What We Reach For in Life - Matters

 

There are two woman who reach for something.  Life happened, choices were made and the results were two completely different outcomes.

The first woman is Eve.  Eve, perfect, never knowing evil, only good and perfect good, was given a new thought, about the fruit on a tree that God had told them not eat.

I am going to give a bit of my introspection... how could Eve really grasp the reality of what Satan was offering her when he encouraged her to eat?  After all she was perfect, had no wrong desires, did not know evil.  She had nothing to compare with what she was about to do.  To her, after the enticing words of the serpent, the fruit looked good to eat and she reached.

She chose to reach.  She reached for what Satan told her God was holding back from her.  She reached for the fruit that looked good to eat.  She reached for something she thought she was lacking.

The other woman, and we don't even know her name, was one who lived with a blood issue for twelve years.  Having this blood hemorrhage would mean she is unclean, continually, all the time.  Which meant she had to stay away from certain places, certain people; she lived life, alone.  She very likely stayed at home and went for water when there would have been no other people besides those who also were unclean.  She stayed home except to search for healing, spending all she had.

As the days slip by, she starts to hear about a man named, Jesus.  She hears about His healings, she hears and somewhere deep inside, she wonders.  She wonders if she has a chance??  We don't have much of where her faith develops, but it does and one day, one day she takes a quiet risk - she goes into the crowd and reaches.

She reaches for Jesus.  She reaches for only the hem of His garment (as some translations say) or His outer garment, thinking if only I can but touch Him I will be healed.  She reaches from behind Him, thinking to then quietly slip away.

Immediately she felt the healing course through her body and also, immediately, Jesus knew.

He turns around and asks, "Who touched Me?"

Now in a crowd, people pushing and shoving, would not Jesus have been touched before?  Yes.  But this time He knew the power within Him, went out. 

The woman, in fear and trembling, came forward.  She took a greater risk and exposed herself.  People knew her story and now she tells Jesus all of it.

And His words to her, "Your faith has made you well", changed her life in deeper ways than even the physical healing she received that day.

Faith.  Faith is believing, reaching for Jesus in our darkness, in the hard of our stories; and believing He is the One who heals.

For her, her issue was healed; but she received a full and complete healing because of her faith.

We can come to Jesus for our physical healing and He often heals.  But the deeper healing comes through our faith.  Our faith in Him, whether the physical piece looks like we want it to or not.

Faith heals us deeply.  Faith heals us where it matters most, within our heart and mind.

These two options are still our today... 

When we're sad and darkness overwhelms us,  we can reach for anything to numb our pain.

When temptation knocks on our door, we can open it; hoping to satisfy the restless and longings we may have.

We can reach for the fruit that looks good, wondering what we're missing out on.  We can reach, controlling what we think looks right.  

This reach was a reach that brought death to Adam and Eve.  This reach opened their world to now know the world of good and evil.  This reach still brings death, death to our souls in ways that destroys, steals, and kills God's life within us; His abundant life.

Or.

We can reach for Jesus, believing in faith that He holds the answers we need.  We can reach for Him for the healing we need in the areas that need it the most, our hearts.  

We can reach for grace to say no to temptation and look to the One who gives us His satisfying truth.

We can claim His words of truth as the darkness, fears and sadness threatens to take us down.

This reach brings life.

And so, just like these two women, we too, have a choice to make in our story and the happenings we walk through.  We can reach for what we think looks good and satisfying in the moment or reach out to the One who is Life and Truth and wants to heal us in deep, deep places where only faith can reach.

When The Outcomes Differ and Become Entangled With My View of God

The prayer I've prayed again and again because the one I care about and love matters to me, seems to go unheeded, leaves me wrestling to believe God cares.

The desires that go unfulfilled or are thwarted and I'm left wondering, 'do I matter'?!?

The rejections you and I encounter at times and the once-again pass over we get, leave our hands open and empty and I find I want to clench mine tight.

The disappointments in our circumstances, relationships; leave our hearts in tangled threads as we reach for giving-up and turning away.

When outcomes differs from what I want or even what I thought would happen, what do I do?  Where does this leave me?  What do you do?

When outcomes, even in the good things, the right things, the good desires of my heart, happen differently or nothing happens as it appears to my eyesight; my thoughts become entangled with who God is.  The outcome collides with what I thought would be and the entangling begins.  The questions form... "Where is God? Do I matter? Am I still loved?  Is God still good? Does He care?"

I reckon you experience the same.

This is exactly the place the enemy of our souls wants us to camp in.  He wants us to believe God is selling out on us, that He isn't good.  He delights in nothing more than when we choose to leave, to turn away from the One who loves us deeply.  He wants us to link the outcome of our situation to who God is and declare He isn't good.  Satan is out to destroy God's breath of life within our souls, to kill the belief we have in God.

Habakkuk was at this very place where his outcome wasn't favourable.  And yet.

And that little three-word phrase catches me... "Yet I will."

And yet, he declared God's goodness, disentangling it from the outcome, to still believe in the One who gives us our salvation and the power to live in high places.

Habakkuk 3:17-19 gives us a window into his choice... Though the fig tree should not blossom and there be no fruit on the vines, though the yield of the olive should fail, and the field produce no food, though the flock should be cut off from the field and there be no cattle in the stalls, YET I will exult in the Lord, I will rejoice in the God of my salvation.  The Lord God is my strength, and He has made my feet like hinds' feet, and makes me walk on my high places.

Recently I once again found myself needing to disentangle the outcome of my situation from who God is.  I was disappointed with the silent response of my prayer and the thoughts slipped in.  I trusted God.  I knew the angst in my prayer matters to God.  But.  But nothing was changing.  Yes, the outcome different than what I desired.  

Then.  Then, I remembered.  I remembered who I know God to be and realized I was once again linking the outcome with God's love for me.  I was letting the outcome speak to my heart that if my prayer is answered then I am cared for.

I 'saw' God was asking me to trust Him deeper still.  To go beyond the outcome to  believe in His goodness and love alone.  To believe that if the prayer's answer seems silent, I still matter.  If my desires in relationship and for relationship are good and right and yet unmet; I still am loved.

So, I rose up and declared war, leaning towards the One who loves me.  I remembered and chose to believe God's greater Truths, the ones that don't change and I said, "I still believe.  I will still exult the One who gave His life so I could live."  He set me on my high places.  The place above outcomes.  The place where we are loved and simply loved.

When we link the outcome to God we have a hard time staying with Him.  Oh friend, I don't know what leaves your heart with tangled threads and maybe more in a tangled mess; your outcome so very different than your prayer.  But to realize the enemy of our souls wants us to walk away from life and Life itself, we can choose to lean towards God, the One who loves us and still believe.  We will still stay.

If you are wanting to walk away or even have, may I come alongside and whisper, "Take courage, and stay.  Choose to believe God.  Turn around if you must and look up.  Come back."  Shift your focus from the outcome to the One who comes, to the One who came to show us the way, to be with us in the way, so we could find our way.

And so very often the way we think is good is not the way God chooses because we don't see the whole picture.  And so we learn to trust, again and deeper still, to know He is good and we declare it when the prayers go unanswered to the way we see it, when the 'stalls' are empty.  We declare it when the desire to better a relationship doesn't happen, we remain single, the healing doesn't happen like we want, etc.  We declare it when the dreams die or lie buried beneath the dark soil in life.

Yet.  Still.  we believe God.  I believe God.

Still we believe God cares and loves.  I believe He cares and loves.

We have an enemy of our souls but we also have a Keeper of our souls.   Psalm 121:5 says, "The Lord is your keeper" and in verse seven it says, "He will keep your soul".

We cling to God right in the middle of calamity, pain, and bareness.  We stay with God in the middle of empty-ness and questions because in the end He holds all the answers and isn't afraid of our pain. Actually, quite the opposite, He wants to redeem it all, to be with us, to keep us.  And when we walk away from Him, oh, I can only imagine the pain and grief He feels to not be able to give us the life that only He can give.  To take us to those high places.

As I take a moment and look at my own people that I love, my sons, the ones I birthed; when they walk away from me because they don't believe I am for them, it hurts.  When they were little and as they grow, stretching their own wings they so very often don't think I am for them, but I am.

And so I imagine that is only a piece of what God feels.  As our Father, as the One who sent Jesus, His Son to ransom our souls, as the Giver of Life; when we don't trust Him, stay with Him, believe Him still - He is grieved.  He weeps as He wept over Jerusalem, wanting to take them under His wings but they did not want it.

Learning to trust God is not for the faint of heart but for the warrior who rises up and declares that 'God is STILL good! For the one that declares the truths of God is the greatest of all realities and chooses to believe them.'

And we do it again.  Deeper.  Peeling back, disentangling another layer and sinking our roots deeper in the truths of  God.

So, friend, fight.  Fight to believe God.  Fight to stay when you'd rather walk away.  Fight to know God's goodness and the truths He gives us.  And the reality is, maybe your fight is only a shift of focus as you lie on the ground, battered, bleeding, and hurting; and that is courage and that is a warrior of faith and trust.  

Don't walk away from life and Life itself.  Your very breath of life depends on it.

And I too, declare, Yet I will exult God who is my salvation.  Still I will believe God to be good when the outcome is so very different from the way I thought it would be.

The Stories of the Scars We Carry

 

I look at these trees and see markings, scars. Markings that hold a story. Scars that tell us something lies beneath of what we see.

I wonder what these trees would tell us?

You and I, we too hold stories deep within. Stories of pain, hard, rejection, fires, and storms.  Moments that have influenced and framed a lot of what we believe and live out of; moments that have greatly impacted us.

But they are not meant to define us.  Yes, they influence and shape us but they don't have to define us.   

There's another tree.  A tree that holds the swing.  Words that come to mind - life-giving, freedom, shade, and enjoyment.

Our stories aren't held to or bound by what created our wounds. The story of our wounds are a piece of the story that God, our Father wants to reframe and re-story.  Re-story it to be a life-giving, redeemed story.  Wounds that are healed and leave a scar, reminding us that our pain does not get the last word. 

The scar of the one tree holds the green of life within it. Our story doesn't need to end in bitterness and oozing muck of pain. It can be the catalyst for something bigger than us, something beyond, something beautiful. 

In the presence of God, a wound that finds its place in the hands of God, is a wound story that can find healing and life. 

We learn of God's compassion in our pain.  

We learn of His presence in our loneliness.

We experience His love when our hearts hold an ache.

His truth grounds us, anchoring our hearts when the ground beneath us heaves.

I hold stories within, stories that left oozing muck of lies from rejections and the darkness of pain and hard that left me wondering if God was even present or cared.   But that isn't the end, they have been redeemed and reframed by a God I learned more of in those hard stories.  I learned in even deeper ways that God is greater than the hard I walk through.  He is abundant in His mercy and faithful in His love.  He IS ever present and really is full of goodness.  He wants me to know Him and find Him among the rubble of my story.  

Death didn't have the last say for Jesus, He arose.  Death, hard, pain doesn't have to have the last word when we choose Jesus.  Resurrection can and will happen after the death, when we choose His truth.

 You too, hold a story or two.  Stories that have left a deep, indelible mark.  Ones that will never be erased, only healed when touched by God.  And the scar is what remains.

Each of our stories are a pathway to seeing more of God.

Let's go back to that tree that holds a swing.  It holds an opportunity for life; for a young child (or one still a child within) to sit and swing, wild and free.  Trees hold nests for birds.  Trees that hold stories also offer shade and respite from the beating, hot sun for man and animals.  Trees hold the seed of life in the fruit it bears and drops to the ground beneath it.

An unhealed wound in a tree, rots it.  When its roots are not grounded, it falls.  But also, a tree that's wounds are healed, continues to produce life.  And one that puts it roots deeper in the ground, stands tall and only bends in the storm.

This is a promise of hope, of redeeming grace to the hard pieces of our stories.  God wants to show Himself to us in our stories, but we must choose Him and choose to want to know Him.

You may be in the midst of a blindsided wounding, a rejection so deep that all you want to is shake a fist or even walk away, that's ok... God is still present and whether you can see or not, it's a pathway to His heart, to Himself. So, I pray for you. I lift you to our Father. I pray for courage to look for Him, courage to choose Him, and strength to stay with Him. 

Maybe your story holds more healing than pain and for that I rejoice and praise the Lord with you.  The wounds are now a scar that only tell the story and remind us of the radical redemption of a loving Father instead of oozing.

Dear Jesus, 

Sometimes the wounds hurt way too much, they knock the breath out of us and we're left gasping and trying to breath. Hold us in Your hand with Your tender care. Give us the courage and strength to find a shelter under Your wing and to stay there. And someday may we be able to trace You, seeing Your thread of hope and love in this story and give You thanks. Amen.

The Love of a Father

Knowing love begins with humanity. The hands that holds an infant. The tender care as baths are given and food supplied. 

The love of a father and mother is the way God intended and created man and woman to provide as they replenish the earth.

But brokenness happened as man and woman reached for the fruit. The tempter enticing woman to reach, not to destroy man, but to destroy God's breath of life within them and us. Satan wants nothing more than to get at God and he did by enticing the creation of God. 

Life was perfect. Love was pure.

Until.

Satan came and enticed the created beings that held the very life-breath of God.

Man, fathers, women, mothers, now offer a love that never completely satisfies and sometimes is very distorted and corrupt.

God is a Father whose love is still pure, wholly and completely pure.  He is faithful in His love and nothing you or I will do, will ever change that.  He gives it freely.

My own father's love was not wholly divine.  His own story tainted it.  But he loved.  He gave, and  to my family as we lived a number of hours away, he'd make sure they would come and visit and when he left, he hid candy among the curtains, on a ledge, behind an object and so on.

Before he left, he would inform our sons how many pieces were hid and as they drove away, feet would run and the search began.

Treasures. Candy. Sweet.  Gifts from his heart to ours.

God gives us treasures that we can search for, hidden among the 'curtains', on the ledges of life, up high in the air, or under the rocks of hard and pain.  God's love is scattered all around us... let's go on a search.

To earthly fathers ---

A father's love looks like a dependence on God as he leads his family, pointing us to Jesus when life is hard and doesn't make sense and even when it does make sense, reminding us who Jesus is.

A father's love is the strength he gives and the steadiness when the winds of life hit.

A father's love is the tender touch, the stooping down to help in a moment of need.

A father's strength is sometimes embodied in the tenderness of tears, the stroke of comfort, and the understanding of a story.

And sometimes, a father's love, is the warrior, fighting for truth and wielding the sword, which is the word of God as he combats the enemy of our soul.

You're meant to lead and be strong , but your strength is for the protection and benefit of those you love.  It's not to coerce or to dominate, but to be a gentle strong.  And in so many ways you're taught that gentleness is not manly.  Let me tell you, that is not so.  Sometimes your strength is actually the most kindest and gentlest of actions

Jesus stooped to heal, to speak words to the lame, to write words in the sand.  Sometimes Jesus' strength was the words on a hillside, the walking on water.  And most of all, it was the strength to give His life as looked to His Father and surrendered to the ultimate plan.

I'm grateful for the father I had who learned more of who Jesus is and to my husband who has the courage to stay with Jesus and lean into Him.  And to my sons, may you learn more of Jesus and choose Him as you learn to be a gentle strong man.

Treasures.  Gifts.  From the Father above for each of us as we live and walk this one life we have.

Thank you, Jesus, for Your perfect and complete love, given freely and for each one of us.

Most of all fathers, God has got you, lean into Him as you live and lead in your world.

Lord, 

Invite the men to Yourself.  For in You, the men will have courage to rise up as needed.  May they have the strength to lean into You when they feel less than and for the wisdom they need.  May they recognize the enemy whispering to them that they are not enough and help them to fight against that because in You, they will receive their strength.  Toughness is the enemy's tactic, for we fight when we are tough and want to protect.  May the men have courage to be a vulnerable strong.  Lead them, meet them and yes, woo them to Yourself, for in You they will have everything they need.

                                                                                         Thank you,

                                                                                     Your daughter, who fights for life

Little Things Matter

 

The working of this tool was not happening.  It was supposed to make the job of staking tomatoes easier and it just wasn't happening.

We worked this and that, read and reread the directions or rather watched a video clip over and over; all to no avail.

So, she set it aside.  I picked it up and thought, "I wonder if there is a staple stuck somewhere?"

Sure enough, when I took the time to look close, I saw one.  They are tiny and so it was crunched and hard to see.  So, I popped it out and the tool worked like a charm.

Little things matter.

The other day I had a sore spot between my big toe and the next one.  I couldn't figure it out until I took the time to really look... and here was a tiny splinter of some sort that took but a moment to get out.  Within minutes it felt much better and in a couple of hours I didn't feel anything.

Little things matter.

Whether good or bad; positive or negative... little things matter.

The smile you give to someone who looks and/or acts grumpy.

The thoughtful act you think of doing for someone and you get it done.

The little negative thought you replace with truth.

The lie you tell, keeps needing to be adjusted.

The faults or things that irritate you about a person, the more you repeat them the more they grow in your mind.  So it is when you say the strengths of another.

The list is endless of the little things that make a difference.

The good things multiply and grow 'green grass', the negative metastasizes and destroys.

Life consists of both.  So when something happens, and the processing happens; we have a choice what we feed.  What we water and pay attention to, grows.

The thing is, it doesn't mean to focus on one negates the other.  Just because I choose to find Jesus in the pain and am grateful for the good things that I don't weep because of what is hard.  But it does change how the story plays out and what takes root in my heart... God's grace and provision and healing or bitterness and pain that becomes festered.

When we take the time to look close, within our own hearts and allow grace and compassion to enter; we can give the benefit of the doubt to others.  

We can see that they really may not have meant it how I took it.

Maybe what they are carrying within their own heart was triggered or was simply what framed their choice of action today.

Little things matter.

And maybe today we simply need to give a bit more grace.

Maybe it's taking more time in the presence of God so I'm more aware of the love and grace He has given me.

Maybe it's simply choosing to release what hurt me into the hands of Jesus and then, then go and smile because of the strength He gives.

Maybe it's going outside and looking up at the sky and smiling, thanking God for who He is.

It might be a choice to shift your focus from what happened to the the One who holds you in His hand and cares for you more than your heart can grasp.

Unconditional love is not something we humans can give unless we have let the unconditional love of God and Jesus impact our own hearts.

Little things matter.

Sometimes it's not so much 'fixing' all the wrongs and what hurts as it is simply taking the time to focus on the good and who God is.  It's amazing what a bit of perspective shifting will do for the soul.  Sometimes it is simply repenting of my own issues and false frameworks and allowing God's redeeming work to take place within my own heart, that allows me to live with joy and freedom.

I have found for me it loosens the grip of the hard and sometimes it slips away and my step is lighter and my heart has found a rest; a rest that comes only from God, our Father.  Sometimes it's the strength I need to take another step; to be resilient and keep fighting and walking the path.

Little things matter.

And you get to choose.

The staple that was stuck.

The splinter in my skin.

The perspective shift towards God.

Little things matter.

And you get to choose.

The Light of Jesus Within Us Is To Be Visible

 

To BE light we must have light within.  Light comes from a source.

As a follower of Jesus, we are to be His light, reflecting a bit of His character as we grow and learn more of Him.

Matthew 5:14, Jesus tells us that we are the light of the world and in verse sixteen, He tells us, "Let you light so shine before men in such a way that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father who is in heaven."

Jesus lived to glorify His Father, the same is true for us.

As I ponder, reflecting what light is... who is Jesus as the Light?

Light illuminates.

Light reveals.

Light allows one to see.

Jesus came to illuminate who God is.  

Jesus reveals truth, exposing sin.

Jesus is Light, pushing back the darkness, so we can see what is really going on inside of us.

The night Jesus came, the angel illuminated the dark.  As Jesus lived He spoke words of truth, revealing areas of darkness where sin abounded.  Jesus lived the way He wants us to live revealing the path, the way for us to walk.

To be His light, I must know the Light, which is Jesus.

Today, this moment, take it and let the way of Jesus settle in your soul.  It may be that some illuminating needs to happen, revealing areas that need His saving grace.  Maybe the way is cloudy and you need to take this moment to stay with Him, so you find a way to stay in step with Jesus.  Maybe this moment is simply to let His Truth go deeper, grounding your heart and mind.

Wherever you find yourself today, may you know more of the Light of Jesus and the His love and goodness.  I need it and I want it.  Do you?

The Hard Good Care

The scissors.  The cutting.  The snippings.

The instructions given to me by the keeper of the greenhouse were to trim these flowers a-way back.  She said these words,  "It's good for them.  They will bush out."  It causes them to become full instead of straggly and leggy.  Oh those good blooms...

Blooms gone.  Cut back, bare.  

The instruction for these flowers were to give a discreet snipping.  Snip here, snip there; giving them a rounded look.  Cut away this long one, cut this wayward vine...

Yes, the snipping I gave this flower produces a flower pleasing to the buyer's eye.  It wasn't time for them to grow uninhibited and live full.  The pruning, the snipping was for the good of a later time of living full.

The instruction for these plants were to stake them, giving them a framework that holds them for the season of fruit-producing.  Support.

The care of plants is varied.  The care for we humans, is also varied.  God, the Master Gardener sometimes cuts way back, other times it's a snip and a snip there, and other times we need the support of another and the care of help.

Sometimes we want to bloom full and free but it's not time says the Gardener.  There are more things to learn, to understand ...

The scissors, the snippings, the cuttings are not fun or pleasurable in my life, but they produce a fruit and understanding more who of God is than if I could bloom in ways that I want to.

Blooms gone.  (Seemingly wasted... they are so pretty....)

Cut back. (But I wanted to bloom free)

The Master Gardener knows what it takes for the good blooms and fruit to be healthy.  And sometimes it's not the unhealthy He cuts, it's the healthy and good blooms.  The blooming you and I do is for His glory, not ours.  It's so easy to bloom for what benefits me, but it is not for me, it is for Him and He knows where to cut, what to snip and when support is needed.

I thank Him for His goodness, for His everlasting wisdom that is good, gentle, and kind.  Jeremiah 29:11 says, "For I know the plans that I have for you, " declares the Lord, "plans for welfare and not for calamity to give you a future and a hope."

As oft it may seem that God is against me as I wrestle and walk through hard; He isn't.  He wants me to bloom and live with a future and with hope.  And so it is for you...

With whatever you are walking through... hard or joyous, may you know God is for you and not against you.