Savior

I have this life...
It's full, it's practiced (I've lived it for nearly 46 years!), it's predictable, it includes different roles--Being a wife, being a mom, being an employee, being a friend, being a sister, being an aunt, being a daughter in law, etc.

I have this habit...
I naturally think I am the source of all strength, solutions, and sustenance. It's all-encompassing, never ending, and quite stubborn. I "humbly" receive counsel and seek input, knowing later that my judgement will prevail because who knows best, but me?

I have this God...
He touches on each and every relationship area of my life, in His time and for His glory. It ends up looking and feeling quite a bit like death. Which it is. "For we who are alive are always being given over to death for Jesus’ sake, so that his life may also be revealed in our mortal body." 

 God has this Gospel---this "Good News"...
"We know that the one who raised the Lord Jesus from the dead will also raise us with Jesus..." 

In small places, indiscernible to the naked eye,

I have this paradigm shift...
I am weak. Jesus is strong. I can't. Jesus can and did. I am fixed because He did the fixing.

My pastor and friend wrote:
"The gospel teaches us that no one fixes anyone; but Jesus paid for the fix with His blood, He does the fixing with His Spirit, and in the end, is still the only one completely fixed this side of Heaven." 

Jesus completed work is still saving me, my husband, my family, my co-workers, my pastor, my friends. What a Savior!

Reminding myself I'm clean

Mark 2


He went out again beside the sea, and all the crowd was coming to him, and he was teaching them. And as he passed by, he saw Levi the son of Alphaeus sitting at the tax booth, and he said to him, "Follow me." And he rose and followed him.

And as he reclined at table in his house, many tax collectors and sinners were reclining with Jesus and his disciples, for there were many who followed him. And the scribes of the Pharisees, when they saw that he was eating with sinners and tax collectors, said to his disciples, "Why does he eat with tax collectors and sinners?" And when Jesus heard it, he said to them, "Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. I came not to call the righteous, but sinners."



I read this recently and it dawned on me that Jesus isn’t speaking of those reclining at the table with him in a disparaging tone…He is, in essence, inviting the Pharisees to join Him, but first they need to realize they are sick too!


I heard Tullian Tchividjian share in his recent series on Grace that we so often think we have to DO DO DO our Christianity (Exactly like the Pharisees). This thinking ends one of two ways…pride (ie: sin) in how well we have done, or despair (faithlessness ie: sin), cuz we just “can’t get ‘er done”.

When will we realize, "It is finished" really means just that?
 
Mark continues...

Now John’s disciples and the Pharisees were fasting. And people came and said to him, “Why do John’s disciples and the disciples of the Pharisees fast, but your disciples do not fast?" And Jesus said to them, "Can the wedding guests fast while the bridegroom is with them? As long as they have the bridegroom with them, they cannot fast. The days will come when the bridegroom is taken away from them, and then they will fast in that day. No one sews a piece of unshrunk cloth on an old garment. If he does, the patch tears away from it, the new from the old, and a worse tear is made. And no one puts new wine into old wineskins. If he does, the wine will burst the skins—and the wine is destroyed, and so are the skins. But new wine is for fresh wineskins."

 The message of God’s grace is “new wine for fresh wineskins”.

Attempting to attach True grace to works-based Christianity will only prolong the misleading notion that we somehow have a part in our redemption.
 We tend to forget the order of things concerning our salvation.

1. It’s God’s gift (we ALL need it, tax collectors and Pharisees alike)


2. It’s not our works (Hello!? We all try to sneak this method by…some for much loooonger than others)


3. We’ve been created IN Christ Jesus for good works
 4. Rinse, repeat.

Need a book to read?

Wow...I was touched by the restraint the author used to show such profound themes, emotion and character development.  Highly recommend this one!

a lot o' Lamott

Anne Lamott fiction...I think I've read them all this spring and summer.

Common themes... Raw, honest brokenness. True community. Grace. Humor.

If I were to write a review...
Her writing deliciously meanders and then she sneaks a breath-taking nugget in the mix. I pause, smile and sip my coffee.

"Husbands love your wives as Christ loved the church...."

My husband "took the shot".
He responded to a verbal assault that was directed to us, as a couple.

He took the wrath and addressed what he saw honestly and yet with restraint as I could not have done.

He Ephesians five, twenty-five’d me and now I can see Jesus in a new and more personal way.

God is good to give me such a man who points me to the Savior through word and deed.

I just love this guy!

Luke William Anderson
Commencement 5/26/2011
Open House at Kaio Church 5/22/2011

Epiphany

The stressful weeks before the wedding lent themselves to easy fear and more than ready concerns making the Spirit's work on the day of their marriage a quiet startle to my heart.

My heart had been doing a good job of warding off most emotion with exhaustion and busy-ness that day, but the Spirit, BEING the Holy Spirit was able to do His revelatory work, even through my thickness.
What used to be "What in the world are you thinking about school and career?" and "Why don't you see what I see concerning opportunities and direction?" was all of a sudden, "Oh! That is who you ARE, dear one!"
Peace indescribable invaded the place that used to be muddied with appearances and approval seeking.

I saw her, uncomfortable with public attention - the beautiful bride...yet, when one-on-one and/or by her groom's side greeting strangers, warm and at ease.
I saw the love her friends had for her as they said their good byes and was reminded at how she, the daughter, can calm this mother's hurt with a warm look and a squeeze of the hand. She is lovely.

Realizations, as only the Spirit can give, washed over me.

I see her as part of God's plan being used for His glory--Not a child being forced to become who she's not.
He saved her from me. He saved me from the past that ruled my thoughts and actions.
He is so good and I praise Him for His miraculous work.