Month: October 2017

Then the angel showed me the river of the water of life, as clear as crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb. Revelation 22:1

Revelation, Biblically speaking, has given me greater pause than any other scripture. I associate it with death. The magnitude and depth of its content are intimidating, but John got to look into Heaven, then tell everyone and it was beyond amazing. It was beautiful and that is often lost, because no one is searching TripAdvisor for the path of least resistance to get there quick.

If you read 21:1-22:6 you will see the New Order, not a new world order, but an eternal order. All things are made new. Like so many things of Heaven, we cannot fathom something that is completely NEW! All we have on earth is what we started with. We understand reuse, recycle, restore, not NEW! But Heaven is nothing of earth. God will dwell among men in a place He has designed from His unprecedented creativity and power.

John saw a river flowing from the Throne of God watering a Tree of Life. This tree holds the power to heal every ill ever imagined. On earth water is necessary to sustain life, in Heaven it is life. Here is something new for me: Heaven holds life, not death.

Living, not dying,

Gretchen

We love because He first loved us. I John 4:19

John’s favorite theme was love, God is LOVE. His command is that we love one another. To love is to obey, to obey is to love.

If you read the entirety of the Bible, God’s breath, His voice, His Word, you will not find a boundary drawn for love. God’s love is boundless, therefore, to live for Him, abide in Him and share eternal life with Him means we love…….without conditions, questions, borders……just love, it’s what we do.

LOVE!

Gretchen

Today I share my sibling’s truth and wisdom with you.  I know you will find her as amazing as I do!  Here are words from Gayle Paladino, the World’s Greatest Middle Sister!

Can the Clay be the Potter?

I love watching those amazing videos of talented pottery artists. They can take lumps of bland, unyielding clay and create beautiful, colorful and functional works of art.  They masterfully apply the skills of kneading, massaging, spinning, molding, glazing, baking and cooling.  They understand clay, and how its properties vary based on where it came from and what it’s made of.  They know just how much water to add to make the clay pliable, and just how much pressure is needed to achieve the design they fancy.  They apply carving tools to add character.  Regardless of the process, the result is a true work of art that is perfect in both form and function.

Videos of novice potters are equally enthralling and always humorous.  They all have one thing in common.  The products of the novice are usually less than aesthetically pleasing, even if they end up being functionally useful.  In other words…they ain’t ”purty”…but they work.

I can’t tell you how many times I’ve taken a figurative look at my life and thought to myself…well, it ain’t “purty”, but it seems to be working (even if just marginally), so I’ll keep plodding along in my slightly useful but ugly imperfection.  How sad it that!?  Yet I can guarantee that each one of you has had that thought and done the same thing.   The questions we need to ask after that look around are:

1. Why is my work of pottery…my life…only marginally useful to the community God placed me in?
2. Why isn’t it pretty?

The answer to both questions is I’M NOT A MASTER POTTER!  GOD is.  I am just a simple lump of clay that He breathed life into.

Isaiah 29:16 (NASB)  says:
You turn things around!
Shall the potter be considered as equal with the clay,
That what is made would say to its maker, “He did not make me”;
Or what is formed say to him who formed it, “He has no understanding”?

Now that really makes sense.  If I’m the clay, how can I ever hope to form myself?  I can wiggle, squirm, poke, roll, and shimmy all I want.  I can buy all the tools the world has to offer, but I am still just the lump of clay.  I simply don’t have the hands, heart or skill of the Master Potter. Rather, I was made to yield to His artistry…to relax into His vision.  As the raw material, I’m free to trust the gentle yet firm hands He has wrapped around me.  I can take direction and character from  the tools He applies to me.  I can rest still and calm even when things are spinning madly, or the furnace is burning fiercely around me.
Once I acknowledge my place in his plan and yield obediently to the Master, the next time look around at my life, I will see something different.  I will see improved function, with a side of beauty.  I will become a useful vessel filled with joy and shining with the beauty that God planned for me.

Have a wonderful week, fellow lumps…and remember what God says:  Be still, and know that I am God (and that you are My precious lump of clay).  Psalm 46:10, the Paladino Unauthorized Paraphrase. 😉

 

“How great you are, O Sovereign LORD! There is no one like you, and there is no God but you, as we have heard with our own ears. 2 Samuel 7:22

God made a covenant with Abraham. His offspring would number as the sands on the earth and bless all people. The Hebrew nation, freed from Egyptian slavery by Moses and led back to their ancestral land, The Promised Land, was this nation. Generations later David becomes their King Through the prophet Nathan, God reveals His plan to complete His promise through David’s family. There would come a King that would reign for all eternity, but have a servant’s heart and an unconditional love that truly ‘makes the world go ‘round.’

It was David’s desire to build a temple for the Ark of the Covenant but to his great disappointment God directed him otherwise. David was a warrior king. His son Solomon, a man of peace, would build the House of God. But God revealed a great plan for David. His throne would change the world for the better. David’s response was the worship and praise above.

David praised and worshiped God because he was the one chosen to bring blessings, but we are the ‘all people’ that were/are blessed. How much more should we repeat David’s response? “You are THE ONE TRUE GOD! How unique and great You are!”

Peace to You,

Gretchen

Will you not revive us again, that your people may rejoice in you? Psalm 85:6

The gift of optimism is a priceless treasure. This Psalmist sees the good in the present and distant future. Sin is a thief. It leaves a path of destruction but God specializes in revival and restoration. Salvation takes care of yesterday and today and makes tomorrow possible.

It is difficult to see the good when devastation’s threat is staring you in the face daily, but Verses 10-12, bear witness to the hope we find in God’s power and glory. The people of old needed the strength of a truthful, but positive outlook and so do we.

Love and faithfulness meet together, righteousness and peace kiss each other. Faithfulness springs forth from the earth, and righteousness looks down from Heaven, The LORD will indeed give what is good, and our land will yield its harvest.
“Love and faithfulness meet together, righteousness and peace kiss each other. Faithfulness springs forth from the earth and righteousness looks down from Heaven.”

Happy Friday,

Gretchen

He restores my soul, He guides me in paths of righteousness for His name’s sake. Psalm 23:3

We are a dependent humanity living in a hostile world. God jealously guards us, His supreme creation, from evil and governs our moral behavior, making us righteous.

Psalm 23 is a song of trust. David wrote this Psalm while still a shepherd boy on the plains of Judea where hundreds of years later, a host of angels announced the coming of another child that would become a King, a Shepherd, the Prince of PEACE.

Each fall, millions of birds, among hundreds of species take to the sky and make their way to warmer climates so they may live. Why? Because God made it so. He takes wonderful care of them. Only God can restore what the weariness of this world has stolen. It is not in God’s character to leave His children lost and struggling. He does not and He will not. Because we are His, He will take us where we are safe, secure and sustained and Holy.

Love,

Gretchen

Who is the King of Glory? The LORD strong and mighty, the LORD mighty in battle. Psalm 24:8

David’s greatest desire was to bring the Ark of the Covenant to Jerusalem, to a permanent home among God’s people. A chest made of acacia wood and overlaid with gold, held the Ten commandments, a pot of manna and Aaron’s Rod. Historically and symbolically there was nothing more important to Israel than this box representing God’s love, promise and presence. David’s vision for Jerusalem was that it be God’s home, a place of refuge, security, worship and praise.

This all important vessel, THE defining object of those that left slavery in Egypt and became God’s covenant nation in the wilderness had come home. You can imagine the excitement along the streets. Victory had been won! The world and everything in it belongs to God. It was a great time of worship and celebration.

Psalm 24 was thought to have been written for the processional bringing the Ark home. Today this would compare to a Sousa March on the 4th of July. If you read the entire Psalm it speaks of gates, doors and heads lifted up. Jerusalem was a walled, fortified, gated city. The gates were closed and locked but with joy and hope a way was made clear for the presence of the King of Glory, the LORD strong and might to enter and stay forever.

Lift up your heads, O you gates; be lifted up, you ancient doors, that the King of Glory may come in. vs. 7 Make a way for God to enter your heart and remain forever. Make your heart the highest place of honor for the Lord Strong and Mighty.

Love,

Gretchen

“For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life as a ransom for many.” Mark 10:45

Jesus is returning to Jerusalem for the final time. He tells his disciples what will happen, that He will be delivered to those who want to kill Him. How much they truly understand is unclear. Jesus is clear about His future though. Other gospels show that Jesus repeatedly encourages and comforts His disciples as the days and hours of His crucifixion draw closer.

James and John, brothers, the sons of Zebedee, in response, come to Jesus and ask to share in His glory. There have been many commentaries on the actions, motivations and attitudes of the two men so bold as to ask for places number one and two at the Throne of God. The fact that matters is, they did not want to be separated from Jesus. They wanted to be where He was, in the present and certainly to the future. So they asked for a guarantee of close proximity for all ages.

There was a discussion you can read in verses 38-44, but in the end Jesus lays it out plainly: If you want to be with Me, you must be like Me and do as I do. Seems like a lot to demand, until you realize it is no demand at all, but rather an invitation to eternity that begins in this very moment.

Blessings,

Gretchen

 

Indeed, He who watches over Israel will neither slumber nor sleep. Psalm 121:4

Eight beautiful verses. Enjoy them all! It’s a pep talk so get ready to rally! If God’s ancient people sang praise choruses, this Psalm would be in the worship rotation.

People would come from all over Israel to Jerusalem for festivals and feasts, a time of celebration and worship of the One True God who led and sustained them. They traveled by foot. The writer observed they walked, with their heads down, watching for obstacles along the road. Doesn’t everyone?

Those pilgrims of long ago were traveling to the city of hope to join family and friends and remember the God who delivered them out of bondage. The God of ages past was faithful to His covenant people. Yet, these people did not always live as though they believed God would remain the same. Would He change and suddenly not care for them anymore? Would their faith become futile? No! The LORD will watch over you forever more, so get your head up and rejoice.

Love,

Gretchen

Smog in my Coffee

My life, Monday through Friday, involves a sunrise, a panoramic view of each new day’s beginning. It’s nothing glamorous or earth shaking, I drive a school bus, so with a little diesel, a few sleepy hellos mixed with beautiful little souls that ‘do mornings’, I set off to start each day.

Many years ago my science teacher led his class of curious young scholars to discover that oxygen was not air, oxygen was in the air along with many substances, but not everything we draw into our lungs is oxygen. This knowledgable gentleman added that it was the molecules of other airborne substances in earth’s atmosphere that made day break and dusk so colorful. With some help from the class clown/smart aleck and my own ability to reason, I discerned that it was pollution painting the morning sky and the saddest part of this is that I will never see pure sunlight, as I have no interest in space travel. Since this occasion of great scientific revelation I have had a slightly twisted opinion of daybreak. My constant mental question is, “Am I seeing life giving beauty or deadly toxins?” The answer determines my right to gasp in wonder or cringe in fear. Yes, this is my mind behind my every blink.

But….. days ago I was listening to two young boys quietly laugh and giggle. My route turned toward the east. There were wispy clouds on the horizon, geese were taking flight for their annual pilgrimage to warmer climates, various fur babies were about their morning constitutions, the world was breathing, pulsing with life, and all dressed up with treetops silhouetted against a radiant realm of variegated oranges and yellows. A peace overwhelmed me and God’s voice spoke. “Gretchen, it’s time you flip your filter.”

A filter is a purification system, a refining agent that sifts away harmful things leaving something clear and clean. Somewhere along the way, mine got turned around. Every ray of sunshine reminded me of a world full of dirt and decay, destruction and devastation. This is not God’s desire.

I looked at the bugs on the windshield in sadness knowing they were a great distraction to my perspective but I gazed further through the sky. I knew beyond the blue, stars, muted by the sun’s great brilliance, filled deep space and further still there was infinity, a facet of God alone that I cannot fathom, yet in His loving kindness He controls and keeps in perfect balance and in His untarnished judgement all is secure.

Sing to the LORD, you saints of His; praise His Holy name.
For His anger lasts only a moment,
But His favor lasts a lifetime;
Weeping may remain for a night,
But JOY comes in the morning.
Psalm 30:5

It does not matter what is between me and the sun, it is the sun and it determines the continuation of life on earth because God made it so. When He is ready to change things He will. It has occurred to me recently that some of those molecules I worry so much about smell really good, like fresh baked cinnamon rolls or my mother’s perfume. So, I will Praise the Name of Jesus, see beauty rather than filth and worship Him as all creation was designed to do. He does not ask me to save the world, He asks me to love and let Him do The God stuff.

Literally smelling the Roses,

Gretchen