God Time

Closet communion needs time for the revelation of God's presence. It is vain to say, "I have too much work to do to find time." You must find time or forfeit blessing. God knows how to save for you the time you sacredly keep for communion with Him.  A.T. Pierson

Do you have a time set aside each day just to spend time with God?  I used to never spend quality time with God.  I just didn’t have the time or so I told myself.  It was easy to just brush off God and go on with my day. 

Then something happened.  I began to feel I was missing something.  I wasn’t sure what it was exactly, the feeling was just there.  So about eight years ago I intentionally set aside morning time to spend with the Father.  I would get to work an hour early and spend that time with Him. 

I admit there are mornings when I just want to hit the snooze button and roll over and sleep another hour.  In fact most mornings I feel that way.  I will lay there and open one eye and glance at the clock.  It would be so easy to pull the covers over my head and close my eyes.

I am not really sure how to describe the feeling I get at those times.  The first thing that pops into my head is “What about your God time?”  Do you want to sacrifice that time?  And something comes over me that says “you can sacrifice a few more minutes of sleep, you can skip the morning coffee, you can skip bringing your lunch to work”.  All of these things fall by the wayside compared to my time with God. 

I didn’t realize how many people at work pay attention to my comings and goings.  I was talking to one of the ladies one day and I asked her if I could help her with issuing checks because I knew she had been out of the office for a few days and things were hectic for her.  She said, “Oh no, I couldn’t let you do that.  You are already here at 6:30am every morning and you are here late every day.  You have too much on your plate already.”  I quickly explained to her that when I arrive at the office every day at 6:30am, I am not working, I am doing a devotional.  I had another young woman ask me if I ever leave work.  I am at work when she comes in at 7:00am and I am still here when she leaves at 4:00pm.  Just a few moments ago I had another young woman stop by my office to say "Do you ever go home?"  This is how God works.  I was able to tell her that I come in early to do a Bible study, write a devotional and spend time with God. God will open those doors for you, we have to choose to step through them and follow Him.  

I don’t say all of this to brag about how much time I spend with God.  I say it because I find that the more time I spend with Him in quiet uninterrupted time, the more I want to spend with Him and the blessing in this is it makes me want to share Him with others.  I enjoy that time.  It helps me to start my day off in the best way possible and I actually feel His presence the most during that quiet time.

Prayer for the Day: Heavenly Father, thank you for nudging me toward spending quality time with You.  The loss of sleep doesn’t even come close to comparing with the joy I feel each time I devote quality quiet time with You. When someone emails me and asks me to add another person to the devotional list, I know You are at work and it makes it all worthwhile. You are an amazing Father and I praise You.             

Scripture: Truly my soul silently waits for God; from Him comes my salvation.  He only is my rock and my salvation; He is my defense; I shall not be greatly moved. How long will you attack a man? You shall be slain, all of you, like a leaning wall and a tottering fence. They only consult to cast him down from his high position; they delight in lies; they bless with their mouth, but they curse inwardly. My soul, wait silently for God alone, for my expectation is from Him. He only is my rock and my salvation; He is my defense; I shall not be moved. In God is my salvation and my glory; the rock of my strength, and my refuge, is in God.  Trust in Him at all times, you people; pour out your heart before Him; God is a refuge for us. Psalm 62:1-8

Self-Reliant

God wants us to worship Him. He doesn't need us, for He couldn't be a self-sufficient God and need anything or anybody, but He wants us. When Adam sinned it was not He who cried, "God, where art Thou?" It was God who cried, "Adam, where art thou?"  A.W. Tozer

Our parents raised self-reliant children.  My parents believed that if you set your mind to do something you could accomplish it with hard work and persistence.  When we were young my parents bought a piece of property in the country and built a house on it.  They did the majority of the interior finishes on the house.  They did all the tape and bedding, electrical wiring, installing intercom and a central vacuum system.  We know how to do lots of stuff.  I’ll give you an example of some of the great stuff we were taught growing up. 

I can milk a cow, saddle and ride a horse, tile floors, repair a washing machine in a pinch, rotate my tires, change a flat, make my own clothing, curtains and slip covers, knit a scarf (although I did try to make a pair of gloves one time and they only had three fingers and one glove was smaller than the other so I don’t think you could call this a great talent of mine).  I can make butter in a churn, homemade jelly, bread from scratch and cook.  I can paint using a paint sprayer, mow my lawn, use a weed eater, cut down a tree with a hand saw and plant a garden.  I can install a toilet and replace a bathroom sink.  You might say I am multi-talented in a lot of stuff.  You notice I didn’t say expert because I am not great at all of these.

This started me thinking about all the things that I could do if I am God-Reliant.  If I have God’s power how much more could I do for His Kingdom?  If I am dependent only on the Father how much more can I accomplish with Him in my corner? The thing we need to remember is our strength comes from the Lord.  If we focus on that there is no limit to what we can do in His Name.

Prayer for the Day: Heavenly Father, You give me the strength to accomplish much in Your Name.  If I keep my focus on You there is nothing I can’t do.  If I live by your strength and keep my focus off of self, I will bring glory to You in abundance.  Thank you for Your strength and Power.  Help me to be God-Reliant.             

Scripture: “For You are my lamp, O Lord; the Lord shall enlighten my darkness. For by You I can run against a troop; by my God I can leap over a wall.  As for God, His way is perfect; the word of the Lord is proven; He is a shield to all who trust in Him. “For who is God, except the Lord? And who is a rock, except our God? God is my strength and power, and He makes my way perfect. He makes my feet like the feet of deer, and sets me on my high places. He teaches my hands to make war, So that my arms can bend a bow of bronze. “You have also given me the shield of Your salvation; Your gentleness has made me great. You enlarged my path under me; so my feet did not slip.  2 Samuel 22:29-37

 

What’s In a Name?

There are two hundred and fifty-six names given in the Bible for the Lord Jesus Christ, and I suppose this was because He was infinitely beyond all that any one name could express.  Billy Sunday

If you were to take every single, solitary grain of sand off of every square inch of beach on the face of the earth, you wouldn't equal the number of stars in the galaxies of the universe. And your God made them all! More amazing still, He named them all! The psalmist declared, "He determines the number of the stars; He gives to all of them their names" (Ps. 147:4).  Sam Storms

I was researching biblical names and their meanings.  I sometimes get confused when I am studying the Bible because I will come across a verse where a person’s name will be changed.  There were times when God changed a person’s name and gave him a new name.  God changed Abram’s “high father” to Abraham, “father of a multitude and his wife’s name from “Sarai,” meaning “my princess” to “Sarah,” “mother of nations”.

Jacob’s name meaning “supplanter” was changed to “Israel,” “having power with God” and Simon’s “God has heard” was changed to Peter, “rock”.  There are times in the Bible where Jesus would call Peter “Simon” after he changed his name to “Peter”.  I often wondered if this was because Peter would turn to his old ways and it was a reminder of what he used to be.  Even though God renamed Jacob, Israel, he would sometimes call him Jacob maybe as a reminder that he had power with God in his new name Israel. 

I decided to take this a step further and look up some other biblical names and their meanings.  I found it interesting that Job’s name means “persecuted, oppressed.” He actually lived the meaning of his name.  Then I ran across Dorcas which means “gazelle” and near that was Damascus, which means “swift camel”.  I am not sure I would want to live up to the name Damascus.  I then found Sharon which means “a plain flat pasture”, and Tekva meaning “pitching of tents.”

I then was curious as to why we have middle names.  The only thing I could find was that it started in Europe with the aristocracy.  I guess you were considered upper class if you had many middle names. 

What I learned from all this is that each of us is unique and important to God no matter what our name is.  We might be a “swift camel” or “a pitcher of tents” on earth but our most important name should be “child of God”. 

Prayer for the Day: Heavenly Father, I sometimes am confused when I read in the Bible where the same person is called by two different names.  I think in many cases a new name was given to someone to remind them of their new mission in life as a child of God and that Your  mission would be fulfilled in them.  I just want to be called a child of God and to fulfill whatever mission You set before me.          

Scripture:  One of the two who heard John speak, and followed Him, was Andrew, Simon Peter’s brother. He first found his own brother Simon, and said to him, “We have found the Messiah” (which is translated, the Christ). And he brought him to Jesus. Now when Jesus looked at him, He said, “You are Simon the son of Jonah. You shall be called Cephas” (which is translated, A Stone). John 1:40-42

The Filing Cabinet

Are you ready to go at once straight into heaven, if the gates were thrown open? What manner of persons ought we to be to say it! Are we walking in a way perfectly consistent with stepping tonight at once into the glory, to be at home in the Father's house?  G.V. Wigram

When Jesus warns us not to store up treasures on earth, it's not just because wealth might be lost; it's because wealth will always be lost. Either it leaves us while we live, or we leave it when we die. No exceptions....Realizing its value is temporary should radically affect our investment strategy.... According to Jesus, storing up earthly treasures isn't simply wrong. It's just plain stupid.  Randy Alcorn

What folders do you have in your filing cabinet? I like to think of my brain as a tiny filing cabinet.  Tiny because there is not much up there I often think.  Anyway, there are all these files stored up there called brain cells.  God is so amazing.  He created us with something in our head that resembles an over large raisin but it has the capability to store endless amounts of information.

What do you store in the filing cabinet God gave you?  Do you fill it with thoughts of heaven or thoughts of the Father? Do you have a file called Scripture where you return often and like an often used book, the pages are worn and frayed?  I have a Do For Others file but sometimes I don’t open it as often as I should.  Then there is the Love Others file.  There is also one filed under “G” that is my Giving file.  Then there is a Joy file.

Too many times I spend more time on other files that are not so important.  There is the Me file and sometimes this file is overflowing.  This one is broken down into categories since I sometimes use this one more than the others.  It has a section on Its All About Me.  Under this section there are subcategories of How to Make Money, How to Spend Money and How to Keep Up With the Neighbors.  Then there is another section on Being First and Winning. 

I’ve come to the conclusion that my filing cabinet is filled with a lot of junk that needs to be shredded.  If I would just clean out the junk there would be more room for the good stuff. 

It never fails to amaze me when we do events, how God gives us opportunities to touch people’s lives by small gestures. We had a young woman who was a vendor at one of our events this weekend.  She set up a booth right next to us and we spoke casually throughout the day.  Near the end of the event she came over and made this statement: “I waited until the end of the day to tell you this.  I wanted to tell you that I lost my sister to cancer a year ago and I just wanted to tell you that she loved your lavender.  It was her favorite.  It brought her great comfort near the end of her life.”  This young woman had tears in her eyes as she spoke and she said she just wanted to thank us. 

As we talked it struck me that this is what life is about.  These are the opportunities that each of us has every day to touch someone else’s life.  Too many times we are so busy using the “Me” folders that we ignore the critical ones that have eternal importance. Fill up your filing cabinet with the good stuff.     

Prayer for the Day: Heavenly Father, before each event I pray that you will allow me to touch at least one person’s life for You.  You continue to amaze me because when I pray that You always answer. Thank You for blessing me with those life changing moments.            

Scripture: Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom, teaching and admonishing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord. And whatever you do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through Him.  Colossians 3:16-18

Life & Death

Many a humble soul will be amazed to find that the seed it sowed in weakness, in the dust of daily life, has blossomed into immortal flowers under the eye of the Lord.  Harriet Beecher Stowe

The lesson for each believer is to humble himself, not to wait for the Lord to humble him.  Theodore Epp

Have you ever been in that place in life when you thought the end of your life could be coming to a close? I have and if you ever get that opportunity you will never look at life the same way again. 

When I was diagnosed with cancer, my chances of survival weren’t good but they were much better than many of the ladies I knew.  Ovarian cancer is one that is rarely caught early and often is fatal.  Not long after my treatments were over and I returned to work, I joined a cancer support group at the hospital where I had my surgery.  It was an eye opening experience.  I watched one woman after another die over a five year period.  During that time we each wrote our cancer story and it was published by the hospital.  Each story outlined the struggles of battling this terrible disease.  I watched mothers of young children die, grandmothers leave behind their grandchildren, and wives leave behind their spouses to carry on without them.  One of the things I learned is that dying of ovarian cancer is not an easy death.  Periodically I would go back to that book and read the stories of the women who fought this battle and eventually lost. 

If you ever want to feel what dying to self is, that describes it for me.  It no longer was important how much money I made, what kind of job I had or how many things I owned. I would say I wasn’t humble before cancer.  I wasn’t even close.  God blessed me in this cancer journey.  He gave me the opportunity to be reborn and the time to be a better person and to seek forgiveness for the mistakes I’ve made in life.  Some of the ladies in my support group didn’t have that opportunity. 

The bottom line is I have been blessed beyond measure. God had mercy on me and a love for me that I didn’t deserve. So if you ask me to pray for you I don’t take that lightly.  I do it immediately.  None of us knows when the end will come but we can be as prepared as we will ever be if we take the opportunity to do it now.  Don’t wait for the Lord to humble you.    

Prayer for the Day: Heavenly Father, I praise You for loving me enough to allow cancer to enter my life.  It was a difficult journey but I praise You for that trial in my life.  If forever changed my outlook on life and my view of You. I praise you for this trial because it forever changed me.             

Scripture:  Let love be without hypocrisy. Abhor what is evil. Cling to what is good. Be kindly affectionate to one another with brotherly love, in honor giving preference to one another; not lagging in diligence, fervent in spirit, serving the Lord; rejoicing in hope, patient in tribulation, continuing steadfastly in prayer; distributing to the needs of the saints, given to hospitality. Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse. Rejoice with those who rejoice, and weep with those who weep. Be of the same mind toward one another. Do not set your mind on high things, but associate with the humble. Do not be wise in your own opinion. Repay no one evil for evil. Have regard for good things in the sight of all men. If it is possible, as much as depends on you, live peaceably with all men. Beloved, do not avenge yourselves, but rather give place to wrath; for it is written, “Vengeance is Mine, I will repay,” says the Lord. Therefore “If your enemy is hungry, feed him; If he is thirsty, give him a drink; For in so doing you will heap coals of fire on his head.” Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good. Romans 12:9-21

Reaping & Sowing

The Lord made it very plain in the New Testament that believers cannot escape reaping the kind of harvest they sow. We cannot hide our sin; we will not get away with it. The secrets of the night are not hidden from God. Theodore Epp

Have you ever thought of the type of seed you sow every day?  I think about it often because I don’t always sow good seed.  If we look at our lives as a farmer sowing seed this is how it would work. 

I might go to a gardening catalog and purchase seeds or go to a nursery to buy young plants.  If I want to produce an abundant harvest, I wouldn’t just wait until the seeds or plants are delivered.  I would go out and start up my tractor and plow the field in preparation for the planting. 

When we planted lavender we didn’t have the type of soil that is conducive to growing lavender so we amended the soil.  We have clay soil so we had to smooth the surface in order to plant.  We used a harrow to break down the clumps of clay.  This meant driving around and around the field dragging the harrow behind the tractor over and over again until we had a smooth surface to plant.  

I might then stake out where I want the seeds or plants to go.  In our case lavender has to be planted three feet apart.  The reason for this is the plants will get quite large so they need space to grow. 

We then make a mix of the right types of soil that will help the plants thrive or in other words produce a good harvest. I might also add fertilizer and then water.  All of these things have to happen before I even put the plants or seeds in the ground.

When I apply this to my daily life some of the same preparation is required.  If I want to reap a good harvest for the Lord I must prepare.  So I turn to God’s Almanac the Bible.  This will tell me everything I need to do to reap a good harvest.  It tells me what seeds to plant, (truth), how to cultivate the soil, (love), and it even tells me how to water, (Living Water).  If I don’t use all of these in the process I won’t reap a thing. 

Sometimes I sow bad seed.  If I lie, cheat, steal, use anger without love, and any number of other things against God’s will, I am sowing bad seed.  The sad part is what I reap can last for generations.  Then instead of plowing the field with the harrow, I decide to leave the clods.  This is like thinking that the sin in my life will stay hidden.  If the clod stays there no seed can be planted.  It is like walking out to the unplowed field and throwing the seed in every direction and hoping they will grow.  If there are weeds in your field they will choke out everything else, even the good seed. Sin becomes our weeds. 

What type of seeds are you planting?  Is it beneficial to the growth of your friends, children, neighbors?  Maybe like me, you need to study the Almanac, pull some weeds and water the plants.   

Prayer for the Day: Heavenly Father, I am guilty of planting bad seed.  I am also guilty of not being prepared when it comes time to plant the seed.  Remind me that I must meditate on Your Word in order to reap a good harvest for Your kingdom.  I will not be able to do that if I don’t spend time with You.            

Scripture: “Remember now, whoever perished being innocent? Or where were the upright ever cut off? Even as I have seen, those who plow iniquity and sow trouble reap the same. By the blast of God they perish, and by the breath of His anger they are consumed.  Job 4:7-9

Let him who is taught the word share in all good things with him who teaches.  Do not be deceived, God is not mocked; for whatever a man sows, that he will also reap. For he who sows to his flesh will of the flesh reap corruption, but he who sows to the Spirit will of the Spirit reap everlasting life. Galatians 6:6-8

Survey

Our love to God is measured by our everyday fellowship with others and the love it displays.  Andrew Murray

I received a survey yesterday.  Companies that do surveys are kind of sticking their neck out.  They are taking the chance that if you are unhappy with their service you will most likely blast them with the reason for your dissatisfaction.

So I received this survey that asks me if I was pleased with the service I received recently when I set up an electricity account.  If you read one of my electricity service devotionals, you know that what I thought should take 30 minutes to set up, in reality took a week. It is those unmet expectations that will get us every time.

One of the things I find interesting about surveys is that they limit the space you are allowed to explain your response.  If you are completing an online survey you are often limited to 100 words.  If you are filling in a mail in survey you are limited to 2 lines.  I don’t know about you, but I am windy so I find it hard to explain a complaint in that amount of space.

I decided to fill out the survey.  I answered question after question and I even had to write on the edge and around other parts of the survey to get my frustration out.  Then came the final statement.  “If you could describe “Our Company” in three words write them below.”  I was stuck.  How do you put into one word or three that you don’t want to be treated like every other customer?  Every person is different and each circumstance is different.  What single or three words describes that?

So after I completed the whole survey, both front and back, and wrote it in ink, I sat back and reread what I wrote.  It was really liberating to get all that off my chest.  Then as will often happen, God popped into my head and said, “Do you really want to send that?”  It was one of those What Would Jesus Do Moments.  I started thinking about the person who would receive the survey.  I put myself in that persons place.  Would I want to hear that I missed the mark?  Then I thought about the customer service person whose hands were tied by the limits to their system which caused a lot of the frustration.   The repercussions of what could happen to this persons pay if I sent in this survey just so I could vent my frustrations.  So I picked up the survey and the envelope to mail it in and I walked down the hall and into our filing room and shredded it. 

Please don’t misunderstand me.  There are times when it is necessary to confront others, but it is also important to remember how to do it.  If it is not done with love then it is wrong.  

What did I learn from this exercise?  I was reminded that God knows I am unique and it doesn’t matter if anyone else acknowledges that or not.  I also was reminded that we all miss the mark.  It also reminded me that if I am unable to approach a stranger, whom I have never met but only talked to on the phone, and show them God’s love, then how can I ever show anyone I meet that God exists. If I want my light to shine so others may see God, everything I do in this life needs to count.  What three words should describe the light I reflect?  God Is Love.  I need to live like that every day.

Prayer for the Day: Heavenly Father, I believe yesterday’s exercise in filling out the survey was so important.  You want to refine me and make me better.  Thank You for sending me the memo.  If I understand Your love for me, then I must share it with others.  Thank you for stopping me from sending something that was not beneficial to the other person.          

Scripture: So, when he had gone out, Jesus said, “Now the Son of Man is glorified, and God is glorified in Him. If God is glorified in Him, God will also glorify Him in Himself, and glorify Him immediately. Little children, I shall be with you a little while longer. You will seek Me; and as I said to the Jews, ‘Where I am going, you cannot come,’ so now I say to you. A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another; as I have loved you, that you also love one another. By this all will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another.” John 13:31-35