Morning Revelations

Because of the LORD'S great love we are not consumed, for his compassions never fail. They are new every morning; great is your faithfulness.

I say to myself, "The Lord is my protion; therefore I will wait for him." Lamntations 3:22-24 (NIV)

Yesterday, Michigan’s weather was bitter cold and by late afternoon the snow was beginning to fall again. As a result, I stayed hunkered down and I spent most of my afternoon and evening on the internet checking out blogs. What I found greatly distressed me.

I found eloquent writing that painted precise visual pictures in my mind. I found scriptural writings that could have been delivered as a sermon by Billy Graham. There were humorous writings that made me laugh until I cried and touching, heartfelt, testimonies that had me wishing I could walk in their shoes so I could experience the same life saving grace that had been given to them.

But the main thing I found as I scanned the multitude of blogs last night was how my writing paled in comparison.

By bedtime my heart was broken and as I knelt beside my bed I called out to God:

“How did I get it so wrong Lord? How did I misunderstand your call to write? Why did I think I could write for your glory just because I enjoy doing it so much? Please help me do what it takes to discern your will for me now and move in the right direction. Please show me what you would have me do.”

In my quiet time with God this morning, he revealed something that eased my hurting heart as I read the daily reading from a booklet called ” The Word for You Today” http://newlifelancaster.org/content/

The reading for today was based on Numbers 14:24 (NIV)

“The Spirit of Caleb”

Caleb wasn’t into “safe living.” As a young man he came back from the Promised Land, stood with the minority and announced, “With God on our side we’ll take it!” At 85, he was still slaying giants and claiming mountains. That’s because he had a “different spirit.” He wasn’t a “go with the flow and expect the status quo” guy.

Richard Edler writes: “safe living generally makes for regrets later on. We are all given talents and dreams. Sometimes the two don’t seem to match. But usually we compromise both before ever finding out. Later on, we find ourselves looking back longingly to that time when we should have chased our true dreams and our true talents for all they were worth. Don’t let yourself be pressured into thinking that your dreams or your talents aren’t prudent. They were never meant to be prudent. They were meant to bring joy and fulfillment into your life.” If a caterpillar refuses to get into its cocoon it’ll never transform and will be forever relegated to crawling on the ground, even though it had the potential to fly.

What do you believe God’s called you to do? Do it! God’s not limited by your IQ, He’s limited by your “I will.” The poet said: “If you think you are beaten, you are. If you dare not, you don’t. If you’d like to win but you think you can’t, its almost certain you won’t. Life’s battles don’t always go to the stronger or faster man, but sooner or later the man who wins, is the man who believes he can.”
The spirit of Caleb is the “can do” spirit! Have you got it? “

What a beautiful reminder from God to keep writing for his glory and quit judging the talents he gives me with the talents he gives to others. A reminder that I'm writing for the pleasure it gives me and not for the esteem of my colleagues.

As he has pointed out in the past, my job is to obey, and leave the results to Him.

So God, this blog is especially for you. Thank you for loving me and using me in whatever way you wish. Thank you for the inspiring words you have given Pastors Chris and Amy Foster at New Life Church. I can’t count the number of times you have used their words to encourage, and guide me.

And thanks too, for my friend Al. Without her passing their church devotional to me I never would have stumbled on to this wonderful addition to my life.

Fasting, Praying, and Almsgiving

When you fast, do not look gloomy like the hypocrites.They neglect their appearance, so that they may appear to others to be fasting.

Amen, I say to you, they have received their reward.But when you fast, anoint your head and wash your face,so that you may not appear to be fasting, except to your Father who is hidden
And your Father who sees what is hidden will repay you.” Matthew 6:16-18 (NAB)

Lent, the time of year where we reflect on our relationship with God through fasting, praying and almsgiving, began, Wednesday, in a virtual winter white out. The trek through the snow for Ash Wednesday Services wasn’t easy, but I was determined to go this year, determined to get real before God.

Leaving the church I pulled my coat and scarf tightly around me as I stepped out into the swirling white snow. What a stark contrast to the big black cross that was tattooed with ashes across my forehead. Ashes to remind me that I am a sinner saved by grace, and in need of repentance.

The snow served as a beautiful reminder of how white my soul will be when God is finished restoring me.

Lent used to be just a bunch of rules to me. As a school girl it signaled the start of 40 days of torture, when I would be guilted into giving up some pleasurable thing as a way of repenting for my sins.

I always tried to give up eating Brussels Sprouts, but mom wouldn’t let me. She knew that for me eating Brussels Sprouts didn’t register on the pleasure scale.

So along with most of my fellow Catholic classmates, I tried going without candy and gum and sometimes sweets in general, for the next grueling 6+ weeks.

Some parents told their kids that Sunday was a free day; others said you should abstain for the whole time. To my dismay, my mom always followed the stricter guidelines.

Some of my friends had iron clad willpower and when Lent was over, their Easter Basket became a true reward for their dedication. Then there were those like me, who, by the second week had already blown it.

Getting my Easter basket often felt a lot like opening my Christmas presents after I had already peaked inside. When the time finally came to savor the moment, or in this case, bite the ear off my chocolate bunny, it was usually a lackluster event.

As I grew older it was time for me to observe the rules about fasting. Fasting meant that our two small meals shouldn’t add up to more than our biggest meal.

I quickly learned to gorge myself at dinner so as not to bend the rules. By the second week of Lent I’d usually blown the fasting rule too.

Then one day I put aside all the “rules” of the Church, and did my own thing. I thought rules were a stumbling block to my relationship with God. So instead I began building that relationship by just talking to him and pouring out my soul. I went to church each week and continued to grow in my faith.

But one day as I was pondering something that was troubling me I heard God ask:

“Why do you always buck the rules?”

“Who Me?”

“Yes, you. Do you realize you have a problem with submission? You always think you have a better way.

After you’ve been still long enough for me to enlighten you, you eventually come around, but before then you are constantly causing an internal conflict.
It’s not that you object to the rules in principle, but you object to someone telling you it’s a rule that you must follow

As much as I hated to admit it, He was right. But then He’s always right.

“Okay Lord, why does the Church tell us we have to fast? Where is the sacrifice if it’s a rule? Wouldn’t you rather have us do something because we want to and not because we have to?”

“Of course, He answered. You always have the choice to do what you wish. The Church is saying if you want to grow closer to God this is what you must do. . Stop thinking of them as rules and call them My guidelines.

Did you notice that My Word assumes you will fast? I didn’t say If you fast but rather when you fast do not look gloomy like the hypocrites.

Fasting isn’t a punishment. Fasting isn’t about not eating, it’s about denying self. It’s about sacrifice, and sacrifice means to “make holy”. Isn’t that what you want me to do, to make you holy?

In other words the sacrifice is a way of saying that food and your desires are secondary to something else, and that something else is Me.
Luanne, what is there in your life that is getting in the way of your relationship with Me?”

Ouch, Ouch and more Ouch!

“How don’t I love thee Lord, let me count the ways”.

1. The words eating addiction came to mind. I use food to soothe my mood, whether happy or sad I want to fill the emotion. Then there is the lack of exercise. Between the two, I am not honoring God when I destroy the temple he created to house his Holy Spirit.

2. The television shows I watch. By the worlds standards they are a little racy, but by God’s standards they are shows that corrupt my mind into thinking certain things are okay because they are funny or cute. I try to reason that they are entertaining, yet bit by bit they draw me further away from proper fellowship with God.

3. I am a shop-a-holic. There is something about buying new outfit that is exhilarating even though my closets are full of more clothes than I can possibly wear in a year I think it is okay because I can afford to buy it. Or how about TV’s. Do I really need so many TV’s when I can only watch one at a time? Greed not only destroys my relationship with God it blinds me to the suffering going on in the world.


Need I go on? I think you have the picture.

Yesterday was the first Sunday of Lent and the Gospel reading was Matthew 4:1-11, Satan tempting Jesus in the desert. As I looked over my list of things that are getting in the way of my relationship with God, I was struck with how they align with the same temptations Jesus suffered.

1. Satan tempted Jesus with food. I have played into Satan’s hand with my addiction to food and my failure to keep my body in optimum physical condition. Lord, help me to fill up on your word and remember that Man does not live on bread alone.
   
   


2. Satan tempted Jesus to test God. I have fallen into that temptation by judging my morals with the world’s standards and not to God’s standard.
   Lord, help me not to test the boundaries of your patience and justice.
   
   


3. Satan tempted Jesus with material gain if he would bow down and worship him. My eyes are focused on the things of this world and I eat out of Satan’s palm when I lust after material possessions.
   Lord, help me to remember there is no other God but you, and help me to do away with anything that comes before my love and dedication to you. Help me to give abundantly and not store up treasures while my neighbor is starving.
   
   

Jesus told us not to look gloomy as we fast. He wasn’t gloomy when he fasted in the desert for 40 days. While he was focused on His Father, his hunger did not overtake him, in fact the bible tells us that he wasn’t hungry until afterwards.

I’m going to follow Jesus’ example. I’m determined to use the next 40 days to rid my life of the clutter that stands between me and God. I’m not giving up, I’m laying down self in order for God to build me up and restore me to the person he wants me to be. I'm washing my face and making it shine and you'll never know whether I'm fasting or not.

But just incase I am would you please say a little prayer that this time I can get past the second week?

Faithful in the Small Stuff

No Doubt About It……..I am style challenged. It’s not that I don’t have style; it’s just… different from everyone else’s.

For over three months, a forest green oversized chair and ottoman stood out as the sole piece of furniture in the living room of my new duplex. I loved this chair and it was the only thing to sit on that I brought from my old home. Finding a sofa to go with it was proving way harder than I thought.

Bigger than the problem of designing the room around the chair was the fact that when God was passing out the style genes, I must have been standing in a different line – most likely the line where they were passing out generous helpings of pleasingly plump.


Not only do I have weird taste in material things, I have an approval addiction, and I judged every sofa I looked at by what my friends would think of it.

My friend Jan had rolled her eyes in disbelief when I told her I was looking for plaid or a feminine flower print. “Oh No, micro fiber is what you need to get. Plaid went out long ago.”

So I began looking at the sofas with micro fiber. I could picture myself curled up on a cold winter’s night in this stuff. But every sofa seemed too light, too dark, too wrong kind of cushion etc. Nothing seemed to strike my fancy.

I was growing depressed with each passing day. I couldn’t entertain a guest unless we sat out on the patio furniture. I was feeling desperate.

After retiring in August I was sure I would finally be able to think clearly and be able to pick a sofa out right away. But when Labor Day rolled around I still hadn’t made my choice.

I took my daughter on a whirl wind shopping trip to 4 different stores to see my favorites that week-end. She liked them all plus a few more. AAAUUUGGGHHH!

I went home that evening exhausted and called my friend Al. She seemed sympathetic even though she’d been hearing the same story for months.

“I think I’m just going to hand my checkbook to my friends Jeanne and Marsha, they both have terrific taste. I’ll just let them pick one for me. It would be so much easier than this indecisiveness”, I told Al. She gasped.

That night when I knelt to pray, I laid my head on the bed and cried out. “Lord, I need a couch but I simply cannot decide. Can you help me, please? Would you PLEASE pick out a sofa for me? Lord, show me what your choice is.

If my friends had heard my prayer that night, they would have laughed. Sometime earlier we’d gotten in a discussion about God’s will. One friend was trying to decide on new flooring but couldn’t seem to make up her mind what to go with. When I asked if she had prayed about it, another friend jumped in and said, “I’m not about to stand in the middle of the store and say “Which rug should I buy God.” “In the first place, I don’t have time to wait to hear his answer. And secondly, I think God has too many other, more important, things to think about than what rug I should buy!”

I wondered if I was passing the buck to Jesus when I should be sucking it up and deciding myself. I don’t know why, but it just felt easier to finally ask God what his decision would be.


After church the next day, I made the twenty mile trek back to the shopping area As I turned the corner I passed by the furniture store that has a different sale every week and sure enough the windows announced a big Labor Day Blow out. I had already decided which store I wanted to buy from but nevertheless I felt a real tug at my heart to pull into the driveway.

Just as I entered the store I saw it. It was different than I ever would have imagined buying. The pillows were a tad bit on the wild side and it had loose back pillows which I swore I would never have, but it just kept drawing me in. I couldn’t explain why I liked it. I just did, it said HOME to me.

When I first began shopping for furniture, my friend Althea, a friend of mine from my widow’s organization, First Tea @ Five, got the itch to replace her sofa. So one day she popped into a name brand furniture store to look around. If you’ve ever shopped some of these stores, you know that you feel like road kill as soon as you enter the store. It seems as though the vultures descend upon you. This happened to Al but she just kept repeating “No thanks I’m just looking.”

Finally one young saleswoman named Cindy stepped up and asked if she could get Al a bottle of water. When she brought the water to Al they began conversing and Al learned Cindy was newly widowed. She invited her to our next meeting, and Cindy accepted. I’m always so amazed at the ways God brings new members into our group.

I sat down on the sofa and wiggled around checking out the feel when I suddenly remembered my prayer from the night before. I raised my eyes to the heavens and just shook my head in disbelief. “Thank You” I whispered. Then God whispered back, “Call Cindy.”

Cindy worked at a different branch and wasn’t working that day, but when I called her at home to see how I could buy this ensemble from her and still take advantage of the sale she assured me I had until Tuesday.

As she thanked me for calling, she mentioned that last month she had not met her quota and was in danger of losing her job. This purchase would help her remain on target.

Had God been waiting for me to ask His opinion? Is anything to small for the Lord to be bothered with? I can’t answer that for sure, but I just know when I put God in charge of even the small things in my life the big things don’t seem so daunting.

With Mom's Blessing

This is my first time participating in Show and Tell Friday.

Here’s my show …and here goes my tell.

My mom died in 1988 due to congestive heart failure. She had been a heavy smoker; at least 1-2 packs a day of Camel cigarettes. She fought obesity for as long as I can remember, which was probably a bigger contributor to her CHF than the cigarettes she inhaled.

But despite her vices she was a dear, and she had a great love for the Lord. In her final years you could usually find her sitting at the kitchen table conversing with God.

My brother’s friends loved coming to our house just to sit and visit with her. She had a tell it like it is attitude, a loud voice and a big heart.

In her kitchen was a large picture window, and my most vivid memories of my mom are pictured with her sitting at the kitchen table keeping watch over the world outside.
In the winter she delighted in watching the birds at the feeders, especially the cardinals dressed in their colorful red feathers. In the summer she was always spotting a humming bird and pointing it out to the grandkids. When we drove out of the driveway she kept waving until we were gone from her view.

My mom’s wedding ring was a simple silver band with a row of tiny diamonds. She was always satisfied with the simplicity of the ring and always said she didn’t need a flashy diamond to prove my dads love to her. Over the years the ring lost several of the chips.

During her first CHF attack, moms ring had to be cut from her finger. She was in a coma for 3 days and we almost lost her. Having to be hospitalized for so long turned into a blessing in disguise for she was able to finally kick the smoking habit she’d had for over 50 years. It was also a blessing that her wedding ring wasn’t ruined, just a tiny cut in the back was all it took to disengage it from her finger, but she didn’t want to have the ring welded just incase it ever happened again.


Her hands and feet often swelled past the point of comfort. Often in the middle of the night she would take her ring off and put it on the night stand.

One day she noticed the ring was missing. The cleaning lady had been to the house earlier in the day, and mom was sure it had gotten knocked off and most likely swept up into the vacuum cleaner. We sifted through the dust and debris to no avail. Mom was heart broken for the rest of her days.

A few years after my mom died my husband came home with an announcement. “I think your dad has a girl friend” he told me. “No way” I gasped.


I hated the idea of my dad having another women in his life, and I didn’t take to the news in a kind way. Especially after I learned she had been his high school sweetheart. It felt like he was betraying my mom.

I refused to have anything to do with this woman and verbalized my feelings to everyone but my dad. In his quiet unassuming way, he suffered in silence at my obstinance.


I became further distraught when he decided to sell my childhood home so he could move into a smaller apartment.


Finally the day came to move dad’s belongings to the new place. It was also the day that I was going to have to meet this “other woman” for the first time, and I was a total wreck.

My job for the day was cleaning the bathrooms. The top drawer of the vanity in the master bath still had mom’s makeup and some of her medicines in it. I remember pulling out the drawers and taking them to the waste basket and dumping the contents out.


I was choking back sobs as I dumped, purging my soul along with the few remaining material possessions.


Finally we were done and everyone began jumping into their vehicles to take the last load of dad’s things to the new apartment.

"I’m not going, you already have enough help", I told them.


After the last car drove away I went to my parents bedroom and sat on the floor and wept.

“Mom I just can’t do this," I cried. "I don’t want to meet Nada. What do you think? Are you okay with dad having this other woman in his life? If you’re okay with it could you give me a sign?" (Okay for anyone reading this don't get bent out of shape because I was talking to a dead person- I know my mom lives today because of her belief and love for her dear savior)

I went home and began getting ready for the evening. Dad and Nada were taking us all to dinner.

At 5:30 my brother George and his wife Cec arrived at our house to drive us to the restaurant. When I opened the front door, Cec was grinning.



“I have a present for you, hold out your hand.” she told me.



Apprehensively I extended my palm and Cec dropped something into it. When I drew it in to have a closer look I saw my mothers lost wedding ring sitting in the palm of my hand.



"Oh my goodness," I exclaimed. "Where did you find this. "



"We found it when we went back to take one final look around. It was in the top drawer of the vanity in the master bath", she said. (Mind you this was the same vanity that I had taken the drawers out of and dumped the contents.)


"We knew you were having a tough time today and we just felt like Mom would like you to have this.”



This was surely my sign from Mom, and as I starred down at the ring, I could feel the touch of God. It was ever so slight as it brushed across my shoulders but it was a healing touch and I felt the scales fall from my hardened heart.


It was an angelic message sent to let me know that it was good that my dad was feeling alive again, and that my Mom was with God and they were rejoicing because dad was moving on with his life.


It was time to put my childishness aside and help my dad be happy once again.

Half of the diamond chips are missing from the ring. I've been hoping to get it restored. Maybe this show and tell will spur me on.