Category: faith

His Personal Love

In a free moment, (which I am learning are scarce when you are handed a schedule with every hour for the next 60 days planned out) I wanted to stop and tell you a small story of God’s provision.

It started abruptly for one little three year old girl as this new word, “Africa” joined our vocabulary. She didn’t invite it, but she learned to get used to it.

Soon “Africa” meant cleaning out old things from cabinets.

Then “Africa” meant doing a lot of shopping and mystery boxes arriving via the mailman.

Then “Africa” meant packing all our stuff away in boxes and giving a lot of stuff away.

But then came the one day amidst all the “Africa” when she looked up at me with sad little eyes and asked, “Pink car is being given away too?”

Pink car was a dear friend to her. Pink Fisher Price car meant “Africa” could wait for a few minutes of reckless parking lot play. Pink Car was independence as she sped her little legs, Flintstone style”, in that preschool play car wherever her heart desired. Pink car was far better than any bike. Pink car was even better than sidewalk chalk. Pink car was AWESOME!

I couldn’t possibly help her understand that she wouldn’t fit in pink car by the time we could see it next in two years. I couldn’t help her see how old and sun-faded pink car had been through the years. Pink car could not go.

And she hurt.

And we hugged.

And God heard her little heart.

 

And then on day one of orientation she found…

Green car!!!!

Oh dear ones, look at her little face. She just couldn’t stop giggling.

Her heart was so full and she shouted out, “I LOVE MY SCHOOL!”

– Oh how He loves you and me.

– … Her dear little heart. He cherishes it so.

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Vocal Depth

I was listening to an audio reading of Genesis while I was folding clothes this morning. The children were playing together while the littlest napped, permitting me full attention to give to the listening amid the monotony of laundry.

And it hit my ears.

“Who told you that you were naked?” The narrator read with a tinge of desperation in his voice.

And through those words God reminded my heart of his desperation for mankind.

Sermons can and have been written on God’s compassion, willing Adam and Eve to confess their forbidden fruit sin. The Omniscient God did not need them to verbalize their sin. He already knew the question’s answer. But He gave them the opportunity to feel the relief of confession. The relief of releasing some of the guilt. Not adding salt to the wound by telling the truth.

But in that voice lies a deeper level. A deeper heartbreak chosen to be shouldered by the Ever-Loving Father. The disaster of the fall’s consequences had begun. And even though I wasn’t there, I think this audio Bible’s narrator got the tone just perfect. His desperation. His heartbreak for the newly lost mankind looking back at Him through the eyes of Adam and Eve. Never again to frolic in the garden together. Never again to share in closeness as before.

No, God doesn’t need us, dear friends. But here in His voice in This Genesis verse His heart pours out. He wants us.

Thank you, Lord, for still wanting us… even in the heat of our rebellion. 

“Blessed” somehow fails to describe the depth of Your gift of adoption.

– Please, Lord, keep teaching my heart to listen to Your Voice.

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The Beginning of the Back-Story

Growing up I didn’t really give much thought to the genders of the kids I wanted to have. I started out wanting to have 16 of them at about age 3 or 4 years old. Then the number dropped to 12 for a while going through elementary school and fell into the back burner of Jr. High and High School’s shadows. In college I knew I wanted to have a good number of kids. I have always adored them and find it quite natural to be in their world. I surrounded myself with kids growing up from helping Moms to play in the other room with their kiddos so they could accomplish tasks independent of kid needs when I was too young to babysit at 9 and 10 years old to babysitting, nannying, going on a few vacations with families and even running church nurseries.

When the idea of a career field came into my world, I naturally gravitated toward an early childhood education teacher. I had helped in teaching environments from the home to Vacation Bible School to even a few tutoring environments. I just love kids. They’re my normal.

In college my early childhood education window opened as God opened my worldview to His heart for “the least of these”. It began in the form of foster care, one branch of forgotten children. Suddenly He taught me how teaching goes so far beyond the classroom and even the very basics of worth, love, and trust need to be taught before a child can move on to enjoying and asserting themselves in Math or Reading or being vulnerable in a challenging subject. I suddenly had a heart change, resulting in a change of my major to Social Work. I began t see my fringe kids in the daycare in which I worked in a totally different light. No, not every case is a social work case, but my eyes were opened to those foster children coming through my afternoon Kindergarten classroom that were “a little more rough around the edges”. I enjoyed being a “secret weapon” substituting in more challenging classrooms. “Who’s name do I need to know?” I would ask the lead teacher of the classroom and then try not to single those kids out for poor behavior problems, but provide structure, consistency and special love to those children. It was cool to see their behaviors change a bit. Nope, I’m no miracle worker, but loving structure goes a very long way in a child’s chaos.

When I met my husband he was one of seven kids, now one of eight with two adopted siblings. He ate, slept and breathed kids, bring the second in the pecking order. Granted, he was one of those kids for the longest, but with parents who consistently ministered to children through foster care since almost as far back as he can remember, his heart and arms were just open. That’s one of the things that drew me to him. See, some can call that being a “family person” but I believe God made my “family man” into so much more through walking with others in their deep hurts and struggles. Barb and Rodger, my in-laws, did a wonderful job of sheltering their children’s innocence while also coming alongside of these really hurt little children in the foster care system. They protected their own blessing while also taking on some pretty tough cases. Their family motto? Christ is more than enough. And that was tested. And it was challenging. And they lost a lot of sleep. And walked in a lot of hard pairs of shoes. And they still have no idea of the impact they had in some of the children’s lives that came through their home for the 18+ years of foster care their family offered.

I joked with Matt that I wanted to have eight kids of our own when we were dating and engaged. His eyes nearly bugged out of his head a few times when he realized I kept repeating the same number… and it wasn’t a joke. He reminded me of how nice four sounded. Hehe. I told my friend and sis-in-law, Ellen, one time that I planned on starting at 8 so we could compromise at 6 kids. We both laughed since Ellen kept talking about a dozen children to her, at the time, new husband. Poor Ron and Matt. Our providers. They must have lost some serious sleep over the thought of feeding so many little mouths on a single salary – you know, since Ellen and I had plans of being stay at home moms. Don’t we sound awful? Hehe.

I worked as a foster care and independent living (transition program from foster care for older teens) case manager as my internship and for a year of my launching board off of college. I wanted to have a baby, but God wanted me to raise a few other kids first. When my car died from all the case management driving, I knew I couldn’t sustain at case management 40+ minutes from the office. The hours were long many days. Too long to start a family. Matt was doing his internship for school. I missed seeing him.  It was our first year of marriage.

I switched to individual and group therapy at a program designed for children who had failed out of multiple preschool/daycare settings due to behaviors. We saw every kind of case there from the lack of parenting to the product of broken homes to foster care cases. I had chairs thrown at me, was called everything under the sun, and had so many scratch marks and even a few bite marks while being spit on. Some of these kids entered our program with utter wild in their eyes. They had all the authority. Many of their parents had given up or they had failed out of multiple, multiple foster homes… and they were only 4. I had the group kids who were older. 4 years old until 6 years old when they aged out of our program. Some of the things these kids had been through would bring even the hardest heart to tears. Such innocence stripped. And all was left was a hurt, hurt frail child who hid behind aggression.

 

And there in that daily environment, God blessed us with our first child.

 

(Continue on to: The Continuation of the Back-Story)

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Sufficiency?

*** This post is written upon the basic Truth that

All Scripture is inspired by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness; so that the man of God may be adequate, equipped for every good work. – 2 Timothy 3:16-17

All Scripture. Not some. Not segments. Not sections are inspired and others no longer apply. ALL Scripture – – even the hard to comprehend parts is inspired by God Himself.. ***

 

Sufficient is defined by good ole Webster as “adequate to accomplish a purpose or meet a need” (c 1995). If you need a more updated definition, dictionary.com defines “sufficient” as “adequate for the purpose; enough”.

Jesus is defined as an All-Sufficient Savior. If you choose to read through Scripture you will see the definition of “All-Sufficient” fleshed out. (And even if you choose not to read through Scripture, it doesn’t make Him any less Sufficient.) So for those of you who enjoy definitions, All-Sufficient would therefore be defined as “All-Adequate” or “Fully-Adequate”.

Now I’m not a theologian or a major in apologetics. I don’t have my masters in anything, actually and while participating in a debate class in High School, I don’t consider myself to be particularly skilled in debating a case and point so as to “hold and persuade the attention of the audience”. BUT that does not mean that the “common man”, like myself, cannot apply their mind to Scripture.

 

I often hear in Christian circles a swirling and “normal” topic of battling sin. I’m talking everyday sins. Anger (rage). Frustration. Being quick-tempered. Selfishness. Pride. Disobedience. Apathy. Laziness. The list could go on and on…. and sadly it does. Paul describes it as a battle between flesh and Spirit. See, the Holy Spirit is a Guide in us, Christians, and we wouldn’t need a guide if the navigation was easy.

But all too often I hear an unanswered grumbling or groaning from the body of Christ. It looks like this: someone in the group admits to struggling with a particular sin. Throw anything in there: pride, apathy, a quick temper… whatever. And the group agrees. “That is really hard to battle” or even “I know, I’ve been there” or “I know, I’m there too”. And that’s the conclusion of the conversation… we return to the Bible lesson, or change the subject, or excuse ourselves to another scheduling demand.

And so what do we leave the other Christian with? An insufficient Savior.

 

Christ takes on the mask of a weak Savior who can save us from our sins’ consequence, “once and for all” according to the Scriptures, but fails to save us from our daily lives. And, therefore, we just have to play this tolerance game for the 2 steps forward, 3 steps back battle with our sin nature.

Why in the world would anyone come to that kind of a Savior and lay down their life?

If I’m struggling with the exact same sin without conquering it in the least, then what did Christ save us for?

 

Christian, I’m not saying that there aren’t repetitive themes of sin in our lives. Some of us are certainly more prone to specific sins. Man, my fiery temper needs self-discipline just the same as Moses’ did. But we are forgetting the KEY POINT in this battle with sin: CHRIST.

I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me. – Philippians 4:13

Paul is 100% right. It is a daily, minutely battle with sin. We are still in the flesh and it is completely unnatural to think in the Spirit while still being in the flesh. But that is why we must train our minds to be like Christ. I mean check out the whole New Testament, Christian, it’s jam-packed full of “putting off the old self” and “putting on the new”. If the old self fell off easily we wouldn’t be instructed to PUT it OFF. But furthermore, trying to conquer sin in the nude is not going to do us any good either. We PUT ON the new self. Who is the new self? Christ!

I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself up for me. – Galatians 2:20

The Scripture doesn’t say that after putting off the old self we now have faith in ourselves because we have a new self. No, it says we can now have faith in CHRIST who is the new self within us.

How are we to overcome sin? We cant! CHRIST in us can. We find ourselves, I find myself, stuck in a pattern of sin, struggling with the same thing over and over again without really making any advancing headway when I look to myself to “fix my sin problem.” There are hundreds (thousands?) of self-help books out there – and so many are stocking the “Christian Reading” sections of libraries and bookstores. But we need to wake up and remember that we couldn’t overcome sin. That’s what lead us to the cross on our hands and knees. We can’t do it! But Christ can… and already has overcome ALL sin. He is ALL-SUFFICIENT. He is more than enough to overcome anything we ever face… even the darkest, hardest stuff. Are we living our lives like we believe that? Does our daily, minutely Christian walk reflect that? Are we teaching our kids that truth (whether they are “in Christ” or, even more importantly, especially if they are not “in Christ”)?

No temptation has overtaken you but such as is common to man; and God is faithful, who will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able, but with the temptation will provide the way of escape also, so that you will be able to endure it. – 1 Corinthians 10:13

Who is our way of escape?

Christ.

Sure being Christ looks different in different circumstances. Sometimes being Christ looks like showing up for the test. Sometimes being Christ looks like fleeing from the temptation. That’s where we need to pray and be in tune with the Holy Spirit’s guiding and not our own agendas or self-reasoning to try to out-smart our way out of sin.

So next time we struggle, or hear of someone struggling… run, bringing the Word, and searching for Christ. The Holy Spirit will guide you if you are seeking. There IS a way of escape. We are not left on our own to battle our daily, minutely, sin lives. We are not just as entrapped and ensnared in our inability to fight sin as we were before Christ… WE HAVE CHRIST NOW.

It’s time to start harnessing Him, Christian (and I’m talking to myself here too!). We cannot overcome sin.

Christ can.

And. Has.

And He has extended His own Self into our very beings that we can live out sanctification, which is a fancy word for being and looking more like Christ daily.

It’s time to take faith and trust and stake our daily, minutely lives on the Truth that He is, can, will, and has been more than enough.

He is All-Sufficient.

 

Sin life… He is All-Sufficient.

 

– Stand on that FIRM foundation.

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Seeds Planted in the Heart of a Child

It began with our prayer life. We were discontent with our contentment. You know how it is… that comfort we Christians find when we find ourselves in a country free, for the most part, of persecution. Free of excessive judgement. A country that, for the most part, just lets us Christians live our lives. Yep, we’d gotten comfortable. And so we forgot about them.

Sure there was a lot on our plate when the boys came. There was a whole host of new adjustments and likes and dislikes. But still they remained forgotten.

A while into the boys’ stay, the oldest boy motioned to the wall, “Who are they?” That was the first time we had remembered for a while.

They came up in casual dinner conversation. A prayer here and there.

And then it became more regular. We read the Word more. Our prayer life became more disciplined. We were discontent with our contentment. The boys had gone home. Things had slowed down and it was time for life changes. A return to serving outward, since there was less inward need.

And they came up on the prayer board again. Our Wednesday regulars. And we began to pray for more open hearts, more open arms, and more direction in loving them.

Then I found her at the kitchen table. Out of the blue. She had three piles of pictures to color. And she asked for their names: Lidia, Tofic and Valentina. Her Kindergarten script wrote each name awkwardly and lovingly on each of their handful of colored papers. Glued on strips of paper with stamp-like stickers of states they would never know… she doesn’t even know. She thought of the colors she used. What they might like and not like. And she frequented back, verifying name spellings, some times calling out letters from across the house. She was creating her masterpieces. And she was making them individually for our World Vision sponsor kids.

She sat there contentedly, diligently for over a half hour. The day progressed and she had to move on to other tasks. She stacked her work neatly in piles and hid them wisely from our rambunctious toddler. And later during her free time she chose to get them all back out, coloring in the parts she left off. Spelling their names over and over again. Collecting envelopes and folding each of her gift pages. An awkwardly placed piece of tape held the envelopes together… they were bulging with her love.

So we followed the lead of a child today. A child with a big heart. A child who, unbeknownst to herself, was an answer to our Wednesday prayers. Open hearts. Open arms. More direction on how to love Lidia, Tofic and Valentina better.

We worked on our envelopes together. Assembling our love into a 6×9 package. We tried to think three of four months ahead. That’s when they’d receive our mail. It has a long distance to travel. They live so many worlds apart. Tofic’s birthday would be right around the corner. Eden would be here or close to here. And by the time we’d receive word back Eden would be close to four months old. It’s almost unfathomable how time will change us. And yet we’ll be the same. Praying our same Wednesday prayers.

She asked if she was the reason we were assembling our envelopes tonight. “Not the reason, but the encouragement, dear Rachael. You were a great encouragement to us. And you encouraged us to send something from our hearts too. Thank you. ”

I’m thankful that our God works in gentle ways…

Through the seeds planted in the heart of a child.

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The Rock We Stand On

I had the opportunity to go with my husband to chaperone youth winter camp this year. This really was a treat since with so many little ones in our home currently (and in the past) I am usually the default in running the routine (that I have been privileged to invent). But this time since our crew was old enough, I got to spend the time with the youth girls.

While at camp we heard this worship song from the camp band.

“Your Kingdom Reigns” by Meredith Andrews

And I must tell you, I just love the Truth in this song.

My favorite is verse 2:

“By Your blood You have paid every debt

You are strong to save us

And by Your Word you will light every step

You are ever faithful!

Jesus, You are every faithful!”

Let’s take a moment to think through that. EVERY debt paid. That’s some serious strength! And while He never had to save us and it still utterly floors me that Christ would choose to save me… ME … without first even having a single utterance of commitment. See, He saved everyone that we would even have a chance to choose to receive His gift. And let me tell you what… I don’t think we can look at the depth of that grace in His gift and not be compelled to run to Him.

He could have just given us our consequence. The one we rightfully deserved.

Rachael and I had a conversation yesterday in the car. She was asking me to explain a familiar Scripture memory song playing from our CD. She’d heard it a bunch of times, even reciting the words along with it, that she finally began applying her mind to it. (What a life truth right there in itself – no wonder I need to repeat Scripture until it becomes more natural in my life!). We got to the topic of Christ’s sacrifice on the cross being a gift. “Let’s think about it this way… when Hannah does something wrong she receives a bad consequence, right? Like for example if she’s a bit older and hits another kid in the nursery. She gets a bad consequence. They may hit her back, she may have to go to time out, she may have lost a friend because they don’t want to be around her anymore… or if she was just told not to hit and she did it in defiance, maybe she gets a spanking after having a conversation about her disobedience.”

“So what if every time Hannah did something wrong instead of spanking her, we spanked you? Hannah hits someone, so you get a spanking. Hannah hits someone again, so you get the spanking again. Think that’s fair?”

“No!!!” Resounded from the back seat with a slight nervous giggle.

“Well Jesus said, ‘I’ll take the spanking!’ He decided to take the bad consequence. She deserved her own punishment. She made the bad choices. But Jesus took the spanking. He chose to. No one told Him to. No one made Him. He volunteered, or chose willingly to be spanked so Hannah wouldn’t have to be spanked. See, someone had to be spanked. The bad was done. The sin was done. The Bible says that the punishment for sin is death. Jesus took the death for us. But it wasn’t just that… Jesus took the death BEFORE Hannah ever even decided she wanted to be like Jesus. He chose the death to allow Hannah to have a choice to live like Jesus or to choose not to.”

“Wow.” There was silence as she pondered.

 Wow, my heart agreed.

Our conversation ended there because we got to our destination and things moved forward. And while I’m sure I butchered explaining the depth of grace in so many ways, I just prayed…. again… for her acceptance of that grace. And I just prayed again for Him to continue to open my eyes to that very same grace.

I mean could you even imagine if we saw that Grace clearly? If we, Christians, took on a lifestyle of boldness from that Grace?

We’ve been praying for laborers to be sent to the Harvest, starting with our own household. We’ve been praying for reaping of the seeds planted by so many missionaries. We’ve been praying to be a part of the Kingdom work. To be open. To be alert. To see the work so we can run to the Harvest. It has changed our prayer life. I feel it changing my heart. Conforming my mind to the Lord. Less of me, more of Christ. That even one more would be added to His number…. that even one more would receive Grace…

Oh how His heart in me has reminded me in this song of the unbriddled power of God falling on His lost people if we would just go with such CONFIDENCE and ASSURANCE in the Truth of the Light. He WILL light our EVERY step. He does not send us alone. He does not send us empty-handed. He went behind us with the cross and goes before us with His Word to light our steps, to guide us.  He will NEVER fail us. He will NEVER forsake us! He will NOT be shaken!  If we would just take up His Word as our flashlight, guiding our steps to the lost, the lonely, the desolate and stand on HIM, not us… HIM, the Rock we stand on!

Take Him at His Word, church. Take Him at His Word, Christian. And non-Christian, see… oh please see how He is beyond Worthy to be taken at His Word.

His Kingdom Reigns. Not a corrupt kingdom. Not a corrupt, selfish king.

THE King who extended such incredible Grace. Such immeasurable Love like we have never seen before. Like we can’t even fully fathom…

HE is Life!

Let’s run and proclaim it to the darkness!

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