They met with Herod, they worshipped Jesus

On coming to the house, they saw the child with his mother Mary, and they bowed down and worshiped him. Then they opened their treasures and presented him with gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh. Matthew 2:11

The three wise men met with Herod, but they worshipped Jesus when they finally saw Him. You meet with dignitaries, you meet with the President, the Queen……your boss. You worship the Lord when you recognize Him for who He is. And when the wise men saw Him they knew.

They knew what they saw was truth, was real…….was worthy of worship.

Jesus birth was heralded with signs in the Heavens, a choir of angels, and stunned Shepherds………and if you think that was spectacular, just wait until He comes back.

I realize the birth of Christ does not fall on December 25th, and I know that some of the things we do to celebrate His birth are mixed in with other things that may not have anything to do with Jesus.

But God has called it all good, and when we worship with right heart motive God smiles.

And I am not stopping with Christmas, I plan to continue all year long.

I used to be really let down when Christmas was over, but I have learned to enjoy the quiet time right after the rush is through. To sit down and reflect on everything that just happened and to prayerfully contemplate on whatever God has for me in the New Year.

So tonight, I plan to calm down a little and light up every string in the house and sit by the tree……maybe drive around and view some lights.

To savor every moment.

The Lord has come……let earth receive her King again and again.

images from: http://www.freebibleimages.org some rights reserved

Ushering in Advent

It is December first and I wake early, in the dark. Still trying to shake off remnants of the work week, I get up for a couple of Advil and head back to bed, breathing a still prayer in the silence. The last three hours of work were stressful yesterday and the shadows of it still crouched in my mind, refusing to dislodge. And yet, I have three days off and I am aglow with the ushering in of Advent.

Be still my soul. Prepare ye the way of the Lord, for though He has already come, and gone and come again with the gift of His Spirit, (He never went away) I celebrate His coming all over again.

In these still hours, my mind feels close to You.

Heal it Lord, wrap it in Your balm of peace.

Erase the cares and worries of the week

with Your healing touch.

Prepare me for Your Advent…….

It’s God with us, still.

Always and forever.

Behold, I show you a mystery: We shall not all sleep; but we shall all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed. For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality. 1 Corinthians 15:51

Today is a gift. Let the celebrations begin, for it’s time to light the house, play Handel’s Messiah, and do all the things we only do this time of year. For He is worthy of a party. And the miracle just never, ever gets old.

On stumbling

Now to Him who is able to keep you from stumbling, and to make you stand in the presence of His glory blameless with great joy, to the only God our Savior, through Jesus Christ our Lord, be glory, majesty, dominion and authority, before all time and now and forever. Amen.

Jude 1: 24,25

And by this we know that we are of the truth, and shall assure our hearts before Him. For if our heart condemns us, God is greater than our heart, and knows all things. Beloved, if our heart does not condemn us, we have confidence toward God. And whatever we ask we receive from Him, because we keep His commandments and do those things that are pleasing in His sight. And this is His commandment: that we should believe on the name of His Son Jesus Christ and love one another, as He gave us commandment.

1 John 3:19:23

It is no surprise to God that there will be times when we fall. Some days feel like one fall after another, but these verses bring me great hope today. I think sometimes we mistake weaknesses for sin. I have come to be thankful for those “thorn’s in my flesh,” such as the Apostle Paul described, for they bring me closer to the Lord and allow me to see the power of the cross all over again.

Those things that I used to resent, I now count as God’s blessings because they force me to rely on Him. It’s the process of turning those things over to him which causes us to grow; that gives God His rightful place on the throne of our hearts.

Sometimes the turning it over becomes the battle of our lives. The battle of our days.

All those things we once thought were so overwhelming lose their power the second we give them to the One who has the power to change them. Some things He does heal, some things He does take away, but some things he leaves us as reminders of who we need to trust. And how He loves us. Better to have a little weakness and boast in what God can do, as opposed to thinking we have none and boasting in ourselves.

Today I rejoice in God my Savior, for all He is, for all He’s done, and for all He continues to do in my life.

Because of the surpassing greatness of the revelations, for this reason, to keep me from exalting myself, there was given me a thorn in the flesh, a messenger of Satan to torment me—to keep me from exalting myself! Concerning this I implored the Lord three times that it might leave me.And He has said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for power is perfected in weakness.” Most gladly, therefore, I will rather boastabout my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may dwell in me. 2 Corinthians 12:7-9

What about you? Is there something you are struggling with today? Leave a request in the comments and I would be happy to pray for you……

photo credit: awrose via flickr, creative commons: some rights reserved.

One of the things I most love about my faith

They heard the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God among the trees of the garden. Then the Lord God called to the man, and said to him, “Where are you?” Genesis 3:8,9

Since the beginning, God has wanted a relationship with his children. He never intended to create us and then leave us alone. This verses suggests to me that God was in the habit of visiting Adam and Eve often, daily, maybe more than once during the day.

He has been seeking us ever since.

He came to Cain after he killed his brother. And He searched the earth looking for a righteous man and found Noah. Down through the ages he has searched.

Abraham……Samuel…..Moses……David……Peter…….Paul……Lori

And he is seeking you too.

Do you hear Him calling?

This is the thing that still astounds me, still amazes me, still thrills me. And it never gets old. I serve a God who wants to know me intimately. And you too. He is not content to sit back and observe. He is a God who has always wanted to get right in the middle of our lives. He is not afraid to get into the down and dirty, nitty-gritty details. None of them surprise Him.

He is delighted, concerned and interested in all the little and not so little events that happen throughout our day, and he loves it when we share those with him!

And my friends, if you are a Christian and that fact doesn’t still absolutely blow your mind, something is wrong.

What would your husband, wife, best friend, child, think if you never asked them about their day or told them about yours? They want to know about what excited you, what thrilled you, what made you sad and you want the same consideration.

This is hands down, absolutely one of the best things about being a Christian; to know that I have a God who is present in each and every detail of my life. I can’t imagine not being able to share with Him throughout the day. I hear a beautiful piece of music and I say…..”Wow, God, thank you for that. Thank you for people who want to use their gifts.”

Every breath can become a prayer and when you have practiced this long enough it becomes second nature to praise Him, to cry with Him, to share laughter with Him.

To share your everyday life with Him.

I encourage you to bring Him in to every moment of your day today. The wonderful ones, and the not so wonderful ones. You won’t be disappointed.

He wants that.

It’s what I am most grateful for today. It’s been a tough week, but He’s still here.

Still listening to the whispers in my heart.

Psalm 139 and 3/4

“I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus.”

He has indeed called us Heavenward. And even as we battle down here we are thinking of that hereafter, that future time where the cares of this world are but a lost memory.

And as I lay awake in the dark tallying up my worries, thinking about all the things I wish I could fix but can’t, I write my own Psalm and call it 139 and three-quarters.

For the umpteenth time, I give Him my laundry list of things, those that He already knows about me and I feel it float Heavenward as He assures me He loves me anyway, again.

When sleep is snatched away by the cares of this world, I pray in the wide awake moments before dawn and I feel the peace of my home surrounding me like a cloak. Though worldly sorrow nips at the edges of my heart, the hope of His peace seeps in and around it like Holy smoke. This is the prayer I pray:

“Bind us together Lord, bind us together with cords that cannot be broken.”

And then I think of the sock that made its way into my suitcase. Her little sock.

I don’t know how it got there, but I am glad it came back with me.

I think of all the pictures I didn’t take, and how my camera never left its bag. And how I couldn’t care less because what we had instead was much more beautiful.

I thought of how we hid every possible place in the house and how she covered her eyes and counted and giggled as we crouched together in the dark closet while my Dad looked for us. She still hasn’t got the part where she is supposed to stay quiet while she hides, and that makes it all the more precious somehow.

Years from now, I will remember how we all collapsed on the couch after we were done, and how Mom came in and asked what we had all been doing to look so exhausted.

I thought of how I put swim goggles on along with my wrinkles and flat hair and went all the way under the water because she wanted to see me under there with her. I can still hear her shriek of excitement, “You too, Nori!”

It was also a weekend of some firsts. She sat down beside me on the couch with a book and let me read to her, something I have dreamed of ever since she was born. It was like a mini miracle. And how she wedged herself into the couch close by me, wanting to be right by my side all weekend long.

We went to the store together and she helped me shop. Another first. Store was always a scary place for her before.

No, I didn’t get one photograph of fall, not one red leaf, not one landscape of how the morning mist lay in the vineyards, and not the one of the old barn I saw either. Sometimes life just can’t be freeze framed, it has to be lived. The leaf you see is one I took a year or so ago.

This was not the time to chase the perfect shot. It was the time to savor, and treasure, and corral that which there is never enough of.

Time.

That’s what the sock reminded me of.

And looking at it now, I’m smiling as big as the face on the sock because when I look at it, I can still hear “You too, Nori!”

Sometimes, Heaven’s a place you can find here. It’s in the love shining out from the eyes you leave and come home too.

God’s way of saying He loves us.

The Gravity of it all

For God did not send the Son into the world to judge the world, but that the world might be saved through Him. John 3:17

I recently went to see the movie Gravity and I loved it. The views of Earth from space were stunning and they almost moved me to tears. Only two actors were used during the entire movie and it not only held my interest, it captivated me. Parts of it took my breath away, literally. I found myself wanting to take big gulps of air, especially for Sandra Bullock who was dynamic.

Watching this movie, watching our Earth from space made me see us how God must see us. I felt for us, I did. All of us with our piles of idols……our pack of worries and heartaches, our problems that seem so hugely monumental. Well, they are to us, anyway.

And I guess they are to God too, because He saw our plight. He saw our great need for a Savior, even when we didn’t see it ourselves.

And all these things that seem so big to us, so unsolvable, so wondrous, so lasting, are less than a breath to God.

I saw us as He does, as a people and a planet worth saving.

And none of the things we are so worried about right now today will matter in 20 years. They may not even matter next week.

Thank you God, for sending us a rescuer. A redeemer. Help us to know that even if we have no idea how we are going to solve our problems today, that somehow we will be okay.

Because you are here. And you promised never to leave or forsake us no matter what.

this photo is a digitally enhanced negative taken from 1972 Apollo 16 by Royce Bair/IronRodArt, some rights reserved

The path to peace

“No one is righteous—
    not even one.
No one is truly wise;
    no one is seeking God.
All have turned away;
    all have become useless.
No one does good,
    not a single one.”
“Their talk is foul, like the stench from an open grave.
    Their tongues are filled with lies.”
“Snake venom drips from their lips.”
“Their mouths are full of cursing and bitterness.”
“They rush to commit murder.
Destruction and misery always follow them.
They don’t know where to find peace.”
“They have no fear of God at all.”

Romans 3:11-18

We watched the first installment of the new series, “The Blacklist” last night starring James Spader. Well, a few parts I watched through my fingers because I was afraid of what I’d see. “What happened to the bad guy?” I asked E. “I don’t know,” she said, “I was afraid to watch, I was sure the husband was going to get killed.” I guess we’ll never know. Needless to say, it was a scene we were not expecting and totally unprepared for.

I was almost ready for bed when I started watching it, but wide awake by the time the show was over.

All over the news, all over the world there is violence. You don’t have to look far. And cursing has become the norm, even for kids. They hear it from their parents. I compare the world now to the one I grew up in. A mistake I know. It’s something I thought I would never do and now I am. It’s hard not to, when you see such a marked difference, when you see how things have changed.

One thing I never had a moment of at any of my school campuses was real fear. All the way from Kindergarten through High School. Well, maybe I was a little afraid of BJ, she was one of the tough girls. And Steven Weigum. He was a punk. With Steven, you worked hard to be invisible. I was good at it, except for the one time I forgot to wear green on St. Patrick’s day.

From Grammar school all the way to Junior High, I heard maybe one parent say the “F’ word and I was shocked. Actually I didn’t even hear them say it, the daughter said she overheard her Mom say it…….once.

I feel sad for kids today. In many ways, they live in a callous and harsh world. Images of violence fills their culture through television, movies, video games and even music. Fear is part and parcel of their everyday world at school since all the school shootings started. Even us adults have to work hard to deprogram our minds from what we see and hear all day, on the news, at work. It would be easy to lose heart, to lose hope. To despair even.

It’s why I try to spend time alone with God the very first part of my day and saturate myself with His words. Sometimes I spend an hour, sometimes it’s 20 minutes, it’s just Him and me getting back to ground zero. Giving my mind and heart over to Him gets me back on track, brings me back home. It takes all that negative the world gives out and replaces it with what’s good.

It is an awesome thing to think we can have an open session with the God of the Universe anytime we want it. In fact, He seeks it…….delights in it. May it never get old for me.

It’s easy to think I’m a pretty good person when I watch a show like we watched last night where really bad guys are plotting to wreak havoc on the world, until I realize that in the verses above, the Apostle Paul is talking about all of us without Jesus.

And when I call that person “a name” for cutting me off on the freeway? I realize there is less distance between me and those character references in the book of Romans than I thought.

He reminds me of how my pitiful little rags of righteousness looked before they were dipped in His fountain.

It’s humbling, yes it is. But it’s good.

If we say that we have no sin, we are deceiving ourselves and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. 1 John 1:8,9

One thousand (plus one) love letters to God

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, The Message

When I glanced up at the number of posts I thought, “It can’t be. How could I have passed 1000 posts and not have known?”

One thousand thoughts, one thousand meanderings, one thousand words I have set free to see what God would do. One thousand dreams, one thousand hopes, one thousand love letters to God.

One thousand ways I can share my faith, as well as my victories, things God and I and you did together……….One thousand times I have failed to love, and one thousand fears set free. It’s amazing really, what He has done with these words. Like bread cast upon the waters, He has carried them further than I ever thought possible.

I stare at the shore and wonder at my own words that have washed up from somewhere I never suspected. Only God can do that. When God stirs words they have a way of coming back full circle. I think of how they’ve come back from people I never dreamed would read them. I think of the ones who sowed the Word into me when I was young in all those Sunday school classes and sermons. To those that first sparked life and hope into my heart I would say this:

“It was the seeds of your own kindness and love for God that caused these words to grow.”

One thousand mornings of entering prayer like a sealed jar, my hope flickering like the candle, I sit back down and wait on Him to find He has already been there. It’s always Him who waits for me. Sometimes I’m not even sure where to start so I don’t. And it’s okay, for the waiting itself is Holy.

Once the words start tumbling out I experience a resurrection that I can no longer keep to myself. I find that God is not scared of what tumbles or flies out of this jar, whether black unnamed thing or brightly colored butterfly, and it seems that neither are you, dear reader. Many of you are still here.

The most important thing I have learned is how much He loves me, and that is what I want you to know.

And what He has taught me through all of you. I have learned that when I harness my words to prayer, miracles happen and when we join our words together it feels much like communion. I could never repay the friendships, the community of love I have found through writing. Your comments never fail to humble me.

Every now and then I think I might just seal this jar and keep the lid screwed on tight, who wants to see this mess anyway? But I thank God that never lasts, that feeling. The love I feel for God is so strong this flesh cannot contain it.

So here’s to 1000 more love letters to God.

And you…..

I thank you for hanging in with me this far.

Needed: Good men, and not just a few

Do not rebuke an older man sharply, but appeal to him as you would to a father; treat younger men like brothers, older women like mothers and younger women like sisters, with absolute purity. 1 Timothy 5:1,2

Therefore be imitators of God as dear children. And walk in love, as Christ also has loved us and given Himself for us, an offering and a sacrifice to God for a sweet-smelling aroma. Ephesians 5: 1,2

The other night a memory came to me as I had just settled myself on the couch to watch some TV. I was trying to arrange my head on the square, hard couch pillow which was obviously meant for decoration and not for comfort. I remembered how my Dad would arrange beds for us on the floor by the fire. He loved doing that for us and it always bothered him to see me laying on the floor without a pillow.

I can’t count the times I would feel his hands under my head…..”Here, I brought you a pillow, he’d say.” The thought almost brought me to tears. I don’t think anyone ever did that for him, but he did it for me. And my brother. And I have seen him do it still even at 85. Some things never change.

I was thinking about how our whole society would benefit from good men. We need you, guys. So much more than you know. There’s a vast ocean of kids that are being raised without Dad’s. And a vast ocean of grown-ups who never had the benefit of being protected, feeling safe, being loved by a Dad.

Men, we need you. The church needs you too.

We need you to be strong and lead your families, not with an iron fist of authority, but with an open hand ready to give……..to show love. A hand that is not afraid to grasp the hand of his child and lead with affection, with kindness, with the leadership and example of our Father in Heaven.

We need you to get up on Sundays and lead your family into church.

We need you to not be afraid to show emotion and to be quick to apologize when you are wrong……..to talk about nothing in particular, just talk.

To spend time with your kids doing the little things that are important to them and make an effort to find out what those little things are. Find out what they like, what interests them. And don’t think you must have a big grand plan. Just be willing to do nothing with them. Jump into the middle of their life.

Wear a tiara if you have to. Jump rope. Help with a science experiment. And don’t worry if you aren’t any good at the activity, they don’t care. They just want you to do it with them. In fact, they might like it if you aren’t any good. That way they can feel good about teaching you something.

Be humble, men. Be kind. Be strong enough to answer with a soft voice.

And you men of faith? You have an even bigger responsibility, because your real Dad is God. And He is watching how you treat children, women, other men, boys. What a wonderful opportunity you have. To be a kind man…….there seem to be so few now. But I know you’re out there. You never know who you might reach.

There is a child out there, a woman out there, a boy out there who never had a Dad. Maybe never had a man in their life they could trust.

Be that man to them.

Be a representative to them of Your Abba, Father.

Don’t you know that your love can send a much more powerful message than telling them what they need to hear?

You have a unique opportunity and it’s up to you to show the love of God by demonstration, not by words.

There are a few men I work with whom I really respect. Those men would never let a door slam in my face. Those men, always hold a hand out and let me go down the stairs first. Those men let me enter a door first, because they know that God is watching what they do.

Don’t be afraid if women look at you funny. I think inside they really respect that, I know I do. Do the right thing no matter what someone else says.

Teachers, Bus drivers, Uncles, Fathers, Cousins, Brothers, Sunday School teachers, Bosses, Garbage collectors. Step up.

Because we all need you, good men and not just a few.

We appreciate you!

photo taken by me: My brother and his girl, Lauryn

When the Son sets in our hearts

“What causes fights and quarrels among you? Don’t they come from your desires that battle within you? You desire but do not have, so you kill. You covet but you cannot get what you want, so you quarrel and fight. You do not have because you do not ask God.” James 4:1,2

“The heart is more deceitful than all else And is desperately sick; Who can understand it? “I, the Lord, search the heart, I test the mind, Even to give to each man according to his ways, according to the results of his deeds.” Jeremiah 17:9,10

For the first time this morning I was able to pray minus the sound of gunfire from the dove hunters out in the desert. It has disrupted my morning peace for two days now. My brother and I were both complaining about it on opening day which was September first. He’d gone out to his driveway with his mug of coffee as he usually does when he is home and was looking forward to listening to his doves cooing from the trees in his yard. Now he is worried about the wild turkeys they have all enjoyed watching come through in the evenings.

We both decided we would put out some wild feed to keep a few close.

The staccato sound of the guns made me think of what is going on half a world away, in Syria. They say around 2 million Syrian people are now refugees and around half of these are women and children. Unrest is the state of the world today.

All my life, I have sat in church hearing of a time when there will be “wars and rumors of wars.” It was just a Bible verse and a time somewhere in the future, but real war was never anything that touched me. It was never something that surprised me or factored into my life in any way at all. It was just a part of what I heard in church or on TV.

But how many people around the world today must live, pray and sleep to the sound of gunfire and shelling? Living and breathing with fear and the possible loss of their own life or the life of their children. Knowing that any moment, they will lose what little shelter they have, grabbing what little they own and heading across the border to somewhere else.

Our world is getting crazier every day. There is no doubt we are in the last days, but who knows how long these last days will stretch out?

There is only one thing that will ever stop war for good and the truth is, not one of us is willing to do what it takes to stop it. Until we each settle the war in our own hearts, war will never end. The war in our hearts will only end when we invite Jesus in.

And I am not talking about lip service but life change. There is a tired, old argument that people use over and over. In fact, I heard it again on the radio just Sunday morning. A talk show host said: “I hate religion because more wars have been caused by religion than anything else.” And while I can understand why they make that claim, it’s still as wrong as wrong can be.

Guns don’t kill people and religion doesn’t cause wars. All wars start as a result of the evil in the confines of the human heart, and just because something is done in God’s name, doesn’t mean God is in favor of it.

When someone is truly transformed by the love of Christ, it will show by how eager they are to strive for peace, not war.

I am talking about a relationship here, not a religion. That’s what makes Christianity different from any other on the face of the earth. And when He comes in and makes a home in our hearts, peace reigns. Note that I didn’t say perfection, I said peace.

War is caused by the selfish desire to get what we want when we want it. Nothing more. And when power and money are added in to the mix it just gets bigger because more is at stake. Sometimes war is unavoidable. When the end result means peace for the world, then I believe it is just.

Universally though, the hope of this world, more than ever, is Jesus. Jesus, only and ever Jesus.

You might wonder why then, does Jesus say this?

Do not think that I came to bring peace on the earth; I did not come to bring peace, but a sword.

In light of all the talk about peace, it doesn’t seem to make any sense, until you understand that while a relationship with Jesus most certainly brings peace to the individual heart and life, it doesn’t necessarily bring peace to the world. That’s because of one simple aspect of human nature.

We still want our way, not His way. When Jesus said that, it was with perfect understanding that He knows what we are made of.

When Jesus was born, King Herod was so threatened by the rumor of a new King, he had all Jewish babies living in Egypt two years and under slaughtered. And right before He was crucified, the religious leaders of the day were so threatened by Jesus popularity with the people, and by their loss of power, security and position, they had to put together a mock trial complete with false testimony in order to sentence Him to death.

And yet, He reaches for us still.

For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him. Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because they have not believed in the name of God’s one and only Son.

This is the verdict: Light has come into the world, but people loved darkness instead of light because their deeds were evil. John 3:16-19

I pray for our world today. I pray it finds Jesus. You might think that it looks pretty bleak and that there is really nothing we can do as an individual. But there is always something we can do. We can all shine the light of truth and love brightly, each in our own corner.

Right where we are. And pray.

Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective. James 5:16

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

God’s love