From Mourning to Joy...It IS Possible!

(A small 4"X6" painting done by my husband's Aunt Nettie Wade. Brings me joy.)

My heart has been heavy lately. Because of numerous things. Many things that are predictably normal happenings such as losing older family members and friends of my age getting diseases that may take their lives before too much longer. At our ages things like that just normally begin to happen. But some of the things that lay heavy on my heart are things that seemingly should not be happening. Heartache and hurt brought on by selfishness or insecurity or jealously...you name it, people use it to hurt other people.  The bottom line though is that all this heartache is brought on by sin....mine, yours, theirs. For after Adam first sinned in the Garden of Eden it has been all down hill from there.  Sin is what caused our bodies...and minds...to to get sick.  Sin is what causes all the problems in this old world.

This morning I woke early and instead of going back to sleep I began to read in Isaiah 61.  The first few verses there spoke to my heart and I began to feel such a comforting peace descend upon me. Isaiah 61:1-3 says this: "The Spirit of the Lord GOD is upon me; because the LORD hath anointed me to preach good tidings unto the meek; he hath sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to them that are bound; To proclaim the acceptable year of the LORD, and the day of vengeance of our God: to comfort all that mourn: To appoint unto them that mourn in Zion, to give unto them beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness; that they might be called trees of righteousness, the planting of the LORD, that he might be glorified."

Good tidings preached.  Wounds of the brokenhearted bound up.  Liberty given to captives.  Prisoners set free. Mourners comforted.  Beauty and the oil of joy instead of the ashes of mourning.  And A GARMENT OF PRAISE in the place of the spirit of heaviness!  All of this so that the LORD might be glorified!

Our Lord Jesus Christ wants us to have joy in Him!  ("the joy of the Lord is your strength"...Nehemiah 8:10) My prayer today is that myself and any of you reading this who are also heavy hearted will begin to experience our wounds being bound up, liberty given to captives and prisoners of satan's stronghold, and the oil of joy being poured on our heads in the place of the ashes of mourning!

To get this healing started I believe it's important to get into an attitude of PRAISE!  (have you heard the song that says "It's amazing what praising can do!"?)  And then I believe that in all of this, the LORD will be glorified!  And that, you know, is why we were made in the first place...for His glory! "for I have created him for my glory, I have formed him; yea, I have made him." Isaiah 43:7

My prayer today for you my friends and for myself, is that we will put our eyes on Jesus and let Him give us the joy we need! For we can have His joy even on the days when tears flow from our eyes! He is worthy of our praise!  "God did not die merely to save our souls, but to empower us to live in a way that would glorify God right here on earth!" (quote by Dr. Henry Morris)

May God bless you!

Marilyn

Our Offerings of Scraps

Recently a friend was sharing at church how she felt like her life had gotten so busy with work and summer gardening and outside chores that she realized she had been just giving God the ‘’leftovers’’ of her time and attention.  I could identify with that.  I think we all can from time to time.

This morning as I was reading in Isaiah, I came across some Scripture that put into a word picture how we are prone to act.  (Isaiah 44:14-17) In these verses it talks about planting an ash tree and the rain coming and making it grow.  Then along comes a man and cuts the tree down.  He cuts off part of it to make a fire to warm himself.  Then after he’s warm outside, he bakes bread to warm and nourish his insides.  And then with the “residue”….the leftovers….he takes his knife and whittles out an image.  (“…for he will take thereof, and warm himself; yea, he kindleth it, and baketh bread; yea, he maketh a god, and worshippeth it; he maketh it a graven image, and falleth down thereto” Isaiah 44:15) This is not some wooden doll or plaything that he’s taking home to his kids either!  He has made a wooden image to fall down in front of and worship!  He’s made himself a god!

Are we not guilty of the same thing? Not with a literal tree but with other things.  We spend time working, playing, buying, selling, planting, harvesting, reading, writing…you name it.  Some of the things we busy ourselves with are good things!  Our jobs provide the means to keep us warm in the winter and food on the table. Many things we do are good and necessary. But many things also could probably be left undone.  We have become such BUSY people!  And where does God sometimes fit into our BUSY lives?  He gets the leftovers. The scraps.  The residue.  We get to the place that we still try to quickly go through the motions of worshipping God but our heart is not in it.  We’re just wanting to soothe a guilty conscience and we end up doing not much more than the heathen bowing down to his whittled out image that he made from the ‘’residue’’ of his tree.  We may call ourselves worshipping God when in reality we are worshipping the things that keep us so busy and away from God.

I admit that I am often guilty.  But I don’t want to stay that way.  If Jesus were literally visiting me, I would never eat a banana and throw the peeling to Him.  I wouldn’t peel a fresh, juicy, red tomato and eat a big tomato sandwich for lunch and put the peelings on a plate and offer that to God!  But basically that’s what I’m sometimes doing in my spiritual life!  I give my best effort, my time and energy, to things of the world instead of giving my best to God first and then letting the world have my leftover time and energy.  I deceive myself when I think I am truly loving and worshipping God as I should when I just give Him my leftovers instead of my ‘’first fruits”!  He deserves to come first in my life and the life of every Christian!

“I am the LORD, and there is none else, there is no God beside me:” Isaiah 45:5

God bless you!

Marilyn

Nasty But Necessary

(view through my pollen-covered windshield one Sunday morning)

Pollen. That's almost like a cuss word here in the South during the spring months! It's finally gotten to where at least my car doesn't have a fresh yellowish-green fuzzy coating of the stuff every morning now. I breathe a sigh of relief over that!

But just a couple of weeks ago, that was not the case!  A few Sundays ago as I walked from my front door to my car headed to church, I noticed the dogwood trees were decked out in their beautiful white "Sunday best" blooms.  When I backed out of the carport to turn around, the same dogwood trees were right in front of me.  But to my surprise I could barely recognize them through my windshield that had been covered with a thick layer of pollen during the night.

I thought to myself, "Why do we have to have this nasty stuff anyway?"  That brought back memories from earlier school years and science classes. I know that pollen is necessary. Without it plants would not be able to reproduce. They would eventually die.

And even though I realize and accept these scientific truths....I still hate the sneezing, the scratchy eyes, nose, and throat,  and the watery eyes that comes with the pollen each season.  Isn't that a lot like life in general? There are things that we go through that really bother us. That hurt us. That aggravate us. That we hate! But some of these things...not all mind you.... are really needful and helpful to us in the long run. Some of the hard and difficult times in our lives are actually growing experiences and can make us better persons.  Especially this is true in our spiritual lives I think.

Let's face it...none of us like all that pollen floating around in the air in our face making us sick! But without it we would cease to see any more plants living and growing. It's nasty...but necessary for reproduction. And at the same time we don't like to go through times of trial and heartache.  But without them we would cease to grow in our spiritual lives.  We need that growth so that we can witness to others and they can find eternal life through Jesus Christ.

"Wherein ye greatly rejoice, though now for a season, if need be, ye are in heaviness through manifold temptations: That the trial of your faith, being much more precious than of gold that perisheth, though it be tried with fire, might be found unto praise and honour and glory at the appearing of Jesus Christ:"  (1 Peter 1:6-7)

May God bless you is my prayer!

Marilyn

Just Hanging On

One sunny but windy day last week I hung out a load of laundry on the clothesline in my back yard.  A few hours later as I happened to look out the window I saw that my favorite turquoise blouse (that I had put on a hanger to dry) had almost blown off by the gusty winds.  I thought to myself, "It's just barely hanging on!" It was actually sort of amusing to think of it in that way.

But then I realized that I was identifying with this wind blown garment.  Lately it seems like there are some areas in my life where I am just barely "hanging on".  Maybe I'm getting lazy. Or maybe I'm tired of the pressure. There are certain problems that I sometimes just feel like giving in to or giving up on!

The last few months have been like a pressure cooker at times. I'm sure you know the feeling. My problems and your problems are not the same but the pressures and fatigue and pain we get from our varied problems sometimes are the same.

I feel like at times the next big gust of wind is gonna blow me off the line...so to speak. And I guess it would if I was having to do all the holding on.  My blouse never did blow off to the ground.  For two reasons. One...I had used a heavy-duty clothes pin to fasten the hanger to the line.  And two...when I saw the blouse hanging on by one arm, I went out and put it back on the hanger.

God does me like that. For one thing, it may feel like I'm just ''hanging on'', but I know that I'll never fall.  Not from God's Hands anyway.  And then also when God sees me being blown around by the problems of life and it seems like I'm barely ''hanging on'' to my sanity, He comes and gently rearranges me back to where I don't constantly feel like I'm falling.  He gives me peace and security...in HIM.

All of this has made me think of a song by Jeff & Sherri Easter called "Thread of Hope". Click HERE to watch Sherri sing it.

Thanks friend for coming along side me today here at Walking in Truth.

God bless you!

Marilyn

God's Glory

Tomorrow is, by the calendar, Easter Sunday. Someone recently asked me why Easter is not at the same time each year so here is the easiest explanation I found: Easter is always the first Sunday after or on the first full moon, after the first day of Spring in the Northern hemisphere and the first day of Autumn in the Southern hemisphere.

But in my heart this week I have been thinking of Easter, not because of the technicalities of what time of the year we celebrate but because of Who we celebrate on this day. I have been thinking in awe of a God Who would come to earth and take on human flesh, live as a pauper instead of the King He really is, then after living a perfect, sinless life, die a hideous death to pay for the sins of all people in time past, present and future, and finally do what no one before or since has done...raise Himself from the grave in power and glory! And definitely not because any single one of us deserved to be saved, but just because He loves us so! Oh, what a Savior is mine!

This week the ladies Bible study group I study with each Spring and Fall finished yet another Bible study by Beth Moore. This one was "Deuteronomy: the Law of Love". Because God gave the law to Moses, he (Moses) was of course an important figure in this study. In the last lecture we studied about the last part of Moses' life and his death. I think that's what really got me to thinking on the glory of God.

We talked about how there finally came the day when God came to Moses and told him He wanted Moses to come up to Mount Nebo, look at the Promised Land, and then die. (Deuteronomy 32:48-52) Remember that Moses was not going to be allowed to enter the Promised Land because he had disobeyed God in the wilderness by striking the rock for water instead of speaking to it as God had told him.

Those of you who have had Beth Moore's classes know what an active imagination she has! During this lesson she got really dramatic wondering HOW Moses died up on Mt. Nebo once he had finished looking over the Promised Land. "Did he fall off a cliff?" "Did God PUSH him off a cliff?" "HOW did it happen?" She was amusing and we all laughed at some of her suggestions. But then afterward I began to think and use my own imagination. I remembered Moses being on a cloud covered mountain alone with the glory of God while God gave him the laws for the people. "And the glory of the LORD abode upon mount Sinai, and the cloud covered it six days: and the seventh day he called unto Moses out of the midst of the cloud. And the sight of the glory of the LORD was like devouring fire on the top of the mount in the eyes of the children of Israel. And Moses went into the midst of the cloud, and gat him up into the mount: and Moses was in the mount forty days and forty nights." (Exodus 24:16-18)

Then there was the time after the people had built a tabernacle for God according to the instructions He had given Moses. "And it came to pass, as Moses entered into the tabernacle, the cloudy pillar descended, and stood at the door of the tabernacle, and the LORD talked with Moses. And all the people saw the cloudy pillar stand at the tabernacle door: and all the people rose up and worshipped, every man in his tent door. And the LORD spake unto Moses face to face, as a man speaketh unto his friend...". (Exodus 33:9-11)

God spoke to Moses ''face to face'' but we have to remember that God's glory was obscured by a thick cloud covering the tabernacle. Farther down in chapter 33 Moses says to God (verse 18) "I beseech thee, shew me thy glory." God responds to him (verse 20) by saying, "Thou canst not see my face: for there shall no man see me, and live." So God put Moses in the cleft of a rock, covered him with His Hand while He passed by in all His glory, then took away His Hand so Moses could see his back. But He told Moses (verse 23) "my face shall not be seen."

After thinking about the life of Moses and his very unique relationship with God, I wonder if MAYBE....just maybe God took Moses up on Mt. Nebo, showed him all the Promised Land and then....removed the veil and showed Moses His face! MAYBE God revealed to Moses ALL of His glory right then and there and it took Moses' life...just like He had said to Moses that "there shall no man see me, and live."

Well, that's just my idea but it makes my heart swell to think about it! And then on top of all that, to think about this same glorious God dying for ME so that I can go to heaven and see His complete glory myself....well, it's almost more than I can take in this day before Easter! In the great "love chapter" of the Bible...1 Corinthians 13...verse 12 tells us "For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known." I am so much looking forward to that day when I shall lay down this old body of mortal clay and enter into the joys of heaven where I will see Jesus face to face...in ALL His glory!...and live forever!

~~Marilyn~~

Just A Glimpse

Early this morning as I looked out the kitchen window, I saw just a glimpse of sunshine hitting the very tiptop’s of the trees down past our old barn.  It was so pretty I just had to get my camera and capture the scene.  I thought to myself, “Here’s just a glimpse of the beautiful sunny day that is to come!” And that made me feel excited and happy.

Now several hours later the sunshine is everywhere you look.  I went back outside just now (for only a very few minutes because although the sun is beating down, the temperature is still only thirty-eight degrees) and took another picture of the full face of the sun.  I could not look directly at Mr. Sun because he was so bright!  So I just closed my eyes, held my camera up to the sky and snapped the picture.  Even the camera could not capture the full intensity of the sunshine.  It’s just too much!

All this reminded me of heaven and the fact that we only have just a glimpse now of what awaits us in heaven as children of God.

We can get just a glimpse of what is being prepared for Christians at this very moment when we read the words of Jesus in John 14:1-3….”Let not your heart be troubled: ye believe in God, believe also in me. In my Father's house are many mansions: if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and receive you unto myself; that where I am, there ye may be also.”

What an exciting thing this is! Jesus said here that He is preparing a place for us in heaven so that we can be forever with Him!  That’s where I want to be!

Jesus Christ gives us a further glimpse of heaven in Revelation 21:21-23…..”And the twelve gates were twelve pearls: every several gate was of one pearl: and the street of the city was pure gold, as it were transparent glass. And I saw no temple therein: for the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are the temple of it. And the city had no need of the sun, neither of the moon, to shine in it: for the glory of God did lighten it, and the Lamb is the light thereof.”

No need of temples or churches in heaven because the “Lord God Almighty and the Lamb (Jesus) are the temple of it”.  And no need of any kind of lights, either natural or artificial, because Jesus Christ our Lord will be the Light!

Do you remember in the Old Testament how God told Moses that he could get in the cleft of a rock and watch as He passed by? But God told Moses (Exodus 33:20), “Thou canst not see my face: for there shall no man see me, and live.”  God is too bright, too majestic, for us to look in His face with our human bodies!  Even the sun that heats our planet earth is too bright for us to look full in its face without leaving our vision impaired or even blinded.  And this sun is just something that God spoke and it came into being during creation week!  Our frail minds cannot even imagine the brightness of our God.

As I look at 1 Corinthians 13:12 (For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known.), it makes me think about watching my husband when he welds.  He has a special welding mask that has a very dark thick glass front that protects his eyes from being burned while looking at the brightness of the light that comes from welding.  Without it, the light would blind him.  1 Corinthians 13:12 tells us that right now it’s like we are looking at God through a welding mask (through a glass, darkly).  We can see him through just a glimpse we get in the Word but, Oh, what  a day that will be when we can see Him FACE to FACE!

Friend, do you have your reservation made for this unimaginably wonderful destination?  It’s already been paid for by the death of God’s only begotten son, Jesus Christ!  We can’t even imagine how great it will be!  1 Corinthians 2:9 says “But as it is written, Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him.”

God bless you friends! Thanks for taking time to share “just a glimpse” of heaven with me today!

Marilyn

Mama

(Mama around 30 years old)

March 3, 1970, is one of the darkest days in my memory.  Both physically and emotionally. 

Physically I was a sixteen-year-old girl sitting in afternoon Spanish class looking out the window at the black clouds that had suddenly covered the sun.  The sky turned so very dark. Then came the wind and the rain. Back then there were no weather alerts but I’m almost sure that there was a strong storm very close by. 

Emotionally I was just a little girl worried about her Mama that day.  She was being transported by ambulance from our small county hospital to a large hospital in a metropolitan city about seventy miles away.  When I had visited her in the hospital the night before she was delirious and didn’t recognize me. That broke my heart. My emotions were in a jumble but having come from a family where showing your emotions were sometimes frowned upon, I was trying to keep all that to myself.

I admit I was not a very good student that day between the raging storm outside the windows and the one raging in my heart and soul.  Then there was a knock on the classroom door…something that was very out of the ordinary…and I looked up to see Mama’s doctor through the small diamond shaped glass window.  At the sight of him my heart came up into my mouth and I felt sick.  I knew there must be something very wrong.  My teacher went out and spoke with him first and then came back to the door and called me out.  The two of them took me across the hall to the teacher’s lounge and Dr. Ketchum told me that Mama had passed away in the ambulance that afternoon.  I wanted to scream!  I wanted to lash out at someone in some way! I wanted to cry!  But what I did was grit my teeth together and ball my hands up into fists and determine in my mind that I was not going to cry in front of these people!  That nobody was going to see my true emotions!

From that time on I never really felt like a young person anymore.  I was the only child left at home and so I became the cook and housekeeper for my Daddy while also going to school every day.  Thankfully Daddy was a man of habit and he believed in everything having a place and always kept things in their place.

My Mama has been in heaven for forty-three years today.  If anyone ‘’deserved’’ to go to heaven in my eyes, it was Mama.  She was truly the best woman I have ever known!  But as good as she was, even she never ‘’deserved’’ to go to heaven!  And she would have been the first to tell you that!  She went to heaven because at some point in her life she realized her need as a sinner to have Jesus as her Saviour!  And she trusted Him to be all that she needed for salvation.

My life’s goal is to be the kind of godly woman that Mama was!

Favour is deceitful, and beauty is vain: but a woman that feareth the Lord, she shall be praised.  Proverbs 31: 30