Praise Him Anyway!

Keeping a good attitude has been a struggle lately. More often than not I'm feeling dissatisfied, frustrated and even downright angry at my circumstances. Life isn't fair!

I've been reading through the Psalms in the morning before I head to work. Sometimes the laments validate my bad mood, but they always end in praise even when my thoughts don't. David often reminds us to sing and shout for joy! But what about if I'm not feeling it? What about when I'm in the middle of hard and terrible things?

David set an example - he faced a lot of serious challenges. Friends turning against him. Temptations stronger than his resistance. Rebellious children. Death of a son. Strained relationships. Whatever it was he faced he acknowledged the difficulty, and simultaneously, he praised God's character: mighty and powerful, all-knowing, tender, just, loving and kind, righteous, and infinitely faithful.

It's what I'm called to do too, if I am to be a woman after God's own heart. His character does not depend on my ever changing circumstances, and in fact His praise will sound louder to the world around me when it's in the midst of hard times. He is always good, no matter what.

I encourage you to praise Him anyway on your difficult days. Read the Psalms. Think about God's never changing characteristics. Turn that praise music up! There's nothing better to lift your mood.

"I will bless the Lord at all times; His praise shall continually be in my mouth. My soul will make its boast on the Lord; The humble will hear it and rejoice. O magnify the Lord with me, And let us exalt His name together!" Psalm 34:1

In Desperate Need

I am in desperate need of a snuggle and a sleep-over with my granddaughter.

I am in desperate need of a good cry, the kind that leaves me not empty but cleansed.

 I am in desperate need of a Sunday family dinner, with ALL the seats filled.

I am in desperate need of connection.

I am in desperate need of forgiveness.

I am in desperate need of…

In this current situation of isolation and limitation, there are so many things I can think of to add to this small-scale list. Things that are real, heart-hurting needs and even the paltry me-focused needs of wanting to be pampered and preened over.

The Random Unabridged Dictionary defines the word “desperate” as feeling, showing, or involving a hopeless sense that a situation is so bad as to be impossible to deal with.

Right now in this suspended life, these needs seem pressing and at times smothering and maybe even desperate. That is my humanness in a season of limits, and in a season of lack of control over events and circumstances. My own strength cannot handle my needs, small and large.

My greatest and all encompassing, desperate need is that of a Savior.

These needs, listed above, are temporal. Fleeting. Transitory. My truest deepest need is surrender to a God who will meet ALL my needs. I do not have the power to overcome on my own, nor will I ever conquer this need and hold it at bay. “For I know that nothing good lives in me. I want to what is right but fail so miserably.” Romans 7:18. I want do those things that are right and good and pure. I want to have hope, and share it with others. I desperately want to be the woman, the wife, the daughter, the Mama, the Nona, the Mother in Law, the friend that I was created to be. I struggle when I fail, fall short, see only my own needs instead of those around me. Focus on comforting myself. I struggle, I stumble. I so often carry the weight on my own.

I try. I bargain. I do-over. I am desperate.

But, ahhhh sweet Jesus there is hope in my desperation. There is no other God besides Me, A righteous God and a Savior; There is none except Me.“Turn to Me and be saved, all the ends of the earth; For I am God, and there is no other,” says the Lord of All. Isaiah 45:21b-22. 

How could it be this simple, and yet so hard, to surrender my desperation to Him. In the never ending yearning. The struggle we feel to have and do and be. To accomplish. To perfect. The age-long desires and the uncountable numbers of failures of doing it all on your own. Our struggles are not unique, they are present in every woman. They were present before the epidemic, and they will be present when this time of travail is locked in historic annals.

I look to those who were long ago God’s chosen people. They struggled and faltered. The sinned in their lack of trust and lack of faithfulness. The turned their back on God, even though He had been ever faithful and ever forgiving. My struggles, it seems, are not uncommon to woman [man].

Say, therefore, to the sons of Israel, ‘I am the Lord, and I will bring you out from under the desperate burdens you carry, and I will deliver you from bondage. I will also redeem you with an outstretched arm and with great judgments. Then I will take you for My people, and I will be your God; and you shall know that I am the Lord your God, who brought you out from under the desperate burdens. Exodus 6:6-7. 

And so, in my present desperation, in my future desperation I will call on the Lord God who is the only one who can meet me in my despair. In my fear. In my uncertainty. In the insecurity of the present day. In the unknown of decades into the future. I will trust in you Lord God. I will trust in you. Again, and again, and yet again. I will call for I am in desperate need of ALL of you Lord God.

The Opposition of Fear is...

With all that is going on around us, it’s a daily battle to not give in to fear or despair; so many headlines, so many changing circumstances, so many unknowns. I know I am grateful for the online Bible teaching and the ability to still hear from our pastors and congregation during this time of social isolation. We are told to increase and display our faith and yes, for such a time as this, that is true.

I read something the other day however that stood out to me as perhaps a missing piece of what we will need to stand, yes, even to grow spiritually during such times as this.

It is Love.

 Ok, if I have not lost you yet, let me explain.

I happened to read Jude 20-21, Amplified Bible: “But you, beloved, build yourselves up [founded] on your most holy faith [make progress, rise like an edifice higher and higher], praying in the Holy Spirit; Guard and keep yourselves in the love of God; expect and patiently wait for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ (the Messiah) -[which will bring you] unto life eternal.”

Now we know we need to guard a good bit in our faith. Proverbs 4:23 says to “Above all else, guard your heart, for everything you do flows from it.” We are to be on guard against our adversary the devil (1 Peter 5:8). We are to be on guard against pride that makes us susceptible to temptation (1 Corinthians 10:12). But Guard and keep myself in the love of Christ?

One of the first examples of this that comes to mind, and is appropriate in so many ways for today, is the story of the disciples in the boat..in a storm...with Jesus..who is sleeping. The storm is raging, the boat is sinking and the Lord is asleep while they are bailing the water and shouting in fear. Finally they approach the Lord and the first thing they ask is, “Master, don’t you care that we are perishing?” And as we know, Jesus rebuked the winds and the waves and then rebuked the disciples for their “little” faith.

Now the disciples knew to get to Jesus as the storm became too great to handle, so they had the faith that He could save them. I am suggesting that Jesus’ rebuke was directly to the question they asked: faith (confidence) in His love for them.

Here, I raise my hand, guilty as charged. How quickly in my intense storms that my faith in His power weakens to the point that I am questioning His love for me more than I question His power over the storm. Here are the thought patterns I am sure you can recognize:

I am with Jesus in the boat, what a great day.

He falls asleep but He is with me.

There is a storm ahead, but that’s ok because I have Jesus with me.

Wow..this storm is a bad one. I am sure Jesus will wake up soon and take care of it.

Right, Jesus?

Jesus, this storm is SO BAD. Why won’t you wake up and do something about it?

Jesus, if you cared, you would wake up and still it.

Jesus, you must not care.

See, I go from faith in His power to lack of faith in His love. And here is where being grounded in God’s love is the antidote to fear.

1 John 4:18 says that “full-grown, (complete, perfect) love turns fear out of doors and expels every trace of terror!” While the immediate context is of no fear of judgement from God, how applicable this is to us in times of storm! Psalm 131:2 speaks of being like a weaned child, resting with his mother rather than fretting because the child is now no longer in constant need of milk.

I am always humbled by Paul’s great prayer in Ephesians 3: 18-19: “That you may have the power and be strong to apprehend and grasp with all the saints [God’s devoted people, the experience of that love] what is the breadth, and the length and height and depth [of it]; [That you may really come] to know [practically, through experience for yourselves] the love of Christ, which far surpasses mere knowledge [without experience].

Yes, I need to “guard and keep myself in the love of God”. In my storms, when Jesus is there with me but not “doing anything”. The cross of the Lord is the ultimate reminder that He who endured my sin will be with me in the times of trial and testing I endure.

Lord I humbly bow at your feet and say Forgive me where my faith focuses on the storm and not on Your love. Keep me and your church filled with this knowledge that surpasses understanding so that we may be so confident of your love that our prayers stay motivated by that instead of fear.

Thank you for loving me, Lord.

Building Faith in Challenging Times

Given the way that our Heavenly Father has used the pain in my lifetime to transform me and build my faith in Him, I am confident that He will use this challenging time in the history of our world to draw us closer to Him. Reading the guidance that God offers us in 1 Peter 1:6-9, I know that, during the threat of COVID-19, I will continue to rejoice in God and my faith in Him will grow even stronger.

1 Peter 1:6-9 In this you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while you may have had to suffer grief in all kinds of trials. These have come so that your faith—of greater worth than gold, which perishes even though refined by fire—may be proved genuine and may result in praise, glory, and honor when Jesus Christ is revealed. Though you have not seen him, you love him; and even though you do not see him now, you believe in him and are filled with an inexpressible and glorious joy, for you are receiving the goal of your faith, the salvation of your souls. 

 I remind you of Moses’ guidance to the Israelites when they were enduring pain as they were pursued by the Egyptians on the way to the Promised Land. As the Pharaoh and Egyptians marched toward them, the Israelites cried to Moses, “Didn’t we say to you in Egypt, ‘Leave us alone; let us serve the Egyptians’? It would have been better for us to serve the Egyptians than to die in the desert.”

 Exodus 14:13-14 Moses answered the people, “Do not be afraid. Stand firm and you will see the deliverance the Lord will bring you today. The Egyptians you see today you will never see again. The Lord will fight for you; you need only to be still.” 

 As I read the Israelites frenzy, I am reminded how prone we humans are to not trust in the Lord in stressful times. We see evidence of how God will protect us as He protected them, parting the Red Sea and saving the Israelites from the hands of the Egyptians. In response, Exodus 14:31 confirmed that the Israelites responded by fearing the Lord and put their trust in Him.

 Jeremiah offers an excellent encouragement for us to trust in Him. 

Jeremiah 17:7 “But blessed is the man who trusts in the LORD, whose confidence is in Him.” 

 My trials have grown my faith in the Lord. I trust in Him to protect all of those who I love, and I will be dedicated to praying for the health and well-being of the people of our world and especially for my sweet family in life, at Cornerstone, in DivorceCare, and at Lafayette. While that protection may not keep everyone on this planet, I pray that it will take those we lose to Heaven to worship God and that someday I will be forgiven by the Lord for my sinfulness and will join them there.

 COVID-19 has isolated many of us from our dear friends. I want to close this post by encouraging all of you to remember that even though we are alone, we are NOT alone. God is with us! That is confirmed by Him in many locations in the Bible.

 Dear Heavenly Father. I plead with you to protect those I love from this devastating health crisis that has overwhelmed our planet. I trust in you and have faith that you will protect us during this devastating time. Amen.

 P.S. A great theme song for this trying time is Steven Curtis Chapman’s tune This Day, which can be found at this link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vnlzUSP0w_c Just press “Skip Ads” and you can hear it right away!

Desperation and Hope In Times of Severe Famine

Have you ever experienced severe famine … or even famine of any degree?

 I know I haven’t. We read in the Old Testament that the Egyptians, in the time of Joseph, were well acquainted with this terrible plight. They experienced such tremendous famine for seven whole years that even the neighboring nations were affected by this serious shortage of food. In fact, the Bible reports, “the famine was severe in all the earth” (Gn. 41:57). People far and near were desperate for life-giving grain in order to survive. All their personal resources were exhausted and there was nowhere to turn. They were desperate!

 But…they heard there was grain in Egypt. Because Joseph had stored grain throughout the land during the seven years of abundance, there was plenty of grain during the years of desperate need. There was hope!

 As I read through this account of how Joseph, through God’s providential hand, had been elevated by Pharaoh to distribute life-giving grain, I was struck by the desperation that existed among the people. If it weren’t for this “severe famine” that reached to “all the earth”, people would not have made the arduous trek to Egypt. If they had not heard the good news of grain in Egypt they would not have come to Joseph. It was the extreme desperation of their situation and the hope that lay ahead that finally drove them to the only One who could supply what was necessary for life.

 What a beautiful picture of the Gospel! Life-giving food was desperately needed and there was no way for people to come up with it on their own. This was bad news! They were incapable, during this time of severe famine, to produce what was necessary themselves. They had no control over the weather conditions and were completely unable to provide what was required for survival. Without the grain from Egypt, people would starve to death. Their physical condition parallels the spiritual condition of all who are without Christ.

 But good news spread throughout the land … there was food in Egypt! There was hope! They must go to Egypt to get grain from Joseph! When the people cried out to Pharaoh, he pointed them to Joseph, a picture of our Lord Jesus Christ, the bread of life. Only Christ can supply what we need for spiritual life and we must come to Him.

 I have several loved ones who don’t yet know the Lord and I’m sure you do too… unsaved friends and family who are in severe spiritual famine but they may not even realize it. They likely are still looking to what the world can offer or are deceived into thinking they can somehow meet that deep internal need themselves. So many are without hope. As I meditated on this passage, I was prompted to start praying more intentionally along these same lines…that my loved ones would come to a place of desperate need and come to realize there was hope. Hope in the only One who can supply what is necessary for spiritual life. In their desperation, I want hope to drive them to Jesus, to know Him and to love Him. I want them to realize what Christ suffered on their behalf to make a way for true abundant, everlasting life and to place their hope in Him.

 “Lord, create a “severe famine” in the life of _______ to draw them to Yourself. Help _____ see the emptiness of what the world offers and the futility of their own efforts. May _____ see You as their hope...that You are loving and kind and waiting to give what they desperately need for life, not just here and now, but for all eternity.”

Having Jesus Is Better

Before I begin I just wanted to share that what I am about to write is not something that I consistently live out. I haven’t arrived. I struggle day to day to live here, sometimes moment to moment. But I so desperately want to move this truth from a head knowledge into my heart so that I live it consistently. But I need reminders from God and His people. Just last week I was reminded of a truth I had long buried somewhere. A truth I had walked in before but now it was gone. It was the truth of 2 Corinthians 12:9-10 which reminds me that Jesus is sufficient for all my weaknesses, distress, and difficulties. When I am weak, He is strong.

 I know this verse, I have read it, studied it, quoted it and shared it, but the thing is I am now learning to apply it into my life in a new way. Friday night I sat with two friends and shared my health struggles. I was honest about the depths of pain, both emotionally and physically. These two women have been where I am, they are were I am. Both live with chronic illness and pain. They were encouraging, pointed me to Jesus and then prayed with me. During prayer one of them said something like, “help Sharon see that You are better than her health.” That changed something inside me. Kind of a refocusing of my thoughts. Jesus is better, He is sufficient, He is more than enough. If I never go into remission of Graves Disease, if this life is my new normal and there is no healing here on earth, Jesus is enough.

 Let’s be honest, many reading this are struggling in some form or another. It might not be with your health, but it could be with any number of trials, heartbreak or suffering. When sin entered into this world along came much pain and suffering. Suffering that we can not endure on our own. We need to invite Jesus into our suffering, for He alone will be our strength. “His grace is sufficient for you, for power is perfected in weakness...Therefore I am well content with weaknesses, with insults, with distresses, with persecutions, with difficulties, for Christ’s sake: for when I am weak, then I am strong.” (2 Cor 12:9-10)

 This is not easy. We like to be comfortable. We do not like pain or suffering. We want to be healed. We place a high priority on being healthy and pain free in this life. But we need to recognize that having Jesus in our life is better than all these things. So even if God does not heal you, or rescue you out of your current circumstance He is still good. He is still faithful and He is, with a doubt, enough!

 One final though, while Jesus is enough, we must also remember that He never intended us to walk through suffering or life alone. We need our brothers and sisters in Christ. There are so many verses in God’s Word that remind us that we need to share our burdens with one another. Honestly, this is another hard area for some of us, but I pray that we learn to not only remind one another that having Jesus is better than what we are going through, but that we are there for one another for support and prayer.

What This World Means for Evil, God Means for Good

Looking back, I remember with such fondness the blessing the Lord brought into my life when He laid it on my heart, during a sad time, to join a Cornerstone Life Group. During this devastating time, when I was experiencing my second divorce and working two jobs in order fund my son’s college education, I was only available on Monday nights. 

As I reviewed the list of Life Groups, the one led by Jan and Dennis Bishop was the only group that met on Mondays. Their study at that time so powerfully focused on Joseph, who had experienced the extraordinary pain of being rejected and sold into slavery by his siblings. This excruciating experience created the pathway for Joseph to become a leader in Egypt and the champion who protected the people of this planet during a devastating famine. 

After protecting his loved ones during the famine, despite their rejection of him, and enduring the loss of his father, Joseph spoke God-inspired insights when he was approached by his brothers. His insights have become a theme for my life.

Genesis 50:18-20

'His brothers then came and threw themselves down before him. “We are your slaves,” they said. 

But Joseph said to them, “Don’t be afraid. Am I in the place of God? You intended to harm me, but God intended it for good to accomplish what is now being done, the saving of many lives.”'

Joseph understood that his healing didn’t arise from his success, but rather from the redeeming work of God. Joseph gave voice to the poignant truth that his enslavement ended up being the very thing that freed his community and family from famine and death. Like Joseph, I also cling to the truth that sometimes there is great purpose in our pain. God has been laying on my heart that I should look with gratitude at the way that He has blessed me through my earthly pain. He has leveraged it to purge sinfulness from my heart and to inspire me to be obedient to His commands and to trust in Him. 

Today, I know that our Heavenly Father loves me, and I love Him too. Unlike some who get mad at our sovereign Lord for their earthly pain, I feel extremely grateful that He did not allow the sinful me to continue my lifetime of disobedience. I was headed to hell because of my sinfulness. Now, because I believe in His sacrifice, I have begged for His forgiveness, and He has changed my heart as a result of this earthly pain, I pray that He will bestow on me Christ’s righteousness and allow me to worship Him in Heaven for all of eternity. 

Some other verses that emphasize this point can be found throughout the Bible. Here are some examples: 

Ezekiel 7:4

'I will not look on you with pity or spare you; I will surely repay you for your conduct and the detestable practices among you. Then you will know that I am the Lord.'

Hebrews 12:11

'No discipline seems pleasant at the time, but painful. Later on, however, it produces a harvest of righteousness and peace for those who have been trained by it.'

By being determined to love Him through our earthly pain and to see His tender mercy in transforming our hearts, we will be blessed by difficult times.

Dear Heavenly Father, thank you for your love. As I look to my past, I know that I have brought much of my earthly pain on myself as a result of my sinfulness. Now, rather than focus on those painful circumstances, I focus instead on your tender mercy and allow my love for and belief in you to continue to transform me. I praise you for who you are and express my loving gratitude for your compassion and your willingness to transform me. 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.