Will you join me in prayer this week?

February 10, 201419 Comments

“You know what we need to do, girls? We need to pray.”

I find myself saying that more and more to my kids. I never expected that the problems of a preschooler, a first grader and a second grader would be beyond my ability to fix so much of the time. I never imagined how much of motherhood is spent on your knees.

We’ve prayed for stolen glue sticks, mean girls, renegade classmates who won’t behave in art class, forgotten homework, lost lunch boxes, friends whose parents are divorcing and other friends being teased on the playground.

When you open the floor to prayer requests from kids, they’re willing to be downright honest, maybe even uncomfortably truthful at times.

If their parents fought, they’ll tell you. If their grades are bad, if their teacher is tough, if their friend is sad, if a bully is mean, you’ll hear about it. Children will spill it all out there.

We seem to learn privacy and shame over time, learning to keep things quiet, afraid to ask for prayer for our real problems because others might know the truth: We don’t have it all together. People might judge. The gossip chain will be initiated.

But I’m saying this now to you as you sit here reading this blog, maybe munching away at your lunch or settling down to read your email messages at the end of the day, or grabbing a few minutes in between phone calls or during your toddler’s nap time….

“You know what we need to do? We’ve got to pray.”

Scripture reminds us of the power of praying together.

When Esther prepared to enter King Xerxes’s presence uninvited, placing her life in jeopardy in order to save her people from mass genocide, she didn’t just pray on her own.

She organized a nationwide prayer meeting, instructing all the Jews of Susa to:

“fast for me. Do not eat or drink for three days, night or day. My maids and I will do the same…” (Esther 4:16 NLT).

Jesus didn’t just fall to the ground in the Garden of Gethsemane alone as he waited for his betrayer to arrive with an army of soldiers and an unwelcome kiss. He took along:

“Peter and Zebedee’s two sons, James and John, and he became anguished and distressed. He told them, ‘My soul is crushed with grief to the point of death. Stay here and keep watch with me” (Matthew 26:37-38).

Paul, who seemed so confident and capable in ministry and who always seemed content and able to rejoice despite circumstances, wasn’t afraid to ask the church in Ephesus to

“pray for me, too. Ask God to give me the right words so I can boldly explain God’s mysterious plan…” (Ephesians 6:19 NLT).

So rather than bowing my head alone, I’m asking for you to do something totally different with me.

Let’s pray together.

Just leave a comment on the blog or Facebook this week saying, “I’m praying, too” or something simple like that and then spend some time this week in focused prayer for others. It’ll take just a second of time to post that comment so we know you’re praying.

And if you have a prayer request, don’t be afraid or ashamed, please share that with us, too. You can leave a comment here on the blog—even anonymously if you wish—and you can keep it simple, “My marriage. My job. My kids.” We’ll join with you on our knees today and ask God for help.

Or, you can email a prayer request to me here: heatherking@cox.net

We’ve got to pray, friends, and not just individually, but together. Please take just a few minutes and join in our “online prayer meeting” today.

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Here are some prayer prompts. Please share if you have any other ideas of how we can pray…

For marriages: For faithfulness, love, affection, honor, making marriage a priority, friendship, spiritual unity, and for freedom from abuse.
For depression and spiritual stagnation: For revival and a return of joy, for friendship and God’s Word to come alive for them again. For hope.
For finances: For freedom from debt, steady work and well-rewarded labor. For wisdom and abundant blessing. For those looking for work.
For children: For salvation, for the wayward child, for restoration of broken relationships, for wisdom to make wise choices for our kids, for help guiding them spiritually.
For churches/ministries and pastors/ministry leaders: For God’s vision, for strength, energy, refreshing, wisdom, and clear direction from God—for their families and their finances and health. For God to fill them up as they pour themselves out.
For caregivers: That God would bring peace and freedom from pain to their loved ones, for salvation for those suffering, for strength for each new day for the caregivers themselves.

Originally published November 26, 2012

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.

Ask Me More: Why are you afraid?

February 7, 2014February 7, 2014Leave a comment

I wake up from the nightmare.

It’s about 4 a.m. maybe. I can’t see the clock without my glasses, so I guess at the time.

Dreams always remain hazy for me, but I remember what finally startled me awake: my daughter in the dream crying out, desperately broken, desperately sad.

It’s the second time I’ve dreamed about this one baby girl of mine being hurt, and I can’t shake the terror in the night or my helplessness. It’s just a dream and yet it seemed so real.

I could do everything right as a mom and still get it wrong. I could do everything right and still I can’t protect them all the time.

So, it’s 4 a.m. and I’m lying there still in the darkness just praying:

“Jesus, Jesus, Jesus….. Have mercy….”

O Lord, I remember Your name in the night (Psalm 119:55a)

I pray it over each of my children by name. Pray until my heart calmly slips back into its normal rhythm.

And I sleep.

The next day, my family drives to church and unloads from the minivan in a stead stream of King family members.

But my other daughter lingers, hiding her face, and I see how she’s turned her back to the door. She’s been crying.

I lead her out by the hand, whisk her off to a quiet place and when I wipe those tears off her cheek, I ask her, “Why are you crying?”

She sobs it out and I try to interpret the shoulder heaves and breathy story.

We’d been listening to the song Blessings by Laura Story in the minivan. What if your blessings come through rain drops, what if your healing comes through tears?

And she watched her baby brother’s smiles and the way he cooed at her all the way to church and she thought, “What if something happens to him?”

She was afraid.

We tried all morning to help her overcome the anxiety of what-if’s and hypotheticals and the wondering, “how could I ever survive?”

Until finally, I whisper into her ear as she bows her head low….Look, I get this. Your mom has been a fearful person. I know what it’s like to be afraid. But you don’t know that anything bad will ever happen. You can’t miss out on enjoying the present for fear of an unknown future. The only thing you do know is that God loves you, God loves us, God will be with us.

I give her these two choices, cut through all of the possibilities and the confusion, the philosophy, the emotions.

Here it is.

Just this: Fear or faith?

And I think how I need this myself, as a woman, as a mom.

I can live in fear or I can live in faith.

I can parent in fear or I can parent in faith.

The disciples rocked violently in the wind of a Galilean storm on a boat they knew how to handle expertly. They were fishermen, well-versed in weather and weathering the storms on that sea.

But they were scared that night. Terrified even. This storm exceeded their ability and expertise. They could not survive alone.

And where was Jesus? Sleeping while they struggled? Ignorant of their need?

They woke him and poured out frustration and fear in a torrent of accusation, “Teacher, do You not care that we are perishing?” (Mark 4:38).

So, Jesus spoke to the waves and wind and they obeyed Him and settled into a calmed hush of stillness.

Then he turned to those still-shaking disciples, dripping wet and exhausted from their battle with the storm. He didn’t lecture them or give a sermon on His power or His mission.

He didn’t command that they also hush and be still.

Instead, He asked them a question:

“Why are you afraid? Do you still have no faith?” (Mark 4:40 NASB)

Fear or faith.

Those are the only options. That’s what His questions mean.

The disciples felt justified in their fear, perhaps. Surely they should be afraid when an overpowering storm threatens to capsize their boat and drown them all.

But Jesus pushed beyond their excuses and reasoning to reach the real issue: We can’t be afraid and full of faith at the same time. It’s an either/or state of being.

Ray Stedman reminds me that even when damage seems permanent and disaster imminent:

One, the boat will not sink; it cannot sink when the Master of ocean and earth and sky is in it. Two, the storm will not last forever.

And that’s faith; it’s returning to what I know instead of worrying over the unknown.

So, I choose faith over fear this time. But it’s a journey. I must choose faith and choose faith and choose faith, not just once, but every time I’m tempted to question God’s presence, His love, or His power.

Want to read more about the questions God asks?
Check out my book, Ask Me Anything, Lord, available in paperback and for the Kindle and nook!

Five Simple Ways to Remember to Pray for Others

February 5, 2014February 6, 20142 Comments

“The first thing I want you to do is pray. Pray every way you know how, for everyone you know.”
1 Timothy 2:1 MSG

“I’ll pray for ya!”

That’s what we promise.

But do we really remember? When life crowds in, do we keep our promise to pray for surgeries, doctor’s appointments, marriages, infertility, job interviews, ministry events, concerns about children, or direction….not for ourselves, but for others?

Because truth be told, so often we’re selfish, attending to our own needs and forgetting the needs of others.

Or maybe we’re distracted. Far too busy. Simply forgetful.

We need, though, not just to say we’re going to pray, but to truly bow down at the throne of God and lift up our friends, family, and church members, interceding on their behalf.

Oswald Chambers wrote:

“Your part in intercessory prayer is not to agonize over how to intercede, but to use everyday circumstances and people God puts around you by His providence to bring them before His throne and to allow the Spirit in you the opportunity to intercede for them. In this way, God is going to touch the whole world with His saints.“

God does not appoint one person in a group to pray for everyone else or call one person to intercessory prayer and give everyone else a “Get Out of Prayer” card.

He invites all of us to His throne room on behalf of the people we meet in “everyday circumstances and people God puts around you by His providence.”

Perhaps God sent you through that particular line at the grocery store so you could meet and pray for your cashier.

Maybe the hairdresser who checks your name off the list and calls you back to the shampoo bowl was God-appointed so that you could pray for her.

That interruption in your day that sent you to the store unexpectedly may have been so that you could meet up with a friend from small group who needs prayer.

So then, how do you combat forgetfulness and busyness and self-centeredness and make praying for others a consistent reality rather than a broken promise?

Mark it on your calendar: Mingled among doctor’s appointments, ballet lessons, and cookouts, prayer requests dot my calendar. Surgery dates, job interviews, baby due dates, and court appearances are marked on the squares so that I will remember to pray on the very days necessary.
Pray right away: If someone calls me with a prayer request, I may very well pray right there on the phone. If not, I pray as soon as I hang up. I may be cutting onions, stirring pasta, washing dishes or folding clothes while I’m doing it, but I’m praying while it is fresh on my heart and mind. If I receive an email with a prayer request, I pray over it as I read and as soon as I’m finished.
Pray as you read Scripture: As I read, I ask God to reveal Scriptures that I can pray for those on my prayer list and He does. Right there in that moment, Bible in my hand, I pray for the person who has popped into my mind in association with that verse. ” God, place a new song in her heart” (Psalm 40). “God, fill her with the knowledge of Your will through all spiritual wisdom and understanding” (Colossians 1:9). Every time I open my Bible, I begin a conversation with God that often includes requests for others.
Stop, Drop and Pray: We’ve all had those moments when we’re running through our day and a friend appears in our thoughts for a moment. “I need to call her,” we might think. Or, “I need to remember to pray for her later.” I’ve learned to obey the prompting of the Holy Spirit and pray right then and there. I don’t need to wait until my quiet time to lift up a friend to God. I stop where I am, drop what I’m doing even if only for a few seconds, and pray—-before I forget and before urgent things distract me.
Post It: I’ve tried keeping a notebook of prayer requests before and it hasn’t worked for me. What I have done, though, is find ways to post the prayer requests so I see them all day and pray for them often. I have a prayer list for my kids on my refrigerator door. I’ve posted index cards around my desk with prayer requests for others. I have a prayer card in my Bible and another in my car.

Too often we try to confine prayer to specific times, meetings, sacred places and holy moments. But prayer can happen right here and now. As soon as the Holy Spirit nudges our heart, we can offer those prayers up to Him on behalf of others.

Originally posted as Pray for Us, Part II, 5/25/2011

Does prayer really have to be that complicated?

February 3, 2014February 6, 20146 Comments

I don’t remember the first time I talked to God, but I remember the moment I decided prayer was personal.

It’s funny how you don’t recall most of life when you’re three or four years old, but you can have these few vivid memories that play back like a well-worn movie.

I don’t remember how I knew my father had left us. I don’t remember how I felt about the whole ordeal of divorce.

But I sat on a swing-set in my backyard one day when I was about four and I said this,

“God, You’ll have to be my Daddy now.”

That I remember.

And prayer’s always been that for me, not some awkward attempt to wax poetic before a stern God. I’ve never felt like my prayers have to ‘measure up’ or ‘sound holy.’

Because it’s always just been me, a simple girl talking to Dad about life on a swing-set, about making tough decisions, about life as a mom, about life….

I found a prayer journal years ago with categories and lists, a calendar of prayer planning, verses and notes, bookmarks, quotes, all spiral bound for easy writing.

I’m a little surprised that it didn’t light up or play music.

But the thing about that super-duper-deluxe journal is that I never could use it. All those bells and whistles complicated prayer, made it so cumbersome and bulky.

I’d been chatting with God all day, every day for decades, and I couldn’t cram all that intimacy into a multi-step method in this how-to of prayer.

Maybe formulas and fancy systems work for you.

Or perhaps you’re like me, who simply wants prayer to be communion with God, the recognition of His presence here in this place.

Samuel Chadwick wrote:

“The one concern of the devil is to keep Christians from praying. He fears nothing from prayerless studies, prayerless work, and prayerless religion. He laughs at our toil, mocks at our wisdom, but trembles when we pray” Samuel Chadwick

There’s such power in this prayer, and yet too often we avoid it and neglect it because we over-complicate it.

We act as if we’re not really praying unless we pray for two hours straight, on our knees, in a prayer closet, with a prayer journal, and maintain an adequate ratio of praise-to-petition.

And, since we can’t do all that, we simply don’t pray at all.

But God doesn’t regulate prayer with some hierarchical system of holiness.

That’s Satan, complicating things so that we give it all up all-together, feeding us the lies:

Prayer is too hard.
Prayer is for the holy.
I get bored.
If only I could pray like her. I guess I’m just a failure.
Surely God hears her prayers, but not mine because I don’t know how to start or what words to say and what if I get it all wrong?
I don’t have anything to say that’s important enough for God to hear.

Perhaps that’s how the disciples felt, when they overheard the Pharisees praying Shakespeare-quality performances every time they bowed their heads in the synagogue.

So, they asked Jesus, “Lord, teach us to pray….”

Maybe they expected a formula or a long lecture about the process of prayer or a complicated prayer cataloging system.

But Jesus did the opposite. The Lord’s Prayer fits into five simple verses, which Jesus prefaced with this:

And when you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by others. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward in full. But when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you. And when you pray, do not keep on babbling like pagans, for they think they will be heard because of their many words. Do not be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you ask him (Matthew 6:5-8 NIV).

Don’t pray to show off.

Don’t feel like you need to pray for a long time.

Keep it simple. Pray what’s on your heart, because God already knows what you’re thinking and feeling.

Over the years, I’ve kept prayers on Index cards, prayers in beautiful journals, prayers on my fridge, prayers in a Word Processor on my computer.

And you know what? All of them were prayer. All of them helped me rest in the presence of God, learning to trust Him with my needs and learning to listen to His voice.

As I continue this 12-month journey of pursuing the presence of Christ, I choose this month to linger here:

In the end, what matters about prayer isn’t how we pray, it’s that we actually do it.

That’s what I’m thinking….Now it’s your turn:

Has prayer ever seemed complicated or difficult to you? What do you want to learn most about prayer? What’s the best advice about prayer you’ve ever been given? What have you found that works?

To read more about this 12-month journey of pursuing the presence of Christ, you can follow the links below! Won’t you join me next month as I focus on Praying Simply?

Pursuing His Presence: Because Being Still Is Not Enough

January 31, 20141 Comment

I found her with untied tap shoes on her feet and eyes red from crying.

We zipped into the ballet studio, one mom and three girls (plus one baby boy) on a mission.

Three daughters in four back-to-back and sometimes overlapping dance classes during observation week. This means instead of huddling in my minivan or zooming around town doing errands in between classes, I sat in the corner of class taking pictures.

We all piled into my youngest daughter’s class except for my tap-dancing girl who left to change into her tap-tap-tappy shoes. I watched the clock carefully and slipped out just in time to check on her before her tap class began.

She wiped her eyes and explained, “I couldn’t get the ribbons on my shoes tied and I didn’t have anyone to help me….”

I tie the ribbons swiftly and then smooth down her hair with my hand. Then I say it so she knows it’s not just about shoes anymore:

You didn’t trust me to come help you. I knew you’d need help and I came just in time.

She’d been frantic and upset and all along I had a plan for her rescue and I was right on time, not a second too late.

So, all her fretting had been unnecessary drama.

And when is fretting not?

I started this year with intentionality: 12 months of pursuing the presence of Christ in the middle of the noise, mess, and busyness of life. Today, I finish January’s journey, learning to be still and know that He is God.

For months, I dreaded this start to the year, knowing it would be the busiest and craziest of our busy and crazy schedule. I feared the stress—-as in, tearful eyes, breathless suffocation just thinking about it.

But here we are. We made it. God is gracious. When I felt that familiar strangulation of fear, I heard that still and small reminder: Don’t worry about that. Just think about today.

So I did.

And, as much as I whine perhaps about winter, the overload of snow days has given me unexpected rest when we needed it most.

God planned the perfect rescue at the perfect moment for me all along, but I had been fretting and worrying.

Why?

Because I didn’t trust Him.

So often, we read that familiar Psalm—-BE STILL and know—and we focus on the stillness (Psalm 46:10).

Yes, stop with the flustered activity, the desperate attempts to fix things on our own, the frantic search for help from everyone except the only One who can truly save….

“Cease striving” it says in the NASB.

So, for a moment we pause.

Here’s what I’ve learned this month, though—“Being still” is not enough. It simply tells me what not to do.

I can’t forget that after I’ve ceased that striving and calmed my heart, God tells me what I should be doing in the stillness:

Know Him, Know He is God, Know that He’s got this under control and I can rest in the knowing that He cares for me.

Ann Voskamp reminds me of this….to remember He is I AM. His very name is the reminder of His Presence here in this present moment.

Like Moses, I’ve asked in the boldest of ways that God will show me His Glory this year. And, like Moses, I’ve told God that I don’t want to move from this place until His presence will go with me.

So, like Moses standing there on a holy mountain before a Holy God, I pray this also:

If you are pleased with me, teach me your ways so I may know you and continue to find favor with you (Exodus 33:13).

Because, God, in order to dwell in Your presence day after hectic day, I must be still and know You more, know You as I AM, know You as God present with me.

To read more about this 12-month journey of pursuing the presence of Christ, you can follow the links below! Won’t you join me next month as I focus on Praying Simply?

Maybe you’re in a tropical paradise…but I’m looking at snow

January 29, 20141 Comment

It may be warm where you are today. Maybe you’re all toasty and sitting out on your back deck to soak up some sunshine.

But not here.

So, don’t make us all jealous with your stories of tropical heaven.

We’re having a snow day. That means taking it slow, enjoying relax time.

It also means huge piles of dripping wet outerwear piled on my laundry room floor and frequent requests from my children that we make snow cream.

While I go play winter mom for the day, I hope you’ll enjoy these 10 Bible verses about snow in the Bible and the reminder that God uses this world of ours, this daily life, this freshly fallen snow to reveal Himself to us. We look out the window at the sun making the snow glisten and remember this:

God forgives His people, shows mercy, washes that sin right out of a repentant heart.

God washes the world with His Word and refreshes the weary.

The Son of God will gleam so bright when we see Him, that whitest of whites and we’ll fall down in awe of His glory.

Psalm 51:7 NASB
Purify me with hyssop, and I shall be clean;
Wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow.
Psalm 147:16-18 NASB
He gives snow like wool;
He scatters the frost like ashes.
He casts forth His ice as fragments;
Who can stand before His cold?
He sends forth His word and melts them;
He causes His wind to blow and the waters to flow.
Psalm 148:7-8 NASB
Praise the Lord from the earth,
Sea monsters and all deeps;
Fire and hail, snow and clouds;
Stormy wind, fulfilling His word
Proverbs 25:13 NASB
Like the cold of snow in the time of harvest
Is a faithful messenger to those who send him,
For he refreshes the soul of his masters.
Proverbs 31:21 NASB
She is not afraid of the snow for her household,
For all her household are clothed with scarlet.
Isaiah 1:18 NASB
“Come now, and let us reason together,”
Says the Lord,
“Though your sins are as scarlet,
They will be as white as snow;
Though they are red like crimson,
They will be like wool.
Isaiah 55:10-11 NASB
For as the rain and the snow come down from heaven,
And do not return there without watering the earth
And making it bear and sprout,
And furnishing seed to the sower and bread to the eater;
So will My word be which goes forth from My mouth;
It will not return to Me empty,
Without accomplishing what I desire,
And without succeeding in the matter for which I sent it.
Lamentations 4:7 NASB
Her consecrated ones were purer than snow,
They were whiter than milk;
They were more ruddy inbody than corals,
Their polishing was like lapis lazuli.
Daniel 7:9 NASB
“I kept looking
Until thrones were set up,
And the Ancient of Days took His seat;
His vesture was like white snow
And the hair of His head like pure wool.
His throne was ablaze with flames,
Its wheels were a burning fire.
Revelation 1:14 NASB
His head and His hair were white like white wool, like snow; and His eyes were like a flame of fire.

I Probably Have a Monkey in My Purse, Too

January 27, 2014Leave a comment

About two years ago, I had to whisk my youngest daughter to the emergency room at 10:00 at night because she gashed her head climbing IN to her crib on her own (long story). So, I performed the super-human feat of entertaining her for three hours in the waiting room with the items in my purse while the triage team pretended we weren’t there.

After frantically rummaging in the mom-bag that night, I discovered:

Two miniature My Little Ponies and a pony-sized hair brush.
A green crayon (miraculously not broken!) and some used envelopes for her to color on.
Two children’s books I was supposed to return to the public library and forgot about.

I had no smart phone, no Kindle, iPad, LeapPad or other source of electronic babysitting.

Three hours of entertaining a child with a still-bleeding head wound depended on me NOT cleaning out my purse.

I knew there was an excuse for that!

So, when one of you recommended Jessie Clemence’s book, There’s a Green Plastic Monkey in My Purse, for my summer reading list, I thought —Yes!!!! I probably have a green plastic monkey in my purse, too!! We could be best friends.

Then I found out that it really is a small world after all because Jessie’s publisher is the same as my publisher and, not only that, but she rocked my world by reading my own little book.

And then she asked to interview me for her blog and I felt like I’d hit the super big-time because I was actually talking to a published author. Sadly, it was over e-mail, so I couldn’t ask her for an autograph. But, then, she lives where the snow drifts are currently piled up several feet, so chatting via e-mail definitely seemed like the best option.

I hope you’ll hop on over to her site today and find out all the things you wanted to know about me, but didn’t ever think to ask. And check out Jessie’s very funny, encouraging and insightful blog while you’re there!

You can click here to check out her post: Let’s Chat With Heather C. King!

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.

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

January 24, 20142 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.

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?

Will you still love me after four kids, a minivan, and a mortgage?

January 22, 2014January 23, 20147 Comments

I made the list when I was, oh, 14-years-old or so.

With cramped cursive letters, I wrote in my journal:

Things I Want My Husband to Be Like

Then I divided the list into “Non-negotiables” and “Negotiables.” Or”Requirements” versus “Desires.” Or some other dual-heading system like that.

Because even then I was neurotic about list-making.

I was spiritual about it, of course. I prayed before making the list and then again afterward.

Even though I can’t find the list anymore in my pile of teenage journals, I still remember most of the items on there.

Non-negotiables:

Not just a nominal Christian, but someone who is passionate about God and His Word and is actively using his spiritual gifts to praise God and minister to others.
Someone I can respect intellectually.
No substance abuse issues.
Faithful.
Hard working.
Unselfish.
Calm without problems controlling his anger.

Negotiables:

Please, God, can he play the guitar since I play the piano?
I kind of like blue eyes.

Amen.

Fourteen years ago, I married this blue-eyed, guitar-playing man who was everything on my list and so much more.

He’s the only guy I ever dated. The only man I’ve ever kissed or held hands with or told, “I love you.” After all, not many men would live up to “The List.”

And I’ll confess it.

I still get all weepy every….single….time he weaves his fingers through mine and prays with me.

I’m still his biggest fan whether he’s on the stage acting in a play or grabbing his guitar and stepping up to the mic to lead worship at our church.

And when he reaches out and places his hand on mine when we’re driving around town in our minivan with four kids (possibly screaming, singing, fighting, or laughing) in the back seats, my heart totally stops for a second or two.

I pretty much still have a teenage crush on this guy.

Back when I was making my ‘husband list,’ I was thinking things like:

What kind of guy would I want to spend the rest of my life with?

Who do I want to date forever?

Whose eyes do I want to gaze into when sitting at a candlelit table?

But I wasn’t thinking this.

Who will give me grace when I’m grumpy?

Who will see the ugliest parts of my heart and dare to love me anyway?

Who will watch me push a baby out of my body or see the surgical scar from a C-section…or see me on days when I’m covered in baby spit-up, child-vomit, or other bodily fluids from my kids and still make me feel beautiful?

Who will crawl under our house multiple times in January during a massive plumbing failure to make sure our pipes aren’t clogged and then call the septic guys and take off a day of work so he can be there to talk to them as they drain out our clogged and filled septic tank? (True story).

One day you just wake up and you’re the one with the minivan, the mortgage, a few extra pounds, gray hair, and four kids.

So, I’m so thankful I didn’t marry someone I could only do romance with, but someone I could do life with, as well.

After all, you can do beautiful with most anybody; it takes someone special to plow through the sludge with you.

In his book, Sacred Marriage, Gary Thomas writes:

Marriage can be that holy place, the site of a relationship that proclaims God’s love to the world.

Paul said it this way:

Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the word, and to present her to himself as a radiant church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless (Ephesians 5:25-27 NIV).

So, maybe this is what should have been on my list all along: At the end of the day, people should see my marriage and say, “Wow, look at the faithful, unselfish, sacrificial, gracious way that God loves the church!”

And here on my 14th wedding anniversary I’m remembering this: marriage isn’t just a secondary something I do while I minister to God elsewhere. Marriage is my ministry, my sacred calling, the workshop God uses to make me more like Christ, and the way He can use me to show God’s love to my husband, my children, and to the world.

If you knew a young woman who was making “a list” of qualities to look for in a husband, what would you suggest she put on that list?

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.

Creating a Culture of Grace in the Home

January 20, 2014January 23, 20142 Comments

My dad was a military man whose father was a military man.

Sometimes, his boot camp methods made it home.

Like the time he woke us all up after we’d gone to sleep, lined us up in the kitchen while we were half-dazed from sleep still, and interrogated us (yelled) over who put the jelly jar back in the fridge without wiping down the outside of the jar first.

Or the time he put all us kids and a baseball bat in a bedroom and told us to fight it out until someone confessed to whatever horrible crime had been committed.

Or the many threats of polygraph tests and elaborate forensic schemes to uncover a culprit or that everyone would be punished severely until someone took the blame.

This was the discipline he knew, so this was the discipline he gave.

I’m a mom. I know the importance of discipline to direct the hearts and minds of our kids. I want my children to learn personal responsibility and the nature of consequences for poor decisions.

But I also know something else….

Our homes need grace.

Not parents who ignore the issues, or who are uninvolved or lazy and can’t be bothered, or who don’t want to follow through with training and right discipline.

Or spouses who give up, or grow bitter, and don’t care enough to talk it out and find a way to grow closer instead of grow apathetic.

No, this: Heaping portions of deliberate grace.

The urge is there, of course.

When my wayward cat dashes out the back door for yet another jaunt through the woods, we want to know….

Who didn’t shut the door? Who was the last one in the house?

Who is to blame for this?

A drain gets clogged and we want to assign responsibility.

Who isn’t following proper plumbing protocol?

Who is to blame for this?

Blame. We want to assign blame. We want someone to fess up.

But so often that just pushes the guilt around, and our kids tremble like Adam and Eve in the Garden, pointing fingers, making accusations. (This woman you gave me. That serpent who lied.)

She did it.

No it was her.

I only did it because she told me to.

Sometimes, truthfully, when we’re stressed and tired and overcome, it becomes less about lovingly correcting character. It’s needing an outlet for the anger of the moment and placing a cumbersome load of guilt onto the shoulders of a kid or even a spouse who’ll be crushed by the weight.

It takes a discerning mom to know the difference:

When to assign the consequences of loving discipline.

And when to hold a repentant child close….or one who simply made a childish, foolish, costly mistake….and whisper, “I forgive you. It’s okay. Now you know what to do next time.”

Jesus told his disciples:

Bring health to the sick. Raise the dead. Touch the untouchables. Kick out the demons. You have been treated generously, so live generously (Matthew 10:8 MSG).

In the NLT, I read:

“Give as freely as you have received” Matthew 10:8 NLT

And Paul said this:

And be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving one another, just as God also forgave you in Christ (Ephesians 4:32 HCSB).

The Message says it here:

Forgive one another as quickly and thoroughly as God in Christ forgave you. Ephesians 4:32 MSG

Don’t be stingy about this. Give mercy, give grace, give healing, give freedom, because I’ve given all that to you. I’ve poured it down in a shower of undeserved blessing on your heads, just drenched your soul deep-down with my love.

So, don’t dispense grace to others with rations of tiny drops or an insufficient trickle.

We’re grace-givers because we’re grace-receivers. We’re human. We sin. We say the wrong thing. We get snippy or react in frustration. We forget. We make a bad choice. We break things. We lose things.

Sometimes we make a right awful mess.

But I want to be a family that “does grace and second chances.”

That means correcting and instructing my children when necessary, delving in deep to the sludge of sin, assigning right consequences when needed and sticking with them.

Yet, it also means knowing their hearts well enough to respond when they need to see Jesus-grace in me. See how He forgave a mob of murderers screaming at the foot of His own cross. See how everyone needs mercy sometimes.

It’s not always assigning the blame that matters.

It’s about teaching them to make a better choice in the future.

More than that: It’s about leading them to Jesus.

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.

Heather C. King – Room to Breathe

"He's solid rock under my feet, breathing room for my soul" Psalm 62:1-2 (MSG).

Category: Thoughts from my Quiet Time

Will you join me in prayer this week?

Ask Me More: Why are you afraid?

Five Simple Ways to Remember to Pray for Others

Does prayer really have to be that complicated?

Pursuing His Presence: Because Being Still Is Not Enough

Maybe you’re in a tropical paradise…but I’m looking at snow

I Probably Have a Monkey in My Purse, Too

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

Will you still love me after four kids, a minivan, and a mortgage?

Creating a Culture of Grace in the Home

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