Thank You God for creating rivers in our wastelands.
Your Kindness delves deep into what really matters.
Romans 2:4.
Romans 2:4.
A Name and A Blanket. Noah faced what was going on inside of him. He spent one year and ten days leading a plethora of family and animals. Surreal thinking about the number of animals and beings in the circumference of a very tight cabin. Nowhere to go. Nowhere to hide.
When Noah let a dove fly out the window in search of dry ground, his project proved flawless. The dove returned with branch in mouth. Yet, Noah waited one more month before he attempted to leave the ark. He didn't move until God told him to do so. Genesis 8:13. Oh! That we may learn from this story to wait on God and not move on just what we see in front of us. Noah wasn't trying to make a name for himself like the residents of Babel. No towering for trinkets.
I read a quote last week that I have been pondering as we rang in a new year: "Unfortunately, many view God's kindness as immediately helpful rather than deeply humbling." Larry Crabb. Do we measure what happened in the ark, in the Tower of Babel, in our personal schedules, by the blessings or by the conviction. Is God's Kindness evident more when things go right for us? It shouldn't be limited to that. Last Friday, our car broke down, permanently. We walked for a few days to get where we needed to be and we told no one. We left for Christmas break in a borrowed car. As 8 of us vacationed in Colorado---another ginormous gift---a friend called to ask if I would like to have her college son's car for free. While I'm sitting in a free lodge. But the Kindness of God was so much more than cars and chalets. It's in the sitting in an ark for a year, or when you rise up every morning against the odds, when you deal with what's beneath the veneer of life---Deut. 6:7. Humbled by the Hand of God. That was Noah. And that is you and me this very day. Humbled by God's Kindness not by having a great name, great things, great agendas, great success. Humbled to know the God Who knows everything about us, even when we mess up like Noah getting drunk and living in shame. May we live humbled in our own mess, before a world that messes up daily. I Peter 4:8 says: Love deeply because love covers over a multitude of sins. And may we cover the sins of our family, our friends, our churches, our communities with a blanket of love, just like two young sons did to their dad many years ago. Genesis 11:23.
COME BOLDLY PRAYER:
"Relying on God has to begin all over again, every day, as if nothing has been done. We must lay before him what is in us; not what ought to be in us.” C.S. Lewis. May we lay before You this day, O God, our prideful pursuits to make a name for ourselves, our confusing goals to quiet down the mess by drinking from the wrong cisterns, our silent demands that we must have a blessing that we see rather than one that sees us. Our deep gratitude for what you are doing in our lives that we cannot see or fathom.
PHOTO: Standing on a Colorado bridge over the Arkansas River wondering what on earth it means to love my adult children well and watching my family of seven scale the wall of the Rockies (small scale).
"Relying on God has to begin all over again, every day, as if nothing has been done. We must lay before him what is in us; not what ought to be in us.” C.S. Lewis. May we lay before You this day, O God, our prideful pursuits to make a name for ourselves, our confusing goals to quiet down the mess by drinking from the wrong cisterns, our silent demands that we must have a blessing that we see rather than one that sees us. Our deep gratitude for what you are doing in our lives that we cannot see or fathom.
PHOTO: Standing on a Colorado bridge over the Arkansas River wondering what on earth it means to love my adult children well and watching my family of seven scale the wall of the Rockies (small scale).
And they said to one another, “Come, let us make bricks, and burn them thoroughly.” And they had brick for stone, and bitumen for mortar. Then they said, “Come, let us build ourselves a city and a tower with its top in the heavens, and let us make a name for ourselves, lest we be dispersed over the face of the whole earth.”
ReplyDeleteLet us make bricks, let us build...letus - how often we can be consumed in something that is not necessarily bad, except for the fact God is not to be found in it.
Lord, show us when You are not in our endeavors. We want only to walk on Your path, led by You.
Bev, awesome thoughts today about our Awesome God. I used to be afraid of being humbled, now I know it is the only process to get close to God. Being on our face before Him is being in His presence.
ReplyDeleteWas God in the ark with Noah and the multitude in the wait? Or was He only there when the dove brought back the branch? Or maybe He didn't show up until Noah experienced the blessing of standing on dry ground for the first time in many, many months.
ReplyDelete"But God remembered Noah." It doesn't say "Then, God remembered Noah." God was there in the wait, in the many miracles that had to take place to keep animal and man alive and fed and from absolutely going crazy in a small space. God was there with the sign of the dove. God was there when Noah set foot again on the earth.
It may be our greatest faith zapper to believe God is only showing us favor when things go our way. Personally, I've experienced my most gratifying times with God in my waits, in my downs, in my "finally coming to the end of myself" seasons than I ever have when things go well circumstantially. Don't get me wrong: I like circumstantial comfort better than tumultuous seasons. We probably all do if we are honest. But the one thing that keeps us going through all of it is knowing He is working all of it for our benefit like a Potter with His clay.
"Our deep gratitude for what You are doing in our lives that we cannot see or fathom." Amen to your prayer, Bev.
God is so into the details of our lives. Why do I keep doubting that He is in the details and think that I keep having to remind Him of our needs? That is sin that needs to be confessed and laid before Him and let go of, so that He may do a work in our lives that will give Him the honor and the glory. It truly is the humbling experiences that draw us closer to God and NOT the ones where we get the answer we want and are allowed to stay in our comfort zones. Oh, how I for one love my comfort zones. When we truly learn to give the sacrifice of praise when things are not going well, or going like we want them to go that is when He can deal with us and show more of Himself to us and then to others through our lives. Bev, your life is a good example of how God does see and know and hear your needs and He takes care of them. You waited on Him and did not try to help Him along in getting a car for you all. That blesses me and spoke loudly to me of how He is in the details and He does care for His own and that He does truly provide. I have so very much and I need to be far more thankful for what I do have than to worry at all about the future and what my needs are going to be then. He grew my faith through providing a wonderful vacation for the Bandons and then the icing on the cake was the car that they needed without them telling another soul. God saw and God moved and someone listened to God. Wow....I imagine they are brought closer to God too, after finding out that you needed a car, not that you wanted a car but that you needed one and God used them to provide. Blesses me. What an awesome God we serve.
ReplyDeleteYou are so precious to me, Mary Lou!
ReplyDeleteThank you for such kind words.