A few thoughts REVISITED

So, I went back and read some things I had written as "notes" on my Facebook page last year - I think they're worth reposting... Here you go!


You're Invited

This seems to be the season of invitations! Graduation announcements, birthday parties, baby showers, pool parties, barbeques.... So much fun and so much to do! Regardless of whether I am able to attend or not, it always makes me feel loved - valued - when I receive an invitation. It lets me know that someone wants to share their experience with me. They are including me in their world. That's a good feeling.

In parallel, I find myself busy, busy, busy, going about my life and my schedule of activities...only to find an Invitation from my Lord at every turn. He values me and wants to share His experience with me. He is including me in His world.

The most poignant Invitations are actually in times of deep sorrow, loss, hurt and pain. At every crossroad I can see His outstretched hand and hear Him say, “Will you take another step into MY world?” Although His world is superimposed over my own, I still find myself deceived - linked to the culture I perceive with my natural senses.

But there’s the Invitation.

“Your Kingdom come…on earth as it is in heaven” is how Jesus taught us to pray. “Your world come down here in my world, just as it currently is in Your glorious, perfect heaven.” I want to be so invested in, so connected to His Kingdom, that I have double vision - seeing and perceiving with natural eyes and spiritual eyes at the same time.

When you have a heartache that you cannot shake, quiet your soul and hear the Invitation from Jesus to take His hand and step forward into the unknown with Him. When you lose someone dear, open your heart to the comforting Invitation of your Savior to rest in His arms. When your life seems to be turning out completely different from what you dreamed, look for the Lord’s Invitation amidst the confusion. Wherever you find yourself today, there is an Invitation with your name on it, written by a loving hand, borne on a fresh wind of the Holy Spirit. You're invited.


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Tuning In

On my drive home tonight from a meeting, I did my usual things: got in the car, buckled my seatbelt, turned the ignition, backed out and headed down the road. I was thinking about some things that had been spoken during that meeting, so I didn't really want to hear the radio, but I glanced at it anyway. It was on some random station. Probably the classical station from earlier in the day when I was trying every possible option to quell the screaming coming from my backseat (out of the mouth of a certain toddler named Graham). Anyway, the radio station got my attention for some reason. I was having a moment of reflection with deep spiritual ideas running through my head, but I decided I wanted to switch the station - which I could not hear since the volume was down - to one that was playing Christian music. I just had the sense that I wanted every reception in my car at that moment to be receiving from the Lord. I wanted every setting to be tuned in to Him.

And it hit me. That's such a spiritual parallel - being tuned in to the Lord, even when I don't have the volume turned up. Establishing that He is the "station" I want to receive from, whether I'm in a time of active listening, or whether my attention is otherwise engaged. I want to set my heart on Him and keep it there, just as I would set my radio tuner to a particular station. So, I'm choosing to scan the spectrum of voices that are all around me and find the Lord's voice. I'm making it my favorite, and no matter the course of my day, my life, I am choosing to leave it there.


"...He will quiet you with His love; He will rejoice over you with singing." Zeph. 3:17


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Combating Fear

Swine flu. (We were scared of that last year, in case you don't remember...) Economic collapse. Moral decay. There are a lot of things to fear these days. Fear becomes even more poignant when you have someone depending on you - children, elderly parents, or others in your care.

However, today I am refusing to bow to fear. My God is bigger than my fears! He holds my world in His hands. As I was reading through the little booklet (Speak the Word) Marilyn Hickey gave out at our recent women's conference, I came across Scriptures related to our safety and release from fear. Here is the prayer paraphrase from her booklet:

"My loved ones and I are delivered from the powers of darkness and translated into the Kingdom of His dear Son. No evil shall befall, neither shall any plague come near my dwelling. I overcome all the fiery darts of the enemy and nothing can harm me because greater is He that is in me than he that is in the world." (Col. 1:13; Ps. 91:10; Eph. 6:16; I Jn. 4:4)

The best way I know how to combat fear is to take it head-on with Scripture. I have to read the Word out loud, pray it out loud, declare it out loud. By doing that, I am setting up a spiritual boundary - a line that the Enemy is not permitted to cross. If you sense the power of darkness creeping in on you, stop it with the Word. Take possession of the life God has given you by proclaiming His truth and faithfulness. He is always True and always Faithful, but you have to activate that fact inside your own existence. You have to partner with Him - take hold of His truth and distribute it accordingly!

Don't sit idly by, wasting away in fear. Do something about it! Draw your own "line in the sand" by proclaiming the Word!!!


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That's my little trio for you today! Love and blessings to you!