Loving God first

I've been thinking about the verse in Matthew 10 where Jesus says, "Anyone who loves his father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; anyone who loves his son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me" (v37). Ouch. As someone who has amazing parents who have been an incredible support to me, especially over the last few years, and who also has two beautiful daughters, this verse is hard.

Sarah's said to me a few times now, "Mummy, you're my best friend". It makes me cry... I love my girls, and I hope we'll still be best friends as they get older, like I am with my Mum! I think I'm starting to see why Jesus said what he did. It's so easy for our relationships with parents and/or children to become more important to us than our relationship with God - it's easy for us to focus on these relationships.

But our relationships here on earth are temporal, God must come first. When it comes to the crunch I must do what pleases God, not what pleases my daughters, my Mum and Dad, or anyone else for that matter. I must be wholly surrendered to Him.

Lord, help me to love you first, and to be prepared to do Your will whatever the cost.

This is what I seek

One of the passages my mentor shared with me this morning was Psalm 27.

4 One thing I ask of the LORD,
this is what I seek:
that I may dwell in the house of the LORD
all the days of my life,
to gaze upon the beauty of the LORD
and to seek him in his temple.

⁵ For in the day of trouble
he will keep me safe in his dwelling;
he will hide me in the shelter of his tabernacle
and set me high upon a rock.

As a Mum, I find it's difficult to make time to spend time with God, to spend time learning from His Word, and just praising Him for who He is. It's difficult, but not impossible. David says, "This is what I seek".

God is the one who keeps me safe in His dwelling and who hides me in the shelter of His tabernacle. As I spend time worshiping Him, I experience His amazing love, His refreshment and realise anew how blessed I am to know Him. I remember how good He is, that regardless of my circumstances I can say with Habbakuk, "Yet I will rejoice."

Dad and I used to worship God by singing and playing together at home often as I was growing up. I miss that. But I'm hoping as the girls get older, we might be able to do the same. That together we can praise God for His faithfulness and His goodness in every part of life, the great stuff and the tough stuff. When we play together at the moment I have lots of extra 'help' on the keyboard, and eventually give up and just let the girls 'play'! It's still fun, but not quite the same.

Thanks, Lord, for Your Word, for all it teaches me about Your character and Your faithfulness, and for all the guidance it gives in living life the way You intended it to be lived. Lord, help me to make time to worship You, to remind myself of who You are and to praise You for being my Comforter, Refuge and Solid Rock. This is what I seek... to dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life.

Learning to relax, and delight in the Lord

I was about to go to bed, and thought I'd take a quick squiz at the next page in my Psalms journal. It's titled "Delight in the Lord", and it suddenly occurred to me that this is a very helpful, practical way to stop worrying and start relaxing. The first Psalm quoted is 37:4-6, talking about, surprise, surprise, delighting yourself in the Lord. Delight is another one of those words we don't really use much anymore. The dictionary defines it as, "to gain great enjoyment or pleasure from something".

Now that's a practical way to learn to relax. Delighting in God, in all that He is, in all the good things He's done in my life and the lives of others, enjoying being in relationship with Him, even amidst the tough stuff... in fact probably more so amidst the tough stuff.

As I delight myself in God, I learn to relax and let go of the reigns, and to trust Him.

I need to spend more time delighting in God... lots more time enjoying my relationship with Him. What an amazing privilege He's given us to share a relationship with Him through Jesus!

Learning to relax, not worry

While I was flicking through all the channels on TV to try and find something decent to watch so I could have some time out, I was thinking more about relaxing and God's thoughts on the matter, after my last blog. I remembered that God commands us to not worry (Matthew 6:25-34), and not to be anxious (Philippians 4:6-7). He tells us to cast our cares on Him (1 Peter 5:6-7).

So if 'relaxing' is learning to stop worrying, perhaps it is something God wants me to do. A number of years back a good friend gave me a book by Joyce Myer, "Be Anxious for Nothing". Joyce writes (p27):

"How many years of my life did I waste, tormenting myself with needless worry and anxiety, trying to handle things that were not mine to handle? I was always a responsible person, but in an addition to the responsibility for my life I took on the care of it. According to the Bible we are to handle our responsibility, but we are to cast our care upon the Lord because He cares for us (1 Peter 5:7)."

Lord, help me to cast my cares on You, to relax in Your Mighty hands.

Learning to Relax, or at least Rest

I just did one of those personality profile tests online, and came out with an ISFJ profile, which is the same profile I came out with when I did my first Myers-Briggs test at AGL about ten years ago.

There are some joke prayers that have been put together for each type. The one for an ISFJ is, "Lord, help me to be more laid back and help me to do it EXACTLY right."

Yeah, ten years on that's still a struggle. Who would have ever thought it could be so hard to learn to relax! But hang on, my detailed mind wants to know where God gives me the OK to relax. Anyone?!

I typed "relaxing" into the search box on Bible Gateway, and there were no search results found.

I know this sounds ridiculous, but I'm serious!! Does God think it's important for me to learn to relax? I don't know that I've ever heard anyone preach about the importance of relaxing. Is that because God doesn't say it's important?

Oh, hang on. On the seventh day, God rested! The Sabbath. Oh yeah. OK, But is resting the same as relaxing?!

Aagh, think I should try and have a rest now anyway... if rest was good enough for God, it's good enough for me.

Waiting on the Lord - Hope

Isaiah 40:29-31, "He gives strength to the weary and increases the power of the weak. Even youths grow tired and weary and young men stumble and fall; but those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength, they will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint."

Just realised the version (NLT) I was reading before I started blogging said, "those who WAIT on the Lord will renew their strength", but the NIV version above doesn't use the word wait. I was keen to explore what waiting on the Lord meant as we often assume waiting is a passive thing, almost like a just hanging in there and not doing anything, where actually I wondered whether it meant a very active thing, a very deliberate, conscious act. But the NIV spells it out for me anyway, it suggests that it is a more active thing I need to do: "HOPE in the Lord". Hope is definitely not a passive thing. It is a very active, deliberate, conscious act.

What does it mean to hope in the Lord? My cheat notes say to 'hope' is "to trust in or look expectantly to", and then that to 'renew' our strength is enabling our weakness to give way to God's strength, as Paul says in Corinthians.

I need to trust in God, completely. I need to look expectantly to Him. As I look expectantly to Him and put my hope in Him, He will renew my strength and help me to soar like an eagle, to run and not grow weary, to walk and not be faint. Only in Him.

Help me to put my hope in You, Father, to trust you completely. Renew my strength as only You can do. You are amazing, God.

Fearfully and Wonderfully Made

This afternoon I had a great chat with my sister-in-law, pondering about life. The best part was when she prayed with me - it's great being able to pray together. One of the things we discussed is fear, and how often for me this drives my passiveness - it prevents me from being assertive.

We talked about the importance of seeing ourselves the way God sees us, as Psalm 139 says, "fearfully and wonderfully made" by God Himself!! But that so often we instead worry about what others will think of us, and want their approval.

I've just finished editing my first edition of the magazine, and I'm a bit worried about the feedback I might receive from some people. It's subjective so no doubt some people won't be happy with what's written. But I guess the key is being confident that I have done what I've done to seek to glorify God, and in realising that, it doesn't matter what other people think, what God thinks should be what matters to me, I should be seeking to please Him and Him alone.

Lord, help me to know who I am in You, to be confident in that. To know that I am Your creation and I am fearfully and wonderfully made... yes, I'm still a work in the making, lots more moulding yet to be done, but I'm Your work in the making, You're my Potter. Help me to stop worrying about what other people think and get on with serving You and You alone. As that kids song says, "I just thank You Father for making me Me".

I WILL

For my birthday (which was ages ago), Mum gave me a Psalms journal.  I hadn't got around to writing in it until tonight... very slack!!  

On the first page there are a couple of verses from various Psalms listed under the heading, "Praise to the Lord".  One is the Psalm I journaled about only a few days ago, Psalm 30:11-12 about God turning my sorrow into dancing.  Perhaps God's trying to tell me something here?!

I love how David uses the words, I WILL.  I will sing to you, I will praise You forever.  It's not just something he'd like to do, it's something he chooses to do, and actually does.  My favourite quote from Habbakuk also contains these two words, "Yet I WILL rejoice".

I have to say though that I'm not sure I can often say those words.  It's my desire to sing to God because of His goodness to me, and to praise Him forever, to rejoice.  But I know that sometimes I don't.  I guess when David said it, he meant it at that moment.  I think "I WILL" is also about head over heart, that I let the decision I make in my head (guided by God's Spirit) rule my emotions rather than the other way around.

Lord,  I WILL seek to keep walking every moment of every day with you.  I WILL offer You everything I am so that you can keep moulding me.  I WILL praise You for your goodness and I WILL tell others of Your faithfulness.

The only One who's trustworthy - my Rock & Refuge

So tonight's message at Church got me thinking... the sermon was actually about the popular book and movie, "Angels and Demons" and dispelling the myth that "you can't trust the church".  But I was a little worried about it, not the whole sermon, just the trusting the church bit.  I realise there's value in helping people understanding the authenticity of the Bible which I think tonight was also about, however I think we need to be encouraging people to think about whether they can trust Jesus, not the church.  

Ultimately, churches will fail at being 'trustworthy' - not meaning to be cynical, but realistic. All of us in churches are sinful people, who though we try to be like Jesus, never will be here on earth, we will always struggle with our sinful nature as Paul says.  So if we try and prove the trustworthiness of our churches, people will most likely be very disappointed.

If on the other hand we try and help people see that Jesus can be trusted 100%, they won't be disappointed.  Jesus never disappoints.  Jesus is the Author and Perfecter of our faith.  He is the only one we can trust completely, anywhere, anytime.

I must have been having a real thinking night because I struggled with the first line of our final song.  It's too easy to just rattle off words of songs and not really think about what they mean. It says, "Rock of Ages, cleft for me".  I had no idea what cleft for me meant.  A friend said she thought it referred to a cleft in a rock, like a hiding place, which makes sense when you look at the second line of the song, "Let me hide myself in Thee".  Google wants me to look at cleft palates, thanks Google!... but the dictionary defines it as a, "a small indentation in a surface, for example, skin or land".  So the cleft in the rock where we can hide seems to make sense.  

I'd love to know how many other people actually know what that first line means.  I thought 'cleft' was verb, that it was something Jesus had done for me, but I realise now it's a noun, that Jesus is my 'cleft', at least I think that's what it means?  Not sure I'll be telling too many people that Jesus is my 'cleft' though, I think I'd rather tell them that He's my Rock and Refuge, or something else they're likely to understand.

Anyway, I think that's enough thinking for tonight.

Thanks Lord that You are my Solid Rock and my Refuge, thanks that I can trust you completely. Help me to trust you with every part of my being, to know deep within that You are my Rock and Refuge.  

Where is the Morning?

A while back I was sent verse 5 from Psalm 30 as an encouragement: "weeping may remain for a night, but rejoicing comes in the morning".  Maybe it's not meant to be taken literally (ie. the night and morning bit)? Perhaps it's implying that a 'new day', or maybe even a better way to put it is a new season, will dawn eventually, and with that comes rejoicing?  

Later in the same Psalm, David says, "You turned my wailing into dancing: you removed my sackcloth and clothed me with joy".   

And Philippians 4:4 says, "Rejoice in the Lord always.  I will say it again: Rejoice!"  These words can sound a bit like a cliche and the word "rejoice" isn't really a word we use much anymore. but I guess the key is "Rejoicing IN THE LORD", that I need to find my joy in Him.

Habbakuk also says, "Yet I will Rejoice" in chapter 3:17-19.  This is one of my favourite quotes in the Bible.  Easy to say when times aren't too tough, but when times are tough...

Lord, help me to rejoice in You despite my circumstances, to find my hope and joy in You alone, to know that You are the giver of life, and life to the full.   Help me to trust in your faithfulness in the past and remember that with the morning (whenever that is!) rejoicing will come.  Help me to be able to truly say like Habbakuk, "Yet I will rejoice". 

Lucy's Lion

Lucy has a lion that she takes to bed with her every night - he's her best friend.  

I took the girls for a drive tonight as they were having troubles going to sleep and of course Lucy had to bring lion and hold him close.  If she's feeling unwell or upset she usually heads straight for lion and carries him around with her.  It's very cute.

But as I was driving tonight I thought about Lucy and her lion, and thought why don't I depend on God like that?  Why is that when I'm worried or scared or frustrated I prefer to just complain and get upset, when God's right there waiting for me to turn to Him and find rest in Him.

My Great Aunty wrote Psalm 62:8 on a little note she gave me a few months back.  It says, "Trust in Him at all times ye people, pour out your heart before Him:  God is a refuge for us.  Selah".  That He is, a Refuge.

Thank you God, that You are my Refuge.  Help me to depend on You and treasure my relationship with You like Lucy does her lion.  Help me to talk to You in the everydayness of life.

Moments to Treasure

Feeling frustrated because both girls are still awake and I'm not 100%.  Then Sarah grabs our kids Bible and asks me if I want to read about Jesus.  When I said, "Sure", she said, "I love Jesus".  I cried.  I love my girls!  

Thank you God for my two little angels.  You are Amazing, God.

Whose Responsibility?

Responsibility.  The dictionary defines it as having a duty to deal with something, or being accountable for something.  A doctor  I saw at the end of last year defined it as "the ability to respond", and that there are some times when I do not have the ability to respond to a certain issue that someone else does, and in this case it's important to realise it is not my responsibility, and instead to focus on those things that I do have the ability to respond to. Ouch.  

Why is that I have such a deep sense of responsibility?  As a Christian, God gives me all sorts of commands in His Word.  I want to obey these commands not because I am religious, I'm not, but because I love Him and I want to please Him in the way that I live my life.   Somehow I think I interpret some of these commands as 'having a duty to deal with' various issues for others, ie. needing to take responsibility for them, even though that's not what I actively think at the time.  

I think I want to be like the Good Samaritan and go the extra mile, but the problem is that it's often to my own detriment.  As Christians I think we so often have the view that our own needs are not important at all.  

It's true that we shouldn't be focusing on ourselves and only seeking to meet our own needs, but at the same time if we don't look after our own needs, we can't help others meet theirs.  And if we don't allow God to minister to us, how can we effectively minister the way He would have us minister to them?  I'm not sure of a Bible passage that talks about this off the top of my head - I'll go away and do some investigating.  

Yes, I should be taking responsibility for my own actions, however, the way that others respond to my actions is their choice, I am not responsible for the way they feel and their actions.  I do not have to deal with this on their behalf, in fact, I'm gypping them if I do because I'm taking away their opportunity to learn to respond to the issue and deal with it.

Sometimes what Jesus said offended people.  OK, he was Jesus and He was perfect, I'm not, however, I guess there may be times that something God leads me to do or say might offend others.  Jesus sought to do His Father's Will, and I need to do the same.

Wow, that was a tough blog - lots more pondering yet to be done on this one!

The things kids say

I love some of the things little kids say.  

Sarah often tells Lucy when she's eating something that she really likes and doesn't want to share, "Lucy, you can't have it, it has dairy in it" (Lucy's dairy intolerant).  I explained today that bananas don't have dairy in them so she couldn't really use that as an excuse.   It was a nice try though!

Sarah told us in the car on the weekend that she had farties in her box, known to most people as smarties.  

Tonight Lucy said "Lion".  Her favourite bed-time friend.  When she had some banana today she said very clearly, "Nana".  It's hard to believe she's growing up, and isn't really a baby anymore.