What I learned while I was home sick for 2 days

It was time for my annual Spring cold. It started on Sunday. I sucked it up and went to meetings on Monday, but had to to stay home on Tuesday and Wednesday. During that time, I learned a few things.

1. Daytime tv is fairly pointless. Even with digital cable.
2. I need to get my act together and not let life pass me by. I need to claim Jeremiah 29:11 and mean it! There is a future and a hope. No, I'm not moving or quitting my job. I just need to view my future with a better attitude and with a sense of hope.
3. This was the big one. I've been reading Karen Kingsbury books for a few years now. These books follow a family through joys and trials. Many of the situations presented in the books have also been in our lives. Last night I was very impressed by God to finish the book. I read about one of the characters life seeming to fall apart around her. She was praising God by singing. The quote that stuck out to me so clearly was “Praising God is an act of trust, a way of putting aside the cares and troubles of this world and looking to God alone”
Wow, did I need that!! I have to praise God and let go of the cares and troubles that hold me back. I need to allow myself to feel things other than pain and sorrow. I need to...no, I will praise God and let Him figure out the rest.

I don't know what to call this

First, I must apologize. I have, at times, lied to you. I didn’t really mean to. It just seemed easier. I was supposed to be the strong one for everyone else. I was supposed to be the one that had spiritual revelations. Maybe I was lying to myself too, because right now I feel anything but fine.

You know when you feel like God is so near and He’s showing you what you need to know? You make a new resolve to get your act together and start living your life again. You feel like you have hope. You even think you’re strong enough to help out some people that are struggling. And for the most part, you were. The people who know you were fun to be around, but then there are those people who don’t know and make passing comments about the one thing that has caused you more pain than anything else ever could. You suck it up and hold it together. You’ve gotten pretty good at that. The day isn’t over yet. You have to make a choice when to address the nonstop coughing that has made rest impossible. Each hour away from work means a smaller paycheck so you head to emergency room. The receptionist doesn’t understand why your insurance is different than before and when you explain it to her, she wants to know who to list as your next of kin, but you’re not really sure what to say. It’s a busy day and you spend over an hour in the waiting room. The nurse finally ushers you into the room where you’ve been so many times before, only this time it’s different. You aren’t there to show love, and support. You’re there…alone. The nurses don’t understand why you’re crying. They don’t understand why walking to radiology is so hard. You’ve walked that hallway too many times to remember. Back in that little exam room with the same magazines that were there the last time, you wait….and wait. Three hours since you arrived, the doctor comes in and introduces himself. He doesn’t remember the countless times that you spent there waiting for test results, hoping and praying for good news. But you remember. You remember the hours that you rubbed the feet at the end of the examination table, just so he would know that you were still there. You realize that there isn’t anybody that can be there for you. There probably won’t ever be and that reality hits you like a load of bricks. They give you your instructions and send you on your way to drive home. You walk in the house and wonder where your life went and you realize that somebody took it 30-some odd miles north of here and buried it.

Do Over

Remember when you were a little kid and someone made a mistake? Someone would yell, “Do over,” and the game was played as if the mistake never happened. Life in the adult world isn’t like that. We make choices and we live with the results…good or bad. There are no do over’s. 

I pondered this fact from two different angles.
First, I looked at the do over dilemma from the standpoint of sin. I used to do an exercise with one of my classes where they had to squeeze all of the toothpaste out of the tube. This was very easy and I awarded a small prize to the one who was fastest. Then I would offer a substantial award to the student who could put it all back into the tube. Of course, this is impossible, but they tried really hard and became frustrated when I pointed out that they had been unsuccessful. I used this to illustrate the fact that it’s easy to say something, but impossible to take it back. It can go much farther than that, though.
Whether it’s big or small, hidden or apparent, planned or unplanned, you don’t get a do over when it comes to sin. God is always there to forgive, but there are consequences to our sins. We may not see it immediately and we may never know how it affects another persons’ view of the God that we claim to serve, but sin affects eternity, for us and those around us. 
It could also be a series of choices that make us look back and wonder where the time went. Maybe it’s the events of the past year of my life that has made me appreciate this fact. I sang a song once that said…

So many things I thought would bring me happiness 
Some dreams that are realities today 
Such an irony the things that mean the most to me 
Are the memories that I've made along the way

What if we spend all of our time waiting for tomorrow only to find that while we were waiting, we missed out on the precious reality of today? What if what we were hoping to happen when the time was “right” caused us to miss what we really wanted. It only takes a small glimpse at the faces of my grandchildren to know how quickly time passes. We have to seize every moment and make it count. How sad to realize some day that while we were making plans, life happened and we missed it. 

My challenge to anyone who chooses to read this and accept the seriousness of what I’m trying to say is this. Number one, when you sin, you can’t take it back, no matter how badly you may want to. It’s out there affecting people’s lives for eternity. Secondly, planning is important, but don’t let today pass by while you’re planning for tomorrow. There are no do over’s.

What Does God Want?

Every once in awhile, someone says something that seems simple, but is actually profound in its wisdom. This happened at church today and it made me think of another profound statement that was made many years ago.I'll start with the past....The question was, "Does God call us to be comfortable or committed?" Ouch. I think of that when I am tempted to complain or tempted to do the wrong thing even though it might make my life easier. I have yet to find a passage of scripture where God says to obey Him, but if it makes life a little harder, it's ok to do what you want. I remember a story of a man and his son walking through the jungle. The dad suddenly told the son to drop to his belly and crawl toward him. The son didn't stand and question his father. He didn't talk about how that might be inconvenient or cause him some pain. He was immediately, and without question, obedient. When the child reached his father, he turned to see that a large snake had positioned itself above the child's path and disobedience to his father would have meant certain death. What a great picture of how we are to be with God. There are certainly areas that we need to seek God's guidance and then make decisions, but there are other times that the question of right and wrong has already been answered and God demands unwaivering obedience regardless of how we may be inconvenienced.

The profound thought that came today was a passing comment made during the sermon. Steve was talking about how we sometimes make a ritual or tradition a substitute for having a relationship with Christ. For example, being baptized or taking communion without the relationship does nothing to get us to heaven. The point of the message was "When a good thing becomes the main thing, it results in deception and misplaced hope." There's the background info for the profound thought. Now for the thought..."If you buy a can of soup with a chicken noodle soup label, open it, and find tomato soup, it would make you mad." We can do all the "right" things, say all the "right" things, but if what's inside and how we act doesn't match what we say we believe, it can be very damaging. To take it even farther...if we act like a christian when it's the "in" thing, or we're trying to maintain an image that we think people have of us, or we're trying to fool someone (maybe ourself) into believing we're something that we're really not, but when it gets a little tough, or we want to have some "fun" that we know is not within God's plan, or it's just easier to justify our behavior, there is no real commitment. 
So, what does God want? Does He want us to wear the label of being His, without the actions and commitment to back it up or does He want 100%, all the time, all the way, no exceptions, obedience? Does He want us to be comfortable or committed?

More Random Thoughts

A family was spending the day at a beach. The day was beautiful, but the sea was rough. The parents warned their child of the dangers of the surf. They wanted to protect the child from the dangers that lurked under the surface of the waves. For a while, the child obediently played in the sand, but then started to question the wisdom of his parents. He wondered, “How could anything that looked so fun be so dangerous?” Slowly, the child eased toward the water and when the parents looked away, put his toes in the water. Surely, this couldn’t be what his parents had warned him against. The water felt so good on his feet. His parents called him back to them, but he just smiled and waved and said that it was ok. He knew what he was doing.

As the tide came in, the child drifted farther away, out of the protective grasp of his parents. Still he smiled and waved. “It’s not too deep, and I’m having fun.”
Helplessly, the parents watched and the riptide pulled him closer and closer to the jagged rocks. There was no way to convince the child of the dangers that were so close. As the wave began to beat the child against the rocks, he cried out for help, but there was nothing that the parents could do. They reached out, but the point where they could make a difference was long past. The pain that they felt watching their child fight to survive was unbearable. Each time that it seemed he had conquered the waves, the water drew him back in and he surrendered to the sea. The rescue attempts were ignored. To return back to the safety of the beach would be hard, painful, and would leave many scars.
God, our Father, watches as we surrender to the waves, He has done so much to help us avoid the rocks, but we ignore His direction and correction. The return to His will does not come without pain and scars. We must listen to what He tells us while we are still on the beach.

God and Digital Cable

Today’s random thought is somewhat humorous, but I managed to get some meaning out of it.

Dan and I decided that the current deal on the digital cable/internet/telephone bundle was a good deal. I called on Monday to make an appointment and they were able to come over on Tuesday. I called home on Tuesday to see how things were going and Dan told me that something had happened that resulted in the entire block losing their cable. I went home after school and noticed that the cable was still not working. About an hour later, it still wasn’t working. I figured that they would probably fix it the next day and went on with other activities. I ventured up to the sewing room where I found another receiver, just as we planned. I figured I would watch a movie while I sewed, so I turned the TV on. The digital cable was working. I thought that was strange so I went back downstairs to check out the set in the living room. Still no signal. I decided to investigate a little further. It was then that I noticed that the cable was not attached to the wall. I hooked it up and it worked!
So here’s the deeper meaning. There’s no way that we can hear what God has to say unless we are plugged into Him. We can sit in church, go through the motions, act like we believe, but if we are not truly plugged into Him and His Word, it’s like sitting in front of the TV with the cable unhooked. If we can’t hear what He has to say, how can we pretend to be following His will for our lives? The Bible is very clear on the basic do’s and don’ts, but we choose to ignore them with the rationalization that God somehow is ok with it. It’s only if we are plugged in that the desires of our hearts are overtaken by the desires of His. Spend some (ok, a lot) of time plugging into God and you’ll be amazed by how clear things become.

Baking soda faith

Baking soda is a wonderful leavening agent.  When combined with moisture and an acidic ingredient, its power is unleashed and baked products rise.  When combined only with moisture…not a lot happens.  When combined with just an acid, not much happens either.  It has to be a combination of all these factors.  For the most part, when I am baking, I don’t have to wonder if the baking soda will do its job.  If I present the right conditions, it will work.  If I don’t bake much and the baking soda gets stale, it loses its effectiveness.  I can still use it though.  I can go into the fridge to absorb odors.  Not a very glamorous job, but as a secondary use, it can still be effective.

Baking soda and our Christian walk have a lot of similarities.  First, it is important to keep things fresh and add the right ingredients.  This may take the form of an active prayer life, time studying the Bible, and attending church. Just like adding baking soda to some flour and an egg or two won’t produce the results that you want, having a faith that is devoid of the things that will make it grow won’t produce good results. With the right approach to faith, we don’t have hope that things will work out.  We can have the confidence that comes with knowing that God is directing our steps.

Baking soda that is left on the shelf goes stale.  Likewise, faith that is put on the shelf goes stale.  If it is not used, it loses its effectiveness.  That doesn’t mean that God can’t still use you, but the primary purpose that He had planned for you, may not become a reality.  Think about the people and situations that may not have God’s blessing because you are just sitting on the shelf.  If you choose later to get off the shelf, you may find yourself being used in a way that you know isn’t as effective  as a result of choices that you made when God wanted you to follow His plan for your life.

Take your faith off of the shelf.  Add the things that are needed to make it vital and alive.  Use your life for the purpose that God intended.