He was thinking of you……

Surely he took up our pain and bore our suffering, yet we considered him punished by God, stricken by him, and afflicted.

He wants to take them up even now, He is waiting.

But he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was on him, and by his wounds we are healed.

He was willing to be a loser in the eyes of the world so that we might be winners.

We all, like sheep, have gone astray, each of us has turned to our own way; and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all.

He took the punishment and death meant for us willingly so that we wouldn’t have to since we were powerless to do so anyway.

He was oppressed and afflicted, yet he did not open his mouth; he was led like a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before its shearers is silent, so he did not open his mouth.

He took the mortal death blows so that we could all be reunited with God and live as one happy family in eternity.

His resurrection gives us peace in this life as we await the next.

He could have silenced them all with one glance, but He took our punishment like a man. He wasn’t afraid to be misunderstood and misrepresented.

He took a false charge because He was thinking of you and me and our future together.

Isaiah 53:4-7 Commentary in between verses are my own thoughts in prayer while reading through passages.

The Suffering Servant

Who has believed our message?
And to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed?
For He grew up before Him like a tender shoot,
And like a root out of parched ground;

He has no stately form or majesty
That we should look upon Him,
Nor appearance that we should be attracted to Him.
He was despised and forsaken of men,

A man of sorrows and acquainted with grief;
And like one from whom men hide their face
He was despised, and we did not esteem Him.

Isaiah 53:1-3

700 years before Jesus walked the earth…..

Images: Google, me, and Laurence Olivier playing the role of Nicodemus in Jesus of Nazareth directed by Franco Zeffirelli circa 1977

My humble Hosanna……

Thank you Lord for this day……this week…… this month…….all these years. 40 years now I have walked with you and many times I have turned aside from the trail only to get myself lost in the brambles, stumbling around in own wilderness which I thought was better than the road you and I were on together.

Time after time you have pulled me out of the deep and set me back into the blinding light of your grace.

And it’s your grace and love that brings me back again and again.

I hope that when I get to the end of this road, looking back will show me all the ground we have covered together and that there be spots of lights where I helped another find their way.

On this Palm Sunday I once again put myself in that crowd of people along the road to Jerusalem. I can hear their cries and see the cloaks thrown in the road and right alongside is my own.

I give you my humble Hosanna.

Waving my palm today for all to see.

Rejoice greatly, O daughter Zion! Shout aloud, O daughter Jerusalem! Lo, your king comes to you; triumphant and victorious is he, humble and riding on a donkey…..Zechariah 9:9

God said it, I believe it.

In the last days,’ God says, ‘I will pour out my Spirit upon all people. Your sons and daughters will prophesy. Your young men will see visions, and your old men will dream dreams. Acts 2:17

Within the last several years there have been multiple books about people who claim to have died and gone to Heaven and come back. Here are just a few:

90 Minutes in Heaven

Heaven is for Real

Proof of Heaven

To Heaven and Back

The last three I read this year, the first shortly after it came out, around 10 years ago. Each account was riveting and they all have a few things in common. They all hesitated before coming forward to tell their story, some of them waited several years. They all struggled to explain the beauty and wonder they saw and felt, and they all expressed deep sadness at having to leave.

They all talked about the music and never found words to describe how it sounded, but they also never forgot how it sounded, and they all talked about colors they had never seen before.

And the main thing they all felt was the most profound sense of Love permeating everything.

There are several cases in Scripture where people were caught up to Heaven and told about it. The whole book of Revelation is John’s account of what He saw there in His vision, and I gotta say, it comes pretty close to what some of these people describe.

I have never found any of these accounts hard to believe. It is easy for me to believe that there is a better more permanent place than this, as good and wonderful and beautiful as it is here.

But here is the main reason I believe in life after life.

God said it, I believe it, and that’s good enough for me.

When I had to identify my husband’s body in Mexico after he died, I will never forget how hollow he felt as I layed my head on his chest. He weighed over 200 pounds and yet he felt empty. His essence, his spirit, the person that I knew and loved was no longer there.

And I know where he was.

This week once again we get to celebrate that Jesus has thrown open the gates of Heaven for all of us. And once again, I am rejoicing with all the host of Heaven.

But God raised him from the dead, freeing him from the agony of death, because it was impossible for death to keep its hold on him. Acts 2:24

Thanks be to God for His upspeakable gift!

How can it be Easter, it’s not Sunday?

I was spastic yesterday. I wasn’t ready to go back to work after having “GASP”, 11 days off. I felt like an alcoholic tearing open cupboards looking for a swig of something, anything. Yes, I am human, I am weak, I am frail. And I wasn’t focusing right then on who I am in Christ. I was looking for a quick fix……

Going back to bed would have worked.

And this morning, I wasn’t expecting the overflow of His Great mercy which came in like a flood as I was praying on the way to work. This year holds some significance for me and I have only just recently realized it.

It’s 40 years this year that I have been walking with Jesus.

Forty days and forty nights it rained. Moses was on the mountain 40 days and 40 nights, the Israelites wandered 40 years, Jesus fasted in the wilderness for 40 days and was seen on the earth for 40 days after His crucifixion.

40 years now He has walked beside me.

And the fact that we were on His heart, His mind, His plan even before time began? It still blows my mind everyday.

This morning, I thought about all the Resurrection Sundays I have celebrated in different churches. Each one different, each one a blessing.

The flowering of the cross at St. John’s Episcopal…….the service at Capital Christian where they made Jesus disappear and I still don’t know how they did it…..the sunrise service at my Aunt’s Methodist where we all held hands in the morning dew and sang along with the birds that Morning had indeed broken…..the Easter morning in Arizona that was every bit as beautiful as Easter morning should be, when we saw the Mother duck and her babies……so many over the years, and the best part of it all is this:

It’s not just one day, it’s every day since I have met Him that Easter breaks free in my heart, over and over.

In the car, as His grace washed over me, I remembered how I wrote about how God picks us first. And I also remembered that all too often I pick Him last. And that’s when His love really kicked in. It washed over me and baptised me anew, and this one thought held me, gripped me.

That when all my ridiculous home remedies fail, even when I choose Him as a last resort, when my back’s against the wall, He still loves me.

Even though He chooses me first even when I choose Him last.

Forgive me Lord.

And from the cross, and from Heaven, and in my heart I hear Him say……

“I do.”

In the grip of His grace today and there is nowhere else I would rather be.

Thankful for the thorns

I felt the panic rise and the riptide of the day starting as I awoke. I tamped it back down as it beat against me, my heartbeat quickening as I glanced at the clock which read 3:40. I layed back down and willed the clock back 8 hours or so. I sliced at it with the sword of the Word kept in my heart.

My cat sensed my stirrings and came up to nestle and I put my face in his fur and felt his purr, silly as it was it calmed me. The thought came: I should be over this kind of thing. But do we ever get totally at ease and comfortable in this life? And if so, then what do I need Him for?

You’d think I would be over this by now, this fear about meeting the day, but it still happens from time to time and I have the feeling I am not the only one.

We are bound to this earth until such time as these cords are cut and we fly back to our maker. Our real home. The one that every day I seem to glimpse a little more of. I think if we could catch one true glimpse of that life, we would never fear again, but God has given us the gift of faith which pulls us through and fills us with hope.

“Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.” Hebrews 11:1

Paul, a servant of God and an apostle of Jesus Christ for the faith of God’s elect and the knowledge of the truth that leads to godliness'” a faith and knowledge resting on the hope of eternal life, which God, who does not lie, promised before the beginning of time….Titus 1:1,2

Paul called his sufferings light and momentary afflictions.

He was beaten, thrown over-board, bitten by snakes, thrown in prison…….

Yeah, I can do this.

As the words to the song fill my car, my hands gripped the wheel as I counted the years in my head that Jesus has been walking with me……40 years with Jesus now, and shouldn’t I have this down pat?

But the answer came: Will there ever be a time to stop trusting, to stop learning, to stop leaning?

I hope that time never comes this side of Heaven.

Thankful for the thorn of my weakness today. Because every day it draws me closer. Nearer.

God picks you…..every time

Only a few things happening can cast me down to despair.
That’s how fragile I am, how fragile we all are.

And into my heart, He whispered like a warm breeze…..
If I didn’t remind you of the darkness from time to time,
You wouldn’t remember the candle I lit in your soul either.

I felt the love in what He was saying.

As tears came I said, “Yes, Lord.”
You know me so well.

I remember how it feels to stand in a place of tremendous
and absolute beauty and not feel or see a thing, and
it’s His great love for me and others that brings those feelings back

How else could I offer any comfort or help to others?
I can light a candle in their soul just the way you did for me, for until you did that for me?

I was a hopeless case.
Useless to myself and others.

Thank you, Lord for these times.
For reminding me just how fragile I am.
How I can feel in an instant alone on a playground not ever the first to be picked.

But you pick me, Lord. Again and again.
You said, “I want you.”

I sought the Lord, and he answered me;
he delivered me from all my fears.
Those who look to him are radiant;
their faces are never covered with shame.
This poor man called, and the Lord heard him;
he saved him out of all his troubles.
The angel of the Lord encamps around those who fear him,
and he delivers them. Psalm 34:4-7

And thank you, Psalmist for these words of yours……they never fail to comfort.

Once again, you light the window in my dark soul.

Thank you for the assurance that my full range of emotions from joy to sorrow and everything in between,

are safe only in Your hands.

In You only, will I put my trust…….

In all things that I contemplate as I am consulting you, I find no secure place for my soul except in you. And in you, I pray that what is scattered in me may be brought together, so that no part of me may be apart from you. Sometimes when you are working within me, bringing my scattered self to you, you draw me into a state of feeling that is unlike anything I am used to, a kind of sweet delight. I know that if this spiritual state were made permanent in me it would be something not of this world, not of this life. Augustine. Confessions 10

The treasure that remains

Stepping off a wonderful vacation and back into reality is tough, and yet something within us knows it can never last. Even at the edges of a dream we can always sense reality just hovering, nipping at our heels.

I was thinking about that today in prayer time as I was letting the memories, sounds and sights wash over me. I used to have a terrible time coming down off a good vacation. I would rebel against going home, starting work or school. I would keep comparing the beautiful place I had just been to where I came back to.

But kicking and screaming on the inside is so tiring, and no way to live.

With passing years, God has taught me how to be okay with it. One of the things I value most about my faith is knowing that my reality is steeped in the Presence of a loving God who has promised to never leave me or forsake me.

And as beautiful as it was, the beauty was only the backdrop. The part that is captured and held in the grip of eternity was the time spent with someone we love, hearing their voice and seeing every expression….things that email, phone and text can never do.

I remember how we talked and laughed and cried. The beauty of the coast and the trees and the mountains will fade away someday but pouring our hearts as an offering to each other, talking about hopes, fears, dreams and God……. That’s the treasure that remains.

I think about all three of our lives, and how we are all a miracle. And it’s a miracle how God brought us back together after so many years. I smile, because I know He jotted it all down in His book when we talked about Him right there in that coffee shop. We had church.

He was listening as we exchanged survivor’s stories about how He saved our shipwrecked lives.

And now that He’s brought us back, I know it’s just the beginning of a friendship that will last until we do.

Then those whose lives honored God got together and talked it over. God saw what they were doing and listened in. A book was opened in God’s presence and minutes were taken of the meeting, with the names of the God-fearers written down, all the names of those who honored God’s name. Malachi 3:16

When the thing you dream of is happening

“Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows.” James 1:17

The trip is happening today, the one she dreamed of when she was overwhelmed, buried and burdened with care-giving. At one point, she gave up on all of it. Of ever having any vacation again. But now her Mom is settled and in a safe place. Yet tattered remnants of guilt remain. When you have been a caregiver for so long, guilt has a way of becoming a constant companion. It permeates your life and settles around you like smoke at a campfire.

I really think certain types of caregiving almost become a variation of the Stockholm syndrome, where hostages express empathy and sympathy and even have positive feelings for their captors. Especially when you are dealing with cases involving Dementia and Alzheimer’s. Of course, the one you are caring for is not a captor but usually someone you love or at the least someone you feel duty bound to care for. Because you want to. Because it’s the right thing.

Yet sometimes, when you are finally free, you don’t want to allow yourself that freedom. That’s an old trick of Satan, and personally, I don’t want to give him any satisfaction whatsoever. So we are taking this time off and accepting it as the gift from God that it is, with joy and anticipation.

Today, Elaine and I fly to Seattle and plan to eat seafood, see our dear friend and gaze in wonder at the ocean once more. And we will thank God for getting us through everything that went before. If you want a taste of it, just click on the sidebar under the Alzheimer’s category. It is with gratitude in our hearts that we will take this trip and savor every minute of it.

Hopefully, I will get a post in over the next week, but if I don’t you will know why.

For now, I am retreating for a few minutes of prayer as light starts to fill the sky and a day of promise begins. And we have a plane to catch.

When someone hurts you or someone you love

"A Better Resurrection"

He has been there before us, He really has.

When we or someone we care about are hurt by someone the first thing, the easy thing is to lash out. We want to dish out some of the pain they so carelessly toss in their direction. That’s the temptation. No one wants to feel slighted, ignored, misunderstood, or worse not even acknowledged.

The best thing we can possibly do in that situation is remember that He was there first. No one has been hurt as much as Jesus while He was walking this earth. That’s why He understands. And that’s why His Father understands, because every time Jesus hurt, the Father felt it too.

We need to know we can run to Him and He more than anyone will understand. More than that, He sees what happened. That thing they did to you……that stabbed at your heart? He saw it.

And He is ready and able to be your comfort.

I know this.

Pour out your heart to Him now and He will come in and fill all those hurting and empty places like rain replenishes the dry parched ground in the desert.

All praise to the God and Father of our Master, Jesus the Messiah! Father of all mercy! God of all healing counsel! He comes alongside us when we go through hard times, and before you know it, he brings us alongside someone else who is going through hard times so that we can be there for that person just as God was there for us. 2 Corinthians 1:3

And don’t ever let anyone convince you that you deserve that treatment and turn it around on yourself. Lift yourself up to your Father who loves you. He is your strong tower, your advocate, your hope, your strength. He will see you through. Nothing passes by Him unnoticed, especially if you are His child.

Trust Him. He will provide you with His peace and comfort.

In any and every situation.

Lori's Prayer Closet

"And when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen. Then your Father, who sees what is done is secret, will reward you……"Matthew 6:6

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