Chips

While having my coffee/sitting with the Lord this morning, I had a thought.

I have a favorite coffee mug, it’s one of many. It’s handle is broken off and it is chipped in two places on the lip. If it’s clean, I’ll use it. Sometimes, if it’s dirty, I’ll clean it so I can use it, even though I may have others already clean at my disposal.

I like it for many reasons: it’s hand made/hand-fired, a beautiful muted green and brown, and has what has become one of my favorite bible passages hand lettered into a clay-orange band around the middle. I also love its shape, the way it sits in my hand.

But none of these are why it is my favorite, why I choose to use it whenever possible. It is my favorite because my dearest friend in the Lord gave it to me.

The Father gave you as a gift to Jesus, and you are precious to Him, and He wants, it is His pleasure, to use you, broken vessel and all. He’ll make you fit for use. You may remain hobbled in places, but He knows what you’re shaped for.

a-bound-ance

He amazes me in that when we take steps toward right/his ways, how He then bounds for us.

what = joy?

to know you’ve been used of the Lord, just at the right time, just in time, to touch another’s life, benefiting you both,
with Him – first and only, on the rolling credits.

Hogswill

Recently, in a bible study I’m involved with, we read and discussed the story of the prodigal son in connection with a study we are doing on redemption and forgiveness. It made me remember that at the bottom of a pile on my bureau was a seed of a poem that I wrote a couple of months back sort of as a cautionary reminder to not even step foot on roads that led me to a lot of trouble and heartache – and quite a distance from God – last fall. God prompted me to share:

Let me squander not
Your grace

To seek the trough
once more

The Lord has the busiest pen….

Just Remains

Do these

stars

I see

still exist

or

is it

their Light

that

just

remains ?

On my commute home last Wednesday I noticed a particularly bright star in the sky.  I wondered briefly if this was a named star I’d learned about or part of a long forgotten constellation (Big Dipper or Little Dipper? – that was all I could recall).  And then I remembered that some of the stars we see no longer exist – that it’s just their light, traveling so far for so long, that we see.  And this poem came to me. And then I thought about how it is also an apt description of believers: – we no longer exist – it’s His light the world should see.

A cure-all for discouraging voices

The devil’s head is crushed

every time

we praise the Lord.

He is who He said He was

I gave this poem to a few of our family friends on Easter along with their little gifts from us.

He is who He said He was

He raised people from the dead. He fed thousands.

He washed feet.

 

He touched the thrown-away people of the world.

He called them

His friends.

 

He

transforms

lives.

And He

desperately, desperately, desperately, desperately

loves

 

 

You.

Jesus takes care of us; He is all we need

Every six weeks, for three weeks in a row, my son and I take care of the two-year-olds during the early service at our church. My biggest blessing of 2006 was the realization that my 11-year-old can’t wait till it’s our turn (“Is it our turn to be with the two-year-olds?” – And if it’s not: “Aw, man!”) – that the Lord is growing someone who loves to serve. Another blessing of this ministry is God’s little lessons for me. He gently prods me to keep it simple.

In thinking about a craft to bring the kids this weekend, I was thinking about phrases and pictures I could print out and have them paste onto paper. My header is what came to mind:

Jesus takes care of us; He is all we need

 

This is such a blessed message for ME…I have been struggling lately with trying to get out of a rut of turning to other things besides Him. My answers are right there.                    God is so incredibly good.

Hungry?

Lord, on a night where many of us have eaten until we were uncomfortable,

Teach us to be hungry:

Hungry for your Word.

Hungry for knowledge of your will for our lives.

And help us to remember that these were the things that Jesus was hungry for:

“My food is to do the will of Him who sent Me, and to finish His work.” (John 4:34)