Celebrating Mothers and Others

Mother's Day is right around the corner.  I remember when I was a girl Mother's Day was celebrated by wearing a corsage.  Those with a living mother wore red and those with a mother no longer living wore white.  We ordered them from the florist with baby's breath and pinned them on with frightening looking pins.  I miss that tradition a little.  The beautiful red roses were such a contrast with the white ones but both were beautiful and meaningful. Without the tradition of the roses, its hard to recognize that for some the day of celebrating mothers may be bittersweet...or just bitter.

There are those who are blessed with beautiful mothers and relationships still alive and thriving and sweet.  There are some who desperately miss a mother no longer available for long phone conversations or trips to the mall.  Those like my friend Jordan whose "missing you heart" still feels tender and raw at the loss.  She was blessed with a wonderful, Godly mother, taken, by our standards, too soon.  Jordan struggles.. but here is what I see that makes me know that Jordan will be okay.  Her mother had wonderful girlfriends.  She included Jordan in that group as well.  I see God's hand in that.  I know that Janet never dreamed that one day she would leave her daughter too early and feeling unprepared...but God put Janet in a wonderful group of friends, in preparation for the day that they would step in and continue to support and mentor and love Jordan with their "nurturing love."  They don't replace Janet, but they "stand in" with arms wide open because that's who they are and they know she would have done the same for their child.

My grandmother was not raised by her mother.  She was raised by her grandmother as the matriarch in her life.  What was unusual in her day is much more common in today's world.  I have several friends who are raising their grandchildren and doing a fabulous job.  It isn't easy but the love of their hearts will make a difference that will be remembered.

There are those among us who for one reason or another may not have bonded with their mother.  There are those who were loved most and influenced most by a step-mother, grandmother, aunt, sister,a best friend, Sunday School teacher or the mom of a best friend.  I think Mother's Day encompasses all.  That's why I love that Heartlife plans a "Mothers and Others" event.  We recognize that "family" doesn't always involve DNA.  

I have included the link below and encourage you to attend this precious event.  Bring your mom, bring your daughter, bring your friend, invite a new mother and celebrate her induction into "the club".  There are no boundaries ladies.  Maybe you are needed as someone elses "Other" and you just don't know it yet.

Tell me about your Mother or the "Other" who influenced your life.



https://www.facebook.com/events/1405014803105782/?ref_notif_type=plan_user_joined&source=1

Proclaiming the Good New at McPherson

The Spirit of the Sovereign Lord is on me,

because the Lord has anointed me

to proclaim good news to the poor.

He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted,

to proclaim freedom for the captives

and release from darkness for the prisoners,^{a- Isiah 61:1}

"To anoint means to choose by divine intervention"

 "Anointing, as described in the Bible, can be defined as "God on flesh doing those things that flesh cannot do." It is God doing those things only He can do, and doing them through a flesh-and-blood, earthly vessel intervention." http://www.kcm.org/real-help/article/understanding-anointing

This week I will again be blessed to join a group of women from FBC Siloam and from around the state in spending time with the women of McPherson Unit- Arkansas Department of Corrections. I am truly excited.  When I stumbled into a similar mission trip last fall, I was terrified and unsure, a feeling completely out of my comfort zone.  I didn't know what to expect and I will confess that I am one who takes rejection hard, so the thought of stepping out and stepping up boldly terrified me.  I also confess that I wasn't sure after the trip if I would do another prison mission. Its a hard place.  Its dull and drab and sad....but every time I would think "well once was enough"  The LORD would say "not hardly".  I had to go on this trip, despite the fact that I felt my schedule was too full or it was not the best timing for me.  God would not let me envision that bus pulling away without me.  

On the last trip to McPherson I met a girl named Sara, a new christian, who wanted to talk to me about her friend Erin.  Erin's brother had recently died and had been very vocal in his life about not needing God.  Sara had been witnessing with the zeal of a new believer to Erin but Erin didn't want to accept Jesus because it was easier to believe that her brother was right than it was to think that he might be in hell and if he was in hell, why would she want to love a God who would send him there?  Wow, I kept thinking "Why me LORD? Why not Carrie or Laura or Loretta?, I'm not sure I can do this."  I told Sara the story of the Rich Man and Lazrus and told her that she had to really pray for guidance in witnessing to Erin, because her heart was broken.  I told her that Erin had to come to understand that if her brother had rejected Jesus and found the bible to be true, he would not want Erin to follow him.  She had to gently word her message and pray that Erin would see that God had provided a way of escape and eternal life for her brother but the choice was his, and the choice was hers.   I want to go to prison this time and I am praying that I will get to see Sara again, and that I will get to talk with Erin.  I am praying that Erin knows Jesus and if she doesn't I am praying she will.

Sunday morning when the church prayed over us, I was so blessed to hear Jason Kelly praying beside me and Carrie Hurley praying behind me. I heard Jason as he prayed for us to "draw deeply from the Holy Spirit"  and my heart flipped a little.  It was the perfect prayer.  From the depths of The Holy Spirit comes the power and the boldness and the joy and the love we need for this mission. With the final amen, as I prepared to return to my seat, Carrie Hurley whispered to me "Isaiah 61:1 is my prayer for you, that you will proclaim freedom to the captives."  I swear I was ready to get on the bus right then and go... completely covered in those prayers.  How precious and comforting and encouraging and empowering are the prayers of our brothers and sisters in Christ.

He has gifted and anointed us individually and as a group for this mission to proclaim the good news of Jesus Christ, to bind up wounds and offer comfort to the brokenhearted, to help those bound in chains unseen to find freedom from darkness. Whatever the job Lord, whoever you bring to us, may we draw deeply from Your Holy Spirit and proclaim You. 

Gifted for His Beautiful Purpose

"Spiritual Gifts, These are the supernatural graces which individual Christians need to fulfill the mission of the church.^[2][3] They are described in the New Testament, primarily in 1 Corinthians 12,^[4] Romans 12,^[5] and Ephesians 4.^[6] 1 Peter 4^[7] also touches on the spiritual gifts"

As I was praying this morning for the upcoming HeartLife Spiritual Gifts Seminar to be held this Saturday, March 8, 2014, I was struck with this thought; "If we don't know our own Spiritual Gifts how can we ever live up to His purpose and plan for our lives?" 

 A few years ago I was in a bible study and the leader taught on this very thing.  After we had studied the gifts she asked us to consider what we thought our primary Spiritual Gift was and she asked if we thought we had a secondary gift as well.  She had us write it on a piece of paper.  She then went through the gifts as listed in the bible and asked other ladies to comment on what they saw as the gifts of the other ladies in the group.  Sometimes what the group saw as the gift was different from what the individual saw in herself.  I think sometimes we want to choose our own gifts and so we try to operate in a "giftedness" that we don't possess.  We then become frustrated and overwhelmed and lose heart.  Sometimes we become envious or feel defeated.  When we know what God has specially created and gifted us to do then we can begin to be more aware and we can start making life choices that lead us on His path to fulfilled purpose. 

In a few weeks I will be going with a group of women to the McPherson Women's Prison on mission for the second time.  This time though, I am more aware of my spiritual gift of Mercy and my role as an "His Encourager".  I won't fear or worry or be envious of my sisters with the primary gift of Exhortation, because I know that there will be women who need us all.  God calls me to tell the broken and those filled with shame that He is God of Restoration and Hope.  He is God of new beginnings.  He is the Binder of Wounds and the Mender of Broken Hearts.  I can do that!  I can do it because He has gifted me to show His heart to others.  
Stop and really consider what God would do in us and around us if we were all operating within His will and fully utilizing His gifts!  

The HeartLife team encourages you to come and join us Saturday.  Come and hear what God has laid on the hearts of Cassie Perryman and Sheree Crandall and begin the journey to fulfilling His wonderful and precious purpose in your life!  We've extended the deadline for buying a ticket because of the weather. You can buy one at the church office until Thursday, March 6, 2014, during office hours, or buy at the door.  However - we still need to know if you're coming. We're busy this week planning menus & buying food for our two light  meals & we want to be sure you're included! So e-mail or call the FBC office and get your name on the list!  

Child care sign up needs to be done through the church office by Thursday.

No Planting Among Thorns

Jeremiah 4:3

New English Translation (NET)

³ Yes, the Lord has this to say
to the people of Judah and Jerusalem:
“Like a farmer breaking up hard unplowed ground,
you must break your rebellious will and make a new beginning;
just as a farmer must clear away thorns lest the seed is wasted,
you must get rid of the sin that is ruining your lives.

Close your eyes.  Imagine two fields side by side.  One is plowed up into straight furrows.  The soil is dark and rich and fertile and receptive to the warm spring rain.  The neighboring field lies fallow.  It is unplowed, untended.  It looks cold and hard and useless.  Now imagine those fields months later.  One is green and full of life and promise.  The other is dotted with sparse patches of stubborn crab grass and weeds.  Brambles have grown up and taken over.

Francis Chan, in his book, Crazy Love, references The Parable of the Sower. (Mathew 13:1-18) and makes this comment to Christians –“Don’t assume you are the good soil”

In December, shortly after Christmas, a beautiful sister in Christ went home to the arms of Jesus after a long and grueling battle with cancer.  Janet Pate was the good soil.  We were in a bible study together for years and every time she prayed, every time she testified, every time she opened her mouth, I wanted to be like her.  She was the woman who could quote scripture from memory to fit any trial or triumph.  She blogged her journey with cancer and had followers from not only around the country but also around the world.  She videoed shaving her head when her hair began to fall out from the chemotherapy and she thanked God that the chemo was working as evidenced by the hair she was losing.  Janet was the embodiment of the scriptural directive “In everything give thanks.”  She praised the sovereignty of God even in her worst days and anyone who had ever met her, called her “friend”.

I sat in the Celebration of Life service for Janet and cried; not just a few stray tears, I cried to the point of feeling drained when it was all over.  I cried not just for the loss of her on earth or for the sorrow and pain her family and friends would feel in her absence.  I cried because I knew that I was not the good soil and I wanted to be.  I wanted to plow up the fallow ground of my heart more than ever.  I was ready to dig up brambles and thorns that I had been unwilling to pull up previously.  I thought about my friend, her relationship, her peace in living and in dying, and I saw how her life meant something.  It meant something for Jesus.  It meant something real.  Janet left a legacy of not just believing in a god but of believing and trusting and loving God.

...So I prayed.  I asked God to help me get rid of the junk in my way.  I asked Him to get me started.  He is faithful to answer when we are repentant and seeking.  I remembered something that Carrie Hurley had said to me on our McPherson Mission Trip.  So I called her.  I asked her to pray with me and in The Parlor she and Jenna Hall, prayed with me while I poured out so much useless junk (anger, unforgiveness, fear) that had been harbored, unconfessed and unresolved for so long.  I was so nervous, confessing aloud my failures and sins. These young women came along side me and helped me begin the process with God to “plow up the fallow ground.”  There is more to this story.  I’ll share that in the coming posts but today I end with this encouragement.  “The journey of a thousand steps begins with one” as the saying goes.  Just because you are not good soil today does not mean that you cannot be good soil.  You have to be willing to admit your condition, confess you sin, and give God the plow.  The process of plowing, breaking, cutting, stripping away…I’m not going to lie, it hurts in the beginning, but in light of God’s word in Isaiah 30, particularly verses 1, 9 and 12-15, lying fallow, holding onto those familiar sins, refusing to submit to God’s will, brings sorrow and bareness.  He promises “In return and rest you will be saved; quietness and trust will be your strength."  Don’t drag it out.  Break up your unplowed ground so that the good seed will not be lost among thorns and do it today.

Isaiah 30 - http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Isaiah%2030&version=TLB

I Just Want To Tell You

Condemnation, guilt, uncertainty, regret, fear, anger, depression..Do you ever have that sinking place in the pit of your stomach where one or all of the above mentioned emotions nestles in and makes its home?  This blog post is going to be a bit of a rambler ladies, so please bear with me.  Last fall when I stepped in to oversee and write for this blog, I thought it was the perfect place for me to minister and encourage women.  It was after all, an answer to a long lifted prayer.  It was an opportunity to serve in a way that seemed natural to me and I had a very clear idea of where I thought it should go.

In my mind a blog is something like an online journal where the blogger discusses something she is learning, in this case walking with the Holy Spirit.  It would be a place to connect with other women, a community of sorts; a place to share and get feedback and perhaps help someone along the way as The Lord directs.  I had hopes for the blog.  Here is where I messed up.  I didn't pray for God to make it His blog.  I didn't pray for Him to give me wisdom and insight, not just in the topics and timing but also in the process itself.  As a result technical difficulties, business of life and unresolved and unconfessed issues in my own life resulted in road blocks, frustration and failure.  The blog has set completely silent for two months.  The enemy is at my shoulder and his comments go something like this.  "Loser.  What made you think you would have anything useful to contribute? How did you end up in a group of women who are organized and talented, they can put together huge events and you can't even figure out how to get a blog post out on a regular basis.  You are worthless and when they see just how useless you are you are going to be humiliated."

That's the first part of this story.

I have come to know in the last 5 weeks or so that God is still writing my story.  The enemy tells me that I am a failure but God assures me that I am a work in progress.  He has been writing new chapters like crazy, this Author of my Life, and it has been an exciting process.   Prayer has become more than just a non-specific "check in the box" process for me. I've learned that prayer really does change things and it really does change me.   I want to tell you about it but it is too much for one entry.  So I plan to share it over the next several posts.  This blog will not always be about me and my personal relationship with Him.  As I tell you what He is doing in my life, I hope you will be blessed, I hope you will share with others who may need to hear that they are not alone in their desire and struggle to be God's woman.  Women like me need to know that the "seemingly perfect christian sister" I admire didn't just pop out of a box like that. I want to hear how she got where she is.  I want to be like her .  We need encouragement and we need to share our burdens and our victories.  We need to help each other in the ever constant battle against the enemy for our hearts
and minds and joy.  We need to walk together and "leave no one behind."  I have so much to tell you but I want to do it one step at a time.  Tomorrow I want to tell you about my friend Janet and how her testimony in life and in dying was a catalyst to send me seeking my own Solemn Assembly even before I knew that FBC was planning one of its own.

For today, I leave you with this scripture  - Romans 8:1-2 written in the Message version says " With the arrival of Jesus, The Messiah, that fateful dilemma is resolved (our condemnation).  those who enter into Christ's being-here-for-us no longer have to live under a continuous, low-lying black cloud.  A new power is in operation.  The Spirit of life in Christ, like a strong wind, has magnificently cleared the air, freeing you from a fated lifetime of brutal tyranny at the hands of sin and death.

There is freedom from the emotions that weigh you down.  Let's talk about  The Spirit of life in Christ.  See you tomorrow.

Hedges of Thorns

Hosea 2:6-23,    Hosea 6:1-3

For years, almost as long as I have had children, I have prayed "Thorn Hedge" prayers
 over my family.  I've mentioned this before and been asked what is a hedge of thorns?  I learned about thorn hedges, at least by name, when I first really read the book of Hosea.  God called Hosea to do a really hard thing, to marry a prostitute and love her in order to see God's heart for Israel and Israel's unfaithful heart for Him.  Hosea did marry Gomer.  He brought her out of shame into love and blessing.  He made her a mother, gave her “respectability” but time and again Gomer returned to her sin and shame.  Finally God said He would place a "hedge of thorns" in her way so that she would always be frustrated and turned back to the home and heart of her husband.

Thorn hedges are dual purposed.  They do turn us back from the wrong paths and sinful behaviors.  They also frustrate and discourage wrong influences and people who would lead us astray from God's blessing and relationship.    I learned from a friend to pray over my children when they were young, that if they did something wrong they would be found out quickly.  Believing my daughter probably needed this prayer more than my son, I concentrated it mostly in her direction.  I found out years later that my son was pretty sneaky and had fooled me more than once.  Note to self.....hedge of thorns for all.  We all need Him to, as we so often pray, "lead, guide and direct us."  We rarely consider the thorns that may be necessary in His answer to that request. 

God has spoken to me many times about necessary thorn hedges in my life.  Even before I knew what to call them, He was building them around me.  There were thorn hedges that turned me from destructive relationships.  There were thorn hedges that taught me about putting too much stock in material things and thorn hedges that punctured my over blown pride so that I could hear Him singing over me.  God has been good all the time.  

Thorn hedges are not pleasant to encounter but I believe that sometimes, as they were for Gomer, as they have been for me, the thorns and the wounds they may inflict are very necessary for abundant life.  Let's face it, the bible tells us that the heart is above all things deceitful and desperately wicked.  We wander from God; we want our own way and try to force it.   Whatever the issue, like Gomer, we often forget what God has done for us and backslide and return to the mess and the shame.  God doesn't put up the hedges to hurt us; He puts them in our way to save us from ourselves.  Frustration and sorrow always eventually lead me to the place where I know I belong; His side. As a mom, a daughter, a wife, a sister, a friend, a grandmother, I will pray for those hedges gently and without malice over loved ones who may need them.  I will pray for them in my own life as well.  In the end Gomer learned that there is blessing in the thorns.  I love Hosea 2:15, “I will return her vineyards to her and transform the Valley of Trouble into a gateway of hope.”   Because our God is good all the time, we should remember not to despise the thorns but rather look for the gateway of hope in the Valley of Trouble.


R' 

Free and Thankful

Free World People - that is what the women of McPherson Prison called us as if we were from a far off distant planet.  I guess, for some of them, we might as well have been from Mars.  In their world of fences, razor wire, rules, no exception submission to authority, restriction and blandness, we seemed alien; from a world that would not be seen by some of them ever again. 

“Free World People”- that phrase sticks with me.  It makes me think.  It makes me wonder.  Like the popular hymn of my childhood a question rattles around in my mind and in my heart of hearts…”Why me Lord?” What did I ever do that was worth loving You or the kindness You’ve shown?” The answer simply put…I did nothing to deserve the Grace I have been shown. My sins were different, my life was different, but without His saving Grace, I would be forever lost.

Before I walked into that prison, I had a different mindset.  I saw myself, sadly to say, as the “good girl”, going in to speak Jesus to the morally bankrupt and heathen.   I was certain I would find women with no knowledge whatsoever of Jesus Christ.  I was certain they would be hard-hearted and without compassion or emotion. What I found were many girls who were not that different in culture and upbringing from me.  Girls whose mothers and fathers and grandparents had taken them to church, girls who knew about Jesus from young ages. I found women, in tears, who wanted to pray with me for their children.  They were mommas whose roads and choices had taken them physically from their babies but had not taken them from their hearts. and young women, new to Christianity, who wanted nothing more than to see a friend saved. 

I sat with the drug addicted, murders, sex offenders, who at their core, were women who had made very bad choices and found redemption.  I heard the personal story of a woman from a terrible childhood, a terrifying life, who boldly confessed “I did awful shameful things but now I know Jesus and I am free.”  Her smile lit up the room and before leaving me, she stopped and came back and asked me “how can I pray for you?”  If she only knew.  Some prison walls are unseen.  Some chains are invisible.  And I thought about Luke 7:36-50.  “Which of them will love him more?”

I walked from a bland and hopeless world into a barracks known as the PAL (Principals and Attitudes for Living) Barracks.  In this barracks, vibrant murals and scriptures colored the walls and women learned the Word and prepared for battle.  They knew that eventually they would leave the shelter of PAL and return to the general population to be missionaries, salt and light, “cities on a hill”.  I remember thinking “how could you ever return to the awful blandness and despair outside of that barracks?  If I had to be in prison I would want to be where there was hope and color and safety."  Isn’t that the way we do it in “the free world?”  Don’t we prefer our beautiful churches and our safe small group bible studies, where everyone believes like we do and there is little opposition or challenge?  Aren’t we thankful for the missionaries in remote African villages even as we are thankful that it isn’t us being sent?  Don’t we often make beautiful “white washed sepulchers?” Maybe I should speak only for myself…so here it is…I am free world living and yet doing less with life than prisoners I met who will never leave the walls of their physical prison again and I am ashamed of that.  I come from a life of protection and love.  I had Christian parents and extended family support.  I wasn’t allowed to run wild and I knew better than to try.  I knew a thousand eyes were on me watching out for my best interest.  The question remains - "who will love Him more?”  - “the one who is forgiven more I suppose.”  (Lord help me love you more because of all you have done for me.) 

They entered prison already in chains, enslaved and hopeless and found eternal life.  I have Jesus as my savior AND I live where my opportunities and freedoms are innumerable and yet I live with less joy and daily dependence on Him. Do I see myself as one forgiven of little or one forgiven of a debt I could never pay? 

I am going to stop making excuses.  I am going to pray for Him to fill me up with His Holy Spirit and I am going to ask Him to teach me to love Him more and know Him more.  I am going ask Him to teach me to take every thought captive and believe that He is more than able to handle what concerns me today.  I am going to pray, like the words of a song I sing... “ Day by Day Oh Dear Lord three things I pray.  To see You more clearly, to love You more dearly, to follow You more nearly, day by day.” I am going to pray to truly live in freedom and abundance in the center of His will.  I want to be known as a woman who loves Him "more".