Month: August 2015

1 John 3:16-18 (NLT) 16 We know what real love is because Jesus gave up his life for us. So we also ought to give up our lives for our brothers and sisters. 17 If someone has enough money to live well and sees a brother or sister in need but shows no compassion—how can God’s love be in that person? 18 Dear children, let’s not merely say that we love each other; let us show the truth by our actions.

What makes you feel loved? Is it when your husband comes home after a long day and tells you how much he missed you while he was gone? Is it when your child grabs you around the neck, tucks his head in under your chin and gives some good cuddle time? Is it when you get a call or text from a friend who tells you she was thinking about you? All of these things make me feel loved. Maybe they make you feel loved too. Maybe the things that make you feel loved are different.

In his discussion of 1 John chapter 2, Warren Wiersbe writes about the word love.

“Words, like coins, can be in circulation for such a long time that they start wearing out. Unfortunately, the word love is losing its value and is being used to cover a multitude of sins.

It is really difficult to understand how a man can use the same word to express his love for his wife as he uses to tell how he feels about baked beans! When words are used that carelessly, they really mean little or nothing at all. Like the dollar, they have been devalued.”

I love his illustration because it is so ridiculous that it has impact. The same word is used to express love for our spouse and how we feel about food? But we do it every day. “I love your outfit!” “I love that song!! “I love pizza!” “I love my mom!” “I love my dog! “I loved that book!” “I love playing World of Warcraft!” And these are just examples from my life. Well, except the Warcraft one, that’s my son…

In 1 John 3, John tells us “We know what real love is because Jesus gave up his life for us.” As I was studying this passage this week, the question I asked earlier came up. What makes you feel loved? And I began to wonder, when I think of Jesus’ sacrifice on the cross, do I feel loved? I mean intellectually I know that it was an act of love. I know that it was the greatest act of love ever given. I know that He went through all of that for me, but do I FEEL loved by it? Jesus’ greatest declaration of love comes with enduring a day of public suffering, humiliation, and brutality. It’s not exactly the warm fuzzy we prefer when we think about love.

I have a dear friend. We have been friends for 20 years. In a lot of ways, my friend is the antithesis of me. She is not overly demonstrative or verbal in her affection. There is a lot of “matter of factness” there. Her focus tends to be fixing the problem so that we will feel better. She’s definitely a doer. But here’s the thing: even though I don’t always get the emotional support that I want (please notice I said want), I have absolutely no doubt in the depth and strength of the love that defines our relationship. She is my sister. My son is her nephew (you should see the confused looks she gets when she refers to him that way). Her children are my nieces and nephews. We are family.

I know this not because we share warm fuzzies all the time. I know it because at one of the lowest moments in my life, she packed me up, moved me into her home and away from a bad situation, and then helped me find a new place to live. I know this because when I got engaged to my husband, she was the first to celebrate and she welcomed him into her family. I know this because on the day when my son was baptized and I was so disappointed because no one in our family could attend the service, she said to me, “It’s ok. You have family here.” And I knew exactly who she meant.

The love in our relationship is defined over and over again by acts of service to each other. Yes, we have warm moments. We do encourage each other and are supportive of each other. We certainly have a great time together and enjoy one another’s company, but the defining love is not during those times of warm fuzziness. I see her love for me every time she goes out of her way to do something. Love is knowing that if I ever need anything, she is just a phone call away. And I hope she knows that is true of me too.

I think we want to make love an emotion. We want to feel love. We have attached too much importance on how we feel and it has led us astray. There are many examples of how our emotions betray us and too often we want to make decisions based on how we feel, but that’s not what John wants us to see about Jesus. John didn’t say that we know what real love is because Jesus told us how much he loves us. He didn’t say that we know what real love is because Jesus showed us through physical affection, although I am quite sure Jesus did both of those things when he was physically here. John said, “We know what real love is because Jesus gave up his life for us.”

I like to gloss over the true extent of Jesus’ suffering. I don’t like to think about how bad it really was. I don’t want to imagine how much he hurt all over, how humiliating it was to be made fun of in public like that, how devastating it was to feel separated from His Father. And yet when I do, I begin to really see the depth of love expressed in those sufferings. Jesus doesn’t have to tell me how much he loves me; he has already shown me, If I’ll take the time to see. I think that in a lot of ways, my friend is more like Jesus than most of us. Most often her love is demonstrated through her actions, just like Jesus.

There have been many times in my life when I have felt all alone, lost, depressed, angry, and/or unloved. I have wondered over and over again if God really loves me. I have wondered if he is really there for me; if I can really trust him. In those moments I was focused too much on how I felt. I was letting my emotions guide my thoughts and my decisions. Please note, my focus was on me, not on Him. And my emotions betrayed me because, of course, God loves me! He showed me just how much 2,000 years ago: “We know what real love is because Jesus gave up his life for us.”

The Bible clearly teaches us that real love is a verb. I don’t have to feel loved to know that I am loved. Real love is cooking dinner for my family without the expectation of a compliment. Real love is working hard to keep the house clean so we have a nice place to live. Real love is answering question number 238 of the day with as much enthusiasm as question one. (You think I’m exaggerating, don’t you…) Real love is reading the Dark Elf Trilogy when you’d really rather be reading something else. Real love is attending the funeral of someone we don’t really know to be supportive of the family we do know. Real love is staying out in the cold a while longer to shovel snow from the neighbor’s driveway too. Real love is reminding me in my moment of sorrow, “It’s ok! You have family here.” Just the right words or the right actions at the right time and years later I still know that I am loved.

Today I commit to recognizing acts of love in all of its forms, not just the ones that make me feel good. Today I will put less stock in how I feel than in what I know to be true. Today I will remember that Jesus showed me what real love is. Today I will look for ways to emulate Christ and show love in the things I do without ever saying the words.

1 John 3:18 Dear children, let’s not merely say that we love each other; let us show the truth by our actions.

What about you? What are some meaningful ways others have shown love to you through acts of service or sacrifice? What makes you feel loved?

John 15:5 (NRSV) 5 I am the vine, you are the branches. Those who abide in me and I in them bear much fruit, because apart from me you can do nothing.

I used to struggle with what it means to abide in Christ… a lot. At the time I was living in Florida, working at a local hospital, and my mom was in her final hospital stay. I wanted desperately to hear Jesus, to feel his comfort, to know his presence. I knew that Jesus said we were to abide in him, but I didn’t really know what that looked like. I vividly remember having a conversation with a non-church going friend about it. She said, “What does that even mean???”

Here’s the thing: It’s really hard to abide when you work full time, your mom is dying in the hospital where you work, and your marriage has gone south forever… I found it impossible to really sit quietly in His presence and if I was sitting quietly, my brain was still going 90 to nothing. I couldn’t focus enough on him to really read his word or be able to hear him if I did. I was too wrapped up in me, I had no idea how to abide in Him.

It’s really only been in the last couple of years that I have seen for myself the value of quiet, alone time with the Lord. I have seen how spending time daily in prayer and Bible study has really brought about spiritual growth and a tangible connection to God. However, my quiet times are often not the traditional quiet times that you might be picturing in your mind right now.

A very popular, often quoted verse is Psalm 46:10. “He says, “Be still, and know that I am God;…” (NIV) Many translations translate the first verb as Be Still, so we start to think that we must be still mentally and physically in order to have quality time with God. However, the New American Standard Bible translates the verse this way: “Cease striving and know that I am God;…” To me that adds a whole new depth to the meaning of that verse! I don’t need to work so hard! I don’t have to sit still (which is good because I rarely can), I don’t have to clear my mind of everything going on around me (also a good thing because it’s nearly impossible), I just need to allow God to take whatever I’m doing or thinking to honor him.

In his book The Me I Want to Be, John Ortberg spends an entire chapter talking about finding out how we grow. His point is that just as there are no one size fits all clothing stores (could you imagine???) there is no one size fits all way to deepen your faith. God has made each one of us different and unique and therefore the way we spend time with him will also be different and unique. What works for one person might not work for someone else.

“How often in spiritual life do we get burdened because we try to wield weapons that have helped someone else in the battle? We hear about how someone else prays, or reads Scripture to start or end their day, or worships, or studies, or serves — and we feel guilty if we don’t do the same. We get frustrated because what works for someone else is not helpful to us. We are like David, trying to walk around in Saul’s armor.”

He goes on to say that we need to accept the freedom that comes with believing in Christ. “ If we really want to help someone grow, we will have to help them in a way that fits their wiring.” This has been so meaningful to me! God doesn’t want us to have cookie cutter spiritual lives. Each one of us is wired differently, so each one of us will feel close to God in different ways through different means.

The absolute fastest way for me to take a nap is to sit down to pray and it really doesn’t matter how much sleep I’ve had. It happens every time. It does work well on nights when I’m having trouble getting to sleep, though…

I have discovered that I pray best when I’m walking. Especially, when I’m walking outside in nature and speaking out loud in conversation or discussion. My focus is never better than in these moments and God has used these times to really speak to me and guide me. Of course, my neighbors think I’m a lunatic. “Hey look! There goes that woman walking down the street talking to… no one!” because, of course, I can’t talk without using my hands…

I’m also a very musical person. I have been involved in choirs since preschool and started learning my first instrument in the 3rd grade. Music speaks to me in a way that I don’t get any other way. So for me, quality time with God can look like me singing praises at the top of my lungs to Jesus while driving in my car on my way to my next destination. It doesn’t matter what I do to spend time with God, only that I do it. As Ortberg says, “A spiritual discipline is simply an activity you engage in to be made more fully alive by the Spirit of Life.” If I’m singing praise songs to Jesus and internalizing the message of the music, that counts!! This was so freeing to me! I don’t have to sit down with my Bible and my journal and pray quietly for an hour. I can sing to Jesus and it counts!

But why make the effort? Is it really worth it to abide in Christ?

In John 15, Jesus gives many benefits to abiding in Him:

We will bear much fruit. If we are spiritually minded, this becomes very important to us. Abiding in Christ gives Him the opportunity to flow in, around, and through us and out to others. Then they will have the opportunity to grow.

We can ask the Father anything and He will do it. This is an often misquoted or misinterpreted verse. Really what it means is that when we abide in Christ, He gives us His mind so that when we pray we are praying for things that He wants anyway. These are not selfish prayers. These are Holy Spirit guided prayers.

Our joy will be complete! This is joy, not happiness. Happiness is an emotion. Joy is a state of mind and heart. In Kay Warren’s book “Choose Joy: Because Happiness Isn’t Enough.” Kay defines joy as:

”the settled assurance that God is in control of all the details of my life, the quiet confidence that ultimately everything is going to be alright, and the determined choice to praise God in every situation.”

God’s goal for every Christian is to live in joy no matter what our outward circumstances are, but the most effective way to do this is to abide.

He will call us friend. Just like God called Abraham a Friend of God, we too will be called Friends of God. Jesus says that this friendship is based on the fact that He has shared everything that He has learned from the Father. However, the only way to really glean that wisdom is to abide.

We are chosen. Jesus says, “You did not choose me, but I chose you…” (John 15:16) Before we ever gave any thought to God, He had already chosen us to be His friends, to be His children. Everything that God has ever done for us has been about this very thing. We were created to live in relationship with God. He wants to have fellowship with us. So we choose to abide in thankfulness to the God who has already chosen us.

Almost everything we do can have spiritual application. Freedom comes in the moment that we find it counts as quality time with God. Can’t imagine sitting still for awhile to pray? Take a walk! Don’t like to read? Listen to an audio Bible! Your gift is service? Serve others in the name of the Lord. It all counts! And each one is a way to abide will lead us closer to God. Ortberg writes, “Spiritual growth is hand-crafted, not mass-produced. God does not do ‘one-size-fits-all.’” Now let’s find our way to abide!

What about you? What are some non traditional ways you spend time with the Lord?

John 1:4-5 (NIV) In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.

The people at Proverbs 31 Ministries have released a new app for Android and iOS called First5. Their goal is that we spend the first five minutes every day with the Lord. Their first devotional series has been going through the book of John. I have found these devotions a great jumping off place to dig deeper into His Word.

This week I have sensed God using these devotions to address a real need in my life. Like everyone else, I have had my share of ups and downs; victories and tragedies. However, I often find the tragedies difficult to let go of. We have all experienced hurt and disappointment in relationships and I am no different. My desire is to let go of the hurt, forgive and move on, but for me that’s not as easy as I think it should be.

Many years ago Nancy Honeytree wrote a song that has stuck with me. The chorus is:

One memory at a time

Each moment he relives is the one that he forgives

And he will live as he forgives

One memory at a time

This song really describes me. I choose to forgive. I pray I ask God to help me forgive. I tell him I’m ready, I do it and all is well… and then the next memory comes and I have to do it all over again. It isn’t that I’m not sincere. It isn’t that I don’t truly desire to move beyond this struggle. But as each new memory comes, I find myself reliving the experience over and over again along with the feelings that accompanied it. Then I find myself wondering, “How long, Lord???” How long before I can let go completely and forever? How long before this particular experience is not an issue for me anymore? Am I even making any of the progress I so desperately desire? Why is this so hard?

This morning in the First 5 devotion, Leah DiPaschal wrote a beautiful devotion about living in the light. In the section for experiencing more and digging deeper she talks about God’s ability to conquer the darkness and includes some very powerful verses to accompany it.

As I read these scriptures today, I was definitely sensing the continuation of a theme. God wants to work on my inner darkness. I found the extra verses that were included in the “More” section very powerful and through those verses, God brought to mind other relevant verses.

My darkness is definitely the hurt and unforgiveness I’ve been carrying around with me even though I desperately desire to be rid of these things! This was Jesus said about our darkness in John:

John 3:19-21 (NIV) 19 This is the verdict: Light has come into the world, but people loved darkness instead of light because their deeds were evil. 20 Everyone who does evil hates the light, and will not come into the light for fear that their deeds will be exposed. 21 But whoever lives by the truth comes into the light, so that it may be seen plainly that what they have done has been done in the sight of God.

As I read these verses, I had the image of someone who is in a very dark room and then suddenly very bright lights are turned on. It has happened to all of us. Our first reaction is to squint and shield our eyes. We shy away from the light. We want to stay in the darkness because at this point the light is painful. And isn’t that the problem? Allowing God to bring my dark places to the light is painful. I don’t always like the path of healing. It’s like treating a deep infected wound. The infected part must be cut out before full healing can begin. Pain before gain. But eventually we get used to the light and we don’t want to stay in the darkness. The light reveals all that we’ve been missing. We learn to love the light.

I want to embrace the light completely. I want to get rid of all of my darkness. So why is releasing these things such a struggle for me?

As I read through the First 5 extra verses, I found at least part of the answer. In Job 12:13-14, 22 God says this:

13 “To God belong wisdom and power;

counsel and understanding are his.

14 What he tears down cannot be rebuilt;

those he imprisons cannot be released.

22 He reveals the deep things of darkness

and brings utter darkness into the light. (NIV)

What God tears down cannot be rebuilt!! What God imprisons cannot be released! That’s what I want! I want God to tear down and imprison my hurt and my unforgiveness so that it never returns. He is the only one who can. This is promise emphasizes God’s power. I can’t do this, but He can.

Another missing piece of the puzzle is revealed in Psalm 89:17.

You are their glorious strength.

It pleases you to make us strong. (NIV)

The Lord is my strength. I think that although I’ve been fervently praying that God would help me with this, I’ve been trying to do too much on my own. I think I shouldn’t be asking Him to help me. I should be asking Him to do this for me. I don’t have the power that God has. What I tear down CAN be rebuilt. What I imprison CAN be released. Or as God said to Zechariah:

Zechariah 4:6 (NIV) 6 So he said to me, “This is the word of the Lord to Zerubbabel: ‘Not by might nor by power, but by my Spirit,’ says the Lord Almighty.

It’s not my might or my power that can accomplish anything. It is only by His Spirit who has access to His wisdom and His power. Sometimes I really do try too hard…

The end of Psalm 89:17 says, “It pleases you to make us strong.” It is His desire to make me strong! I need to think about that for a minute. I need to marinate in the fact that God’s desire is to make me strong. He wants me to be strong! He desires it! So why do I keep fighting him? If He and I have the same desire to heal my heart and enable me to completely forgive, why do I fight against him? Because the strength He wants me to have is not my own and I much prefer to be in control…

Paul faced a similar dilemma in 2 Corinthians chapter 12. He writes about how he had a thorn in his flesh. No ones knows for sure what was going on with Paul, although there is loads of speculation as to what his problem might have been. I personally think that Paul left this deliberately vague because each one of us will be plagued by different things, but the truth of what God revealed to him is applicable to all of us. Whatever it was, Paul prayed to God three times asking Him to remove this problem. In Paul’s own words:

8 Three different times I begged the Lord to take it away. 9 Each time he said, “My grace is all you need. My power works best in weakness.” So now I am glad to boast about my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ can work through me. 10 That’s why I take pleasure in my weaknesses, and in the insults, hardships, persecutions, and troubles that I suffer for Christ. For when I am weak, then I am strong. (NLT)

After begging God to take this thing away, Paul realized that He was actually stronger when he was weak. It wasn’t his power that could overcome these things, it was God’s power and God’s power could only fully manifest when he was weak. Now I don’t know about taking pleasure in these things… I am far from there, but maybe from these passages, I can begin to understand the purpose in the length of my struggle. Maybe God is reminding me that only He can do this work and if my struggles completely go away, then His power to work within me will be reduced because I will think I can handle it from here. I will take over and try to do things in my power. I will forget that God’s desire is to make me strong through His power. I know I will, I have done it before…

Today I choose to hold on to His promises. I choose to remember that what He tears down CANNOT be rebuilt. What He imprisons CANNOT be set free. He desires to make me strong through my weakness. He is my glorious strength. Today I choose to surrender my darkness to His wonderful light.

How about you? Are you holding on to a place of darkness in your life? Are you struggling to let it go only to have it return time and time and time again? What decision will you make today?