Category: thankful and grateful

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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Opening our Hearts

When Hannah said “baby” and pointed to the ultrasound pictures revealing our Eden my Mommy-heart melted. We haven’t taught her that. She wasn’t copying her sisters. It came from her, which made it more special.

Rachael has also, on her own accord, added Eden (who was termed Baby4 before we knew her gender) to her prayer life. Today at lunch she prayed in the most heart-filled little tone, “Thank you, God, for giving us baby Eden to snuggle and love. We’re just so excited she is a girl and we get a new sister soon.”

God is answering our prayers and has begun to open all our hearts as we have prayed over our adjusting to the future newest addition coming in July. Only God creates a bond among sisters that is deep rooted… and just plain beautiful to watch take on a life of its own.

– Eden, baby, our arms are wide open and excited to pray over you as you take the last few months of growing in there.

– The greatest things are worth waiting and praying for.

– Thankful, grateful and blessed.

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Announcing Eden

Oh my wonderful girls. That’s right!!! Announcing: EDEN ROSE. Due July 11, 2014 (though we’ll most likely meet her around July 4th). Our cup runneth over. We are blessed and thrilled beyond measure!!!!! – Adoring our clean sweep of little ladies. 😉

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Continuing Right Along

I took the afternoon to finish Rachael’s Kindergarten lesson plans for the year. Yep, friends, for the YEAR.

I was thrilled to organize the remaining 18 lessons into 6 day bundles per lesson (dividing out each subject’s work and bundling them together by days). So pretty much now if I die someone can pick up my teacher book and teach Rachael the remainder of her Kindergarten year (P.S. No intent on dying, just happy to get this completed).

I also calculated out the days we have completed of school (I wasn’t tracking it before – oops) and have a game-plan for the remaining school year’s required days.

Just trying to get more organized here so I can

a). Not have to lesson plan each week.

b). make it a habit to track school days so…

c). I can have a written record should I need to prove the days we have homeschooled [With no idea where God will take us in the years after Matt graduates, I wanted to be prepared to meet other states’ stricter homeschooling requirements should we end up moving there.]

and d). Be more pro-active in planning fun things during our school year based upon future weeks’ themes.

It feels good to finally get a grasp on advanced forward panning for Rachael’s school year after just struggling to get into a regular school groove post-boys.

And it’s also been really exciting to make some changes in organization of educating multiple children in multiple grades, while balancing a baby on my hip (Hannah’s no longer taking morning naps).

I really like our new groove. And I’m excited and less stressed about the remaining school year.

Abi’s coming along quite well in her first year of preschool. She;s picking up things quite quickly thanks to being a byproduct of a homeschool listener. The alphabet and numbers are coming much more naturally to her and I’m excited at the increased fine motor skills in tracing and writing her own name.

And Rachael is really coming into her own in her Kindergarten schooling. It’s fun to watch her take confidence in developing the skills that began a looong (relatively) time ago when she first learned the alphabet. It’s also really neat to watch her manipulate her knowledge to apply it in different settings. And it’s downright fun to encourage her as she is beginning to read. Very…. very… slowly… she has begun sounding out words… one…. at…. a… time. And then her memory kicks in and she puts the words together into a sentence. It’s also fun to see her reading comprehension growing through a really fun workbook I picked up for a buck (Yay dollar store find!). She has enjoyed hearing the princess fairy tales and then learning to write sentences to answer the questions following the story.

I must say, I really enjoy homeschooling. And now that I’m more practically organized, I am enjoying it all the more.

I look forward to the wonder and excitement of the remainder of the school year. =)

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