God doesn't have an expiration date on His plans for you

I bent low to pull out the old food containers.  I rolled up my sleeves and sighed.  One of my most dreaded jobs in the home is to clean the refrigerator.  You just never know what's growing in there.    You know what I'm talking about right?  Why is it that some foods taste better the first time and then others just don't reheat the same?  Believe it or not there were some expired condiments from years ago.  Ahem...I said years.

As I was pulling out some older sandwich meat, I was just thinking about how God doesn't have an expiration date.  I was a bit sad that some food didn't get used as I had planned.  And then my mind drifted how we get stuck in those places where we think we have dropped on God's plan list.

When we don't see God working in our lives, we think His greater plans for us have expired.  We see God doing greater things in others, but fail to recognize His hand in our own.  Do we really think that God is going to run out of blessings for us?  

There is a part of us that wish we could expedite the plans of God.  So how do we dispose of man's way of thinking about His plans for us and not inject our own timelines into God's agenda?

Take a deep breath....we must learn run with patience.  We must wait upon the Lord, instead of crossing our arms and tapping our toes at Him.  God has an appointed time for the plans that He has involved us in.  So many of us just give up on the promises of God because we expect God to move and shuffle circumstances around according to our rush.

God is outside of time.

God appoints time, He created it and has planned seasons for everything and for every purpose.  "To everything there is a season, a time for every purpose under heaven" (Ecclesiastes 3:1).

How often do we think that God is only watching the clock to tick off our birthdays, and has forgotten about our dream list.  When you are tempted to think that He has forgotten you, ignored you, and or is simply disappointed with you, that is a lie.  Don't give into that way of thinking.

Dispose of the lies of what you think God isn't doing and believe that His greater things are something to hope for.  Give into what you know about God over what you don't see happening quickly enough.  Every season takes a preparation.  So it if feels like you are taking a new unplanned direction or you feel marginalized or rejected, it's more likely God's protection that is cleaning out His plans for you.

I'll never forget the time, my son-in-law was applying for several pilot jobs with some smaller airlines.  There was one airline that he preferred.  He didn't hear from them right away and he started to think the worst, that he wouldn't get the job.  He felt rejected by the company in their lack of communication.  As it turns out, he didn't get the job.  But a few months later, he read in the news that the company that he was hoping to get hired by was going bankrupt.  He was immediately grateful that the job he wanted so badly didn't work out.  He now flies with a mainline airline that is much bigger than the one he was hoping for.

If you are waiting on something God has promised, remember:
God is outside of time, and your time is coming.

God is working on ALL the details for His glory.  He does everything with attention to detail.
There is service in waiting.
Encourage yourself in the Lord, read some stories of His faithfulness in the Bible.

Learn to wait patiently.  Not like a spoiled child who just wants their way, but like a loving child who can't wait to see what their Daddy has for them.  Don't give up!

"Let us not grow weary while doing good, for in due season we shall reap if we do not lose heart" (Galatians 6:9).

Remember God has a due season; His plans for you never expire.  

Why does it take this before we do that? You tell me...

Psalm 62:8  "O my people, trust in him at all times.  Pour out your heart to him for God is our refuge."  ....in all our times we should do this.

It seems to be the cause and effect at work in our lives.

At work, or with a project, is it only when we are handed a deadline, that we do what we can do to meet it on time.  

In the line at Wal-Mart or stand-still traffic, reactions are made quickly and those angry words are hurled at strangers about time.  Then we recant and lost words are just that...lost in time.  

Is it when we hurl stones of retaliation at other tender hearts we think they have to take it because they are family and we can make it right with them "sometime"?

The soft bounces of time around in the hard places of this world.  
"It takes the absolute strongest people to be soft around others." ~ my dear friend, Mary Waters.

Is there a purpose for who Christians stab their own, leave them wounded, and rejected in the pew hurting?  Is it really love when we treat them the worst, just this time?

Does it take the fact that one is dying before we start living?
Is it the living among the dead or the dead among the living?
Are we really a broken people or just disconnected from God because of our sin?

Why does it take a limp, sleeping infant's hand to appreciate new life and a pale, dying hand to magnify death?

Is it that death always takes us by surprise or time steals our lackluster view of hope?  

Our time matters.

My husband Terry and I have some open discussions about dying.  I blurted out the other day that I would miss him when he meets Jesus, but I would be here celebrating his arrival to our "home" if he went before me.  If we only knew how much time we had left.

God has been speaking to me about how I manage of the gift of time.  You tell me how you do it...please?

Time it marches on, and it's all ours to manage, even though God created it.  Let's be honest, we don't manage it well unless we are under pressure to celebrate it or let go of it.

We don't know how.  I don't know how.  And it's about time I learned.  I'm tired of wasting this precious gift. 

In the time it took to write this post, you could have told someone "I love you."  or "I know what you are going through, and would love to help you discover the answers."  Write that down, you might not get another chance to say it time.

God, remind us that our time is short, and that it matters.  Remind us that if our days feel like we are running out of time, then we are running out of Your will.  Time in Your presence goes swift and sure, I am swept away.  Let us be aware of your timing.  Let us always find you, God where You are found in death, in life and all the minutes in-between.

My prayer:  Oh God let us become more aware of your Presence!  God may we seek you for you are good, and holy and rest for our wearing days.  May we be overcome by your Presence Lord, not the presence of messy life the plagues our hearts, that makes us complacent in getting right with Jesus because there is plenty of time.  We hunger for you God, the Giver of grace, mercy, and peace.  Give us more of you to settle our hearts in your time.  We trust you in these times.

This is the time

On Day 4 of this month of preparing for Christmas, I am up at 5 a.m.   You're thinking...."What in the world?"  Today's post is all about making time for Christ these days of this season of Christmas.

To make room for Jesus in your home and hearts, we have to make room for Him in our focus, our plans, our holiday, our days, our weeks, our hours, our thoughts, our minds and yes, our hearts.

That's what a preparing does.  This time of preparation isn't about ticking this off your to-do list of things to read, or checking another day of Advent devotionals off your calendar.   This time is about inviting God to be a part of why we are celebrating Christmas in the first place.

Advent days bring about ways we focus on the coming of the greatest Gift to mankind.  The focus forces us to think about time.  The preparation forces us to wrestle with our clocks, timers, and alarms.

Our use of time is such a big thing to manage.

Time is the elusive commodity that is so easily sacrificed during this time of year.  I believe we take advantage of the fact that there be more time tomorrow to write a post, or send a thoughtful note or to invite someone to church, for some of you, to make amends with someone you need to forgive.

Invitations to spend time with someone, take time.  Invitations force us to prepare and make preparations us for an important event.

Will you invite Jesus into your adventurous days?  Would your to-do list be different if you considered that today could be your last?

The prophet Isaiah prepared the people of Israel with an Advent invitation.

Isaiah 11: 1-2, 10  "A shoot will come up from the stump of Jesse; from his roots a Branch will bear fruit.  The Spirit of the Lord will rest on him - the Spirit of wisdom and of understanding, the Spirit of counsel and of power, the Spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the Lord - and he will delight in the fear of the Lord....In that day the Root of Jesse will stand as a banner for the peoples; the nations will rally to him, and his place of rest will be glorious."

Isaiah's invitation welcomes a time with Rest, with lasting, eternal time.

A Forever Divine Invitation was coming as a Banner "for the peoples; the nations..."  His invitation was a foretaste of Christ's coming, an epic birth announcement in the days ahead.

Time to get everything done these days is so hard to manage.  Or is it?

Preparation takes time.  And these days of Advent make us think about preparing.  Preparing helps us focus on the event, the guests, the people who you want to spend more time with.  The focus on the party or that coffee date together is appointed time.  To get the most out of these invitational days we have to sacrifice some time.

Advent is a season of preparation for the Divine.

How many of you have said this within the last week..."I need more time!?!"

Let's think back just 6 days ago.  Who of you were preparing for a big day of giving thanks?  We made time to eat and give a momentary nod of thanks for the meal before us to the God who invented time.  We thanked Him for the blessings on and around our table.  With grateful hearts we gathered and asked Him to bless our lives.  We invited Him to be a part of our days of counting the blessings around us.

And then...the Christmas season began and all of a sudden in the next 24 hours, we (me included) spent some of our grateful minutes in long lines giving thanks to God for saving us some pennies on a gift.  On the very day we thanked God big we invited the busy blur of gift shopping to begin.

I'm not proud of the way I spent my time that day.

So in these days of Advent, let's focus our blurring minutes to the manger shall we?

Even though we acknowledge that God is the giver of all time, let's set aside some time to worship Him today, and tomorrow, and the rest of our days.  Worship prepares us for a Coming.  It prepares our hearts to receive our Savior.  The posture of prayer, gratitude and worship prepares us for our eternal Rest, which has been described as "glorious".

Having more focused time on the Christmas miracle during these busy, blurry days would be a glorious gift.

My prayer:  God, we lay our minutes, our days before you.  Prepare our hearts and spirits to receive what you have for us today.  There are days that we invite so many silly things in.  Worry, stress, sin, and many messes.  God we know you are the giver of all the minutes and each of has an appointed time to meet you face to face.  What a glorious day that will be.  Until that instant, God teach us to number our days.  Focus our hearts on your Presence, so that today we can posture our day to receive your love, peace and joy.  Teach us to manage the gift of time well. Don't give us more hours but more of You in these days of preparation for your coming.  Give us more meaning to our preparations.  In our blurry moments, may we see Your hand on our days.

How will you make more room for rest these days of Advent?  For me, today I'm up at 5 am.    

Time to Get My Hands Dirty

My God sized dream has burned a hole in my heart.  

I describe it like this...when you are at the end of your dreams, you have to give them up, and lay them neatly in a journal... and I have given them to God.  

I have a dream of writing a book.   Maybe two of them.  As if one was even possible. 

It's hard for me to assimilate.  The thought of writing just one overwhelms me.  
Just one comprehensive and cohesive chapter would be a dream.  

Is writing God's dream or mine?  
You tell me...    

There are days I don't feel like sharing my story, 

and then...
I think of her.

I think of the person I used to be, and how I am becoming.  
I think... if it helps....helps just one.  And ...if she is like me ...and we can grab hands
and we can discover God's heart together.  Then...that thought makes me want to share. 
Then I become strong in this weak frame.
The words start to flow.  
So can we become together?  

Those are the days when I think sharing my story would be so easy.  

I often look at the blank pages

 with my clutter-filled heart churning.
Just like a revolving door...
ushering in new thoughts and ushering out excuses, so many thoughts.

Is there a promise here in this journey?

If you follow me on Facebook, you might have noticed the post that mentioned a "burning bush moment" one day.

That morning, The Greatest Story Teller asked me, 
"Are you ready to get your hands dirty?  
Will you write your story?  
I want to write it on your heart."

Blink....Blink.  Yes, Jesus, yes. Tears. Blink....Blink.

I pray "the end" result will be filled with hope, just like dirty hands above.  

That would be a God-sized dream come true.

What is God asking you to do in 2013?  I would love to know.
Will you come along too?

Five Minute Friday {Time}

Time is measured on clocks, on calendars, on our bodies.  Time is spent well and wasted.

Time is powerful when harnessed and focused.  

Time on Facebook is soon lost.

I need some time margin, do you?

We all need more of it because it's the biggest gift that we waste.  

Oh wait a minute...that's just me.

So I pray for more of it.  

Not that God would increase my minutes, 

but make the time He gives me more productive.  

What He has been teaching me is rest in this "time-is-mine" lesson.

Dear...God.slow.me.down, make my time yours...make me wait on your best time, 

in all my minutes, hours, days, years, and beyond... in all this time I have left.  

In evaluating my time, I realize there must be time margin.  I need more for.....  

In my deepest need, I need more time to spend with you God.  That's what I crave.  

Is time an issue with you too?

Five Minute Friday {Question?}

If you had all the money, resources, time...you name it...at your fingertips...and you were allowed to do anything you wanted, what would you do? Where would you go? 

And go.....

S-L-O-W-D-O-W-N

Watch out..lawn mowing season has begun.  If you are frequent reader here, you might be acquainted with the fact that I have a lesson that sometimes emerges out of my time spent with the mower and God.  For me, it really can be a time to listen to God, process and learn.

This past week's message for me was S-L-O-W-D-O-W-N.  

When I mow, I'll admit that I want to get it done and fast.  I really don't like to spend time doing it.  So when it's time, I like to get the mixture of fumes, sweat and grass clippings over with.  Another confession, some spiritual lessons learned are harder than the actual mowing process.   With either point it takes most of my afternoon.    


While mowing last week it was challenge because the grass was really high.  My pasture-grass-yard had transformed into a jungle during the first two weeks of March.  The season of Spring was here for about 10 minutes and then we said hello to summer.  With the high grass, there were some hard inanimate things that were laying hidden.  Unfortunately, I found such hidden objects with the mower.  There was an awful collision of the blade and the junk in the tall grass...then the mower stopped.  


Upon careful inspection, it was revealed that the blade was bent.  Not just a little bent, but bent down in such a way that it would churn up the ground every time it rotated.  It was like mowing with a garden tiller. It didn't work very well.  The blade had hit something HARD!  I continued to limp the mower along to finish the yard.  It was taking twice as long since I had to slow down because of the bent blade.  It was frustrating at best.  As I was mowing, God reminded me that I also might need to slow down.


I realized in the moment of churning the turf that I cause my own churning chaos.  I create it, in fact, I am an overachiever in this category.  So now....I need to have a collision of God's blade and some hard things hidden in my heart.  And that hurts.  I need to slow down to find rest in God.
  

1 Corinthians 7:17 "Nevertheless, each one should retain the place in life that the Lord assigned to him and to which God has called him.  This is the rule I lay down in all the churches."

I need to find my place that the Lord has assigned to me and has called me to.  I need to find that "sweet spot".  Why is this so hard for me?  Because I like to do.  I like to do a lot of ministry things.  I like to serve, I like to move, I like to progress and help.  I like to accomplish.  I don't like standing still or becoming stagnant in my service.  I feel guilty if I am not serving enough.  And I need to look to Jesus for my example of ministry and service.  


Jesus' ministry on earth was only three years.  In comparison to today’s church standards, Jesus probably wouldn't have been very effective.  He kept a pretty low profile, he healed people and then told the healed to not tell what had just happened.  He liked to be by himself, to seek the Lord and pray.  Jesus often stopped and took time to teach the children.  He would retreat on top of mountains, and go deep in the olive groves.  Even though He was very relational, He didn’t care much about making the most of his time talking to huge crowds.  In his three short years, he accomplished great things and yet he still took lots of breaks.  He didn't have a 3-year-world-tour plan calculated out for each and every stop and how it could be most impacting.  


He just sought the will of His Father.
He paused.
He prayed. 
He listened. 
He obeyed.  
He rested.  
He knew God.  

So here you are...you work, you have a family, you are active in church, you attend church on Sunday, Wednesday brings prayer meeting and kids zone, you attend or lead a women’s Bible study, teach Sunday school, sing in the choir, play an instrument for some special concert during Easter.  And your list goes on and on.  You accomplish a lot.  We don’t have time to think about how busy you are.  You just go, go, and go some more.  You don’t take time to rest.  You don't take a break.  And then your spiritual blade hits something hidden in your heart and you stop.  

The church needs us right?  How could we say no to the church?  If we don’t do it who will?  Can we really say no as a Christian and not feel guilty about it?  Taking time off makes us feel guilty.   That's why studying Jesus' ministry is so important for us overachievers and chaos causers.  The difference is that Jesus knew his limits.  And when he knew it was time to take a rest, he didn’t let anything get in the way of that.  Jesus was intentional with everything, so when he rested he did so with a purpose.  He said no.  Jesus didn’t assume the guilt either.  When he spent time alone, he knew he needed it.  He chose to do it and knew that if he didn’t he would soon be spread thin.

Doing with focused, rested intention... impacts. 

If you are overwhelmed with life and have a lot of chaos swirling around in your head and house, then slow down.  Start creating some time margins that help you breathe a little.  It’s okay to say no.  Go ahead…rest.  Jesus thought it important, why don’t you?  Don't kid yourself into believing that you can't take a break. This is the kind of thinking will only drive you to exhaustion.  And it's prideful to think if you don't do it no one else will.  Even God the Creator rested on the seventh day. Jesus constantly withdrew from the crowds to connect alone with the Father.

R-E-S-T!!!  S-L-O-W-D-O-W-N...  Jesus had the most important and perfect ministry of all.  Yet he still had time to accomplish His purpose on earth.  Whatever Jesus has called you to; don’t you think he has taken care of your rest breaks too?   He didn’t intend for you to scurry around with a crammed-packed-schedule with His calling on your shoulders only to wear you out for the sake of the gospel message.  He does ask us to be faithful to our calling and to trust Him for the results in what He has called us to do.  He has planned some seasons of rest and refreshing, because He knows we can't keep up with the break-neck speed the world tries to conform us to.  I need time to refresh and rejuvenate my soul.  Jesus knew you were going to need some rest too, so he showed you how He did it…He retreated and drew close to his Father.  He said no...because he truly understood a key ingredient of a powerful ministry--constant refueling by God's strength.

God commands you to rest. 

What do you find so hard about resting?  What is your "sweet spot"?   

Five Minute Friday - Give

Give it all away

We give of our time, talents, and our finances.  We give blood.  We give thanks at Thanksgiving and at Christmas we give gifts.  We are a giving people. Some people are very generous, some are stingy.  Some just give to impress.  Some give to honor God.    


Luke 21:1 tells us one who gave it all.  The poor widow came to give a gift to the temple treasury.  Jesus was there with his disciples watching, as many came to give alms.  The woman simply offered her best, two very small copper coins.  She didn't make a big deal about giving.  

From what she had, she gave it all.  She gave it all away.    

Luke 21: 4 "All these people gave their gifts out of their wealth; but she out of her poverty put in all she had to live on."

With it being so small was it significant?  The widow gave it all which is in contrast to the way most of us handle our money.  When you consider the tithe, we are returning a portion of it back to God through the church.  But if we give a certain percentage of our income and consider that a great accomplishment, do we resemble those who gave "out of their great wealth"?  


The widow gave, but she gave extravagantly.  That's admirable.  That's honorable.  That's giving an offering.  That's giving like none other.  That's giving like Jesus.  That's giving it all away. 


How do you give?