When God Intervenes

Last weekend my husband and I did what we normally do on a Saturday, we made up a grocery list and went to Aldi's, a grocery store chain that sells discounted food items. We love that store! You meet all kinds of interesting people, some not so fun to listen to, but they're doing what we're doing, shopping for groceries for the upcoming week. It's a staple in their life just like it is in ours. However, on this particular Saturday I was about to meet with God's reconciling grace. As I was walking the cart down the aisle I glanced to my left and saw someone I thought I knew, did a double-take and realized it was indeed an old former friend. She and I had a falling out a few years back, both said some things we shouldn't have and parted ways. She was hurt, I was hurt and that was that. Or so I thought. So to see her in the grocery store shopping for groceries with her husband, just like I was, at first glance caused a fight or flight response in me. I could either ignore her and keep shopping (which I did for a few minutes), or I could step into the opportunity God presented to me to restore a friendship, right there in the grocery store. After first ignoring her I tussled within myself as to what to do. As I continued down the aisle it was inevitable, we were going to meet. What should I do? At the gentle nudge from the Spirit who lives within me I stepped forward and said her name, waiting for her to first, see me, then recognize me, and then wait and see how she would react. She turned, looked at me and a glint of recognition came to her face and instantly we hugged. And it wasn't a quick "hug, hi, how are you, now go away" kind of hug. It felt like all the pent up feelings I had towards this sister in Christ just dissipated into nothing and I felt restored, righted and renewed. We couldn't talk long enough, but both knew we had husbands waiting off to the side to continue our shopping, so we parted and moved on. The next aisle we met again, hugged again, only this time I apologized for what happened between us and she did the same and it was if we had each found a new friend. Oh, how I've missed my friend. And I didn't even really realize it until just then. We had been through so much together and parted on such painful circumstances that reconciling didn't ever seem to be possible. But for God. He knows when it's time to restore. I hadn't been praying about it, hadn't even thought of her for quite a while, but He knows when it's time. How I thank Him for his loving intervention in my life. Would that every broken relationship be renewed in such a way! I don't know why now, why us, for what purpose, but He does and even though we live 50 miles apart I know that I know when we meet up again, and we WILL meet up again, He will be at the center of the relationship and be glorified through it.

Peace, Be Still

Genesis 18:17, NIV Then the Lord said, "Shall I hide from Abraham what I am about to do?" Note that the Lord "SAID"; He truly didn't ask anyone for their opinion, He wasn't doubting or unsure. He knew his friend Abraham, their friendship was intimate, true and sure. Without waiting for any response from anyone, He then proceeded to speak over Abraham his future. All this time good ol' Abe said nothing. He didn't goad the Lord to disclose what He was talking about. He didn't beg, "Oh, pretty please? Tell me?" Abraham waited to let the Lord speak His peace. Sometimes when my husband of 21+ years is sharing his thoughts with me or telling me a story he takes longer than I'm comfortable with, just getting the words out of his mouth seems to take a long time because he is forming them in his head before they are spoken. Yet, knowing him as an intimate friend as well as wife I can pretty much know what he's about to say and if I'm really impatient I will say it for him. That just kills the moment. His eyes will ever so slightly twitch and I'll see a frown out of the corner of my eye, and I realize that something is now lost in the sharing. I've learned over time that if I want to be his partner in the telling, I need to keep quiet, listen and let him speak his peace. It's a difficult thing for me to do but I've discovered that this way he tells his story his way and he is honored more by my respectful silence than my impatient slap-in-the-face blurting out of his thoughts for him. My heart desires to claim the above bible verse over my own life and many times I want to help the Lord speak the words over my life like He did Abraham. I may even give him suggestions. However, I'm learning that if I want to be His partner in the prophetic words, I need to keep to be still and let my heavenly Father speak to me in His way and in His time. My intimate desire is to honor Him whom I love above all things and He is worthy of my respectful silence.

God keeps His word! AMEN

I love the section about God keeping His word. Satan surely does lie through his teeth! "First, there’s the matter of being put in charge of writing down and caring for God’s revelation, these Holy Scriptures. So, what if, in the course of doing that, some of those Jews abandoned their post? God didn’t abandon them. Do you think their faithlessness cancels out his faithfulness? Not on your life! Depend on it: God keeps his word even when the whole world is lying through its teeth. Scripture says the same: Your words stand fast and true; Rejection doesn’t faze you. But if our wrongdoing only underlines and confirms God’s rightdoing, shouldn’t we be commended for helping out? Since our bad words don’t even make a dent in his good words, isn’t it wrong of God to back us to the wall and hold us to our word? These questions come up. The answer to such questions is no, a most emphatic No! How else would things ever get straightened out if God didn’t do the straightening?" (Romans 3:2-6, MSG)

I DID IT!!! DANCERCISING 101 & 102

I did it! I did it! I found that ONE thing that clicked with me for exercising. After writing the article for www.liveliving.org regarding motivation to transformation entitled, "The Beauty Within," something inside of me just started clicking into place. After accomplishing the 5K race in March I've been vacillating about what to do "next". This past weekend the Holy Spirit prompted me to pull out the CD's I used when I led worship at a previous church and I found that I have 50-60 CD's. On those CD's there must be 20-30 songs that I could use to dance/exercise to. I thought I just needed to burn the songs onto a CD and incorporate the steps. However, this morning I couldn't wait any longer and yanked the CD player off my work desk and took it down to the racketball workout room in the gym of my workplace, set it up and pushed the "on" button. Had no idea what steps to do but I just moved in worship and praise, incorporating what dance steps I remembered from 2nd and 3rd grade dance classes and some exercise moves I knew. IT WAS EXHILERATING! I sweated more dancercising than I did when I walked for 60 minutes on the treadmill or elliptical. Christian Zumba? Could it be on its way in? I've found my niche. Have even looked at taking a dance class (for senior citizens no less, LOL)to learn more steps and moves. This is only the beginning. I'm writing this just before heading to lunch but there will be more of my adventures into dancercising, you can be sure. Sorry this is so short but stay tuned for updates. In Jesus' name I'm off and DANCING!!! Woo HOO!!! SPECIAL NOTE: Strangest thing happened in the afternoon at work after writing this post. I shouldn't have been surprised by it, for every time you rise to a new level of intimacy with the Lord the enemy tries to dig his claws in and works even harder to stop the work of the Lord in your life. I was working away and from seemingly out of nowhere I was overcome with anger and frustration, with my job, boss, coworkers and felt like I wanted to walk away from it all. Thoughts like "why am I bothering to work out, I work and work and nothing, I just look stupid down there trying to "dance", I should be struggling more, not enjoying it more. Oh, I hate this place. I am so frustrated!" And kept getting blow after blow with thoughts that truly weren't of me. So I got up, seemingly to walk to the restroom, to escape iand sat down to take it all to my Lord. "God, help me. I need your truth and peace." He began to open my heart to recognize that Satan works with more force to combat me with lies when I'm on the path the Lord desires for me. While I may not be madly in love with my job, He has given me strong Christian women that surround me with support here and He's supplied a workout area totally free of charge. Struggles will come with any job but He is there to lift me up out of them. He came that I might have LIFE and live it to the full so enjoyment of that life is totally of Him. So I'm back this morning and exercising in His word and He takes me to Isaiah 41. I love verse 10 but here's a little snippet of comforting truth: verse 9b-"I have chosen you and have not rejected you," verse 10: "So do not fear, for I am with you; do not be dismayed, for I am your God. I will uphold you with my righteous right hand," verse 13-"for I am the Lord, your God, who takes hold of your right hand and says to you, Do not fear, I will help you." Isn't He just the most understanding and nifty Friend? Yeah, back at the dance tomorrow morning!

Revelation

I apologize for not having written in this blog for a week. I've been challenged to write a motivational article for the e-magazine on www.LiveLiving.org and have been rather consumed with the process of that. It is now finished and will be available to read in its next issue on Motivation. I was stunned to read, as I wrote, what the Lord wanted to reveal within me. What He desired to show me about myself that in all my 57 years of life I never saw. He showed me how greatly the arts influenced my life and why, out of all the members of my family (who were all into sports), I was the one given this gift. You'll have to read it when it comes out. May it touch and bless your life as it has mine. More later.

He Hears my Pain

In light of yesterday's post, "Stones vs. Peace" I want to share what my Heavenly Trainer is right now teaching me as He reveals more of just Who He is to me. Yes, the past several days have been really sucky, but I can still go to Him with it. He is so faithful that even when I screw up, even when I fail, even when I don't "produce" the fruit of righteousness that we're all taught we're to produce (tho for the life of me I haven't figured out how to do on my own! "Ta-daa, daughter, you can't do it on your own!"), even when I'm not glowing with perfection, He is there for me. He tells me in Ephesians 3:12 that "In Him and through faith in Him we may approach God with freedom and confidence." WOW! He's teaching me, even this week, about perseverance, endurance, and HOPE by sending me to Romans 15: 4-6. That "hope", that truth-filled surety that only comes as He plants His truth in my heart through His living word and He reveals His heart to me. That hope, that solid, concrete evidence of His Truth, is unfolding like a rare flower in a field of my life's weeds and it's alive with His beauty, His resolve, His love. I am so filled with thankfulness this morning that I find it difficult to express how excited and yet humbled I am whenever He reveals His heart to me. As I open His Word His Spirit leads me to The Message version of Romans 5:3-5, which reads-"There’s more to come: We continue to shout our praise even when we’re hemmed in with troubles, because we know how troubles can develop passionate patience in us, and how that patience in turn forges the tempered steel of virtue, keeping us alert for whatever God will do next. In alert expectancy such as this, we’re never left feeling shortchanged. Quite the contrary—we can’t round up enough containers to hold everything God generously pours into our lives through the Holy Spirit!" Romans 5:3-5 (MSG) Oh, the authenticity of my Father's love and nifty personality! That is what He is doing within me. Yes, I had a melt-down, but the neat part of all that is He understands, and I know deep in my heart, He hears my pain, receives it to Himself and will fill that pain with His love. It's just Who He is. That melt-down drew me more into His heart than I've ever been before. No, I don't "see" any changes outwardly at this point, but inwardly, His peace is filling me and I love Him all the more for that. True change is happening within me and it's all Him. Wow! Thank you Father. Thank you!

Stones vs. Peace

It's been a rough week. I should have expected attacks from the enemy considering the decision my husband and I made last week, and began to put into practice, to obey God's command and fully tithe to our church. We gave each week prior to that, but knew that just giving half-heartedly wasn't fully obedient to our Father's will. So this past Sunday we stepped up and gave a full tithe. I don't share this to get a pat on the back, quite the contrary, I share this information to set the stage as one of the reasons it's been a tough week mentally. Mother's Day has always been difficult for me as well. My mother and father abandoned me and my 2 brothers when I was 2, they were 4 and 5, and to honor her on this day is tough. We've somewhat mended our fences, but the pain is still lurking in my heart. I'm just sayin'. And then we got home from church and not a word was said to me from my son about Mother's Day, and I had a disagreement with my husband, and the day just fell apart from there. Not monumental, but was enough to throw me into a self-centered conundrum. One of the worst things you can do when there's a "disagreement" is to say nothing and go to bed that way. Confrontation is tough, but it also brings quicker healing. Alas, I chose to be silent, thinking I would take it to the Lord the next day and did so. He reminded me that the same issues I was upset about, I, too, had been guilty of and shouldn't be throwing stones expecting peace. Yesterday morning when going to exercise I chose instead to go into the pool room and pour out my heart to the Lord, basically I had a melt down. I'm 57 years old and still it hurts to know that my mother and father didn't want me. "Why didn't they love us enough to seek Jesus? Why didn't they love us enough to work it out? Our lives could have been so much richer had they dealt with their problems through the Lord! Why, Father? Why?" This morning I went to the pool, again seeking peace from my heavenly Father. Unfortunately, although I went through the motions of exercising in the pool my heart wasn't in it and depression settled in. Doom and gloom shrouded my heart and I knew Satan was enjoying every minute of my despair. I wanted the Lord to wave His magic wand and walk to me on the pool's surface and take away all my pain, leaving me with a supernatural high that I could brag about to others. Strangely enough, He didn't do that. What He did gently tell me was that I needed to practice thankfulness, to tell Him all the reasons I had to be thankful to Him. Although when I started to do that I didn't "feel" thankful, the more I spoke about it, the calmer became my heart and the depression lifted from shoulders. I just read part of a "Girlfriends in God" devotional by Gwen Smith entitled, "When Your Heart Needs Healing." These words really touched my heart, "...this is one of the biggest challenges we face. Having a heart fixed on healing. To press through to a place of wellness and strength: spiritually, emotionally, and psychologically. To not back down from the resistance before us in light of the rewards that await us. To run the race of faith well!" Healing. Oh God, thank you for your healing in my life. In Jesus' name I forgive my mother and father, I forgive my son, I forgive my husband, I forgive those who've hurt my child's heart. Thank you for forgiving me the hurt and pain I've caused you, I've caused others. Thank you for your mercy and grace. Thank you for your great love, thank you for the confirmation you give me in i Peter 4:8 that tells me, "Above all, love each other deeply, because love covers over a multitude of sins." Thank you for taking my stones of pain and giving me your Living Water of peace.