sabbath

no post today ~ enjoy the sabbath

holiness

“Holiness, not happiness, is the chief end of man. “

Oswald Chambers

This quote is directly opposed to what the culture has taught me. I grew up thinking that God wanted me to be happy. And…it wasn’t just the culture but the church as well. Several churches I had been involved in the past reinforced this. If I was ‘doing’ all the right things…going to church, praying, living right…my life would be good and I would be happy. I would have enough money, good health, and my children would be model citizens….

I have talked to so many people who are struggling through difficult times and they ask, “What am I doing wrong?” They are looking for the right formula, as if they can control God by doing certain things and viola, achieve happiness.

If right behavior and doing good things for God made our lives happy and easy, then how do we explain Paul’s life? He was always in some sort of trouble; shipwrecks, beatings, prison, etc. His life should be an example to me that living a life pleasing to God doesn’t mean I will always be happy.

Working to be happy seems easy enough, but to be holy? The bar has been raised. I think God knows that happiness will make me complacent and soft. But in pursuing holiness I need to look deeply at my heart and notice all those things within me that are not holy. I then need to abandon them to God and ask Him to change me, from the inside out. Happiness only lasts as long as the good times, but holiness will sustain me through the tough times too.

Do you think you have bought the package that advertises ‘happiness’ for all who love God? Or have you come to the place where you realize happiness is not the chief end and you have a desire for God to move you towards holiness?

Peace,
Deb

prayer

“Prayer for me, used to stand as something separate from other parts of life. But I have come to learn that real prayer is not so much talking to God as just sharing God’s presence….Prayer, I have learned, is more my response to God than a matter of my own initiative.”

Malcolm Boyd


For me, prayer used to be a one way conversation. I talked, God listened. I went through my list and asked God to do ‘this for this person’ and ‘that for that person’, and of course, there were the requests just for me. As I think back on it, it was like I was telling God the way I thought it should be. Some days, it felt like I connected with God, but most days, I felt I was just checking it off my list of things to do to be a good Christian.

I quit praying that way. In fact, I had no idea how to pray any other way but I wanted to try. I asked God to teach me how He wanted me to pray and slowly but surely, my prayer life changed. Now, it rarely involves my talking, either out loud or silently, to God. It more often is sitting with God and listening to Him. I’m sure He finds that to be a refreshing change. I know I do.

Take some time to today to consider your prayer life. Ask God if it is how He wants you to interact with Him….then take some time to listen and see what He might be saying to you.

Grace and Peace,
Deb

prayer

I who live by words, am wordless when
I try my words in prayer. All language turns
To silence. Prayer will take my words and then
Reveal their emptiness. The still voice learns
To hold its peace, to listen with the heart
To silence that is joy, is adoration.
The self is shattered, all words torn apart
In this strange patterned time of contemplation
That, in time, breaks time, breaks words, breaks me,
And then, in silence, leaves me healed and mended.
I leave, returned to language, for I see
Through words even though all words are ended.
I, who live by words, am wordless when
I turn me to the Word to pray. Amen.

Madeleine L’Engle

faith

Yesterday, I came across this definition for faith:

“….Faith is finally this: resting so utterly in the character of God – in the ultimate goodness of God – that you trust Him even when He seems untrustworthy.”

The author also talks about the fact that "one moment in our lives can change everything. One moment that can’t be undone, can’t be contained, can’t be accounted for, that demolishes in a single instant, a lifetime of entire moments."

I am sure that everyone reading this can identify at least one moment in their lives that reveals this as truth. The moment you found out your parents were getting a divorce, the moment you, or a loved one got a terminal diagnosis, the moment you found out that the one you trust and love cheated on you, the moment you found out your child made a decision that will forever alter their lives…I could go on and on. We have all had at least one of these moments and probably more than one.

In those moments, all that we have learned and know intellectually about God and who He is can fall to the wayside. Our shattered heart claws at our faith, desperately trying to hang onto it, like a drowning man hanging onto a piece of floating wood.

Faith is a noun when the world is right but it quickly becomes a verb when our world is turned upside down.

I think the bottom line is - do I trust in the sovereignty of God only when things are going well? That doesn’t seem to require much from me. But to trust in His sovereignty when my heart is broken, when grief is so overwhelming that I can’t seem to catch my breath, when one moment redefines everything that I knew to be my life, that is the definition of faith.

As you reflect on this, can you think back to a time when everything changed for you…a time when there was a BEFORE and an AFTER…when life was forever altered? How did you respond? Did you cling to God or run from Him…maybe even blame Him? I invite you to spend some time today thinking about how you have responded to God in the past during tough times and how much you think you may be able to trust Him with whatever lies ahead for you.

Grace and peace,
Deb

desire

This past week, I was at the Creation Festival. For those of you who don’t know what Creation is, it is a gathering of 60,000 to 70,000 Christians who come together to listen to speakers and bands. Occasionally, members of the bands will take a break from singing and speak to the crowd. Sometimes I connect more with what they have to say than the actual speakers.

I love the group, Casting Crowns. During their time on stage, the leader of the group said something that really resonated with me.

“God doesn’t need us…He wants us.”

Wow. Again, it is something I know on an intellectual plane but I don’t often think about the reality of it. God wants us. Wait… let me make that more personal. God wants you…He wants me. I’m not sure why but it seems different than saying that God loves you or me. Maybe because I’ve heard, so many times, that God loves me. But the thought that He wants me, moves me in a different way.

Today, I want to let that truth wash over me. I want to let it sink in. I want to let it become part of what I know deep inside. I invite you to do the same. Spend some time with the thought that God wants you…that He is continually inviting you into a deeper relationship with Him. What would be different if you were to really grab hold of this? How would it change your relationship with him? Reflect on this and consider journaling around this thought.

Grace and peace,
Deb

creation

God, brilliant Lord,
yours is household name.

Nursing infants gurgle choruses about you,
toddlers shout the songs
That drown out enemy talk
and silence atheist babble.

I look at your macro-skies, dark and enormous,
your handmade sky-jewelry,
Moon and stars mounted in their settings
Then I look at my micro-self and wonder,
Why do you bother with us?
Why take a second look our way?

Yet we’ve so narrowly missed being gods,
bright with Eden’s dawn light.
You put us in charge of your handcrafted world,
repeated to us your Genesis-charge.
Made us lords of sheep and cattle.,
Even animals out in the wild,
Birds flying and fish swimming,
whales singing in the ocean deeps.

God, brilliant Lord
Your name echoes around the world.

Psalm 8
The Message


I invite you to spend some time with this portion of scripture today. Read it through two times, slowly. Pay attention to what God might be saying to you…just to you, in these words. What draws your heart? Allow yourself some time and space to allow the Spirit to move within you.

Peace,
Deb