Life Goes On

So life goes on. Our best life today includes spring planting, caring for baby chickens, helping children plan the end of the college year and summer. With or without us, life goes on.

In my chronological read through the Bible (which started in January of 2017), I'm finishing the book of Acts. Honestly, I have so many thoughts and questions--and have stopped to take a closer look at this and that that it's taken a bit longer than anticipated.

As I read back and forth between the book of Acts and the Pauline Epistles, I began wondering who this "we" is that popped up regularly. Of course Luke is referring to himself as he travels with Paul, but there are others as well--people I'd never taken the time to notice. So I backed up the bus and, beginning in Acts 13, created my own catalogue of Paul and company on their missionary travels. I'm wrapping up chapter 28 and have been encouraged by a number of truths:

- Ministry, even individual ministry, includes an ebb and flow of others. It is not wrong or bad for people to come and go, but it is natural. I am only responsible for where I am and who I am with now, today.

- Ministry is a group project. Whether people are praying, giving financially, spreading the Word, coming for healing and grace, or working alongside one another making tents or teaching, we're in it together. God is using each and every individual, sanctifying them in and through their part.

- I can trust God with the unknowns of life. Sometimes Paul was in a place for a short period of time, at other times he was there for months or years. Paul made decisions based on circumstances, what he thought was best, God's intervention, communication from others, the needs of others. He was flexible and willing to do whatever, whenever. One thing that did not motivate Paul's plans was fear. Safety. Yes. Fear? No.

- When God wants you to go somewhere or do something (like Rome), nothing can interfere--not a 2 week storm on the sea, or other's intentions to kill you, or shipwreck, or a poisonous snake bite. Even if it's a hard, life-threatening situation, God's provision in and through the difficulties is encouragement to persevere. So I can look for His guidance in the hard times--and not be discouraged. 

Those are just a few takeaways before I head up to sort and clean my mother-in-law's empty apartment. I'm so thankful for the richness and truth in God's Word. Perhaps you, too, will be encouraged as you run the race God has put before you.

Live Your Best Life

We have a saying at our house--"Live your best life." Maybe you say it, too.

My mother-in-law, who has lived with us a number of years, was recently admitted to hospice. Struggles in the last couple of weeks have resulted in confusion and a disconnect between her body and mind. As she turns for help, we've started to say, "Mom, next you're going to do (whatever) and live your best life." There is comfort and hope in knowing that today I can experience God's best.

What does it mean to "live my best life?" It means 

- I will take life as it comes. There are a lot of people and situations I can't control. That's okay. I can trust God to bring what He will and see me through. He sees and knows each one and He is with me.

- I will ask for God's help in each and every moment. Whether it's a breakfast choice, completing the laundry, or loving others, I will ask God for help realizing I can't do it on my own--and I don't want to.

- By God's grace, I will make wise, God-dependent choices in those things that are my responsibility. Each day has a multitude of decisions. Am I putting God first--acknowledging Him in all my ways? Am I loving others in thought, speech and conduct?

- I trust that God will provide and reward. He is the Giver of every good gift (James 1:17). Others may seek to harm me, but God has a bigger, better plan (Genesis 50:20, Jeremiah 29:11). I choose to believe God has "my best life" in mind, too.

- I will be grateful. Knowing I need God's help, asking for His help, and trusting His goodness will help me see Him throughout the day. 

- Finally, living my best life today means recognizing that I will blow it. I will sin against God and others. Confessing my sin and asking forgiveness is the reality of life on earth. 

May each of us, in the little and big moments of today, live our best life--to the glory of God.

Lord, You have been our dwelling place in all generations.
 Before the mountains were born
Or You gave birth to the earth and the world,
Even from everlasting to everlasting, You are God.

 You turn mortals back into dust
And say, “Return, you sons of mankind.”
 For a thousand years in Your sight
Are like yesterday when it passes by,
Or like a watch in the night.

You have swept them away like a flood, they fall asleep;
In the morning they are like grass that sprouts anew.
 In the morning it flourishes and sprouts anew;
Toward evening it wilts and withers away.

For we have been consumed by Your anger,
And we have been terrified by Your wrath.
 You have placed our guilty deeds before You,
Our hidden sins in the light of Your presence.
 For all our days have dwindled away in Your fury;
We have finished our years like a sigh.
 As for the days of our life, they contain seventy years,
Or if due to strength, eighty years,
Yet their pride is only trouble and tragedy;
For it quickly passes, and we disappear.
 Who understands the power of Your anger
And Your fury, according to the fear that is due You?
 So teach us to number our days,
That we may present to You a heart of wisdom.

 Do return, Lord; how long will it be?
And be sorry for Your servants.
 Satisfy us in the morning with Your graciousness,
That we may sing for joy and rejoice all our days.

Make us glad according to the days You have afflicted us,
And the years we have seen evil.
 Let Your work appear to Your servants
And Your majesty to their children.
 May the kindness of the Lord our God be upon us;
And confirm for us the work of our hands;
Yes, confirm the work of our hands. (Psalm 90 NASB)

Worship Language

I continue to be blessed by the memory of praying with a brother and sister at church, each in a different mother tongue. We prayed together primarily for the purpose of beseeching God, but also for edification and fellowship. It wasn't their words that stick with me (I admit to being a limited American), but the heart, the expression, and the greatness of our God who sees, hears, understands, and knows apart from our very real limitations.

It would seem that those who minister to others and seek God--seeing the best and worst--would have a practiced worship language. A way to reach out to God, focusing mind, heart, and body as a product of God's personalized, individual design.

The Word. Yes, the Word is central, tantamount to worship. Jesus is the Word made flesh. God communicates through His Word. The Word of Christ is necessary for growth. We are dependent on God's Word to save us, change and transform us. The Word is to be in us, abiding, implanted.

So how does the Word come out of you ? How do you say thank you, praise Him, or cry? Do you pray, write, sing, play an instrument, dance, draw, run? What is your worship language? How do you express your heart to God when it is full of praise, full of pain, full of need?

I am concerned that many of us are distracted, failing to develop skills and discipline to worship God well. To offer our best. To give of that which is costly for the glory and praise of God; which can only be achieved through sacrifice, effort, and diligence. It is not only natural ability, but natural ability combined with the Spirit's empowering for the edification of all. 

How will you invest in glorifying God today with all that you are? May He be praised and honored by our gifts of praise.

https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2017/nov/29/god-made-me-for-china-eric-liddell-beyond-olympic-/

I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service. And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.

For I say, through the grace given to me, to everyone who is among you, not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think, but to think soberly, as God has dealt to each one a measure of faith. For as we have many members in one body, but all the members do not have the same function, so we, being many, are one body in Christ, and individually members of one another. Having then gifts differing according to the grace that is given to us, let us use them: if prophecy, let us prophesy in proportion to our faith; or ministry, let us use it in our ministering; he who teaches, in teaching; he who exhorts, in exhortation; he who gives, with liberality; he who leads, with diligence; he who shows mercy, with cheerfulness. (Romans 12:1-8)