pressure, is Christ himself. Without him, I wouldn’t
stand a chance. And hear this…when He walked out on the water and his friends
were terrified and freaking out, He called out to them, “Take courage. I am here!”
Because Christ is here with us we can take courage. We can
display grace under pressure. We can choose to act in love and patience and
self-control. Because He is here! When I’m praying under pressure, I’m asking
to act in grace. When I need to act in grace, I must have courage. In order to
do any of this, I must remember first that
He is here. Mid-tantrum. Mid-battle. Mid-moodswing. Mid-contraction. Christ
is there, so I can take courage. And when under pressure, I can choose grace.
(Speaking of courage = grace under pressure, this timely example is unbelievable! I journaled this before I heard this story, but what courage, true grace under extreme pressure.)
Forgiveness last week challenged me. What stuck the most was the
parable of the King and the servant that Jesus told. Remember when the King
forgave the servant of a huge, unpayable debt, the same servant immediately
went out and acted unforgiving to another for a much smaller debt. The King in
the story is like God and we are the servant that He undeservingly forgave. I
imagine God saying to me, just like the King said, “I forgave you of that
tremendous debt (all of your sins) because You came to me and asked. Shouldn’t
you have mercy on your friend, parents, spouse, fill-in-the-blank, just as I
had mercy on you?” Jesus’ stories may come off as abstract sometimes, but they
are very personal analogies to give us a better understanding of what He’s saying
to us.
Some topics, however, He explained in a pretty clear-cut way.
Unfortunately, these might also be the ones we try to complicate the most. This
week, we’ll focus on what Jesus said about Heaven. Heaven…the place He left to
come down to Earth, the place He returned to when He rose again, and the place
He promised could be for us as well. This week we’ll be able to read the very words
Jesus spoke about Heaven, how we get there, and what HOPE there is in that! Use
this week as an opportunity to solidify or renew what you personally believe. Confess
this statement of belief to God, for the first time or the fiftieth, and then
share the joy of your hope with someone else! I’m so glad someone told me :)Now what Jesus said...
-Jesus
said this in prayer to God soon before being arrested. I’m so thankful He
prayed it out loud for his disciples to hear and for me to read right now. It
makes the complexity of Heaven seem more like a simple equation:
Eternal
Life = to know _____________+ _____________
What’s the difference between “to
know” vs. “to know of/about”? (Do you know our President or do you know of
him/about him?) Which did Jesus use?
-I’m sure when the disciples first
heard this they were confused, possibly grossed out, yet since we know how the
story “ends” with the Last Supper and Jesus on the cross, how does this analogy
make a lot of sense to us?
-Go back in your Bible to Exodus 16to gain more background on manna. This is where Moses is leading the Israelites
out of slavery in Egypt and God sends down special food to sustain them.
-What a
great conclusion verse to this four-week study! With the context of all
Jesus has told us, we do know the way. Write your own prayer of thanks.
Tuck it in your Bible or tape it to your mirror, refer to it or pray it out
loud when you need some hope!
Please comment below with
your favorite verse from the last few weeks – feel free to share anonymously.
Thanks for joining me in this… hope it stuck in your mind & blessed your
heart.
