Tag: Moses

It’s Not Business; It’s Personal

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The letter arrived in a crisp white envelope with a typed address….for my six-year-old.

Obviously, this wasn’t a card or drawing from a school friend or a birthday invitation from a classmate.  This looked like official business.

I opened the envelope and was amused to find them asking her to contribute to their nonprofit organization.  If she made a generous donation of $50 to their worthy cause, they would send her a beautiful and stylish tote bag.

I’m sure she’s just dying to empty her piggy bank of pennies and send them right along.

Clearly, they didn’t know this name in their database belongs to a six-year-old first grader who would prefer to spend her money on fun-shaped erasers and colorful pens at the school book fair next week.

That’s because it wasn’t a personal message.

It was business, just business.  She was a name on a computer screen that ended up as a name on a form letter.

In a world of catalogs and bills, form letters and political mailers, opening the mail box and finding a handwritten note from a friend surprises us.  It’s the rare joy of thoughtfulness and kindness in a mostly business society.

So sometimes we think that our God is a mostly business God, too: That somehow He just pushes His agenda on us without concern for our feelings or best interest.

Or perhaps we think that He’s juggling so many crises–wars and famines and terror—and how could He have time for anything else?  And the people, so many people, how could He possibly care about one little insignificant individual like me?

Maybe we feel like little more than a typewritten name on a divine form letter.

Yet in a mostly business world, we have an amazingly personal God.

He calls us by name and knows our innermost thoughts, saw us in our mother’s wombs and designed a plan for us from the beginning. 

He was not a Savior from afar, but God who walked among us, suffered among us, and knows what it is like to live out life in this world.

This was His reminder to the nation of Israel as they stood on the edges of the Promised Land, a people wandering long and whose last memory of a “home” was a land of slavery.

God said:

So be strong and courageous! Do not be afraid and do not panic before them. For the Lord your God will personally go ahead of you. He will neither fail you nor abandon you….Do not be afraid or discouraged, for the Lord will personally go ahead of you. He will be with you; he will neither fail you nor abandon you” (Deut. 31:6, 8).

He didn’t set them on a path and then abandon them to the journey.  God was personally with them, personally going before them, personally concerned about them.

And for Joshua, the newly appointed leader of this wayward and difficult people, God’s message was specific and consistent.

It began with God’s instruction to Moses on how to hand over of the staff to his protege, not with lectures and correction, but with encouragement:

Instead, your assistant, Joshua son of Nun, will lead the people into the land. Encourage him, for he will lead Israel as they take possession of it (Deut. 1:38).  Instead, commission josh1,9Joshua and encourage and strengthen him, for he will lead the people across the Jordan. He will give them all the land you now see before you as their possession (Deut. 3:28).

God repeats the message again and again, relentlessly, not just through Moses, but with His very own words—“be strong and courageous…Do not be afraid or discouraged, for the Lord your God is with you wherever you go” (Joshua 1:9).

God didn’t have to say that.  He could have issued commands from afar, distant and cold.

But God knew Joshua personally. He knew exactly how it felt to step into Moses’s gigantic sandals.  He knew just how high those walls of Jericho were and how much courage it would take to command the people.

God knew the one message that Joshua personally needed to hear, not once, but repeatedly: Do not be afraid.

This is the blessing for us, incredible as it is, as hard as it is at times to feel with our emotions:

God knows us personally, too.  He knows exactly what obstacles we’ll encounter and the precise insecurities and fears that will beat down our faith.  He knows the days we walk weary and the nights we flop into bed discouraged.  He knows the immensity of the need and how insufficient our provisions appear.

And He “will personally go ahead for you.  He will neither fail nor abandon you….” so do not be afraid.

That’s not a business slogan.  That’s a personal guarantee.
 

Sick Days, Coveting and a Case of Leprosy

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My three-year-old had been sleeping for hours curled up on the sofa.  We all tiptoed and whispered around her “sick bed,” trying not to wake or disturb her.

Then my six-year-old asked, “Mom, if she’s still sick on Tuesday, will she have to go to school?”thermometer

“No, babe, kids can’t go to school when they have a fever like this.”

“Oh man, she’s lucky.  I wish I didn’t have to go to school.”

“Lucky?”

I instantly pointed out the drawback.  It doesn’t do much good to stay home from school when you’re too sick to enjoy it.  It’s not like she’s playing. She’s sleeping the day away on the sofa, feeling miserable and uncomfortable.

“Oh.”

It’s not surprising, really, how she saw the benefit so clearly and didn’t see the cost.  We have the same blinders on often enough.

We think our friend is “lucky” or maybe it seems a bit unfair, how easy she’s got it, how blessed she is, how much she has, how happy….

And the wishing starts so simply, “I wish….I had her house, her marriage, her job, her ministry, successful kids, healthy kids, luxury vacations, that wardrobe, those spiritual gifts.”

They seem, after all, like benefits without cost, clearly good things without downsides or drawbacks.

Yet, no matter how clearly we think we see the situation or how well we know what another person’s life is truly like, we’re really just peering in through the public-access windows, seeing what they choose to let us see.

We don’t know what happens behind the closed doors of their homes.  We don’t know what struggles they endured in order to build a marriage so strong.  We don’t know how much effort it took to parent her children.  We don’t know about the criticism she endures as the consequence of her ministry or the battles she’s fought or the self-discipline it took.

We don’t often see the bad days, the hard times, the sacrifices, the mistakes, the overcoming.  We see the Facebook posts and Pinterest pictures of success stories and not so much the moments when it isn’t so perfect.

The truth is that we don’t know, not really, what anyone else’s life entails, but God does.  He’s specifically designed her for that life and you for yours, and the moment we start glamorizing or over-romanticizing another’s lot is when jealousy is at work.

It sure is hard to be grateful for God’s gifts to us when we’re drooling over His gifts to another.

This coveting of others conveniently fails to consider that the things we want are a package deal.  We can’t just want good and not the bad, the day off of school without the sickness, the power without the responsibility, the success without the sacrifice.

Miriam and Aaron didn’t understand this.  They looked over Moses’s life as leader of the Jewish people and envied his position as the Lord’s anointed.  They criticized him and started questioning him publicly: “Has the Lord spoken only through Moses? Hasn’t he spoken through us, too?”  (Numbers 12:2).

Oh sure, they wanted to feel set apart by God like Moses was.  They wanted to be in charge, receive recognition, have power and the anointing of God.

What could be so wrong with that?

But did they consider that Moses had to handle the daily (yes, daily!) complaints and whining of a rebellious people, who so quickly forgot the miracles God had done for them?  Did they think about what it felt like to bear the brunt of criticism and rebellions?  Were they really willing to get down on their knees and put their own lives on the line in order to intercede for the unworthy nation?

Moses hardly had a cushy desk job.

Still, Aaron and Miriam, eyes closed tight to the difficulties, decided they should have the same position as Moses.

And Moses, who was “very humble—more humble than any other person on earth” (Numbers 12:3), didn’t argue with them.

But God did.  He called Miriam and Aaron out, told the whole community why Moses was specially anointed, and then afflicted Miriam with leprosy as punishment.  If only they had been content with the ministry God had given them instead of coveting that of another.

If only we could be so content.

Thank You, God, for allowing us the blessing and responsibility of this life and not the life of anyone else; not their marriage, friendships, children, money, home, car, jobs, ministry, looks, spiritual gifts, popularity, not any of it.

That blessing you’ve been given, that life you have, that’s what we cherish and thank God for because it’s the one He specifically designed for you—both the good things and the hard things.  The weight of anyone else’s life would crush you, but this load is the one He’s prepared you to carry and the one He’s carrying with you.

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 November 2013!  To read more devotionals by Heather King, click here.

Copyright © 2013 Heather King

Dealing With Gnats and Other Problems

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She stood at the top of the slide pointing them out to me and I stood at the bottom of the slide smashing the gnats.010

When it’s over 70 degrees outside in the middle of winter, you play hookie from chores and pop your preschooler into the minivan for an afternoon at the park.  We had rushed up the hill to the playground and she tried the swings and the sandbox and the seesaw (which exhausts this mommy who has to do all the see-sawing with my own muscles).

When she climbed to the top of the slide, though, she complained about all the bees…or were they ants?

“Gnats,” I tell her.  Fifty of them at least dotted all along the yellow slide.  The closer you looked, the more you saw.

“They’ll bite me,” she whined.

I reassured her.  Gnats are a pesky, annoying nuisance, but hardly a health hazard or a reason to fear the slide.  But she stood there paralyzed, so I wiped them away.

When she climbed up again for another slide down, though, they were back.  Or, to be more accurate, fifty other gnats had landed.

We repeated it relentlessly.  I smooshed bugs.  She slid down.  She climbed back up.  I smooshed more bugs.

In between, I swatted the pests away from my face.

Like most kids, I spent a week during several summers away at camp and the line for the dining hall there at this camp along the Potomac River stretched outside.  We lined up morning, noon and night for our meals, knowing one thing for sure:

The gnats would drive us crazy.

They swarmed in tiny black clouds around us.  Some of the other girls started walking around with one hand raised up on top of their heads, looking like a rooster with feathers all fanned out.

“Gnats always go to the highest part of your body,” they explained, all-knowing as sixth grade girls always are.

I never was sure if walking around with a hand on top of my head really kept the gnats from swarming around my face.

Perhaps it really was as ineffective as squashing the gnats on the playground slide over and over again only to watch more land within seconds.

But when you’re bothered or stressed, anxious, annoyed, pestered, worried and troubled, solutions are what you seek–no matter how ridiculous or sane.

Unfortunately, sometimes God is the last solution we seek to the messes we find ourselves in.

Certainly for Pharaoh, the pattern of the plagues was clear (at least to us) and yet he was desperate to find a solution outside of God.

Over and over, Moses asked for the deliverance of God’s people.
Pharaoh refused.
A plague of boils, blood, frogs, gnats or worse descended on the Egyptians.
Pharaoh asked Moses to pray.
The plague ceased.

So, when “gnats infested the entire land, covering the Egyptians and their animals.  All the dust in the land of Egypt turned into gnats,” the solution to us seems obvious (Exodus 8:17).

Pray Pharaoh.  Pray hard.  Step down off that mighty Egyptian throne, throw yourself on God’s mercy, so abundant, so longsuffering.  Bow that head and bend that knee in humility to God and God alone and obey His Word.

But that turning aside from self, that relinquishing of personal programs and plans and the solutions you’ve charted out so carefully takes humility.  It means confessing the hard-to-swallow truth.

I can’t do this on my own.

God, please help me.

Even Pharaoh’s magicians exclaimed, “This is the finger of God!”  But he resisted.  That proud earthly king would rather breathe in gnats and swallow gnats and swat gnats away from his face and sleep with gnats rather than rely on the mercy of a Merciful but Mighty God.

Oh, the humbling.  For Egyptians who prided themselves on hygiene and personal cleanliness, the perpetual buzz of pests must have been the ultimate pride destruction.

Still Pharaoh resisted.

Still we resist at times, too. We’re puzzling out our problem and feeling the shame of broken relationships, broken marriages, broken finances, broken lives, broken ministries, broken hearts, brokenness.

And what God wants is for us to just ask Him, to turn to Him first, to confess that we’ve messed up and to do things His way this time.

To pray and pray hard.  To bow that head and bend that knee.  To lay it all out at His nail-scarred feet and say what’s true:

I can’t do this on my own.

God, please help me.

Oh yes, we pray: “Let Your mercy, O Lord, be upon us, just as we hope in You” (Psalm 33:22 NKJV).

Kyrie eleison.  “Lord, have mercy.”

Amen and amen.

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

Glowing

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Originally posted on January 11, 2012

“When they saw the courage of Peter and John and realized that they were unschooled, ordinary men, they were astonished and they took note that these men had been with Jesus” (Acts 4:13)

I think I must have a sign on me when I shop at Wal-Mart.  It says, “I don’t work here, but I can help you.”

I don’t mind really.  There’s something satisfying about knowing the aisle for laundry soap and the one for body soap and that they are about a mile walk away from one another.  Or that there’s tape in hardware and different tape in stationery.

Perhaps it’s that I usually shop with at least one of my kids.  Strangers probably see me and think, “She has children. I bet she’s in here ALL the time.  I’ll ask her where to find stuff.”

It seemed natural enough until I realized just how familiar I was with the Wal-Mart after trekking there more times than I’d like to admit every week for almost eight years.

I glanced down at my shopping list one day and discovered I had automatically organized it by quadrants of the store.  Every item was listed in the order I would find it on my usual route.

Now that’s a lot of time in Wal-Mart.

The time we spend anywhere shows up in our lives.  We can’t hide our influences or interests or the habits and relationships that take up the most space on our calendar. Our conversation is flavored, our mannerisms influenced, our choices altered by the way we spend our days.

It was the same for the disciples.

After Jesus’s death, resurrection and ascension to heaven, these Christ-followers became quite the trouble-makers.  They preached sermons and performed miracles all in the name of Jesus, to the dismay of the Sanhedrin or religious leaders, who thought that a dead Jesus was a problem solved.

When Peter and John were arrested and stood before the Sanhedrin, Peter—the guy arrested for giving sermons about Jesus— decided to give another sermon about Jesus.

Bold, huh?

He spoke the bottom line truth: “Salvation is found in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given to mankind by which we must be saved” (Acts 4:12).

Was this a fisherman talking?  Was this the guy who had denied Jesus three times, now preaching salvation through the crucified Jesus to a group of men who could crucify him, too?

The Sanhedrin wondered the same thing: “When they saw the courage of Peter and John and realized that they were unschooled, ordinary men, they were astonished and they took note that these men had been with Jesus” (Acts 4:13)

You couldn’t miss the miraculous change in them. “These men had been with Jesus.”  And it showed.

It should be that evident in our lives also.  Our time praying and meditating on His Word should cause a life-revolution.  People should see us and think, “I bet she knows where to find hope, joy and peace.”  They should witness the changes in us over time and think, “Clearly she’s been with the Lord.”

For Peter and John, this brought life change—spiritual insight and boldness.

For Moses, time with God impacted Him physically.  All those days in the presence of God’s glory on the mountain made his face glow–literally.  And he couldn’t cover it up with some Covergirl face powder.  Even Mary Kay couldn’t do the trick.

It was so distracting to see this glow-in-the-dark face and how it faded over time, that Moses began wearing a veil to hide it.

Paul tells us that we glow like that, too, when we’ve been with God.

Yet, he also tells us that unlike Moses, there’s no reason for us to hide the glow of glory that comes from God’s presence.  In 2 Corinthians Paul writes:

And we all, who with unveiled faces contemplate the Lord’s glory, are being transformed into His image with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit (2 Corinthians 3:18).

Unlike Moses, our faces are unveiled so that all can see the transformation God works in us over time, making us ever more like His Son.  This change only happens, though, when we’ve been with Jesus.

People will be able to tell where we’re spending our time, what’s occupying our thoughts, and what our priorities are.  If it’s not God, that will show up on our faces and in our lives, too.

But I want my face to glow with God’s glory.  I want my life to be a like a sign that says, “This girl has been with Jesus.”

Just like Peter and John.   Just like Moses.  Just like Paul.  When we spend time with Christ our life will glow as we reflect Him.

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

Resting is Just a Part of Moving

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It’s Monday and I already feel behind for the week.

The laundry is spinning, shushing it’s way through washing machine cycles and dryer loads.

The dishwasher is halfway empty.  I’ve been grabbing clean plates and cups all morning as I walk by.  Grab and stash in the cabinet, go about my business and return for more on the next pass.

My daughter’s arts and crafts-filled Sunday afternoon has left a Monday morning mess.  Scraps of paper and felt dot the living room and dining room carpet. Popsicle sticks are scattered here and there on desks and tables in the playroom.  There’s a pile of papers topped by markers and scissors, and glue sticks overflow onto the floor.

And the glitter.  Oh, the glitter.  Apparently, it fell.  Not in one easy-to-clean location, mind you.  It seems to have popped up in the air and thrown its contents across every surface in the playroom, which is now aglow.

I’ve been fielding phone calls and catching up on e-mail messages and social media all morning.

And I feel the crunch of time, the deadlines and the to-do list, and part of me feels frustrated and maybe a little breathless.

Deep down I want to blame the rest.

Why am I behind?  I reason it out.

Because I didn’t do any laundry yesterday.  Because I made origami cars instead of vacuuming.  Because I read my book instead of writing.  Because I take a break from social media (no Facebook browsing, no Twitter tweeting, no Pinterest pinning) one day a week.

I unplugged from busyness and plugged in to family and soul and beauty and joy and God…and rest.

Of course, I’ve thought it before.  I probably will fight the lie for a long time: If I just didn’t take that break once a week, I wouldn’t be so busy.

This resting is counterintuitive.  It isn’t what makes sense to me in my self-focused, rational way of looking at life.

And yet, it’s necessary.  This walking away, this stepping back, this slowing down, this breathing in and out, this ceasing activity, this stopping the rush, this halting of busyness….it’s worship.

It’s obedience.

It’s humility.

It’s trusting God to take care of my little world and the whole wide world without me, and realizing just this: the world spins on and moves along even when I take a break.  This is the shocking revelation that I need. It’s God, not me, that keeps it all going.

Without the rest, we wouldn’t really get very far anyway.  Oh sure, it seems to make sense.  Do laundry on Sunday so the basket isn’t so full on Monday.  Write on Sunday so Monday morning there’s less pressure to rush to the computer and type away.

And yet, how far would we really make it before we crashed?  How long could we go before our pride exploded and we forgot that God is really the one in control, so we ended up on our face in a forced and painful humbling?

The truth is that moving forward doesn’t require perpetual movement.  It demands moving when God says, “Move” and resting when God says, “Stop.”

After all, how far would Elijah have managed to run without the food, drink and rest the angel brought him before his journey?  (1 Kings 19).  How long could the disciples have ministered, traveling on foot and mobbed by crowds, without time away with Jesus?

How could Israel have made it to the Promised Land without seasons of rest by the mountain of the Lord, beside clean water, and with peace from their enemies?

Even when they were pursued by the Egyptians, facing opposition and recapturing, still God didn’t tell the Israelites to grab their handmade weapons and armor and strive against the enemy.

Instead, “Moses told the people, ‘Don’t be afraid. Just stand still and watch the Lord rescue you today. The Egyptians you see today will never be seen again. The Lord himself will fight for you. Just stay calm.'” (Exodus 14:13-14, NLT).

Stand still.  Just watch.  Stay calm.  Let the Lord fight for you.

Just rest in Him.

But they couldn’t stand there forever, looking at the Red Sea and never crossing over.  They had trusted God in the waiting.  Now they could trust Him in the moving:

“Then the Lord said to Moses, “Why are you crying out to me? Tell the people to get moving!” (Exodus 14:15 NLT).

So it is for us.  We trust Him in the waiting and in the resting.  We trust Him in the moving and the battle …. and the laundry, the dishes, the to-do lists, the emails, the phone calls, the meetings, the appointments, and the deadlines.

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

In the Splash Zone

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They wanted to be splashed.

That’s what my daughters said as we walked into the pavilion with risers, some of them marked “Splash Zone” and others unmarked, indicating the safer, dryer seating area.

There’s something about childhood that makes you love getting wet, especially when it’s a dolphin splashing her tail that’s sending a wave your way.

Sadly, most of us grow up and out of this urge to get splashed.  We start to climb a little higher to avoid the “Splash Zone,” to play it safe and mature and under control.

My kids, however, crowded into the front rows of seats with all the other excited children and joined in shouting for the dolphin to splash “over here, get me, don’t forget me!”

I may not be eager to get soaked at a dolphin show, but there’s one place where I’m climbing all over folks to sit up front and center.

I’ve been arriving early and often, staunchly guarding my seat until the largest wave of them all rises high over the edges of the pool and splashes down all over me, soaking me through so deeply that you could wring out my soul into a puddle on the ground.

I want a front row seat to God’s glory.  I want to see it, drench in it, feel it, and I don’t want to miss a single drop of His Spirit pouring down.  No playing it safe, comfortable or in control.  If the seats where I’m sitting aren’t marked with warning signs for the Splash Zone, I need to move down closer.

Others have longed for the front row seating for God’s glory.  Like Moses, of course, meeting with God on that holy mountain and asking with so much boldness I can’t even believe he dared to say it: “Show me Your glory.”

Ezekiel saw it and painted unimaginable pictures, trying to cram the glory of God into the confines of words, so unfitting and restrictive.  It was like a rainbow, like bronze, shining bright like a blazing fire.

What was it?

“It turned out to be the Glory of God!  When I saw all this, I fell to my knees, my face to the ground” (Ezekiel 1:28 MSG).

That’s what the uninhibited presence of God does, knocks us straight to the ground.  We can’t postulate and question it, hesitating: “I think this is what God is saying,” or “I think God is in this.”

When you’re sitting in the front row, you can’t mistake His glory.

Rick Warren wrote:

“What is the glory of God?  It is who God is.  It is the essence of his nature, the weight of his importance, the radiance of his splendor, the demonstration of his power, and the atmosphere of his presence.  God’s glory is the expression of his goodness and all his other intrinsic, external qualities” (The Purpose Driven Life, p. 56)

The beloved disciple John’s testimony was that of an eyewitness to this, saying, “We saw the glory with our own eyes, the one-of-a-kind glory, like Father, like Son” (John 1:14 MSG).

Trampling along after Jesus, James, Peter and John probably didn’t expect much on the day of the transfiguration. They’d taken that walk with Jesus many times.  And hadn’t they just totally messed up at the feeding of the 5000, underestimating Jesus’ ability to transform a meager lunch into a feast for thousands?

They certainly didn’t seem ready to glimpse heaven that day.  Yet, it was there on the Mount of Olives where they saw him no longer as God-man, but God and God alone in all of His divinity and light.

“They saw his glory,” and Peter, the master of understatement said, “Master, it is good for us to be here” (Luke 9:32, 33 NIV).

He’s right, you know.  It may be simple and straightforward, but it is good for us to be in the presence of God’s glory.

These close-knit trio of disciples had followed along after Jesus many times, climbing up the Mount of Olives to pray, taking time out of exhausting ministry to kneel in God’s presence.

But they didn’t see Christ transfigured every time.  That was a one-time event.

That means the Mount of Olives isn’t some magic formula for a God-sighting so much as a constant discipline of our faith.  It’s got to be a daily trek for us, a meeting place with God where we linger often and stubbornly climb even when things are difficult or dreary or we’ve failed.

In Streams in the Desert, L.B. Cowman wrote: “Every Christian should have his own Mount of Olives”

Because when God reveals His glory, we want to be there.  We won’t want to have missed out that day with excuses of busyness, fatigue, or shame.

I want a front row seat in the splash zone of His glory.  Don’t you?

Heather King is a wife, mom, Bible Study teacher, writer for www.myfrienddebbie.com 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.  To read more devotionals by Heather King, click here.

Remembering: One Lump or Two?

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Originally posted on August 3, 2011

My soul, wait in silence for God only,
For my hope is from Him.
Psalm 62:5

It’s my nightly routine.

Place favorite mug on the counter.
Heat up the water.
Lay tea bag in the mug.
Pour steaming hot water in and let it steep.
Add spoonfuls of sugar.  (Yummy and sweet).
Splash in some milk.

Evening tea.  It’s been years since I’ve gone to bed without drinking it and it’s become a sort of security blanket.  I’m not sure if I could sleep without a cup.

Even worse, maybe I’d lie awake just because the tea wasn’t in my favorite mug and instead dumped into some random coffee cup grabbed from the cupboard.  That’d be like someone trying to swap a precious teddy bear for some unfamiliar spare stashed at the bottom of the toy box.

Last night, I sat down to my steaming cup, took a sip,  . . .

gulped and grimaced.

Instead of sweet tea, I tasted bitterness.  I’d filled the sugar canister, but never spooned any sugar into my mug.

Have you ever been a little disappointed?  You hope for something sweet and taste undrinkable bitterness instead?

The Israelites wandered through the desert for three days, searching for water.  Each day, their hunt must have grown more desperate.  How long could they survive out there, moving through endless wilderness without water to drink?  And then they arrived at Marah and there was water and they felt that rush of joy that accompanies salvation!

But the water was bitter and undrinkable.  It seemed like cruel disappointment considering their true need.  They weren’t asking at that point for luxury; they were asking for necessary provision and it seemed like God had failed them.

Yet, there at Marah, “Moses cried out to the LORD, and the LORD showed him a piece of wood. He threw it into the water, and the water became fit to drink” (Exodus 15:25).

The Israelites placed their hope in their water-finding abilities.  They hoped for an oasis or a stream in the desert. And when they found what they had been looking for all along, they also discovered disappointment.

Moses placed his hope in God instead, knowing that even bitterness can be transformed into water for the thirsty.

When we place our hope in God, we will never be disappointed. But when we instead look for what we think we need, we misplace our hope in:

the job we think is secure
the financial answer to our bills
the debt program that’s going to transform our life
the 401K that’s going to make our retirement comfortable
the weight loss program that is going to make shedding the pounds easy
the husband who is going to make us feel loved and not lonely any more
the ministry that we can put our energies into
the friendship that makes us feel connected
the church with the programs we think will fit our needs

There are oh so many places to deposit our hope and each could yield bitter disappointment.  But the Psalmist wrote: “My soul, wait in silence for God only,
For my hope is from Him” (Psalm 62:5).

We wait for God only.  Not God plus the answer to our problem.  Not God and the life preserver from some friendly bystander who sees us drowning from the shore.

God.  And if He what He offers to us is a program or plan or a friend, then we accept His gift, but we never depend on the gift itself. 

We hope in God alone.  Only He can provide what we truly need.  And if it’s insufficient or bitter, He can transform it into plentiful abundance and sweet blessing, making “everything beautiful in its time” (Ecclesiastes 3:11).

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 © 2012 Heather King

Present and Accounted For

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“Where are you going, Mom?”

My three-year-old has a radar system that rings alarms and sets off alerts if there is a possibility that I am going out…and leaving her at home.

That morning, she had caught me slipping on my socks.  I reassured her, though, “Just putting on my socks because my feet are cold, baby girl.  I’m not going out.”

“You’re staying here?”
“Yes.”
“You’re not leaving?”
“No, sweetie. Mommy’s staying with you today.”

Seeing as how a hurricane raged off the coast of Virginia that morning, staying in seemed like a good idea.  We had stocked up water, canned food, and batteries and hunkered down until the storm passed.

She didn’t understand all that, though.  Snuggling in close to me, she pressed her cheek against mine and cooed, “Mommy, I stay with you.”

Of course, she can’t, not all the time, not forever, not every minute and each second of day after day after day.  But for this moment and surely in this storm, here I was snuggling with her and remaining present.

We sang it at church Sunday morning, leaving the weather reports and streaming satellite images about the approaching hurricane behind for a short time.  We gave praise, declaring, “You are My Shield, My strength, My Portion, Deliverer, My Shelter, Strong Tower, My very present help in time of need.”

This is our way of singing Psalm 46 back to God:

God is our refuge and strength,
an ever-present help in trouble.
  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 (Psalm 46:1-3). 

Normally, I sing this song imagining God as my Tower, my Shelter in the most fearsome storms.

But what good is a tower-of-brick if it isn’t nearby when you need to hide?  And what is the point of a refuge that is too far away to reach in times of distress?

It is God’s constant, faithful presence that makes Him effective as our Refuge and our Strength, our Defense and our Deliverer.

That is why “we will not fear,” not during storm or raging sea, or mountains crumbling or news reports of flooding and fire and disaster.

Because He is present.  Not just here in this moment and maybe leaving us later in the care of others while He slips out for a meeting or relaxes with friends or fills a cart with groceries at the local store.  We needn’t trip to His feet in alarm when He pulls on His socks or takes His jacket down from the pegs in the closet.

He is always, ever, constantly, faithfully, never-changing, perpetually, every second of every day present with us.

This means He didn’t close His eyes, turn His head, blink, snooze, or simply grow too distracted to care when the mountains crumbled and the waters roared.

No, our God doesn’t promise us a world without frightful shaking and uncertainty.  It’s a sin-plagued planet, aching and groaning for the perfection of eternity.  Hurting and death and sickness and tears are part of life here.

But He promises to be with us and be the strength and shelter we need for whatever rages outside.

Moses plead with God simply for this presence.  Days on that holy mountain, shining with reflected glory, and Moses still longed for more of God.

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

His presence.  Our rest.  Without Him, turmoil and worrying and stress.

Then Moses said to him, “If your Presence does not go with us, do not send us up from here. How will anyone know that you are pleased with me and with your people unless you go with us? What else will distinguish me and your people from all the other people on the face of the earth?” (Exodus 33:15-16).

Like Moses, we pray, knowing that without God’s presence, we are a mess and a disaster, and we are alone and lost, no different than those who don’t know Him at all.

His presence is what sets us apart.  That’s what gives us hope for each new day and peace and that’s what others should notice about us–Christ in us, the hope and glory.

Today is a day to praise God for His presence:

You Never Let Go (David Crowder* Band): “When clouds brought rain, And disaster came…When waters rose, And hope had flown.. Ever faithful, Ever true.  You I know.
You never let go

Made Me Glad (Hillsong): “He has delivered me from all fear; He has set my feet upon a rock. I will not be moved! I’ll say of the Lord, You are my Shield, my Strength, my Portion, Deliverer, my Shelter, Strong Tower, my very present help in time of need!”

Heather King is a wife, mom, Bible Study teacher, writer for www.myfrienddebbie.com 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.  To read more devotionals by Heather King, click here.

Copyright © 2012 Heather King

Weekend Rerun: I’m Not A Boy!

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I’m not a boy.
I’m not a good dancer.  I’m not easily offended.  I’m not a blonde or a red-head.
I’m not tall.
I’m not artistic.  I’m not quick to cry.
I’m not usually a fan of “chick flicks.”
I’m not much of a TV watcher.
I’m not from a small family.
I’m not a quick decision maker.
I’m not an extrovert.  I’m not athletic.  I’m not fond of “outside.”

We all define ourselves by lists of “I ams” and “I am nots.”

“Are you a Christian?”
I am.

“Are you fond of sports?”
I am not.

Is it any wonder that God has a list, too?  His “ams” and “am nots” through Scripture establish His character and give us reliable assurances in times of trouble.

We rest in safety because we know He is “I AM.”

It’s the most powerful declaration of God’s identity in Scripture, when He tells Moses His name: “I AM WHO I AM . . .This is my name forever, the name you shall call me from generation to generation” (Exodus 3:14, 15).

My Bible notes that His name could also be read as: “I WILL BE WHAT I WILL BE.”

He is I AM and I WILL BE.  He is eternal.  He has existed before our human history began and He has walked through the entirety of our time on this planet and will still remain forever.

So, we can trust Him.  We can place in His capable hands all that frightens us because He knows where we have come from and where we are headed.

It’s more than that.  He tells us:

  • “I AM with you” (Genesis 26:24).
  • “I AM God Almighty” (Genesis 35:11).
  • “I AM the LORD, who heals you” (Exodus 15:26).
  • “I AM the LORD your God” (Exodus 16:12).
  • “I, the LORD your God, am holy” (Leviticus 19:2).
  • “For I AM the LORD your God, the Holy One of Israel, your Savior” (Isaiah 43:3).
  • “I AM the LORD, and there is no other; apart from me there is no God” (Isaiah 45:5).
  • “I AM the LORD your God, who teaches you what is best for you, who directs you in the way you should go.” (Isaiah 48:17).
  • “I AM the LORD your God, who stirs up the sea so that its waves roar—the Lord Almighty is His name” (Isaiah 51:15).

Can you read through this list of what God says about Himself, His “I ams” and not be in awe, not be filled with the desire to worship, not be comforted?

He is with you, there in the places of hurt and despair.  He heals you.  He is holy.  He is your Savior, pulling you out of the pit and redeeming you through the blood of His Son.  He is the only God.  He directs our steps.  He is Lord Almighty, in control of all creation, including the circumstances you find yourself in.

Praise God!

He doesn’t stop there, though.  He also has “am nots.”  Just as powerful, these are declarations of His dominion over all the fake gods that vie for our worship.

In Daniel 2:11, the magicians and advisers of King Nebuchadnezzar whine that no one can possibly tell the king what he dreamt except the gods, and “they do not live among humans.”

Not our God.  He made His dwelling among His people, directing them to “make a sanctuary for me, and I will dwell among them” (Exodus 25:8).  He abandoned the glories of heaven and “The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us” (John 1:14).

He can say, “I am not distant from you.”

In Psalm 135:15-18, the Psalmist writes:

The idols of the nations are silver and gold, made by the hands of men.  They have mouths, but cannot speak; eyes, but they cannot see; they have ears, but cannot hear nor is the breath in their mouths.

Not our God.

Our God is the Shepherd who speaks to His sheep (John 10:27).  He is the God who sees us (Genesis 16:13) and hears our voices when we call to Him (Psalm 5:3).

He can say, “I am not ignorant of your need .”

And our God “is not human, that he should lie, not a human being, that he should change his mind. Does he speak and then not act? Does he promise and not fulfill?” (Numbers 23:19).

Colin Urquhart wrote, “God is the God of promise.  He keeps His word even when that seems impossible.”

He can say, “I am not a promise-breaker.”

It may feel difficult at times to believe in God’s nearness, responsiveness, concern, love and faithfulness because we are immersed in a pit of circumstances that blocks our view of Him.  And yet, He tells us all the things He is and all the things He is not and it is that Scriptural assurance of His character to which we cling.

We can rest in safety knowing that He is I AM.  We can rest in safety knowing all that He is not.

Heather King is a wife, mom, Bible Study teacher, writer for www.myfrienddebbie.com 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 © 2012 Heather King

Did Jesus Get Splinters?

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“Mom, did Jesus get splinters from the cross?”

My daughter doesn’t really know how to whisper.  She somehow manages to make her voice breathy and full of air, but still push the words out with a great deal of volume.

I mentally apologized to the audience members in front of us and behind us, who had come that night to see the Ballet Magnificat dance in worship and to tell the Exodus story.

But then the dancers surprised us.  They fast-forwarded in time to our ultimate Deliverer, Jesus Christ, who sacrificed Himself to give us freedom from slavery to sin.

There He was mocked and scorned by the crowd.
There He was beaten and nailed.
There He was hoisted onto the weathered wood and left to die.
There He cried out in pain.
There He died.

You never know what might make an impression on a child. I had already answered  whispered questions about slavery in Egypt earlier in the program.

Because, as many times as we had talked about the story and read the account in the children’s Bible . . . . and as often as my daughter had heard it in Sunday School and Children’s Church and Awana . . . somehow she had missed the part of slavery where it’s horrible and evil and frightening and relentless and hard and unfair and cruel.

So, the sound of the whip cracking and the way the slaves dropped to the ground in fatigue and despair shocked her.

You mean “slavery” is this?  It’s not just a happy little Jewish community living in tiny houses on the outskirts of Egyptian cities?

No, my baby girl.  Slavery is a pharaoh ordering that every male baby be killed at birth.  It’s waking up every morning to labor hard and long for someone else, no freedom to worship or rise above or choose for yourself or provide for your family.  It’s whips and rods and beatings and shame and being less than.

Why are the slaves working so hard, Mom?  Why is he beating them, Mom?  Why do they look so tired, Mom?

All whispered in my ear and what to say in that moment of hushed conversation other than, “That’s what slavery is, honey.  Didn’t you know?”

But how could she know?  We have a way as humans of protecting ourselves from knowledge that hurts.  And we have a way as parents and teachers of watering down the truth so we don’t frighten kids (or ourselves).  And we have a way as adults of sanitizing reality so we don’t have to face the ugly horror of it.

But when Jesus told the crowd that the truth would make them free, they didn’t understand: “We are Abraham’s descendants and have never been slaves of anyone. How can you say that we shall be set free?” (John 8:34).

They had forgotten their people’s four-century-long history, of slavery in Egypt, and how God sent them the deliverer Moses.

Jesus reminded them: You, yourself, have a lifelong history of slavery to sin and “a slave has no permanent place in the family, but a son belongs to it forever.  So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed” (John 8:35-36).

I explain this later to my daughters, when whispering is no longer mandatory, and we have the time and space to talk.

Did you see how terrible slavery was for the Israelites?  Jesus says we were slaves to sin in the same way.

And did you see what Moses had to give up in order to deliver the people out of Egypt?  He couldn’t keep his fancy room in the palace, his princely clothes, his royal position, his delectable foods.  He sacrificed all that to lead his people out of slavery.

But Jesus gave up more.  Paul tells us that Jesus “made himself nothing by taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness.  And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to death—even death on a cross” (Philippians 2:7-8).

My daughter knew about the nails and the crown of thorns.  She knew about the cross.  But the scornful cries of the crowd, that she couldn’t understand.

Then, while watching the dancers portray Jesus’ crucifixion, she thought of the most horrible thing she could imagine, the thing that terrifies her into wearing shoes on our deck and the thing that has sent her into fits of screaming on our couch when we pull out the tweezers.

Did Jesus get splinters from the cross?

Why yes, baby girl, he probably did.  But he did it for you and for me.  He hung bare-skinned on a rough wooden cross so He could deliver us and set us free.

That’s the truth of costly grace and the Savior who paid the ultimate price: splinters, whips, mockery, the weight of sin, separation from God, and death and all.

How can you keep from forgetting what Christ has done for you?

Heather King is a wife, mom, Bible Study teacher, writer for www.myfrienddebbie.com 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.  To read more devotionals by Heather King, click here.

Copyright © 2012 Heather King