TRUST IN YOU

WHAT BETTER WAY

TO BEGIN

THE SABBATH

BUT WITH GOD'S WORD

SABBATH BLESSINGS,

DEAR FRIENDS

BLOOM

My yard has been blooming all spring.  The current offerings include the gardenia bushes and my hydrangea bed.  There are blooms galore!  A visual feast of God's glorious creation.

The color of the hydrangea blooms is dependent upon the acidity of the soil.  Obviously my dirt is a mixed bag of PH since I have pink, blue, and white blooms all on the same plant.  

The gardenias bushes are so filled with blooms you must look to find the green of the leaves.  As an added bonus these blooms produce a sweet aroma which floats on the breezes all the way to the street in front of the house.  A sensual delight which greets me every time I step out the door.  What a glorious painting the plants and shrubs have offered this year.

This beautiful landscape does not happen without work.  The bushes must be fertilized, watered, trimmed at the correct time, and sprayed.  It takes a vigilant eye and plenty of sweat equity to produce the fruit of the bloom.  The blooms will be here but a short time~ here today and gone tomorrow~ BUT what joy they are while they last.  I marvel at God's creation each time I cross my threshold and I am certain my neighbors are enjoying the fruit of my labor as well.

So it is with our spiritual lives.  We must nourish our soul, prune that which is dead wood, and protect ourselves from the pestilence of the evil one.  To produce the best fruit, we need to tend our eternal spirits.  And then we can

How pleased our Master Gardener must be when He gazes upon His handiwork and sees the fruits of His labor.  

Bloom where you are planted and know God's good pleasure.

For it is God who works in you,

both to will and to work for His good pleasure.

Philippians 2:13

SEALING THE DOOR

The floor replacement has been a much bigger project than I realized it would.  The old wood floors are cut and then pulled up in small pieces since they were originally glued down.  Unfortunately--when you saw--there is saw dust.  To add to the problem, the sawdust is very fine.  Taken alone~sawdust seems harmless~the problem is when you have buckets and buckets of sawdust released in a house.  This has necessitated creating barriers to keep it out of the rooms with floors not being replaced.

The kitchen has a sealed plastic barrier to keep the sawdust out.  All of the furniture is stacked in three rooms and we have gone to great lengths to keep the fine dust from invading these safe rooms.

If I should happen to need to enter one of the sealed rooms, I immediately reseal the space.  The evil sawdust must NOT infiltrate the protected space.  No contamination is acceptable!

This has worked well-NOT!  The sawdust is so fine, it cannot always be seen by the human eye.  If you dare to open the door, sawdust is escaping as if there is a vacuum needing to be filled.  The insidious dust creeps through the tiniest of holes seeping into the seemingly dust free zone.  The next thing I know there are saw dust foot prints all through the house.  You think you have swept it all up--contained it, but the footprints tell the truth.  Sawdust has crept into the rest of the house.

So it is with sin.  We think we have closed and sealed the door to the Evil One.  We have the barriers up and have become a no sin zone.  AND THEN~temptation comes knocking at the door asking for you to open it for just one second.  The next thing you know--sin has crept in and we are leaving our dirty footprints as we travel down the path.  We did not intend to sin--we only briefly opened the door--just a crack~  You know the rest of the story.  Time to call the clean up crew.  The Holy Trinity of sin redemption--who help us reseal the door, clean up the mess and start with a clean slate.  With their help we can close the cracks, slam the door and sin no more.  What a Great God we serve--Go and sin no more!

If we confess our sins, 

he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins

 and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

I John 1:9

EXTENDED WARRANTY

In case you were unaware, things are not made to last as they once were.  I have had two refrigerators go out just after the year warranty expired.  It left me wondering if there is a button they push which destroys the inner workings of the fridge in one year if you do not buy the extended warranty.  I REALLY think a fridge should last more than a year!  

I clearly remember having refrigerators which rusted before they quit working.  It takes a LONG time for a fridge to rust.  OH--but they are made of plastic now--and plastic does not rust.

When I had the spring service done on my air conditioning (we turn on the AC in the South late March ), I naively asked the serviceman how long did he think it would be before the unit had to be replaced.  Having had more than one unit that lasted thirty years, I was SHOCKED to learn they are now usually replaced in 15 years.  My home is now 13 years old---OH NO--major repairs in the future.  

My good friend had a vehicle which she loved and it had served her well.  UNTIL the warranty expired!  At that point there were major repairs needed.  SO major she ended up buying another vehicle from another car company.  AGAIN--in today's world of computers is there a preset self destruct button for when the mileage hits the warranty expiration?

The latest repair needed here at my casa is the wood flooring.  Almost every house in the hood has manufactured wood flooring.  This is flooring which has a thin coat of wood on top of laminate.  My flooring was beginning to show major signs of wear.  OF COURSE, I googled it and learned you can usually refinish the floor one time.  In my thinking, this gives me more than ten more years, and seems a good solution.  What I learned was NOT ALL manufactured flooring is eligible for this restoration AND it is not cheap.  SO, the men are here this week replacing my floor, and this time I am putting down ceramic tile.  THIS should definitely last my lifetime!

It would seem the world has come up with a new solution to increasing the bottom line, make things which have to be replaced more often.  That works well for corporate America, but NOT so good for my pocketbook!  What are your choices---replace or let it self destruct.  Perhaps this is why we see houses with cars and furniture in various stages of rust and decay piled around them like garden statues denoting a better day.  The theory of implosion states all things return to their original state if not cared for.

This does not bode well for the human body.  I have reached my expiration according to The Word and am living on borrowed time.  I choose to look at it as beating the warranty game.  Every day from here forward is Lagniappe and I am delighted with the dawning of each and every day.  The question becomes what do I intend to do with my Lagniappe?  Sit here waiting for the next breakdown of a part or   

Who am I to question the days given to me?  The expiration date has been extended without even having to buy an extended warranty.  WIN-WIN!  NOW to make the most of the day before me ~  ALL for God's Good Pleasure!

10 For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.

Ephesians 2:10

TOMORROW

A series of recent conversations have me thinking about the past and what we should do with it.  How many times have we all heard those cliches such as "What's done is done."  " Time to start again"  "Let it go"  

I finished a book this past weekend which was a poignant reminder of the problem with allowing the past to rule the present.

If anyone had a right to hold onto the grievances of the past, this World War II family of Jewish refugees did.  Mistreatment, abuse, theft, death,  misplacement, rejection, and loss of the dreams of tomorrow are only part of the story.  The Grand Dame of this family died bitter and vowing revenge-even in her death.  It was a painful reminder of the danger of living in the past--good or bad.

The stark truth is the past is just that--in the past--history--gone.  BUT the past is a vital part of who we are--in our present.  What do we do with the past?

Honor the memory.
By embracing and acknowledging what was, we honor our history.  There are good as well as bad things in all of our past.  We cannot selectively carve out what we care to remember.  It is a collage of what has made us who we are today.  Do not deny it, do not live in it, but instead accept it as part of the very fabric of your being.

Learn from it.
Our past is perhaps one of our greatest teachers.  If a dog chases me every time I walk a certain street, I should learn to not walk down that street.  To continue to return to the same street over and over is only asking for a dog bite.  If I enjoy a wonderful meal every time I visit a certain restaurant, trust the next meal will be good also.  Learn from the experience of our history and use it to frame our present.  If history is going to repeat itself, then we should learn from our past how to avoid the painful recurrence of painful memories by avoiding the circumstances leading to the pain.  In the same manner, the successes we have enjoyed should teach us the path to pursue to repeat the circumstances that lead to our triumphs.

Embrace today.
All we are promised is this moment~make the most of it.  Do not keep one foot in yesterday for your cannot walk into tomorrow dragging yesterday behind you.  Try walking in a door with one foot planted firmly outside the door.  The door will hit you in the face stopping your forward progress.  Step forward--even  tentatively--but take a step.  Today is not found in yesterday. Yesterday is gone, but today is a blank page waiting to be filled.

Always hope.
Even if your yesterday was so wonderful you cannot fathom life being any better, tomorrow could well be better.  The better will never be discovered unless you are willing to look for it.  One thing is sure and certain, without hope, without expectation, tomorrow has no hope of being better.  If your yesterday is painful and the horror of repeating it can have you pulling the covers over your head or headed for the nearest cave, there is hope for a better tomorrow.  How do you live--how do you move forward without hope?  

The past can paralyze us.  We can become stuck in the world of fear over a repeat performance or idling in the denial of life ever possibly being better than yesterday.  We choose how we live today--and today is all we have.  Make the most of it and live in hope by putting both feet inside the door of today.

May the God of hope fill you will all joy and peace in believing,

so that by the power of the Holy Spirit you may abound in hope.

Romans 15:13

HILLS AND VALLEYS

LIFE IS FILLED

WITH HILLS AND VALLEYS

BLESSED SABBATH,

DEAR FRIENDS!

VULNERABLE

#2 Son recently encouraged me to listen to a talk by this lady~

Upon further investigation, I discovered she is one of the gurus for the younger generations.  She is a highly effective communicator who has done her homework and knows her subject.  Perhaps she is a little too worldly for my taste, but I came away thinking.  The sure sign of a gifted communicator is the ability to make us think.

Brene Brown has spent years studying vulnerability.  Her contention is you have to be willing to experience failure and pain to grow.  She has MANY good points and I especially applaud her teaching on gratitude.

During the video I watched  "The Call to Courage,"  she addressed the armor we tend to wear in our day to day lives.  It is no secret that I am protecting my heart and there is definitely a wall around it.  Brene's contention is we need to take our armor off and allow ourselves to risk pain to fully experience life.  I thought of the book our small group studied and I have spent a lot of time writing about~

In this study of the 6th chapter of Ephesians, we are told God provides us with armor to fight the spiritual battles of this world.  We are not only given this suit of armor, but we are also told to not leave home without it. Brene would have you believe unless you are willing to strip off your armor, you will never experience life to the fullest. (In all fairness, I don't think she is talking about our spiritual armor)  God tells us, through Paul, that we are in a daily battle with evil and must be fully protected by the armor He has provided to live life fully in God's will.  A direct contradiction to each other.  

Without arguing the contradictory points, I did come away with one conclusion,

We should all be willing to be vulnerable when standing before God.

When searching for the meaning of vulnerable, my ears perked up when I read~

UNPROTECTED

Unprotected gives me a clear vision of open and willing to admit the truth of who we are.  God already knows the truth, but we need to be willing to admit that truth to Him.  Once we face the truth, then we are willing and able to change.  Perhaps there is a common theme in what Brene is saying and what I am thinking.   She desires for us to improve ourselves to live life to the fullest.  My desire is to change myself (reaching for santification) to live life in the fullness of God's grace.  

I came away from her video with this conclusion~

Much of what she says is Gospel based.  She is trying to instill in man the very things we are taught in God's Word about how He loves us.  Our roads diverge when she seems to promote "Me" to an equal status with God.  Our joy and eternal significance is found in God~all else is of this world and will fade away on the winds of time.

 God is sufficient. God is good. God loves you. And Jesus Christ will never leave you nor forsake you. No matter how weak or vulnerable we may be, we can look to Christ, whose grace is sufficient for us and made perfect in our weaknesses.

My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.

Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses,

so that the power of Christ may rest upon me. 

For the sake of Christ, then I am content with weaknesses,

insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities.

For when I am weak, then I am strong.

II Corinthians 12: 9-10