Genesis 41:51 ESV
Joseph called the name of the firstborn Manasseh. “For,” he said, “God has made me forget all my hardship and all my father’s house.”
Psalm 25:7 ESV Remember not the sins of my youth or my transgressions; according to your steadfast love remember me, for the sake of your goodness, O Lord!
Psalm 51:10 ESV Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me.
Isaiah 40:1 ESV Comfort, comfort my people, says your God. 2 Speak tenderly to Jerusalem, and cry to her that her warfare is ended, that her iniquity is pardoned, that she has received from the Lord‘s hand double for all her sins.
Isaiah 43:18-19 ESV “Remember not the former things, nor consider the things of old. 19 Behold, I am doing a new thing; now it springs forth, do you not perceive it? I will make a way in the wilderness and rivers in the desert.
Isaiah 43:25 ESV “I, I am he who blots out your transgressions for my own sake, and I will not remember your sins.
Isaiah 65:16 ESV So that he who blesses himself in the land shall bless himself by the God of truth, and he who takes an oath in the land shall swear by the God of truth; because the former troubles are forgotten and are hidden from my eyes.
Lamentations 3:22-23 ESV The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases; his mercies never come to an end; 23 they are new every morning; great is your faithfulness.
Luke 9:62 ESV Jesus said to him, “No one who puts his hand to the plow and looks back is fit for the kingdom of God.”
Romans 6:4 ESV
We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life.
Romans 8:1 ESV
There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus
2 Corinthians 5:17-18 ESV Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come.18 All this is from God, who through Christ reconciled us to himself and gave us the ministry of reconciliation;
Galatians 2:20-22 ESV I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.21 I do not nullify the grace of God, for if righteousness were through the law, then Christ died for no purpose.
Ephesians 4:22-23 ESV to put off your old self, which belongs to your former manner of life and is corrupt through deceitful desires,23 and to be renewed in the spirit of your minds
Philippians 1:6 ESV
And I am sure of this, that he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ.
Philippians 3:13-14 ESV Brothers, I do not consider that I have made it my own. But one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead,14 I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.
Colossians 2:13-14 ESV And you, who were dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made alive together with him, having forgiven us all our trespasses,14 by canceling the record of debt that stood against us with its legal demands. This he set aside, nailing it to the cross.
Hebrews 8:12 ESV For I will be merciful toward their iniquities, and I will remember their sins no more.”
Hebrews 12:1-2 ESV Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us,2 looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.
1 John 1:9 ESV
If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.
1 John 3:2 ESV
Beloved, we are God’s children now, and what we will be has not yet appeared; but we know that when he appears we shall be like him, because we shall see him as he is.
It’s not often I zip around town in my minivan alone.
I’m usually toting a passenger (or two or four or more).
But that night, the stars had aligned and the schedule had been arranged and all of those things so that I hopped into my minivan after some errands in town and headed home.
I drove.
And thought.
Thought.
And drove.
Prayed and thought and drove.
I was just enjoying the sweet quiet as only a mom of four kids can do when she’s out by her lonesome self.
It should only take me about 5 minutes to get home from anywhere in town now that we’ve moved to the new house, but I drove for about 12 minutes before I turned onto a familiar road.
It wasn’t the road to my brand new home, though. I had managed to drive far past that, all the way to my old house.
I sheepishly turned around in my former neighbor’s driveway and backtracked down the road to what was supposed to be my destination all along.
HOME.
If I don’t stay alert even now when I’m making this drive, I’ll pass right by the road to my new house and I’ll trek all the way back to where I used to live.
This is me in default mode. This is what I fall back to.
This is where I end up when I’m not paying attention.
We all have these “old ways,” the habits of the past, the “who we used to be.” And when we’re distracted, or weary or plain old apathetic, maybe this is where we end up all over again.
Maybe we default to worry and stress.
We default to overbooked and overwhelmed.
We default to bitter and unforgiving.
We default to resentful.
We default to people-pleasing.
We default to sharp words.
Maybe we don’t even realize it until we look up in a daze and wonder how we ended up back here all over again?
It’s when I start feeling complacent about controlling my tongue, that I start losing my temper and lashing out.
It’s when I start feeling like I know how to keep myself from getting overwhelmed by stress that I just about break down because I’ve let the to-do list nigh on destroy me.
We’re not alone, of course. This is all just being human. We’re not perfect and those old sin habits can drag us right along.
That’s why I feel for the disciples who kept defaulting to old habits and old ways of thinking. No matter how many times Jesus explained how He’d be persecuted and killed and then raised again, they didn’t get it.
They didn’t see with spiritual eyes.
There was a day when they set out on their travels with Jesus and forgot to pack the bread for lunch. Jesus told them to watch out for the leaven of the Pharisees and Sadducees and they completely missed his message…again.
They thought Jesus was picking on them for leaving the bread at home by mistake.
As i f Jesus needed them to pack bread.
They’d watched Him feed the five thousand and the four thousand, but one day without a full lunchbox sent them right back to that old place of fretting over provision.
Jesus asked them “Do you not yet perceive?” (Matthew 16:9 ESV).
The Message paraphrase says, “Haven’t you caught on yet?”
And that’s me at times, defaulting back to my old ways of thinking and doing, not quite catching on yet to what Jesus has done in me and wants to do in me.
What we do then, though, is what matters most.
Because what I want to do is just give up right there.
I’ll never get this right, Jesus.
I’m such a failure, Lord. I’m failing at everything. I want to be used by you and I just….keep….messing….up.
But we can’t give up right there because that past isn’t meant to be our home anymore.
Slowly. Slowly. We keep turning the old over to Jesus and letting Him make us new.
Slowly. Slowly. He changes us within so our default itself is different.
We default to peace.
We default to joy.
We default to gentleness.
We default to trust.
It’s okay to be in progress. It’s okay to trip up and mess up sometimes.
It’s not okay to stay there in that old place where we don’t belong anymore.
We have to move back to Jesus, always back to Jesus.
My son screams in the morning when I take off his fire truck pajamas and put on his dinosaur shirt.
Does he want the shirt with the train? The dump truck and excavator? The monkey?
No. What he really wants is to stay in his fire truck pajamas all day.
At the end of the day, though, long after I’ve wrestled him into actual clothes, he screams again when I try to take off his dinosaur shirt and put back on the fire truck pajamas.
Now he wants to wear the dinosaur to bed.
Toddler wardrobe wars.
I’ve done this four times with four kids.
I had the daughter who went several years of her life only wearing dresses and skirts and never ever wearing pants.
I had the daughter who only wore pink and purple and didn’t like any other colors, but who also still refuses to wear dresses or skirts.
Then there was my compliant child. She would say, ‘no’ and take off running when I held up a shirt she didn’t like.
When I found this half-naked toddler in the house, the shirt would be completely missing and she’d appear innocent.
I searched her room, the dresser, every hiding place without result. No shirt.
Then I went to throw something away and saw it peeking out of the trash can.
She skipped the tantrums and went right for putting clothes she didn’t like in the garbage.
I wonder what would happen if we were as careful about the attitudes, beliefs, and heart conditions we clothe ourselves in every morning. Maybe we should be that picky.
It’s a favorite metaphor of the apostles, reminding us to peel off the old clothes of flesh, lust and sin and to purposefully put on a brand new outfit everyday.
We are to clothe ourselves in Christ.
Paul described it this way:
But now you must also rid yourselves of all such things as these: anger, rage, malice, slander, and filthy language from your lips. Do not lie to each other, since you have taken off your old self with its practices and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge in the image of its Creator . . .
Therefore, as God’s chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience. Bear with each other and forgive one another if any of you has a grievance against someone. Forgive as the Lord forgave you. And over all these virtues put on love, which binds them all together in perfect unity (Colossians 3:8-14, NIV).
In other words, take it off, take it all off: The anger, the bad attitude and grumpiness, the bad language, the lies. All of those pesky remnants of our pre-salvation self have to go.
We stare at the closet and choose the new clothes we’ll wear each day with great care, pulling on clothes of compassion, kindness, gentleness, patience, forgiveness, and most of all love.
Add in to that mix the favorite outfit of Peter:
“All of you, clothe yourselves with humility toward one another” (1 Peter 5:5)
The bottom line, for Paul is that we should, “clothe yourselves with the Lord Jesus Christ, and do not think about how to gratify the desires of the flesh” (Romans 13:14, NIV).
Unfortunately, our old fleshly selves have a way of sneaking their way back into our closets.
We think we’ve restyled only to snap in anger during the morning rush.
How did that discarded sin find it’s way into our wardrobe again? More importantly, how did we end up wearing it today?
We aren’t picky enough about the spiritual clothes we don every day. When we’re not paying attention and when we’re not being careful, we find we’re wearing the dirty rags of old habits and familiar sins.
We have to make the conscious choice, the prayerful choice, the one where we ask Christ to robe us in His righteousness.
We can choose to wear Jesus each day.
Reject the clothing of the old self and instead pull on love and step into compassion. Spice things up with a scarf of kindness and a jacket of forgiveness. Wear our own favorite shoes of humility and gentleness.
It’s our Jesus style, it’s Christ shining through us, making HIs presence in our lives unmistakable.
I found a $1 treasure at a summer yard sale, an oak step stool to solve my problem.
My kids had been scaling the counters to reach cups and bowls from the cabinets, a heart-stopping feat if ever there was one.
They carried the bathroom stool out to the kitchen and left it there where it didn’t belong. It was a step stool in demand, actually. Every time we needed the stool, it was inevitably hopelessly lost in whatever room in the house we didn’t think to look.
I spotted that “new-to-us” wooden stool in that yard sale and my heart skipped happy beats of victory and accomplishment. With just a simple coat of paint, I’d have a sturdy new stool that belonged in the kitchen, kept my kids off the counters, and matched my home décor.
Score!
The first time it wobbled, we dismissed it as our own clumsiness. That’s easy to do in our house.
But the offending stool failed us again and again, causing bruises, bumps, scrapes, tears and accusations.
I gave lessons to my kids on how to keep from smashing your head on the kitchen counter. Surely, they simply needed to know “How to Stand on the Stool” and “How Not to Stand on the Stool.”
The problem, though, wasn’t our technique. The stool itself was faulty in a way a coat of paint couldn’t cover. It was treacherous and off-balance.
Finally, I admitted defeat and threw it out with the morning garbage before I added an emergency room visit to my daily agenda.
My refurbishing failure reminded me that Christ doesn’t just make things over, He doesn’t just make things pretty, He makes all things new.
More than that white covering of snow that sparkles in the moonlight and hides the wilted grass and un-raked leaves, Christmas offers us a fresh start.
But do we believe it? Do we treat ‘newness’ as little more than cosmetic refurbishing? A coat of paint, perhaps, and God sends us on our merry way with a façade of Christian niceties covering over a truly treacherous human condition?
Scripture is radical in its promise:
Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come (2 Corinthians 5:17 ESV).
I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh (Ezekiel 36:26 NIV)
God’s work in us isn’t just life with a Christian ‘varnish.’ He promises to remove the diseased and petrified heart that plagues our life with sin and transplant in us a new heart of flesh, a heart where His Spirit dwells.
It’s complete. It’s not refurbishing a $1 step stool and hoping you don’t gash your head open when you use it. It’s not ‘settling’ for a little bit of God in a big pile of mess.
More than this. Oh, so much more.
It isn’t God handing us a 12-step instruction sheet with complicated diagrams and a paint kit and telling us to go make a new heart.
That’s the law. That’s us trying to get it all right. Trying to be perfect. Trying to reach heaven on our own tip-toes (maybe with a faulty step-stool).
That’s us landing on the ground again, worn and weary, exhausted from trying so hard to stop the wobbling, the failure, the mess the brokenness.
That’s us trying to hold it all together and still finding that it falls all apart.
But Christmas is God come down; not us reaching up high enough to touch Him. Christmas is God’s gift, God at work, God-with-grace, God-with us.
Too often, we make it all about us. What we have to do to make Christmas perfect. What we have to accomplish in our homes and in our hearts: The projects, the parties, the get-togethers, the programs, the traditions, the attempts to pack more meaning into something so deep-down meaningful.
And we almost miss it. For all the to-do, we almost miss this:
Christmas is about Him.
He will take us as we are and He will make us new. It’s all in His big hands, big enough to hold us all together, big enough to heal, strong enough to carry us right on through.
Isaiah 43:18-9 ESV “Remember not the former things, nor consider the things of old. Behold, I am doing a new thing; now it springs forth, do you not perceive it? I will make a way in the wilderness and rivers in the desert.
Isaiah 65:17 NIV See, I will create new heavens and a new earth. The former things will not be remembered, nor will they come to mind.
The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases; his mercies never come to an end; 23they are new every morning; great is your faithfulness.
Ezekiel 11:18-19 ESV And when they come there, they will remove from it all its detestable things and all its abominations.19 And I will give them one heart, and a new spirit I will put within them. I will remove the heart of stone from their flesh and give them a heart of flesh,
Ezekiel 36:26 ESV
And I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you.And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh.
Romans 6:3-4 NIV Or don’t you know that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death?4 We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life.
2 Corinthians 5:17 ESV
Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come.
Ephesians 4:22-24 ESV to put off your old self, which belongs to your former manner of life and is corrupt through deceitful desires,23 and to be renewed in the spirit of your minds,24 and to put on the new self, created after the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness.
Philippians 3:13-14 NIV Brothers and sisters, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead,14 I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus.
Colossians 3:9-10 NIV Do not lie to each other, since you have taken off your old self with its practices10 and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge in the image of its Creator.
1 Peter 1:3 ESV
Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! According to his great mercy, he has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead,
Revelation 21:4-5 ESV He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more,neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.”5 And he who was seated on the throne said, “Behold, I am making all things new.” Also he said, “Write this down, for these words are trustworthy and true.”
Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here! 2 Corinthians 5:17
Unsweetened iced tea.
That’s what the quiz said my personality resembled. Not sweet tea or peach tea or even a little wild raspberry tea or health-conscious green tea.
Unsweetened iced tea, as in bitter, plain, strong, and unfriendly.
During our family trip to Pennsylvania, we spent a morning at the Turkey Hill Experience where my kids learned how to make ice cream, created their own flavors, starred in their own ice cram commercials, sampled some of the delicious treats, and more. It was a great family day.
Before we left, though, my oldest daughter discovered a touch screen display with a little personality quiz.
What flavor of tea are you?
So, I gave it a little try, just for fun. After a few questions about what I liked to do in my free time, how I handled conflict and what I was like around my friends, it made its deep psychological assessment of my character:
Unsweetened iced tea.
Underneath that was a paragraph about how I’m blunt and can hurt people’s feelings, but I get the job done no matter what the cost. I sounded a little like Donald Trump.
I turned to my husband with a questioning look and he shrugged it off. “Nah, that’s not you.”
Silly machine, I thought. It’s just a foolish test that probably isn’t ever right about anybody.
So, of course I made my daughter take it just to prove my point.
She read through the questions and gave her own answers, and then it popped up with her flavor personality.
Peach Tea.
The read-out said she is smart, creative and a kind and compassionate friend. They even recommended she pursue a career in making greeting cards.
That is so her.
If I had to write up my own assessment of this child, that is exactly what I would say about her, and this machine figured her out with only about five questions.
Silly machine?
It seems like it should be so much easier to ignore the accusations and judgments of just-for-fun personality games or even those of other people.
So what if they think we’re unsweetened iced tea? Does it really matter what they think? Should I care about what a machine says based on my answers to a few multiple choice questions?
It’s not rational or logical, but it did matter to me a little. Unsweetened iced tea….that’s who I used to be.
Sixteen years ago, I was bitter and hurtful, strong, unrelenting, and essentially unconcerned about who got knocked over or bruised when I focused on accomplishing tasks and reaching goals.
Maybe I was a miniature Donald Trump without the hair-do or bank account.
But God.
God took that teenage mess of a girl, who seemed so in control and together, and broke her in ways she needed to be broken. He shattered pride and the hardness I had built in my relationships with people. He reached in and kneaded my heart until it became soft and pliable in His hands.
He taught me how to receive grace…and then how to give it.
Yes, He re-formed me.
Maybe in seasons of pressure or stress, I still have that capacity to revert to who I used to be. Maybe my tongue can still slash through people like the sharpest of weapons.
But today I am thinking as I cut through the butter with the tines of the fork and smash it to the bottom of the bowl, crack open the eggs, and watch the sugar pour in grain upon grain. I mix with the spoon at first and then finally reach in with my hands to do the work needed.
And as the dough pulls together, I realize—hadn’t God done this to me?
Paul wrote:
For by the grace given me I say to every one of you: Do not think of yourself more highly than you ought, but rather think of yourself with sober judgment, in accordance with the faith God has distributed to each of you (Romans 12:3 NIV).
That means seeing the truth about me—not who I was, not who others say I am, or how I measure up on personality quizzes. It means looking deep and seeing “this is how God has made me and this is who I am in Christ”—no better or worse than that.
If God’s grace did this, smashing and breaking me until I could be pulled together again into something He could use, then why still think of myself in that old way? Why hold myself to labels from the past and an identity formed oh-so-long-ago before grace bruised me and healed me in the way that grace does?
Some machine still saw me as unsweetened iced tea.
But God’s sweet grace had poured into my soul and I’m not the same.
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.
Today is my oldest daughter’s eighth birthday. Here’s the post I wrote last year when she turned seven about growth and how encounters with God change us.
“Having been warned in a dream not to go back to Herod, they returned to their country by another route” (Matthew 2:12).
Seven.
My oldest daughter turns seven today. She asked me to stop calling her “Baby girl” this week. She seemed to think that seven year olds are too big for a nickname as embarrassingly babyish as that.
Birthdays never seem to be what my “Big girl” expects. We take a birthday trip. We do presents. She shares in time with friends and family. We sing to her. She picks out her favorite cake (spice with cream cheese icing) and her favorite dinner (tacos or chicken and dumplings). We celebrate her that day and she’s sheepish and sweet and content.
But at night as she climbs back into bed, she wonders why she hasn’t grown six inches. Why, if she’s now seven years old, is she still wearing some 6X clothing?
Somehow my girl thinks an annual encounter with a birthday candle should provide immediate change, as if it’s a fairy dust *poof* over her head.
I can’t say how these things happen. I remember so clearly the night nurse bringing my newborn into my hospital room at 3 a.m. seven years ago to the day. She was screaming inconsolably. Didn’t want to cuddle. Didn’t want food. Just needed to scream in protest for a bit. I looked up at the nurse with the fear of a brand new mom and asked, “What should I do?” She shook her head at me and said, “I don’t know!” Then she walked out leaving me with Victoria, still screaming at the top of her lungs.
She was strong from the beginning. Sure of herself, demanding of others. Determined. Sensitive and full of big emotions that just didn’t fit all bottled up and contained in a little body.
I remember her crawling, walking, talking, reading, dancing, and her first day of preschool and kindergarten and first grade. Her love of horses, princesses, tea parties, arts and crafts, sparkles, and dancing and the mystery she is to me.
And yet, I can’t say when she grew up.
When, after all, does change happen for any of us?
Surely we have that immediate moment of course redirection when we first choose to worship Jesus. Paul describes it this way: “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come:The old has gone, the new is here” (2 Corinthians 5:17).
One encounter with Jesus was enough to change the Magi’s travel plans also.
They had come from the east to Jerusalem and asked, “Where is the one who has been born king of the Jews?” (Matthew 2:1).
Their Messiah pursuit wasn’t popular. It disturbed King Herod and “all Jerusalem with him” (Matthew 2:3).
Undeterred, the wise men followed the star and found Christ. They were overjoyed, bowed down and worshiped him, presenting the gifts they had carefully toted along on their journey.
Then, “having been warned in a dream not to go back to Herod, they returned to their country by another route” (Matthew 2:12).
It was a practical decision for them. To trick King Herod, they slipped quietly out of the country.
It’s spiritual for us. We meet Jesus and from then on, we simply can’t travel back the same way we came. We have to follow “another route.”
Nor is this a one-time course correction for us. Just like my birthday girl who doesn’t magically grow six inches at each birthday, so we change gradually. There’s the initial moment of commitment to Christ and we are a new creation.
Then there are seasons of growth spurts as God performs focused work on our character. Intense encounters with God cause us to drastically change course.
At other times, the change is slow and daily as we shed layers and layers of flesh. It’s so gradual we can’t always see it until someone sees the change in us.
They see how we react differently now. How our words are seasoned with grace. How people have become our primary heart motivation. How our hearts are broken for the lost. They see that the faith we profess now impacts our motivation and activity.
It’s the change God is working in our hearts, just as Paul said: “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).
But the ever-increasing transformation in us requires us to drop the veil from our faces and “contemplate the Lord’s glory.“ Like the Magi saw Jesus after their relentless, focused, studious search for Him, we have to seek God in order to see God.
That’s our task, to “look for God like the watchmen looks for the morning” (Psalm 130:6). We search. We find Him. We adjust our course to follow Him.
That’s how change happens. That’s how we grow.
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. To read more devotionals by Heather King, click here.
She asks us about it all the time and we’ve told her the story over and over.
Why is she named Victoria Eileen and what does it mean anyway?
You’re named after your grandmothers, we tell her, Godly women who are strong in their faith. We prayed over our first baby, prayed about naming her just right— a name that was clearly feminine and clearly strong, a name for an overcomer, a fighter, a stand-up-for-what-is-right kind of woman of God.
Victoria—“Victorious One.”
It fits this feisty little person, the perfect name from the first day I held her in my arms in the hospital and she screamed and screamed, trying desperately hard in her newborn way of making her needs known. She befuddled nurses and her first-time momma.
Yet, submitted to God, believing in Jesus, with His Spirit in her, she’s a mighty force to be reckoned with underneath her princess exterior of swirly skirts and long blonde hair.
When she asks us about her name, we tell her the whole story of what it means, and why we picked it and what we hope it says about her future and her character.
I can’t imagine how that conversation went in Hosea’s house.
God told the prophet Hosea to marry a “promiscuous woman.” His marriage was to be a living testimony of how the long-suffering God remained faithful to His people Israel, despite their ongoing adultery with foreign gods and idols.
That sounds hard enough. Yet, in obedience, he married Gomer, a frequent runaway lover.
Then God told Hosea to have children with this faithless wife.
When she had a daughter, God told them to name her “Lo-Ruhamah (which means “not loved”), for I will no longer show love to Israel, that I should at all forgive them” (Hosea 1:6 NIV).
Then she had a son and God said, “Call him Lo-Ammi (which means “not my people”), for you are not my people, and I am not your God” (Hosea 1:9 NIV)
The Message translates these names as “No-Mercy” and “Nobody.”
Every time moms in the marketplace cooed over these precious babies and asked, “What’s the baby’s name?” the answer came back as a label and message from God.
No-Mercy.
Nobody.
Have you ever felt labeled and even condemned by your name, your heritage, a nickname, a curse, the hurtful words of others that you can’t seem to erase from memory?
Has your past held you captive?
Surely these two children could relate to your pain.
But the beautiful thing about Jesus is that He doesn’t leave us untouched by His presence. He’s a Creator God, making things new, making US new.
He changes us and renames us, giving us a new identity in Him. Paul tells us:
Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come:The old has gone, the new is here! (2 Corinthians 5:17 NIV).
In Hosea 2:1, God tells the prophet:
Say of your brothers, ‘My people,’ and of your sisters, ‘My loved one.’
Or as the Message says:“Rename your brothers ‘God’s Somebody.’ Rename your sisters ‘All Mercy.’”
Eugene Peterson asks: Under what circumstances have you seen “No Mercy” turned into “All Mercy?” How about “Nobody” changed to “God’s Somebody?”
That’s our story, yours and mine! Our story of redemption and transformation, how we’re shedding who we used to be and stepping into new clothes of righteousness—new names, new lives.
Hosea’s kids probably had to fight for their new identity. Townsfolk likely slipped up time after time. “No-Mercy,” they’d say, and she’d reply, “That’s not my name anymore! Haven’t you heard the good news? My name is “All Mercy” now. God changed it!”
And her brother, “Nobody,” likely had to correct friends and neighbors and the school teacher who always treated him like a fool: “God says I’m no longer, “Nobody!” I’m “God’s Somebody” now!”
God says that about you, too. He says, “You’re mine. I’ve given you my name and called you my child. You are a sign of my mercy, you are loved, you are important to me.”
Yet, just like Hosea’s poor children, who likely had to stand up for their name change time and time and time again . . . so we must continually refuse Satan the prerogative of defining us by our past.
Instead, those names from our past, those identities are just part of our testimony now, a reminder of how God redeems, renews, and recreates, how He makes “beautiful things out of us.”
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.
“Why do you look for the living among the dead? He is not here, He has risen”
Luke 24:5
A few months ago, my husband came home, arms full of roses—deep red, fragrance so rich. They were the most beautiful flowers I’d ever been given.
This bouquet from my husband greeted me throughout the day for two weeks, perfect in their vase. I’d stop my chores and my rushing to literally stop and smell the roses. But, of course then came wilting and fading and falling petals. As a girl, I had collected up rose petals over time and filled a glass cup with them, like homemade potpourri with scents of summer and memories dear. So, I once again gathered up the petals to keep them as a reminder of my gift.
Last week, I peeked into my jar of keepsake roses to enjoy them just for a moment and instead of dried and faded flowers still filled with aroma, I found instead mold grown over. Into the trash they went.
Sometimes there are things we hold onto so dearly that are truly dead. We try and try to revive and preserve; we linger over things past. Have you held onto the habits and comforts of the past when Christ has called you to lay them down and move on? He has asked you to sacrifice and instead you clutch it to your chest, not willing to give it up. So, you cling to the old and fail to receive the new. “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here! ” (2 Corinthians 5:17, NIV).
At the tomb on the morning of Christ’s resurrection, women brought spices for anointing. Instead of the expected, they faced the unexpected—the stone rolled away, the body gone, two angels in clothes gleaming like lightning, asking a question: “Why do you look for the living among the dead? He is not here, He has risen” (Luke 24:5)
Why do you look for the living among the dead?
Surely there are times we do this, too. We look for our Living Savior among the graves. Sometimes our faith is more cemetery than empty tomb.
Chris Tiegreen wrote:
We read the Bible as a historical document rather than as a living Word. We follow Jesus as our example rather than listening to Him as our living Lord. We take our cues from our denominational traditions rather than from the Spirit of life. In other words, we turn our faith toward dead things rather than toward the Living One.
Has this been you? Has faith been dulled and the joy of your salvation replaced by compulsory duty and passionless motions—doing Christianity rather than living with Christ?
Or, are you instead staring at a tomb of a different sort, but still there is death? A relationship broken. A marriage over. A child turned prodigal. A ministry struggling. A passion now cold. A vision gone dark. A hope proved impossible. A lack of direction and not knowing where to go. A season of waiting, waiting, waiting, always waiting.
There is some mourning to be done, some grieving over what is lost and dead in our lives. Some letting go and laying down. And there may be tears; that’s expected. Yet, “weeping may stay for the night, but rejoicing comes in the morning” (Psalm 30:5).
With morning, comes resurrection and abundant new life, and we rejoice for He is “making everything new” (Revelation 21:5, NIV). This Savior whose sacrifice we remember on Good Friday by eating the bread, drinking the cup—this Savior declared victory over death and the grave. Power over His tomb. Power over the places we mourn and grieve.
“Where, O death, is your victory? Where, O death, is your sting? The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. But thanks be to God! He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ” (1 Corinthians 15:55-57, NIV).
and
“Wake up, sleeper, rise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you” (Ephesians 5:14, NIV).
What would this rising look like for us? What can He resurrect in us this year? Over what can He give us victory?
I pray this new life for you.
That His Word will be living and active, changing your heart, altering your perspective.
For renewed passion, vision, excitement, and ministry impact.
For restoration of relationships.
For the return of hope.
For weeping to end and joy to fill you.
For your eyes to be opened wide to God’s presence, His character, His goodness.
~Amen~
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.
“Having been warned in a dream not to go back to Herod, they returned to their country by another route”
(Matthew 2:12).
Seven.
My oldest daughter turns seven today. She asked me to stop calling her “Baby girl” this week. She seemed to think that seven year olds are too big for a nickname as embarrassingly babyish as that.
Birthdays never seem to be what my “Big girl” expects. We take a birthday trip. We do presents. She shares in time with friends and family. We sing to her. She picks out her favorite cake (spice with cream cheese icing) and her favorite dinner (tacos or chicken and dumplings). We celebrate her that day and she’s sheepish and sweet and content with the affection and attention.
But at night as she climbs back into bed now one year older than she was the night before, she wonders why she hasn’t grown six inches. Why, if she’s now seven years old, is she still wearing some 6X clothing?
Somehow my girl thinks an annual encounter with a birthday candle should provide immediate change. It’s a fairy dust *poof* over her head and she’s insta-bigger and more mature.
I can’t say how these things happen. I remember so clearly the night nurse bringing my newborn into my room at 3 a.m. a year ago to the day. She was screaming inconsolably. Didn’t want to cuddle. Didn’t want food. Just needed to scream in protest for a bit. I looked up at the nurse with the fear of a brand new mom and asked, “What should I do?” She shook her head at me and said, “I don’t know!” Then she walked out leaving me with Victoria, still screaming at the top of her lungs.
She was strong from the beginning. Sure of herself, demanding of others. Determined. Sensitive and full of big emotions that just didn’t fit all bottled up and contained in a little body.
I remember her crawling, walking, talking, reading, dancing, and her first day of preschool and kindergarten and first grade. Her love of horses, princesses, tea parties, arts and crafts, sparkles, and dancing and the mystery she is to me.
And yet, I can’t say when she grew up. I can’t look at circles on the calendar and see the moment she was an infant and not a newborn. The day I saw her as a toddler. The moment she was a little girl. Or how she became this big girl with long flowing blond hair and a tall, thin frame like a ballerina.
When does change happen?
When does change occur for us?
Surely we have that immediate moment of course redirection when we first choose to worship Jesus. Paul describes it this way: “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come:The old has gone, the new is here” (2 Corinthians 5:17).
One encounter with Jesus was enough to change the Magi’s travel plans also.
They had come from the east to Jerusalem and asked, “Where is the one who has been born king of the Jews?” (Matthew 2:1).
Their Messiah pursuit wasn’t popular. It disturbed King Herod and “all Jerusalem with him” (Matthew 2:3).
Undeterred, the wise men followed the star and found the newborn Christ. They were overjoyed, bowed down and worshiped him, presenting the gifts they had carefully toted along on their journey.
They met Jesus. They saw the Messiah. They encountered God in human flesh.
Then, “having been warned in a dream not to go back to Herod, they returned to their country by another route” (Matthew 2:12).
It was a practical decision for them. To trick King Herod, they slipped quietly out of the country and avoided another meeting with this evil earthly king bent on Jesus’ destruction.
It’s spiritual for us. We meet Jesus and then we can’t go back the same way we came. We have to follow “another route.”
Nor is this a one-time course correction for us. Just like my birthday girl who doesn’t magically morph into an older child at each birthday, so we change gradually. There’s the initial moment of commitment to Christ, when we worship, bow down, and offer Him our hearts and lives. We are a new creation.
Then there are seasons of growth spurts as God performs focused work on our character. Intense encounters with God cause us to drastically change course, when Scripture sears our heart, when a life lesson digs deep in our soul. We have an unmistakable moment of revelation and heart remodeling.
At other times, the change is slow and daily as we shed layers and layers of flesh. It’s so gradual we can’t always see it until someone sees the change in us.
They see how we react differently now. How our words are seasoned with grace. How people have become our primary heart motivation. How our hearts are broken for the lost. They see that the faith we profess now impacts our motivation and activity.
It’s the change God is working in our hearts, just as Paul said: “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).
But the ever-increasing transformation in us requires us to drop the veil from our faces and “contemplate the Lord’s glory.” Like the Magi saw Jesus after their relentless, focused, studious search for Him, we have to seek God in order to see God.
That’s our task, to “look for God like the watchmen looks for the morning” (Psalm 130:6). We search. We find Him. We adjust our course to follow Him. That’s how change happens.
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.
Heather C. King - Room to Breathe 
