Category: God’s heart

A Dream

I had a dream last night, really it was this morning. And it left me woken earlier than usual. Many times pregnancy dreams are so crazy and so random. But this one stayed on the emotional side and less on the “Alice in Wonderland” type weirdness.

This one was about me returning to a high school reunion. Ironically those who returned were signing up for a weekend camp-like experience where we were to “get in touch with each other and ourselves.” This concept entertains me when taken into a secular cause like it was in my dream as if “getting to know ourselves better” (much selfishness) should be the focus of our world. It’s helpful to know those areas that you are prone to weakness for sure, but not that you would correct them or be able to make your own status strong, but that when you surrender yourself to Jesus you would especially rely on Him to guide you through those areas.

So in my dream we all sat in an old library. I looked around and saw a mixture of faces that I honestly haven’t thought about or remembered since high school and some that I have recently heard about via facebook. It was funny to feel the dynamics of high school again – the “who’s popular” and the “who’s labeled what in what crowds”. Petty… unrealistic… and surreal look at how society works in “the real world.” And it was funny, much how you slip into fulfilling a role in your family when you all get together, I felt myself feeling once again like a stranger in my own “hometown” like I did in high school.

I think, ironically, many of us felt like strangers and aliens and wallflowers in that awkward phase of adolescence. We could have played the “to be liked” card or the “fake confidence in myself” card or the “mostly assured in myself” card. But it’s funny to look back on how much of me grew so much deeper and more assured in my faith post high school. So much so that as I stood up to introduce myself, after all the popular people were asked first (recess team picking in more advanced terms), in my dream, I hardly knew where to start.

In our introductions we were asked to say a few things about ourselves and then pick a theme song for our lives. Only the popular people in the room were told in advance how the schedule would go so they were prepared. The first song that popped into my head was “In Christ Alone”

It was the only song that made most sense to me then and now at how to describe the overall theme of my life. Glad my subconscious didn’t pick some crazy disco tune or something. hehe. You never know what happens in dreams sometimes.

Then after announcing my theme song I was overwhelmed with how I could possibly explain who I was. A pastor’s wife… a lover of my Matt – my best friend… a Mom of two wonderful children, Rachael and Abi, and one on the way… blessed beyond measure… striving after Christ to apply the Word and live it daily (sometimes better than other times due to still needing much work, but pushing forward toward His prize)…. a homeschooling Mom who believes education begins with Jesus… a cloth diapering fool because I will go to no limits in serving my family the best I can give – even when it’s hard work sometimes… a boaster in Jesus… a broken vessel poured out on the mission field, whether it’s in my backyard or across the oceans… lost and found in Jesus….

How can I possibly summarize who I am and how I have changed from the self-centered, immature but well-meaning Christianity I displayed to you all in high school? It’s like the blinders have come off… the scales have fallen from my eyes and my heart has broken so in the compassion of our Father for the truly lost, dying and piteous world that so desperately needs laborers for the harvest.

And it’s my hearts cry, whether it be here or there or anywhere, to yell from the pit of my toes, laying it all out, “Here am I!!!! Pick me, Lord!!!” as He rallies His troops to send them in Christ’s Name. Oh that He counts me worthy… me?!… is beyond anything I can possibly express to you all…

And then I woke up.

– Grateful for the reminder.

0

Open Eyes

It was something in the scrolling through the Bible School material, the constant planes, the play passports we were ordering for the kids, Daddy’s old passport Rachael has been playing with, Daddy’s new passport sitting on the counter, the missionaries and countless children on our missions wall, the adoption stories I have read and celebrated with as children from desperate situations in and out of the States have found their Jesus-loving forever families… something in it all brought a tear to my eyes.

This years VBS theme is “Amazing Adventures” and is airplane themed. Each year Matt, Mark and I tackle the sixth grade class. Usually by sixth grade VBS is no longer cool. The glamor and flare of VBS has become commonplace and the kids are coming because their parents are involved or their little siblings wanted to go. Matt, Mark and I try to take that opportunity to not focus on the cute- VBS, but instead we lean more on the side of “cooler” stuff. I have enjoyed the challenge of transforming a brightly-lit, plane Sunday school room into a basketball court in the Bronx, an outdoor Western Scene and various other “slightly on the edge” themes in VBS pasts. This year we’re going “world travel” in our theme, erring on the side of transforming the room into an airport hanger with country flags hanging. We’ve erred on the dog tag, military, and world travel side of the cute airplane theme, choosing our symbol to be a bomber.

While I am one to believe that the Word does not speak void or does not need dressed up to speak, it is nice to pray over and try to break down barriers and allow the kids to be comfortable in their uncomfortable skins.

But all the airplanes and passports and luggage and country flags carry so much more today than they have in the years past.

Monday we drop Matt off with his Daddy at the airport with hugs and kisses. He and his Dad are going on a preview trip to Haiti in preparation of planning next year’s first-ever youth mission trip out of the country. Matt’s vaccinations, malaria medicine, and travel preparations have filled our household conversations for a few weeks now. This will be Matt’s first trip out of the country and I am as certain as can be on this side of Heaven that it will not be his last.

Haiti has brought up so many conversations: adoption focus, world missions, our family’s involvement in world missions, local missions, potential 3 year missions stints with our family, short-term missions, bringing the gospel to unreached people, who constitutes as unreached people, and so many more topics. God has really been using the past few years to open our hearts and our minds to the reality of His hand around the World. Isn’t it funny how you can learn that God loves the whole world and God has the whole world in His hands, but as you allow God to breathe the Truth of that into your heart it’s like the blinders come off?

Matt surprised me this past Christmas with a future trip to Jos, Nigeria, to visit and see firsthand the community for which I have been praying. The community that is displayed on our missions wall through a few pictures. The community that we track the time of with our “Nigeria clock.” The children, the faces, the hearts…. needless to say it was overwhelming. I would never have anticipated seeing or meeting these people and have been content to just love them from across the ocean.

With God’s timing and the reality of vaccinations, this trip has been postponed to next year. (Yellow fever does not have a pregnancy equivalent and dying, I’m hoping, is not on the agenda). While my heart looks forward to and longs for the adventure to visit such dear friends and the Nigerian people, I am so excited at the prospect of seeing the fruit of Will and Theresa’s labor in the Lord as they begin to close out their 3 year mission stint, turning the work over to those that they have trained and invested in for three years: the Nigerians.

And then there’s the heart for the world that God is opening inside of me as He reveals His heart for mankind – no matter how sinful. I am blessed to be in the shelter of His hand, for His full heart for His people is beyond me to comprehend. But He is such a good God that He would even dare to open my eyes to His compassion.

Missions adventure readings have flooded our household. Conversations about the nations and God’s heart for the nations have saturated our dinner tables and family walks. Practical sacrifices and being useful to the Lord here and now has filled our planning in more ways than financial planning.

This all comes to mind upon thinking about passports, luggage and airplanes.

Something in it all brought a tear to my eyes.

It was the heart of God.

The heart of God.

– Thankful.

0

The Least

While sitting on my porch swing during the girls afternoon nap, I was reading the Word. I read a bit about doing unto “the least of these” (Matt. 25:40) serving Jesus. I flipped on to the next passage in our daily Scripture Readings and read Philippians chapter 1. Paul spoke there of how his current situation was spreading the gospel.

I was just praying in my heart to use my home as a ministry when I looked up from the Bible to see a young teenager stumbling across the road, carrying a baby pumpkin seat. The afternoon sun had come out and the girl was obviously fatigued. My first thought was wishing I had a stroller to give her to help her with her load. But then thinking of how God has not given us so much to give out, I then thought what I had.

I walked over to the road and offered her a drink, in which she gladly came. Asking her about her baby, she offered that she was 3 months old. I came out of the house with a drink and peaked in on the little one. A huge smile came from the baby that melted my heart. I instantly thought how the child had no control over the situation and my heart immediately thought of the many, many children needing adoption from situations far worse.

The young mother asked me for a phone. When I came out from the house with our phone, she proceeded to call someone nearby and explain that she believed she was miscarrying, had been refused help from someone she knew and saw up the street, and needed someone to watch the baby while she went to the hospital. The person on the phone offered their help to watch the child and the conversation ended. I offered the mother a few female supplies to help and then she walked on with a bit more energy in her step.

I was stuck at the house with two sleeping little ones otherwise I would have happily driven her to her destination. But I am so amazed how the Lord opened an opportunity literally from my front porch to serve someone in their need. And how that precious baby’s smile is burned into my mind.

I hope and pray the Lord NEVER stops bringing people by our house.

God blows me away!

Ministry is all around us.

All we need is willing hands. 

– To the least of these, my Jesus.

*** Please hear my heart that I am not trying to brag and bring glory to myself in this post. Instead, I just wanted to share the goodness of our God to use open and willing hands. Many times I have far from open and willing hands, but this time was different and God just blew me away.

0

Learning Lately

It’s days like today that I just feel so blessed to be a part of this family God has given me. There was nothing special today, nothing out of the ordinary. Just a regular day. But it’s amazing how different the day can feel through eternal eyes.

Gratitude. It’s been something my dear friend, Theresa, and I have been trying to incorporate more of in our everyday lives. And I could not stress more how our everyday lives differ. She’s in the dry season Nigerian desert, me in the cool Ohio Spring. She’s in the “foreign world” and I’m on the “homefront”. But we share some common things too. She’s on the mission field (3 year missionary with her husband to Nigeria) and so am I (serving in the States and through prayer and finances). Do I long to walk the dusty streets of Nigeria some day? – oh how my heart longs. But I do not long so for my ministry there to begin that it discredits my ministry here.

I think there is a danger in Christians viewing ministry in the extremes. We are truly ministering to God if we are full-time on staff at a church or “on foreign soil”. This is not to discredit either of those positions. But could God possibly call us to be a martyr in our own house?

Luke 9:23 says, “And He was saying to them all, ‘ If anyone wishes to come after Me, he must deny himself, and take up his cross daily and follow Me.” (emphasis mine). 

Sounds like daily martyrdom to me.

Matt guest preached at a nearby church Sunday from Ephesians 3:14-19. Wish you could have been there. Your heart would have been cheering and uplifted like mine. So amazing to sit there and just feel the exhortation from the Lord filling your heart and mind. It was like Jesus was saying, “be full, child, and run hard the race before you!”

Ephesians 3:14-19 goes like this [exactly like this to be specific 😉 ] :
(Keep in mind that Paul is speaking to people that will later be martyred and harshly persecuted for their faith – the very people whose faith and deaths God will use to bring more to the faith)

“For this reason I bow my knees before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth derives its name (the Alpha and Omega), that He would grant you, according to the riches of His glory (limitless, never-ending glory, people), to be strengthened with power through His Spirit in the inner man, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith; and that you, being rooted and grounded in love (key part), may be able to comprehend with all the saints (counted among the saints? those amazingly loyal ones sold out for Jesus) what is the breadth and length and height and depth (can you even imagine?), and to know (KNOW!) the love of Christ which surpasses knowledge (indescribable), that you may be filled up to all the fullness of God.”
* (commentary clearly mine).

Can you even imagine that people? That we would be filled up to all the fullness of God. I can’t even fathom that. I can’t even grasp that concept in my mind. The fullness of God through joy, peace, love, hope, might…. His attributes are endlessly wonderful. And just like God through Matt explained, all we have to do is ask. It’s not like God is unwilling to grant us things in line with His will. It’s not like He wants us to walk through this life as mediocre believers. It’s not like He’s restraining his fullness from us. He is more than willing. He died in an ultimate display of willingness.

Gratitude! What more could we possibly be thankful for?

 When we look at our lives through God’s eyes suddenly right where we are becomes our ministry. I am not waiting to do something for the Kingdom – today I can. Maybe my ministry is begging the Lord of the Harvest to send more laborers. Maybe my ministry is asking the Lord for His fire and His zeal and more of Jesus in me that more of Jesus would touch someone’s life for His glory. Maybe my ministry is showing my children unconditional love and practicing self-control in Christ when they are living out their sin nature. Maybe my ministry is doing an extra load of dishes to serve my family and my husband.

The Lord has not forgotten us. The Lord has not mistakenly placed us “on layaway” until we can do something Kingdom worthy. He has given us an opportunity TODAY to deny ourselves, take up our cross (crucifying our flesh and walking in the spirit) and follow Jesus. When we follow Christ in speech, manner, the way we love others, the way we raise our kids, the way we open our homes and our lives to believers and non-believers, the way we set aside time to meditate on the Word and let it permeate the depths of our soul, we point to the Leader of our follow-the-leader-line. The Head. The very One worthy of all the praise, honor and glory.

Today, dear brothers and sisters, today “lift your eyes up to the hills, where does my help come from? My help comes from the Lord, Maker of heaven and earth,” , “seek first the Kingdom of Heaven and all else will be added to you,” , “delight in the Lord your God,” , “lean not on your own understanding,” , “run the race, fight the good fight and keep the faith.” For we can “do all things through Christ who strengthens” us. He is the “Author and Perfecter of our faith” and He’s more than capable of winning every battle of flesh verses spirit in us throughout the day. For one day you will stand before His throne while the angels call out “Holy, Holy, Holy is the Lord, God, Almighty” and oh so much your heart will beat to hear the words drip from His tongue, “Well done, good and faithful servant… enter into the joy of your Lord.”

“Now to Him who is able to do far more abundantly beyond all that we ask or think, according to the power that works within us, to Him be the glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations forever and ever. Amen.” (Ephesians 3:20-21).

0

The Fall.

All parents have been there, it’s the terror of the fall. That slow-motion fall that you know will result in bruising, scrapes, blood, head-banging, chin-banging, skidding, or other pains. It’s that helpless moment when everything went wrong and no one can stop it. The look of chaos on your child’s face as they feel completely out of control and helpless falling in mid air. The time in which you brace yourself and pray for the best, fearing the possibility of the worse. The fall. I’m not talking about the trip or the bump. I’m talking about the fall. The all-out fall that can only end in those sobs of pain or worse, that shriek of great pain.

I have found that the sinking feeling in your stomach doesn’t change when witnessing falls at older ages. That kind of a fall results in the same unpredictable outcome whether you’re a baby or a teenager, the first or the tenth kid. All parents should rightfully fear the fall.

Thinking about the fall, a few terrifying moments come to mind. A normal outing at the park, sitting around the picnic table with the cousins enjoying Popsicles. Abi was asleep in the stroller, she did that a lot at nearly four months and Rachael sat amongst a gaggle of cousins and her nearby her Daddy. I sat on the other side of the table with Abi and Uncle Ron when I saw it happen. Daddy was preoccupied and 21 month old Rachael fell backward, head-first off the picnic bench. For those of you who need a mental image, when you fall off a picnic bench your legs are the last things to dismount. Sure enough her head hit with a thump on the concrete, producing a bloodcurdling wail. I remember it like it was yesterday, being stuck on the wrong side of the picnic table to catch her. All I could do was pray for the best in that moment of terror. Watching her head bounce off the concrete didn’t aid in my assurance. We scooped her up, Daddy and I both at the same time – both of our hearts in the pit of our stomachs. We watched her walk for the rest of the afternoon and kept a look out for signs of a concussion. She was fine. Just rightfully shaken up. And you had better believe over-protection came thereafter for the next hour.

Today, while drawing outside with chalk, Abi tripped over her own feet while nearly running resulting in a Superman dive to the sidewalk. I thanked the Lord on impact that her elbow broke her fall instead of her face. But her feet and arm took the skidding impact of her 20 month old body. Mommy was instantly needed and with some antiseptic creme and many kisses, Abi returned to normal in five minutes of heavy sobbing into Mommy’s shirt. 

Or the time that Abi fell out of her booster seat, catching her chin on the table the way down. Her head bouncing backward in aftershock. My heart sank. Suddenly “you should have listened to Mommy” didn’t matter. She needed comforted and I needed to know she still had a tongue attached properly. Comfort and time produced healing, leaving behind the battle scar of a red spot.

I wonder what God’s face looked like as He saw Adam and Eve eat from the tree. I wonder if His heart sank to His stomach watching that slow-motion fall that He knew would result in bruising, scrapes, blood, head-banging, chin-banging, skidding, or other pains. It’s that helpless moment when everything went wrong and His redeeming love knew it was better not to stop it, though His compassion wanted to.

Being a parent is teaching me so much about the restraint and the heart and the compassion and the self-control and the reckless running that the Father has for His kids.

Being a parent is teaching me more about God

and forcing me to run to His arms all the more.

– thankful, even in the scrapes.

0

Adjusted Worldview

This morning a thought hit me. I was sitting in a half-filled bathtub to allow for Matt also to have hot water for his shower when he awoke. This alone is not blog-worthy, but the thoughts that God impressed upon my heart are blog-worthy.

It was in that moment that I realized most of the world doesn’t take a hot bath in the mornings or have the luxury of a shower. Here I was silently cursing our less-productive hot-water heater and suddenly I felt very grateful for it. Many people bathe in ponds, lakes, rivers or lukewarm tubs/buckets of “family bath” reused water.

I thought about our semi-useless dishwasher as a glorified two-level drying wrack with new eyes. Suddenly I felt over-blessed to have dishes to hand wash and put away when so many eat from one community bowl with their hands.

Check out this book at your local library (once I return it) for more literal pictures: “Material World – a global family portrait” by Peter Menzel. It certainly will open your eyes to the reality outside of our country. 

 

This is not a blog to make you feel guilty or call us to flee our houses and live outside in our sheds to be more like the reality of the countries outside of the United States. But i have found that the more I look outside of the U.S. and the more I look to the reality of the majority of the population, not just the elite of wealthy countries, the more I am thankful to be so blessed by the Lord.

But we can’t stop there – how are we using our blessing to lift up the Lord and spread Christ? Selfish gain is useless to the Kingdom!

So thank You, Lord, for the conviction and the correct worldview from the comforts of my pretty-warm bath water. Thank You, thank You, thank You, Lord. Now, Lord, please continue to open my eyes, my mind and my heart to how I can use the blessing to further Christ …. to the ends of the earth, Lord!

“Heal my heart and make it clean
Open up my eyes to the things unseen!
Show me how to love like You have loved me!!!
Break my heart for what breaks Yours!!!
Everything I am for You Kingdom’s cause…

Hosanna in the HIGHEST!”

0

Proudly powered by WordPress | Theme: Baskerville 2 by Anders Noren.

Up ↑