Just when I needed it most, I read this verse today in my Bible with markings from years past. So many ups and downs in life make us strong and sometimes war-torn, but God just does not tell us what comes next. We might be wiser by living through the experience, but the valuable truth is that through his grace and mercy, our Lord God has equipped us with an instruction book—or an athlete might better describe it as a “playbook.”
At the moment of realization that I had left my wallet in a busy interstate highway gas station two hours earlier, my heart began racing while my brain began rehearsing the rapid steps of what to do next. Call the bank card company. Call the credit card company. Call the station where I left it. Tomorrow, go to the driver’s license office to reorder my license.
Life’s difficult circumstances sometimes turns peace to panic. Our survival may depend on living through complicated medical treatments, making difficult decisions about our children, struggling with financial hardships, caregiving, coping with unhealthy habits... and on and on. But seemingly hopeless situations are the perfect ground for God to show us his glory, as he did continually to Moses and the Israelites.
In the beginning, in Eden, the LORD God made all kinds of trees grow out of the ground—trees that were pleasing to the eye and good for food. In the middle of the garden (was) the tree of life (Genesis 2:9). At the end of time the fruit of the same tree of life will be ripe for the picking by God’s redeemed (Revelation 22:14), Edenic life theirs—the curse of sin over and done with, for all nations.
When we moved to Texas from southern Ontario some 40 odd years ago, I was so excited about the prospect of planting a vegetable garden, nurturing gorgeous roses, and harvesting pecans from the tree in my spacious back yard. In Ontario I had managed a small plot of veggies and babied along some hybrid teas, considering the short growing season. Why, you couldn’t plant beans until the 9th of June! Sad to say though, in Tyler my efforts were in vain—the pecans were wormy and tough to crack, black spot got the best of the roses, rhubarb couldn’t stand the heat, the carrots were woody. But oh my, how the weeds did flourish. Since I had assigned weed control to my seven-and-eight-year-olds, they hated that garden. After one season of crop failure, we all quit.
As tragic as the loss of the perfection of Eden was, as redeeming as Gethsemane and Golgotha were, as eternal as the garden party in heaven will be, today we live in the garden we are planted in ladies. How best to bloom where God planted me, I ask.
As you well know ladies, the enticing bouquet of the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil was too much for the happy pair in Eden, once that crafty snake got his way. So God drove the two out, placing a guard on the gate to keep them from the tree of life (Genesis 3:22-24). Purity had lost to desire.
I love spending time in nature because I can see God’s creations so much clearer.
When my ninth grader asked for help on his essay, I got more than I bargained.
His book: Ecclesiastes.
His thesis: everything is meaningless.
Job suffered more than anyone I know. I know he gets everything back in the end, but he walked a long, hard road. And his friends became part of the problem. I don’t want to be a friend like that.
As I read Job’s story, I discovered some ways to be a better friend — especially to someone suffering.
Have you ever had a long wait? Maybe like the one I had today.
What I thought would be a quick, 15-minute appointment turned into three hours with one roadblock after another.
Kids ask good questions.
My husband gave me and our two teen boys a chronological Bible for Christmas. As we plod through Exodus, my 13-year-old asks, “What does all this have to with my life today?”
It’s a key word in parenting. I even used it when reviewing a list of do’s and don’ts to teenage drivers—don’t speed, watch out for the other driver and, finally, be home on time!
Paul wrote of God’s incomparably great power for us who believe. He also knew how to consistently draw upon it. One of those occasions occurred in the metropolitan city of Ephesus, a city famous for housing the popular goddess, Artemis. Cultic followers spent large amounts of money on images of Artemis. As Paul taught of the one true God, people began to follow God, and the idol craftsmen began to feel the financial pinch.
I remember receiving chain letters as a young girl. The letter instructed me to mail additional copies to ten friends and add my own name to the bottom of the list—or something like that. The goal was to eventually receive letters from people all over the country. I always complied but, to my knowledge, never received any letters in return. Today news, prayer requests and other helpful information arrive via email, texts or other forms of social media. I often forward, cut-and-paste or even screen capture specific information to pass onward.
Memes have invaded my family’s communications and social media. We laugh at the whimsical ways they point out extreme behaviors and nonsensical situations all around us. Memes seem to help us acknowledge the absurdities we see as biblical morality and ethics deteriorate at an ever-increasing pace.
I’m a small-town girl. My hometown’s population hovered around eight thousand. My English teacher played the piano at church, the fire station displayed it’s life-sized nativity scene and the water tower emblem proclaimed “In God We Trust.” My mother taught school in a nearby community of three hundred citizens, and each year’s senior class consisted of ten graduates. Imagine combining my life experiences with a husband’s who grew up in Chicago! After years of marriage, we still share new tales with one another of growing up in our respective communities.
As I write this devotion, I am praying the words of our scripture fervently. Our family is facing a situation about which I have many questions, but I am trusting God to calm my fears.
Have you ever watched a potter work, as Jeremiah did in today’s passage? It is amazing to see something lovely begin to take shape from a lump of clay. In this passage God was showing the prophet that the nation of Israel—as well as every person from the beginning of time—was to be shaped by His hand. We are all lumps of human clay waiting for the touch of the master Potter.
