The Written Word

It's so easy for me to read the Bible. I can read the words, see them there on the page in black and white, and then walk away. It doesn't sink in. Instead, it looks like one of these:

• Hmmm, that's nice. Now I'd better get those dishes done and the laundry folded . . . where'd I put my cell phone?
• Hey, so-and-so could really use this verse today. I can so see how that would apply to their lives. They should really look into that. 

And it's not enough. It's not enough for me to let that slide. It's not enough to read it and then walk away. I need to know it. I need to use it. I need to live it. And so, I need a way I can make it my own.

I've been reading the book Life Unhindered by Jennifer Kennedy Dean. In chapter six, she references Romans 7:14-17, the ever-famous passage by Apostle Paul where he basically 'fesses up to what amounts to a disciple-ish face palm. "I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do." (Romans 7:15) Yep, I can relate to that, and God knew that when He inspired Paul to write it. I think if Paul was me, a 30-something busy homeschooling mom of two with a full-time business, two dogs, one cat, a huge garden (you get the idea), this passage may have sounded something like this:

I don't know what's wrong with me. I know God's laws are good and that I'm supposed to follow them. It's not like they're just arbitrary guidelines and requirements - God knows what He's doing and what's best for me. But I just can't swing it. I'm so full of selfishness and pride and laziness and discontent and everything that drags me down and holds me back. I just can't muster it up. 

Oh, I try. I have such good intentions. I start the day with great expectations. "I won't get impatient," I vow. "I'll keep my focus right. I'll serve God and love my neighbor and pray and read my Bible. I won't lose my cool with my kids or complain about all the shoes cluttering up the porch. I won't waste time on Facebook or beat myself up for not looking like I did when I was younger." 

Five minutes later I realize I'm on a rant about dirty socks on the floor next to the laundry hamper while shoving cookies in my face. It's like I'm completely incapable of doing anything but exactly what I said I wouldn't. What is going on in my head? Who let the evil, grumpy Christa out? Oh wait, that was me . . . 

But there's hope! Thank God! Through Him all things are possible. THROUGH Him. Not me. He's my only hope.

Writing Scripture - either word for word or in Christa-paraphrase - is very cathartic for me. It forces me to really focus in. It gives me that time, not to just skim, but to stop and consider how His word wants to change my life.And it will, if I let it. If I let go of the easy and the fast.

I would love to hear from you. What helps you focus in on God's word? Do you copy scripture? Journal? Write music? (Yeah, I tried that once, thinking it would be awesome. Turns out that's not my spiritual gift. Yikes! It would have put chanting monks to sleep. Seriously.)

Thankfulness and Trust: On My Own, I'm Toast

 Thankfulness opens the door to my presence. (Jesus Calling)

Thankfulness.

Thankfulness is built on a substructure of trust. (Jesus Calling)

Thankfulness. Trust. Partners in faith.

Some days it’s easy to be thankful. Some days the sun is shines and the day’s road is wide and straight and clear. On days like this, I’m like a child skipping through a field of bright-faced flowers, stopping to admire some of the more showy blooms, automatically breathing up gratitude and praise.

Great. Super. Good for me. 

Good for me?

On my own, I can only muster up thankfulness on the bright, happy days. Because on my own, my thankfulness is contingent upon my circumstances. When my circumstances are effortless and good, thankfulness comes easily. That is if, in my tra-la-la tripping along, I can get my focus off myself long enough to remember to be thankful.

On my own, I’m toast.

Good for me? Truth is, I don’t even know what’s good for me. I’m imagining what my life would be like today if I had been allowed to direct my own path and choose the circumstances that in that moment would have made thankfulness the easiest. And I’m horrified. Try it. You’ll be scared straight.

“There is a way that appears to be right, but in the end it leads to death” (Proverbs 14:12). Yep, that pretty much sums it up. That’s me left to my own devices, manufacturing thankfulness out of my own strength.

I can’t be trusted. The circumstances that have made the most difference in my life – those things that have strengthened my faith, brought me to my knees and driven me closer and closer to God – given a choice in that moment, I probably wouldn’t have chosen them.  

I’m so glad He did. He knew what I need, even if it’s not what I wanted. He knew what would shake me up, form my character, challenge me, grow me and bring me peace. I may not have liked it at the time. It may not have made sense just then. But it. Was. Best.

I can’t be trusted. But GOD can.

Thankfulness. Trust. Partners in faith. 

The partnership makes sense now.

I can be thankful, truly thankful, because I trust Him. In the good things. In the bad things. In the things that are hard and don’t make sense. They make sense to Him. His way is what’s best for me. “He guides the humble in what is right and teaches them his way” (Psalm 25:9).

And you know what? Those hard things, the circumstances that have made the most difference in my life? Today I am the most thankful for them. Even though it was hard. Even though it hurt. Even though it didn’t make sense. Oh, I’m thankful for the easy times, the happy times, the clear and sunny days. But I’m the most thankful for the others.

The only way that’s possible – the only way I can be the most thankful for the hardest things – TRUST. If I don’t trust that God knows what’s best for me, when hard times come, I will fall apart. No question. I will fight and cuss and doubt and waver and drag everyone else around me down with me. Good times, right? 

Oh, I might fight and cuss and doubt and waver anyway. Just a little (or even a lot). But if I’m doing it from a place of trust in God, I’m not fighting Him. I’m fighting me. Instead of tearing apart and killing my relationship with God out of mistrust and fear, I’m tearing apart and killing my self-ness, putting myself, with God’s help, in my proper place.

Get out the way, Christa! Praise God, I can be thankful, because He is trustworthy.

Need help getting started? This article based on Psalm 33 is great! “But before we jump on the thanksgiving bandwagon, we need to realize that genuine thankfulness is inextricably bound up with trust. We will never truly thank God until we first truly trust Him. We will not be grateful to God for all that we have until we first recognize that we’re dependent on Him for all that we have.” Check it out!

https://bible.org/seriespage/psalm-33-key-thankful-heart

One Woman. One Bible.

“I don’t know if you knew this or not, but I grew up Catholic until I was in my early twenties,” she said. 

We sat together on a couch, a little boy’s birthday party bustling around us. Kids ran in and out, tracking in grass and water from the yard. A giant, curly-haired dog with wearing a blue bandana sniffed around for cake crumbs at our feet. Coming up empty, he shuffled off in search of something more entertaining.

But I was riveted.

“My mom was really involved in a women’s prayer group, like a Bible study. And when the leader stepped down, they asked her to take up the position. She agreed, and she began to study the Bible.”

“She started to realize that what she’d been taught her whole life and what the Bible said was very different. They were always praying to the saints. They prayed to the saints during the meetings, but it didn’t agree with the Bible. She just couldn’t do it anymore, so she stepped down from the position and told them why. Eighty percent of the women stopped talking to her because she had betrayed her faith.”

The woman next to me had been a Brazilian foreign exchange student at the local high school, then returned to her family in Brazil to finish her college education. Years later, after a long-distance overseas courtship, she married her Iowa high school sweetheart and moved to his farm. That’s when I met her. It was over a dozen years ago, but this was the first time I’d this part of her story. 

Her eyes crinkled for a moment, remembering, and her smile radiated the joy she’d found.

“My mother told us kids. She converted us,” she laughs. 

She laughs, but I am spellbound, in awe of how alive, how sharp, how powerful God’s Word is.

No theology discourse. No sermon series. One woman. One Bible. God’s Word was enough. 

Do I read my Bible like that? Is it my ultimate resource? If I see something God’s Word in that differs with what’s going on in my life, do I immediately accept and adjust my life to align with it? Or do I test it? Question it? Ignore it? Do I even recognize the truth as I read it?

Would I have done what her mother did, and counting the cost, throw off her whole life’s way of thinking, way of living, way of worshipping? Would I have been willing to risk friendships and family and tradition to follow God’s Word? Would I have let God’s Word be reason enough for all of that?

What if she had not? She could have chosen differently. What if she had counted the cost and decided the price was too high? What if she had only secretly agreed with God’s Word but never let it affect her life? She could have acknowledged internally that her way and God’s way differed but continued the same outwardly. She could have kept it to herself. She could have kept her friends, her position, her traditions.

She could have, but she didn’t. And so she was saved. Her whole family was saved. 

I want to read God’s Word like that. I want it to change my life. I want my children to see that it makes a difference. That it’s not just a truth or some truth, but THE TRUTH. I want to freely throw off anything that’s in the way to follow THE TRUTH.

One woman. One Bible. And now one family with children and grandchildren and someday great-grandchildren are living and walking in Truth.

I am a woman with a Bible.What difference will it make in my life? In the lives of my family members? In the lives of my friends and coworkers and relatives? I don't know exactly what it will look like, but I know there will be a difference. Who will be freed because of the truth I know? If I don't share it, no one. Not even me. 

If I don't let THE TRUTH change my life, nothing will change. 

Here's my chance. As one woman with one Bible, my life can be changed. I can be free. I can be used. I can be who God uses to spread truth to my family, my friends, my communities. 

Here's my chance, but I have to take it every day. I have to choose. Either I choose consciously, knowingly, purposefully, or I choose by default. I'm always following something. Will I choose myself and my society - or my Savior and my God? 

Today I will follow THE TRUTH. By the grace of God, I will. One woman. One Bible.