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All we need

Paul wrote a letter to the church in the large and prosperous city of Corinth. This was a church of non-Jewish people, a church sprouting from the soil of pagan Greek culture. He intends, in his letter, to address all kinds of issues the church is having—everything from incest to divisions in the church body. A ton of problems, and most of them very messy. Paul knows these people well—he settled in and lived and worked there for more than a year.

Yet Paul begins his letter addressing these people as those “called by God to be his own holy people”! Far from perfect, burdened still by many pagan ideas and influences, selfish, argumentative—yet God has invited these people to new life through Jesus’ sacrifice. They’ve accepted the invitation, but they’re finding that living out this holiness and God’s standard of righteousness is tough. They’re stumbling, time and again.

Sound familiar? Sounds like my life. So far from the mark, it seems. Still struggling with so many things…

And then Paul writes to those so-much-less-than-perfect Corinthians,

Now you have every spiritual gift you need as you eagerly wait for the return of our Lord Jesus Christ. He will keep you strong to the end so that you will be free from all blame on the day when our Lord Jesus Christ returns. God will do this, for he is faithful to do what he says, and he has invited you into partnership with his Son, Jesus Christ our Lord (1 Corinthians 1:7-9 NLT).

Wow. Imagine what the people in that church must have felt as they opened Paul’s letter and began reading. They were well aware of all the bad stuff going on; probably every person was embroiled in at least one or two of the specific problems Paul will go on to discuss in the letter. Yet the first thought he brings to them is that God has invited them to a new kind of life, and He supplies everything necessary to live that life, and He intends to present everyone to Himself…blameless!

How would you feel, reading such an assurance, especially knowing the trouble that churns through your church? And knowing that you have played a part in all those problems?

How do I feel, reading this assurance, knowing too well how less-than-perfect my own life is, how often I stumble on my pilgrimage, how many times I open the door to doubt or discouragement or guilt over the unholy still in my life?

I hear Jesus’ words: I have called you to a new life, and I will supply everything you need to stand strong. Cling to Me. I am the one who will get you through. And in the end, you will stand blameless!

God will do this, Paul declares. He has invited you to be His partner in His work here on earth, and He will supply everything you need to do that. He will do it, because He keeps His promises.

And so, in those times when I am beset by discouragement or doubt or weariness, my hope can only fall on its knees and say, Spirit, help my unbelief!

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Chariots of fire surrounding you

Let us imagine what that morning must have been like.

They wake up in the hill country of Samaria, in the small town of Dothan. The servant, out on an early morning errand, is stunned by the sight of chariots and foot soldiers everywhere. The enemy has moved into place under the cover of darkness. These are the troops of the king of Aram, who has been attempting raids on towns in Samaria, trying to break the country bit by bit.

The servant runs back home to report the situation to Elisha. “Sir, what will we do?” Dothan is under siege. It is not clear if Elisha and his servant know that these soldiers are here to capture Elisha, or if they simply assume that the enemy is attacking the town, as it has tried to do with other towns. They do know, though, that the enemy forces are powerful, they are everywhere, and there is no apparent way of escape. It looks like they’re doomed to capture or destruction.

“What will we do?”

Elisha is not afraid. “We have more on our side than they have!” he declares.

And then he prays. Not for God to come and help them. No, he prays for the young man. He asks God to open the young servant’s eyes to see the truth of their situation. “And let him see!”

The LORD opened the young man’s eyes, and when he looked up, he saw that the hillside around Elisha was filled with horses and chariots of fire (2 Kings 6:17 NLT).

Oh, Lord, open our eyes and let us see!

Let us see your constant watch over us. Scripture holds so many reassurances that the eyes of the Lord are constantly on those who rely on His love and His ears are always open to our prayers. I just discovered another one recently; 2 Chronicles 16:9 says the Lord is continually looking throughout the earth, looking for hearts devoted to Him so that He can strengthen them. He is there, constantly.

Let us see the power with which you protect us and provide for us. Chariots of fire? Who knows? Are there angels fighting for us in the spiritual realm? We have Scriptures that would indicate this is happening. But God also sends his “angels” in human form—people sent into our lives at just the right time for the purpose of strengthening, encouraging, teaching, and supporting us. They are—just like heavenly angels—special representatives sent by God for a certain purpose. Prayer warriors might very well be, in God’s eyes, driving chariots of fire into the thick of the battle. (I like that image.)

Psalm 18 is a great picture of God tearing open the heavens and coming down Himself to rescue one who depended on His help. God has done that for you and me! He has torn open heaven, and He not only came down to rescue us but He comes to live with us. God comes to abide with us. We abide in Him. He comes and makes His home with us and we share a life together. He tore the heavens open one night in Bethlehem, coming to rescue us and to share His life and kingdom and power with us.

We cannot despair, even when the situation looks grim to our blind eyes. We cannot feel helpless or hopeless when faced with enemies so strong they seem unbeatable. We cannot, because Jesus said, “Don’t be afraid of any trouble you face in the world. Trust me.”

What would this day look like if we could see clearly the chariots of fire surrounding us? What if we could have just a taste, one wee sip, of the might of His power at work in our lives?

Today, I pray for you and for me—not for His help in what we face or victory in our battles, but I pray: Lord, open our eyes and let us see!

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Thanking God … And Friends

Today’s guest post focuses on hospitality, something that abounds during the coming Thanksgiving and Christmas seasons. Mary Jane Smith expresses her appreciation and thanks for her friend Joanie’s gift of hospitality and sharing of her bounty.

So I offer a challenge for this week of Thanksgiving: as you thank God for your blessings, include thanks for the special talents and passions He has given to each of your friends and the many ways those talents enrich your life.

Then, make a point of thanking your friends and telling them how their gifts have brought you comfort, encouragement, and joy.

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Hospitality

I Peter 4: 9  “Use hospitality one to another without grudging.”

The first time Joanie invited me to dinner with her family, I quickly found out that this was not a picnic-table-style affair.  Joanie loves to entertain, and she loves to entertain with style.  Her table was set with matching cloth tablecloth and napkins.  The centerpiece was a stunning floral display that she had created (hues of the seasonal display outside).  Everything, and I do mean everything, was coordinated for optimal visual enjoyment — candles, crystal, china, and cutlery.  The visual display paled when compared to what she served us:  breads, salads, entrees, multiple side dishes, and desserts.  All sumptuous pallet pleasers.

Joanie and I are decorative painters, and our methods of implementing our art are vastly different.  Over the ensuing years our friendship deepened.  She has become the little sister I always wanted.  About our art connection, she will laughingly say that she helped me to speed up and I helped her to slow down and enjoy the details.

Joanie is employed full-time as an Executive Assistant for a large corporation in our area of Florida.  Even though she has a schedule jam-packed with obligations, she always finds time to share her baking, canning and cooking with family and friends (my personal favorites are her Strawberry Jam and her Pickled Beets).  Many “goodie bags” have come home with me over the years that have nourished me well into another week. Even when we were not celebrating a special occasion, her food and decorations were spectacular.  However, when she really wanted to celebrate – the visuals and the meals would be outrageously extravagant.

When I think back over the gatherings around her tables (yes, that is plural – one formal, one casual, and of course one on the patio), the words that come to my mind are abundance, hospitality, and love.  Joanie genuinely enjoys showering family and friends with her awesome gifts of food (and her design talents).  Every recollection of the wonderful times of fun, laughter and fellowship around her tables brings with it a sense of peace and benediction. I am just sure that the same feeling will be part of the celebrations we will have around the Lord’s Table when we finally get home to heaven.

Hospitality to me means abundance, and it means giving with love.  If that is not a description of the life of my beloved friend, I do not know what it would be.

Heavenly Father, 

Provider of our daily bread and sustenance, thank You for allowing us the precious comfort of friends who portray for us the true meaning of hospitality by their gifts of time, talent and love.  Thank you for these precious earthly reminders of what Heaven will be like, and what You have in store for us. 

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Mary Jane Smith lives in Florida and will be guest posting again at Christmas and New Year’s.

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“It’s going to be good!”

When I was a little girl, eternity looked pretty boring to me. Was life with God going to be like one long church service? No good books to read for hours? No horses to ride? No creeks to play in? No ball games? No friends to share with? Were we just going to wander aimlessly around heaven with nothing to occupy our hands and minds other than singing praises?

Frankly, the heaven in my imagination was so unappealing that I couldn’t summon up much enthusiasm for spending even a weekend there, much less endless time. But one thing I did know: heaven was preferable to the hell pictured by the preachers, so of course I must focus on heaven.

That was a young girl’s limited imagination. Now, many decades later, I still can’t imagine the great plans God has for His children. But I’m much more excited about stepping into them and discovering what He has in store for us.

Dear friends, we are already God’s children, but he has not yet shown us what we will be like when Christ appears. But we do know that we will be like him, for we will see him as he really is. And all who have this eager expectation will keep themselves pure, just as he is pure (1 John 3:2-3 NLT).

In these verses we have a promise that is far beyond the imagination of anyone, young or old. We can only look forward and say, “Wow. What will that be like?”

We will be like Christ. God began the process when He opened the way and invited us to come back to Him. He continued the plan when He adopted us as sons and daughters, siblings, if you will, of Christ. He gave us glimpses of the future when He sent His Son to model for us how to live out the life of His kingdom — pure, devoted to God, in close relationship with Him. And then God ripped open the limits of our earthly lives when He raised His dead Son to life, pulling apart the curtain to give us a peek and say, “This is your future too!”

As a guarantee of that future, He planted within us the beginnings of transformation. His own Holy Spirit is working as you read this, transforming, connecting you to your Creator and your God, the one who loved you so much He came into your world to rescue you.

And here’s the promise: the ultimate end of this process is that we will be like Christ.

That’s amazing to me for a number of reasons. My first thought is of how far I am—now—from being like Christ. I know I share His Spirit, but I also daily experience the war that still rages within, between my old person and the new person the Spirit has birthed and wants to grow.

Secondly, I wonder what it will be to be like our Lord. We will be like our God? That’s a bold statement. Yet we were created in God’s likeness in the beginning. He paid the price to bring His lost children back. He is now in the process of creating again — He’s established His kingdom and He is creating new lives in His people. And yes, this is the promise: His new creations will indeed share in all that Christ is and has!

I do not yet understand how seeing Him “as He is” will complete the transformation, but I suspect that knowing Christ fully, being with Him face to face, will have a transformative effect on me. We know that even now, the more time we spend with our Lord, the more He can change our minds, hearts, thoughts, and actions. Yet our sight is clouded. When we see Him clearly and when we are fully with Him, what exciting and incredible things will surely happen to all of us who love Him?

I take from this another promise: I will someday see His love clearly. I’ll be able to see it on His face and in His eyes and feel it in His touch and hear it in His voice, and I will finally understand the love that is so deep and wide and beyond my comprehension now. We know that in our life here, being loved has transforming powers. Perhaps knowing Christ’s love fully and finally seeing its depth will transform us completely. For now, it is enough for me to know that I will see Him and know, face to face, how much He loves me.

So, John writes, let’s work at keeping ourselves pure because we are headed for this exciting future. Of course John knew, just as we know today, that perfection before God is impossible—we still stumble and fall short of Christ’s purity and sinlessness. John knew this reality, and he reminds us (in chapter 1 verse 9) that God uses even our sin and confession to cleanse and change us, working toward the future promise of our complete transformation.

My little girl imagination had such narrow limits. Even now, my grown-up imagination can only go so far. But Scripture says that all of this Good News of what God is doing is so wonderful that even the angels are eagerly watching as it all unfolds.*

As one of my friends says, “It’s going to be good!”

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*see 1 Peter 1:12

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Even though …

This passage from Habakkuk is both beautiful and astonishing. It’s astonishing because we see a life filled with disaster, a life we might think is bleak and hopeless—yet the passage positively shines with hope and strength.

Even though the fig trees have no blossoms,
and there are no grapes on the vines;
even though the olive crop fails,
and the fields lie empty and barren;
even though the flocks die in the fields,
and the cattle barns are empty,
yet I will rejoice in the LORD!
I will be joyful in the God of my salvation!
The Sovereign LORD is my strength!
He makes me as surefooted as a deer,
able to tread upon the heights (Habakkuk 3:17-19).

Read these verses again, slowly and maybe even aloud, and don’t miss some key words.

Even though. Even though the check book is depleted or the savings are gone or the job disappears. Even though the diagnosis is cancer. Even though I have wasted all those years. Even though I struggle with depression or live with chronic pain. Even though I am a single woman alone. Even though I’m being ridiculed for living as a follower of Jesus. Even though my best friend dies. Even though my husband leaves me. Even though I cannot see the light at the end of the tunnel.

Even though …

You can finish a few more of those sentences, I’m sure.

Even though all looks like disaster …

Yet. Yet I will rejoice that God rescues me. Salvation is a difficult word to make concrete in our world. When I learned that it meant rescue, then many Scriptures took on new meaning for me. Even though disaster falls in every area of my life, yet I will rejoice in the God who rescues me. I remember that He has in the past and know He will in the future. No matter what situation I’m in today or what battles are raging, I know He is my rescue. In that, I will find my peace and joy.

Sovereign. He is sovereign! He rules supreme, and as Sovereign, He holds my life in His hands. What better place to find refuge? My strength comes from His. My resources come from Him. He is my Shepherd, and He sees to it that I do not lack anything I need. The Lord of the universe has claimed me as His child!

He makes me… I have no stability, no joy, no strength, no security of my own making. All of my strength comes from Him. I depend totally on Him for courage and endurance. He is the One who makes me able to scramble up the mountainside, no matter how steep or high. He keeps me from slipping and places me on solid ground even when the path leads through the valley of disaster or I am under siege by the enemies of my soul. Even though my clay is fragile, He makes me strong and firm, courageous and steadfast.

In the middle of disaster, hope can yet trust the Sovereign Lord who rescues and gives strength.

As a writer, I wish I could write words this beautiful and powerful. As a child of God, I want my life to sing these lyrics.

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