Irrelevant Messages

Tonight I was searching through my old text messages for some information I needed.  In the process, I discovered many old messages that I no longer needed - one from several months ago when a repairman was letting me know he was heading to my house, short questions from friends that had been read and answered, temporary passwords from websites helping me to reset ones I had forgotten - you know the kind of things that can clog up your text message page.

As I began deleting all the unneeded information it made me think of other messages in my past.  These weren't text messages or phone messages or emails or even written notes or letters.  They were the lies of the enemy that he used to try to circumvent the work of God in my life.  Maybe you've heard some of these messages yourself.

"You've messed up too much.  You've sinned so deeply that God could never forgive you."

"You'll never amount to much. You don't have anything to offer that church.  God can't use you."

"Your mama was that way and your daddy was that way and you can't change it.  It's just how it is with your family."

"You're not important.  Nobody cares about what you think."

"You can never be like that other person from church. You'll never have a relationship with God like they have.  God only picks certain people to be like that and that will never be you."

"God's just waiting for you to mess up so He can cut you off.  There's no way you can live right all the time, so you might as well quit now."

Here's what Jesus said about Satan and these words should be our guide when we hear this kind of venom spewed out in an assault on our minds and spirits. 

John 8:44 (NIV......He was a murderer from the beginning, not holding to the truth, for there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks his native language, for he is a liar and the father of lies.

Jesus spoke the definitive word on the sayings of the enemy.  Don't believe anything he says because he is a liar. Don't even entertain those messages for a moment.  They come from the source of lies and there is no truth in them.

We know the enemy hates life - especially the lives of those who he knows are the saved, the called, the chosen of God.  He murders reputations, hopes, callings, dreams, relationships, ministries - anything birthed of God and His promises in our lives.

So just like I scrolled through my phone tonight, deleting all the irrelevant texts, take authority over those messages that he's been trying to sneak into your mind and heart and begin to attack with the only weapon God gave you - the sword of the Spirit - the word of God.  Blow up his "phone" with these messages:

"God says that He has redeemed me, called me by name and I am His." - based on Isaiah 43:1b

"God says that if I confess my sins, he'll forgive me and make me clean."  - based on 1 John 1:9

"The Word says that the manifestation of the Spirit is given to each one - so that means me.  Those gifts are to profit everyone, so I know God has gifted me to give and serve in His church and His kingdom"  - based on 1 Corinthians 12:7

"God doesn't have favorites - His blessings of eternal life, glory, honor, and peace are for everyone who works what is good."  - based on Romans 2:7-11

"God says I am a new creature.  My old life is gone!" - based on 2 Corinthians 5:17

That's just the tip of the proverbial iceberg of the things that a God who cannot lie says about you.  Dig into the book and see what messages you should keep close to you forever and never delete.

Rip off the Band-Aid!

Have you ever tried to entertain a two-year-old on a three-hour car trip?  It's a daunting task.  At one point on the trip home today, Bella turned her attention to a very tiny red mark on her leg - a probably temporary scar from the last scraped knee incident.  She whined that it was hurting and that she needed, as she calls it, a "boo-boo sticker". 

My students ask for band-aids all the time for everything from a hang-nail to a cut so small I can barely see it.  Often they want one just to put over an already well-formed scab that's protecting the skin just fine on its own, in my opinion.  "But Mrs. Ellis, it hurts!"

I try to tell all of these kiddos that the band-aid will not make the pain go away.  All a bandage does is to protect the skin while our bodies naturally go through a healing process.  There is no pain relief in that little sticky strip.

It's not only children who have problems understanding this concept.  I know many adults who are using all sorts of things to cover up hurt in their lives.  I've done it myself.  People use all manner of things - some destructive and sinful, others just futile and pathetic.  We use drugs and alcohol, illicit relationships, excessive sleep, frivolous entertainment, the pursuit of money - name your poison.  All these things are a cover-up to keep us from dealing with the root issue and allowing healing to come and just like the band-aid, there is no real relief from the pain.

We get so attached to our self-medicating that whatever we are using to mask the issue starts to bring us into bondage and now we not only have the original wound but we've created a new problem. We've figuratively dug ourselves a deeper hole.

So- what do we do with this cycle of hurt and denial?  First, you have to bring it to Jesus.  The Great Physician knows how to deliver healing to us. This kind of healing is a process, not an instantaneous action.  Our spirits and souls take time to heal, just as our bodies do.  It starts with a surrender to Him and continues through all the channels He uses to make us whole, healthy, and normal.

It starts with forgiveness - either by repentance for what you have done or by forgiving someone who has wounded you.  It continues by finding out what the Word of God says about the way you should live. The words of the Bible are "life to those who find them, and health to all their flesh" (Proverbs 4:22) You stay in health by learning who you really are in Christ - how much you are loved, what amazing plans God has for you, where your place is in His body of believers where you can learn, grow and be accountable to others. 

Bella's little childhood cuts and scrapes will all soon heal - band-aids or not, but the big issues in our lives will not clear up on their own. If you are holding an issue, plastering over it with whatever you can to avoid it, please rip off that band-aid and let Jesus bring lasting change and freedom to your life.

Filled to be Emptied

(This blog post is dedicated to my two-year-old granddaughter, Bella, without whom it seems that I would only have half as much to write about. 😇)

Bella spent the night with us on Friday and was taking a bath before bedtime.  I sat by the tub and she played in the water.  One thing she really enjoyed doing was pouring water from a container into my cupped hands. She'd pour it out until her container was empty as the water filled my hands and overflowed back into the tub.  When there was no more to pour, she'd take her little hands and push my hands apart so that I'd have to let that last puddle of water in my palms splash out.  Then she'd fill her container and continue the game, time after time until the water got cold and it was time to dry off and get into some clean pajamas.

What a picture of what God wants to do with us!  He fills us up to overflowing and that overflow becomes a blessing to those around us, but when we are inactive, just holding on to the blessing in our hands, he wants us to let it go so He can fill us up again.

 It's an old analogy, but I think it bears repeating, that the Dead Sea is "dead" because it is constantly being filled, but has no outlet streams.  All that it receives concentrates there, causing it to be almost ten times saltier than the sea - a condition that means that it cannot support plant or animal life.  I've also read that the Dead Sea is receding at an alarming rate.  Not only is it devoid of life, but it's also diminishing itself.

I had an opportunity tonight to see "church" demonstrated outside the four walls of a gathering place with a name on the door.  A group of Christians met together to minister to a sweet faith-filled lady and her family as they stand against a diagnosis that may be "fact" but it's not God's truth.  Those who were in the home were definitely pouring out life to her and to each other. 

When we don't pour out to others, we become spiritually dead and as a result, we begin to recede - to grow smaller and powerless.  Faith, gifts of the spirit, love, compassion - all these grow by being exercised.  Inaction brings stagnation.  We were never meant to fill up and then put a lid on what we have received. 

John 7:38 says, " He who believes in Me, as the Scripture has said, out of his innermost being will flow rivers of living water."  Flow means there is movement.  We are to do something with what we are given. We are to be conduits of blessing, love, and grace.

Matthew 10:8 says "Heal the sick, cleanse the lepers, raise the dead, cast out demons. Freely you have received, freely give."

I know that I sometimes tend to get wrapped up in my own little life and I forget that I have a responsibility to do more than just seek God to meet the needs in my own family.  My life here should be less about "my life" and more about His kingdom. I'm asking God to show me where and how to flow so that I can freely give as I have received. I know that if I empty myself, He will be faithful to fill me up and give me a fresh blessing to share once again.

Happy to You!

My little granddaughter Bella recently turned two.  Of course, that meant a birthday party and the singing of the birthday song.  She's been to a few other family birthday parties and has heard the song before. She's learning lots of little songs and rhymes, but in this case, the word "birthday" gets left out and she sings "Happy to you!" making the song appropriate for any occasion now. 

For Valentine's Day, her mama gave us a nice little flower arrangement and she and Bella surprised me with a visit to my school to deliver it.  When they were at home, preparing this for me, Bella's mother, Brittney, cut out a little heart and asked her to color it. She told Bella that it was for Mamaw and Pawpaw and Bella replied, "Happy to you!" so that's the greeting Brittney used to finish the heart.

I have no profound thoughts tonight.  God hasn't used any mundane little occurrences to teach me any big lessons this week, but as I looked at this note, kept now on my refrigerator door, I went to see where the word "happy" occurred in the Bible.  I know the Bible talks more about joy than happiness, but surely the word was there somewhere.

Indeed it was, but only a few verses.  Here are just four of them.

Proverbs 16:20 
He who heeds the word wisely will find good, And whoever trusts in the Lord, happy is he.

Psalm 146:5 
Happy is he who has the God of Jacob for his help, Whose hope is in the Lord his God.

Psalm 144:15
Happy are the people who are in such a state; Happy are the people whose God is the Lord!

Deuteronomy 33:29 
Happy are you, O Israel!  Who is like you, a people saved by the Lord, The shield of your help And the sword of your majesty!  Your enemies shall submit to you, And you shall tread down their high places.

As Christians, we are heirs of the promises and declarations of the Old Testament from which these verses come.  They speak of being happy because of our trust in the Lord, of His help, of His salvation, and His hope.  Reading them reminds me of all the reasons we should be rejoicing.  So I leave you today with my granddaughter's declaration to me -  HAPPY TO YOU!

Spiritual Vertigo

On Friday morning, I woke to the alarm on my cell phone.  I reached over to turn it off, still flat on my back.  Then the world tilted to the right and I felt like a chicken on a rotisserie being flipped over to finish the cooking process, but I hadn't moved an inch.  Vertigo had given me the perception that I was moving when I was not.

That feeling has come back on and off over this weekend, so like anybody in this information age, I started researching it on the internet. I found that the most common reason for vertigo is something called benign paroxysmal positional vertigo.  It is caused by tiny calcium particles that are naturally present in a jelly-like substance in your ear that move out of place and clump up in canals of your inner ear, distorting your perception about gravity and balance. Nothing foreign or infectious has entered your body.  Something is just in the wrong place.

About four years ago, I was working with an adorable little blond kindergartener at school, when across my field of vision appeared what looked like a worm.  I was wearing contact lenses then and I assumed that a tiny hair or piece of fiber from my clothing had made its way into my eye.  As soon as I was free to check it out, I removed the lens and found that the "worm" was still there.  After a visit to my eye doctor, I found that this was my first real experience with a floater. Floaters are also part of something natural.  The jelly-like vitreous inside the eyeball becomes more liquid and little fibers clump up and cast shadows on the retina. Again, something that was a normal part of my body moved out of place and caused me to see something that wasn't really there at all and interfered with me seeing what was directly in front of me.

So why is this important?  You don't care about the minutiae of all my little medical peculiarities.  It's significant because, if you listen to what God is saying in any of your everyday little circumstances, you can learn something that is totally different than what the surface situation may be. 

You see, there are things in my life that are natural and normal and right and good.  I have a husband, children, a grandchild, friends, a job, a church, hobbies, and amusements that are all things that God means for me to enjoy.  I can spend time on these people and things with no condemnation whatsoever.  They are the things that make up my life.  Having an interest in these aspects of my life is not sinful, but prioritizing any of them over my relationship with God is missing the mark.  When these things are moved into the wrong place, I experience "spiritual vertigo"- a difficulty with keeping my balance - an interference with my perspective.  Little "floaters" of distraction move across my spiritual vision, obscuring the God I should be looking to above all things.  I have been guilty of this so often that I should have learned this lesson well by now.  Sometimes God has to show you something many times before you finally understand what He is trying to say.

One home treatment during an attack of vertigo is called visual fixation where you pick a spot on the horizon and focus your vision there while you are moving.  The floaters finally cleared up on their own and the vertigo is gradually subsiding.  I didn't have control over either of these conditions, but I have control over my spiritual vision and balance if I submit them to God and keep my focus on the horizon He has set for me to seek.

The Bible says it this way, "I keep my eyes always on the Lord. With him at my right hand, I will not be shaken. (Psalm 16:8)

Colossians 3:1-3 says, "Since, then, you have been raised with Christ, set your hearts on things above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things.  For you died, and your life is now hidden with Christ in God.