Heirs and Heirlooms

A special thank you to everyone who prayed for the ladies meeting where I spoke last night! Although I was still nervous before hand, God gave me a calmness during the time I spoke. The ladies were all so very gracious and kind and attentive so that made it easier. My goal anytime that I get up to speak for the Lord.....whether it is in my Sunday school class or in another church.....is to forget about myself....how I sound; how I look.....and just try to point our attention toward Jesus. I hope that goal was met last night.

The evening started with a meal which was all breakfast foods. These ladies really know how to do some "down-home country cooking"! Biscuits, sausage, bacon, gravy, grits, hash browns, waffles, strawberries & cantaloupe, all kinds of jams and jellies....you name it and they had it cooked! I tried to not eat too much so I would be able to still speak afterwards without losing my breath! ha

My subject last night was "Heirlooms". I took several of the heirlooms that I have been given since my Daddy passed away about 18 months ago. All were things that had either belonged to my Mama (who died when I was 16) or that she had made by hand. I just took a sampling of a lot of the things....a quilt, an embroidered pillowcase, some crocheted doilies, some tatting, a tatting shuttle, and some silver forks.

I'll try to sum up in a few paragraphs what I talked about.

My Mama always made quilts every winter and when my older brothers and sisters got married she gave each of them a quilt. I looked forward to mine but by the time I was married she had been gone almost four years. Then last year after Daddy died my stepmother found FIVE of Mama's quilts packed away in plastic on a shelf in the closet of one of the bedrooms. They had been there for 35 years or more! In the end I got five of her quilts instead of only one! Have you ever wanted something and you just never got it? Maybe you have even prayed about something and it seemed your prayers are not answered. It could be that God is just delaying the answer for some reason that is known only to Him.

The talent of crocheting, embroidering and most especially tatting is almost a lost art with this generation. I compared that with how high moral standards are also almost a thing of the past with our generation. It’s sad that people don’t see that God has given us moral laws and standards NOT ONLY to glorify Him but FOR OUR OWN GOOD! It’s not impossible to learn to make tatting. But most of us don’t want to take the time. It’s not impossible to teach our children and grandchildren morals and purity. It’s just that sometimes it’s hard for us to take the time and also to go against the flow of the world! We seriously need to get back to basics concerning the Word of God and what He expects of us.

I carried 2 forks from the set of silverware I inherited. (For the whole story about that, click HERE)
One of them I had left in the very, very tarnished state that it was in when I got it after being in my Daddy's attic for 35 years; the other I had polished to a sparkling shine. As I polished one of the forks and saw it turn from a grayish/black to a shiny silver I thought about our lives as Christians. I took the clean fork and held it up beside one that I had not yet cleaned. I held a fork in each hand but I would not have wanted to eat with the black one!....you wouldn’t want to either! The tarnish didn’t make it any less a fork but it did make it unusable. How many times have you and I turned from the things of God….or maybe we didn’t turn away…we may have just stood still and done nothing for a while….and we began to be tarnished by the things of the world. The longer we resist God’s voice to return to Him, the more tarnish we have on us. Oh, we are still Christians all right! Just as both of these forks are forks. But we just can’t be used of God like we can when we stay up close to Him and let Him polish us up every day with His Holy Spirit and His Word. Proverbs 25: 4 says “Take away the dross from the silver, and there shall come forth a vessel for the finer.”

A lady in my church sang a song one Sunday that said, "Jesus is more than an heirloom to me." I hope that is a truth in all our lives but sometimes I fear that we….me included…treat Jesus like just that….an heirloom. We set him on a shelf in our lives. We look at Him and brag on Him but then we go on about our daily lives and just leave Him there….on the shelf. Are we busy accumulating THINGS that may someday become heirlooms for our children? OR are we busy trying to share our faith with other so that they might become HEIRS with Christ and have their lives changed forever? So many people live with a form of godliness but then don’t know the true power of God! They try to “do good” or “perform” for God so that he will decide they are good enough to deserve heaven. They are actually trying to work their way into heaven by following the law….or parts of it at least. But the Bible says that NO ONE has ever been able to keep the law except for Jesus Christ. Scripture calls us “Servants of the law” UNTIL we accept the free gift of salvation, and then we are called “the sons of God”.
(Galatians 4: 4-7) "But when the fullness of the time was come, God sent forth his Son, made of a woman, made under the law, Top redeem them that were under the law, that we might receive the adoption of sons. And because ye are sons, God hath sent forth the Spirit of his Son into your hearts, crying , Abba,Father. Wherefore thou art no more a servant, but a son; and if a son, then an heir of God through Christ."

Last evening ended on a perfect note as the ladies presented me with a gift for coming and speaking to them. It was a beautiful ceramic angel holding a dove. I've included a picture of it here. It will hold a special place in my heart....maybe even become an "Heirloom" in our family.....you never can tell.

I pray that you, too, are an heir of God through Christ and that you are sharing with others how they can become heirs also. That's our most important task here on earth!

God bless you!

Marilyn