The Ultimate Gift......

“When Jesus had tasted it, he said, ‘It is finished!’ Then he bowed his head and gave up his spirit.” John 19:30

What more can be added to those words….to their meaning…..

As you go about this day….remember…..all that He did…

all that He endured……the agony that He suffered at the hands of
an insane crowd……God in the flesh allowing Himself to be murdered by puny man….He did it all for you….He did it all for me.

He died for us………How can we not live for Him?

Hosanna on the Highest!!!

As I sit here, writing again for the first time in over 2 ½ months, I am overwhelmed by the abundant love and mercy of my heavenly Father, my Daddy. Though I have been struggling with depression over the last several months and have not maintained my walk in all the ways that I believe in…..I forced myself to go to church this morning and received nothing but blessings in the form of His love and grace. I didn’t even think about this being Palm Sunday but I am blessed to be in a church that loves to rejoice in our Lord!
My pastor is preaching verse by verse in Romans, which is my favorite book of the Bible because of the very strong message of grace that it holds. I am always so hard on myself when I am not doing all the things that not only do I believe I should do but desire to do…and yet, even when I am not measuring up to my standards of spirituality, which obviously fall very far short of His standards…..He does nothing but love on me! I am so humbled by His unconditional love for me…by Him taking me in His arms and holding me against His chest when I am so unlovable and muddy from my sinful nature. He sees me as perfect! Pure! White as snow! How inconceivable is that? I just can’t wrap my mind or heart around that!

You know sometimes when I go to write after intense prayer….I don’t always have a beat on which way He wants me to go. Yet today, I opened my Bible and there it was after turning just a couple of pages. And on top of it, it directly correlates with the sermon that I just took in this morning. He is just so very cool!
So, I will share with you….His heart for me, for you, for all of us…and this is His heart when we are so lacking in ourselves and so undeserving…

I am reading from the NIV version in Micah 7:19: “You will again have compassion on us; you will tread our sins underfoot and hurl all our iniquities into the depths of the sea.” And beside that I had written a notation to look up Colossians 1:13, 14 which says, “For he has rescued us from the dominion of darkness and brought us into the kingdom of the Son he loves, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.”

I think that the main thing that He has reminded me of today, which He wants me to share, is the message above. He wants us to remember that there is nothing that can change His overabundant love for us, His bountiful grace that He pours over us constantly and no circumstance that could ever make us unable to approach our Daddy and crawl up in His lap and receive the comfort and warmth that we need.

So how appropriate that He give me these much needed reminders on a day such as today. Palm Sunday, the day to lay my clothes to cover the ground before Him and rejoice in the very Person of Jesus Christ and praise Him for the sacrifice that He has made for me, the sacrifice that makes this broken little girl, whole.

Hosanna! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord! Hosanna in the highest!

A Father's Extravagant Love.....

I must be getting old because there were a couple of other things that the Lord laid on my heart over the last month and for the life of me, I cannot access them and He is not bringing them to mind. So I just prayed and began reading in the Word, asking Him what He wants me to share. After reading in several different books, I found myself in Ephesians, began to read chapter 5 and ZAP! The first two verses were it! I was reading in The Message and this is what it says:

“Watch what God does, and then you do it, like children who learn proper behavior from their parents. Mostly what God does is love you. Keep company with him and learn a life of love. Observe how Christ loved us. His love was not cautious but extravagant. He didn’t love in order to get something from us but to give everything of himself to us. Love like that.”

Now is that a wonderful verse or what?! I was so touched by the description of how he loves us. I mean, isn’t it so true? “Mostly what God does is love you.” Well, the only word in that sentence I might change, which would be ok since it is a paraphrase BibleJ, is the “Mostly”. As I think about it, there is nothing that the Lord has done in my 42 years of living that has not been a reflection of His love for me. Like any truly loving parent, He has ALLOWED bad things to happen in my life because of lessons that I needed to learn. And because of this depraved world and the enemy himself, I have had some very bad, very hurtful things done to me. Yet, in His amazing love, He uses His power to turn even the worst events into things that have benefited me and actually made me a better person than if they had never happened. Now THAT is amazing love.

Then if you read further in the verse it says that Christ’s love for us is extravagant! I looked up that word and it was defined as, “excessive or unduly lavish” and unduly means “unsuitable”. There is no doubt that without His amazing grace it would be very unsuitable for this awesome God to love someone like me and even more, in an extravagant way! Then it concludes by saying “He didn’t love in order to get something from us but to give everything of himself to us.” (Italics mine) In a world that is so “me” oriented and selfish, it is hard to wrap my mind around the concept of someone giving of themselves with no hope of getting anything in return, even the pleasure of giving. But then you add to that concept, Almighty God of the entire Universe, One that has an unending amount to give and HE gives EVERYTHING of Himself to us!!!! WOW! How very humbling and thought provoking for this very undeserving woman to dwell on.

Being the economical God that He is, I am amazed by the fact that in a verse that so completely and beautifully conveys His amazing love for us, we also find advice on how to live our lives as well or maybe I should say… how to live our lives well. And interestingly enough, there are not a lot of instructions…..just, “Watch what God does”, “keep company with him and learn a life of love.” and “Love like that.” I can’t think of a much larger challenge than trying to love like God but it is one worth accepting, especially in a world that has grown so cold and devoid of warmth and human emotion. The next time that you are having a bad day or feeling blue, try reaching out to a stranger with a sincere, kind word and just see if the sun doesn’t seem just a little bit brighter and your step a little bit lighter.

To Accept or Reject...........My Choice

While this Christmas season was a blessed time for me, I have to admit that I am glad to be getting back into life’s regular routine again. I have missed sharing with you and my Father has laid several things on my heart over the last few weeks that I will share with you, one at a time.

Today I wanted to share what He laid on my heart over a month ago.

I was pondering the scripture in Matthew 23:37 where Jesus spoke to the city, Jerusalem and said, “How often I’ve ached to embrace your children, the way a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, and you wouldn’t let me.” as written in The Message. We all know that when He spoke of Jerusalem’s children, He was referring to His people Israel. I have heard quite a few sermons that make reference to this scripture but always in the literal context of Jesus speaking to Israel. Yet, as I reflected on this verse as one of His modern day children, He “spoke” to me and said, “You do the same thing to Me. When you are hurting and afraid due to situations or circumstances, in your fear you do not always turn to Me and allow Me to comfort you and reassure you that I am here and I will take care of things if you let Me.” Then I thought about another reference that the Bible makes about Him weeping over Jerusalem because of her rejection of Him and His love and I wondered just how many times He has wept over me and my rejection of His love for me.

Coming from a background of abuse makes it very hard for me to believe, much more, accept His love for me. And that is without the whisperings from Satan in my ear that He doesn’t care about me or my trials. But I think that even someone not coming from abuse would find it hard to embrace His love all the time, especially in the dark valleys of fear or condemnation from the enemy.

So I just felt that He wanted me to say that He is always here for you and for me. That He NEVER wants us to try and cope or handle things all by ourselves. There is not a single tiny little aspect of our lives that are not important to Him. He cares about ALL of it. Anything important to us is important to Him. So I hope and pray that the next time that you are hit with something out of left field and you begin to feel afraid or confused, that you will remember what He reminded me of………He is waiting to gather you in His arms and give you the exact thing you need at that moment for that situation. Remember…..He loves you no matter what!!

Merry Christmas in 2007!!!
At this time of year it is customary for some to send out a Christmas letter updating you on their lives.
While I am not against such a thing, I have chosen to do something different. I decided to focus on YOU this year. After all, it is YOU that makes my life special; it is YOU that gives color and dimension to my world. YOU are the reason that I am thankful for the life that I have! The angel Clarence in the movie, “It’s a Wonderful Life” said, “No man is a failure that has friends.” I agree with that, which means YOU have made me a success! So as you go about your life during this most wondrous and sacred time of year, keep in mind that YOU ARE SPECIAL…YOU ARE LOVED and YOU ARE APPRECIATED!
Have a very, very Merry Christmas!!!!