Easter

New Easter Bibles!

Both of the older kids have started asking philosophical questions of my husband and me. Our 3-year-old son has already asked us "God is Jesus. How is that?" Amazing, this is a profound mystery that scholars have wrestled with for over 2000 years!

What a blessing to have children who's questions about the LORD make me reaffirm my own faith and beliefs so I can "Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have." 1 Peter 3:15 (NIV)

The Crucifixion

After Easter, I spent some personal time with the LORD in contemplation of the crucifixion of Jesus on Passover and His resurrection on the third day. The LORD spoke to my heart with some awesome insights, as I knew He would, in His love for me as His child and partner in Covenant.

I first thought about the act of crucifying the Christ on the Passover. Just as the Israelites had been commanded to sacrifice a lamb to receive a "pass over" of the angel of death, Jesus was sacrificed to deliver us from eternal death. Ok, that one I've known for a long time (it probably deserves further explanation, but that will be for another post). But, as I let the LORD speak to me further about the resurrection, I wondered if there is any significance in Christ remaining in the grave the day after He died. Surely He could have been raised on the second day, but He was not, it was the third day. Was there any significance there?

God does nothing by chance or without specific reason, so I let myself think and pray about it more. The Holy Spirit revealed profound Truth, as is every revelation from God in His Word. I heard the Spirit say, "The Christ, as God, had to remember the Sabbath day and keep it Holy." There was no way that God could break this or any of His commandments, as that would negate every other commandment and what would I have then? A God who changes His character and His Word... this is impossible and not a God I would want to worship!

Exodus 20:8-11
8 Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy.

9 Six days you shall labor and do all your work,

10 but the seventh day is a sabbath of the LORD your God; in it you shall not do any work, you or your son or your daughter, your male or your female servant or your cattle or your sojourner who stays with you.

11 For in six days the LORD made the heavens and the earth, the sea and all that is in them, and rested on the seventh day; therefore the LORD blessed the sabbath day and made it holy.

I let myself imagine the "rest" God was allowing Jesus to receive. After the horrific slaughter the Christ endured as my passover lamb, God the Father allowed Jesus to spend the next day in His Holy presence; basking in His Glory, communing again with His Spirit after total and complete separation from Them both when He took my sin upon His body on the cross.

This Is Awesome! Because our LORD never changes, I can bank on His Word to reveal Truth to me every time I seek Him in His Holy Scripture. Praise God, He DID raise from the dead, and through His resurrected life, I can enter the Kingdom to hear, "Well done, good and faithful servant."

So Long Self

My new mantra...

Well if I come across a little bit distant
It's just because I am
Things just seem to feel a little bit different
You understand
Believe it or not but life is not apparently
About me anyways
But I have met the One who really is worthy
So let me say

So long, self
Well, it's been fun, but I have found somebody else
So long, self
There's just no room for two
So you are gonna have to move
So long, self
Don't take this wrong but you are wrong for me, farewell
Oh well, goodbye, don't cry
So long, self

Stop right there because I know what you're thinking
But no we can't be friends
And even though I know your heart is breaking
This has to end
And come to think of it the blame for all of this
Simply falls on me
For wanting something more in life than all of this
Can't you see

So long, self
Well, it's been fun, but I have found somebody else
So long, self
There's just no room for two
So you are gonna have to move
So long, self
Don't take this wrong but you are wrong for me, farewell
Oh well, goodbye, don't cry
So long, self

Don't feel so bad (don't feel so bad)
There'll be better days (there'll be better days)
Don't go away mad (but by all means)
Just go away, go away

So long, self
Well, it's been fun, but I have found somebody else
So long, self
There's just no room for two
So you are gonna have to move
So long, self
Don't take this wrong but you are wrong for me, farewell
Oh well, goodbye, don't cry
So long, self
Farewell, Goodbye...

So Long Self by Mercy Me

Bye, Bye Baby

Although she still refers to herself as "baby", she is no longer a baby. We now have a toddler. As hard as ending the baby chapter has been, I didn't cry. Well, I did shed a tear on Monday, her last full day of being a one-year-old.

May God bless our sweet girl in this new year full of discovery and wonder at His creation and may He grant my prayer to be filled with His wisdom to raise God fearing children.

Beautiful Name

I'm listening to this song right now, thinking of my family that is making preparations to return to the Mission field in Rwanda. I pray daily for their safety, but above all else, that the Word of the LORD will continue to go forth in Africa brought by Godly men and women like Sam and Nancy Shewmaker.

Beautiful Name from Different Kind of Free by ZOEgirl

Your heart I seek to find
With Your hands You fashioned mine
Let me be used by You to carry Truth
To the ends of the earth
'Til everyone's heard
My mended heart will share Your words
I will tell the world that You are God

I will run
I will fly
I will live to be a sacrifice
Through it all I'll rise above
Unafraid I'll face what comes
I will run
I will fly
And for my faith I'll live & die
I'll be strong
I will press on
For the sake of Your beautiful name
Your beautiful name

Should all life cease to grow
Should chaos take control
The only hope we know is You will save us
It's worth the cost to take up my cross
As You take back what's been lost
Until all who doubt know
You are God

I will run
I will fly
I will live to be a sacrifice
Through it all I'll rise above
Unafraid I'll face what comes
I will run
I will fly
And for my faith I'll live & die
I'll be strong
I will press on
For the sake of Your beautiful name
Your beautiful name

I'm not a captive anymore
I'm gonna soar to a new place
Take on a new pace
I know what my life is for

I will run
I will fly
I will live to be a sacrifice
Through it all I'll rise above
Unafraid I'll face what comes
I will run
I will fly
And for my faith I'll live & die
I'll be strong
I will press on
For the sake of Your beautiful name
Your beautiful name


May the LORD continue to bless their labor for His Kingdom now and forever.

Jesus' Example

Do you want to learn how to know and then do the will of God? There is no better model than that of Jesus himself. During His 33 years on earth He never failed to do every assignment given to Him by the Father. He perfectly completed every assignment God gave Him. He never sinned. Would you like to understand how Jesus came to know and do the will of God?

John 5:17,19,20
17 Jesus said to them, "My Father is always at his work to this very day, and I, too, am working."
19 Jesus gave them this answer: "I tell you the truth, the Son can do nothing by himself; he can do only what he sees his Father doing, because whatever the Father does the Son also does.
20 For the Father loves the Son and shows him all he does. Yes, to your amazement he will show him even greater things than these."

This is one of the clearest examples of how Jesus knew what to do. An outline of Jesus' approach to knowing and doing God's will would be:

Jesus example
- The Father has been working right up until now.
- Now God has Me working.
- I do nothing on My own initiative.
- I watch to see what the father is doing.
- I do what I see the Father already is doing.
- You see, the Father loves Me.
- He shows Me everything that He, Himself, is doing.

This model is for my life personally and for His church. It is not just a step-by-step approach for knowing and doing the will of God. It describes a love relationship through which God accomplishes His purposes. In short: Watch to see where God is working and join Him!

God Is Always at Work Around You

Right now God is working all around you and in your life. One of the greatest tragedies among God's people is that, while they have a deep longing to experience God, they are experiencing God day after day but do not know how to recognize Him. The purpose of Experiencing God is to learn many ways to recognize clearly the activity of God in and around your life. The Holy Spirit and the Word of God will instruct you and help you know when and where God is working. Once you know where He is working, you will adjust your life to join Him where He is already at work.

You will experience His accomplishing His activity through your life. When you enter this kind of intimate love relationship with God, you will know and do the will of God and experience Him in ways you have never known Him before. The study of the material in Experiencing God cannot accomplish that goal in your life. Only God can bring you into that kind of relationship.

Jesus is Your Model

Interpret Experience by Scripture

During your life you will have times when you want to respond based on your own experience or your own wisdom. Such an approach will get you in trouble. This should be your guideline: Always go to the Bible for truth (or, for the Holy Spirit to reveal Truth).

Look to see what God says and how He works in the Scriptures. Make your decisions and evaluate your experiences based on biblical principles.

When you study the Scriptures, do not base your decision on one isolated case. Look to see how God works throughout the Scriptures. When you learn how God has worked throughout history, you can depend on His working in a similar way with you. Your experience is valid only as it is confirmed in the Scriptures. I do not deny any experience that a person has had. However, they must always be interpreted according to what is in the Scriptures. Someone might say, "Well, I don't care what you say, I've experienced this."

My response is, "I do not deny your experience. I do question your interpretation of what you experienced, because it is contrary to what I see in the Word of God." Our experiences cannot be our guide. Every experience must be controlled and understood by the Scriptures. The God revealed in Scripture does not change and the Truth of Scripture will never contradict itself. You must be cautious about isolating a single experience from the context of Scripture. You will want to see how God works throughout Scripture. You will never go wrong if, under the Holy Spirit's instruction, you let the Bible be your guide.

The Bible Is Your Guide

Christians are becoming more and more disoriented to the Bible as a guide for faith and practice. Because of this, Christians have turned to worldly solutions, programs, and methods that appear to be the answer to spiritual problems. The Word of God should be the only guide to what we should be doing. Some people say, "That is not practical." They want to move away from the Bible and rely on the world's ways or on personal experience. As a Christian disciple, we cannot abandon the guidance found in the Bible. The Bible is the only guide for faith and practice.

How do you let the Word of God become your guide? When I seek God's direction, I insist on following the directives that I see in the Word of God. The previous blog post Jesus Is Your Way is an example. Does God call people to follow Him without giving them all the details up front? We know that He called Abram to follow that way. Is that a pattern consistent in the Scriptures?

Matthew 4:18-20
As Jesus was walking beside the Sea of Galilee, he saw two brothers, Simon called Peter and his brother Andrew. They were casting a net into the lake, for they were fishermen. "Come, follow me," Jesus said, "and I will make you fishers of men." At once they left their nets and followed him.

Matthew 4:21-22
Going on from there, he saw two other brothers, James son of Zebedee and his brother John. They were in a boat with their father Zebedee, preparing their nets. Jesus called them, and immediately they left the boat and their father and followed him.

Matthew 9:9
As Jesus went on from there, he saw a man named Matthew sitting at the tax collector's booth. "Follow me," he told him, and Matthew got up and followed him.

Acts 9:1-20
Meanwhile, Saul was still breathing out murderous threats against the Lord's disciples. He went to the high priest and asked him for letters to the synagogues in Damascus, so that if he found any there who belonged to the Way, whether men or women, he might take them as prisoners to Jerusalem. As he neared Damascus on his journey, suddenly a light from heaven flashed around him. He fell to the ground and heard a voice say to him, "Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?"

"Who are you, Lord?" Saul asked.

"I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting," he replied. "Now get up and go into the city, and you will be told what you must do."

The men traveling with Saul stood there speechless; they heard the sound but did not see anyone. Saul got up from the ground, but when he opened his eyes he could see nothing. So they led him by the hand into Damascus. For three days he was blind, and did not eat or drink anything.

In Damascus there was a disciple named Ananias. The Lord called to him in a vision, "Ananias!"
"Yes, Lord," he answered.

The Lord told him, "Go to the house of Judas on Straight Street and ask for a man from Tarsus named Saul, for he is praying. In a vision he has seen a man named Ananias come and place his hands on him to restore his sight."

"Lord," Ananias answered, "I have heard many reports about this man and all the harm he has done to your saints in Jerusalem. And he has come here with authority from the chief priests to arrest all who call on your name."

But the Lord said to Ananias, "Go! This man is my chosen instrument to carry my name before the Gentiles and their kings and before the people of Israel. I will show him how much he must suffer for my name."

Then Ananias went to the house and entered it. Placing his hands on Saul, he said, "Brother Saul, the Lord—Jesus, who appeared to you on the road as you were coming here—has sent me so that you may see again and be filled with the Holy Spirit." Immediately, something like scales fell from Saul's eyes, and he could see again. He got up and was baptized, and after taking some food, he regained his strength.

Saul spent several days with the disciples in Damascus. At once he began to preach in the synagogues that Jesus is the Son of God.

In some cases God gave more details than in others. In Moses' call, God gave him a bigger picture of the assignment than he usually gave. In every case, however, the individuals had to stay close to God for daily guidance. For Moses and the children of Israel, God provided daily guidance through the cloud by day and the fire by night. For Peter, Andrew, James, John, Matthew, and Saul, God gave very little detail about their assignments. He basically said, "Just follow me, and I will show you."

What Is God's Will for My Life?

When people seek to know and do the will of God, many ask, What is God's will for my life? Seminary professor Dr. Gaines S. Dobbins said, "If you ask the wrong question, you are going to get the wrong answer." Sometimes we assume that every question is a legitimate question. When we pursue an answer and always come up wrong, we cannot figure out what is happening. Always check to see if you have asked the right question before you pursue the answer.

What is God's will for my life?- is not the right question. The right question is, What is God's will? Once I know God's will, then I can adjust my life to Him. In other words, what is it that God is purposing where I am. Once I know what God is doing, then I know what I need to do. The focus needs to be on God, not my life!

Jesus Is Your Way

For 12 years, Henry Blackaby pastored in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, Canada. One day a farmer said to him, "Henry, come out and visit with me at my farm." His directions went something like this: "Go a quarter mile past the edge of the city and you will see a big red barn on your left. Go to the next road and turn to your left. Take that road for three-quarters of a mile. You'll see a tree. Go right for about four miles, and then you will see a big rock..." Henry wrote all of this down and eventually got there!

The next time he was to go to the farmer's house, the farmer was along for the ride. Since there was more than one way to get to his house, he could have taken them any way he wanted to. You see, the farmer was the "map". What did the driver have to do? Simply listen to the farmer and obey him. Every time the farmer said, "turn" they turned. The farmer took them a different way than before. The farmer was the "map"; he knew the way.

When you come to the Lord Jesus to seek His will for your life, what do you ask?

Lord, what do you want me to do? When do you want me to do it? How shall I do it? Where shall I do it? Who do you want me to involve along the way? And please tell me what the outcome will be?

Or...

Lord, just tell me what to do one step at a time, and I will do it.

Isn't the first response most typical of us? We are always asking God for a detailed "road map". We say, "Lord, if You could just tell me where I am heading, then I will be able to set my course and go."

He says, "You don't need to. What you need to do is follow Me one day at a time." We need to come to the place where the second response is ours.

John 14:6
"I am the way and the truth and the life."

Who is it that really knows the way for you to go to fulfill God's purpose for your life? God is. Jesus said "I am the way."

He did not say "I will show you the way."
He did not say "I will give you a road map."
He did not say "I will tell you which direction to head."
He said, "I am the way." Jesus knows the way; He is your way.

If you were to do everything that Jesus tells you one day at a time, do you suppose that you always would be right in the center of where God wants you to be? When you get to the place where you trust Jesus to guide you one step at a time you experience a new freedom. If you don't trust Jesus to guide you this way, what happens if you don't know the way you are to go? You worry every time you must take a turn. You often freeze up and cannot make a decision. This is not the way God intends for you to live your life.

I have found in my own life that I can release the way to Him. Then I take care of everything He tells me one day at a time. He gives me plenty to do to fill each day with meaning and purpose! If I do everything He says, I will be in the center of His will when He wants to use me for a special assignment.

Abram Followed One Day at a Time
Abram (later, God changed his name to Abraham) is a good example of this principle at work in a Bible character. He walked by faith and not by sight.

Genesis 12:1-5
1 The LORD had said to Abram, "Leave your country, your people and your father's household and go to the land I will show you.

2 "I will make you into a great nation
and I will bless you;
I will make your name great,
and you will be a blessing.

3 I will bless those who bless you,
and whoever curses you I will curse;
and all peoples on earth
will be blessed through you."

4 So Abram left, as the LORD had told him; and Lot went with him. Abram was seventy-five years old when he set out from Haran. 5 He took his wife Sarai, his nephew Lot, all the possessions they had accumulated and the people they had acquired in Haran, and they set out for the land of Canaan, and they arrived there.

What did God say? How specific was He? "Leave" and "go." Go where? "To a land I will show you."

Are you ready to follow God's will that way?

Many times, as with Abram, God called people just to follow Him. He is more likely to call you to follow one day at a time than He is to spell out all the details before you begin to obey Him.

Matthew 6:33-34
33 But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. 34 Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.

Now, spend time with God in prayer and...
... agree God is absolutely trustworthy.
... agree with God that you will follow Him one day at a time.
... agree that you will follow Him even when He does not spell out all the details.
... agree that you will let Him be your Way.

If you cannot agree to these right now, openly confess your struggles to Him. Ask Him to help you want to do His will His way. Claim the promise: "It is God who works in you to will and to act according to his good purpose" Phillipians 2:13.

...Worth a Thousand Words

She even makes sand look cute!

Introduction

John 17:3
Now this is eternal life: that they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent.

The heart of eternal life and the heart of Experiencing God is to KNOW GOD and to KNOW JESUS CHRIST whom He has sent. Knowing God does not come through a program or method. It is a relationship with a Person. It is an intimate love relationship with God. Through this relationship, God reveals His will and invites you to join Him where He is already at work. When you obey, God accomplishes through you something only He can do. Then you come to KNOW GOD in a more intimate way by EXPERIENCING GOD at work through you.

John 10:10
... I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.

Relationship to Jesus Christ - a Prerequisite

The understanding here is that you already have trusted Jesus Christ as Savior and acknowledge Him to be Lord of your life. If you have not made this most important decision in your life, the rest of the Experiencing God study will have little meaning because spiritual matters can only be understood by those who have the indwelling Spirit of Christ.

1 Corinthians 2:14
The man without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him, and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually discerned.

If you need help with this important decision, please call on your pastor, a deacon or a Christian friend for help. They will be there for you and direct you to the relationship you seek.

Looking for More in Your Experience of God?

You may have been frustrated in your Christian experience because you know God has a life for you that you have not experienced. Or you may be earnestly desiring God's direction for your life and ministry. You may have experienced tragedy in you life. Experiencing God will help you to:
-hear when God is speaking to you
-clearly identify the activity of God in your life
-believe Him to be and do everything He promises
-adjust your beliefs, character, and behavior to Him and His ways
-see a direction that He is taking in your life and what He wants to do through your life
-clearly know what you need to do in response to His activity in your life and
-experience God doing through you what only God can do!

This is an impossible task for a Bible study course. These are things that only God can do in your life. Experiencing God will be a catalyst for your deeper walk with God.

The most important thing to remember about a relationship to God is His interest in you. As His precious child, He is infinitely more interested in your life than you or I could possibly be.