Turning ‘events’ into adventures

July 11, 2024

Maria Fear, Humility, John 17, Knowing Jesus, Prayer, Service , , , 4 Comments

Ye fearful saints, fresh courage take,

The clouds ye so much dread

Are big with mercy, and shall break

In blessings on your head.

Stanza 3, William Cowper, Light Shining out of Darkness

All week long, with intentionality, I have fought back old patterns of imagining the worst. Daily I have sought a different truth with which to fight fear. 

Anne had pointed me to Cowper’s poem more than 2 years ago when I was worried about what another family member might ask me to do to help my mother-in-law.  I had been traveling a lot already and did not want to add another air trip.  Besides sharing the Cowper verses, she had me actually articulate the worst that could happen: “I’ll have to fly out to Seattle and escort her to Asheville. And I don’t want to.” Anne then responded: ‘Do you think you’ll survive that short hardship?”

Well, put that way, what could I do but nod ‘yes’?

This morning reading Oswald Chambers devotion for July 11, I saw a healthier and saner way to approach ‘worst case scenarios’.

Oswald describes just how to think about all of life. It’s to keep reminding myself that the purpose of life, of every occurrence I face is to know Jesus.

Now this is eternal life: that they know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent. John 17:3 NIV

And we ‘learn him’ better through every experience, from menial tasks to scary events. That is, IF we remember to view events from that perspective.

Using Jesus’ example of washing his disciples’ feet, Oswald writes that Jesus was willing to humble himself since he knew two fundamental truths: that he had come from God and was returning to God.

Continuing with Oswald, I should not approach a commitment, a volunteer responsibility or household chore with the attitude: ‘There’s work to be done, I must do it’. Instead, I should bring an attitude of wonder to the work at hand.  ‘I wonder what I will learn about Jesus in this?’

Just now sitting in the dental hygienist’s chair, the Holy Spirit reminded me, “This is an ‘event’.  (No, I don’t dread the dentist’s office!) Be on the alert from what you can learn about Jesus.”

I’ve been praying for ‘Karina’ since my last appointment, that she would come to know Jesus. With the Spirit’s prompt, as she removed tools from my mouth I asked her if her mom and dad were believers. That’s when I found out she grew up with Hispanic parents who never went to church.  I broke into Spanish and chatted with her some and created a point in common.  Now I understand more why she has no spiritual point of reference.

This is actually fun! Every part of my day is a new adventure if I seek to see more of Jesus.

And when it comes to those events I dread or worry about, I will continue to work on changing old patterns of fearful imagining of future problems. To that end, I’m copying Jesus, by applying and personalizing John 17:3 –  Since I know the Father loves me, I will do/face what is at hand, eager to know Jesus in a new way.  For this is what true life is.

What makes a good day for you?

January 27, 2024

Maria Galatians 2, God's love, Gospel, Jeremiah 31, John 17 , , 3 Comments

I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one—I in them and you in me—so that they may be brought to complete unity. Then the world will know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me. John 17:22-23 NIV

I didn’t sleep well the other night and woke up yesterday morning VERY tired, with a cold hovering near my body.  In short, I felt blah about everything.  Thankfully, this doesn’t happen too often. At one point I did nap for 30 minutes and walked for another 30 minutes talking and listening to God. “Jesus, I’m tired, I have a cold and I’m preoccupied about Mom.  I open my hands and release all this yuk to you. I want to receive whatever you have for me today.”

By the time I got back to the house I was thanking the Lord for ‘the blahs’, for they led me to ponder what makes for a good day. I admit that being productive in my self-assigned tasks results in a mild euphoria with which I measure my days.

Providentially preceding these blahs, my friend Ali had forwarded on a Tim Keller sermon where he explains the impact that Jesus’ words SHOULD make on our lives as believers.  He posed the question, “How would your life change if you actually believed that the Father loved you as much as he loves his son, Jesus?”  Keller pointed out that most of us live our lives trying to prove that we are worthy of love. We start from a belief, obviously FALSE, that the Father isn’t really pleased with us.

This morning, I ran across a clause in Galatians 2:14 where Paul writes to the Galatian church about his meeting with believers in Jerusalem:  But when I saw that their conduct was not in step with the truth of the gospel, I said to Cephas before them all……..(ESV)

When we don’t believe that God the Father loves us as much as he loves Jesus, then we CANNOT live our lives aligned with the truth of the Gospel. Period. Full stop!

Let that teaching soak in. Knowing the Gospel precedes any doing, any imitating Jesus’ actions with others.

Jeremiah’s words to Israel attest to this same truth: Long ago the LORD said to Israel: “I have loved you, my people, with an everlasting love. With unfailing love, I have drawn you to myself. Jeremiah 31:3 NLT

Let’s go back to John 17 and look at what Jesus declares in verse 26 (NIV) I have made you known to them, and will continue to make you known in order that the love you have for me may be in them and that I myself may be in them.

I believe that if I were to live each day from a posture of being infinitely loved by the greatest love that there is in the universe, then 1) people would notice how different I am. 2) I would consider EVERY day a good day, just due to being loved by Absolute, Perfect Love himself.

That means, whether we sit on a park bench, enjoying and quietly contemplating what we see, whether we energetically get through our ‘to-do’ list, or whether we are feeble in mind and body and CANNOT even do anything for ourselves, as my mother-in-law is these days, it’s STILL a good day as a beloved child of the Father and brother/sister of Jesus.

Has how you pray changed over the years?

May 4, 2023

Maria John 17, Luke 11, Prayer, Spiritual Growth, Spiritual Practice, Spiritual Warfare, The Lord's Prayer , , 2 Comments

“Lord, teach us to pray….” Luke 11:1 ESV

Today, 4 May 2023, is our country’s National Day of Prayer, a time to renew our practice of prayer and perhaps adjust it.

I can sense changes in how I now talk to God, especially in how I intercede for others.

Have you ever noticed how children pray?  They blurt out exactly what they want. “Jesus, give us a good day.” And rightly so. We must enter the kingdom with that same simple but cheery, trusting and care-free approach. Our Lord wants us to hand over every material and immaterial situation to him. But our Father also expects us to grow in our understanding and practice of praying.

For a while my care for God’s honor, for his name has increased. His expansive goals and perspective are slowly replacing my limited ones, or maybe amplifying them.

Remember how God planned to liberate Israel from Pharaoh as well as cause Egypt to know experientially that HE is Yahweh, the LORD? He had dual purposes.  And so can we.

This morning, I asked Jesus that the four men in my immediate family would honor God in how they pray for their wives. That he would give them the spirit of wisdom and revelation in their work. As well as draw them deeper into intimacy with our Father. Then reading Oswald Chamber’s meditation for today, I felt resolve to pray more like this expand.

With razor-sharpness, Chambers diagnoses the limited ways we intercede for others. (May 4 meditation from My Utmost for His Highest)  “We do not identify ourselves with God’s interests and concerns for others…..we are always ready with our own ideas, and our intercession becomes only the glorification of our own natural sympathies…..Vicarious intercession means that we deliberately substitute God’s interests in others for our natural sympathy with them.”

So, where do you start if you want to mature in how you pray for others? You can’t go wrong by allowing ‘the Lord’s Prayer’ to shape and change your approach.  Think of it as a framework, a springboard for a personal and God-honoring way to intercede.

Focus first on God’s goals and purposes. If we are believers, then our primary goals, our ‘first concerns’ should be the Lord’s, such as the honoring of his name, kingdom expansion, and all his purposes to become reality.  Then we are invited to hand over what we need this day, personally as well as for others.  This is where we can mention the immediate situations and needs, such as Jim’s surgery or travel safety for Sally, or a peace-filled resolution to the war in Ukraine.

But, don’t you want to talk to practice talking with the Father like Jesus?  For inspiration and guidance, we can sink our teeth deep into John 17 and study how Jesus prayed and for what.  We can select one of his petitions for the day and model our prayers for others on that.

For sure all and any sincere conversation with the Lord is a GOOD and RIGHT thing. This is not a suggestion to leave one way behind and replace it with something new. It’s a both/and.

Who knows, maybe Jesus is calling you into a grand adventure.  Maybe this shift will cause you to look forward to praying for others with a greater sense of expectancy.

Beware, though, Satan will not be pleased. So, armor up each morning with all the spiritual defenses and the one offensive arm we are to use, God’s Word.  

How you can help someone

August 6, 2017

Maria Ephesians 3, John 17, Prayer, Promises, Supernatural Power , , , 2 Comments

It started out as an ordinary church supper.  But two events transformed the occasion into a memorable one.

What do you take to a potluck?  For years I’ve relied on my standard, easy-to-assemble quiche.

  • Roll out a commercial pie crust into the plate
  • Add chopped cooked ham
  • Spread evenly 8 ounces of grated cheese (Swiss or Cheddar)
  • Beat up 3 eggs together with 2 cups of heavy cream (or 4 eggs and 1 1/2 cups of Sour Cream for less fat).  Pour on top of the ham and cheese
  • Bake at 400 for 50 minutes

There are rarely any leftovers, but the ingredients have grown pricey.  So I asked my ‘go-to source of practical wisdom, my hairdresser, for some fresh ideas.  What I wrote down was one of those Jiffy corn muffin mix-based dishes that also calls for an egg, sour cream, creamed corn, cheese and a stick of butter.

The little old ladies RAVED!  Not a finger-swipe remained in the 9×13 dish.  Note to self – keep making this for future potlucks.

The next surprise is weightier.  One of our elders shared a 20-minute message whereby he wove together and linked 30 or so Biblical promises from God to us, His people. This man’s goal was to encourage us to believe how much God loves us.  As I let wave after wave of strengthening truths bathe my heart, one couplet of verses startled me. Something new in Ephesians caught my attention, sparking some thoughts.

Whispering, I asked Mike to locate the passage on his phone’s ESV app.  I scanned the screen.  Sure enough, I noticed an anchor in Paul’s most famous prayer on behalf of this particular church.

Ephesians Chapter 3, verses 14-17 records the former legalist confidently asking God to grant the people strength to know His love so that they can be filled up with ALL of God. No new news there. But the structure of that clause-laden Greek invocation arrested me.  Here’s how I parsed it out looking at the Greek words on the Blue Letter Bible Website.

(Paul prays) I ask God to grant you all

  • to be strengthened with power
  • through the Spirit of God
  • by means of Christ dwelling in your heart by faith (both His presence and the gift of faith are permanent realities in the heart of believers)
  • whose presence makes it a given that you are rooted and grounded in LOVE and empowered with effective force
  • So that you all are enabled to seize and possess (meaning of  ‘to comprehend’) both the ‘physical dimensions’ of Christ’s love and the intimate knowing of Him that go way beyond knowledge
  • So that you all may be filled with the fullness (full measure of His grace and provisions) of God

What fascinated me was God’s supernatural interlinking of His Power with His Love. He then transmits to us intimate knowledge about Himself.  Thus, God’s power, love, and knowledge synergistically work, filling us up with Himself!

What a God! And what a prayer!  If you’re anything like me, you might be filled up with a churning mixture of anxieties, fear, doubt, pride with a touch of scorn for others tossed in to sour the pot.  Who would not rather be filled up with just God?

And just how do we replace the junk with the life-giving alternative?  By echoing Paul’s prayer for ourselves and then directing our thoughts to savor these God-given treasures that are rightfully ours.

Without a complete sifting through the Bible, these promises seem to constitute the most powerful prayer we can offer for others and ourselves.  And since I’ve been writing about power prayers, have you ever seriously thought about Jesus’ plea to His Father for us, His brothers and sisters?   Chew on this:

John 17:24 (NIV) “Father, I want those you have given me to be with me where I am, and to see my glory, the glory you have given me because you loved me before the creation of the world.”

Jesus is asking His and Our Father for transfer to heaven.  Do you think that the Father will deny His Son this request?

You wanna change your life?

December 11, 2016

Maria Ephesisans, John 17, Thinking , , , , 2 Comments

Here’s how:  change your narrative.

I think it is that simple.

A friend recently updated me on her warmer relationship with a formerly  (almost) estranged daughter.  This adult daughter repeatedly wanted to rehash childhood pain, assigning blame to her mom.  She maintained that only by revisiting those times could she and her mom reach a healthy place.

My friend decided to ‘change the narrative’.  She practiced a piece of Shakespeare’s advice fleshed out in Hamlet.  You’ve probably heard the adage, ‘assume a virtue and it’ll become yours’.  Here’s the context in this excerpt:

Hamlet, Act 3, Scene 4, Page 7

Good night—but go not to mine uncle’s bed.
Assume a virtue if you have it not.
That monster, custom, who all sense doth eat,
Of habits devil, is angel yet in this:
That to the use of actions fair and good
He likewise gives a frock or livery
That aptly is put on. Refrain tonight,
And that shall lend a kind of easiness
To the next abstinence, the next more easy.
How did she do it?  By ASSUMING that she and her daughter already had a healthy relationship and then proceeding from there.  In that way, she actually influences the conversations and her daughter has warmed to approach.  Their interactions have grown more frequent and enjoyable to both.
Jesus actually set this precedent long before Shakespeare.  I’ve often read the Upper Room Discourse in John 17 where Jesus makes this outlandish statement to His Father in verse 6:
“I have manifested your name to the people whom you gave me out of the world. Yours they were, and you gave them to me, and they have kept your word.”
The disciples kept God’s word???? Really?  What about Peter’s denial or James and John vying for the premier cabinet positions in the new kingdom?
But should we be so surprised when the Bible is replete with bold promises that for those who are in union with Christ, God sees them as pure and righteous.  We are told that the Father loves us, His adopted kids, just like He loves His beloved Son, Jesus.
And maybe that is the key to behaving better, to assume that it is true what Jesus says, what the Father says and act the part.
What if in a marriage locked in an impasse, one partner chose to treat his or her partner tenderly,  as though they were worthy of love and respect?
What if like the Jews carted off to Babylon, they started to treat their new pagan neighbors as though they were just as worthy of love and respect as their own race?
To bring it closer to home?  What if I dropped the narrative built up in reaction to the pain of my first years in my current school?  What if I started to ‘channel’:  God has so blessed me by giving me this job here!  What might change?
I can think of many applications of this principle of rewriting the script to break the logjam of negativity and failure.
I can hear someone say, “But it is not true!”
My one-word quick answer:  ….“YET!!!!”
Lookit….if Jesus can describe his wobbly disciples as those who have KEPT His Word, then we are in good company if we treat others with grace (including ourselves) and interact with them as though they were ALREADY mature….loving….kind.
One further scriptural support.  Consider the grammar of verse 6 in the second chapter of Ephesians.  The verbs are in the PAST tense, meaning the action has been completed. God through Paul informs us that we are already sitting with Jesus in heaven:
For he raised us from the dead along with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly realms because we are united with Christ Jesus.