Joy in the Journey

Moses answered the people, “Do not be afraid. Stand firm and you will see the deliverance the Lord will bring you today. The Egyptians you see today you will never see again. The Lord will fight for you, you need only to be still.” Exodus 14:13-14   “ Be still.” Say it out loud. “Be still.” If you have children or work with children you probably say those words fairly often and then cannot understand why the child isn't still. Now, personalize it, add your own name after the “be still.” Hm.... maybe you're beginning to understand the kid a little better. It isn't easy to be still or do nothing or wait. For most of us it is our nature to be active. So we pray and then we take action, not waiting for God to speak to us, direct us or just take care of the matter Himself. After all, “the Lord helps those who help themselves” right? Wrong! So, so very wrong. If right now you're thinking “but that's from the Bible!” I assure you it is not. One of the ...

  “ I tell you that in the same way there will be more rejoicing in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous persons who do not need to repent.” Luke 15:7 The stories in Luke 15 of the lost sheep and the prodigal son beg for the whiny response, “that's not fair” because on the surface, from our worldly perspective, it's not fair. Look closely. Ninety-nine sheep are sticking close to the shepherd and he leaves them to search for the one who wandered off. That one didn't get left behind, the shepherd didn't abandon him, he wandered off of his own volition. Willfully doing what he was taught not to do. Then there's the prodigal son. This brat said, “Give me my money Abba, 'cuz I'm over you and this dreary farm. So, basically I'm wishing you were dead and I could do my own thing. See ya' later.” Like the sheep, this boy was not thrown out of his home, his very comfy home. No, he threw it all away in a fit of se...

And the devil, who deceived them, was thrown into the lake of burning sulfur, where the beast and the false prophet had been thrown. Revelation 20:10a I am the Alpha and the Omega, the first and the Last the Beginning and the End. Revelation 22:13 The other night I was watching a television show with my husband. It's all about the conflict between good and evil. It's wildly imaginative and fun to watch. It's also quite a bit farfetched, even for its genre. At one point one of the main characters said to another, “Face it, darling, the villain always wins.” I laughed at that, first because every fairy tale I've ever read, no matter how gory parts of it might be, has ended with, “they lived happily ever after.” Sure there's death and destruction in some of the original, darker tales but in the end, good always trounces evil. Tells me that somebody's reading their Bibles. The other reason I laughed was because I know that is the world view in s...

  Peter came to Jesus and asked, “Lord, how many times shall I forgive my brother when he sins against me? Up to seven times?” Jesus answered, “I tell you not seven times but seventy-seven times.” Matthew 18:21-22 Forgive us our debts as we also have forgiven our debtors. Matthew 6:12 For whatever reason, I seem to be experiencing a season of testing in the area of forgiveness. It's not just my own challenges either. I've had a couple of friends come to me to talk about how much we're supposed to forgive, how often and what that means going forward. In those conversations it's easy to quote the Scriptures about forgiveness. It's easy to talk about the next steps, reconciliation or moving on from those people who are toxic to us.* The conversations are easy. The actual living out that forgiveness is hard, very hard. As flawed human beings, when the offense is too much for us, or has happened too often, we say, “That it's! That one is unforgiv...