Look What's Coming!

This last summer we took on a large remodeling project in which we removed part of the house--the kitchen, laundry room, and family entry--and rebuilt it. During that time we learned to be flexible and go about everyday tasks differently.

Now we're back in the house and I'm enjoying a larger, warmer kitchen. Yesterday I expressed gratitude to God for things like a dryer vent that doesn't snake through the crawl space and clothes that dry rapidly, for heat that touches my toes when I stand at the kitchen sink, for being able to set down packages inside the back door.

There are areas of the addition we haven't moved into yet, but I can easily imagine. Our bedroom closet, circa 1911, is the size of a coat closet the two of us share. The process of choosing, removing, and replacing clothes is the same, but the ease of a walk-in closet is exhilarating. Isn't it the same with Heaven? So many of the tasks and people we enjoy that are tainted with sin, will repeat themselves in glory without blemish. Can you imagine?

Can you imagine singing in the congregation of saints? Voices so strong yours is lost in the melody of lives saved from abuse, torture, loneliness, grief, and sin-sick bodies to praise our King? Can you imagine living the truth of God's Word and precepts without a hint of self? Free from bondage to personal desires, longings, and demons? Above all, can you imagine the very real, enfolding presence of our precious Lord, in glorified flesh, for eternity? We experience His presence in the person of His Spirit and Word, but to see Him, touch Him, hear and speak to Him personally? We can only imagine.

Today, when sin makes life difficult, once you're done complaining and groaning, take a moment to praise God for what's in store. It's exhilarating! Thoughts of eternity give us fuel, courage, and love to move forward in spite of wickedness, self, and sin. They move us to share and live out our confidence before others as a gift and ministry. It's not ours alone. It's meant to be shared.

For we do not preach ourselves but Christ Jesus as Lord, and ourselves as your bond-servants for Jesus’ sake. For God, who said, “Light shall shine out of darkness,” is the One who has shone in our hearts to give the Light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ.

But we have this treasure in earthen vessels, so that the surpassing greatness of the power will be of God and not from ourselves; we are afflicted in every way, but not crushed; perplexed, but not despairing; persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed; always carrying about in the body the dying of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our body. For we who live are constantly being delivered over to death for Jesus’ sake, so that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our mortal flesh. So death works in us, but life in you.

But having the same spirit of faith, according to what is written, “I believed, therefore I spoke,” we also believe, therefore we also speak, knowing that He who raised the Lord Jesus will raise us also with Jesus and will present us with you. For all things are for your sakes, so that the grace which is spreading to more and more people may cause the giving of thanks to abound to the glory of God.

Therefore we do not lose heart, but though our outer man is decaying, yet our inner man is being renewed day by day. For momentary, light affliction is producing for us an eternal weight of glory far beyond all comparison, while we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen; for the things which are seen are temporal, but the things which are not seen are eternal. (2 Corinthians 4:5-18)

Faith: When I Disagree

A few different thoughts have been going through my head lately. Here are a couple. If anything strikes your fancy and you'd like to hear more, send a comment or let me know.

1) Faith isn't faith if I agree with God. Instead, my faith is tested when I disagree or don't understand and I obey anyway: i.e. Abraham offering Isaac on the altar.

2) My response to Jesus reveals much. While the unclean spirits told Jesus to leave them alone and depart, the crowds sought him even in desolate places.

3) I have been much more aware lately of how much worry is created by fear of being inconvenienced. In the end, I will lose nothing more than comfort, but that seems to be the end goal--and I find it sad that my desire is so fleeting and empty compared to what God has in store through difficulty, inefficiency, and inconvenience.

Here is a list of bullet points re: faith, (I am lacking creativity, time, and prose this morning):

• Abraham rose early the next morning, (He didn't wait. He didn't barter. He got up and went.) Genesis 22:3
• He split wood, took 2 servants and his son and went to the place God told Him (note: He didn't choose a "better" place or one that suited his idea of a good idea. He went exactly where God told Him to go.) Genesis 22:3
• Abraham told the young men, "we will worship and return to you" (He did not think less of God; He trusted God to spare his son because God has promised and delivered Isaac once--he was the promised son. Abraham believed the impossible--"that God is able to raise people even from the dead," Hebrews 12:19.) Genesis 22:5
• Abraham put God's plan into action (He did not waver or change God's revealed plan; he obeyed completely) Genesis 22:6
• Even in the midst of conflicting emotions and circumstances, Abraham believed God would provide ("Where is the lamb?" "God will provide for Himself...my son.") Genesis 22:7-8
• Abraham acts in apparent conflict with the character of God to do the will of God: "Abraham bound his son Isaac and laid him on the altar...stretched out his hand and took the knife to slay his son" Genesis 22:9-10.
• Abraham expected God's intervention. When God called, "Abraham, Abraham!" he said, "Here I am." Genesis 22:11.  (How very different than Adam and Even's response to God's call, "Where are you?" Genesis 3:9)
• Abraham looked for and applied God's solution. (When God intervened, Abraham looked, went up and took the ram, offering it in place of his son. God's solution required action, effort, and sweat-equity, but provision was generously, miraculously supplied) Genesis 22:13.
• Abraham's response was not one of resentment, but worship. (He had seen God in a new, amazing, personal way and he now called God by a a new name, "Jehovah Jireh," the Lord will provide.) Genesis 22:13-14
• Abraham, and all the nations, were blessed as a result of his faith and God's provision. Genesis 22:16-18

Signs of Growth, Gifts of Grace

Before Bible study this morning, I vacuumed floors. Not because I'm a Neat Nelly but because of necessity. In one room a full-length mirror lay broken on the floor. In another a potted plant had fallen off the shelf.

It occurred to me that, in the days of young children, this would have been a disaster. A catastrophe. Broken glass and small feet. Black dirt and carpet.

But not today. Today I was alone. Thankful I didn't have clambering, half-dressed, hungry children. Thankful I had a full-size trash bag to scoop up the mirror, frame and (almost) all. Thankful no one had watered the plant before it fell.

And in that moment I realized that past trials have given me grace and patience in today's trials. The first time you find a cat in the clothes dryer, it creates a bit of panic. The next time you know what to do and it's not as concerning.

Isn't God good to teach us, stay with us, remind us of His constant presence and work in and through our lives?

Consider it all joy, my brethren, when you encounter various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance. And let endurance have its perfect result, so that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.

But if any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God, who gives to all generously and without reproach, and it will be given to him. But he must ask in faith without any doubting, for the one who doubts is like the surf of the sea, driven and tossed by the wind. For that man ought not to expect that he will receive anything from the Lord, being a double-minded man, unstable in all his ways.

But the brother of humble circumstances is to glory in his high position; and the rich man is to glory in his humiliation, because like flowering grass he will pass away. For the sun rises with a scorching wind and withers the grass; and its flower falls off and the beauty of its appearance is destroyed; so too the rich man in the midst of his pursuits will fade away.

Blessed is a man who perseveres under trial; for once he has been approved, he will receive the crown of life which the Lord has promised to those who love Him. Let no one say when he is tempted, “I am being tempted by God”; for God cannot be tempted by evil, and He Himself does not tempt anyone. But each one is tempted when he is carried away and enticed by his own lust. Then when lust has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and when sin is accomplished, it brings forth death. Do not be deceived, my beloved brethren. Every good thing given and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shifting shadow. In the exercise of His will He brought us forth by the word of truth, so that we would be a kind of first fruits among His creatures. (James 1:2-18)