A Kid in a Candy Store
Therefore I exhort first of all that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and giving of thanks be made for all me
1 Timothy 2:1
And my God shall supply all your need according to His riches in glory by Christ Jesus.
Philippians 4:19
Therefore He is also able to save to the uttermost those who come to God through Him, since He always lives to make intercession for them.
Hebrews 7:25
I have a remarkably dear friend whom I met at a Walk to Emmaus in 2018; this friendship was tailor made by the Lord’s hands before the foundation of the earth. Although we don’t see each other all too often, we stay close via text and phone calls. Many times I will get a text out of the blue from her, just exactly when I need it, telling me that she is praying for me. A quick text from her to me or from me to her with a plea for prayers is answered almost most immediately, with the peace and presence of the Holy Spirit following nanoseconds behind the reply.
Words can’t convey the excitement I felt from receiving a text from my dear friend one morning, saying that she was getting ready to pray for me and was there anything specific she could pray for me about? I felt like a kid in a candy store! It was not a question I had been asked before and delight bubbled up inside of me as I pondered my response. Nothing sprang to mind immediately, as there weren’t any burning issues (fortunately) in my life at the time. I savored each idea that came into my head, like a child gripping coins in a sweaty little hand with eyes solely on the best piece of candy to buy and enjoy. What a treat this was! What a gift I had been given – to have someone approach the throne of grace to entreat the Author of Life on my behalf on a need that I had. And this gift, like the loaves and fishes, multiplied exponentially, because not only was my friend imploring the Lord on my behalf, but my King and Redeemer was interceding for me.
Friends, do not think lightly of the gift of prayer when it is offered, and do not be ashamed or embarrassed to ask for prayer. Many of us hesitate to share our prayer requests with others, for various reasons: we do not want to burden them, we don’t want to appear weak, or we may ashamed to admit the sin that we need to be released from. You have my promise and my vow that if you share your prayer needs with me, I will not judge you, I will not condemn you, nor will it be a burden for me. (I will warn you, though—if it’s a doozy, I cannot promise to control the reaction of my non-poker face J. I’m kidding.)
It’s a guarantee that when you share your prayer needs with the Lord, He will not judge you for them, nor will He condemn you—He has paid for the penalty for your sin. Paul reminds us also in Romans 8 that there is no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus.
Prayer is such a wonderful gift—one that blesses the pray-er as much as it does the pray-ee.
Prayer Requests
· For those dealing with physical, emotional, or mental pain and drain
· For those facing unexpected life events like the loss of a job or a divorce
· Praise for the changes we see happening in our church—both in the physical (changes to buildings, websites, and the like) as well as the people-related types—emotional and within the body of Christ
· For us to continually seek His will for our lives
One of the phrases I saw on our website at one time is that we called ourselves “the church that prays”. Let’s commit to living up to that moniker. I’d also like to invite you to come by and share in our prayer meeting time—we meet every Thursday night in the Fellowship Hall at 7:00 p.m. You won’t regret it—in fact, I’m certain you’ll be quite blessed!
Quotes
“My story is filled with broken pieces, terrible choices, and ugly truths. It’s also filled with a major comeback, peace in my soul, and GRACE that saved my life!”
“Sometimes God’s blessings are not in what He gives, but in what He takes away. He knows best. Trust Him.”
My Choice on How To React
If your enemy is hungry, give him bread to eat;
And if he is thirsty, give him water to drink;
For so you will heap coals of fire on his head,
And the Lord will reward you.
Proverbs 25: 21-22
You may recall my last devotional was about the Lord answering my mail a couple of weeks ago after a run-in with my neighbor at an HOA board meeting. This neighbor, whom I’ll call Karen, was quite upset with my statement that her strong personality made our HOA board meetings challenging for me. She did not accept my apology and I grappled with how to rectify the situation, knowing that anything I might say could be used against me later on, or wouldn’t be accepted, or whatever other Chicken Little concept I could come up with. Emails since that encounter among the five of us, as board members, had been civil. One such email from Karen asked me if I had an extra can of the fence stains we’d used to paint the common fence, and if so, could I leave it on her front porch one of the nights. I told her that I’d be happy to, and was hoping to be able to do it when I returned home from our prayer meeting on Thursday evening <shameless plug: we meet at 7:00 p.m. every Thursday in the Fellowship Hall. Please join us!>. Unfortunately (for me), I was home before the prayer meeting and in front of my house putting items in the recycling or compost bin when I saw Karen down the street, walking her dogs and heading for her house. Since I’d figured I’d been spotted, I got the paint out of my garage and walked to her house (just two houses down from mine), reaching her front porch as she got to her front door. She brought the dogs in and then SLAMMED the front door, about five feet ahead of me. Now lest someone think that she didn’t see me, I know that she did. She slammed the door almost literally in my face. I know that it wasn’t an oversight because the door slammed. As I stood there stunned, because such a thing has never happened to me, I knew that I had a choice on how I was going to react. And surprisingly, I started to chuckle. In that split second, I saw her as how she really was: a petty woman whose immaturity and bitterness combined to make her a sad shell of a person. I learned three valuable lessons in that suspended moment in time: first, that while I had it in my power to get angry at her treatment of me, I could choose to how to respond; that through my journey in spiritual discipline and maturity, the Holy Spirit could allow me to see her how she truly was, as a person, as one of God’s creations, and not the intimidating creature I’d made her up to be in my mind; and lastly, that leaning into that spiritual journey, I could indeed experience that seemingly elusive fruit of the Spirit I’d often grappled with: self-control.
I walked away from Karen’s house, still chuckling, and apparently went to the prayer meeting with a silly grin on my face, virtually beaming at this whole experience. I’ve never been so cool, so collected, and I was quite pleased with the work that the Lord did in me that evening. Now please note, lest you think I’ve broken my arm patting myself on the back for having such a mature reaction: I have yet to walk over to her house and ask her if she knows Jesus. I have yet to heap coals on her head by killing her with proverbial kindness. I can’t necessarily affirm that I know without a doubt that our next interaction will involve us holding hands and singing Kum Ba Yah and the “I’d like to teach the world to sing” Coca-Cola song (actually, I can probably guarantee that won’t happen, but you get my drift). In fact, I cannot declare right now that I will not dread our next HOA board meeting. I am, however, armed with this experience and it’s a fantastic start. And I attribute it all to Him!
Prayer Requests
· For our government leaders, at all levels, as we are called to do
· For those who struggling with depression and other seemingly unseen-at-the-surface illnesses
· Praise for the finally cooler weather
· For us to continually seek His will for our lives
I have to admit that for at least a day after the incident, the thought of what Karen did would come to mind, and I’d shake my head at it, disarming the potential the thought had for drudging up a negative attitude towards Karen and letting it fester. I acknowledged the power of indulging in the little hurts, barbs, and arrows, and in letting the enemy win, and decided otherwise. God be praised for His influence, example, and working on me!
Quotes
“You can be sure, the Holy Spirit never enters a man and lets him live like the world.” – A.W. Tozer
“God never said the weapons wouldn’t form; He said they wouldn’t prosper.”
God's Perfect Knowledge of Me
Trust in the Lord, and do good;
Dwell in the land, and feed on His faithfulness.
Delight yourself also in the Lord,
And He shall give you the desires of your heart.
Commit your way to the Lord,
Trust also in Him,
And He shall bring it to pass.
He shall bring forth your righteousness as the light,
And your justice as the noonday.
Psalm 37: 3-6
O Lord, You have searched me and known me.
You know my sitting down and my rising up;
You understand my thought afar off.
You comprehend my path and my lying down,
And are acquainted with all my ways.
For there is not a word on my tongue,
But behold, O Lord, You know it altogether.
Psalm 139: 1-4
I had a run-in with a neighbor with whom I serve on my neighborhood’s HOA board the other evening a couple of weeks ago. Now I like to think of myself as fairly nice and friendly; I’m also a people pleaser and peacemaker. I’d rather crawl on glass and squeeze lemon juice on the cuts before I’d upset or purposely offend someone, but I upset this woman by sharing, somewhat under duress, why I was not going to run again for the HOA board (because of her bossiness and strong personality, though I did not say the bossiness part. I did say that I wish there was a little bit more grace and openness when we talked about issues so that all voices and opinions could be heard, and that each meeting filled me with such dread because of the strong personalities and conflict). I could tell by her body language the rest of the meeting that I’d upset her, and I apologized for doing so when I walked her to the door when the meeting was over. She didn’t accept my apology and left quite upset. In chatting with two of the other women on the board, I was assured that what I had said was not ugly, and had I not said anything, they would have, and their way of saying it would not have been as diplomatic as mine had been. I still felt horrible for having upset someone, and my heart hurt. Right, wrong, or indifferent, I didn’t feel that I represented Christ in my actions, and I wondered how I could rectify the situation. Others in our neighborhood had experienced similar interactions with her in the past, and she was not one to forget each one who had crossed her. And now I was on her you-know-what list.
I prayed about the situation and asked for guidance on what I should do. As I am wont to do, I also thought of various methods to communicate my apologies to her, and played out each possible response she could have to each medium and message. Knowing how she has been with others in the past gave me keen insight as to how she would most likely respond. In talking with others, I did not see how any scenario could end well. The whole thing weighed heavily on my heart and mind, consuming more emotional energy that I truly wanted to devote to it.
As I started my morning one day last week before sitting down to pray, I played out a scenario in my mind in which I tried to talk with her, dialoging both sides of the conversation, again to no avail. I gave up in frustration, and read that day’s devotional in Jesus Calling. I’m sharing the first couple of sentences that stopped me in my tracks: “Trust Me enough to let things happen without striving to predict or control them….When you project yourself into the future, rehearsing what you will do or say, you are seeking to be self-sufficient: to be adequate without My help. This is a subtle sin—so common that it usually slips by unnoticed.”
The Lord, in His infinite wisdom, slated that devotional content to be printed for that particular day, because He knew that I needed to read it, because I was doing that very thing. I don’t know what the future held, but here I was trying to be prepared for it. Though I’d asked Him what to do, I was not sure that my heart would have been 100% open to going over and talking to her if He had instructed me to do so (hey, I’m just being honest. I’m not perfect). I knew, however, that I needed His help to determine what my next steps would be, and I was confident that He would provide. I merely needed to let go of any preconceived notions I had and give to Him the burden. I started that morning. God be praised for His omniscience and commitment to maturing me.
Prayer Requests
· For our pastors Ray, Wayne, and George, for their sacrifices of time, and for April, Jody, and Pat, for their sacrifices as well
· For those who are struggling to make ends meet and are overwhelmed by their life’s circumstances
· For first responders and their families
· For us to continually seek His will for our lives
There is a Part Two of this whole situation, and unless He tells me otherwise, I’m going to share it with you next week. Next week’s devotional will come out a little later than normal as I will be out of town next weekend, returning next Monday evening.
Quotes
“Even as a Christian, you’ll have good days and you’ll have really hard days. But you’ll never have a day without God.”
“The enemy is not after your money or your stuff. He wants your mind…your attitude….your heart…your faith….your peace. Understand that you’re not being attacked over the tangible things in your life. The enemy is fighting over things you can’t see.”
Reflection
Finally, brethren, whatever things are true, whatever things are noble, whatever things are just, whatever things are pure, whatever things are lovely, whatever things are of good report, if there is any virtue and if there is anything praiseworthy—meditate on these things. The things which you learned and received and heard and saw in me, these do, and the God of peace will be with you.
Philippians 4:8
Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works and glorify your Father in heaven.
Matthew 5:16
There’s a post going around Facebook that spoke to me, and I thought I’d share it.
There is a story they tell of two dogs. Both at separate times walk into the same room. One comes out wagging his tail while the other comes out growling. A woman watching this goes into the room to see what could possibly make one dog so happy and the other so mad. To her surprise, she finds a room filled with mirrors. The happy dog found a thousand happy dogs looking back at him, while the angry dog saw only angry dogs growling back at him. What you see in the world around you is a reflection of who you are.
Friends, we live in a ridiculously crazy world filled with unspeakable violence, sadness, sickness, betrayal, and a whole host of other things. It can be tempting and easy to see nothing but the negativity and the challenges, and forget that we, as believers, have our hope in something other than this world. It can be difficult to understand why things happen the way they do and to whom they do, and that difficulty can cause us to doubt. That doubt and negativity can seemingly quench the light that is within us, and we become the angry dog in the story above. In fact, that’s what the enemy wants us to become—that angry dog whose scowl reflects every last wrong that was ever done to him or her, the one whose use of certain language and hand gestures in traffic is at odds with the ICTHUS sticker on his or her car, the one who silently (and sometimes not so silently) judges others with an air of superiority that harkens the prayer of the Pharisee in the parable Jesus shares about the Pharisee and the tax collector.
But we must withstand the attacks of the enemy. We must focus on being the light in the darkness—that light that reflects Jesus. I’m not saying that as followers of Christ that we can’t have our days in which things just don’t seem to go our way, and that we just have to force ourselves to smile and be Pollyanna to everyone we meet. That’s just plain silly. What I am challenging us each to do however, especially yours truly who wears her heart on her sleeve, her emotions on her face, and who suffers from incredibly thin skin, is to strive for perspective in the face of troubles, to understand that the Lord’s promises are to work all things together for good to those who love Him and are called to His purpose, and to shine His light in spite of how we may feel.
And the cool thing? We don’t have to do it all on our own. We have the Holy Spirit with us as our Comforter, our Friend, our Protector. We just need to call upon Him, and He will respond.
Prayer Requests
· For those preparing for the contemporary youth service—our thanks for all that you’ve done, and praise to the Lord for helping us go in the right direction
· For those who face dark and negative thoughts and struggle against them
· For those in our armed forces and their families
· For those who are searching for meaning in their lives
· For us to be in constant communion and communication with Him
May we shine His light so that others will see that He is the reason for our joy, our proverbial wagging tail, and our hope.
Quotes
“A bad attitude is like a flat tire—you won’t go anywhere until you change it.”
“Life is the most difficult exam. Many people fail because they try to copy others, not realizing that everyone has a different question paper.”
Triumphant
“O Death, where is your sting?
O Hades, where is your victory?”
The sting of death is sin, and the strength of sin is the law. But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.
1 Corinthians 15:55-57
I have to qualify a thought I shared in the last devotional entitled Grace. The comment read “We, as His creations, sin.” I never meant to imply or state that He made us to sin—quite the opposite. We sin because there is sin within us, as children of Adam after the fall. Praise be to God for His sending of His son as the propitiation for our sins.
I was praying the other day while I was driving to work, and as I was seeking for new and different ways in which to convey my adoration for Him, the word “triumphant” came to me. The treasure that this beautiful word brought with it overwhelmed me, and the fact that George talked about it in our Sunday School class the other day reinforces that treasure and the fact that I’m supposed to be writing about this topic.
Friends, no matter what challenge you are facing, no matter its magnitude, potential impact, or disruption, regardless of whether you can around to its outcome, know this: it cannot defeat you. Jesus, with His magnificent sacrifice, foiled the enemy’s plan and vanquished death, and conquered the enemy, and made us victorious. Dear ones, let us stand tall in that feat, knowing that while we did not contribute one iota to the achievement itself, we benefit by the achievement. The enemy can try to make us forget the overwhelming completeness and finality of the defeat in his attempts to fell us, but let’s not let him. Let us, as Paul, James, and Peter tell us, stand steadfast against the enemy, resisting him in the process. I’m not saying it’s going to always be easy, but realizing that we don’t have to fight because the battle has already been won by Christ can change our mindset dramatically.
You, my dear, are victorious! Don’t ever let anyone tell you otherwise.
Prayer Requests
· For our country, and government leaders at all levels
· For first responders, to sustain them throughout the challenges they face
· For those who are searching for new jobs
· For those facing life’s trials—remember, you stand victorious!
· For us to be united in purpose and in seeking His will
Words cannot completely convey the extent of the love He has lavished upon us. May our lives constantly reflect that love to others, as we share the gospel with them.
Quotes
“The church cannot be the salt of the earth if we keep sugar-coating the gospel.”
“It’s time for us to rise up, get out of the rut and routine, and begin to take our Christian faith seriously.” A.W. Tozer