240/365: HIS Grace

Isaiah 41:10 “Fear thou not; for I am with thee:  Be not dismayed; for I am thy God:  I will strengthen thee; yea, I will help thee; yea, I will uphold thee with the right hand of my righteousness.”

Matt has been gone for two weeks now, fifteen days actually…

(but if my post weren't so far behind, and actually up to date the above sentence would read, "Matt has been gone for four weeks today, thirty days actually,")
not fun.  not one bit.

I miss him

his lightheartedness. his laughter. his strength. his confidence.  his determination.  his leadership.  his fun.  his wisdom.  his steadfastness.  his faith.

I confess there have been moments where I thought I couldn’t do all this, “shoring up the house” thing without him…

& though it’s just been me here, in this California house,

I am not alone…

Is 54:5 “For you husband is your Maker whose name is the Lord…”

HE is taking care of me.  Protecting me.  Providing for me.

HIS lovingkindness overwhelms me…

è in countless answered prayers

è in His daily words to me, so timely, so sweet

& in other ways that I did not ask for, but He sent anyways to encourage and strengthen me… for, “indeed the Lord will give what is good,” (Ps 85:12) because His love is that amazing!

è in a neighbor bringing me a fresh bag of piping hot popcorn, because our microwave is packed

è in an email... in a card...

è in garage sale breakfasts with mom, so I didn’t have to sit there alone

è in a neighbor mowing our lawn, though I told him I could do it…

è in a homemade chicken dish from a lady I’ve never met

è in a goodbye party with spin friends

è in an impromptu tea with Suzie

è in a wedding rehearsal dinner

è in chipotle bowls at the parents

è in the bank teller having my exact phone charger (out of how many cell phone models out there??? and no, I do not have an iphone, that'd be too easy) so that we could access the details from my email that would allow us to complete the wire transfer and close on our HI house on schedule

è in the fact that my mom arrives in Cali in three days (can’t wait)

è in His Word (I already said that, yes I know, but I really should type it five more times…)

RUN

I've always been a visionary.

A fresh word or direction from the Lord to me is sweet, sweet, sweet…

There really isn't anything in the world like a FRESH off of the pages,

from the Holy Spirit call/vision/direction from the One who calls me HIS.

My heart melts, my eyes redirect, my ears are freshly tuned

and often my steps redirected to follow more closely the One I love.

Sometimes, that God-dreamed path involves redirection...an altering of my course.

Sometimes that alteration means letting go of old dreams

so I can more fully grasp on with both hands to a new dream...HIS dream.

And sometimes following a fresh route from the Lord

even means running as fast as I can in a new way altogether.

And if that's what it takes, then running is what I'll do...

No looking back.

Because sometimes looking back means I still have one hand on my old dream

while trying to move toward the new one at the same time...

But that's not the way I want to respond to the One I love.

No...I want to run toward the way everlasting, seeking first His kingdom.

Happy Easter

Forgiveness (& Starbucks)

98/365: 

"And in our sin...yes...even THEN! He shed, His blood for me!"

He loved so deeply.

He forgave so profoundly

That even in the last hours of His life, He allowed Himself to be beaten and spat upon, only to carry His cross up a hill to die for the very men who put Him there.

To forgive right in the midst of deep, unjustifiable offense...that's Jesus.

I want to love like that.  I want to be able to count it all as loss, to forgive seventy times seven times...

...because, right in the middle of my most vile, revolting, irreconcilable, heinous, sin-filled state...He died for me, then.

“But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” ~Romans 5:8

Good Friday

97/365:

At the age of 33, Jesus was condemned to the death penalty.

At the time, crucifixion was the "worst" death.  Only the worst criminals condemned to be crucified. Yet it was even more dreadful for Jesus,

for unlike other criminals condemned to death by crucifixion Jesus was nailed to the cross by His hands and feet, rather than tied...

Each nail was 6 to 8 inches long.

The nails were driven into His wrist. Not into His palms as is commonly portrayed. There's a tendon in the wrist that extends to the shoulder.

The Roman guards knew that when the nails were being hammered into the Wrist, that tendon would tear and break, forcing Jesus to use

His back muscles to support himself, so that He could breathe.

Both of His feet were nailed together. Thus He was forced to support Himself on the single nail that impaled His feet to the cross.

Jesus could not support himself with His legs for long because of the pain, so He was forced to alternate between arching

His back and using his legs just to continue to breath. Imagine the struggle, the pain, the suffering, the courage.

Jesus endured this reality for over 3 hours.

Yes, over 3 hours! Can you imagine this kind of suffering? A few minutes before He died, Jesus stopped bleeding. He was simply pouring water from his wounds.

From common images we see wounds to His hands and feet and even the spear wound to His side... But do we remember the many wounds made to his body.

A hammer driving large nails through the wrists, the feet overlapped and a nail hammered through the arches, then a Roman guard piercing His side with a spear.

And... before the nails and the spear, Jesus was whipped and beaten. The whipping was so severe that it tore the flesh from His body.

The beating so horrific that His face was torn and his beard ripped from His face.

The crown of thorns (two to three inch thorns) cut deeply into His scalp. Most men would not have survived this torture.

He had no more blood to bleed out, only water poured from His wounds. The human adult body contains about 5 liters (just over a gallon) of blood.

Jesus poured all 5 liters of his blood; He had three nails hammered into His body; a crown of thorns on His head and, beyond that, a Roman soldier who stabbed a spear into His chest.

All these without mentioning the humiliation He passed after carrying His own cross for almost 2 kilometers, while the crowd

spat in his face and threw stones (the cross beam was almost 30 kg of weight)

Jesus had to endure this experience, so that you may have free access to God.

So that your sins can be "washed" away. All of them, with no exception!

Jesus Christ died

for you.