Sonshine!

The first time I realized my home was profoundly different from most was as a teenager during the Cold War. Minute Man missile silos in the near country side were a continuos reminder of world affairs and I worried constantly about peace on earth, goodwill toward men. That there were people on the face of the earth prejudiced toward me simply because I was an American was never far from my mind. Yes, I stayed distressed without ceasing! My dad commented that if I couldn’t think of anything real to worry about I invented something. I’m glad my parents had enough wisdom and personal strength to see me through these age appropriate worries without having me institutionalized or treated for extreme paranoia.

Dad was patient and wise. He realized I was on a journey to knowing God as my source of strength and assurance and sat beside my bed one sleepless night discussing the greatest concerns of my life: Friday night activities, facial blemishes, stylish fashions and the biggie….. Did the opposite sex find me acceptable? Exceptional? Or revolting? In the course of our conversation we graduated to discerning what the worries of fourteen year old Russian girls, or Chinese girls were. I began to realize that adolescent girls worldwide spend most of their creative energy and mental space on boys, social acceptance and daydreams of happily ever after, rather than the nuclear destruction of me.

In the following years as I became a wife and mother I again felt overwhelmed by the social and political status of the world. I had a toddler when the Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City was bombed killing 168 people, including many pre-school children. The terror of Sept. 11, 2001 brought the world to a stop and my mother’s heart felt cold and afraid. As I processed each of these events and many others I returned to that night of crisis when dad taught me that with the exception of a very few extremely evil beings we are all the same world wide with much the same objective, peace. I am comforted that the issues of greatest concern to every mother in the world is the well being of her children. Therefore, there is hope and great possibility of dialogue on world peace or the lack thereof.

Loving a physically and emotionally hungry world is a priority to many people, not just me. I’m not in this alone and never will be. The essence of God is this, He sent His Son, the Prince of Peace to settle the battle between good and evil. The declaration that “Love Never Fails” (I Cor. 13:8) isn’t just a warm fuzzy, but a promise worthy of guiding our every action. It’s 100% guaranteed to win……..… Actually, it already did!

Blessings,
Gretchen

Whoever does not love, does not know God, because God is love.   1 John 4:8

Sometimes there are no more words to add. Have a wonderful weekend and know, you are loved, you are cherished and you have great value because God gave His Son so that sin (yours or anyone else’s) cannot hold you captive.

Love,

Gretchen

Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends. John 15:13 NIV

This verse is commonly used to memorialize civil servants and military that have paid the ultimate price for our freedom and peace, and rightly done. Except, this passage of scripture says nothing about the life given coming to an end. Jesus is emboldening His disciples to love one another, to make love their priority however long life will last.

To lay down our lives for others is to set ourselves aside and put others first, to love others so much that our own feelings, emotions, objectives become shadowed by a world that needs our grace. I’ve often used the slang phrase, “Cut me some slack.” In other words, “I need your grace, please look beyond my carnal instinct and behavior and forgive me.” I need the grace of my family, colleagues and friends daily. When they set aside their natural reaction to my mistakes or misspoken words and return kindness and camaraderie, they have set aside their life for the sake of mine. They put me first when I don’t deserve it but need it in great proportions. Kindness, goodness, perseverance, self-control…….these things are sacrifices that we can offer in our daily walk and the world really could use it.

Christ loves us so much that His comforts, His very life meant nothing in the battle for our eternal life. He put us first. We must lay down our lives for our friends and put them first daily.

Because of the LORD’S great love we are not consumed, for His compassions never fail.  Lamentations 3:22 NIV

Here is a verse packed with powerful words:
Not, meaning prohibition
Consumed, to destroy or expend by use; completely use up.
Compassions, a feeling of deep sympathy and sorrow for another, a strong desire to alleviate the suffering.
Never, at no time.
Fail, fall short of success.

I don’t need to commentate on these powerful words, but I encourage you to put these absolutes into your heart and live them as your reality.

Here is a restatement of Lamentations 3:22 with dictionary.com and Gretchen partnering to remind you of how much love and assurance you have.

Because of the LORD’s great love, He will prohibit us from being destroyed or completely used up, for He has a strong desire to alleviate our suffering, He sympathizes with our sorrows and at no time will He fall short of success in this endeavor!

The LORD had said to Abram, “Go from your country, your people and your father’s household to the land I will show you,” Genesis 12:1 NIV

This verse marks the beginning of Abram’s story. God calls to Abram and he obeys. The end………..NOT!

Abram grew up in the city of Ur. It was a major port metropolis. Residents of Ur had financial security and a high standard of living. Abram’s father Terah took his entire household and began a trek toward Canaan but stopped in Harran. Terah did not honor God (Joshua 24:2) and he died before the journey ended. But God called Abram to leave the traditions and security of his family and the convenience of urban life and go into a wilderness that would be the equivalent to the pioneer’s Kansas prairie.

Why are these details important? Because God called Abram away from what was ordinary and comfortable to make him His own; so he could become extraordinary! Abram’s story ends with the complete change to the history of mankind so you may think this invalidates the relevance of your obedience on this scale. But the story isn’t about the history of the world, it’s about becoming God’s own.

May you feel God’s abundant love today,

Gretchen

“Your Kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in Heaven.” Matthew 6:10 NIV

These very familiar words are taken from Jesus’ prayer that is actually part of His ‘epic’ Sermon on the Mount. They are a request, ‘On earth as it is in Heaven!” That’s a pretty tall order if you ask me. Was Jesus’ just waxing poetic or was He serious?

These things I know: God is Holy. God dwells in Heaven…. Holiness is the absence of sin…. Heaven is Holy so there is no sin there…..God will not dwell in the presence of sin….SO….if Jesus said to pray, “On earth as it is in Heaven,” then Heavenly things are possible for us on earth. Really, Jesus said to pray in this manner, vs 9.

Now ask yourself, “What in Heaven do I long for on earth?” (Be reasonable and know that those loved ones really don’t want to leave there and come back here.) I long for God’s power and Holiness to dwell within me on earth just a boldly as I know it will when my address is Heaven. I can’t create a Holy earth, but I can pray for a Holy me on earth. The essence of Heaven is that God fills that space with His love and Holiness. Today I ask that God fill me, my space, with His love and Holiness and my heart will be ‘On earth as it is in Heaven.”

For God is not a God of disorder but of peace-as in all congregations of the Lord’s people. I Corinthians 14:33

This verse was revolutionary in my walk toward Christian maturity.  Life at it’s finest is still very overwhelming and our natural responses to this state are not good: anger, bitterness, discouragement, despair to name just a few. These responses also lead to actions that fail us in productivity whether it’s in our work or in our relationships.  Does this sound like a play date with the devil?  It always was for me UNTIL a wise older woman said, “Honey, don’t you know God doesn’t wish all this chaos on us, He is a God of Order and Peace, take His Peace!!

Sometimes I have to do a complete houseclean of my activities, schedules, ambitions and expectations to restore Godly order.  Sometimes I just have to rearrange my spiritual furniture to make paths of movement more efficient and comfy. Whatever needs to be done, only you and God will know, but HE IS PEACE.  He is the architect of peace and order.  He wove the universe together and while doing so He gave each creature in that universe the gift of unique individualality. Ask, listen and receive from Him today. He’s certainly up to the challenge.

Have a blessed day.

Gretchen

 

Life in a Borrowed Home
I think my mother took the concept of Christ folding His head covering (John 20:7) before He left the borrowed tomb out of context. She thought the message was: Don’t start your day without making your bed!

Throughout my childhood we lived in church parsonages. The roof over our head was not really ours to do with as we saw fit, but a home on loan to provide shelter and protection to the pastoral family. As Christ left the tomb in better shape than He found it, so would the parsonage family of Sandra Jones leave things better than they found them! I don’t think this was the point in the gospels at all, but I, at age 6, really had no theological grounds for argument, and so that’s the way things were.

Mom believed her home was a testimony of her respect for the church family and the tithes they brought into the storehouse for the perpetuation of the Lord’s work. It didn’t matter if she lived in a mansion or a mud hut, she was just passing through and those who came behind her would know her character by the home she kept.

The day mom found a black sheet of construction paper glued to a newly painted white wall will forever echo in the halls of my memory. My younger sister had decided to do a little redecorating in our bedroom and black on white seemed a great color scheme to a four year old. I remember most how glad I was that it was my sister’s artwork and not my own that had wrought such despair in my mother that particular afternoon. I was not above such behavior, it just wasn’t my day. Boy was mom mad!

Today it’s easy to laugh. We have “washable glue” and construction paper is as thin as onion skin. These innovations are terrific because the glue my sister used could hold the space station together and the paper really was durable enough to “construct” something. It took plenty of elbow grease and sand paper to clean up the mess, but you can be assured my mother didn’t leave it for someone else to find, nor did she just move the furniture to cover up the sins of her children. The redecoration/sin was dealt with appropriately and we moved on all the wiser and a little less free spirited with our decorating flair.

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The marks we leave while passing through are how others will know us and the God we serve. When my mom refused to leave any secrets for someone else to find, she was teaching me that no problem was going to get the best of her. She was tough enough to deal with anything and as her daughter, so was I. Some things really shock you. Some things break your heart, but even though they take some really hard work, things can be fixed and the darkness of sin can be turned to spotless white.

Mother never tried to hide real life behind the parsonage door and pretend it wasn’t there when she went to church. Mom was the same on both sides of the front door. Crisis did arrive, but the world didn’t end because we were not perfect. My mom took care of each moment and moved forward. Most of the time laughter led the way, but there were times when tears and sorrow shadowed our steps. My mom’s faith was consistent and persevering. It’s been said that integrity is what you have when no one is looking. Well, mom (and dad who you will hear about in future posts) had a great deal of integrity. When the front door on the parsonage shut, real life happened but the strength of truth and transparency saw us through and made us strong.