Category: ‘Presence’

How Pioneer Women Were Superheroes and Why I’m Baking Bread

2 Comments

I measure out the honey, heap it onto the tablespoon and let it drip slowly (as honey does) into the warm milk.

I could have grabbed a loaf off the grocery store shelf.  One loaf in a plastic bag, pre-sliced, and BAM–bread.

Not this time.

I pour in the bread flour.  One cup, now two, now three.

Why not just keep this simple?  Why not a box of crackers from the store?  A bag of pita bread?

I can’t explain it exactly, but I want to push elbow deep into the dough and knead it with my own two weak hands.

Surely I’ve been kneading for 10 minutes already.

It’s been two minutes exactly.

I think maybe my clock is broken.

Those pioneer women were superheroes, performing muscular feats of miraculous strength everyday at the kitchen table.  Maybe not leaping over skyscrapers and flying through space, but baking that daily loaf of bread, that takes power.bethmoore

I’m a modern-day wimp, so this pounding out the dough and stretching it and pounding some more is breathless work.

But it gives me time to think about this:

In the Tabernacle that Moses and the Israelites packed up and toted around the wilderness, God set His Presence right in the midst of His people.

He told them how to craft the Holy objects, the washbasin, the altar.

And He told them to place fresh bread on the table once a week, the shewbread.  But I read in my Bible its other name: “the bread of the Presence“ (Exodus 39:36).

The priests placed that bread on the table and there it sat every single day, not in the Most Holy Place where the High Priest entered once a year.

No, in the Holy Place, where the priests came in day after day to worship before God.

They walked in that sacred space and there was the bread.  There it was.  There it always was.

The moment it started to crackle with staleness, they brought in fresh, warm bread, baked new and placed it once again, a daily reminder of the daily presence of our God.

This bread is to be set out before the Lord regularly, Sabbath after Sabbath, on behalf of the Israelites, as a lasting covenant (Leviticus 24:5-8 NIV)

I set my own bread dough on the oven to rise and sit down to my Bible study book and cup of tea.  That’s when I read it… Beth Moore tells me in her study on David:

The Hebrew term for presence is paneh, which means ‘countenance, presence, or face.’  The everlasting covenant symbolized by the bread of the Presence was a reminder of the pledge of God’s presence to His people.

That bread on that altar reminded God’s people that He was with them, yes, even there in the wilderness.

Even there with David as he ran from Saul, hiding in caves, feigning madness, running for his life.  He used that same Hebrew word–paneh—when he wrote:

For he has not despised or scorned
the suffering of the afflicted one;
he has not hidden his face from him
but has listened to his cry for help (Psalm 22:4 NIV).

My bread is in the oven now, giving the whole house a domestic smell, a fresh and warm aroma.

As it bakes, I consider Christ, because He’s the Bread of Life—God in the flesh, God in our midst, the touchable and tangible sign of God’s presence, the way we could see the face of God.

And Jesus, when He broke that bread and passed that cup around the Passover table, said, “Do this in remembrance of me.”

Every single time you eat the bread and you drink the cup, you remember Christ’s death.  But also His presence. 

“Christ is the bread of God’s presence to us” (Beth Moore, David).

Steven Furtick asks if this Communion we take could “also be an invitation to constant communion with Christ?  For each of us, everywhere, each day?”  (Crash the Chatterbox, p. 152).

So, if I’m feeling the staleness, the crusty or even moldy sign of old bread, then what I need to do is remember. 

I need to renew the Bread of His Presence right here in my life.

I slice off a piece of this warm, newly baked bread.

I pour out the grape juice in my tiny tea cup.

There I pray,  My Lord, I remember what You have done for me.  I am so thankful.  So unworthy.  Will You cleanse my heart?  Will You remind me of Your Presence here in my life?

Communion, this sacred act, becomes personal, a way for the holy to invade my daily: this home, this kitchen, this kitchen table.

God’s presence in this place.

How do you pray before taking Communion?

Heather King is a wife, mom, Bible Study teacher, writer and worship leader.  Most importantly, she is a Christ follower with a desire to help others apply the Bible to everyday life with all its mess, noise, and busyness.  Her book, Ask Me Anything, Lord: Opening Our Hearts to God’s Questions, is available now!  To read more devotionals by Heather King, click here.

Copyright © 2014 Heather King

Made it to the bus with 30 seconds to spare

3 Comments

“I think it’s Career Day at school today,” she announces.

“No, I think it’s tomorrow,” her older sister explains.  “I wrote it in my agenda.”  She pulls out the book as evidence and shows us where she penciled it in.

“See….Dress like what you want to be when you grow up…. That’s tomorrow.”

“Who told you it was tomorrow?” I ask.

“My teacher.  She had it written on the board like this and I copied it in my book like she said.”

“Okay,” I turn to the other sister, “did your teacher tell you it was today?”

“No, but all the smart kids in my class except for me heard it on the announcements and they said it was today.”  She lists the name of every “smart kid” in her class that she can think of.  It’s a long list.

I turn back to the oldest girl.  “Did you hear it on the announcements?”

“No, but my teacher said….”

We’re right back where we started.

Easy enough, though.  We have the largest dress-up collection on the East Coast.  (I really need to check into whether we can get into the Guinness Book of World Records or something).

I ask the daughter who thinks Career Day is today (as in starting 20 minutes from now when the bus will pull up in front of our house) “Okay, what do you want to dress up as?”

A magician. Or maybe a clown. Or maybe a rabbit who has his own children’s show and entertains kids on TV.

Magician it is.

I find the black cape.  I scramble through the largest dress-up collection on the East Coast and find the hat (a little crushed perhaps, but still a hat).  I shuffle through the magic kit and pull out the magic wand.

Bam.  Magician’s outfit.

Then I fold it all up, pop it in the backpack and declare the solution to our entire morning crisis:  If Career Day is today, you can wear the magician’s outfit today.  If it’s not, keep it in your backpack until tomorrow.

I then zip up the backpacks, hand them to my daughters and toss open the front door.psalm16

It’s raining.  I grab umbrellas and hand them out.

We make it to the bus with 30 seconds to spare.

Thirty whole seconds.

Because we’re awesome like that.

The sky is that curious ashen white of winter and the rain drips rhythmically on the roof as I flop down onto the sofa, cradling my baby boy close and holding my Kindle in the other hand.

I’m looking at dishes in the sink and the aftermath of the morning whirlwind of pajamas, blankets, ponytail holders, brushes, and more.

But then I open that Kindle up and there’s the Bible.  It tells me right there that even when the world was a nothingness of empty void, “The Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters” (Genesis 1:2).

Maybe that’s how I feel right then, like His Spirit hovers over the start of this new day.  Like He’s present and waiting for the invitation not just to enter in, but to roll up His sleeves and nehemiah8create something beautiful–something “good”— in the middle of the noise and mess and all the busyness.

Yesterday, my four-year-old pantomimed what looked to me like an outfielder in baseball, dropping a mitt to the ground and snatching up a ball.

As she did, she said, “God scooped up the dust of the earth and “whooo” blew His breath and made man.”

Just like that, she says it, like the sing-songy rhythm of a well-choreographed routine.

I read it this morning again, “God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life” (Genesis 2:7).

I take a deep breath, letting that air fill me up after the suffocation of the morning stress, and I pray—

Lord, don’t let it just be a day when Your Spirit hovers over my life.  Breathe Your breath right into me and let me feel Your presence.

Because even on the hard days, the sad days, the crazy days, ,the hectic days, the stressful days, the fun days, the unexpected days….

You reveal the path of life to me;
in Your presence is abundant joy;
in Your right hand are eternal pleasures
(Psalm 16:11 HCSB).

And you know something else, His presence isn’t just the  joy I need right here in the middle of  a rainy winter day after a morning rush.

It’s this:

For the joy of the Lord is your strength (Nehemiah 8:10 NIV),

In His presence, there is abundant joy, and that joy is the strength I so desperately need.

Heather King is a wife, mom, Bible Study teacher, writer and worship leader.  Most importantly, she is a Christ follower with a desire to help others apply the Bible to everyday life with all its mess, noise, and busyness.  Her book, Ask Me Anything, Lord: Opening Our Hearts to God’s Questions, is available now!
To read more devotionals by Heather King, click here.

Copyright © 2013 Heather King

What My Three-Month Old Is Teaching His Mama

4 Comments

I hear his sharp, startled cry.

It’s only been half an hour since I cradled him and tucked him into his baby bed for the night.  This awakening is unexpected.

I slip into his room and its deep darkness.  Even though I can’t see his tiny frame, I hear him squirming, kicking, tossing his face side to side searching for me and calling out for rescue and help.psalm46-10

The floor creaks under my footstep and he ceases the cries, lies still for a moment, just waiting for Mommy to reach in and scoop him up into arms that will soothe and fix and comfort.

He knows I’m there even though he can’t see me.  And for the moment, that’s enough.

I lift him out of the bassinet, snuggle him close and rock from side to side, patting his back and assuring him that “Mommy’s here, baby boy.  Mommy will make it better.”

Soon his muscles relax and his head droops down onto my shoulder.  His breathing slows and deepens.

Still, I sway back and forth in the darkness and quiet, cuddling this infant blessing, not ready yet to move and let go.

And I’m thinking about this.

After just three months of life with me, my son calms simply at the creaking floorboards that announce my presence in the room.

But me?

I don’t have an infant faith or a 3-month experience with my Savior.

Thirty years into this faith journey, still I scream and thrash and demand attention and rescue even when I know He’s with me, even when He’s assured me of His presence, even though He’s never once failed or abandoned me.

I cradle my son and continue rocking back and forth as God reminds me:

He says, “Be still, and know that I am God;
    I will be exalted among the nations,
    I will be exalted in the earth.”
Psalm 46:10 NIV

It’s not a verse about quiet times or somber worship.  It’s a battlefield Psalm, written when circumstances crushed God’s people and their hearts were trembling. The Sons of Korah wrote a song to remind God’s people of this:

God is our refuge and strength,
    an ever-present help in trouble (Psalm 46:1 NIV).

Ever-present.  That’s what our God is.  He’s with us.  Even before He lifts us out of the pit, we can hear the creaking of His footsteps nearby and know He’s there in the darkness.

Therefore we will not fear, though the earth give way
and the mountains fall into the heart of the sea,
though its waters roar and foam
and the mountains quake with their surging.

Therefore—-because He’s always there—-we need not fear, no matter what rumbles and falls to pieces around us.  Even if the foundations of the earth shake, He is our unshakeable Foundation.

Indeed:

The Lord Almighty is with us;
    the God of Jacob is our fortress (Psalm 46:7 NIV).

So, “be still.”

Be still and know that He Is God. He will be exalted.psalm46

In the midst of any darkness, in any storm, in any crisis or struggle or pain, He will display His glory through the rescue and redemption of His children.

That’s me and you.

Those Psalm-writing sons of Korah say it again.  Maybe they know we struggle to understand.  Maybe they know that a three-month-old baby can trust his imperfect Mama, and yet we’ll fail to trust our perfect God.

So they repeat it for our stubborn, slow-to-learn shaky souls:

The Lord Almighty is with us;
the God of Jacob is our fortress (Psalm 46:11).

It’s not just the earthquakes and battles that make me question His presence sometimes.  It can be as simple as the overwhelming rush of my minivan life.

But there, yes, even there on the busiest of breathless days, The Lord is with me and it’s His presence that gives me peace.

As I lay my sleeping baby boy back down in his bed, I find myself singing an old hymn, a favorite that I’ve sung through some of the hardest times of my life.

It’s a song I’ll be singing all month long as I pursue the presence of Christ by being still and knowing He is God.

What songs do you sing when you’re scared or overwhelmed and need to know God is with you?

Be Still, My Soul
by Katharina Amalia Dorothea von Schlegel

Be still, my soul: the Lord is on thy side.
Bear patiently the cross of grief or pain.
Leave to thy God to order and provide;
In every change, He faithful will remain.
Be still, my soul: thy best, thy heavenly Friend
Through thorny ways leads to a joyful end.

Be still, my soul: thy God doth undertake
To guide the future, as He has the past.
Thy hope, thy confidence let nothing shake;
All now mysterious shall be bright at last.
Be still, my soul: the waves and winds still know
His voice Who ruled them while He dwelt below….

Be still, my soul: the hour is hastening on
When we shall be forever with the Lord.
When disappointment, grief and fear are gone,
Sorrow forgot, love’s purest joys restored.
Be still, my soul: when change and tears are past
All safe and blessèd we shall meet at last…

Heather King is a wife, mom, Bible Study teacher, writer and worship leader.  Most importantly, she is a Christ follower with a desire to help others apply the Bible to everyday life with all its mess, noise, and busyness.  Her book, Ask Me Anything, Lord: Opening Our Hearts to God’s Questions, is available now!
To read more devotionals by Heather King, click here.

Copyright © 2013 Heather King

Why I’m Serving Up Spaghetti and Brownies for Three Kings’ Day

2 Comments

I’m slipping ornaments and lights into Rubbermaid containers and packing the Christmas village into Styrofoam and cardboard today.

On the kitchen table, though, I place the three wise men from our nativity scene.

They aren’t glass or hand-carved from precious olive wood.  I have four kids, after all.

Instead, they are three little plastic figures that my daughters have been playing with for five Christmases at least, reenacting the birth story of Jesus with unbreakable Nativity toys.

Tonight, the wise men take center stage.006

My middle daughter announced this year that we should celebrate Three Kings’ Day on January 6th.  That it was important.  Necessary even.

She instructed us:

  1. We must leave our Christmas decorations up until then.
  2. We must have a special dinner with a special kingly treat.

I tried to ignore the pleading at first and then made futile attempts to explain that since January 6th was the day we return to the insane schedule we call everyday life, that perhaps we could skip Three Kings’ Day.

But no.

I did what any mom might do after that.  I Googled it and Pinterest searched and Facebook asked about how to make this happen.

I read about traditional dishes like “pickled cabbage leaves stuffed with grouts drizzled with water and sauerkraut juice, ” “broccoli accompanied by crostini with chicken liver pate” and “stuffed ravioli with rich duck or rabbit ragu.”

I’m not loving this holiday.

But a friend speaks truth to me.  It’s not about the menu.  It’s about the family time and the celebration.

So, I let my daughter plan the feast: Spaghetti with King’s Hawaiian bread and brownies.

Slowly, this Three Kings’ Day or Feast of Epiphany captivates me as we celebrate men who abandoned it all to seek truth—to seek Christ.

I read that it’s not just the celebration of “three kings,” but the rejoicing in the Epiphany, the humanity of Christ, God in flesh. It’s the reminder that He’s not a cold and impersonal deity too far out of photo by Ruud Morijn reach to care about the passions of my day-to-day heart.

He’s God come near.

God bent low.

God of compassion, who knows what it’s like to be hungry, tired, hurt, broken, sad, joyful, loved, and hated.

And I marvel at the magnitude of this, that when God’s infant Son cried out in a hay-filled manger, right there at the beginning of the salvation story, God sent the birth announcements to the whole world.

Not just to the Bethlehem natives.  Not to the religious elite or the most righteous among them.  Not even just to Jewish shepherds keeping watch over their flocks by night.

For God so loved the world….

The whole world.

He sent a Messiah to the Jewish nation, but then announced redemption for us all with a star that Gentile sages could see and follow to find their Savior, as well.

These men, these watchers-of-the-sky, not so much kings as bookworms, as astronomers, as students and sages, they remind me to pursue the presence of Christ.

How long had they been seeking?  They knew the prophecies, knew that a Messiah would come, knew where He would be born.

They knew when they saw that star in the sky that God was at work.

How hard it must have been to explain to wives, to family, to employers, to friends, to the people in their hometown that they needed to journey far in pursuit of a newborn King.

Sometimes I’ve imagined them following a star without really knowing why, without knowing what it could mean or where it would take them. Yet, when they arrived in Jerusalem, they pestered Herod with questions:

“Where is the one who has been born king of the Jews? We saw his star when it rose and have come to worship him” (Matthew 2:2).

They couldn’t understand why everyone else could continue on life as usual when they were willing to rock their entire lives in radical pursuit of the Messiah.  It was so clear to them.  So simple.

See the star.
Follow it.
Find the Savior.
Worship Him.

Reality, though, can complicate the simple too often.  Life gets busy.  Radical seems too hard.  Maybe the journey will cost too much.  Perhaps I forget along the way whatever it was I was seeking to begin with.

Or maybe I’m too busy and distracted to seek at all.

The wise men saw that star because they were actively looking.  Too often, I’m missing God’s presence because I’m not bothering to look.

But I’m reminded tonight that God comes near and wise men seek Him.

Tonight I celebrate these magi who pursued the presence of Christ with wild abandon and focused determination. And I celebrate the God who promised this:

You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart (Jeremiah 29:13 NIV).

Have you ever celebrated Three King’s Day?  How do you make it special?

Heather King is a wife, mom, Bible Study teacher, writer and worship leader.  Most importantly, she is a Christ follower with a desire to help others apply the Bible to everyday life with all its mess, noise, and busyness.  Her book, Ask Me Anything, Lord: Opening Our Hearts to God’s Questions, is available now!
To read more devotionals by Heather King, click here.

Copyright © 2013 Heather King

Finding Room to Breathe: A 12-month pursuit of the presence of Christ

65 Comments

I’ve waved the white flag and retreated to the kitchen table this morning.

It was the unexpected nature of the rush and stress that did me in and led to my defeat.  I woke up without major plans or a busy schedule, determined to soak in the joy of winter break for just a few more days.

But then ‘it’ happened.

And by ‘it,’ I don’t mean one crisis.  Not an accident or disaster or tragedy.  No, more like life trampling all over my garden of peace and tranquility.

Like four children all needing help at the same time, calling out “mom” (or the newborn equivalent thereof) in harmony from all four corners of the house.  Suddenly I was off on missions of finding and fixing and feeding and changing and breaking up fights.

And that, my friends, is when momma gets grumpy.  My vision of winter break rest turned into sorting through the cabinets and cleaning out drawers and discovering where children had hidden the missing top to my water bottle (behind the television cabinet) and the missing Xbox game (in the very back of the DVD cabinet) and various other long-lost treasures.

All before mom had her cup of tea and time with Jesus.

Have mercy.

Life can suffocate us at times, slam right into our sides and knock the very life-breath out of our bodies when we’re not looking.  Pretty soon we’re panting on the sidelines, injured, weary, and defeated.

Yet, Psalm 62 says that God is “solid rock under my feet, breathing room for my soul” (Psalm 61:1-2, MSG).

I need the reminder.

In a few days, I’ll be back to zooming around town in the minivan, picking up children, dropping off children, passing sandwiches to the kids in the back because we won’t make it home exodus33for dinner and coaching them on homework all from the driver seat as we bounce from school to ballet to church to play practice and back again.

And right there, in the middle of the ‘mess, noise, and busyness’ of life is where I need God to manifest His presence and to breathe life back into my hyperventilating soul.

God promised this to Moses:

The Lord replied, “My Presence will go with you, and I will give you rest” (Exodus 33:14).

A promise like that might leave me in a blubbery mess of tearful gratitude and peace—His presence and the promise of rest.  Yes, Lord, Amen!!

The promise of God’s presence and rest didn’t come at the end of the journey or on the edge of Canaan either.  It was right there at a mountain in the middle of the wilderness.

So, Moses got a little bold.  Or a lot bold.

He said,

“Now show me your glory” (Exodus 13:18).

God did just that.

Here I sit at the beginning of a new year praying the same thing.  Please, Lord, show me Your glory on the mountain, in the wilderness, along the journey, in the everyday travels.  Let me know the heavy weight of Your presence as I go.

This year I’m choosing one word to focus my faith-journey and I’m making it a year-long pursuit.

I’ll be writing each month about how I’m pursuing God’s PRESENCE in a particular way.

Here’s what I’m thinking for each month (although I reserve the right to change my mind, move things around, alter, delete, and improve this list as time goes on!!)

  • January:  Be Still and Know
  • February:  Pray Simply
  • March: Unplug (Turning off TV, social media, and other distractions and tuning into God)
  • April: Enjoy beauty (Gardens, walks, nature, and more)
  • May: Create beauty (Dabble in the arts and get to know the nature of our Creator God)
  • June: Invest in Friendship
  • July: Retreat and regroup (Why we need to get away and how to make it happen)
  • August: Learn how to say ‘no’ (Because you can’t do everything)
  • September: Learn how and when to say ‘yes’ (Because you have to do some things)
  • October: Find sacred in the ordinary
  • November: Practice Sabbath-Keeping
  • December: Abandon perfection

Will you join me? 

Will you share with me in this pursuit of the PRESENCE of Christ?

I’d love for you to comment, write your own blog posts and share them with me, email me and give me tips, ideas, failures and success stories as we pursue His PRESENCE.

Heather King is a wife, mom, Bible Study teacher, writer and worship leader.  Most importantly, she is a Christ follower with a desire to help others apply the Bible to everyday life with all its mess, noise, and busyness.  Her book, Ask Me Anything, Lord: Opening Our Hearts to God’s Questions, is available now!  To read more devotionals by Heather King, click here.

Copyright © 2013 Heather King

The Discipline of Resting Not Rushing

Leave a comment

I’m tempted to rush.

This one day I have this time and the temptation is there to fill it right up with more activity, more going and more doing.

Most days, I don’t have this luxury, of course.  It’s the mad morning scramble of toothbrushes, hair brushes, ribbons, bows, socks, shoes, lunches and backpacks to send two older girls out to the bus stop.

Then, buckle a preschooler and a newborn into the minivan for the drive to school and errands or meetings or Bible studies or appointments or whatever busyness has etched itself onto the day.

But this day.  This one day.psalm27

After I watch my oldest girls step onto that school bus, I return to my home and breathe in and out this uncertain freedom.  I don’t have to drive to the preschool.  I don’t have to meet an external agenda or deadline until the afternoon.

So what to do?

Rush through my home, stuffing laundry into the washing machine and another load in the dryer?  Frantically move cereal bowls from sink to dishwasher and then grab the broom (maybe the mop if I’m inspired).  Respond to messages.  Catch up on the to-do list.  Fill out the forms.

So it goes, me filling up this one little space of time with too much, cramming in activity and sitting on the lid in hopes it will fit.

My tea, poured hot this morning turns cold.

My morning devotions, rushed through just to be done, leave me unfilled, uninspired, unopened to what God wants to say.

Too busy…too busy…just always too busy.

But today  I consider Joshua.

Moses met with God face-to-face in a tent.  A pillar of cloud covered the entrance while the Israelites looked on from the flaps of their own tent dwellings, bowing in worship in the doorways.

When Moses finished talking with God, he returned to the camp to share the message with others.

Not Joshua, though.

“his assistant, the young man Joshua son of Nun, would not leave the inside of the tent” (Exodus 33:11 HCSB).

He wouldn’t budge from the glory and the presence, lingering there stubbornly while others moved along.

What if I chose to linger here….chose to be Joshua refusing to leave the tent as long as God’s glory electrified the air….chose for this one day to be Mary at the feet of Jesus rather than Martha slamming pots in the kitchen?

Because serving perpetually means serving empty and that means dying of spiritual starvation and dehydration.

We need the Mary moments so we can re-enter the kitchen as Martha and care for others cheerfully and ably until we have that opportunity once again to lay down the dish towel and sit at Jesus’ feet.

It’s not practical, of course.

That crowd of more than 5000 who sat on the hillside listening to Jesus hour upon hour should have been watching the clock.  They should have known what time it was and how long they had to travel back for food.  They should have abandoned the sermon and packed up their blankets and lawn chairs at a reasonable time so they could eat dinner at a reasonable hour.

Yet, Jesus rewarded their time in His presence.

Had they left early, they would have missed the miracle.

In order to witness God’s glory, they had to wait, they had to sit patiently and linger there until they received.

In Living Beyond Yourself, Beth Moore writes:

“He placed them in a posture to rest in His provision.  He commanded them to “sit down” and fed only those who were “seated” (vv. 10-11) . . .”Are you ‘sitting down’ in a posture of trust and sitting quietly to receive it?  If so, prepare the baskets!”

For me, it’s just this one day a week to take my morning slow before the afternoon and evening wave of stress and busyness crashes down again.livingbeyond

For you, it may be a morning, a day….even a season of sitting and waiting on that hillside so you can see His glory, or a season at Jesus’ feet instead of in the kitchen, or a season of lingering in the tent.

Whatever the length of the wait and the stillness, it’s a discipline to rest rather than rush.

When we remain there, though, insistent on lingering where His presence is, we see His glory displayed and He fills us up with the sustenance of His presence and His Word.

But only when we wait until He says it’s time to move on.

Heather King is a wife, mom, Bible Study teacher, writer and worship leader.  Most importantly, she is a Christ follower with a desire to help others apply the Bible to everyday life with all its mess, noise, and busyness.  Her book, Ask Me Anything, Lord: Opening Our Hearts to God’s Questions, is available now!
To read more devotionals by Heather King, click here.

Copyright © 2013 Heather King

What if God is in this place?

3 Comments

What if God is in this place?

It may not always seem likely.  Not when you’re elbow-deep in soapy dish water, or pulling out the third wipe from the tub while doing diaper duty.

Not perhaps while cradling a tiny babe at 2:00 in the morning so he can eat or zooming from school to ballet while quizzing children on homework questions at the same time.

And not when passing back sandwiches to little people in the car as you spend a night away from home moving from activity to activity.

Yet, this is the place I inhabit, the Mom World.  It’s the life where my schedule is dictated by the schedules of other, tinier, needier people.

There was a time….there will be a time….when I can linger over tea, a Bible, a prayer journal.DSCF2151

For now, though, I’m scribbling Scriptures onto index cards and reading devotionals in a parked car while waiting in a line to pick up my kids here, there, and everywhere.

God has to be mobile for me.  He has to be everywhere I go.  He can’t be confined to one hour, one specific holy place, one quiet spiritual atmosphere.

No, He has to be God amidst the loud, the stressful, the busy, the on-the-go, the tired.

We talk about the discipline of a quiet time, the need to establish a routine and stick with it no matter what.  Schedule your time with God….that’s the advice we give.

For most people, there’s wisdom there.  Make a date with God.  Write it down on the calendar.  Protect the time.  Do the habit until it becomes a habit.  Persevere until it becomes second-nature.

Sometimes, though, in some special seasons and particular times, this advice leaves us defeated.  My schedule is different each day of the week.  A newborn baby can cry and change my plans in one unexpected instant.

If I’m inflexible, too rigid, only ‘doing devotions,’ only meeting with God in this one place at this one time, I will miss Him.

I’ll miss Him completely and utterly.  My life would be devoid of heaven and communion with my Savior and I’d be one stressed out Mama ending every day emptier and emptier than the day before.

Yet, there’s Mary in Luke 1, a teenage girl busy with chores, doing common, everyday things on a common, average day. That’s when an angel appeared and announced she’d carry the Messiah.

God was at work.  She couldn’t see Him…not when hauling water and baking bread.  Still, God was in that place, active in her life, preparing the greatest plan of all plans to display His will and His presence in the world.

And then there’s Jacob, the runaway rogue, the trickster fleeing his home and family because he’d made his brother, Esau, mad enough to kill him.

All Jacob did was fall asleep on a stone pillow and God was there, displaying a stairway up to heaven and bringing blessing and promise for Jacob’s future.

What could Jacob say, but:

“Surely the Lord is in this place, and I was not aware of it.” (Genesis 28:16 NIV)?

That’s it exactly, what I’m thinking, what I’m praying for and hoping to accomplish even with four young kids and a husband and a ministry and a life…

To be aware.

I don’t want to walk in and out of this life unaware of God in this place—right here, right now, right in the middle of everything I’m doing and everywhere I have to be.  I can wait for some future moment when an uninterrupted hour of quiet is an everyday commodity, but how much better to ask God to inhabit this busy, stressful, active, full life, the very life He’s given me?

After all, even when we set apart time and places for holy encounters, we can miss seeing His glory.

Zechariah the priest entered the holy place for a once-in-a-lifetime encounter with God….and yet when the angel appeared to him and announced that he’d be the father of the Messiah’s forerunner, Zechariah “was startled and was gripped with fear” (Luke 1:12 NIV).

What was God doing there in the temple?  What was God doing there on this spiritual day?

Zechariah stood in a holy place at a holy time and didn’t expect to see the holy.

But I want to be expectant in the holy places and in the places that seem steeped in the mundane.  God, please meet me here in the mini-van, here helping with homework, here making dinner, folding clothes, washing dishes, packing lunches, feeding a newborn.

May I remember that yes, God is in this place.

Heather King is a wife, mom, Bible Study teacher, writer and worship leader.  Most importantly, she is a Christ follower with a desire to help others apply the Bible to everyday life with all its mess, noise, and busyness.  Her upcoming book, Ask Me Anything, Lord: Opening Our Hearts to God’s Questions, will be released in the Fall of 2013!  To read more devotionals by Heather King, click here.

Copyright © 2013 Heather King

Dear Pinterest, May I Suggest a Glossary?

6 Comments

She says the word ‘just’ and I cringe.

Something about that word, the way it frustrates and deceives, never quite used as intended, never fully revealing the truth.

She says, “Mom, you can just….” and “how about we just….” and, in her innocence, she believes the lie.

That this is easy.

I explain to her that despite the Pinterest headings on the pictures that promise “Simple,” “Easy,” DIY for beginners,” “Quick,” and “Painless….” her mom is in fact craft handicapped.

So, no we do not “just” snip, fold, twist, tuck, glue and ‘voila’…create masterpieces.11918590_s

In fact, these projects always seem to involve more effort, mistakes, mess, physical trauma, and failure than the pictures and the headings make you believe.

Dear Pinterest, may I suggest a glossary of terms for non-crafty folks like myself?  Perhaps a translation tool?  Or a handy dandy guide to assessing your actual ability to reproduce the adorable projects people post?

Maybe a “Warning Label?”

Like this:

“5 Easy steps..”:  Each step really includes 5 other sub-steps not included in the instructions because the writer assumed you’d be craft-smart enough to know without being told or shown.

“Simple….”:  This project is designed for people far more artistic than yourself.  For them, it is indeed “simple.”  For you, it will not be.  Consider yourself warned.

“For beginners…”:  These instructions are written by people who are not beginners and who have forgotten how ‘beginner’ Beginners really are.  Sure, it’s easy for them; they’ve been whipping out afghans, dresses, pillow cases, cakes, and wreaths for years.  You, however, are truly a beginner, still apt to burn your fingers with the glue gun and stab at your fingertips with a sewing needle.

And my favorite:

“Just”:  “Just” implies that the steps you’ll be given are simple, a snap, easy as 1-2-3.  But in reality, the instructions are long and involved, utterly confusing and complicated, and at some point will not work the way they are pictured or portrayed.

It’s not just the pitfall of arts and crafts.

It’s faith, too.

We forget sometimes that faith is hard.

We say, “just believe,” “just trust God,” “just hold on to the promises,” “just wait on Him,” “just keep praying….”

“Just,” that’s how we oversimplify when really it’s desperately difficult.

And rather than wade in waste deep to the muck and mire of messy faith, we stand on the shore and shout out pat phrases and cliches like ineffective life preservers.

Here’s what’s true:

Some days we’re going to mess up.

Sometimes God’s provision is hard to see, when the bills are crushing in and it’s one broken thing, one unexpected expense, one medical crisis after another after another.

Sometimes you can sit all day at that kitchen table with your Bible and journal, praying desperately for direction and still He remains silent for a season.

Some mornings you wake up believing implicitly that God has got this whole massive world tucked into the palm of His capable hands only to feel the earthquake threaten your faith foundation just ten minutes into the day after one tragic phone call or one message of hurt, pain, fear, and need.

Some days you want to give up because this calling is too hard and you can’t even see the tiniest bit of purpose or hope or sign that all this sacrifice is worth it.

This isn’t “Simple,” “5 Easy Steps,” “Just” faith.

This is real life faith.

This is where we’ve exhausted all of the belief we have and the circumstances haven’t changed, so we bring it to Jesus because we don’t even know where else to go.

And like the father in Mark 9, we pray:

“if You can do anything, take pity on us and help us!”” (Verse 22, NASB).

God, if You can help me…

That’s what the father prayed, and Jesus reminded him: All things are possible to him who believes (verse 23).

Surely the desperate dad had heard the promise before.  He could have nodded his head complacently and pretended to “just believe” and “just have faith.”

Instead, he confessed the truth to Jesus:  “I do believe; help my unbelief” (verse 24).

I believe.  And yet, sometimes, Lord, it’s hard to believe.  If life were easy, faith would be easy.  But life isn’t and faith is hard.

That’s the truth.

This father prayed for mercy because he was human.  He doubted and struggled.

We confess this, too, and this is the assurance we receive:

As a father has compassion on his children,
so the Lord has compassion on those who fear him;
for he knows how we are formed,
he remembers that we are dust (Psalm 103:13-14 NIV).

Dust.  That’s what we are: Small and dependent, near-sighted and earth-bound.

Have mercy on us, God.  Help our unbelief. 

That’s what we pray when life isn’t “simple” or “easy” or “just.”

Heather King is a wife, mom, Bible Study teacher, writer and worship leader.  Most importantly, she is a Christ follower with a desire to help others apply the Bible to everyday life with all its mess, noise, and busyness.  Her upcoming book, Ask Me Anything, Lord: Opening Our Hearts to God’s Questions, will be released in the Fall of 2013!  To read more devotionals by Heather King, click here.

Copyright © 2013 Heather King

A Heart At Rest

2 Comments

Too often it’s the insignificant things.

Like the dishes I had to leave unwashed as I unexpectedly rushed out the door…or the items on the to-do list, there because they need to be done, but truly tomorrow might do just as well as today.

It’s the project that sits unfinished, the playroom with evidence of an abandoned toy sorting marathon on display, and the increasingly evident need for a vacuuming.

Too often this is what overwhelms me, the ultimately unimportant and insignificant trifles and I’m tempted for just one selfish moment to say, ‘no.’14157735_s

‘No, I can’t.  No, I’m too busy.  Not today, not tomorrow, not later or in an hour.  No I can’t give this; it’s mine and I need it.  No, you’ll just have to ask someone else.’

While others are needing the hands and feet of Christ right now in this place where they find themselves ….and while God has told this perpetual Martha to abandon the mess in the kitchen and just sit down restfully at His feet or perhaps head out the door to serve another….still I glance incessantly over my shoulder at the kitchen, thinking of what I need to do.

How can my priorities be so awry?

I know it when I’m there… with a friend, on the phone, lingering at church, sharing the cup of tea, holding a crying daughter, baking cookies for another daughter to share with her class, surprising yet another girl in the lunchroom at school and sitting in a noisy cafeteria while she nibbles on her sandwich.

I know this is what matters.  This is what is important.

People are always more important than productivity. 

The dishes will be done.  I’ll stand on the kitchen mat soon enough with my hands soaking into the suds, rinsing cereal bowls and cups. This, too, will be service and love for others, for my family.

Yet, right now what matters is being with God and loving others as He does, not fretting over the remnants of breakfast in my sink.

God challenges my perspective, shifting my viewpoint that is ever so stubbornly focused on my own needs.

He did this for Peter, too, as Jesus explained that He would die and be raised again.

Peter argued with the Savior:  No way, Lord.  That’ll never happen to you!

“Jesus turned to Peter and said, “Get away from me, Satan! You are a dangerous trap to me. You are seeing things merely from a human point of view, not from God’s” (Matthew 16:23 NLT).

That’s my problem, isn’t it?  My blindness to God’s perspective and the way that selfishness tunnels my vision until all I can see are my needs, my rights, my worries, my struggles, my life with my priorities.

I’m seeing things from a human point of view and never lifting my head high enough to see from God’s eyes.

This, then, is the deeply penetrating truth that challenges me: If I’m being obedient to God and loving others as He has told me to, then I needn’t worry about the peripheral, the secondary and the insignificant. 

He will give me the time.  He will help me. He will take care of what I need.

I can trust Him with it all, with every bit of my worry, my cares, my needs, my agenda.  When I’m serving God in obedience, my stressed out, frazzled, distracted soul can rest in His presence.

That’s what it says in 1 John:

“Dear children, let us not love with words or tongue but with actions and in truth. This then is how we know that we belong to the truth, and how we set our hearts at rest in his presence”  (1 John 3:18-19).

Put love-based-on-truth into action and there I find that heart of rest simply because I’m where God is, doing what He’s called me to do, being obedient to His direction and timing.

In What Happens When Women Say Yes to God, Lysa TerKeurst writes:

I must confess I have moments where my heart is at rest in His presence, but they are broken up by pitfalls and pity parties.  Sometimes I just simply want to be selfish.  But when I choose selfishness, I may be happy for the moment, but I’m miserable in the long run (p. 98).

Yes, I have moments when serving comes easy and I feel the peace in obedience.  But I have those other moments when selfishness tempts me to hide away and to hoard my time or resources.

Ironically, it’s only when I’m pouring out to others that God can fill me up with His presence.

It’s only when I cease striving for myself so that I can serve someone else that God meets all my needs, for provision, for rest, for peace, for wisdom, and for time.

OBSBlogHop

Heather King is a wife, mom, Bible Study teacher, writer and worship leader.  Most importantly, she is a Christ follower with a desire to help others apply the Bible to everyday life with all its mess, noise, and busyness.  Her upcoming book, Ask Me Anything, Lord: Opening Our Hearts to God’s Questions, will be released in the Fall of 2013!  To read more devotionals by Heather King, click here.

Copyright © 2013 Heather King

Not Perfect, But All

3 Comments

It’s beautiful.

Not perfect, but beautiful.

The stitches aren’t tightly even, each one the same and pulled taut against the next in one long continuous line of knitted row after knitted row.  There are mistakes.  There are corrections.

There is learning.

But the beauty is there, unmistakable, the beauty of a gift, of an offering that took sacrifice and thoughtfulness and care.

Why else would an eight-year-old devote so much of her summer vacation to discovering the favorite colors of others and knitting them hand-made scarves to suit?yarn heart

As she knits, she learns.  Each scarf goes faster.  Each row becomes more even.

Less mistakes.  Less dropped stitches.  Less recovery and fewer requests: “Mom, can you help me?”  At first, I’m checking almost every row, periodically unraveling stitches to reach the start of all the trouble.

Two steps forward, one step back.  Sometimes more.

Now, though, her needles fly and she doesn’t carry me mistakes to fix; she brings me finished work with pride, with joy in the making and joy in the giving.

She hasn’t made a single scarf for herself.  Only for others.  Even her sisters line up stuffed animals who (clearly) need mini-scarves for the fall and winter season, and she knits a special order for a toy monkey and toy cat.

But those first scarves, like the wobbly steps of a weak-kneed toddler, aren’t perfect.

Still she gives.

And they are still beautiful.

I look up on a Sunday morning from my place at the piano keys to see one of the recipients on the church stage, draped with a yellow scarf,  a handmade gift from my daughter.

She wears the present with joy and I’m struck by the beauty—the beauty of one who cherishes the treasured offering of another without criticism, complaint, or the impossible standards of hostage-holding perfection.

And I’m struck by the beauty of my daughter, who gives not to show off, but to show love.

Perfectionism paralyzes….

We hoard and we hide because our offerings aren’t perfect.

She’s more capable, more talented, more equipped, more recognized…

He’s more educated, more bold, more articulate….

We compare, we fret, we worry, we feel so insufficient, and so we don’t offer any gift at all for fear of the failing.

My daughter knitted this summer.

I edited, proofread, wrote.

I sat in front of a word processor staring at the final draft of my book, tasked with proofing the text for the very last time, looking for spelling errors, for periods out of place, and for missing words.

My impulse was to hold on.

It’s been over two years since I finished writing that book, and now looking back I want to tinker and adjust, alter and amend.   I want to patch this here and fix that there.

But at some point, I had to attach the file to an email and hit send.  Off it goes, out of my hands, into the hands of the editor and on to the printer.  It’s done and I can’t go back anymore.

Perfectionism screams, “There’s always more to do.  Don’t ever offer up what isn’t absolutely right.”

But then there would be no offering.

Not now.  Not ever.  I’d wake up one day long from now and realize that I never gave because what I had was never good enough.

Better to offer as my daughter does: 

Giving with passion…

Giving with love…

Giving out of hard work and effort and time…

Growing, learning, improving, but only through the doing and the giving….  That is, after all, how we learn, not with the giving up or the hiding away, not with the wishing for more or the lost opportunities.

We learn through the mistakes, through the process, through the work itself and through the handing it over, an offering to God, a gift to others.

God didn’t call perfect people or those already equipped.

He called those willing to go and do.

Like the prophet, Amos, we know our own weaknesses, but we give anyway:

Amos answered Amaziah, “I was neither a prophet nor the son of a prophet, but I was a shepherd, and I also took care of sycamore-fig trees. But the Lord took me from tending the flock and said to me, ‘Go, prophesy to my people Israel’ (Amos 7:14-15 NIV)

A shepherd.  A fig-grower.  That’s what he was.

God called

He obeyed.

God used.

God received the glory.

Thus, we lay down our gifts all full of holes and mistakes, with corrections and revisions, ones that aren’t perfect but ones that we labored over long.  We place them down on the altar and offer them up for His use, for His glory, for His name.

And then we go back and strive again, never for ourselves, always to give anew.

Never giving perfect.  Instead, giving all.

Heather King is a busy-but-blessed wife and mom, a Bible Study teacher, writer and worship leader.  Most importantly, she is a Christ follower with a desire to help others apply the Bible to everyday life with all its mess, noise, and busyness.  Her upcoming book, Ask Me Anything, Lord: Opening Our Hearts to God’s Questions, will be released in November 2013!  To read more devotionals by Heather King, click here.

Copyright © 2013 Heather King