Dependent Upon Man

“When Jesus saw him lying there and learned that he had been in this condition for a long time, he asked him, ‘Do you want to get well?’   ‘Sir…I have no one to help me.’  Then Jesus said to him, ‘Get up!  Pick up your mat and walk’ John 5:6-8. 

I have read this story several times and just discovered something I previously had not considered.  The place was Bethesda, a pool believed to have healing waters once stirred.  Surrounding this pool were many sick people lying around waiting for their tiny window of miracle and deliverance.  We are not told how long this man had been attempting to be healed.  What we are told is that he was lying on a mat waiting for someone to help. (I have no one to help me)  One big mistake that had prevented him from healing was his belief that healing came through man.

In my 30’s I so desperately desired to be accepted in a community which was extremely closed to outsiders.  If you were not born in this community you were welcomed but not really accepted.  Time and time again I reclined on my mat of rejection, awaiting the time where hearts would be stirred and acceptance would be mine.  Tiny windows opened but no one ever moved me to the pool of acceptance.  It wasn’t until circumstances became so public and extreme with my daughter’s rebellion that healing came to me.  Jesus knew that my healing would not come through the waters of acceptance but through the deliverance from a Savior who would comfort, accept and lavish me with His love.  His requirement of me was not to move into the waters for these were not life giving waters.  His command was for me to get up and walk with Him.  Although I thought the healing waters would come from the acceptance of those in my community, they came from a different pool…they came from Living Waters.

Several decades later this community has changed its face as so many people have moved into the area.   I love my community and feel completely a part of this amazing place but this acceptance didn’t come from the stirring of the pool…it came from God’s stirring of my heart.

‘Am I now trying to win the approval of men, or of God?  Or am I trying to please men?  If I were still trying to please men, I would not be a servant of Christ.’ Gal. 1:10. 

As Mercy Gathers Dust

“…for he satisfies the thirsty and fills the hungry with good things.” Psalm 107:1

We have all done it.  Open the fridge and stare…throw open the pantry doors and scan… go shopping and browse.  What are we looking for?  What hunger are we trying to fill?  Why are we so thirsty?  Are we just bored or do we really crave?

Every child was born with an appetite and thirst for the One who held that child in His hands prior to birth.  There is a craving and comfort that we search for that can only be found when we seek our Creator.  From birth we have growling in our spirit that longs for something to fill us up.  We respond to those hunger pains with food from the world.  We open our earthly pantries and reach for power, moving humility to the back.  We open a can of judgment while mercy gathers dust.  Our pantries which should be filled with heart healthy items are cluttered with self-made indulgences.

When we look to Christ who fills us with the good things…peace, joy, contentment and satisfaction we will begin to be heart healthy.   When we look to God to satisfy that insatiable thirst for something different we will find refreshment.  There will be seasons of thirst and seasons of satisfaction but we will always find the good things of God apart from our circumstances. 

Once we truly pursue the power of God our spiritual pantries will be full of the things of the Spirit…boxes and boxes of grace…cans stacked upon cans of forgiveness…bags full of compassion and mercy.  It will not matter what mood we are in for when we open our pantries everything we reach for will be heart healthy.

Seekers & Finders

“But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well” Matthew 6:33.

When our children were young it never ceased to amaze me that after a few minutes of looking for their lost item they were resolved to quit looking.  I am not sure if this occurred because the item wasn’t really that important to begin with or because they knew I would find it for them.  Either way their search was halfhearted due to their lack of interest or their lack of priority.

In considering my life this morning I was that child that said I wanted God in my life but wasn’t really seeking Him for my life.  Much like my children, I deferred to others to bring God to me.  The definition for seeking is ‘trying to locate or discover…to go toward.’    We should notice that seek in its true definition means active movement on our part towards a discovery.  God invites us to discover Him and move more deeply with Him.  When I began truly moving towards Him and His word through daily study and worship the discoveries were constant and precious.  It was like someone handed me a treasure map in 2006 promising me relics at every turn if I would only seek.  The discoveries and treasures that have been mine over the past 7 years have built a storehouse of blessings and revelations.  The things that God has given me that the world never could will never pass away…His joy…His love…His peace…His protection and His amazing grace!  The map winds and twists but the place at the end is where the true treasure lies.  When I have discovered the things of God on earth it will be time for me to discovery the things of eternity. 

The gate will open and the light will be so brilliant from Christ’s radiance I won’t even notice that Daddy’s arms are extended towards me.  I won’t see that Beth is over by the waterfall playing nurse to the gentle animals in the field.  I will fail to hear the powerful worship service being held in the garden by my grandparents.  Those beautiful things will come in time but what I will be focused on is the met gaze between a creator and His creation…a sinner and a Savior… a daughter and her Father.  What are waiting for?  Why aren’t we seeking every moment of every day?  God promises His holiness and His abundance ‘on earth as it is in Heaven.’

‘Seekers become finders in the kingdom of God!’ Spirit Hunger, p. 59.

When Jesus Requested Prayer

“‘My soul is overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death,’ he said to them…Then he returned to his disciples and found them sleeping.  ‘Simon,’ he said to Peter, ‘are you asleep?  Could you not keep watch for one hour?  Watch and pray…’” Mark 14:37.

Whenever my children were young, when they heard me say Kristen Diane, Michael Walker or Caroline Marie they knew that I was displeased.  Jesus Himself had changed Simon’s name to Peter which in the Greek translation means rock.  So I find it interesting that when Peter defaults to his flesh and falls asleep, Jesus calls him Simon.  It is most likely because Simon sometimes acted like his old self instead of the rock God called him to be.  Can’t we all relate to this?   I can just hear the inflection in His voice with disbelief that Peter couldn’t hold his eyes open for even an hour.  Jesus was not only their teacher but He was their precious friend.  He was struggling …He was hurting.  He shared His deepest feelings with a select few and specifically asked them to join Him in prayer.  After pouring His heart out to His Father he returned to find His chosen friends asleep.  Jesus asked His friends to pray three different times that day to no avail, but did not judge them.  He was very aware of human weaknesses since He temporarily gave up His God status and became that of flesh. 

We have all been the one who uttered these words of despair, and we have all been the one who promised to pray and failed to…oops, we forgot…we dozed off.    Now I dare not judge because my grandmother could pray like nobody’s business.  I remember as a child when we would ask her to bless the food, every member of the family got blessed and a few people we never heard of.  It would not have been out of the realm of possibility that one of us fall asleep during one of her marathon prayers.  The point is that prayer is a gift we give each other.  We need it so we ask…we are asked so we give.  The power of prayer is something that nothing else can replace.  Even if we know God’s will and it is disparaging, we pray.  Even if our circumstances look impossible, we pray.  Even if we have prayed the same prayer for a span of time…like Jesus…we repeat our prayers with confidence that they are being heard.  ‘Once more he went away and prayed the same thing’ Mark 14:39.

Prayer requires more than a repeated chain of thoughts and requests.  It requires sitting with God and really discussing some things…having an actual dialogue.  Speaking…pausing…listening… crying…laughing.  It involves taking His words and reading or speaking them back to Him so we show Him that we believe in those words.   It means that if no one else ever prayed for us God would have heard every desire in our heart from our very own lips…nothing left on the table.  He will respond to what we honestly and humbly bring before Him.  What we do not bring to Him cannot be taken by Him.  What we hold onto in the secret places of our hearts will come to light eventually, so why not bring it to Him immediately and continually?  He is our Father who desires to heal us in our inner places.

Take everything to Him in prayer no matter how many times it has already been spoken.  As we are Christian prayer partners may we keep watch over our brothers and sisters and cover them in prayer…even if we do fall asleep occasionally.

Fit For Duty

“Now there is at Jerusalem by the sheep market a pool.   In these lay a great multitude of impotent folk, of blind, halt, withered, waiting for the moving of the water…For an angel went down at a certain season into the pool, and troubled the water: whosoever then first after the troubling of the water stepped in was made whole of whatsoever disease he had." John 5:2-4 (KJV)

When I think of this image it brings sadness to my heart.  I can just picture steps leading down to this pool with all kinds of sick people lying on them.  They wait and watch for the angel to come and slowly walk into the water.  They anticipate the moment that the angel’s finger reaches down and stirs the water.  They are so sick and have such restrictive movement that when the water was stirred another one always beats them into the pool.  They watch someone else become whole as they remain wounded.  They are so sick of their sickness.

There lies a great multitude of withered and spiritually sick Christians.  They believe in the healing waters of Jesus and believe in His power for making their brokenness whole.  They watch for Jesus and pray that He will heal them.  What is sometimes misunderstood with broken people is that God stirs our hearts to serve out of the very wound that has defined us.  He doesn’t take it away but uses it to heal others which in turn heal our own wounds.  This stirring invites us to use our wounds and brokenness for the service of others.  In reading God Loves Broken People by Sheila Walsh she poses crucial questions for our consideration.  ‘What if our deepest wounds are the very places through which God’s mercy flows to others?  What if instead of trying to fix ourselves, we present ourselves – broken and flawed though we are – to be used as He sees fit, for His glory and our good?  What if the wounds we beg God to heal, the burdens we plead with Him to remove, are the very things that make us fit for His service?’ p. 130.

Through our brokenness, we have been well-trained.  Through His grace, we have been re-made.  Through our service we will be made whole.  ‘In loves service, only the wounded soldiers can serve’ The Angel That Troubled the Waters, Thornton Wilder.  We must remember that it takes us stepping into God’s stirring place for us to be made whole from our own spiritual sicknesses and past troubles. 

We must embrace that in God’s army all of His soldiers are wounded and through our wounds we become fit for duty!

...And Heaven Opened

“The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children.  Now if we are children, then we are heirs – heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ” Romans 8:16-17.

Being one of four siblings I am aware of how committed and dedicated this sub-community in the family can be.  I am extremely close with my sisters and any of us would do anything in this world for each other.  Our victories are shared in joy and our sufferings are shared in pain.  We laugh with each other and cry for each other, as the circumstances of our lives are interconnected.  We are co-siblings and co-heirs within our family.  We have been up close and personal with having to say goodbye to one of our precious members of this sacred community.  Society rarely gives much consideration to the loss of a sibling when measured up to losses.  But Christ Jesus does…

There was a co-heir with Christ named Stephen, who was described in the Bible as ‘a man full of God’s grace and power’ Acts 7:8.  He performed great wonders and miracles through the Holy Spirit, being the first Christian martyr as was recorded in the Bible.   ‘The text tells us that as the maddened crowd drew near Stephen kept his gaze steadily upward.  In the process he saw the glory of God, and he saw Jesus standing in the place of honor at God’s right hand.  Just before his death, however, Stephen saw Christ standing…Christ was not only present at the right hand of the Father, but he also was (at least in Stephen’s case) standing to receive his faithful servant home.  There can be no greater nor more honorable reception than to have the Son of Man standing at one’s entrance into his presence.  Steven saw the heavens opened.’  Life Application New Testament Commentary, p. 499.

…and so did my sister.  During the final two weeks of her life her gaze stayed steadily upward.  I watched her eyes narrow at whatever was appearing to her.  I witnessed her mouth spread with smiles as she was enjoying the company of those we could not see.  Were her eyes narrowing trying to shield Heaven’s light from the gates opening?  Was her face of joy because she saw her co-sibling rise to His feet to welcome her into the spiritual family?  That must have made it easier to let go of our hands to grab onto His hand.  Christ is aware of the pain of departing from family.  He hung on the cross and watched His mother suffer.  After His resurrection, He made sure that one of the ones to whom He appeared was His precious sibling.  He understood the power of that relationship and the Bible stays silent on their intimate exchange. 

“Precious in the sight of the LORD is the death of his saints” Psalm 116:15.  This is the balm for my soul that no one ever dies alone when in Christ.  I know that as our loved ones release our hands on earth they already have grabbed the hands of heaven’s loved ones in eternity.  I can only imagine those final moments on earth when the thin veil between heaven and earth is pulled back and ‘what I have only known in part…then I shall know fully.’ 1 Co 13:12b.

Earning An Enemy

“Then the priests who bore the ark of the covenant of the LORD stood firm on dry ground in the midst of the Jordan; and all Israel crossed over on dry ground, until all the people had crossed completely over the Jordan” Joshua 3:16-17.

I have always loved the story of Joshua and the Israelites crossing over into Jericho.  The people were commanded that when they follow the Ark of the Covenant carried by the priests they would cross over into their Promised Land.  They were to keep their eyes on the Ark, the dwelling place of God, and follow in the steps led by Yahweh.  I am sure it was exciting to be one of the sojourners walking on dry ground with the water ‘heaped up’ on both sides.  The walls of liquid must have been so high on each side that they couldn’t see anything to the left or to the right.  As they stepped from the riverbed to the bank it must have been overwhelming to realize that they were exactly where God had orchestrated for them to be – the place where God had promised and purposed for them.  Did they look at each other wide-eyed with smiles stretched broadly across their faces?  Did the little children run up ahead and taste the fruit from the land?  What did that initial excitement look like?  Did they realize that crossing into the land was going to be much easier than defending it?

This is not just a story to be read but a reality to be considered.  This is a story that you and I can cross over into with our own sandals.  When God formed each of us we were created with a purpose and a promised land.  We entered this world with a temporal promised land…God’s purpose for us on earth…and a heavenly promised land at the end of our lives.  When we surrender the fleshly things of this world God will provide a path for us to walk in the Spirit.  When we reach the banks of our own promised lands we must protect what we have been given.  We must be watchful and alert so that our old sins and weaknesses will not find us.  We cannot continue to allow ambushes of the flesh to overtake our newly attained spiritual land.  ‘The point is not just getting us into our proverbial lands of promise where we bear much fruit.  The point is developing the spiritual muscle on our way so once we receive it, we are strong enough to keep it.  The hardest part of possessing the land is defending it.  A person has hardly begun to have a real fight on her hands until she starts serving in her full-throttle giftedness and effectiveness.  She who proves a threat earns an enemy.’ James, p. 164.

May all of us have an enemy in our wake!