“The Lord says, ‘I will guide you along the best pathway for your life, I will advise you and watch over you.’” Psalm 32:8NLT

 Learning that God had a plan for my life was a relief to me.

I hadn’t done such a good job at it myself, making mistakes along the way, living in fear that I’d never get it right. I soon discovered, however, that knowing He had a plan and following it were two different things. I still felt like something was missing. And it was.

~

When I was 18, I had the delight of traveling to Germany after high school graduation to meet my relatives. My German grandparents also happened to be there at the same time, returning for a trip to visit the “old country” and their families they had left many years before. At the end of my visit, I was packing when Grandpa slipped a few pouches in my suitcase.

“I don’t think I’ll have room for these when we leave next week, Janie,” he said as he stuffed them in my suitcase. My cousin Max loaded my suitcase in the car as I searched the house for any forgotten items. At the airport, I waved good-bye to family and grabbed my suitcase to head through the Frankfurt airport. I could barely budge the thing. “What happened to this?!” I thought to myself. I suddenly recalled the bags Grandpa shoved in there, wondering what could possibly be in them.

I dragged that suitcase what seemed like miles to my gate, so encumbered by the weight of it that I wasn’t certain I would make it, arms and back aching. I was never so glad to unload something as I was that suitcase at the baggage check.

Extra Baggage

When I got home, I found the bags Grandpa had glibly tossed in. I peeked inside one of them. BB pellets! Each bag was brimming with BB pellets, weighing about 5 pounds. Ugh. My ultra-frugal grandfather had found a deal on pellets, and I had just lugged them halfway around the world for him.

After spending the previous day dragging around my suitcase, I had learned the lesson of traveling lightly. But it wasn’t until many years later that I realized this truth applies to much more than our physical travels. Thomas A Kempis said, “They travel lightly whom God’s grace carries.” I spent too many years of my young adulthood dragging around 30 pounds of my “BB pellet” past. God was guiding me along the best pathway for my life, but I was so bogged down by my past that I was just inching along.

Finally, the Holy Spirit taught me that I was missing grace — the grace that rids us of what has come before, freeing us for what is now. I already had the grace that forgives all my sins at the cross of Jesus. But I needed to learn how to accept grace for the journey that each day brings, realizing that each day I can choose to walk in that grace and live it. I learned that traveling lightly means I live with open hands that are not full with holding on to the past but are empty, waiting to grasp what God has for me today, now.

And it makes all the difference: Grace means I can dump the baggage of my past, free to run the path God has laid before me. Free to relish His plans. Free to join in His work.

If you’re still towing around your past, it’s time to permanently check it at God’s baggage counter and run with Him down the pathway of grace called Your Life.

Has grace made a difference in your life? Please feel free to share your experience below.

Pray on!

“Image courtesy of iconmac / FreeDigitalPhotos.net”.
“Image courtesy of Keattikorn / FreeDigitalPhotos.net”.

Ever since my daughter was a preschooler, she’s been able to memorize things so easily. She put this skill to good use when we enrolled her in Awana. Amber loved working on her Bible verses every week. It seemed as if the verses just effortlessly implanted themselves into her mind and heart and rolled off her tongue. Many of those verses stuck with her through the years, and now as an adult, they’ve become words of life that she is able to apply.

That’s why I love Psalm 119:11: “I have hidden your word in my heart that I might not sin against you.” When I stockpile God’s word in my heart, I can easily pull out the “ammunition” that I need at a moment’s notice.

If I’m feeling fearful, I can recall 2 Timothy 1:7 “For God hath not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind.”

If I am depressed I can recite Nehemiah 8 :10 “The joy of the Lord is your strength.”

If I need wisdom I can meditate on James 1:5, “If any of you lacks wisdom, you should ask God, who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will be given to you.”

What are you in need of today? The Bible surely has something to say about it. God has given us a storehouse of supplies to draw upon everyday — and amazingly this stockpile is never depleted. The only thing that is limiting us is how often we go to it to replenish our own supplies. We need to read His words and memorize them so that we are fortified for our battle in this world.

Pray on!

“Jane—is there an app for that?”

I called to my sister from her guest room while was tidying up her office across the hall. We had just returned from the Proverbs 31 She Speaks conference and were brain-storming on how to apply what we had learned to our lives and ministries. During one of my sessions the facilitator encouraged me to use a notebook to organize my writing ideas. I thought a computer would be more efficient than a notebook, so I asked my tech-savvy sister if there was such thing as a writer’s app.

Jane answered, “Yes, there is a writing organizer app for your Mac, but they also have apps for your Kindle.” My Kindle? I purchased a Kindle a few months ago and instantly became a Kindle fan. When I bought my e-reader, however, I thought it was only for reading books. I did not know that I could use my Kindle for other thing such as watching movies, making voice recordings, searching the Internet or editing documents.  I looked with new respect at the intricate little instrument sitting next to me on my bed. I wondered how many others untapped powers and abilities were hidden behind its glossy black screen.  Abruptly I felt my heart quicken as the Holy Spirit nudged my soul. “This is how people often live life … using only one app … John 3:16.”

The wheels began turning in my mind as I thought through what God was revealing to me. We app-ly John 3:16 to our hearts and get saved, but some never move on to live the abundant life. The John 3:16 app is just the beginning. Sadly, many Christians remain unaware of the powerful potential that is hidden within God’s app store, the Bible.

God has countless apps. In fact, God has an app for every need. For instance, if you have blown it big time, download Evergrace at Ephesians 1:7. Perhaps you feel lonely and need a little fellowship—purchase the app Faceinthebook at 1 John 1:3 and start interacting with social media. Maybe you are low on faith–try TheWord 2008, which must be directly downloaded to your heart from Romans 10:17. The best thing about God’s apps is they are free! (Save your coins for your tithe!)

What great need do you have today? Go to God’s app store (the Bible), and download an app (a verse) to your heart. Please remember–God’s apps are meant to be app-lied to your life. The more apps you download, the more you’ll realize there’s no limit to what God can do!

By Mary Kane

All rights reserved. Copyright 2013

Image courtesy of ddpavumba / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Image courtesy of nikorn / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Last week was not a week that I am proud of.

My attitude was weighing me down, becoming progressively worse as the week went on. If I am totally honest about it, I have to admit that I was mired in anger, frustration, and stress and really didn’t want to listen to what God wanted me to do about it.

The result being that by the time I was willing to listen, I was pretty much a mess.

Had I just listened to God from the start, it wouldn’t have been such a painful process to fix things, but my stubbornness got in the way, so I had to do things the hard way. As a result, I spent some time in Psalm 51, which is a panacea for sin.  King David penned this prayer of despair and hope after he made a mess of his relationship with a married woman, Bathsheba.

As I read through his heartfelt plea, I added my own regrets to the Psalm and felt the refreshing words of forgiveness wash over  my soul. I decided to write a prayer of forgiveness based on Psalm 51 to help me truly remember this lesson. I share it with you in the hope that it will encourage another struggling soul. Feel free to share your thoughts and feelings in the comment section. Remember, forgiveness is just a prayer away~

(If you’d like to download a free Bible study on forgiveness, just click on The Sinner for a study by Mary Kane.)

Pray on!

O merciful God,

Once again I come to you humbly, asking for your forgiveness, that You will remember my sins no more.

You love me with a depth of love that is difficult for me to fathom. It is not based on me living up to my part of the bargain, because I can’t do that. It is based on who you are and your unfailing love.

I know my sin all too well. Just when I think I have finally mastered it, it masters me. And I sin against you. From my earliest days, my soul has been marred by sin, yet you never give up on me. You continue to instill Truth deep into my soul and dangle tidbits of Wisdom for me to grasp until I am hooked by the absolute rightness of your way and the futility of mine.

I am sorry. Forgive me.

You scrub my soul with the hyssop of the blood of Jesus, making me whiter than freshly fallen snow. I draw a deep, life-giving breath and offer you my undivided attention, ready to learn from my mistakes, welcoming the joy and light back into my parched soul.

I ask to serve you with a clean heart and a spirit that is determined to cling to you. I need your presence with me and the Holy Spirit to guide my steps. Otherwise, I wander my own paths that lead to destruction and destinations far from you.

A broken spirit and a broken and contrite heart are the incense of my sacrifice to you. Released from guilt, my praises pour forth, and I am set free to proclaim all you are. You take my offering and heal me, one step closer to the person you made me to be.

Amen.

By Jane VanOsdol June 2013

OnlyByPrayer.com

If you would like a nice, printable copy of this prayer, click on this link My Failure, God’s Forgiveness for a pdf.

Simple Truth

Sometimes you read something that just makes you stop and ponder. This happened to me last night. It’s such a simple truth, yet it’s so profound as to be life changing. I should already know this, be able to deduce it for myself, yet I’ve never thought of it in this way.

What is it?

I’m reading the book The Good and Beautiful God by James Bryan Smith. Chapter Three is entitled “God Is Trustworthy,” and as you might imagine, it’s all about why God is trustworthy. James makes the point that many people don’t trust God. Unfortunately, there’s nothing unusual about that. I know many people who don’t know and trust God, and I’m sure you do too.

What he said next really got my attention.

He said that many people can’t relate to God as Father because they had either mean, abusive fathers or absent fathers. Because of that they have a twisted version of the truth in their heads, and they want nothing to do with God. Many hate the idea of a father.

James said that this thinking pattern is entirely backwards.

Jesus Defines What Father Means

We should not be using the template of earthly fathers as the way to view our heavenly father. No; rather just the opposite should be true. “God’s fatherhood must define what human fatherhood ought to look like, and not the reverse,” he says. “The better solution is to encourage [us] to let Jesus define what Father means and thereby come to know the God Jesus knows. In so doing, [we] might find healing.”

The hope for healing for those who have experienced abusive parents lies in not letting those parents define God, but in letting Jesus define God. Jesus said in John 10:30 that “I and the Father are one.” In John 14:7 Jesus talks about how if we know Him, then we know and have seen the Father.

Recently, I was praying with a person who has suffered for years from the effects of an abusive parent. This person was ready to let go of her idea of God as someone to be afraid of and to see God as He really is. She was desperate to let go of her skewed idea of God and step onto the path of healing and truth.

Grasping the Truth

How do you see God? If you had cold or abusive parents, you don’t have to live in fear of a mean, distant God. Read the stories about Jesus in the gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, and you’ll have a clear picture of the true nature of God. He’s waiting for you to allow Him to love you as He wants to.

The question is, will you let Him?

Pray on!

The Good and Beautiful God: Falling in Love with the God Jesus KnowsBy James Bryan Smith / IVP BooksWhat does being Christlike really mean? Smith believes we need a pattern for transformation. He encourages us to re-examine what we think about God (our narratives), how we practice (the spiritual disciplines), and whom we interact with (our social context) to discover the life Jesus lived and grow in the knowledge of a good God. 232 pages, hardcover from InterVarsity.

What does it mean to be blessed or to live a blessed life?

I was pondering that myself the other day after reading a section of scripture in John 13. Verses 16 and 17 say the following:

I tell you the truth, no servant is greater than his master, nor is a messenger greater than the one who sent him. Now that you know these things, you will be blessed if you do them (NIV, emphasis mine).

Jesus had just finished washing His disciples’ feet as a demonstration to them of how they should serve others, when He finished up with the statement that “you will be blessed if you do them.”

I stopped on the word blessed and considered it. I’ve always thought blessed to mean something good bestowed on me by God. But I was intrigued to look at the meaning in more depth.

The first two definitions in my Webster’s New World College Dictionary tell me that blessed means “1. holy, sacred; consecrated; 2. enjoying great happiness; blissful;” That seems about on par with what I’ve always thought.

But to truly understand the meaning, it makes the most sense to explore the Greek word  for blessing that is used in verse 17, which is makarios, so that’s what I did.

I wasn’t disappointed at what I found. 

My Keyword Study Bible explained the nuances of the word in this description:

“Biblically, one is pronounced blessed when God is present and involved in his life. The hand of God is at work directing all his affairs for a divine purpose, and thus, in a sense, such a person lives coram Deo, before the face of God.” The definition went on to state that blessedness also means sharing in the life of God and participating in the kingdom, and it includes all of these things: forgiveness, freedom of conscience, the Second Coming, the Holy Spirit, heavenly rest, and moral and spiritual purity. Even in suffering and pain, we can still be blessed because God’s purpose is behind it, ensuring that God will bring good out of it for us and glory to him.1

That’s a lot of meaning to meditate on from one small word.

Of all the insights the Greek word gives us, I have to say I’m both entranced by and scared by coram Deo, or living before the face of God. That implies so many things. To live before God’s face is a close, intimate relationship. It is comforting to know that God is right there living life with me each and every day. He’s there to guide me, love me, grow me, and comfort me.

It also means that I’d better ditch any thoughts I may have about just skating by on certain issues, actions, or attitudes. I’ve always understood that God knows everything about me, but when I ponder coram Deo, it attaches a whole new weight of intentionality to my life. I’m truly living before the face of God, so I want to do it right.

What does that look like for me?

Well, an initial thought concerns being more purposeful in how I spend my time. Are the things I’m reading, saying, spending my money on, exerting my energy on, dreaming about, and planning for — are these things, things that I feel good about living coram Deo? Do many of them benefit or serve others, like the example Jesus set for us, or are they only for my own good?

It’s a question I need to answer.

Before the face of God. It changes everything.

¹ Zodhiates, Spiros, Th.D. Hebrew-Greek Key Word Study Bible, NIV. Chatanooga, TN: AMG Publishers, 1996.