There are times when my Faith makes me feel like I could walk out to Jesus on the waves without a doubt, and there are times when my fear makes me not want to even get into the boat. We are all afraid in part of going deeper into God. We like to have control of our lives just like we like to have control of the TV remote, when we go deeper into God we start giving up control. Stormie Omartan said ‘we let God into one room of our hearts and tell Him to stay there, but soon He starts knocking on the door to another part of our hearts, then another, then another until He fills our whole hearts. We hate losing control so we shove God in a corner and say we are Christians because we have Jesus, but that’s not what God wants, in fact that behavior is probably to blame for so many people claiming to be Christians but not acting like it. You can’t act like Jesus until He holds your whole heart. We have to trust God and be guided by our Faith so that we can fall so deep in God that we see nothing but Him.
Category: searching
A manly need to protect
In one my favorite novels the MC ends up with a new baby brother; what I love is the part where it says that he suddenly felt a manly need to protect this small form. That is what a dad is. He was the cool kid with the motorcycle and thick wavy hair who married the shy pretty pastor’s daughter, suddenly there is a small form that comes into their lives and he changes from the cool kid to the big bear, the protector, teacher, friend. A manly need to protect comes over him. Don’t miss that word manly. There is nothing weak about being a good father, it’s the opposite, it takes a great strength to be a good dad. God is our Father. God-all powerful being, is our Father. Father is a word synonymous with strength. God gives us dads to provide for and protect us. When a baby is born the man changes from self sufficient island to nurturing care taker, his need to see his child safe, to see them grow, to cry when they hurt to hold them strongly when they’re scared, is all a show of his strength as a person, to become more than himself, to become what they need him to be, that’s a father.
#HappyFathersDay
Uncle Tom
As tears streamed down his face, he spoke with an unwavering voice, he shared his heart with us. It was proud, it was broken, it felt sorrow, yet it held faith. This side of Heaven, a strong man is briskly hiding his tears as he mourns someone he loved dear. He tributes his brother in Heaven with a grin as he recalls his face and his voice and his heart, but refuses to break because his brother would want him to smile.
When we get to Heaven what will people here be saying about us? Will our loved ones feel pride at having loved us? Will they have Faith in God knowing we are in Heaven? Will they say, ‘she loved Jesus fully?’ Will they say, ‘she was my best friend?’
Will we have a tribute that speaks the message of Jesus’ love?
Someone loves you and is watching you. That was the last thing I recall my Great Uncle saying to me, as he hugged me until my lungs popped. It’s a message we should all remember. God loves you and is watching you. Have you spent time with Him today? Will His name be spoken often when people remember you?
Hate is easy, love… that’s the hard part
Hate is easy, love is hard.
Charlie Brown was asked why it is that people didn’t mind you asking them why they didn’t like you but why they did mind if you asked them why they did like you? He replied that it was because the latter was a harder question to answer.
Disliking someone is easy, it takes no effort. I once heard a movie character say that she was now free to hate, unburdened by the ties That Force us to love she felt the freedom of being allowed to hate. It’s a terrible sentiment, and yet it almost makes sense. As Christians we are demanded to love, it’s not a suggestion, it’s not a request, it’s a rule. Jesus said ‘and the greatest of these is love,’ and spoke on love being the sign of your Faith over ten times in the Bible, He also speaks against hating others several times, it is not a request.
Why does God demand it? Because it’s a sign of Him, He is love. Why does He repeat this demand over and over? Because it’s hard to follow. There are so many people that would be so easy to hate, having to love them may even cause you to feel ill or in pain. There are really awful people out there. Think of Corrie Tenboom speaking to the crowd and having that German soldier from the prison camp she was in come up to her and ask for forgiveness, what nerve! He had no right to do that after all she had gone through, right? No. He had the same right to ask for forgiveness that we all do because of Jesus. Because God forgave us we must forgive eachother. Love forces us to forgive the unforgivable, to help those who have hurt us, that’s why love is so hard. If we do not love we are not Christian, love is a sacrifice for Christ, and sometimes loving one another is our way of bearing our cross up to the Place of the Skull. Love is pain. Hate doesn’t hurt in the moment,-though it may hurt in the long run- but love hurts often, that’s why it’s a sacrifice, that’s why so many give up on it, and it’s what separates us from the rest of the world. It’s easy to love your friends, but what kind of crazy person loves their enemies? The kind who is crazy about Jesus and knows they have to love to serve Him.
Do I show Jesus or just speak Jesus?
How do I tell Jesus to the boy sleeping in the cardboard box?
Lately I’ve been reading and re-reading some of the old classic novels. What are the three main things I find in all these novels? 1.poverty is rampant. 2. God is mentioned often. 3. Faith and perseverance are what cause the main character to win.
Poverty. It’s not a word often stated involving North Americans, though many experience it still. Back in the day, however, (and I mean back around the 30s and earlier) poverty was simply a life style. It was just how it was. You read about the little kids smoking and chewing tobacco because back then it was cheaper than food and quenched hunger; kids, worked in the streets and the sweat shops and the ones that didn’t work stole to survive, sometimes the ones who did work still had to steal. And it was a world wide problem. From the kid in Asia hitting the traveler with a rock and searching the body for food or something to trade for food, to the kid in the old factory in the US, hiding because his dad beats him and he can’t risk going home, poverty ran the streets and that was just how it was.
In these novels God is often mentioned as someone that the adults have learned to trust in despite their hardships, but the kids are still learning and they don’t understand. How can God take my family away? How can He let me go days without food so I dig in old gardens to find three year old dead roots to eat, just so I can have something? How do you explain God to them?
You meet them on their level. There was a time when all sidewalk a preacher did was read the Bible and people came to God without needing what they heard explained, that’s what God can do. But you can’t take a kid off the street, fill them full of rules and say ‘that’s God’s will so do it right or you don’t go to Heaven.’ It’s too much. You need to start on where they are at that moment. Tell them of Jesus’ love and how He is there with them, explain how Faith in the hard times will get them through. Most of all, show them love. Don’t look sideways at the dirty kid with barefeet who just entered your Church, take them and get them a water and let them sit with you so you can explain things to them when asked. We preach too many words, we need to live like we were listening to Jesus’ word more. The kid who had lived in moccasins her whole life can’t be expected to suddenly wear shoes, you can’t demand that she dress like you just to hear the word of God! What part of the Bible says ‘thou shalt wear suits to chapel’?
The kid who has run the streets his whole life with no one caring what he did can’t be expected to sit quiet and not fidget, he can’t suddenly be told to pray and receive but not be told what that means, he might pray for a toy truck and never get it and think God doesn’t care. Explain. But keep it to the Bible, not your opinion.
These kids in the stories learn to fight hard, with the right help they learn to trust God, then they win the battle. But if we try to break them to be in our image, they may never learn how to live in God’s image.
Oh, and all the books I’ve been reading are based on true events, so, how many of those true event kids found Jesus and how many were sidelined by people who wanted them to be respectable, but didn’t care if that stopped them from becoming Christians?
How many people have missed out on Jesus because the Christians got in the way?
And how many people met the right Christian? The Christian who wanted to help, the one who was Jesus’ hands and feet and therefore that person was able to guide the lost to Jesus?
I’m saying get out of the way, I’m saying that we need to pray about our approach before speaking. I didn’t think I could ever find a way to speak to a kid who had been mislead by false teachings and show them Jesus, until I prayed about it and God gave me the words to say, and in the end the biggest thing I could do was love and trust God to give me the words. I didn’t say ‘go change and then try again because God won’t see you when you are like this.’ I said what everyone at my booth said, ‘we are all sinners and make mistakes, but Jesus loves us and is our friend.’
Because that’s the Jesus people will respond to, and that’s what Christ Himself preached and that’s how He lived.
Drain
Watching All Creatures Great And Small, we came across an episode where a beautiful spaniel had an absess in the skin of his ear. If your dog has long ears you need to clean them regularily to avoid this.
The vet was forced to drain all the blood from the absess and then sew buttons on the ear to cause the veins to distribute the flowing blood in the ear evenly. Gross yes, hang in there, here’s my point. Sometimes it’s like we have absess on our soul. We haven’t cleaned it properally, we havr let dirt and wet get in there and the infection has grown. Suddenly it hurts all the time so we run back to God and He drains all the inpurity out of our lives once again, but if we don’t let him clean it up and sew on the buttons then the infection will just keep coming back and growing. We need to let God distribute our lives in the way that He knows best, we need Him to be our guide and to control the flow of how we live, only then will the pain be gone.
In the quiet
In the quiet.
With the new Covid lock down we are having to change things up. Walking my dog has been one of the things I have had to change, he still needs walks but I can’t take him where there are people. Last weekend I took him on deer paths instead of following the main trails. The further you walk down these trails made by generally shy and flighty animals you draw further and further away from the people noises around you. You can’t hear vehicles any more and the sound of noise fades away, no more construction or five different people’s music competing against eachother and suddenly the birds are the only song you hear, a bubbling stream rolls past you and you feel peace. That is the moment you can worship without even trying. We struggle to fill our souls with God and to be in the moment because there is so much noise pollution in the world, you can’t concentrate on God because there are too many distractions. So get out of the noise, go into a place of quiet and see if your soul doesn’t take a deep breath and starts seeking God hungrily, it’s not your fault if you struggle to seek God, you just need to get away from all the noise.
Just like mom
Mother’s day.
The tones of laughter drifts up the stairs and a small bark from a white poodle shows the little girl that her mom is taking care of her dog so she doesn’t need to rush. It’s Sunday, Mothers Day, and she wants to look good for mom. Her black satin shoes click as she climbs on to the stool at the bathroom sink. She has her mommy’s makeup kit, and had watched mommy put it on so many times that she was sure she could to do makeup on her own face, she wanted to look her best for Mommy. So she leans in close to the mirror and ‘poof’ face powder sparkles over everything, ‘it’s like fairy dust’ she thinks as she poofs more powder on to her face. Next mommy would use the red stuff, she finds the blush powder brush in with the powder and dabs some on each cheek. What next? Now the stuff for the eyes. She can’t find the eye shadow brush, frustrated but determined she grabs her tooth brush and uses it for the eye makeup. She looks at herself, ‘close enough,’ she decides. ‘Now, how do you work the curling iron?’ Thankfully this is when mommy comes in, alerted to her daughter’s bad idea by the silence from the bathroom. “Oh no!” Mommy shrieks, “sweetie what have you done?” The question is rhetorical.
The little girl smiles big, “look mommy, I made myself pretty for you.”
Mommy is a mix of emotions, she is relieved, horrified, a little irritated, but loves her little girl so much. She picks her daughter up and kisses her -inch thick powdered- cheek, “you are always pretty sweetheart!”
Mommy sits the little girl on her knee and wipes her face clean, as she removes the cloth from the pouting lips mommy does what mommies do and offers to show her sweetie how mommies put on make up. This brightens up the disappointed face and mommy and daughter laugh as they put their ‘faces’ on together. Though they walked into church a little late, the little girl in her swishing cream dress with soft pink flowers, holding to mommy’s hand and smiling loved mommy all the more for her kindness that day. The day was about mommy, but that didn’t stop mommy from taking care of her little girl that day, and they had such great memories.
Thank you Jesus for our mothers. We have ups and downs as parents, but if we cling to the happy memories than we will see that our lives really were good.
Feeling a little splashed?
Jesus being in your boat doesn’t mean you won’t face storms, Him being there means that your storms will not overcome you❤
-Pastor Dennis Shram
I don’t know what storm has hit you, or if you’ve gotten to the – ‘but I have Jesus, so why is this happening?’ – Point or not, but I hope that this encourages you, because it often encourages me. Jesus sometimes has to let is see the storm and feel the waves before saving us so that we are more aware when He causes a breakthrough, now we will see His miracles more clearly because we are looking for them. Sometimes we have to ride out a storm too, because God knows that it is growing something necessary in us. But never forget, that Jesus will never let you drown.
What makes Him a King?
I don’t want to be a Christian in name alone.
There was once a story about a prince who loved his people more than anything, he would dress up as them, leaving behind his royal clothes to dress as a soldier or a peasent so he could be with them, and in being with them he learned more about them and was able to be a better prince because of his love for his people. He said his reason was that he didn’t want to be a prince in name alone, but instead in action and record as someone who cared for his people. He is so like Jesus in that way. Our king came down from Heaven and went among us, caring for us, and loving us so we would know Him better. He has never been a king in name alone, but are we Christians in name alone? We claim to be Christians but we don’t act like it. I never want that to be me, but I know that there are days when it is. We need to have people be able to know we are Christians by our actions, by our love. Just like we know our God is good by His actions and love.
Carried in the cross 