GROWING SEEDS: "We Are Living History - And We Get to Live HIStory"

 

 

Do you hear it?  The keys of the keyboard clicking this week as history is being documented in our lifetime? 

Do you feel it?  The pain of no paycheck....the nest egg you saved up for your entire lifetime so you could one day retire, quickly becoming a shadow of your portfolio?  The pit in your stomach that feels like you ate an entire watermelon and you don't even have the Coronavirus? 

If you think for a second this is about a virus, think again.

This slice of history we've all been "chosen" to walk through was predicted more than two thousand years ago.  Didn't know that?  It's right there...smack dab in the Bible.  Check it out....

I'm not afraid of this virus nor should you.....but what I am afraid of is that many Christians were caught off-guard by it and didn't know they were told to expect pandemic viruses, billions of locusts swarming East Africa, a barrel of oil being worth less than $0 and that an earthquake in Utah could be so strong it could shake the Salt Lake City Temple's iconic spire, causing the golden trumpet to fall from the angel Moroni’s right hand.  And friends, that's just this week. 

If everything's not okay yet, everything's not over yet. 

I fear many don't know these things.....but desperately need to.

This virus is the least of your worries......if you don't know Christ.  Because when your faith is in the One who writes the story - you can always trust the end of the story.

Have we forgotten we know the end of HIStory? 

*Quote by Ann VosKamp

GROWING SEEDS: "God Is Like A Chiropractor"

 

 

"God is like a Chiropractor"

You’re going to need to keep going back for realignment.

I chuckled when I read that line above in a friend's blog the other day.  Maybe because I myself am needing to see the chiropractor for a dislocated elbow that keeps popping in and out of my life and causing me pain....OR...maybe its because I know, since I've walked this road with God many times before, that when He tells me to "Come and get away with Him", he's not saying, "Just once and you will be aligned."  But what He's actually saying is, "Liz, every morning when you get up, come and let me re-align You and help you through the day ahead."  I guess you could say it's like taking vitamins.....you can't just take them for one day.  You must take the vitamins every - single - day in order for them to work. 

Just as we know a chiropractor brings healing by realigning the bones, muscles, and nerves, we also know that if everything is put back into proper order, healing will take place.

So often we consider the time at church on Sunday our God re-alignment.  It's our once-a-week "fix" trip to have ourselves snapped back into place.  But how do you feel on Monday?  Back to feeling a little stressed?   A little different than you did on Sunday?  It's because you need intentional space with God every day....not just Sunday (or Saturday)!  The key word here is "Intentional".  Yes, reading your Bible and studying diligently will bring you closer to God.  But when You have that private consultation with Him to discuss the things that are hurting you...those big rocks in your life you can't seem to climb over...well, that's called Intentional Time and those are the moments God loves spending with You the most.  That is the doctor-patient consultation time. 

That is when He snaps your dislocated spots back into place.

"Make straight the paths you walk on,

that your halting limbs may not be dislocated,

but healed."

Hebrews 12:13

GROWING SEEDS: "Peace Be With You"

I currently live in a campground.  Walleye Park Campground to be exact.  I sold my house in December to a couple who had spent years of weekends at their cabin in Walleye Park.  We traded houses.  They bought mine....I rented theirs.

And an interesting thing happened last week at Walleye Park.  It had been mostly empty until the world shut down from the virus.  Suddenly, campers started arriving.  Walleye Park started filling up.  Families started living life together and I felt like a bug-on-the-wall of the campers' lives from the view in my cozy rented cabin.  I could see them smiling, laughing, enjoying life with each other in front of their campfires and fishing off the shore.  Life as they knew it may have shut down, but they ignited life once they hit the Park.  It was such a contrast to what I was seeing on Fox News or CNN.

I saw Peace on their faces.

Imagine with me for a minute, will you?  Two-thousand years ago....in a park much like Walleye.  Can you see Jesus' eyes blink open as He lay in the tomb?  A tomb, I might add, that was a "virgin" tomb (a never-before-used tomb)....just like the "virgin" Womb He had been born from.

Pause....and think about that for a minute.

A smile most certainly must have crossed His face as He opened His eyes.  Can you see Him standing up.....maybe even stretching a bit....before moving the stone that blocked the entrance to His tomb in the park?  Do you see Him look up into Heaven as He walked out into the early morning dew?  It was still dark, the Bible says, and the park was quiet...peaceful....as He waited for the world to experience the miracle that had just occurred.  I see a sly grin on His face as He knows what’s coming next.

This, my friends, is the blessing of Easter morning.

If you believe this happened, then you have no fear of the future.  You have no concern of the world imploding or the stock market crashing or even death.  Because death has no sting....if you believe in Jesus.  He took your sting of death from you when He placed it on Himself at the cross.  It was a trade-off, actually.....

He TOOK Your death....He GAVE you His life.

Beginning of story.

“Easter is a time when God turned the
Inevitability of Death....
Into the
Invincibility of Life.”

Craig D. Lounsbrough

GROWING SEEDS: "We're Living A Mary Moment In A Martha World"

My older sister Debbie and I have joked for years that she is the "Martha" of the family and I'm the "Mary".  We're, of course, referring to Mary and Martha, sisters of Lazarus and best friends to Jesus, in the story found in Luke 10. 

In a nutshell, Jesus, along with His disciples and followers (a lot of people!!) were visiting Martha's home where she lived with her brother Lazarus and sister Mary.  She was feeling the stress of feeding all these unexpected guests, making sure she had enough chairs and toilet paper (kidding), and watching her sister Mary doing nothing; well, except sitting quietly at Jesus' feet....listening to every word He said.  Martha, hands on her aproned hips, complained to Jesus that Mary wasn't helping her in the kitchen.

Debbie is a much better hostess than Liz in our family.  She is the one who organizes our get-together's, determines where they will happen and when.  Liz just plops down a loaf of bread she bought at Brookshires and starts catching up with everyone since the last time we were together.  All the while, Debbie is cooking in the kitchen (usually MY kitchen) and getting the food on the table.  Truly, this is a picture of our family get-together's.

But as the world has come to a screeching halt and been confined to their homes these past few weeks, it dawned on me that maybe God is needing us to use this time as Mary Moments in our Martha World.  God is "allowing" us to SLOW DOWN so we can sit at His feet to listen and  learn....get to know Him....hear His voice in all of this.  Time is short, friends...and perhaps He needed us in "Time Out"; almost like a parent sending their child to their room to “think” about what they did and to come out asking for forgiveness, so we can become “changed” from this time alone with Him.  I pray He whispers in our ears....and then delivers us from ourselves. 

Pull that Bible off the shelf and blow off the dust.  Open it up to the story of Mary and Martha in Luke 10.  And don't miss those critical last verses in 41-42,

"Martha, Martha" (Insert your name here), the Lord answered,

"you are worried and upset about many things (Coronavirus, loss of jobs, economy, sickness and death),

but few things are needed - indeed only one thing is needed (time alone with Me).

Mary has chosen what is better, (she chose Me)

and it will not be taken away from her." (a beautiful, forever life with Me)