thinking & writing on faith, life, mentoring, and motherhood
In time, we put away the implements or gadgets or devices; just like in time all of our things become obsolete, unnecessary, unfashionable. They get put away, or simply never get picked back up again as demand and desire pass them by. Rust or mold or worms complete the ruination. Such are the things of this world.
Darkness is pushed back as a spotlight flashes on. It’s over my head and I am in the middle of its sharply defined circle of light. I look down at my trembling frame, encased in rags and smudged with ash and dirt from the fire. I am not prepared to meet Him who “has roused himself from His holy dwelling.”
Surely I am doomed.
Despite the growing societal disdain for “evangelicals” as a loosely identified political class in America, evangelism (which, by default, is practiced by evangelicals) is a thing. A believer embraces the evangel, the good news, the gospel. To the one who believes, it is the power of God for salvation (Romans 1:16), by which we are saved, if we hold fast to it (1 Corinthians 15:2), a truth embedded in the Scriptures which gives eternal life to those who come in truth (John 5:39-40).
Most of the time, life’s reveals come to me in retrospect. “Oh, now I see why that had to happen that way!” But after many years of repeating that to myself over and over, now, in some moments, the images slide together in focus, and I comprehend that—Aha!—God is at this very moment providentially moving about in the world, through human action, to bring about his will for his glory and my good. I don’t know what he has planned as the outcome, but there are things he is doing today that are instrumental in accomplishing it.
We are free from being typecast as the damsel in distress. That’s not your story anymore and it’s not mine. Jesus our Hero has paid the bride price, and it was very great—much too great for the prize to be a defeated, discouraged, withering and wilted damsel still acting as if she’s shackled to her old master Sin. His love is for a bride who loves the gracious and pure bonds of righteousness that unite her to Him.
The world cannot dislodge our footing in Christ. He is steadfast and so are his promises, more than anything we could find from this present vapid and groundless age. He has said he will complete the work he has begun in us.
Add some higher math to your witness today. Begin with an understanding of the old equation and end with the majesty of the new. With God’s mercy, stone cold hearts will be turned to flesh, light will overpower the darkness, and the eternal result will be redeemed lives walking in Christ.
There is a rock bed harder than that of the floor and walls of the Niagara, and it is buried within the soft flesh of every person born since the time of The Fall (not the Falls).
My heart was that rock bed once. Hard and unyielding and resistant to life, truth, mercy. Then it underwent erosion and battering.
How fitting that Tax Day falls on the calendar in the same season as Good Friday and Easter. The day … More
The tax collector is beyond caring about how he feels. Whether he has been treated unfairly, whether he has honed just the right tone to signal his repentance, whether he was a victim of discrimination by the masses is inconsequential to his ability to enter heaven. He knows his own perceptions are untrustworthy (Jeremiah 17:9); the masses follow culture’s rules and culture’s rules are capricious and arbitrary. Neither change the reality. “God, be merciful to me—a sinner” is what he said.
#thereyougothinkingagain 