Guard Your Community

So then we pursue the things which make for peace and the building up of one another. Romans 14:19

I am sure I am not alone when it comes to being hurt in relationships. Even in, or especially in, those relationships that are dearest to us. They must be guarded and they take intentionality as we grow and develop. But sometimes words are said and taken the wrong way. Or actions are misinterupted. We allow little things to effect our relationship. We let our insecurities overwhelm us and they are allowed to fester and grow. Instead of just going to the person and talk it out we believe the lies we tell ourselves.

I know, because I have done it far too often. I have allowed small petty things to ruin, or almost ruin a relationship. I have taken a look from a friend and assumed she must be upset with me. An unreturned phone call or text as we are growing apart or even she's tired of me. So many lies. So many insecurities.

But you know what? God calls us to community, even when it's messy. I have learned that in order to guard my relationships I need to be honest even if my honesty is uncomfortable. Time after time I have gone to people and shared I my insecurities, the lies I had believed about our relationship. I have asked them if we are okay. To be honest this has not been easy. It's very difficult. What if everything I've felt is true? More often than not it's been my own crazy imgination.

In the process of doing this though I have learned some very valuable lessons. I have found that if I can remember these 3 things my relationships, and therefore my community, is unified. Also, these three things are good reminders when it comes to our relationship with God...you know, those times we doubt how He feels about us.

We need to remember...

Who they have been in the past. Remind yourself of circumstances, and life decisions that have spoken of their character. Be reminded of their consistency in choices and the living out of life in Christ.

Their heart. Remember those times they've shared their heart with you. Go back and list all the things you know to be true about this person. Their love for God, for others, for you. How they have been there for you. Loved you. Invested in you.

Who our enemy is. Remember that we fight the same enemy and that enemy would do anything to stop the work that is being done in God’s kingdom. He loves nothing more than to create friction and undercurrents in order to divide the body of Christ. He doesn’t want God’s people getting along. He hates unity in the family of God and will do anything to stop it. Choose to rejoice that Christ’s love won and the enemy was defeated in this battle.

My dear sisters, we need to guard the unity among us. We need to fight for community. It's so easy to let things slide. To let our insecurities speak lies. God's desire for each of us is to love one another. To get along with one another, not just get in our own small communities but with all believers.

Perhaps you are far better at this than I am. Perhaps you don't need this reminder, but I know I do and I am pretty sure there are a lot that are like me. So can I ask you to join me in choosing to go to that person (or to God) immediately when you have doubts, no matter how small or petty you think your insecurities or doubts are? Can we value communty over looking foolish?

Let us all remember to guard our relationships with our brothers and sister in Christ. Let us remember that we all fight the same battle…the same enemy.

What about you? Are you willing to go to your friend, your brother or sister in Christ, your pastor, Bible study leader or church leadership and fight for community. Are you willing to humble yourself and die to pride so that the body of Christ will be guarded? Will you, at all cost, protect the community of Christ against an enemy that seeks to destroy?

Who do you need to talk to today?

Therefore if there is any encouragement in Christ, if there is any consolation of love, if there is any fellowship of the Spirit, if any affection and compassion, make my joy complete by being of the same mind, maintaining the same love, united in spirit, intent on one purpose. Do nothing from selfishness or empty conceit, but with humility of mind regard one another as more important than yourselves ; do not merely look out for your own personal interests, but also for the interests of others. Phil 2:1-4

Our Heavenly Father Renews Our Strength

Throughout my chaotic career, I have felt overwhelmed. I never did like the word mediocre, and I never wanted it to be said about me. There have been many occasions on which I have gotten only one hour of sleep in order to complete my professional assignments. Currently, although I work many weekends and some evenings, I still cut my sleep short now and then to get my work done. I have had opportunities during this chaotic career to serve our Heavenly Father. I find it emblematic of Satan’s tendency to use the pain in our life as a barrier to us serving our Heavenly Father that heavy workload has forced me to give up writing feature stories for my church newsletters at both Hershey Evangelical Free Church and Cornerstone. When I made the transition to my current job, the stress of the position at one point motivated me to consider giving up my service to our Heavenly Father. Fortunately, when I asked my supervisor if I should give up my volunteer efforts to get my work done, she responded, “No!”

I considered her response a sign that I needed to wake up and see God’s glory.

Currently in my lifetime, I am determined not only to work hard for my employer but also to serve our Heavenly Father in as many ways as I am able. Now, because my focus is on Him, our Heavenly Father is renewing my strength, helping me to find joy in my lifetime, and motivating me, despite the stress, never to give up my time in His Word, on my knees praying to Him, or serving Cornerstone. God’s Word has taught me that I need to renew my strength and find pleasure in the chaos of my career by being joyful and placing my hope in Him.

The following verses confirm that our weary soul is renewed when we hope in the Lord.

Isaiah 40: 29-31

He gives strength to the weary and increases the power of the weak. Even youths grow tired and weary, and young men stumble and fall; but those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint.

Psalm 103: 2-5 

Praise the Lord, O my soul, and forget not all his benefits—who forgives all your sins and heals all your diseases, who redeems your life from the pit and crowns you with love and compassion, who satisfies your desires with good things so that your youth is renewed like the eagle’s.

When I spend time praising Him during my prayers and hearing Him by spending time in His Word, God does remind me that He is sovereign, and He does renew me. My focus on Him and my confidence in Him turns my tendency of getting stressed out to being joyful and confident that He will help me get it all done.

I find it interesting how David’s thoughts evolve in Psalm 13. He starts out suggesting that God has forgotten him and focusing on his pain in verses 1 and 2. Then in verses 5 and 6, after praying that God gives light to his eyes, he focuses on the fact that he trusts in God’s unfailing love and notes that his heart rejoices in God’s salvation.

Psalm 13: 5-6 

But I trust in your unfailing love; my heart rejoices in your salvation. I will sing the LORD’s praise, for he has been good to me.

To that I say, “Amen!” God has also transitioning my thoughts from being stressed in my life and constantly posing the question, “Why?” to being grateful that He has chosen to transform me. Thank you, God! So glad that my focus is now on you and that you have inspired me to trust in your unfailing love and to rejoice in your salvation even during the chaos of my life.

Dear Lord, thank you for changing my tendency to be in pain and to be a roadblock for your renewal of me. When I focus on you throughout my day, my days become joyful, even when there is chaos present. Thank you for renewing me! Amen

Fruit of the Heart

When the ground soaks up the falling rain and bears a good crop for the farmer, it has God’s blessing. But if a field bears thorns and thistles, it is useless. The farmer will soon condemn that field and burn it.
Hebrews 6: 7-8

Each time I come across this passage I am often left asking a few questions of my heart. If I am a follower of Christ, if I have been enlighten by His truth does my life show it? If I have experienced and tasted the goodness of God do others see His goodness in and through me? Does the ground of my heart soak up His truth? Do I allow His word to penetrate all of my life so that a good fruit can bear forth?

As I sit here asking myself these questions once again I can't help but think now is a good time to really reflect on the state of my heart before God. After all, for the most part, life has stilled. We have no place we must run off too. We have been "forced" to stillness. So, honestly, what better time to ask God to show us where we are lacking the fruit of the Spirit? What better time than now to ask God to show us the thorns and thistles of our hearts?

So are you willing to join me? Can we go before the Lord and honestly ask ourselves these questions?  Does our life produce the fruits listed in Galatians 5:22-23 or are there more thorns and thistles than we care to admit?

We all will have thorns growing from time to time but there should not be field of them. Why not sit before the Lord today and ask Him what kind of “fruit” your life is truly producing. If you are walking in the Spirit of God then you life and your fruit will show it. Let's journey together and pray for one another as we allow God to create in our hearts a willingness to allow His fruit to grow.

A prayer: Oh Father how we desire a heart that so pliable and ready to sit and soak up your Words of truth! Show us those areas that the ground of our heart might be hard. Help us to give you access to all of our heart, all of our weakness, sins, and even our strengths so that we can place them at Your feet to do with them as you will. Father show us the areas of my lives that are producing thorns and thistles instead of the fruit of Your word. And show us those places in our life where we are reaping Your fruit so that we might thank and praise Your name! May our life reap love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. (Gal 5:22-23) Father we know that apart from you we know we will produce just the opposite of these, so Father once again we can lay our lives down at your feet. That we would surrender all that we are…help us to surrender it all into Your hands. Amen

Where There Is Pain

“The problem of reconciling human suffering with the existence of a God who loves, is only insoluble so long as we attach a trivial meaning to the word "love” and look on things as if man were the center of them. Man is not the center. God does not exist for the sake of man. Man does not exist for his own sake. "Thou hast created all things, and for thy pleasure they are and were created." We were made not primarily that we may love God (though we were made for that too) but that God may love us, that we may become objects in which the divine love may rest "well pleased".” ― C.S. Lewis, The Problem of Pain

Pain, and loss, and brokenness have existed since the beginning of time. And while mankind may struggle in disparaging the existence of man and God, and God before man, the whole of the universe set into motion by a flick of His wrist, a glimmer of will across His all and everything minds-eye- and the universe, snaps into orchestral harmony- we cannot argue that pain has always been. No discussion with an atheist or even grieving heart-wide-open-baby-Christian has been without, “then why? Why if we have been created by and for a God (THE God) who loves us, why would that same God of love and joy also set sorrow and pain in the souls of so many?” And really, why not just do without? Why not just leave that one out, or those ones who would perpetrate it upon us if pain in and of itself is necessary? And we do see that pain is necessary, in the sense of self-preservation, and if you’ll allow it, divine creation. Without nerve endings to allow the pain which radiates and screams as we burn our hands on an oven, we may very well continue to drive that lacking sensation until the limb is no more. We need pain. Pain is our central alarm system. “Stop! Stop it! Don’t do that or things cease to work right!”

But what about emotional pain? What is its necessity? Does a mother need to experience the searing and abrupt, unjust loss of her child for things to work right? Does the lack of hope; black, bleak hopelessness… do we need that? To function? The hopelessness that leads us to drug abuse, to poverty, to suicide, to unspeakable evil? What about that could we ever need? Why? Because when those things exist, we can agree that the mechanisms within the human soul which differentiate healthy pain and scary pain, in some capacity, are already not working right. Things have ceased to work correctly when we have taken our lives or the lives of others or experienced the brokenness of failed marriages, abandoned children, drug and alcohol abuse. These things, and these people- they have pain and they are broken.

And here is where I am stricken- things cease to work right where there is pain.

I see the hand of God in all things. I see His hand at work in the trees, I can feel Him at work as I watch my children mull over a math problem. I almost feel like loving Jesus is the continuous up-springing of awareness of His everywhere and everything, and His purpose; of His hands. The winds of life, the proverbial breath of His lungs. It wasn’t always the case, though. I’ve had  “God is a bully” moments, too. Hard teenage and pre-adult years, teeming with anger and resentment of that same all-seeing, all-knowing, coming and going, and intentional God. Infidelity despite children, knees with broken skin, begging Him to relent. Make it stop. “This isn’t fair.”

And yet today, I sit in a cacophony of grace, and goodness, and mercy. Jesus, the mercy. I tap at this computer on a day mixed with both joy and sorrow simultaneously, with my coffee sitting too cold, among the voices of three and not two, in a home that we own, on the anniversary of my children's adoption. Grace, and goodness, and mercy. Divorce, and sorrow, and pain. Lord- searing, tearing pain. But He said it, “You will live.”

Where joy and sorrow meet is the place of the fulfillment of every promise God has ever bestowed upon mankind. Pain, and its necessity, is what grabs our attention. What calls us to cease. What conditions us to wait. On who or what? Eventually, on HIM and on His goodness, so separate from our own.

“I can’t see, what’s in front of me, still I will trust you. Steady grace that keeps forgiving, steady faith that keeps believing, lead me on.” 

“Steady Heart”, Steffany Gretzinger

In this ringing and relentless weight of pain left in the wake of Jen's passing; in losing any of those that we cherish,  I am plagued by that sensation. In my conscience, these words, “Things cease to work right, without pain. Without correct observance of that pain. Without pursuing the root of that pain.” And what follows that has baffled me and left me confused, but grateful; ashamed, but so hopeful, “But God.Is.Good.”

It feels so counterintuitive to speak, to allow, to further the thought. Seconds beyond the shock-loss of a friend, “God, I know this feeling. I have felt this, and I know that you will do something good with this current pain.  Don’t take it away, but Lord, it hurts. Give us YOU. Show us your kingdom work at hand.”

And He will. And He does. And He will continue to. We need only praise Him in the wait.

Choosing Christ-Focused Peace During The Holiday

Photo by Greyson Joralemon on Unsplash

As my thankfulness swelled in me during the Thanksgiving holiday, my heart began to feel the surge of the Christmas season craziness. The annual holiday To Do list registered in my mind, and my heart started racing. I typed my list in order to not forget a thing and to begin seeking an opportunity to squeeze it all in during the normal busyness of my life. As so often happens, my mind did not focus on the reason for the season in the midst of the chaos.   

Fortunately, the Bible in a Year study landed me in some verses in the Psalms that remind me that I have the ability, with God’s help, to choose my focus and still my heart. As I pray every day on my knees, I ask God to help me control the chaos and find peace and joy in this season in which we celebrate the birth of His Son and our Savior, Jesus Christ. 

Psalm 122:8

For the sake of my brothers and friends, I will say, “Peace be within you.”

As I read this verse, I notice that it does not say, “peace be with you,” which is a phraseology on which I lean heavily during my conversations with family and friends. It says, “within.” Maybe this is a sign that, despite the chaos around us, we can still have peace in our hearts. 

Psalm 131:2

But I have stilled and quieted my soul; like a weaned child with its mother, 

like a weaned child is my soul within me.  

Notice the first “I” in that verse. Peace is our choice! We can choose to let the mayhem consume us, or we can choose to manage it with His help. Every day during this special Christ-focused season, I remind myself that my heart should be celebrating the gift He gave us in His Son, Jesus Christ, and not be completely consumed by the stress of my To Do list. 

I wholeheartedly believe that finding peace during the holiday season pandemonium that our culture has habituated in our lives requires help from our Heavenly Father. The enemy wants us to think we can do it by ourselves because he knows we can’t. Thank God, we have access to a never-ending peace, love, and joy supplier. And, during this wonderful season, we bring joy to the chaos by asking for His help in managing the work and focusing our heart in thankfulness on Him and the blessings He has given us through His Son. 

When you are making your dozens of cookies for the endless Christmas cookie platter, what is your focus? Do you envision the joy these sweet treats will bring your loved one or do you focus on all the effort that creating them will take? Choosing your focus does help. 

When you consider the limited resources that you have, do you push the boundaries and overspend, or do you buy just what the resources God provided you will allow? Certainly, generosity does bring everyone joy for a moment but can result in anxiety when the first credit card bills start arriving. 

Do you tend to overfill your precious Christmas holiday time, or do you set boundaries about what is on your list? Choose carefully. Involve your loved ones in the difficult decision-making. And make the decisions that will bring everyone the most joy.   

I may have made these wise choices all sound so easy, but I know from personal experience that they are not. In fact, the only reason that I have raised these three suggestions is that these situations are routinely an issue for yours truly. I have found that I can ask for His help not only in making my decisions but also in finding joy in the outcomes. A large measure of that joy is generated when I focus on the special gift that this season celebrates and swell with jubilation about what His gift and sacrifice have made possible for all of us. Maybe a daily reminder of that Christ-focused peace is just what is needed to surmount the holiday season pandemonium. 

Dear Heavenly Father, I am so grateful for Your gift of Your son, Jesus Christ. As I celebrate His birth this Christmas holiday season, please guide my choices so that they bring joy to me and my loved ones and focus all of us on You and Your Son throughout this holiday season and our lifetime. Amen.