Midnight Revival

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There’s been a few times in my life I’ve been able to get a little taste of what heaven is probably like. When I was in 9th grade my best friend and I spent a night talking about God and praying. It probably wasn’t typical behavior for a couple of High School Freshman girls, but we were hungry to know God more and He was very willing to fill us. We stayed up most of the night laughing and then crying and talking about how cool God was and how much we wanted to know Him.

My second year of college a couple of friends and I ended up talking about God. Late in the night we started praying for each other and crying. It was just an impromptu prayer meeting in a College campus house that ended up with us “spreading the joy” to others on our floor. We were amazed at how real God was and how close He felt.

Early in our lives as young parents, my husband and I were discussing God and suddenly began to feel His touch. What was a simple car ride from one side of town to the other ended up with the very real presence of God with us. Tears, laughter, and a trip to his brother’s house for a time of prayer there.

I’ve seen it happen more than once. Not necessarily something experienced in a church building with the right people at the right time. Although He’s met me there too . Just someone hungry for more of God experiencing Him in a new way.

Acts 16 shares a story of an experience just like that. What started out as persecution of Paul and Silas for freeing a slave girl from tormenting demons turned into a prayer meeting that started at midnight and went until the sun came up. It started in a jail cell bound in stocks. Songs of worship for a God who has all things in His hands. It went to a jailer frightened by a supernatural earthquake wanting to know the God these men had been singing about. Then on to the jailers house for all night long discussions about God and His word. Baptisms in the middle of the night. A meal prepared and served and joy filling the house. Not an ordinary church service, not a bunch of holy people: prisoners, jailers, a common household, and a couple of men who had an encounter with Jesus- full of the Holy Spirit, and they were ready to share. All before the sunrise on what seemed to the rest of the world to be just another ordinary night.

Me in my middle aged state values my head hitting the pillow before 10pm. An all night prayer meeting seems like it could be a daunting task. Until I remembered, There’s nothing like the times I’ve spent in the past when God for some reason chose to let me experience His presence and reality those years ago.

I think God allows us to experience times like those as anchors. It locks us in securely in just how real He is. Paul experienced the reality of the presence of God in times like that night at the Jail/ Jailers house. The testimony I’m sure sustained him, Silas, the Jailer and his family for the years to come.

The times I’ve seen the hand of God move in my life have done the same. When my focus has been off and I’ve “forgotten” God reminds me of those times.

The times He’s allowed me to feel the reality of His closeness, the power of His presence, and the personal touch of His hand, those are the things that create a hunger for more. May I be willing to be inconvenienced by the place God chooses to show up, the time He appears, and the way He brings it about. God’s ways of showing Himself to us are not always our convenient, preconceived ways. They may involve a midnight revival with some ordinary people that just want to know “what must we do to be saved?” Or “what must I do to know you? Because what little taste I have had of You God is not enough. I want more.”

Bring on the Midnight Revival in my crazy world that makes little sense at times. When You step in, God, a prison becomes a pathway to freedom. Shackles become instruments of worship, and in the darkness and pain of a trial filled night a table for a feast is set before me.

Enough Already…

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I’m about done with this whole Quarantine deal. We’ve been at it for about 4 weeks I believe and are only about half done. Although I’m not really sure half done is accurate. It may be more…

I’ve been doing all the “right stuff”. Exercising, projects around the house, gardening, going outside, spending time in prayer and meditation. Honestly, the pressure from the changes of my life are starting to get to me. It occurred to me last Saturday after a day of straightening my pantry, cleaning out cabinets, and probably the most shocking thing to me- alphabetizing my spices (Not a natural organizer, never done before). It hit me… “Enough Already”. I’m tired of this change. I’m tired of the nightly news. I’m tired of the conspiracy theories. I’m tired of trying to get up, show up, and continue doing the same thing over and over again like I’m living the movie “Groundhog’s Day”. And honestly, unlike the majority of this world I really don’t even have it that bad. I’ve got room to roam out in my little corner of the world. Death rates are low, and so far the financial impact of this has been minimal to my family, with exception of a bigger grocery bill. So throw a little guilt on top of all the other emotions I’ve been feeling…”Enough Already”.

Usually at this point in my blog entries I make the turn towards the light at the end of the tunnel, or the deep spiritual point I’m trying to convey begins to become more clear. But if I’m honest, I’m not quite sure how to make the turn this time or turn on the light switch that makes the light at the end of the tunnel appear. Right now the light doesn’t seem to be there, and the point seems to be hidden from me. Not exactly the best place to be, or is it?

It’s times like these in my life that I appreciate David’s Psalms he wrote. I can go to the Bible and see that on its pages are feelings similar to mine. Psalm 13:1-5 The Message expresses these sentiments.

“Long enough, GOD — you’ve ignored me long enough. I’ve looked at the back of your head long enough. Long enough I’ve carried this ton of trouble, lived with a stomach full of pain. Long enough my arrogant enemies have looked down their noses at me.Take a good look at me, GOD, my God; I want to look life in the eye, So no enemy can get the best of me or laugh when I fall on my face.”

David is saying the equivalent of “Enough Already”. That gives me hope. David saw situations that surpass my temporary inconveniences that aggravate me. He lived through situations some placed upon him without his ability to control, others from bad choices he made. He found God someone He was able to run to and pour out the feelings of his heart without fear. God loved his honesty calling David “a man after His own heart.”

Honesty, laying it out to God is the best policy. He knows it all anyway because He sees what’s in our hearts. If I am afraid, if I am discouraged, if I am angry, if I am… God knows. I am assured of that. Not only does He know, He listens, and He cares. I can take my “Enough Already” to Him, and soon I will find as David did that God hears and He answers. The last two verses of Psalm 13 MSG declares just that. “I’ve thrown myself headlong into your arms— I’m celebrating your rescue. I’m singing at the top of my lungs, I’m so full of answered prayers.” I can look back on some of the darkest times in my life and see now how God was at work. It may have taken time, but He turned it all around, as God promised in His word: “And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.”
‭‭Romans‬ ‭8:28‬ ‭NIV‬‬

There I’ve found it again. “The light at the end of the tunnel”, the “deep spiritual point” I can make.

I may currently have the feelings of “Enough Already” rolling around inside of my heart and mind, but God… God is exactly that. He is “Enough Already” for me. He will not leave me here. I may not see the changes that put my world back to where it was before Covid 19. But I will see God’s Goodness in my life as I continue to run with my “Enough Already” to Him.


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Grandpa- 101 Years of Example

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I have to admit.  I have been a little down the past few days.  The reality of the change we are up against with regards to the Corona Virus has hit me more than once.  I’ve found myself thinking about how easy I’ve had it the past 49 years, and now it seems my world has been grabbed by one end and shaken out like a dusty rug at the entry way of a house.  Dust is flying everywhere and I’m not sure when the air will clear enough for me to breathe.  I was complaining to God about my feelings the other morning.  “My world will never be the same…” Then I was gently reminded, “Is that what you wanted? Did you want your world to never change?”  Good point.  Maybe my comfort levels, my ease… that would be good to leave them alone.  But the very changes I have prayed for in my world, those would be good to adjust. 

Here’s the deal… Change is a part of life.  You can’t dodge it or escape.  It happens and you have to just go through.

My Grandpa was born in 1914.  He died a few years ago just a few days shy of his 101st Birthday.  When he was 4 years old the world was in the midst of another infamous pandemic, The Spanish Flu.  I never heard him talk about it, so he may have been young enough to not remember it much, but I do remember hearing stories about his life during The Great Depression. How as a boy he hunted and fished, not for pleasure, but to help feed his siblings and himself, so much so that he wasn’t much a fan of either when he got older. He just went to the pond and watched us fish.  He witnessed World War I and II, the Korean War, and Vietnam War, the war his oldest son fought in and was faced with uncertainty of how that would end up for him, he came home.  He had loved ones born and loved ones die, among which were infant grandbabies.  He lost a great grandson, my nephew in the Gulf of Aden- lost at sea while serving with the United States Navy.  He saw marriages in the family, he saw divorces.  He stood at the side of the casket of his only lifelong love of 60 plus years gazing at her and commenting on how young she looked, like the days before they had moved from Kansas decades before.  He outlived all his siblings, 7 of them, and most of his friends. In fact towards the end, that fact kind of hit him- “I’m the last one left.”

He saw changes, but I never saw him fearful or complain. In fact, I’ve only mentioned a portion of the challenges he faced in his 101 years on earth, but the memories I have of him are not of a man filled with fear. Instead it was a quiet man, who would always greet me with a hug and ask me, “How’s my girl?”  Grandpa just adjusted to it all somehow.  He had Faith in Jesus, evidenced to me by his presence in his spot every Sunday and Wednesday at church in the back right hand corner pew all the years of my life until he couldn’t drive to church any more some time in his 90’s.  He lived his life, and he went on. He did what he had to do, and he enjoyed what he had, his farm, his business, his family , his God, and his life.

Grandpa never escaped the changes, and neither will I.  Some will bring joy, some incredible sadness. I guess what matters most is how I end up going through them.  I look at the current situation of my world, and I can’t see a way that any of it is going to get any better any time soon, but I’m certain there were times my Grandpa must have felt the same way. But he made it through with stories to tell of the better times of life. Stories of drag racing Model T’s and boat racing with “The Tub”. In his older years, playing “The Game” and Mowing his lawn gave him great joy. Grandpa rarely talked about the bad, the hard, the sad.  He had many stories to tell of other times, which is probably what helped him to live so long.

I’ve often said I wanted to make it to at least 90. I have a lot of living I want to do.  It’s easy to forget that in order to make it that long, I’ll have to live through the good times and the bad.  But the main thing is to live life with joy.  I must experience the life that is before me now, do my best to live my life with my Faith in Jesus as my guide, enjoy the good things along the way and know that even when things are painful, God is there to hold me close as I go through.  Ultimately I will make it through the ups and downs of this life and some day live free in heaven.  That’s what my day of contemplating Grandpa’s life has taught me.  101 years of his example has spoken a lot more than what his words could have ever said.

 

 

The Focal Point

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From the time my girls were little bitty they were aspiring ballerinas.  The love for the dance came with a gift of two tutus that a friend had found.  Their Grandma took them and spruced them up.  The girls, ages 3 and 5, fell in love with them the moment they put them on.  Days and days, hours and hours of twirling and prancing around the house in what was just a hand me down. To them it was the ultimate princess outfit.  As they grew the Barbie Movies- “The Nutcracker”, “Swan Lake”, etc.  reinforced the desire to dance.  As they grew, I finally got them set up with dance lessons with a friend.  They were thrilled.  I sat on the side lines as they learned the basic moves of ballet.  Most of the time quietly whispering to the mom next to me as we visited and waited.

Every once in awhile I would hear the instructor give the girls a little tip on how to do one of the harder moves more effectively.  In one of the dances they were learning, they were supposed to twirl from one corner of the rectangular dance floor to the other.  A move that I am certain, if I attempted it, I would land flat on my back from the dizziness.  Their instructor told them that the best way to make it from point A to point B while twirling across the floor was to have a focal point picked out on the wall that they were going to.  She said to start by twirling slowly and to watch for the point with each turn as they moved towards it.  Sure enough the more they practiced it, the more straight their path from point A to point B became and the less dizzy they felt.

I’ve often thought about that ballet lesson in the years since then.  There’s actually something quite profound in the simplicity of it that can be applied to some of the most complex, stressful situations.  There are times life feels like we are spinning around and around while we are trying to go from one point to the other.  With current events as they are, this is one of those times.  If I allow my eyes to get off my focal point, it’s quite possible to end up either flat on the floor with my head spinning, full of anxiety, depression, fear, etc.  Or I may just end up way off course. It is my continually going back to my focal point that keeps me going the right direction.

Peter in the Bible learned that lesson pretty quick.  Not in a ballet class, but in a boat far from shore.  Peter had went out on a boat with the other disciples ahead of Jesus to go to another town.  When the boat was being buffeted by the waves they looked up and saw what looked like a ghost to them walking toward them.  Peter recognized that the ghost was not a ghost at all, but it was Jesus. He had the courage to ask if he could come out on the water with Jesus, and Jesus told him to come.  As Peter walked along, he started to notice the wind and waves around him.  He took his eyes off the focal point, Jesus.  That is when he began to sink, but it is also the time that Jesus bent down and lifted him back up saying, “You of little faith, why did you doubt?”

Last night I had a short time of looking at the waves, or in ballet terms getting my eyes off my focal point.  The waves of the evening news, situations I am aware of, what seems like a never ending/ ever increasing plague. At times, it feels like my comfortable American life is going down the drain. Uncertainty of the future… spinning around and around, going off course…

This morning I awoke to the picture of my sweet girls wearing their tutus in my mind. I kept thinking, “Watch the focal point, always get back to the focal point”.  When I sat down with my cup of coffee and my Bible this morning, I kept contemplating keeping my eyes on Jesus, my focal point.  I read a short devotion from a book my daughter let me borrow. It quoted a Psalm that David wrote.  Psalm 27:4 “One thing I have desired of the Lord, that I will seek: that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to behold the beauty of the Lord, and to inquire in His temple.”  David experienced times of plenty, times of lack, times of peace, times of war, but he had found the one thing that kept him.  He returned to his focal point, God.  His desire was to dwell in His presence, to behold God’s beauty. No matter the situation, No matter the storm, No matter how much my world spins: I must keep my focus on Jesus. I am also thankful that when it seems like I can’t get my focus on Him.  He takes hold of my hand like He did Peter and pulls me back up on top the water, and He is the one who with a word calms the storm. He has me and as we traverse this storm of current events together. Look to Jesus. He has you too!

Responding to the Signs of the Times

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(WARNING…Big word usage for End Times theories ahead. Stick with me there is a point in it.)

Eschatology (end times theology)  has not been my forte… I was raised in a church that was amillennialistic, I’ve attended churches that were Post Millennialist, and I am currently going to a church that is Pre Millennialist.  If I sit there and give it some thought, I can see where each one of them is coming from and I can find things I agree on and disagree on.  So when it comes to End Times Theology, I land on this point. I believe Jesus is coming again.  I don’t know when that is or how it will all go down, but I know that I am ready and the last instruction Jesus gave to his disciples before He ascended was for them to receive the Holy Spirit and to be a witness of Him to their local home area, those areas around it, and then to the ends of the earth. Acts 1.   That is plenty for me to keep busy with in my area of the world and everywhere I may go.

Probably the one thing that really gets my goat when people start talking about Jesus coming is they approach it with this attitude that you feel like you should be hearing “Twilight Zone” music in the back ground and a spooky voice saying, “You know, Jesus is coming…”  It’s like they’ve got to scare you with the fact.  Major earthquake occurs, “Jesus is coming…”(scary tone applied to quote).  Giant tornado rips through a major city, “Jesus is coming…”(apocalyptic fear applied) And now the current news, a global pandemic… “Jesus is coming… BOO!”  To me the fact that Jesus is coming is not something to scare my neighbor with.  It is something I should eagerly anticipate. Something I should be so excited about that it leaks out on those around me.  He is coming, I am excited, time to prepare.

When my husband and I were dating 28 years ago about this time of the year, he lived in a town about 1 1/2 hours from where I lived.  It was the dinosaur age of phones.  There was this thing called long distance, that if he called me or vice versa, we would have to pay large fees just to talk for 10 minutes each night.  In fact, we learned that one the hard way.  He had to sell his favorite guitar to pay a phone bill that we racked up talking each night.  We just wanted to be together.  So every weekend as soon as he could get free, he would hop in his car and drive to where I lived to see me.  I knew he was coming sometime that evening.  So I would try to be ready.  Hair fixed just so, make up on, the cutest outfit I could find.  I would watch and wait to see his little red car driving up.  I wasn’t scared in the least bit at his arrival. I anticipated it.  THAT is the kind of feeling I want to find in myself as I anticipate Jesus and His return.

I have been reading a weekly devotion this year, Secrets of the Secret Place  by Bob Sorge. This week I have been contemplating chapter 14 “The Secret of Watching”. Watching for Jesus… It’s just like me watching for my love 28 years ago.  Watching is not out of fear that at the last moment I get my ducks in a row because the past 49 years I have wanted to do my own thing and now the signs of Jesus coming has increased. I better get ready… Watching is “I am soooo in love with Jesus right now.  I want to be with Him.  Is that the possible sound of Him coming my way?”  Interpreting the signs of the times is for me to have a better perspective of how to show people this Jesus I am so enamored with.  in Luke 12:54-56 Jesus talked about how the people of his time were able to “see a cloud rising in the west, and immediately say ‘It’s going to rain’ and it does.” Or they could feel the “south wind blow and say its going to be hot.” and it was.  But they could not interpret “this present time”.

Global Pandemic, National unrest, International Terrorism, Natural disasters, etc.  That’s what preoccupies our news.  Going to the grocery store in my town, shows the fear and unrest that preoccupies my corner of the world.  I can look at the “clouds and the winds blowing” in a figurative speech.  It is time for me to interpret “this present time”.  My interpretation is that this is not the time to scare your neighbor to repentance.  Now is the time to be the light.  Now is the time to show the Hope, the Peace, the Love that has been inside of us ever since we encountered the Lover of our souls, Jesus.  “It’s the kindness of God that leads us to repentance.” Romans 2:4.  People are scared. Offer them the cure for the fear that is eating away at their broken hearts.  Let them know how you have found the One who not only holds peace for today, but who walks with you no matter where you go.  The power of sickness and death are conquered in Him.  We don’t have to fear. That is what the world needs to hear now.  Not “get right or get left.” “Turn or burn”.  But show them the love that conquered death on Resurrection Sunday so many years ago, and now He has given us GREAT Hope in a time when uncertainty and fear abounds.

Lessons Learned: the Birds, the Flowers, and a Stare Down With a Deer

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What a evening for a sunset walk! It felt so good to listen to the birds singing as I walked by our pond. It reminded me of when I was a kid and went fishing at my Grandma’s Pond. Such a happy place of peace. As I strolled by our garden plot and looked over the fence to the Federal Forest land. I saw a deer watching me from a distance. So I decided to watch it. I’ve never really been in a staring contest with a deer before until tonight, and I have to admit. The deer won. It hit me as I watched the birds flying overhead and listened to the animal sounds. These animals don’t have a care. They do what they need to do for today and they don’t worry about tomorrow. Jesus talked about this very thing. He talked about how the birds don’t plant fields or store food in barns. Yet God takes care of them, and the beautiful flowers of spring and summer don’t work hard to clothe themselves. God does and He dresses them magnificently. He talked about how we aren’t to worry about tomorrow because tomorrow has enough worries of its own. If God has the birds and the flowers, and my stare off challenging deer, He has me.

My staring contest opponent

It’s Tuesday and it’s already been a week. I am fully aware of how blessed I am to be where I am during our national crises. But it is still hard not to let fear, anxiety, and worry creep in. I had to make a journey to town today. (Not that far away. Just 8 miles.) My daughter who is staying with us has a bad tooth ache. I was blessed to get ahold of our dentist, who called her out an antibiotic for the infection. It’s kind of unnerving not feeling like you can just take her to the local walk in clinic and have it looked at whenever you need to. Now it feels like a life and death endeavor. As I drove through town, our town had a large sign informing the residents of the Covid-19 threat. Displayed for all to see at the only roundabout in town. We’ve had an outbreak here. Not a whole lot of cases, but for a small town, too many. I’ve never been germ conscious in my life. But today I was not pleased to touch the gas pump handle, and pick up some necessary items at a local store. Not to mention go through a drive thru pharmacy window to pick up my daughter’s RX. Even though my social isolation with my husband and three of our kids hasn’t been that bad, (actually at times it feels like a vacation) I’m starting to feel the fear and paranoia of touching things in public and running the necessary errands. I have contemplated the hardships in New York as they struggle with their outbreak, Italy, and others. Then the weight of the heart break a family we are friends with as they struggle with the possibility of losing their husband, son, and dad as he fights to stay alive in the hospital 30 miles from my home. (Not covid related). So much weight…

Thus the walk… blue skies with light fluffy clouds and my prayer floats up too. “God everything seems to be just going on as normal. These are the same things I saw, the same sounds I heard a year ago this time on the walk I did back then. Nature has no idea the hardship and pain in our world right now. It just goes on.” Birds are preoccupied with singing and finding a worm here and there, and my deer friend: he’s concerned about whether a middle aged woman could be fast enough to bolt across a field and catch him so he’s going to keep an eye on me. All living in the moment. All taken care of by something much bigger than themselves, God.

What about me? The weight of the events that surround my heart could easily smother me if I let them. But I know I need to leave them in bigger hands than I have. My running ahead trying to figure out how this will all end up is futile. My looking back at how I could have, should have, would have done better at sanitizing everything around me is probably futile as well. Although I am a proponent of doing what you can.

Somewhere along the way I have got to just trust. I have to know that the same God that orchestrates the seasons, watches the animals scurry, and keeps the planets in their orbit so we don’t end up in an interplanetary marble game, with us riding on the blue and white ball. He’s the same God who numbers the hairs on my head (which happens to be a lot, thick hair) and watches me when I wake and when I lay down to rest. He will take care of me. He loves me. He has the current events. I must keep my eyes on Him and trust Him.

“Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? Can any one of you by worrying add a single hour to your life? “And why do you worry about clothes? See how the flowers of the field grow. They do not labor or spin. Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these. If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, will he not much more clothe you—you of little faith? So do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’

But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.”
‭‭Matthew‬ ‭6:26-31, 33-34‬ ‭NIV‬‬

The One

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Finals week of my freshman year of college did a number on me. I was a walking ball of nerves. One class in particular gave me great angst, College Algebra. College Algebra was one of the main reasons I switched my major from computer programming to Spanish. The thought of taking another college level math course sent me into instant panic. It was in studying for the Algebra final I found myself broke down into tears. I was certain of the impending doom and my demise to being a total failure. One of the older girls in the campus house I lived in walked by in my time of despair. She encouraged me with words that have stuck with me through the years. It’s a southern way of saying the age old proverb of “How do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time.” She said in her distinct southern drawl, “You know my daddy always told me to remember how the best way to build a brick wall is, one brick at a time.”

One brick at a time, one step at a time, one person at a time, etc. I’m not sure what makes me and probably 90% of Americans think “when you go you’ve gotta go big.” I’ve lived most of my life with a “99 brick at a time” mentality to building a wall. It needs to be done and it needs to be done now. No steps, no process, just “bam!!” Instant achievement. That thought process isn’t very conducive to success when we think “everything is all up to me right now”. It just produces a bunch of anxiety, stress, and eventually I just shut down, “Can’t fix it, so why try.” I forget how important “the one” can be in the big picture of things.

Jesus has always been about the one, the individual. He had great crowds around Him at times, but when it came down to the life changing miracles He did. It was Him touching the one. I think His desire for individuals to be touched was what spurred His statement, “The harvest is plentiful but the workers are few. Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into his harvest field.” Matthew‬ ‭9:37-38 NIV‬‬. In order to touch the individual lives of so many, a lot of hands would be needed.

The American church has been very fixated on numbers. The more we have in attendance the better. I’ve heard the arguments that Jesus is into numbers as well because he doesn’t want “one to perish”. So go big or go home. But sometimes my focus on how do I reach so many runs over the obvious “one” that is sitting right in front of me “face to face”. Maybe the better approach would be for me to look for that “one”. Pray for that “one”. Offer help to that “one”. So that as “the one” is reached they in turn will see their “one” and reach them too.

So let’s break this down to where I am today. A global pandemic speaks of masses of people being affected either physically, spiritually, or mentally. It’s the elephant that needs to be ate. It’s the wall that needs to be built. It’s the “one” who needs to be found. One person at a time.

Sad to say. I’ve lived here in my house for 12 years. I can honestly say that I don’t know the first names of the women whose houses and land are on each side of me. I’m pretty sure I would have a hard time identifying them as my neighbor at the grocery store if I ran into them. My excuse for not knowing, our busy lives… I’ve been working and volunteering in so many capacities for the past 12 years, all of them noble tasks, that I’ve not had time for my neighbors, and at times, “the one”.

The other day I was on my daily walk up and down my driveway when I noticed my neighbor in his yard. I contemplated what it would be like to walk on by and maybe not be noticed. (Not sure why). But instead I decided to make a point to wave and greet him. There’s been a lot of talk about how the life of Social Isolation has actually brought communities together. Neighbors talking to neighbors (from a distance of course), checking on each other’s needs. People making calls to loved ones and friends, to catch up and make sure they didn’t forget anyone and leave them alone.

Even the churches encouraging their members to be what we’ve always been called to be, family. Call and visit, make sure they have their needs met, give, etc. Since the opportunity to minister to crowds has been reduced greatly, we’ve been refocused on “the one”. I believe when this storm all blows over and we can finally come out of our bunkers we will find something new. All this focus on the one will cause us to grow and people will finally see what they have been needing to see all along. Instead of just one giant light house pointing the way to peace and safety in the storm, the homes of Jesus lovers on every street corner will be shining its light pointing the way. Because when we look all around us there is plenty to do. It’s been sitting under our noses all the time. It’s not only some gigantic move out there that changes the world. It’s also us touching “the one” next to us with the love of God and the truth of Jesus and His power to change a life. Then the next one, and the next, etc. “The one” is waiting, Lord open our eyes to see just how close and easy to touch they can be.

Life on this Potter’s Wheel (April 2011)

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Sunshine today!! Finally! I can’t express how happy that made me feel. I went out to my place of contemplation, my driveway. My drive is 1/8 of a mile long. I can’t tell you how many trips up and down my drive I’ve made in the 12 years we’ve lived here. It’s been a place of solace when I’ve faced some of my toughest challenges. I’ve walked, thought, and prayed a lot on that stretch of gravel.

Today I was reflecting on just that. As I prayed, I thought about all the things that I’ve prayed about as I’ve walked up and down that drive: sanity to survive head lice on my tween daughter’s heads, grief overwhelming in the days following my father in law and nephew’s deaths 14 days apart, struggles of my adult kids in recent years, my family, my mind…

I remembered a poem I wrote in 2011 during the height of my father in laws struggle with cancer. It was a reflection on how our world spins round and round day after day, and here I sit on it. I am like a lump of clay on a spinning wheel. The pressures of life, unpleasant as they are at times, are shaping me and making me to the very thing I am supposed to be.

This whole Covid-19 thing wears on me at times. I’m probably watching the news a little too much. I’m not a fan of the changes to my life and schedule. Honestly the changes I feel are mild compared to the others in our world and nation that are suffering much worse than my mere inconveniences. My prayers ended on this note: “I’m not sure what you’re doing, and I’m not sure I like it. What exactly are you doing to me?” And like I always seem to conclude I came up with, “I don’t understand You or Your ways, but I know You are good. I will trust You.”

Life on this Potter’s Wheel – originally written April 2011

Life on the Potter’s Wheel

Is sometimes not fun at all

The tools You use to shape me

Dig deep as unholy falls.

You mold me and shape me

As I am sitting very still

My world seems unsettled

As I am turning on this Potter’s Wheel

Trusting and accepting

What You are making me to be

Is the crux of the battle

As I sit here while You’re molding me.

In the Hands of the Potter

Is the safest place I can be

He knows what He’s doing

Even when I can barely see.

Your strength and Your wisdom

Is making me what I should be.

I am thankful and comforted

As Your hands are molding me.

Is Jesus Enough?

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What a week!  News nationally, state wide, and locally has gone from bad to worse.  Our small town that seemed to be so isolated from it all has developed five local cases of Covid-19.  I took comfort thinking, “At least I don’t live in the big city…” Now not so much any more…

Last night we decided to video chat with some friends we used to have a home fellowship with on Messenger. It was like water to a thirsty soul.  For about 15 min or more we laughed at each other as we, a group of 40’s/ 50’s year old’s, tried the different effects out and lamented how we wished there was an app for playing “Village Idiot” card game so we could play once again together.  It felt good to look at the faces of friends we have been doing life with for years, some of them for almost 20 years. After a while we started asking each other how they were holding up.  In our group, we have a pharmacist, a nursing director for a nursing home, a nuclear professional, a building contractor, and a couple of stay at home moms.  My heart ached as we talked about the fear people have and the measures we have had to go to in order to try to slow the spread of this dreadful disease.  My friend who worked in the nursing home talked about how they have had to limit the old people to their rooms in hopes of isolating them better, families bringing dry erase markers and playing tic tac toe outside of their windows and exchanging smiles.  My friend who works at the pharmacy talked about the extra orders of medicine and the lack of Tylenol for people who actually have something else, like the flu because of the panic buying.  We rounded off our evening with praying for each other and specific situations we are aware of, such as a mutual friend in the ICU currently hanging on to his life while his wife is praying not only for him to live, but that sh0e won’t have to leave his side because of Covid-19 protocol that has to be enacted.  Hard times…

As I laid my head on my pillow last night, I kept hearing the words, “Is Jesus Enough?” rolling around in my head.  It seems quite unfair for all these bad events to culminate at once, and these are just the few I know of in my little corner of the woods.  The more I thought about those words, “Is Jesus Enough?” The more I concluded, “Oh yes Lord, I know you are more than enough.”
Although these are crazy/ hard times, I have seen crazy/ hard times before.  At age 21, I lost a precious friend in a tractor accident while working at a church camp.  The very camp I came to know Jesus in.  I’ve watched loved ones suffer as cancer slowly, but really not so slow, took it’s toll on their bodies.  I’ve experienced the pain of miscarriage, loved ones deaths, limiting illnesses of those close to me, friends struggling with infertility, unfair abuse being heaped upon the innocent, etc.  And in each of those situation, I have seen Jesus be enough. 

My first and only experience with watching someone die has been my father in law.  For a little over a year,  he suffered as an aggressive form of prostate cancer ravaged his body, but with each visit, even up to his very last he never failed to grab ahold of us and pray for God to bless us. On his last day, I sat by him on his bed. As I watched him gasping for breath and then breathing so shallow, I saw him utter words after a complete day of saying nothing and showing no response. Moments before he took his last breaths. He suddenly began to speak, “Jesus… Jesus… Jesus…” and then he was gone.  It was in that moment that I felt something that I’ve never felt so strong.  It was God’s presence in the room.  The most heartbreaking, gut wrenching moment of our lives was made peaceful by a moment and a truth that is engraved in my heart. “Jesus is enough.”

I am a creature of comfort.  I would rather laugh, than cry.  I don’t enjoy pain. I have no desire to walk through difficulty, but I know that no matter what may come in the days, weeks, months ahead, “Jesus is enough.”

Psalm 16 has been rolling around in my heart today.  “Keep me safe, my God, for in you I take refuge.  I say to the Lord, “You are my Lord; apart from you I have no good thing… Lord, you alone are my portion and my cup; you make my lot secure.”” This Psalm was written by David.  David was a man that God describes as a man “after God’s own heart.”  David pursued a relationship with God.  He wrote many songs and poems expressing His love for God, at times rejoicing, at times lamenting, at times happy, at times sad.  David expressed it all.  He had times of great victory and times of great defeat, times of overwhelming joy and times of overwhelming grief.  But in it all He said, “God you are my portion.”  “You are my everything.”  David didn’t allow fear to rule over him because he had confidence that he would see God’s goodness.  I can be confident of the same.

Things may go well,this virus quickly passes by, and my life returns to normal.  Or, things may never be the same, pain, sickness, and death may come to me or those around me, but I have this confidence, “My Jesus is Enough!”

I’ve mentioned before on this blog that I am practicing social isolation with four others, my husband and kids ages 16-21, here in a home that a few months ago seemed too big for us because it was often empty as we all ran our different directions living our lives. Now it seems too small as we all hunker down in one place together and it continues to rain outside… To lighten the mood we have posted some crazy videos of us singing “La Bamba” and rapping a rap I wrote 30 years ago in college about accidently hitting a cat with a car: Purely a joking/ crazy song intended for laughter, not violence against kitties.  (I have one I dearly love living in my house right now.)

I’ve posted these videos on Facebook and had friends from decades ago, laughing and sharing crazy stories of fun times passed by.  It was one comment that my cousin I haven’t seen in years stuck out to me as I laughed at the different replies.  “Had to share your post with pride– this is history and you are handling it with some awesome sauce instead of panic that is out there.  Making the best out of our situation.”  I thought about what she said, and contemplated what has made the difference.  Once again I come back to the answer of why I can have peace and joy in the midst of times of fear and sadness.  Jesus is enough!

(I’ve not really went here before on my blog, because I usually write as a therapeutic aid to my soul.  But I want you to know you too can experience this hope, peace, and joy. I would be happy to point the way and pray for you in the things you are facing.)

 

The Unchanging God in Uncertain Times

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I’m not a fan of change big or small. I’m the kind of person that would happily leave my furniture in the same arrangement for 12 years. I’m a big fan of stability and consistency, and for the past couple of years, especially the recent week, my life has been anything but that. My plans, my schedule, my daily routine: all up in smoke… I’ve been left sitting here this morning talking to God about it all.

I would probably say the biggest upheaval in my life, until the past 2 weeks, had been 9/11. It all occurred at a time when I had three kids ages 1, 3, and 6. The uncertainty of war, terrorist attacks, the presence of evil in my world, etc. Left a young mother of three afraid, but trying to hold it together and not let it show. I knew I had a job at hand, raising my kids, and I would need to carry on no matter what was my adversity that had arisen.

The upheaval since the corona virus has rivaled, if not surpassed that. Except now I am a mother of three young adults and a sixteen year old. We are all old enough to hear the news, talk to our peers, and observe our world. It’s easy to see and feel the uncertainty of this hour. Three of those kids are at home riding out the initial storm for the next 3 weeks or more. It’s an adjustment. We’ve probably not seen this kind of together time since the head lice outbreak when they were young. Ha ha. So this leads me back to my current situation of uncertainty, instability, and change. Pressure…

Last night as I scrolled through Facebook, I noticed a post of a young mother about the age I was when 9/11 happened. She said, “I was surprisingly doing a really great job of holding it together. Now, however, I am panicking. What are we to do?” It brought me back to that Tuesday night almost 19 years ago. How I felt the weight of taking care of my family, protecting my kids, and trying to survive. If I am truthful, I feel the same weight again today. I spent a lot of time crying and praying back then, it would probably do me some good to spend time doing the same now.

When everything is good, and I am enjoying the wealth and prosperity of the country I love, It’s easy to get up and show up. When everything is uncertain, not so much. That’s where God comes in. It is good to remember that He is the God who sees me. He sees me where I am, and no storm whether it be physical, emotional, or spiritual can cloud His ability to see me, His child. He has not “left the building” so to speak. He is very present. He is very near.

My social life may be limited, my schedule turned upside down, my future uncertain, and my current living situation totally rearranged: God, however, has never changed. He has never left me. He has not abandoned His plans for me. These plans include a “future and a hope”. So I can trust all this to Him, and get to the business at hand: Finding His joy in my new set of circumstances, and shining His light in the clouds of uncertainty.

Which is why I wrote this Blog today. It’s probably very natural to feel fear in the face of the turbulence we are in. But our God is supernatural. He is above the storm. I want to let you know I’ve found peace in our current troubles. It is in knowing an Unchanging God, who sent Jesus to give us life beyond the temporary life here. The Holy Spirit in us provides the friendship that no quarantine can challenge. It is this God that gives the certainty of His love in uncertain times, and I am sure that 19 years from now, just as it is almost 19 years ago when 9/11 happened. We will look back at these times and be able to speak of His faithfulness to the younger generations that did not walk through the Covid-19 pandemic just as I can speak of God’s faithfulness during the uncertainty of the days after 9/11. Because God’s friendship is truly closer than a brother, and He will see us through it all. Trust in Him.