Fire!

 

By Marilyn Travis

 

Fire is certainly on our minds lately. Seeing images of the many wildfires raging in our beautiful wilderness brings a flood of powerful emotions. It is beautiful, terrifying, destructive and unpredictable. It saddens me to think of charred trees and blackened land.

 

However, fire is also necessary. New life springs from burned forests. The ash enriches the soil with nutrients, pinecones burst and new trees sprout, wildflowers abound after a fire. Fire plays an important role in the regeneration of our forests.

 

Of course, fire is also prevalent in Scripture. Christianity.com states, “The Bible describes the Lord God as ‘a consuming fire’ (Hebrews 12:29) which is why Scripture often uses it as a symbol of the presence of God.” The list of personal studies I’d like to dive into is growing. I want to go deeper into the references to fire in the Bible.

 

One verse I came across was 1 Peter 1:7. It refers to our faith being tested by fire. I don’t want to share just one verse with you though. The entire chapter held great meaning for me as I read it. I think it is appropriate and addresses the events we are experiencing. This chapter is from the New Living Translation.

 

Greetings from Peter

 

1 This letter is from Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ.

 

I am writing to God’s chosen people who are living as foreigners in the provinces of Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia. ² God the Father knew you and chose you long ago, and his Spirit has made you holy. As a result, you have obeyed him and have been cleansed by the blood of Jesus Christ.

 

May God give you more and more grace and peace.

 

The Hope of Eternal Life

 

³ All praise to God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. It is by his great mercy that we have been born again, because God raised Jesus Christ from the dead. Now we live with great expectation, ⁴ and we have a priceless inheritance—an inheritance that is kept in heaven for you, pure and undefiled, beyond the reach of change and decay. ⁵ And through your faith, God is protecting you by his power until you receive this salvation, which is ready to be revealed on the last day for all to see.

 

⁶ So be truly glad. There is wonderful joy ahead, even though you must endure many trials for a little while. ⁷ These trials will show that your faith is genuine. It is being tested as fire tests and purifies gold—though your faith is far more precious than mere gold. So when your faith remains strong through many trials, it will bring you much praise and glory and honor on the day when Jesus Christ is revealed to the whole world.

 

⁸ You love him even though you have never seen him. Though you do not see him now, you trust him; and you rejoice with a glorious, inexpressible joy. ⁹ The reward for trusting him will be the salvation of your souls.

 

¹⁰ This salvation was something even the prophets wanted to know more about when they prophesied about this gracious salvation prepared for you. ¹¹ They wondered what time or situation the Spirit of Christ within them was talking about when he told them in advance about Christ’s suffering and his great glory afterward.

 

¹² They were told that their messages were not for themselves, but for you. And now this Good News has been announced to you by those who preached in the power of the Holy Spirit sent from heaven. It is all so wonderful that even the angels are eagerly watching these things happen.

 

A Call to Holy Living

 

¹³ So prepare your minds for action and exercise self-control. Put all your hope in the gracious salvation that will come to you when Jesus Christ is revealed to the world. ¹⁴ So you must live as God’s obedient children. Don’t slip back into your old ways of living to satisfy your own desires. You didn’t know any better then. ¹⁵ But now you must be holy in everything you do, just as God who chose you is holy. ¹⁶ For the Scriptures say, “You must be holy because I am holy.”

 

¹⁷ And remember that the heavenly Father to whom you pray has no favorites. He will judge or reward you according to what you do. So you must live in reverent fear of him during your time here as “temporary residents.” ¹⁸ For you know that God paid a ransom to save you from the empty life you inherited from your

ancestors. And it was not paid with mere gold or silver, which lose their value. ¹⁹ It was the precious blood of Christ, the sinless, spotless Lamb of God. ²⁰ God chose him as your ransom long before the world began, but now in these last days he has been revealed for your sake.

 

²¹ Through Christ you have come to trust in God. And you have placed your faith and hope in God because he raised Christ from the dead and gave him great glory.

 

²² You were cleansed from your sins when you obeyed the truth, so now you must show sincere love to each other as brothers and sisters. Love each other deeply with all your heart.

²³ For you have been born again, but not to a life that will quickly end. Your new life will last forever because it comes from the eternal, living word of God. ²⁴ As the Scriptures say,

 

“People are like grass;
    their beauty is like a flower in the field.
The grass withers and the flower fades.
²⁵     But the word of the Lord remains forever.”

 

And that word is the Good News that was preached to you.

 

Amen!

 

Conversations With Jesus

By Brooke Momblow

 

 

“You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart.”

 

Jeremiah 29:13

 

My grandmother, my dad’s mom, had an unshakable faith in Jesus. When she would pray, things happened. When I was a child, she told me Jesus lived in my heart and I could talk to him whenever I wanted and if I’d listen really close I could hear him talking in my heart too.

 

My dad told me something different. He said that some people are just special, like my grandmother… they have the ear of God… the rest of us just have to do our best and try to be good people because God doesn’t talk to us like that.

 

When I discovered an interactive relationship with Jesus through the Holy Spirit, I was a young teenager. From reading my Bible I realized the Holy Spirit wasn’t only for a few gifted people, it was how everyone was intended to walk with Jesus. What I saw exhibited in scripture was that an encounter with Jesus either turned your world inside out or you chose to ignore him and what he offered. Choosing to follow Christ as described in scripture is marked by great love and desire for God and supernatural Spirit leading and empowering.

 

In the gospels Jesus was our example of seeking God, communicating with him, and following in obedience. This was a way of life, a reality lived by Paul, the disciples, Stephen, Timothy, Barnabas, and those many individuals in the early church because of the Holy Spirit. My grandmother lived that way.

 

Jesus became my best friend and I talked to him all hours of the day in casual conversation. In the beginning it was a lot of me talking about me and my world. But as the Holy Spirit met with me and taught me through the Bible, I learned to listen more and to care more about the things God cares about. Jesus became my greatest joy.

 

Enthusiastically, I would share with my parents what I was discovering and how I thought the Spirit was leading me. Convinced that I had inherited my grandmother’s special ability, dad would often request that I ask God for an answer for him about a job to take, or a car to buy, or wisdom for a difficult situation. Unable to convince him that talking to God was open to anyone who chose to seek and follow Christ, my teenage self would sometimes get mad and retort that I wasn’t a magic lamp.

 

For years I prayed my father would encounter Jesus. I asked that my dad would be able to grasp how great Jesus’ love was for him, that he would choose to follow Jesus in all his ways and discover what great joy and peace it brought, that he would walk in relationship with the Holy Spirit.

 

A.W. Tozer said, “The Holy Spirit is not a luxury meant to make deluxe Christians, as an illuminated frontispiece and a leather binding make a deluxe book. The Spirit is an imperative necessity. Only the Eternal Spirit can do eternal deeds.”

 

In The Pursuit of God, he also said, “For it is not mere words that nourish the soul, but God Himself, and unless and until hearers find God in personal experience they are not the better for having heard the truth. The Bible is not an end in itself but a means to bring [people] to an intimate and satisfying knowledge of God…”

 

On a random day long after my dad retired, he called me to his house to tell me that he finally understood what I’d been talking about for all those years. His face radiated; his smile beamed. I cried. In my head I pictured my grandma dancing with the angels.

 

After that I endured many lectures from him about relying on God and praying about everything. He loved to share about the ways God answered prayer and what actions he was taking in response to a sermon or the Spirit’s leading. He was joyful on the inside, a way I’d never known him to be.

 

C.S. Lewis says that love isn't an affectionate feeling but a desire for the other person’s highest good. Throughout the years I’ve found that the prayers I pray for others are very similar to the prayers I prayed for my dad. Christ is our highest good. Even if we’ve never met, I know how much God loves you, and I want God’s best for you.

 

St. Seraphim of Sarov said, “For the true aim of the Christian life is the acquisition of the Holy Spirit of God.”

 

The Spirit always points us to Jesus. Jesus points us to a relationship with the Father.

 

Lord, grant us the desire to seek you. Give us a love for you as passionate as your love is for us. May we know the joy of relationship with You. 

 

Going Deeper for August 16

By Pat Russell

 

 

Considering the sermon by Pastor Bruce on August 16, 2020

 

If someone else thinks they have reasons to put confidence in the flesh, I have more: circumcised on the eighth day, of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews; in regard to the law, a Pharisee; as for zeal, persecuting the church; as for righteousness based on the law, faultless. Philippians 3: 4-6

 

For you have heard of my previous way of life in Judaism, how intensely I persecuted the church of God and tried to destroy it. I was advancing in Judaism beyond many of my own age among my people and was extremely zealous for the traditions of my fathers. Galatians 1:13-14

 

Paul answered, “I am a Jew, from Tarsus in Cilicia, a citizen of no ordinary city." Acts 21:39 

 

“I am a Jew, born in Tarsus of Cilicia, but brought up in this city. I studied under Gamaliel and was thoroughly trained in the law of our ancestors. I was just as zealous for God as any of you are today. I persecuted the followers of this Way to their death, arresting both men and women and throwing them into prison, as the high priest and all the Council can themselves testify. I even obtained letters from them to their associates in Damascus and went there to bring these people as prisoners to Jerusalem to be punished." Acts 22:3-5

 

“The Jewish people all know the way I have lived ever since I was a child, from the beginning of my life in my own country, and also in Jerusalem. They have known me for a long time and can testify, if they are willing, that I conformed to the strictest sect of our religion, living as a Pharisee." Acts 26:4-5

 

Today as Pastor Bruce spoke about Paul’s history, I was impressed with a couple of thoughts:

 

1.  No matter how “bad” or “good” a personal history is, God is able to take the past and make something of worth in the present.  He does not waste anything in our lives!
   
   
2. Paul was so very willing to acknowledge all that he was and did in his past in order to help those he was around in the present to grow in their faith walk.  He was vulnerable about the “bad” and the “good.”  He knew that God sooo loved him in it all!
   

So, today, I thought it would be good for us to take stock of our past – all that it was and how it continues to be a part of lives.  Donna and Frank did a bit of that today as they reflected on their music history and on Donna’s dad.  Probably you were as moved as I was to hear their vulnerability while sharing.

 

Dallas Willard in his wonderful book entitled, Life Without Lack: Living in the Fullness of Psalm 23, says, “In either case [thinking about our parents or our children and I add ourselves] we begin by asking God to help us delight in them, focus on what is good for them [I would add, FROM them for us in these days], and celebrate what is valuable within them. This may involve going back in our memories, and saying, ‘Lord, help me to remember the good.’  Because it may be that things have been so bad that you are unable to see anything good or valuable.  No one is only an unvarnished lump of bad.  We must seek to see them, to relate to them as it is appropriate and good.”

 

Here are some questions to aid in your review of your personal history:

 

1. What are the hurts that still linger in your thoughts and feelings?  I suggest holding them up to God by actually cupping your hands in prayer.
   
   
2. What are the places of shame that come to mind about your past?  I suggest taking your cupped hands filled with those thoughts and turning them over in prayer as you lay them in Jesus hands.
   
   
3. What are the gifts that you have received from your past?  I suggest holding your gifts up to God by raising your hands in praise and thanksgiving.
   
   
4. Now, how do you see God using your hurts, your shame, your gifts in your present life for good?  Read Romans 8:28 out loud “with Paul”:  “We know that all things work together for good for those who love God, who are called according to his purpose.”
   
   
5. Lastly, remembering Paul’s and Savanah Guthrie’s vulnerability, consider sharing with someone you trust, what went on in your thoughts and feeling and prayers today. Or, ask them to listen to your as you reflect on these questions.  Then, pray together.

 

May the Lord bless you today with holy remembering.

 

This Sacred Life (Continued)

 

By Pastor Bruce

 

 

 

 

It wasn’t only Celtic women who sang and prayed their way through their days. The men would sing as they headed off to the fields or the sea for work which sometimes exposed them to danger:

 

My walk this day with God,

My walk this day with Christ,

My walk this day with Spirit.

The threefold all-kindly:

 

Ho! ho! ho! the Threefold all-kindly.

My shielding this day from ill,

My shielding this night from harm,

Ho! ho! both my soul and my body,

Be by Father, by Son, by Holy Spirit:

By Father, by Son, by Holy Spirit.

 

Be the Father shielding me,

Be the Son shielding me,

Be the Spirit shielding me,

As Three and as One:

Ho! ho! ho! as Three and as One.

 

At harvest time, they would recite these words:

 

God bless Thou thyself my reaping,

Each ridge, and plain, and field,

Each sickle curved, shapely, hard,

Each ear and handful in the sheaf;

Each ear and handful in the sheaf.

 

A home was not built without it being blessed and consecrated to God:

 

God bless the corners of this house and all the lintel blessed,

And bless the hearth and bless the board and bless each place of rest,

And bless each door that opens wide to strangers as to kin,

And bless each crystal windowpane that lets the starlight in,

And bless the rooftree overhead and every sturdy wall.

The peace of man. The peace of God. With peace and love for all.

 

And children were encompassed by the grace of God in word and song from the hour of their birth. Before an infant was presented to the priest for baptism, the women who assisted in the birth had already consecrated the newborn with these words:

 

In the name of God,

In the name of Jesus,

In the name of Spirit,

The perfect Three of power.

 

The little drop of the Father

On thy little forehead, beloved one.

 

The little drop of the Son

On thy little forehead, beloved one.

 

The little drop of the Spirit

On thy little forehead, beloved one.

 

To aid thee, to guard thee,

To shield thee, to surround thee.

 

To keep thee from the fays,

To shield thee from the host.

 

To sain thee from the gnome,

To deliver thee from the spectre.

 

The little drop of the Three

To shield thee from the sorrow.

 

The little drop of the Three

To fill thee with Their pleasantness.

 

The little drop of the Three

To fill thee with Their virtue.

 

O the little drop of the Three

To fill thee with Their virtue.

 

And then these mother’s words to them as they left the home on their wedding day:

 

The benison (blessing) of God be to thee,

The benison of Christ be to thee,

The benison of Spirit be to thee,

And to thy children,

To thee and to thy children.

 

The peace of God be to thee,

The peace of Christ be to thee,

The peace of Spirit be to thee,

During all thy life,

All the days of thy life.

 

The keeping of God upon thee in every pass,

The shielding of Christ upon thee in every path,

The bathing of Spirit upon thee in every stream,

In every land and sea thou goest.

 

And each day ended with a bedside prayer:

 

I am lying down tonight as beseems

In the fellowship of Christ, son of the Virgin of ringlets,

In the fellowship of the gracious Father of glory,

In the fellowship of the Spirit of powerful aid.

 

I am lying down tonight with God,

And God tonight will He down with me,

I will not lie down tonight with sin, nor shall

Sin or sin’s shadow lie down with me.

 

I am lying down tonight with the Holy Spirit,

And the Holy Spirit this night will lie down with me,

I will lie down this night with the Three of my love,

And the Three of my love will lie down with me.

 

And then as a dear friend, parent or spouse approached the gates of heaven, these words were spoken:

 

Sleep now, sleep, and away with your sorrow,

Sleep now, sleep, and away with your sorrow,

Sleep now, sleep, and away with your sorrow,

Sleep, my loved one, in the Rock of the fold.

 

Sleep, O sleep in the calm of all calm.

Sleep, O sleep in the guidance of guidance.

Sleep, O sleep in the love of all loves.

Sleep, my loved one, in the Lord of life.

Sleep, my loved one, in the God of life.

 

The shade of death lies upon your face, my loved one,

But the Jesus of Grace has his hand round about you;

In nearness to the Trinity, farewell to your pains;

Christ stands before you and Peace is in his hand.

 

 

 

Poems taken from Every Earthly Blessing: Rediscovering the Celtic Tradition  by Esther de Waal and Celtic Daily Prayer compiled and published by the Northumbrian Community

 

This Sacred Life

By Pastor Bruce

 

 

Perhaps the greatest loss in the consignment of Celtic spirituality to the dustbins of our Anglo-Saxon past is that we no longer view each hour and activity of life as a sacred gift from God to be received with thanksgiving and praise.

 

When Susan and I heard Cambridge graduate, Esther de Waal, author of Every Earthly Blessing: Rediscovering the Celtic Tradition, speak at Oxford, we were very taken by her non-academic grandmotherly manner, that of an ancient sage rather than the pre-eminent authority on our Celtic heritage.

 

 

We learned that awareness that every part of our daily lives is a sacred gift from above, and each act throughout our busy days a sacred offering to the God of all life, was what she was seeking to preserve and restore to our modern world where life has turned so flat and secular.

 

She said her favorite method of research was to travel her native Wales (as well as Ireland and Scotland) visiting with elderly women who still remember the songs their grandmothers had sung as they went about their daily tasks.

 

And song for the start of day by splashing a handful of water on your face three times:

 

A palmful of the God of Life

A palmful of the Christ of Love

A palmful of the Spirit of Peace

Oh, Triune God of Grace.

 

Then a prayer for making the bed:

 

I make this bed

In the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost,

In the name of the night we were conceived,

In the name of the night that we were born,

In the name of the day we were baptized,

In the name of each night, each day,

Each angel that is in the heavens.

 

Followed by a prayer as the fire is kindled in the hearth:

 

I will kindle my fire this morning

In the presence of the holy angels of heaven...

God kindle Thou in my heart within

A flame of love to my neighbor,

To my foe, to my friend, to my kindred all...

To the brave, to the knave, to the slave,

O Son of the loveliest Mary,

O Son of the loveliest Mary,

From the lowliest thing that liveth

To the Name that is highest of all.

 

And then as the family cow was milked for that day’s sustenance:

 

Bless O God my little cow,

Bless O God my desire;

Bless Thou my partnership

And the milking of my hands, O God.

 

Bless O God each teat,

Bless O God each finger;

Bless Thou each drop

That goes into my pitcher, O God.

 

And then for brewing the ale which was a staple of their diet, this poem of profound faith and hope de Waal learned from “an old Kerry woman in the south-west of Ireland who still recites words which may well be in origin as old as the tenth or eleventh century.”

 

I would like to have the men of Heaven

In my own house;

With vats of good cheer

Laid out for them.

 

I would like to have the three Marys,

Their fame is so great.

I would like people

From every corner of Heaven.

 

I would like them to be cheerful

In their drinking,

I would like to have Jesus too

Here amongst them.

 

I would like a great lake of beer

For the King of Kings,

I would like to be watching Heaven’s family

Drinking it through all eternity.

 

And finally at the end of day:

 

The sacred Three

To save

To shield

To surround

The hearth

The house

The household

This eve

This night

And every night

Each single night. Amen.

 

“For the men and women who recited them,” de Waal explained, “prayer was not a formal exercise; it was a state of mind. Life was lived under the shadow of God’s outstretched arm; his protection was constantly sought. They have in them something of the breadth and depth of the Hebrew psalms.”

 

Our friend Richard Foster explains it this way, “This sacramental way of living addresses the crying need to experience God as truly manifest and notoriously active in daily life.”

 

This worldview may seem so quaint and distant, but it is a world I far prefer to live in than a world without a sense of the divine. As Thomas Kelly wrote in A Testament of Devotion:

 

Life is meant to be lived from a Center, a divine Center… Life from the Center is a life of unhurried peace and power. It is simple. It is serene. It is amazing. It is triumphant. It is radiant. It takes no time, but it occupies all our time. And it makes our life programs new and overcoming. We need not get frantic. He is at the helm. And when our little day is done, we lie down quietly in peace, for all is well.

 

High Places

By Brooke Momblow

 

 

 

“He makes my feet like hinds’ feet [able to stand firmly or make progress on the dangerous heights of testing and trouble]; He sets me securely upon my high places.” Psalm 18:33 AMPC

 

If you’ve never read Hinds’ Feet on High Places, it is a beautiful allegory of walking in relationship with Jesus through life. Much Afraid, who has club feet, and her two companions Sorrow and Suffering set out on a path to follow the Shepherd and get new feet. The journey is riddled with obstacles and enemies. In the process, they all grow in ways they never could have imagined, realize the great love of the Shepherd for them, and at the end of their journey are given beautiful new names. I love this story.

 

Bill and I planned to hike a couple of 14ers with the dogs on our trip last month. After some injuries I haven’t been able to walk very far the last two years without great pain, so I was anxious about being able to hike a mountain. But I’ve been putting in the work to get well and wanted to at least try, even if it meant I hiked at a snail’s pace. I did it. It took me a long time and my husband was as patient as a saint.

 

After the first 14er my confidence grew. The last 14er we did was my favorite part of our trip. Everywhere we looked there was something stunning to see: waterfalls, wildflowers, animals, peak vistas. Well worth the effort. Our dogs were able to run off-leash for a good portion of our climb. I struggled to breathe, and I struggled to push myself without re-injuring anything, but I also made a point to look up and look around. Chena, our hunting dog, would speed up the side of the mountain to such heights she almost disappeared from view, then she would barrel back down to check in with us and speed by to run the entire length of the meadow, then back again for a quick passing check-in and right back up the side of the mountain to repeat all over again. Her energy and ability were mind boggling. She kept at this for hours without fading.

 

Chena’s antics reminded me of Much Afraid’s quest, and I could see the parallels in my own story, too. She said, “O Shepherd. You said you would make my feet like hinds’ feet and set me upon High Places.”

 

“Well,” he answered, “the only way to develop hinds’ feet is to go by the paths which the hinds use… The High Places are the starting places for the journey down to the lowest place in the world. When you have hinds’ feet and can go ‘leaping on the mountains and skipping on the hills,’ you will be able, as I am, to run down from the heights in the gladdest self-giving and then go up to the mountains again. You will be able to mount the High Places swifter than eagles, for it is only up on the High Places of Love that anyone can receive the power to pour themselves down in an utter abandonment of self-giving.” Hannah Hurnard, Hinds’ Feet on High Places

 

Peak experiences are magnificent, but we don’t stay there. We come back down the mountain into the valley, and we bring treasures with us to share.

 

“John of the Cross tells us that our journey will often include a time when what we know of God no longer seems to be valid, and God seems far away. His work offers an important corrective to our way of thinking about the spiritual journey, for the journey includes not only growing deeper and deeper in a joyful, affirmative way, but also time in the valley of the shadow of death. John of the Cross helps us be realistic about times when our understanding of God seems darkened as we are led into a deepening walk with God. It requires death to find new birth and life. We may have mountaintop experiences, but we will surely then have to come back down, go back to the living of our lives, and journey with others in the valley.” Heather Parkinson-Webb

 

“My idea of God is not a divine idea. It has to be shattered time after time. He shatters it Himself.” C.S. Lewis, A Grief Observed

 

My mountaintop experience was fulfilling not just because of the amazing sights, but also because it had become difficult for me to believe I could make the journey to the mountaintop (physically or spiritually). I’m healing. Someday I hope to bound across the heights like Chena. In the meantime, I’ll take the paths the hinds use in order to develop a heart that loves like my Shepherd loves.

 

Dear Father, help us to know you better and to quit trying to confine you to what we understand. Open our eyes to see beyond what we expect. Help our unbelief. Let us encounter you through your Holy Spirit. Be glorified in us. Amen.

 

Lord, you are my God; I will exalt you and praise your name, for in perfect faithfulness you have done wonderful things, things planned long ago. Isaiah 25:1 NIV

Mosaic

By Marilyn Travis

 

 

I’ve been contemplating the idea of my life long spiritual journey. I used to picture a linear path, from birth to death, growing in Christ as I get older, and hopefully growing in grace and knowledge as well.

 

Lately, though, that image in my mind has changed. I realize, of course, that my life on this earth still begins with my birth and ends with my death. My spiritual journey is so much more complex than that linear vision. I began to picture a wide, winding path, with hills and valleys, lush vegetation and barren expanse – much more indicative of real life and real growth. Then I began to imagine the path itself. The base I believe is faith. My faith in Christ is the foundation of my life. Yet what makes my life different from every other life? What makes my journey unique to me?

 

Imagine a path made of a mosaic of tiles. Each tile an integral piece of the path, a stepping-stone creating a pattern. Each tile represents a person, a relationship, a place, an experience, or a lesson. Some tiles may be large and contain several small pieces within themselves. Others are a tiny fragment of the whole.

 

The inspiration for this contemplation came from a piece I wrote in 2002 about my relationship with my brother Robert. For those of you who may not know him, my parents adopted him when he was seven months old. He is three years older than I am and has developmental disabilities.

 

I titled it “Mosaic.”

My life is a mosaic of contrasts.

I am the little sister, yet the big sister.

To my brother I’m also a parent.

I must guide yet appear to be guided.

I am a disciplinarian and a friend.

I am an advocate, yet I’m reluctant to get involved.

I feel great love weighed by great responsibility.

I long to be free,

yet I would not trade my brother for any other.

I didn’t choose to be his sister;

the choice was made for me.

Sometimes I’m embarrassed by him

or feel he’s a burden,

but truly he is a blessing.

I have been entrusted with the privilege

of caring for a special child of God, 

and God creates a perfect pattern,

placing these contrasting shards

and fusing them together

into a beautiful mosaic.

 

It is comforting to know that God loves me and knows everything about me. He knows every detail, every thought, and He has a grand design for my life. If I allow Him to, He will create a lovely path for me to follow. He can expertly place each “tile.”

 

Psalm 139: 1-14, 23-24

 

Oh Lord, you have searched me

and You know me.

You know when I sit and when I rise;

You perceive my thoughts from afar.

You discern my going out and my lying down;

You are familiar with all my ways.

Before a word is on my tongue

You know it completely, O Lord.

You hem me in behind and before;

You have laid your hand upon me.

Such knowledge is too wonderful for me,

too lofty for me to attain.

Where can I go from your Spirit?

Where can I flee from Your presence?

If I go up to the heavens, you are there;

If I make my bed in the depths, You are there.

If I rise on the wings of the dawn,

If I settle on the far side of the sea,

even there Your hand will guide me;

Your right hand will hold me fast.

If I say, “Surely the darkness will hide me

and the light become night around me,”

even the darkness will not be dark to You;

the night will shine like the day,

for darkness is as light to You.

For You created my inmost being;

You knit me together in my mother’s womb.

I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made;

Your works are wonderful.

I know that full well.

Search me, O God, and know my heart;

test me and know my anxious thoughts.

See if there is any offensive way in me,

and lead me in the way everlasting.

 

I encourage you to reflect upon your own journey, and the mosaic that creates your path. I also encourage you to do an internet search of “mosaic pathways.” They are beautiful!

 

Don’t forget to thank the Lord for each tile piece in your life’s journey.

 

Remember Proverbs 3: 5-6

 

Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and lean not on your own understanding.

In all your ways acknowledge Him, and He shall direct your paths.