Paul speaks the elders at the church of Ephesus that he dearly loves. He tells them that he knows the Holy Spirit is compelling him to go to Jerusalem, and he knows that hardship awaits him. Even so, Paul has set in his heart to obey and to go. His only desire was to obey God and to do exactly what God had called him to do. Paul says this:
“But I do not account my life of any value nor as precious to myself, if only I may finish my course and the ministry that I received from the Lord Jesus, to testify to the gospel of the grace of God.” Acts 20:24 ESV
Life is not easy, and living for God with a heart that is wholly His is not normal to the world around us. Because those around us who do not know God do not value Him or His ways. But Paul had an encounter with Jesus Himself, and Paul had experienced the fullness of the Holy Spirit in his life. He was forever changed and wanted to know God alone. He only wanted to please God no matter what.
Have you come to that point in your life? Have you had an experience with Jesus and found that He alone satisfies? Have you entered into fellowship with the Holy Spirit? Can you hear Him speak to you, and do you know He hears you when you pray? This is what you were created for! Nothing else matters!
My prayer is the same as Paul’s. May I testify if the grace of God in my life! God has been so very good to me! I want you to experience that same goodness! But that goodness is only experienced when you surrender your life to Him. That is when the Holy Spirit fills you to overflowing and you experience the same Jesus Paul encountered on the road to Damascus and the same Holy Spirit the disciples were filled with in the upper room at Pentecost.
“Jesus replied, “If you only knew the gift God has for you and who you are speaking to, you would ask me, and I would give you living water.” John 4:10 NLT
In today’s chapter, Jesus was speaking to the Samaritan Woman at the well. She had a sinful past and had come to the well at an hour that signified her life of shame. Jesus asks her for a drink of water and she is surprised that a Jewish man would talk to her. Let along ask her for a drink. Jesus responds to her surprise. I love the NLT’s wording of this response. “Jesus replied, “If you only knew the gift God has for you and who you are speaking to, you would ask me, and I would give you living water.”
Oh how I have run from God. I do anything at times to avoid being where He is and what He has for me. I guess it’s because I want what I want, when and how I want it. Surrender to Him goes against my “me centric” life. Maybe you have been where I have been too?
But Jesus stands there offering what He offered the Woman at the well over 2000 years ago. “The gift God has for you…”. If we only knew what that gift would be when we simply yield our way to His and ask. Jesus offers us “living water” that satisfies us forever. We never thirst again when we finally take a drink of His life He offers.
“If you only knew the gift of God…”. May you and I thirst for that gift more than all the other things that are temporary and futile. He offers us Himself in abundance. May we thirst for Him alone!
I am a writer. It’s kind of an outlet for me. Sometimes the things I feel come out better written in a journal with pen or pecked out on a laptop keyboard. I woke up this morning, 4:36 am to be exact, thinking about my mom. My mom has suffered for 22 years with poor health and chronic pain. A couple of weeks ago she took a turn for the worse and has now been released to hospice care at home. I spent the past couple of days at my parent’s house helping out as our family has begun to navigate what hospice has indicated are the last one to two weeks, she is with us here on earth. So, forgive me as I sort through it all in this Blog entry today.
I don’t know if I’ve ever seen this picture of us until this week. Mom and me camping. She made camping look like fun when I’m sure she had to work hard. Thanks mom!
Mom probably doesn’t know this, but some of my best parenting hacks I could attribute to her. When I was little, she made me and my brothers and my Dad the center of her world, with the exception that God truly was first. My earliest memories are hot summer days sitting on the concrete back porch of our home eating homemade popsicles she had in abundant supply. (I got the recipe and made them for my kids.) They were always soooo good especially my favorite, the grape. Summers were spent going to the Current River to play, Sinking Creek to be exact. Mom took us there frequently during the hottest of the summer days. She wanted to make sure I could swim. If we didn’t go to the river, she would set up a sprinkler for us to run through in our back yard. While I played outside, she canned fresh vegetables and made the best homemade jellies ever. I was so spoiled with the taste of them, I struggled when I moved out and went to college to eat store bought jelly. It wasn’t the same as my mom’s.
During the winter, on snow days, Mom let my brothers, my cousin Ted and I build forts out of blankets between our rooms so we could have rubber band gun wars. As a kid they seemed to go on forever. She didn’t seem to mind us sliding down the hallway in our socks on the hard wood floor of our little 1200 sq ft home. We loved to pretend to ice skate. I’m sure we were loud, rambunctious, and a little crazy, but she let us play.
Birthday party for my daughter with my Mom and Mom in love
Mom took us to the public library frequently and would read us book after book. She also, sat us down and read us Bible stories from the Egermeier’s Bible Story Book, which is one of my personal favorites. Her mom read it to her, she read it to me, I repeated this with my kids and hope to pass this tradition to my grandkids as they grow up too. Thanks, Mom, for giving me the idea.
Mom, my son, grandson, and me
Mom was the church pianist, so she made sure piano lessons were available to each of us kids. She loved music. It was always playing in our home. She passed this love on to me, my kids, and now to my grandkids. What a heritage!
Mom playing at church
My mom was a seamstress. She spent hours sewing me the most complicated of dresses that I would request. They fit perfectly and were beautiful. Although occasionally she would forget a sewing pin in them, and I would find it while trying it on. i teased her a lot about that. She made several quilts for wedding gifts or baby blankets as well. She painted paintings, worked on cabinets and other projects with my grandma in Grandma’s woodshop. She was brave enough to take us kids to that woodshop and let us make Christmas Ornaments with the bandsaw one year. That instilled in me a love for woodworking inspiring me to take shop in High School so I could make a cedar chest as a project. Maybe someday I’ll take up woodworking again it sure sounds fun.
Mom and me at my wedding. Mom did all the flowers. Fishing trip to Texas she went with my dad on
Probably one of my favorite things my mom passed down to me is the love of fishing. My favorite summer memories are of her and my dad taking us fishing at Grandma’s pond. It was such a happy and peaceful place to go. Mom loved to fish. If she got a big one on the line, she would get so excited making my dad and the rest of us laugh as she reeled in her catch.
A not so successful trout fishing trip
Mom tried to pass down her skills to me working with me to learn to crochet, embroidery, sew, cook (I was pretty resistant when it came to that), and even tried to get me to learn to bake pies. When I was around five, she would be making dough for her own pies, but give me a little of hers, put it in my little toy pie tin, let me dip a spoonful or two of her pie filling in the crust and help me to seal it up with a small piece of dough on top. She would bake my little pie right next to hers so I could give it to my dad when he got home from his long day of work at the mines. I would “work” right next to her wearing a little apron she had made for me. to wear. This is one of my happiest memories growing up.
When I was nine, Mom and Dad felt like God was leading our family to become a foster family and help children who were in need. The second child my parents fostered was a special needs child that they adopted almost 9 years later. Mom tried very hard to help my sister, and keep our home what it should be, but those years proved to be very hard years for us all. Things were not easy at home as they once were. When I graduated high school, I left home a day or two after graduation. I let a lot of hurt and bitterness fester for several years in my heart. Things were not what Mom and I had wanted between us.
A couple of years ago, I took a trip home to talk to Mom about it all, for years she had been trying to talk to me, but I couldn’t, and I wouldn’t. We laid it all out there and forgiveness came. We talked about how we did not have what we both had wanted all those years, but we had what we had now, and we would try to go forward from there. But her illness, kept us from really getting to do the things we wanted to and to be what we wanted to be.
While I was at home the past couple of days, mom told me how much she had always wanted me. I was a “pleasant surprise” to my parents when I was born. She hadn’t planned another baby, and she never dreamed she would get a little girl. She proceded to tell me how she wished things had been different.
Things may not have been all we wanted here, but we have a hope, His name is Jesus. I know very soon she will leave behind the pain she has walked through and step into the beauty of His glory! Although by earth’s years, (I hope to have at least another 40 years left in me), it may seem to be a long time. In heaven, time is no more. It will only be a short time for her, and we will be back together once again. Everything that kept us apart will be no more. What we missed here will be there. Yes, we have this Hope. I told Mom as I kissed her goodbye, “If Jesus comes to get you, go ahead and go. I will see you again very soon. We will all be together again, and it will be beautiful.”
I love you Mom, don’t worry about me. As we talked about in the hospital a week ago, “God has worked all things out for the good of us (me and her) who love Him and have been called according to His purpose.” (Romans 8:28) If I don’t get to see you before Jesus comes to call you on, I will see you again when my race is done.
The setting in today’s chapter is a meal at the house of a prominent Pharisee, a religious leader of Jesus time. Jesus sat and watched as the guest came in looking for seating in prominent places. They wanted recognition and positions of power with the affluent in the room. It is at this point Jesus tells a parable about a “Great Feast, “ a feast much like the kingdom of God.
A man sent out invitations to a great feast he was giving, but everyone he asked had excuses for why they could not come. So the man told his servant to go and invite the “rejects”, “the poor, the crippled, the blind, and the lame.” (Verse 21) He also instructs the servant to go “to the roads and country lanes and compel them to come in…” (verse 23) The man throwing the feast wanted his house to be full. Our loving Heavenly Father is like this man. The invitation to His Heavenly banquet was sent years ago, on a dark night, in a Bethlehem Stable. Jesus came inviting the ones rejected- the poor in spirit; those crippled by fear and pain; those blinded by sin; those lame, unable to stand in His presence. He calls to the “roads and country lanes” ,the out of the way, lonely places, “Come!” He longs for His house to be full!
For this I am so grateful. I am all of the people Jesus invited- I am the poor, the crippled, the blind and the lame. I am the one who could not come to the banquet had it not been for Jesus inviting sinners to come!
The first Christmas shows us a glimpse of the God who would go to great lengths to see His house full of guests delighted and fulfilled at His banquet. Our God came to be His invitation, with us- Emmanuel. He prepared the way for us to the banquet by His sacrificially dying on the cross, and victoriously rising from the grave. May we hear the invitation declared to us so many years ago at His birth, “Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth peace to those on whom His favor rests.” Luke 2:14. His favor is upon us! His invitation has been sent! May we drop any excuse for not attending His feast and RSVP with Him replying “Yes! I come!”
The accounts written about in today chapter seem to be the height of the wonders Jesus did while walking with His disciples. He continued to do miracle after miracle and speak truth that was irresistible to listen to. He then invited His disciples to participate with Him in proclaiming the Good News of the Kingdom of God. Still there was something coming He wanted to prepare His closest friends, the disciples for, His death.
Jesus knew He would suffer. He knew He would be separated from them. He knew how hard it would be. But verse 51 says He “resolutely set out for Jerusalem.” He headed to the place He would die with a fixed purpose. But this was not the first time Jesus “resolutely set out” for the place He would suffer. Jesus left the splendors of Heaven, with a fixed purpose. He willingly submitted Himself fully as God to become fully man. With resolve, He came to us! He knew before He ever entered our world on that Christmas night that He would live, laugh, and love with us. He knew He would experience pain, sadness, and sorrows. Yet He came. He never wavered in His fixed purpose! He had come to love, to provide the way, for our own good, to be with Him.
The things to come in the chapters of Luke we have not yet read this month of December, Jesus knew would come about. The betrayal, the trial, the beatings, the execution, the death… Jesus knew it would come. For the King of born in Bethlehem at Christmas was born to die. This death had a fixed purpose as well. Without His sacrifice, there would be no cure for the sin of our stony, hard, and darkened hearts.
As we celebrate His birth, let us not forget His death! He had come to give His life so we could be united with Him again, free from our sins!
“Therefore since we have such a hope, we are very bold.” 2 Corinthians 3:12
Our God is soooo good! I have been contemplating the goodness of God lately. Something that in my 40 years of walking with Him I have never done. I’m not sure why not, but here we are… I have been awed by a definition I heard of love in a class I am taking, “Living Life Live” at WOW- Women on Wednesday. “Love always wants the very best, the most excellent, and the most profitable for another to benefit them for their own sake.” In other words since God is love, He wants the most excellent, the most profitable, the most beneficial for me. Mind blown. Especially if for some reason you have lived your life with a distorted image of God, looking at Him as a taskmaster of sorts. One who demands work from us in exchange for His blessing that He occasionally doles out to keep us plodding along like a donkey following a carrot on a stick so it will pull a cart. Not so with our Loving Heavenly Father who has set His affections on us and gives so many rich gifts of love, joy, and peace to the heart who is open to receive.
This leads me to the verse above: “We have such a hope…” hope- the confident expectation of Good. Our God is the God of Hope- when we trust Him and believe Him He pours out a confident expectation of GOOD- Hope because all His ways are GOOD toward us, EVERY single one! He never acts as the false gods of ancient times did. They were known for manipulating their subjects, punishing harshly for any misstep or act that displeased them. Their ways were not able to be known because they simply cared only for themselves.
Our God is good! And He is our hope, confident expectation of Good, because Good is the essence of who He is. This goodness makes us “bold”- free from timidity, confident, brave! We are told in the word we can approach God boldly because of what Jesus did for us on the cross. We can be confident of His heart towards us, because it is filled with His great love. And Our God is always good!
I’ve been asking the Holy Spirit to fill me with Boldness the past few months: Boldness to obey God fully, boldness to say whatever He places in my spirit to say, boldness to do whatever He asks.
Yesterday I was in a break out session at the Inspire Women’s Retreat and this verse was one of a section of scriptures being discussed. It stood out in my heart as I heard it read: God’s hope- my understanding of just how GOOD He is and expectation of that GOODNESS to be poured out in my life moves me. It makes me free, free from timidity and fear. It makes me BOLD! It makes me willing to go wherever God leads me, to do whatever He asks. Because I am living a life close to Him, basking in His goodness. I am anticipating with hope His love has gone before me, goes behind me, and is in me. It makes me unable to fail! That Hope truly does make me bold!
Every once in a while, a memory of hard, traumatic, unexplainable events of the past will raise its ugly head inside of me. It tends to rock me to the core. Sometimes taking a while to get my mind off of it.
Today I was reading in Luke 24:1-12. It is the account of Mary Magdalene, Joanna, and Mary Mother of James going to the tomb of Jesus to put burial spices on His body. They find He isn’t there. Suddenly, Angels appear and one says “Why do you look for the living among the dead?” This phrase resounds in my heart today. The women had seen some of the most traumatic events of a brutal death of a loved one. They surely were processing what had happened trying to make sense. But they were instructed that there wasn’t anything there for them in the dead things of the past. Jesus was living! He wasn’t in the past He has risen!
Whatever we have walked through that was hard, painful, and death to us is not where Jesus is. He has risen!! He is not in the dead things of the past. He is alive now and forever more!
The song “I Will Rise” by Bethel has been on my play list this week. This morning has been a morning that I have it on repeat. It speaks of what I read in Luke.
“Beyond the burial, there's a resurrection Your will be done in me Oh-oh, Let my roots go deep And I will rise, I will rise He holds the time that I will rise”
Jesus calls us out of our graves of the past to stand in the present with Him! “I will Rise! God through my life be lifted high!” We have no time to be looking intently into the graves of our lives! Jesus is not there! The living life of Christ cannot be found in the graves of failure and pain! He is risen and we are seated with Him in the heavenly places of His victorious Kingdom! I will rise! Let Jesus rise in me!
I’m not what I would consider a musician. I can play the piano some. I have family members that are musicians, which is how I became familiar with a phenomenon of the musician’s world, “Name dropping”. Name dropping is naming someone you have played music with while in a conversation with someone who may not know what level of a musician you are. The more popular or talented the musician is that you can name you have played music with/ the more talented you appear to be because of the association. All it takes is one performance/ gig with the mentioned musician and you have developed your cred.
Another game people who want to impress another might play is talking about your “brushes with greatness” Here’s a couple of mine… prepare to be blown away… #1. When I was in college I went to church with the “Miss America” of that year. She was super sweet and I’m sure she still is. #2. When my husband and I were first married and poor, we had a small duplex we rented. One time we had the then House Majority Leader Dick Gephardt’s daughter over for dinner that I cooked a meal for her in our humble abode. Long story, but she was a friend of a friend and the friend asked if I cared if she came along for the meal. Now I know you are hooked with all the credibility I have since I have spent time with some pretty famous people and on one occasion cooked for one. . Ha Ha.
I’ve been involved in this Bible study about “Abiding in Christ”. After reading today’s study on what it really means to “Abide”- live in Christ, close relationship, tight with Him, it occurred to me, so many “Christians”,including me at times, are content to “Name Drop” God instead of living in the relationship with Him. Or throw Him into the category of one of your “brushes with greatness”.
Here’s how I would define “Name Dropping God”- Saying “Yes, I believe In Jesus, I go to church at such and such place, I am most definitely there on Easter or Christmas… ” Maybe even having some religious artwork hanging around your house. OR “Brushes with greatness with God” – When I was nine, I had an experience with God, I prayed a prayer. Or 5 years ago I prayed, and God did a miracle for me, but those are my only experiences with God.” All of these are good things, but God wants to go past our “Name dropping” and “Brushes with greatness” that we have with Him. He wants us to experience Him on the regular/ daily. He wants relationship. He wants to take us from knowing of Him, to knowing Him, from feeling His occasional touch to being connected with Him like Jesus talked about in John 17:33 When He said He wanted us to realize the “I in them, and You in Me”, the interconnectedness of truly finding ourselves living in Him.
Maybe a more practical illustration would help to wrap this all up. I’ve been married for 29 years, not an easy feat in today’s world, but it has been a great 29 years, because of the “relationship” I have with my husband. We’ve been together long enough that I often know what he is thinking, finish his sentences, can predict what he will do next. And the same goes for Him with me. Now imagine if all our relationship revolved around was “Name dropping”. “My husband has street cred for being the best husband, because he can mention knowing me, but he hasn’t ever hung out with me… or “My husband is legit! One time he met “the most famous husband in the world” But he rarely sits next to me in our living room.
29 years together requires lots of time, weekends away, old people dates to Menards together, holding hands- my favorite 🙂 , working through arguments- not my favorite, being together, etc. A “name drop” or “brush with greatness” simply is not enough. We have to be as the Bible describes it “ONE”. And this is what Jesus desires from us as well. He wants us to “be in Him, and He be in Us” not just conveniently bearing His name so we some how seem “legit” spiritually and have heavenly “cred” with Him. He loves us! He wants more and may the cry of our hearts be “more of Him”!
More than once in my 40 year walk with the Lord, I’ve come to conclusions that my way is best, and more than once in my 40 year walk with the Lord, I’ve figured out it isn’t. Every so often God allows me a course correction, usually entailing me having a brief glimpse of who I really am and who He is. It’s at that point I feel all the feels Isaiah did when he exclaimed, “Woe to me!! … I am ruined!!” I think God allows us those peeks every so often so we can see just how much it was that we thought we knew and we didn’t.
I Thought I Knew
I thought I knew how to grab ahold of You, to be close to Your side. But how can I know how to dwell in unapproachable light?
I thought I had you figured out, what to say to move Your heart. But how can my earthly words command You, the One who orders the stars?
I thought I could impress You by all the good I've done. But how can I compare to You, whose righteousness outshines the sun?
I thought I had perfected the tricks to make me be alright. But how can my performance compare to the price You paid when on the cross You died?
I thought I could fix myself, present to You my best side. But all You wanted me to do was surrender and Abide.
Isaiah 6:5 “Woe to me!” I cried. “I am ruined! For I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips, and my eyes have seen the King, the Lord Almighty.”
“I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race…” 2 Timothy 4:7
One of the many school days. Me and my baby, Andy, Graduating this year Class of 2022
When you’re a writer, you write. I’ve been at this for a while. It’s probably the best way to sort out what’s going on on the inside of me. The other day I was digging through one of my MANY 1/2 finished journals and stumbled upon this entry.
Journal Entry 8/29/2007
The above journal entry must have been right before I started a new school year. I was calculating the cost that day, and I’m pretty sure I must have been overwhelmed. My baby would have been almost 3 1/2, youngest daughter – 7, older daughter -9, and oldest-13. As I have told many, I have no business teaching math, I was a little off on my calculation for graduation of Andy- the baby, it is this year, in fact, it’s less than a week away.
First graduate class of 2013 First born Aaron.
I did it! It’s almost a done deal. The verse in 2 Timothy 4 has been running through my mind. Paul was finishing up his race on earth., and I’m not planning on going anywhere soon i.e. dying… but as far as the homeschooling season of my life, all 22 years of it, “I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race…” It’s really been hard for me to believe it is true. Although, this past year, has had relatively little homeschooling for me, since Andy took some classes at a small private school for dual credit, it signals the end of the homeschooling season for me.
Daughter #1 -Laura Class of 2016 with little sister.
Years ago, when all this started up, someone asked me how long I was planning on homeschooling my kids. I told them that I had no idea. It would be as long as God gave me the ability to do it, and I am glad that He did give me the grace for 22 years. I knew in my heart that God had called me to homeschool my kids, but I have lived with self-doubt of my abilities to teach my kids the entire time. I have had a nagging voice telling me how I was “Screwing them up” whispering in my ear frequently. I have woken up many mornings thinking about how I needed to figure out how to get the school bus to pick up my kids. But in the end after all my self-doubt, fears, and thoughts of quitting, I would not change the past 22 years for anything in the world. In fact, being at home with my kids since July 1995 when my first born came home from the hospital has been the joy of my life and I am thankful that God gave me the opportunity to do just that. I’ve often told my kids the reason I wanted to stay home and then homeschool was that I wanted to see all their firsts: Their first steps, their first words, their first word’s read, their first field trip, their first dance, and oh yes, their first time driving on a road with a permit… so many firsts. All this culminating with being able to stand on a stage in front of friends and family and hand their diploma to them personally as their teacher K-12.
Daughter #2 Faith class of 2018
I want to attest to you, that completing the past 22 years is not something that I did in my own strength. I finished the above journal entry on the next page with these two sentences, “Who else have I got besides you God? If I don’t trust, what can I do?” If you only knew me, you would understand how much I have needed Him the past 22 years. In fact, looking at the future, I still see how much I need Him for the next 49 of whatever He has for me to be about. It’s a little disconcerting to find yourself done with the one thing you have focused so much attention on for so long. I’ve found myself tearing up more than once the past couple of weeks contemplating it all. I’ve got things to be about, but honestly, I feel a little lost. Who I have been for the past 22 years is a “homeschool mom”. Now I’m not 100 % sure who I am supposed to be. I’ve got some ideas, but just like it was 22 years ago, when I think of what that means for me to be about it, I find myself shaking in my boots again, thinking about how unqualified I am, self doubt, and the old familiar “you will definitely screw that up…” So I guess I’m on the right track. lol. Because once again I find myself needing to write in a journal for 5/15/2022. “Who else have I got besides you God? If I don’t trust, what can I do?”
Your Love 