A Place of Our Own

 Of course every aspect of who Jesus is fascinates me...I'm in complete awe of everything that He IS...but there are a few things that get me in more intense ways than others.  One of these things that speak to me in special ways has to do with His personality.  I am always intrigued by how He commanded audiences of 5,000 plus (Matthew chapters 5 through 7 as one example), called us to pray in groups (Matthew 18: 20) and chose His disciples to walk alongside with Him during His earthly ministry...and yet...He often retreated to solitary places to pray...even in His darkest hour, in the garden of Gethsemane, when He took His inner circle of friends with Him to keep vigil...He also said to them, “Sit here while I go over there and pray.” (Matthew 26: 36)

I bet today's phycologists would categorize Jesus as an "ambivert," a person whose personality has a balance of extrovert and introvert features.  To me, He is just acting like a perfectly normal human being: He preaches in the temple, on the mountains, to friendly crowds, to people who want to trick Him, in homes of friends and of tax collectors, He goes to weddings and hangs out at funeral gatherings, but it comes a moment when He needs to gather to Himself and fellowship with the Trinity on His own and pray alone.  He keeps the people in close proximity, but He takes a few steps and goes a bit further still...

I don't pretend to know anything...but to me...I just think that after all the commotion, He needs time to breathe and commune in solitary, private, personal intimacy with The Father and The Holy Spirit in prayer...the most perfect way to connect and communicate with the Divine...in a place just of their own.

Like Jesus, it is also important for us to set aside time to be alone with the Lord...fellowship with others, prayer groups, support systems, service groups, ministry alongside our sisters and brothers in the faith...sharing the Kingdom and our testimony could all be very energizing, but also overwhelming to our senses and to our minds and hearts...often draining us and leaving us like our phones after a day of constant use without plugging them in.  There comes a moment that we need to find a charging station so we can plug ourselves back in and be revived. That's what prayer in solitude does for me.  As much as I love gathering together to pray, and as much as I need that more than I need air...I also need to have that time in which I go "over there and pray" by myself...even if still in proximity of others, even if I can still hear them and see them...but in a spot all by myself.

Dear Heavenly Father, I pray that you will fill our lives with opportunities to serve you in ministry and gather together to pray in groups with the faithful, as well as give us opportunities to have one-on-one intimacy with You at a place that is just ours, so I may know You better and grow closer to Your Heart.  In the Precious Name of Jesus, Our Role Model in Prayer and Life.  Amen!

Thank You, Lord for Another Birthday!

 Birthdays have a funny way of making you reflect, don't they?  I don't think much about mine, but then I go to Facebook and I see the abundance of well wishes from friends and the reality of the blessing of reaching another year hits me.  I don't complain about birthdays.  I just don't think about them much.  But reading the birthday greetings from people from all over, touched my heart in a very special way.  

The Lord, has indeed blessed me with a life filled with love and I don't want to take any of it for granted.  In talking about this with my sister, we both agreed that gratitude is an every moment virtue.  We cannot be blinded by less than ideal circumstances.  If we do, we totally miss the abundant life!  She said, "when I was young, I use to think walking, running, sitting, getting up, squatting, and overall normal, painless movement was a given, now I praise the Lord for every step." Yep...I hear you, sister!

I don't want another minute to go by that I don't feel and humbly express my thanksgiving for this life I've been given...including the pain.  After all, "no pain, no gain," right?  The pain reminds us we are still alive...and anything that reminds us of the blessing of another day is something to be grateful for.

Therefore, as I look back on another birthday, I say: Thanks be to God for his indescribable gift! 2 Corinthians 9:15

There is Hope in Waiting

Wait for the Lord;

be strong and take heart

and wait for the Lord. Psalm 27: 14

"Where is THAT KID????!!!!"  "OMGOSH I'M GOING TO .....  UGH!!!!"  "HE IS RUINING MY VACATION!!!!"  

Yep...those words actually came out of my mouth a few weeks ago when we were waiting for Grant to come home from his summer camp job so we could leave for my long-time-dreamed Outer Banks vacation. He was like 1 hour late from when I had hoped he'd be able to be home...and that waiting period KILLED ME! Every minute he was late represented another minute that my beach-time was reduced...and I couldn't deal with it.  

Let's just say, waiting is NOT something I do gracefully.  

God has been trying to teach me the all-too-crucial lesson of waiting in His timing, but I refuse to learn.  So He keeps giving me opportunities to acquire this most important virtue.  The thing that makes it harder is that the lesson includes learning to wait for other people too...waiting in their timing without forcing my timing on them.  Boy, is that a super hard thing to master...sigh...

But the Lord is a Faithful teacher and He has made sure I have living tutorials that re-enforce the class on a daily basis. Being wired to rush, dash and jump...has made it very challenging to live surrounded by 3 gentlemen who seemed to have been born to just chill.  So...hence...the built-in, daily lecture on patience and waiting...sigh...

At any rate, all these came to mind when reading our last verse in Psalm 27...which...I love.  I love it so much because it is like a healing balm to my frazzled mind.  It is a verse that gives me an abundance of hope...and hope is a commodity that is at a premium in this harsh world today.  Thinking about hope reminded me of two words in Spanish that are related:  Esperanza and Esperar.  

Esperanza is a beautiful word that is also used as a name.  The word means, exactly that: Hope...to be precise, it comes from the Latin word "sperare" which means "to have hope." Then, the other word, Esperar which comes from the same Latin word as Esperanza, means..."to wait."  

How beautiful is that? 

Hope and Wait go together.  They come exactly from the same place and they can't be split apart.  There is hope in waiting.  So, I pray...next time I have to wait...I remember the hope that lives inside of that waiting period...so I don't lose it!

Anyway, Grant made it home eventually.  And as usual, God showed me how His plan is a GIZZILION times better than mine because we ended up having the most pleasant, uneventful, smooth ride EVER to that region of the country.  We didn't run into any stopped traffic or highway accidents.  We were stunned.  We concluded that leaving later than usual helped us avoid the "normal" road obstacles we have grown accustomed to when traveling to the Carolinas.  So...waiting paid off...and I got to enjoy the Outer Banks in all their glory...and no harm was caused to Grant.

Blessed be the Name of the Lord, the One Whose Timing is Perfect and Who is All Hope.  Amen!

Arming Ourselves with the Word

I remain confident of this: I will see the goodness of the Lord

in the land of the living. Psalm 27: 13

At this moment in time there are so many scary, frightening, terrifying, troublesome things happening in our society and the world at large, that people like me who are naturally negative/pessimistic can't help to struggle keeping an attitude of hope alive. I try to take precautions to avoid falling in the sink hole of hopelessness...like for instance, I avoid the news like an airborne virus...but regardless, the world finds a way to filter into my mind and my hope begins to shake.

This is why it is not enough to just try to insulate oneself from the world...if we are not getting our daily dose of the Word of God, our defenses don't hold.  The Word is the Sword (Ephesians 6: 17).  And without the Sword, we cannot counter attack...without the Word we can't fight back.  Therefore, it is verses like Psalm 27: 13 what we need to have stored into our hearts and souls in order to charge against the enemy when he launches attacks on our hope...because the only way to keep our hope alive is by carrying Him who IS Hope, inside of us...ready to strike.

Believe it or not, we are at war. So, we better take time to gather the tools and weapons we need to not get crushed in the battles ahead.  The Word of God is our arsenal, so let's not waste time and make sure we have it in us.  That's the way to remain confident that we will see the goodness of the Lord not just in heaven, but also in the land of the living.  In the Precious Name of Jesus, Who Is The Word!  Amen!

No Lies

Do not turn me over to the desire of my foes,

 for false witnesses rise up against me,

spouting malicious accusations. Psalm 27: 12

I've always told my kids to be the kind of person whose word is solid.  "Be the one that when people ask: 'who said that?' and someone says, 'Dylan' or 'Grant' they go like...'ok, if Dylan/Grant said it...it must be true.'"  They still lie to me to my face, though.  I do have to say, it is very difficult for Dylan to lie to me.  He can't keep a straight face.  Grant, on the other hand...boy...that kids lies...ugh.  He said it's not that he is lying...he is trying to protect me because he knows I can't handle the truth...sigh...yep.  

Regardless, I continue to preach.  I want them to understand the importance of honesty.  I want them to adhere to the "Thou Shall Not Lie" Rule.  I especially don't want them to spout malicious accusations against anyone...no malicious lies against those they don't like so they can cause hurt.  I sure hope they never get into that.  I hope I don't get into that either.  I always worry about others doing that to me...but, I want to never fall in the trap of doing that to anyone just because my pride is hurt or I'm not a fan.

I pray the Lord does not "turn me over to the desire of my foes..." but that He doesn't turn me over to my own sinful ways either.  I pray the lessons about honesty I've been trying to instill into my sons also permeate my own soul.  In the Precious Name of Jesus, The One Who Is Truth! Amen!

Teach Us Your Way

Teach me your way, Lord; lead me in a straight path

because of my oppressors. Psalm 27: 11

There's a time during summer break when I begin stressing out about the mountains of work I've ignored since the end of the previous academic year...that's the time when I realize I have procrastinated long enough and I have no wiggle room left so I better get my head back in gear so I can organize my classes for the new year...well...that time has arrived.  UGH...sigh...roll eyes...

The "things-to-do-over-summer-FOR-WORK" list that began as a thin outline back in early May is now fully fleshed out...and I'm beginning to fret.

The most important things in that highly cryptic and borderline schizophrenic list are the lessons I need to teach.  I have to go over each of the courses I'm teaching in the fall and spend time designing the outcomes I want my students to achieve by the end of the semester in each of them...and then...I have to figure out fun/intelligent/entertaining/engaging/impactful/differentiated/non-boring ways to teach them...sigh... I'm exhausted just contemplating the task.

Thinking about all these, and now looking at verse 11 in Psalm 27 I'm reminded that one of the names of Our Lord is "Teacher." Oh, how I love that Name! If there was ever a most glorious role model for how to be a good teacher, that was Jesus, no contest.  He sure knew how to design a most effective lesson plan, that's for sure!  And His delivery methods...WOW!  He knew how to command an audience!  I doubt anyone would ever fall asleep, stare out the windows, zone out or aimlessly scroll down their social media on their phone while He was teaching...

Jesus not only taught...but once they heard Him, people wanted to be taught!!  They followed Him and clamored for more! I cannot even jokingly fantasize about it:  "Please, pretty please...teach us more!!" HA! Yeah...that'll happen...NEVER!  But with Jesus, we feel the urgency of the message, and we want Him to teach us!  He need to hear from Him to know which way to go, because He IS The Way! Without Him, we are utterly lost...no hope of ever finding that straight path.  

It's peculiar to me how the verse ends kind of openly...it almost feels as if it is left hanging...lead me in a straight path because of my oppressors... I almost want to say, "because of my oppressors, what?? What is it?"  But we know, don't we?  It goes without saying that without Him as The Way, the road leads straight to death.

As a teacher, I know I will never be even a pale, very distant and faint reflection of what Jesus is...but as a teacher I also know that one of our main jobs is our willingness to be constantly learning...so I pray the Lord teaches me and all educators, His Way as we walk with Him Who Is The Way, so we can find the straight path in this world of confusion, conflict and uncertainty.  May the Divine and Most Perfect Teacher who ever walked this earth guide us and lead us as we try to find our way on these rocky and muddied roadways. And may He also inspire me to start working already! In the Precious Name of Jesus.  Amen!

  

Fear of Abandonment

Though my father and mother forsake me, the Lord will receive me. Psalm 27: 10

Dylan is a pretty strong, young man.  He is solid as a rock.  I tell you, the weight lifting equipment he made me "invest" in is paying off.  But, inside that tough façade, he is mush. We tease him because he's afraid of tiny bugs...I mean, who isn't, right? But one thing that is no joke with my son is this one thing he is terrified of: abandonment. There is a deep-seated, primal dread in his psyche of being rejected...forsaken.  Though this angst works mostly at the subconscious level and he doesn't quite understand it...he feels it.  And it rattles him every time it surfaces. It is this feeling what makes him specially sensitive to stories of neglect.  So, when he came home after spending time at a Christian concert-camping adventure, he related to me some of the accounts he heard from the morning talks he attended and from some other more personal sources.  He was really taken by the horrific tales he heard and I could see the fear emerging.  At the end of his narrations, he said:  "but you love me, right?"

In my deeply rooted inadequacy as a mother, I rely on the Holy Spirit to guide me in this rockiest of paths, the path of parenthood...and He blessed me by moving me to do what my son needed at that moment of extreme vulnerability: give him a big hug and quietly reassure him that of course I love him. 

My love for my son goes beyond what I can express and demonstrate to him.  But it doesn't matter as long as he remembers that there is a greater love...a love we don't deserve, but that is given nonetheless

But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Romans 5: 8

A love that remains even when everyone else has left us...forsaken us...a love that endures even when we are not worthy ... because, like Paul says in Romans 8: 35-39...

Can anything ever separate us from Christ’s love? Does it mean he no longer loves us if we have trouble or calamity, or are persecuted, or hungry, or destitute, or in danger, or threatened with death? (As the Scriptures say, “For your sake we are killed every day; we are being slaughtered like sheep.” No, despite all these things, overwhelming victory is ours through Christ, who loved us.

And I am convinced that nothing can ever separate us from God’s love. Neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither our fears for today nor our worries about tomorrow—not even the powers of hell can separate us from God’s love. No power in the sky above or in the earth below—indeed, nothing in all creation will ever be able to separate us from the love of God that is revealed in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Dylan kept telling me all about his experiences at the concert/camping trip he'd just returned from...as I listened, I kept thinking how much I love this kid and how grateful I am God decided to lend him to me for these years...I am so not worthy of such a gift...but that is the mystery of God's love, that even when we are so insignificant that even our own fathers and mothers might forsaken us...the Lord receives us...

Thank you, Lord Jesus for never abandoning us and for having such profound love for us that we don't have to fear because nothing could ever separate us from You.  In Your Precious Name.  Amen!