I recently wood burned an image of Jesus’s hand. The artist I used to copy had drawn His hand as a carpenter’s hands would be. Strong and rough with little lines that could be cuts or could be cracking from the work, and in the center of that hand was a big, black hole. A nail hole.
I can’t help but think of the hands of the men I care about when I think of Jesus’s hands. They are the hands I have held to compare to. It’s easy for me to imagine that His hands are rough and strong and perhaps have sand or wood shavings on them. It’s easy for me to see them as hands where I could hold on and swing my feet off the ground and they wouldn’t drop me. But those are in the good times. When bad times hit it is too easy to take our eyes off of Jesus and feel like He has let go of our hand. But in truth, we have let go of His. He will never let us go.
Those hands were pierced for us.
Category: lent
Hands part 2
Mark 12:36 referenced King David when David said that Lord spoke to Him, promising to keep Him at His right hand.
God often spoke of being at His right hand.
In this train of thought I looked up the importance of the right hand man. Of course this is not what God was meaning, but it brought a new perspective A website called Monster-work said the best right hand person should be as follows:
When searching for this key figure, consider the following: Trustworthiness: Look for someone with a proven track record of reliability. Complementary Skills: Your ally should possess strengths that enhance your own. Diversity of Thought: He/she should bring new ideas and perspectives.
This is very much what having God at OUR right hand is like, that is very different from being at His right hand but we will cover that in a second. God is always reliable! He is 100% trustworthy. He uses our strengths to bless His kingdom and His uses His power to bless us. He often shows us a perspective different from our own. And best of all, He is always on our side.
Now. Being at GOD’S right hand means that you are in place of honor. If God is defending you with His right hand, then He has placed you in a place of importance to Him. God’s right hand is often a metaphor for God’s power as well, He will say “I will strike them down with my right hand” < Paraphrased >
His right hand is both safe to those who love Him and dangerous to those who don’t.
Thankfully, we as His children are shielded by His powerful right hand.
Hands part 1
Ephesians 2:10 says that we are God’s handiwork!
Think on that for a moment. We are God’s handiwork. Handiwork is defined as something someone made- a synonym for Handiwork is handcrafted, which of course means skillfully made. This makes me think of the fearfully and wonderfully made verse. We were made with skill by hand, by God’s hands. He put us together piece by piece, ion by ion, chemical by chemical until at last we were His perfect creation.
Whenever we receive a gift that is hand made we smile a little more because of the effort that went into it, the love and time needed to keep create it. God gave is the handmade gift of ourselves, we are special and unique and put together with effort and love.
Are you hurting? Turn to Jesus
Sometimes you are hurting but don’t notice it because you are busy carrying all the burdens. Take a moment and breathe and connect with your feelings. Then take those feelings and turn them over to God. When everyone is relying on you it’s easy to feel like you have to keep a brave face and hold on. But God. God never called you to be strong in yourself, He called you to be strong through Him. Take your pain, anger, fear and sorrow and place it all in His hands, then walk away. I don’t mean stop praying about it, I mean stop holding onto it like it’s your burden to hold. His yoke is easy remember? His burden is light. He is not going to give you a bunch of stuff to deal with and then walk away. God will carry you. Trust Him.
And just like that….
And just like that….
So. You go about your day totally fine. You meet some people, you smile and laugh, and then the next day hits and boom, just like that you have a cold. You were fine the day before, but somewhere along the line you were exposed to a virus and now you are sick. Your cells are fighting the virus with all they’ve got and all you can do is walk around and be host to the battle. One day the cold will leave, but not without a struggle.
Sin is like that. You are fine and go about your day, you expose yourself to some minor things but are not affected by them, then some more minor things add on and some more, until one day you look at yourself and realize you are no longer living like a Christian. But God. God is like your white blood cells, He is fighting the battle against your sin. Unlike your cold, however, you are not just a host to the battle, this battle you fight too. You walk away from sin, you spend more time with Jesus. You fight everyday with your desires and you teach yourself to have only one desire, Jesus.
It’s funny how Jesus helps us fight to get closer to Him, when He is who we are trying to draw closer to.
He battles for us even when we don’t live Him or acknowledge Him. He is our true friend.
Noble gases and God
Noble gases
When looking at the periodic table there are many different groups of elements. You have your highly reactive nonmetal elements you have your highly reactive metal elements you have your non-reactive and semi-reactive and the list goes on.
But all of the elements are trying to be one thing, Noble. Noble gases are the gases that are completely stable. All the other elements want to be like the noble gases. Some elements try and lose one or two electrons so they can reach the stability of the noble gases, other elements are trying to gain electrons so they can become like the noble gases. And yes people will argue that this is science and that it has to do with the pull on the electrons and that these gases don’t have a preference to be Noble, but let us set that aside for now. The noble gases, and bear with me here, remind me of God. We as people, whether we realize it or not, are always trying to be more like God. We see it in the way people continue to create, to understand, to grow to be more than what we are. Christians are always trying be more like Jesus, that’s a given. But I think all people want to reach God whether they know that’s what they are doing or not. Like the elements, it’s set into us to want to be close to our perfect creator. We all want to be perfect as God is perfect, even if we don’t realize it. But without knowing Jesus we will seek after false idols and false goals that we feel will complete us. But only Jesus can complete us. Just as the elements give away parts of themselves or try and gain parts of other elements to try and reach that stable perfection, we try and mimic other people and gain more things, or we give everything away and try to be minimal, all in a constant strive to be perfect and stable. But we can never be perfect, only God is perfect. But praise Jesus that He lives in us! Though, we can never be perfect in this world, the one who is resides within us and perfects us by His presence.
The reason
The reason
I was too late. She didn’t know the truth, and now she was gone. The cancer won in the end. We didn’t think it would.
Six hours we had spent together. All the time in the world. Yet never once did I speak the truth. Now it’s too late. Now she’s gone, her soul lost forever. If only I could go back. Say anything that would make a difference. Anything at all.
The reason for the death and Resurrection was so that people would be able to come to Jesus and be free from hell. We get caught up in the ribbons and the bright colors added to this day and forget, today was the winning of a battle, not an Easter parade. It’s a happy day for those who know and love Jesus, it’s a hopeful day for those who find Him, but for those who don’t believe it’s just another Sunday to stay in bed. These souls are what we are supposed to fight for. We all fail daily to spread Jesus to the world, for those who aren’t missionaries, preachers or evenagelists, it’s really hard to find the words and the moment to show Jesus to people. Sometimes a lady you met once who you pray for for years will suddenly die from cancer and you never know, was it enough? Did she find Jesus in the end?
Souls of the lost and found are the reason for it all. My soul, your soul and the wandering souls out there are the reason for the empty tomb.
He gave us everything. We need to give Him all of us in return. Don’t be half a Christian following the easy path. Serve Him and be a jewel in His crown.
I can smell it, life is returning
I can smell it coming, life is returning.
Walking through the grove of blue spruce trees in our yard I took a deep breath. The past several months of winter, the air burned and smelled like snow; today my senses were filled with warm scent of pine. It was faint, but it was there. Little by little the trees were coming back to life. I know pine trees don’t go fully dormant during the winter like Birch or Poplar, so they are usually the first you notice a difference in during Spring. Yet that doesn’t change the joy of having the trees start to show sign of winter ending.
Yesterday Jesus was killed and buried. Today He was busy preparing for tomorrow. His body lie in a stone tomb, yet His Spirit was working on the Father’s plan. He wasn’t up and walking about yet today, but there was something stirring, life was returning. Lewis would speak of it as the other world or realm and that is how I will speak of it also. We couldn’t see or hear anything happening here on Earth during the middle day of Holy Week weekend, yet in the other world- the one our souls belong to- there was a great awakening of souls who had lied in death for many years awaiting their savior to come and take the keys from the devil and bring them home. Jesus’s death and resurrection was always planned, God didn’t suddenly go, ‘oh no! The world is really bad I need to send someone to save them!’ He knew all along what would happen and was ready for it. Today was a busy day for Jesus, and though his body lay dead in the tomb, life was preparing to return to it.
Thank you for the nails, the lashes, the crown, the humiliation, the seperation, and the cross Lord Jesus. Thank you.
Thank you for the Easter presents.
We always do Easter baskets in our family, (which originated in Old Catholicism for those wondering, no it did not begin with a bouncy rabbit no matter how cute he is.) The adults receive fancy chocolates, sometimes books, sometimes crafts, sometimes games- you get the picture. Afterwards we always thank each other for our Easter gifts.
But what about the big gift in the basket? The one that Easter is truly all about, do we thank the giver for this gift?
What does Easter mean to you?
In truth the date doesn’t matter, it doesn’t have to be in April for this day to be important. Too many get caught up in the chronology and forget about the event. If it happened in June or October instead, the day of Jesus’s death would still be the most important day in history. He gave us His purity. His honor. His grace. His blamelessness. He gave us a place in Heaven. So let me refrase the question: what does Jesus’s death mean to you? Do we remember to thank Him? He gave us the greatest gift we have, don’t let Easter go by, more importantly don’t let your life go by without stopping and thanking Jesus for His gift. He didn’t have to do it. He chose to.
With Him in the garden
‘Today is my day to sorrow’, thought the tiny flower growing beside a rock. ‘Last night a great trouble came over me as a man, or something more than a man, sat by my side and wept. His tears were so great that when they splashed upon me I felt sick and my roots were weakened. I tried to reach out to the man, but I am just a flower and cannot draw attention to myself like a bird can with her song. He cried and screamed and begged and pleaded, but no peace came to this man. I hoped that He would look at me and I could make Him smile. He left and then returned, even sadder when He came back. All I could do was sit with Him. Then I sensed a resolve in His being and He went to stand once more. He stumbled and His hands landed near me. I tried to be radiant to bring Him comfort, finally He saw me, He smiled very gently, then He rose to His feet. “Thank you my radiant flower.” He said, then He left.
I feel that something great and tragic happened that night. Today I feel as though a friend is calling out for mercy. Today I feel sad. But being a flower, I know that tomorrow will bring new joy and hope.’
Carried in the cross 