Are we there yet………?

I have drifted back into silence again…mainly because the things I have been pondering lately as it pertains to this journey through my True Woman meditations has been deeply personal. And, my golden rule: I never get too personal on my blog, unless directed by the Lord. He has not so directed me; thus, my silence.

But I did have a thought today as I was reading and praying that I wanted to share. How do you “wait” well? Because, let’s face it: one constant in the Christian life is the notion of “waiting”. We wait on the Lord – and it is always inevitiably because He works much “slower” than we anticipate or most of the time would want Him to. He rarely works on the same timetable as we do - although, as I heard many times over growing up in the church, “He may not come when we want Him to, but He’s always on time!” How true that is – and how I appreciate that more and more as I grow in my relationship with the Lord.

When I consider this idea of waiting, one word comes to mind: patience. Let me state the obvious for those who know me well: patience is not a strength for me. And when I pray for it, I’m always in for a bumpy ride – because God always answers our prayers for patience with something that will try us. Patience does not grow in times of ease – patience must be tested and tried in the fire to be refined. And so, you are asking for it in spades when you pray for patience! But, it is indeed a characteristic of the fruit of the Spirit, and so it is in there – we must cooperate with the Lord as He seeks to bring it to full bloom in our lives.

Back to this question of waiting well…the fruit of patience must be allowed to grow in my life if I am to wait well. This hearkens back to what I wrote about meekness and humility – patience and waiting imply bowing the knee. Accepting God’s will, God’s timing, and God’s ways as good – as best actually – for the given situation in which I find myself waiting. Because He can see much more clearly than I – He has the totality of the situation in view, whereas I can only see the moment in which I am existing. And from His view He knows better than I what I need and when I need it. He also knows the purposes for which He is calling me to wait.

This is all well and good, but how do I go about being patient, meek and humble in those times of silence and waiting? What I finally rested on is that it is a simple matter of trust. Trusting the Lord’s heart; trusting His goodness; trusting His will. Trusting that He is sovereign, He is holy, He is righteous, He is pure…and He will withhold no good thing from me as His child. Also knowing that His purpose for me is holiness, not happiness (although, it is in that pursuit of holiness that I will find true, lasting happiness; but that’s a topic for another day…)…and He will do what He knows will bring about that result.

And hasn’t He done so for me so many times before? Remembering and meditating on the goodness of God will help me wait well…

So, when I find myself in those moments of impatience; when I’m throwing a temper tantrum and wagging my finger at the Lord saying, “Father, when…Father, why…”; I must ask myself if I am trusting Him in that moment. The answer is always no! I want what I want and I want it NOW! And really, if I were honest, now is not soon enough for me because my impatience is born of the idea that I should have gotten my way ages ago! How grateful I am that the Lord is slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love. How grateful I am that the Lord is long-suffering (the KJV phrase for patience – I love that!) – because He certainly suffers long with me!

And when I have finished, and I’m sitting on the edge of my bed, exhausted and nearly hyperventilating from crying so hard, eyes puffy and make up gone, I am usually amazed by the Lord’s response. He doesn’t point out to me how ridiculous I look (because most of the time, it’s quite a pitiful sight!). He gently and lovingly reminds me that if I wait on Him, it will be okay. He gently calls to my mind those times and those ways He has done so before, and assures me that He will do so again.

Now, there is a certain element of melodrama to that description, but it is true that I can indeed throw “temper tantrums” with the Father. And one of the things I love so much about the Lord is how gently He restores me when I get to this place. He picks me back up, and reminds me that He is Lord and Father, and I can trust Him. His way is best; He loves me, and is working all things for my good. He is working, even though I cannot see it. And I just have to…………wait.

More later…

Grace and peace…

 

The glory of grace

I love the book of Romans. This week I decided to read through Romans slowly – and out loud. Yes, I sit in my room at night and read out loud to myself. And it has been a wonderful exercise that I commend to everyone. I cannot tell you how many times I have read through Romans – again, it’s my favorite book in the entire Bible. But the other night as I was reading through Romans 3, I was overwhelmed with joy, as if I had never picked up the Bible before in my life!

I came to the end of chapter three and read these words:

Where, then, is boasting? It is excluded. On what principle? On that of observing the law? No, but on that of faith. For we maintain that a man is justified by faith apart from observing the law. Is God the God of Jews only? Is he not the God of Gentiles too? Yes, of Gentiles too, since there is only one God, who will justify the circumcised by faith and the uncircumcised through that same faith. Do we, then, nullify the law by this faith? Not at all! Rather, we uphold the law. (3:27-31)

Paul has just finished demonstrating the hopelessness of our situation apart from Christ. Earlier in chapter three he reminds us that there are none who are righteous – not even one. All stand condemned before God because all have sinned. If you were to begin reading Romans and stop at 3:20, you would truly be depressed! It is a hopeless, dismal picture that he paints. But he does not stop there – in fact, he uses this very dismal picture to set us up for the truly wonderful good news that he will spend the rest of the epistle expounding – that the righteousness of God is a gift from Him, by His grace, through the redemption that comes through Christ Jesus (3:24).

Now, this is the basic message of the Gospel – something I have known (and sometimes, to my shame take for granted), but what truly gave me pause was the relationship of the law to this beautiful gospel that he is presenting.

 As I read through this chapter, I saw the beauty of the law in a way I never have before. Paul said that through the law we become conscious of sin (3:20). The law -what law is he referring to? The law that God set forth for us in His Word, mainly in the Old Testament. The law is beautiful, but fearsome. It is awesome, but intimidating. Because in the law we see the perfect holiness of God – His character, His purposes. We see the standard by which we can be holy and stand before a holy God.

And…we see how we fall short. James reminds us that “whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles at just one point is guilty of breaking all of it.” (James 2:10). If we slip up just once, we are guilty of it all. And who can say they have never slipped? Who can say they have never transgressed the law in any point? No one can say that! And this should make us all tremble. In our culture, the word “sin” is like a four-letter curse word. We prefer to talk of “mistakes” or “shortcomings” – but the Word calls it what it is – sin. And this sin puts us in emnity with God. We are lawbreakers. All of us. There is no distinction.

Now, you may ask, what is so beautiful about that? Well, on the face of it, nothing. But here is where it the beauty arises out of the ashes of our sin – the law, and our inability to keep it, points us to the One who can keep it, and who can save us from the hopelessness of being lawbreakers before a holy and righteous God.

Read these beautiful words:

But now a righteousness from God, apart from law, has been made known, to which the Law and the Prophets testify. This righteousness from God comes through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe. There is no difference, for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus. God presented him as a sacrifice of atonement, through faith in his blood. He did this to demonstrate his justice, because in his forbearance he had left the sins committed beforehand unpunished— he did it to demonstrate his justice at the present time, so as to be just and the one who justifies those who have faith in Jesus. (3:21-26 NIV)

The law point us to Christ. It is a tutor, a guide (Galatians 3:23-25) that leads us to the only hope we have. Through His life, Christ fulfilled all righteousness; and because He was sinless, holy and blameless, He became the perfect sacrifce for we who have broken that law, because He didn’t have to offer any sacrifice for Himself (cf. Hebrews 7:26-28). His death paid the penalty for our lawbreaking – His resurrection justifies, reconciles and gives us peace with God, and the glorious gift of eternal life.

This is Gospel 101 – but how easy it is for us to forget. We cannot add anything to this – all we can do is receive it. Our lives will reflect glories of His grace – it is not what we do that commends us to God. It is what He is done for us. This is our hope, this is our sure foundation.

It is appropriate that I ponder these things as I walk through this journey toward holy, biblical womanhood (which, I have not abandoned…). It is easy for me to look at my life, look at my sin, look at my failures and lose hope. But my hope is in the One who redeemed me by His blood; who by His Spirit dwells within me. The same power with which Christ was raised now resides in me (Ephesians 1:19-20). And it is He would will complete the work He has begun in me. And is this not true of all who call on the name of the Lord? How glorious is His grace!

More later…

Grace and peace…

 

That which is “indeed important”…

Okay, I do have to say something about this because it is so dominating everything about our culture right now. And, given the age group, the “generation” I belong to, I have to share my thoughts on this…for whatever they are worth.

On my facebook page, I linked to a video by Michael Jackson for his song “Childhood”. This song made me cry. Right before watching this video, I watched another video where he spoke about his childhood – or lack therof – and how different and painful it was. I wrote the following on my facebook page:

Okay, I just watched this [attached video] and it made me cry. Mike was…ummm….eccentric? Yeah, that’s a good word…but when you think about it, and listen to him talk about his life, he didn’t have a life. Not like we do. We think his life was fabulous – fame, fortune, etc…but when I listen to this, I hear him saying he would trade it all to be able to have memories of school, friends, etc…We benefited from his musical genius and how fabulous he was as an entertainer. But WOW – he had some serious pain…which led to some of the more – er, eccentric – things he did. Not to excuse him – but to understand…

I guess what I’m seeing here is that – those things we as a culture aspire to – that fame, fortune, power, prestige – are in the end so very empty. Kind of reminds me of what is indeed important.

Michael Jackson was a part of my youth – I grew up with Michael plastered on my walls – my first adolescent crush. But oh, the price he paid to be that crush…

Michael Jackson hit his highest point of popularity around the same time I hit puberty. “Thriller” was the only thing I listened to for a long time – so much so that I snapped the tape I had of the album, and then fought with my brother about listening to the LP (ahhhh, vinyl!) until my poor parents couldn’t stand it anymore and bought me my own copy! I watched MTV every hour on the hour when the video for “Thriller” came out and memorized the entire dance sequence (and yes, I can still do it!!). I was, well, a big fan…understatement of the year…

I can look back on that time and crack up at how silly I was. Looking at his life from a different vantage point though gives me pause to consider more deeply the things I mentioned in that facebook post. Things much weightier than getting the next issue of  Tigerbeat with the new poster for my wall…

My geeky, philosophical self starts pondering things of deeper and greater signficance – like, how can someone who seemingly “had it all” become such a reclusive, sad, tragic figure? Well, because he didn’t “have it all” after all…he didn’t have that which truly matters. Ecclesiastes 5:15 says the following:

Naked a man comes from his mother’s womb, and as he comes, so he departs. He takes nothing from his labor that he can carry in his hand.

I recognize that none of the accolades, achievements or honors mean much in the end. He cannot take them with him, and he cannot point to them when he stands before the Lord. They didn’t even bring him peace while he was alive. I am grateful for the common grace that was bestowed upon him in the enormous talent he had and how he shared it with the world. And, since I do not know him,  I will not begin to imply I know his heart…but, what I am saying is I must keep all his earthly accolades in proper perspective – in the end, they profit him nothing.

How depressing, right?

But, can we be serious in how we contemplate his death? Or even Farrah Fawcett’s death…or Ed McMahon’s death…or any other famous person who dies? Or any person period who dies? What about the nine people who died in the transit accident in Washington DC? Or the men and women who are dying in the protests in Iran? Or in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan? What is the true hope? What is the one thing that would bring meaning to any of these things? What truly profits us in the end?

It is only knowing that when we depart from this life we enter the presence of the Living God – that we are present with the Lord. So what is “indeed important”? Living a life that pleases God – which means, first and foremost recognizing that Christ alone is our hope for salvation. His death is the atonement for our sin against a holy God. His resurrection gives us hope for eternal glory with God…but only if we call on Him in repentance and faith and place our trust, our hope, our faith in Him and Him alone.

That is what is “indeed important”…

 

The precious jewel of meekness…

So as I’ve been journeying through this True Woman meditation, I have been drawn to a study of meekness. This is a subject that, quite frankly, makes me uncomfortable. But I am finding the pursuit vastly enriching, more so than I could have ever imagined.

Let me start with a definition of meekness. Meekness is a heart attitude first and foremost toward God. Vine’s Expository Dictionary defines it as “that temper of spirit in which we accept His dealings with us as good, and therefore without disputing or resisting.” This attitude of spirit recognizes that God is in control, and that God is working all things for our good and His glory. So, a meek spirit is a spirit that is at rest, that is confident in the Lord, and in His goodness and power. The question of meekness is not just an acknowledgement of this truth – it is a surrendering to it, a submission to the control of the Lord in our lives. It is accepting that ways and purposes of God as good, even if they imply a certain level of discomfort or suffering in our lives, knowing that there is a deeper purpose to these things than we can see.

Now, I want to apply this very narrowly – at least for now – because this hits a very important note in my own life, and perhaps it will in yours as well.

The issue of great importance in my life this year as been about wholeness. As I began the year, the word that the Lord placed on my heart was “wholeness” or fullness. So, as I seek to apply this concept of meekness to my life, it would mean (among other things) being whole and complete in the Lord and resting in that. A meek spirit accepts that which the Lord gives or allows as good. There is peace in that disposition. There is a trust in that, a security in knowing that in all things God is in control and do not need to strive and toil. That peace gives a sense of well-being, of wholeness, that can only be found in the hands of the Lord Himself.

So, if I am looking for other people to provide this wholeness or completeness, I cannot live with a meek spirit – I will not have a gentle and quiet spirit. I will be disappointed; I will be anxious, wondering what will come. I will be toil and straining, seeking to control circumstances and people to achieve what I think I need to make me whole. Another human being cannot provide this for me – they are looking for the same thing! Why do I think someone can give me what they don’t have themselves – what they must depend on the Lord to provide for them?

But if I am depending on the Lord for these things, I can live in peace and rest. And I can relate to others with gentleness, patience, peace, mercy, love – all the fruit of the spirit will spring forth from a meek heart because I know that the Lord is providing all I need.

May the Lord work this into my life…

More later…

Grace and peace.

 

Humble pie…

My weekend definitely did not go as planned. I was all set for a relaxing weekend at home – out of the heat – reading, praying, napping (my personal favorite)…housework, laundry. All that came to nothing. I was sick most of the weekend. So, half of what I wanted to achieve this weekend didn’t happen. I did manage to get to church Sunday, but the rest of the day went downhill from there.

Needless to say, I’m behind on my meditations. But, no worries – I shall pick myself up and keep moving from here.

Last night I thought through some of the issues that were raised in my reading about humility. I think it was a good that I got sick this weekend – not because I particularly enjoy being sick, but because it forced me to stop at Day Three and camp there, which is what I did last night, and may do again tonight. As a matter of fact, I may put the actual True Makeover meditations on hold for a minute and spend some time working through the recent series on ROH about meekness. I was listening to the program on the way to work today, and became convinced of this when I found out the title of today’s message: Think before you speak. Whaaaa? Oh boy!

Why does the Lord insist on messing with me? Of course, I say that tongue in cheek! But boy, oh boy – this is a rough road I’m traveling right now. But, what does Hebrews 12 talk about? God is treating me as His child through the discipline He administers. So I suppose I should worry when the Lord stops messing with me, eh?

Well talk more later…until then…

Grace and peace…