Month: May 2021

I was walking with the Worst-Best the other morning, albeit much slower these days, but that’s what happens when the years go by.  It was a predawn morning, a little warmer than some.  As we moved steadily up and down the road that cuts the fields, a shiver ran through me.  We’d hit a cold spot.  You know what I mean, you’re moving along and all at once the air suddenly turns cold.  It’s the gentlest of breezes.  The moving of the air is so subtle it’s almost imperceptible.  But it’s just enough to usher in a chill pocket.  We kept moving and as quickly as it came, the cold spot was gone.  That’s happened to you before, right?  We notice those cold spots particularly in the middle of Summer.  But when we emerge from the cold spot, we recognize it, don’t we?  We notice when we travel through different temperatures, from hot to cold, or from cold to hot and we almost always comment on it and ask our companion, did you feel that?  You see, we’re feeling people, right? 

As long as the earth endures, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night shall never cease.  Genesis 8:22

We’re told that as long as the earth endures we’re going to have cold and heat.  We may walk through those cold pockets many times a day.  It may even feel like we’re living in a cold pocket and the warmth will never come.  Or that we’re stuck in a hot pocket and praying for a cold spell with every step. On the inside and outside.  This reminds me of my deep need for Jesus.  When I hit a cold spot and I need Him so desperately or, when I hit a hot spot and need Him so desperately.  He knows what I need in the cold and the heat of life. Just maybe those little spots were put there to remind me of that.

Because it was cold, the servants and officers were standing around a charcoal fire they had made to keep warm. And Peter was also standing with them, warming himself.  John 18:18

We’re just like Peter who hit those spots more than once.  Those spots where we have been made cold by our denial, our pain, our loss, our hurt, our sin.  Those spots where parts of our hearts are just frozen solid.  But what does Jesus do in those places?

“The Lord has really risen! He appeared to Peter!” Luke 24:34

In those cold spots of life when we need Him so much, Jesus is there.  He thaws our frozen hearts, with His presence.

Likewise, with those hot spots of life, you know the ones where we’re tested by the fiery flames of the world – mistreatment, oppression, persecution – followers of Christ have been, will be, or should be in those spots.  Hot spots where our faith is challenged, our beliefs are questioned, our convictions tried.  He protects us from the heat with His presence.

But suddenly, Nebuchadnezzar jumped up in amazement and exclaimed to his advisers, “Didn’t we tie up three men and throw them into the furnace?”  “Yes, Your Majesty, we certainly did,” they replied.  “Look!” Nebuchadnezzar shouted. “I see four men, unbound, walking around in the fire unharmed! And the fourth looks like a divine being!”

Then Nebuchadnezzar came as close as he could to the door of the flaming furnace and shouted: “Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, servants of the Most High God, come out! Come here!”

So Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego stepped out of the fire. Then the high officers, officials, governors, and advisers crowded around them and saw that the fire had not touched them. Not a hair on their heads was singed, and their clothing was not scorched. They didn’t even smell of smoke!  Daniel 3:24-25

His presence calls us beyond the cold spots and hot spots of this life.  Being rescued and protected by His presence then requires us to live our lives as rescued and protected people.  If we know Jesus, the cold and hot spots of life are tempered by the presence of the Spirit living inside us and we will emerge warmed and untouched by the flames.  The Lord has really risen!

There’s this little treasure spot on Burke Street, heading east, right before you climb the big hill.  You may know the spot.  I’ve lunched on a bench there a couple of times.  It’s beautiful and peaceful, except when cars are passing, so it’s more beautiful than peaceful.  Anyway, while sitting there the other day listening to the water run through, it dawned on me that this is the very same water that runs through our property at the foot of North Mountain – the Tuscarora Creek.  When I really thought about it, I was like whoa, that’s so cool!  That’s a good four or five miles away, as the crow flies.  To think that the water that I was looking at in town had traveled through my home place really was amazing to me.

Now, it seems perfectly natural for a creek to run through the countryside, doesn’t it?  But for that same water to follow a route of twists and turns and flow right before my eyes in town was a wonder and a comfort to me.  It was the exact same – the exact same water at my house and in town.  The water before my eyes had traveled from its beginning, and there’s great debate in our neck of the woods of the location of those headwaters, to Burke Street and beyond.  Nevertheless, the creek started somewhere, it had a beginning and those same beginning waters were now in town.  I sat there thinking, isn’t that just like Jesus?

Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever.  Hebrews 13:8

Jesus never changes.  Regardless of where He flows, His Living Water is always the same.  He is the same, He is changeless.  He doesn’t roll with the waves of circumstance as we do.  He is not a God of happenings.  He doesn’t ever change.

But You remain the same, and Your years will never end.  Psalm 102:27

Never is forever and that’s when God will change – Never!  No matter how we feel, the promise and the reality is that God never changes.

“I am the Lord, and I do not change…Now return to me and I will return to you”  Malachi 3:6-7

Even when we are disobedient, when we are unloving, unmerciful, un-Godly, He is the same – merciful, loving, Godly God.  His message since the Garden has always been the same – return to me – come to me.  That’s His message to us today – return to me – come to me – I will restore you.

Before the beginning of time He has loved us and prepared to bless us all the while knowing our love for Him would waiver, knowing we would be an unfaithful people.   His love, His mercy, His grace are not based on who we are or what we do.    God is the same today, tomorrow, forever, His promises are the same today, tomorrow, forever, because of who He is.  He always has been and always will be the God of the returners.  Praise the Lord! 

Did you feel that?  You know, that unexpected call, that diagnosis, that accident, that loss, that illness, that broken, that hurt.  You know what I’m talking about.  The things that come out of left field when it’s not even game day.  The things that knock us off our feet and make us thrash like crazy to get our sea legs underneath of us again.   I know you know exactly what I mean because I know so many of you who are going through so many difficult things – you’ve felt the thwack for yourself or for another and you’re a little stunned.

Are any of you suffering hardships? You should pray. Are any of you happy? You should sing praises.  James 5:13

I read something today about this verse in James that was absolutely life changing for me.  No kidding, life changing.  Listen:

When we face stress of all kinds, prayer is not our last chance but our first choice.  James does not promise us that our emotional pain will always go away, but he does guarantee us that God cares about our suffering.  When we cry out to God and bring him into our pain, he is a “friend that sticks closer than a brother.”  When we put our burden in his hands and accept the loving arms of Christ around us, then we experience comfort and gain strength to bear up under the pressure. Jack Graham

Of course, I know in my heart that prayer should be first, but…I italicized the life changing part.  For some reason, I always think I must not be praying right, or must not be praying hard enough, long enough, or, my favorite — I must not be giving my hardship to God because my emotional pain in the midst of my crisis didn’t go away when I prayed. Does anyone else feel like that too?  Oh, good.  You see, in my feeble mind I somehow equated praying about my hardship with immediately “feeling” emotionally pain free.  James says not so.

James’s statement is frankly so simple it’s hard.  James is saying unexpected call-pray, diagnosis-pray, accident-pray, loss-pray, illness-pray, broken-pray, hurt-pray.  Pray through the tears, the shock, the hurt, the pain, the questions, the confusion.  Just pray.  The tears may still flow, we may still feel the gut punch, we may still feel the pain and confusion and our minds may be whirling, but as Jack Graham says, when we pray, that’s when we bring God into our pain.  That’s when we can begin to emotionally heal, be comforted and strengthened when the tough stuff comes our way.

Remember, God knows our hardships before they happen.  He doesn’t need us to pray to Him to tell Him what our hardship is, He knew and knows.  We need to pray to Him for our healing.  Only when we invite God into our tough stuff can we be comforted and be strengthened.  God wants to be an active participant in our burden bearing, not a distance observer.  He enters when invited, by prayer. While relaying yet another devastating prayer request to a friend the other day, she said:   “God must really want to spend time with us because He’s giving us lots of things to talk to Him about.”  So true.