Tag Archives: love

Lamb of God

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How many times have I heard and read the story about Jesus’ arrest, unfair staged trial, and sentencing to death? So many. I know the prophet John the Baptist called Jesus the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world. (John 1:29) I know the sacrifice of animals by priests for many years were offered to atone for the people’s sins and had to be made over and over again and that the sacrifice Jesus made by giving His own life is a once for all deal. (Hebrews 7:27)

I know the deep, beautiful parallel of the Passover lamb and Jesus: how hundreds of years before, the blood of a lamb spread on door posts of  the Israelites’ homes kept the angel of death away and how Jesus’ blood, willingly spilt, covers our sins, marks our hearts as His own, and defeats death. (Of course we must believe and accept this incredible gift)

I should have noticed before, but as I was listening to the story of Jesus’ trial and sentencing, Continue reading →

Father, forgive him?

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I have a long way to go. My first reaction to the recent tragedy in Charleston was anger, sadness, and frustration. What happened is so wrong, so hurtful, just plain evil. I had the incredibly heartbreaking picture in my mind: those people praying together, unsuspecting, not knowing that minutes away some of them would actually be with the Savior they were praying to.

A dear friend posted on Facebook about how we need to pray for the man who murdered them. He is loved by God just as we are and is evidently troubled. He needs compassion and love. She’s right.

I have so admired people who have that gentle, amazing outlook of forgiveness and compassion in the face of injustice, evil, pain and loss. I think of the story several years ago of some Amish people who actually began reaching out to and caring for a man who shot and killed some of their own.  I’ve heard of parents who began visiting their child’s murderer in prison, befriending them, forgiving and showing God’s love.

I am asking myself today, would I, could I honestly do that? If someone had killed my daughter, my husband, my friend? I know God can help us have a change of heart and help us do anything, but I’m thinking my nature is not bent that way.  Not yet, anyway.  I’m not proud of this, just being honest. I already knew I still have a long way to go in the transformation of my heart to be like Jesus, but today that reality is especially apparent.

I am comforted by the story of Corrie Ten Boom, a woman who endured harsh cruelty in concentration camps during the Holocaust, but kept her faith in Jesus. She began traveling and sharing the story of her experience (and her sister Betsie’s, who died in the camp) as well as the Good News about Jesus. At a church service in Munich, she saw a man who had stood guard in the shower room in the processing center at Ravensbruck. She writes that he was the first of their actual jailers she had seen since being released and when she saw him, all the painful experiences resurfaced.  This is how she describes her encounter with him:

He came up to me beaming and bowing. “How grateful I am for your message, Fraulein,” he said. “To think that, as you say, He has washed my sins away!”

His hand was thrust out to shake mine. And I, who had preached so often to the people the need to forgive, kept my hand at my side.

Even as the angry, vengeful thoughts boiled through me, I saw the sin of them. Jesus Christ had died for this man; was I going to ask for more? Lord Jesus, I prayed, forgive me and help me to forgive him.

I tried to smile, I struggled to raise my hand. I could not. I felt nothing, not the slightest spark of warmth or charity. And so again I breathed a silent prayer. Jesus, I cannot forgive him. Give me Your forgiveness.

As I took his hand the most incredible thing happened. From my shoulder along my arm and through my hand a current seemed to pass from me to him, while into my heart sprang a love for this stranger that almost overwhelmed me.

And so I discovered that it is not on our forgiveness any more than on our goodness that the world’s healing hinges, but on His.  When He tells us to love our enemies, He gives, along with the command, the love itself. 1

Corrie was a woman who loved and followed Jesus for years. Yet, even she struggled to forgive.

Sometimes we might think, “Well, I will eventually, it’s just too fresh right now.”

How did Jesus forgive his murderers while He was still hanging on the cross?? His accusers weren’t even repentant, but He had compassion for their lostness and concern for their souls.

Thank goodness, thank God, it is not dependant on me or you. As Corrie so beautifully said, the world’s healing hinges on Jesus’ goodness and forgiveness. We are just commanded to share it and pass it on, even when it feels impossible.

Jesus, help us to be more like You!  I know that love, YOUR love, not anger and retaliation, will reach those troubled, lost ones who hurt others.  Walk so closely with the loved ones of these martyrs in Charleston. Comfort that church, that community. And yes, comfort the killer. Open his eyes and heart to what he’s done, but also please heal and save his soul. I pray in obedience, knowing that even if I don’t feel all these words, you hear and are at work for his sake, as well as those who lost family, friends and pastor. Bring your healing, God, please.

When they came to a place called The Skull, they nailed Him to the cross…Jesus said, “Father, forgive them, for they don’t know what they are doing.”  Luke 23:33-34 NLT

1 p. 238, The Hiding Place, by Corrie Ten Boom with John & Elizabeth Sherrill, Copyright 1971, Bantam Books

The power of perspective

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The word perspective comes the Latin word “perspectus” meaning “clearly perceived.” It’s been defined as a way of regarding situations, facts, etc, and judging their relative importance; as the proper or accurate point of view or the ability to see. [1]  

Perspective can mean looking more carefully or thoroughly at a person, structure, event, or situation (and more) – to step outside of our own subjective viewpoint and see something or someone more objectively.  Getting perspective in relationships is crucial, being willing to try and see from someone else’s viewpoint or “stand in their shoes” is key.  Sometimes all it takes to get out of a slump or rut is a change in perspective.

It’s a choice, this all-important perspective, to not just look but see, to allow more information and defining insight to shape our view.  If I take the time to gain perspective, I see that someone who hurt me is actually feeling very hurt and therefore lashing out.  That perspective helps me to stop feeling sorry for myself and have compassion, to show grace instead of hold a grudge.

Perspective can be a gift, given by someone who can share with me viewpoints I’ve never considered or some I’ve forgotten.  It helped me see a new friend in a new light, to realize how he might have extra need of friends, of belonging in a place where he is clearly the minority and is far from home.  He shared that most of us here have people or our own race to hang out with, have people who speak our native language to talk with, have the food we’re most accustomed to available to us, and forget that someone from another place may not have those things.  That can all be easily taken for granted.

Perspective helps us to see, if we allow God to show us, that our stunted, defective, incomplete view of who we are is not the whole story.  I believe God will give us, if we ask Him and open our hearts and eyes, bits of His perspective of our souls, our worth, our potential, our future.  We are so short-sighted and our view one-sided.  We need perspective.

God has been prodding me all week, reminding me of these things.  It is not about me. If it is I’m missing so much, like sitting inside on one side of a door that would let me out into wide, spacious, fresh air freedom and not taking the initiative to open that door.

He has to give it to me, and I dearly want it…precious perspective.

“If you change the way you look at things, the things you look at will change.”  Dr. Wayne Dyer

So if you’re serious about living this new resurrection life with Christ, act like it. Pursue the things over which Christ presides. Don’t shuffle along, eyes to the ground, absorbed with the things right in front of you. Look up, and be alert to what is going on around Christ—that’s where the action is. See things from his perspective.  Colossians 3:1-2 The Message

Before you judge someone, walk a mile in his shoes.

[1] Collins English Dictionary – Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition
© William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins
Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

My Dear?

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Recently I was browsing Bath & Body Works – I love that place – and a nice young girl came over. “Hi dear, is there anything I can help you find?” I was put off right away. Dear? It felt a little condescending. I feel the same way when someone younger than me calls me sweetie or honey. Just a pet peeve of mine. On especially fiesty days, I feel like saying, “Listen chica, I’m old enough to be your mom.”

Last night my daughter was listening to a worship song I hadn’t heard before. I walked from the kitchen where I was washing dishes out to where she was listening at the computer. “Did they say, ‘I love you, my Dear?'” “Yep,” she answered. I hadn’t thought of saying that to God before, possibly because of my association with that word and maybe because of my somewhat silly pet peeve. “Is it okay to say that to God?” I was thinking.

As I listened to the rest of the song, I understood. The writer was expressing passion, devotion and love to God, who loves us so fiercely and faithfully. I looked up the word “dear” in the dictionary and found that it can describe someone or something as beloved, cherished, precious, treasured. It’s an expression of fondness and affection.

I needed to think outside my “worship box.” That’s a good thing! There’s nothing in Scripture that indicates we shouldn’t think of God as dear. In fact, He describes Himself as the Bridegroom who died for and will come again for all of us, the Church, His Bride. There’s no greater love. He surely thinks of us as His beloved and we are most certainly treasured by Him. Why else would he number the very hairs on our heads, hem us in with His Spirit and presence before and behind, be with us all through the night as we sleep, waiting and ready to greet us as we wake? Why else would He step up to the horrible task of sacrificing Himself for the likes of us?

It is bewildering to me that He loves us so. It feels kind of strange to say to God, “I love you, my Dear” but as we sang “My Dear” in worship this morning, my heart was moved. I felt as if a window opened allowing me to tell Him what he means to me in a fresh, new way.

Those boxes in which we put God, our relationship with Him, our interactions with Him, and our understanding of Him, need to be opened and stretched, even taken apart. I’m so thankful for the way He did that for me today.

I love you, Papa, my Savior, my Healer, my Teacher, my Creator…

my Dear.

I am my beloved’s and my beloved is mine.  Song of Songs 6:3

Follow God’s example, therefore, as dearly loved children and walk in the way of love, just as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us as a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.  Ephesians 5:1-2

 

There’s one!

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20130819-075434.jpg Piled into the old, gray, mostly reliable church van, we drove around town, brown bags of food on our laps, looking for someone down and out. We found two sitting at that curb there, one resting on a bench in front of a store. “There’s one!” someone would cry out and the one driving would pull over, turn around or pull into the lot and we’d hop out to give food, talk for a moment, and offer a prayer. We like to ask their name, because somehow being known by name might help them feel more like they matter and aren’t alone. God sees them and so do we.

My friends know several of these folks from seeing them month by month. This month we were serving pulled pork and there was one man in particular who loved that. We were determined to keep looking until we found him. He wasn’t in his usual place, but driving down a narrow alley we found a man sleeping on a mattress back in a shady corner and it turned out to be him!

As our little search party drove around, it struck me that the Church, God’s people, should be this intentional in finding the lost people around us, those who are hungry in their souls. We have a feast of hope and love that’s been given to us, like a brown bag of food sitting on our lap, needing to be served to someone.

I want God to open my eyes today to see hearts needing to be encouraged, heard, made to feel less alone, loved.

I want to hear Him tell me, “there’s one!”

What did you do?!

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Raising a puppy is a lot like raising a baby – lots of fun, but lots of work.  You have to keep an eye on the doggy at every moment, especially while she’s learning that going potty is for outside only!

ImageWe received a puppy when our youngest daughter graduated from high school a few months ago.  It was a gift from one of her close friends.  Surprise!  She then had to leave for Alabama for a few months for a summer job, so John and I became the mostly happy, sometimes reluctant, often exasperated parents.

If you’ve potty trained a pet, you know that you’re supposed to watch them for any signs of impending…you know…and then whisk them outside cheerfully saying “outside! outside!”  Eventually they get the picture.  

Keeping a sense of humor is helpful, because otherwise you might lose your cool Continue reading →

Didn’t give it a thought

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The guilt nagged, but apparently not enough to make me actually do something about it. An older lady in our church, one I love and who has been a source of encouragement to me, fell and hurt herself a few months ago.

I kept meaning to send a card, call her, or stop by to see her but didn’t. I Iet the hectic pace of life get in the way of showing love. I prayed for her, but she didn’t know that. She was back at church on Sunday and I was thrilled to see her again, looking well and smiling as usual.

I hugged her tightly and said, “I need to ask your forgiveness.” She pulled back, “Whatever for?” “I have thought many times of calling you, sending you a card or coming to see you and didn’t make it happen. I don’t want you to think I don’t care about you!”

She chuckled, hugged me tightly, and said words that washed my guilt away, “Oh my goodness, it’s okay! I never gave it a thought!”

This morning, my devotional reading spoke of how God has forgiven us, has accepted us, yet we continue to nurture guilt or feel we have to do things for his approval. What a silly, sad state to be in, when, if we have accepted Jesus, we are heirs of an eternal treasure: the deep love and fellowship of God.

I can just hear Him say to me this morning, “All that guilt you keep inside about not being enough or doing enough is so unnecessary. I forgave you and since haven’t given it a thought!”

Thank you, Papa, for your undying, constant, persistent love and grace. Thank you for holding me and reassuring me that I’m your girl. Teach me to live in the freedom of truly knowing that.

and to know that I belong to him. I could not make myself acceptable to God by obeying the Law of Moses. God accepted me simply because of my faith in Christ. (Philippians 3:9 CEVUS06)

Remembering Flo

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Today would have been my Grandma Neal’s 90th birthday.  Five years ago, on a December day in Columbus, Ohio, grandma was on her way to her second Christmas party gathering of the day, blacked out while driving and drove off the road.  By the time the ambulance got her to the hospital, she had already gone to be with Jesus.

My mom and her brothers are going to celebrate her today, scattering her ashes (what remains of her earthly “shell”) at the foot of “her mountain” in Huachuca City, Arizona. Grandma used to live out there in the Sierra Vista valley surrounded by desert hills and it’s the perfect resting place.  She would have loved knowing they are doing that today, and that they’re doing it together.

I miss her.  As I’ve thought about her this week, a fresh sadness at her absence in our lives has washed over me.  There was so much good about my grandmother, who wasn’t perfect of course, but was a vibrant, genuine, extremely loving woman of God.

I miss her impassioned voice when she prayed to Jesus, whom she loved more than anything or anyone.  I miss hearing her cheerful voice and laughter and seeing her make strangers into friends at the grocery, the bank, restaurants and even at the door of her apartment, inviting the pizza delivery boy to church.

I remember so many things, so many good memories are swirling around in my heart today.  One that stands out is how, following my mastectomy, my mom and grandma came to take care of me and help John with the house and the girls.  After mom left, grandma stayed longer and watched over me, brought me my meals, told me to take naps, sat with me and talked, prayed with me, and folded laundry while I sat on the couch.  It was a precious time and it was the way she loved people the best.

Grandma was a hands on person, she showed her love by serving.  For a time she worked in the V.A. hospital treating old soldiers with respect, cheering them up with her ever-present smile, washing their old tired bodies and keeping them comfortable.  For years she watched over and took tirelessly care of my grandfather when he was battling Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s disease.  I remember one time she went over to my other grandmother’s house, Grandma Shultz was wheelchair bound at the time, and gave her a decent bath.  Humility and love was wrapped up in her tall, fair-skinned, Norwegian body.

She made friends with her neighbors, no matter what nationality.  At her last apartment complex she had befriended several Indian families and had them over for dinner, took them jello salads, and enjoyed dinner in their homes.

She was acting out her love for Jesus by loving people.  She did it well.  I want to be more like her.  I love her so much, still, and miss her so much today my heart aches.

When her ashes are scattered it will be meaningful and special, but Grandma isn’t in those ashes.  She’s with God in heaven.  If Grandma had her way she’d be surrounded by cute little white doggies, lots of flowers and maybe even a concrete donkey or set of frogs on a love seat in her heavenly garden.  I can imagine her sitting at the foot of a mountain with Jesus, smiling and talking with Him, praying still for her children and their children to know Him.

I remember you, Grandma Neal, and I love you!  Someday I’ll sit with you there.

Are you in the bottom three?

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It was a shock to her and to the judges. Jessica Sanchez, the powerhouse singer in the petite 16-year-old body was in the bottom three this week on American Idol.  She is a favorite of the judges and clearly has a music career ahead of her.  Even more shocking was the announcement that she was the one leaving the show this week.  A collective gasp was heard across the audience as Ryan Seacrest said those words.

Continue reading →

She’s home!

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I knew it wasn’t going to be a very restful night for me. It’s not that I was worried, just waiting. My youngest was on her way home from spring break, traveling with her friend and her parents all the way home, straight through.

They weren’t due in until around six a.m. and so, in typical mom fashion, just about every two hours I turned over and checked the clock, said a prayer and tried to go back to sleep.  It was a long night!

When I heard the door shut just before 6, I jumped out of bed, grabbed my bathrobe and hurried to the kitchen to hug my girl. She’s home! Thank you, God.

It’s always been that way during my years as a mommy: if any of the girls were out I couldn’t sleep deeply until they were in the house. There’d be one thing on my mind ’til they came in: their safe return.  Moms out there, I’m sure you can relate! 

As I was thinking about this this morning while eating breakfast, I heard God tell me that is how eager, anxious, even desperate He is for all his kids to come home, to be in His house, in His arms.

Remember the story of the prodigal son? And how the father stood day after day looking down the road toward the horizon, hoping to see the silhouette of his rogue, wayward son coming back to him? 

What if all of us who are already “safe” at home with God shared his inextinguishable compassion and consuming desperation for our brothers and sisters still “out there” to come home?

I know whenever He hears one of them coming in, He runs to them to wrap them in a huge hug, His heart nearly bursting with joy as He smiles broadly, saying, “you’re home!”

God, stir in me a restlessness for those who aren’t home yet. Help me know how to call them, show then the way to You.

When he (the lost son) was still a long way off, his father saw him. His heart pounding, he ran out, embraced him, and kissed him.   Luke 15:20 MSG