I am a teacher currently, and I am finishing my fourth year of school.  There is something that I have learned when it comes to being in a school building in the last quarter, and that it is HARD.  It is so hard this time of year.   It is not easy to get the students to focus, or to quiet down.  The weather is getting nice, which means the last thing that people want to do is to stay in a room and study books. 

 We even have a term for this called, senioritis.  This is another term that really shows up for me as a teacher who does teach seniors in high school.  When a person is so close to getting out of high school, it can be very easy for them to want to just scrape by.  Why put in the extra work, if this is going to be the last few months that you will ever see this place?  The grades are pretty much decided, the colleges have given out acceptance letters if they are choosing to go to college, and the scholarships have been given out and accepted.  There is not a lot more that can be done at this time of year to do.  Yet there are still a few weeks left of learning.  There are still a few more weeks of knowledge to be gained, and we still have connections and life lessons to learn before the goodbyes are said. 

It has been a good show to me that I need to remember to see this year through to the end. Because I am so close to the end, it would feel much easier to just give in and put up the towel.  Not spend as much time lesson planning, hardly grade, not really help the students who are struggling to desire knowledge.  I will be honest that I can really feel that way this year in particular as I am leaving this profession at the end of the year.  It would be much easier to allow this to be their problem next year after I am gone.   

However, then I need to remember that we need to work hard and be diligent even when we are approaching the end, the end of a season, the end of the year, the end of a relationship.  We should have the same approach and love as we did in the beginning.  Sometimes journeys, jobs, relationships, can all be exciting in the beginning, but it is the middle and the end where the times get tough.  How can we still keep our character and our diligence and our God-fearing ness during those times?  

Jesus definitely did.  He really perseveres even at the end.  Can you imagine?  He knew that he was going to die.  He knew that the end of his life was coming.  He could have taken that time to enjoy himself.  He could have taken that time to fish or to hangout with his friends, but he decided he wanted to focus his energy on saving as many people as he could and then still be sent to the cross for the good of the Lord, His father.  He still knew that he had a role he needed to fulfill before he left this earth. He did it with gladness, even when it must have been difficult.    

This is also the challenge that God gives us for the end times.  He reminds us that at some point, Jesus is going to be coming back.  Jesus never planned on leaving his people here on earth forever.  Yes, we have the opportunity to go to heaven after we die, but there is also going to be a day when Jesus will come back and will bring all believers up to heaven.  He is going to get rid of Satan, once and for all.  He reminded us many times throughout the Bible to be ready because the end times would be coming.   The verse, Matthew 24:44 is just one example of the Bible bringing up ways we as Christ followers need to be prepared for the end times.  This says, “Therefore you also must be ready, for the Son of Man is coming at an hour you do not expect.”   

I do want to spend this time encouraging anyone who is like me and will be going through a change of season.  I want to encourage any senior that is reading this who may be struggling with the idea of branching out on their own, or seeking to find a path that isn’t just going to classes.  I hope that everyone who is choosing to move to a new town or join a new group of friends is excited about this grand adventure.  I pray that you can continue to grow as close to the Lord throughout the rest of the days of your life.   My challenge for you this week is to spend time in prayer for strength, diligence, and encouragement as you close a particular chapter.

If you have been reading along with my blog, this may sound repetitive, but at church today we were learning about Abraham and his mighty story.  He definitely had a lot of ups and downs with a lot of temptations where he sometimes showed great faith and sometimes showed complete fear.  The story that wraps up Abraham’s tale in the book of Genesis is when he was being tested by God through being asked to dedicate his son, Isaac.  

This is not my favorite story from the Bible.  I don’t know what I would do if I was in the position that Abraham was.  I don’t think I could even start the process of walking up to the temple with my son, or even a human being with the intent to give him as a sacrifice.  Abraham shows great faith through this whole interaction.  He faithfully and obediently goes up to the temple with the intention to do what the Lord has asked.  We even see that Abramham really believed in his heart that God was going to provide.  He believed before he went up with Isaac that God would provide the sacrifice that was necessary which was why he didn’t have to bring one along.  We absolutely see great faith, and from the moments of his lack of trust, this is a high moment for Abraham to have.  

The good news, for anyone who knows the story, is that God does provide a ram that is found in the thicket.  This was the perfect provision that Abraham had been hoping for.  This was the replacement.  This also serves as a wholesome and beautiful metaphor to Jesus as our perfect replacement when he died on the cross.  We don’t need to give sacrifices anymore because we have been given the perfect sacrifice who has the ability to forgive all of our sins and will allow us to spend forever with him and his father in heaven if we so choose.  

However, my pastor was able to provide me with something new to think about when it comes to this passage.  There are so many take-aways, but this is a new one that I have never thought about before, and one that I think is important for everyone to think about.  God wants our best and our worst. He wants us to come to him about our hard times, but he also wants us to come to him when we are excited.  He desires a complete relationship, and just like every good and healthy relationship, the two people share their highs and their lows.  

It is actually in some ways harder to give God our best.  However, I am not going to say that it is easy to give God our worst.  There are many temptations and sins that are hard to give over to God.  There is shame that we don’t always want to present before the Lord.  We can have fear.  However, have you thought about how hard it can be to give God our best or our good things?  It can be incredibly difficult to give God our dreams, our passions, and our relationships.  We want to think that because they are our best and most sacred things, they should be kept sealed to our hearts where we are completely in control of them.  We would rather be the ones in charge of the decisions surrounding those things.  

We see this is what Abraham had done.  A great chunk of his story from the book of Genesis was about the promise to be a father of a nation.  Even though he and his wife had struggled to father a child, after desperately wanting one, Abraham and Sarah were promised they would have a child.  They tried to take this into their own hands through Hagar and Ishmael, but still God promised they would have a biological child of their own by each other, not through anyone else.  Then even with the laughter through their age and lack of faith, they finally had their baby, Isaac.  A good part of Abraham’s personality was now matched in with having this child of Isaac and being his father.  Yet, as we see in this story, Abraham was getting ready to sacrifice the child they had been waiting years for to the Lord.  Abraham was willing to give the absolute best part of him and his son’s life to God.  Luckily because God saw that Abraham was faithful, he did decide to bless his two sons with a Ram and a replacement. God provided the future to Abraham and it was completely good.    

We do see that there are many verses that speak to giving sacrifices throughout the Bible. The first one I am going to highlight is from the Old Testament and that is Psalm 66:15, “I will sacrifice fat animals to you, and an offering of rams; I will offer bulls and goats.” We see that God does care about good meat as a gift to him.  Then the second one is Luke 12: 33-34 which says, “Sell your possessions and give to the poor. Provide purses for yourselves that will not wear out, a treasure in heaven that will never fail, where no thief comes near and no moth destroys. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.”  This is a reminder not to care about worldly possessions.  We are not to care about the items in this world that sparkle or twinkle.  We are to be more focused on the future world, or the one that we are headed towards and the treasures that will be there.  

How does this really work in our day to day life? What are some ways that we can always give God our best moments and the exciting parts of our life?  How can we avoid just giving him our bad, but commit to giving him our good as well?  The way I best seek to give God my best is through prayer before all my big events.  Every time I am about to seek doing something related to a dream or a desire, I am trying to give more and more attention to talking to God about it.  It is important that I let him know where my heart is with this particular desire.  I need to let him know where my heart is taking me, and where my heart is leading me.   I don’t just try to talk to God when I am sad or I am mad, but also the moments when I am happy and when I am feeling more at peace.  

My challenge this week for everyone reading is to think of one desire or dream that you can put into God’s hands.  What is something that you would like to see in your life?  What is something that you have been afraid to give up to God because you secretly want all the control over it?  I pray that whatever you desire, the Lord will showcase the best possible option for you with that dream or desire.  I pray that you see God’s promise in this dream and in your future. 

We have all been in a situation where we have been challenged with someone in our lives who drives us nuts or is difficult to love.  There can be those people who say mean words to our faces or who do not have the decency to think about their actions and how it may impact us before they do them.  I know that I have encountered many people along the way who are not completely loveable, but it doesn’t necessarily make it easier any of the times that we come across them again.  It takes skill to face this particular challenge.  

I have a woman at my current job who has not been pleasant.  She is not a fan of mine.  Why is this?  I don’t know.  I don’t know what I ever did to upset her.  But I can say that she has a lot of negative comments to make towards me.  It has been hurtful, and I have been so annoyed and angry.  So far at least in these last few months, I have done a fairly good job at not retaliating, and I am happy this is the current story.  However, I have been so tempted to treat her the exact way she has treated me.  I have been so tempted to get angry back at her and say unkind things to her.  There was a time in the fall when I was very angry and snapped back at her, but I didn’t enjoy how I felt about myself later that day.  Since then, I have been cautious to not repeat that particular action.   

For my Bible Study group, we are reading the book, “Mere Christianity,” by C.S Lewis.  For our last session, we read the section on charity.  Lewis thought of charity in different ways than I ever have.  For one thing, he thought of charity, not just in the sense of giving to the poor but in what charity was supposed to be authentically.  Charity in its original definition was supposed to be thought of as “Love in the Christian sense.”  Love in the way that we are supposed to act and have towards one another and towards God himself.  

One line that stood out to me from that chapter was, “Do not waste time bothering whether you ‘love’ your neighbor, act as if you did.”  Lewis will go on to explain that actually liking someone or not has no sin, but it is the actions and the choices that we make towards that person.  Also, he will mention that yes, spending time trying to like the person can make it easier to be loving to them because we are usually more loving to the people we like as a general rule.  However, we don’t actually have to like a person in order to be a Christian towards them or loving towards them.  

This is also a good reminder to focus our energy away from doing the opposite.  I have often mentioned that I have struggled with venting about people.  I always claim that this helps me feel better.  When in reality giving constant complaints about someone makes a person dislike that person even more than they did originally.   I am not saying that sometimes blowing off some steam isn’t a good thing or that sometimes we need to talk out our feelings with someone, but we should not focus as much of our energy discussing with others the things that we dislike about a lot of different people.  It doesn’t help us show God’s love, but it can rather make more apparent the ways it is hard to show God’s love to that particular individual. 

There have been a lot of studies and articles  shown to relate this claim.  Including an article by Kristalyn Salters who has a PhD who said, “However, more recent research suggests that venting anger in this way doesn’t dissipate it. Instead, venting anger may make these feelings worse.”  Again, I am not writing this from a place of having it all figured out.  I definitely struggle when it comes to desiring to vent out my feelings.  I believe it makes me feel better.  I believe that this is just me getting my anger out and that is the end.  When in reality, I become more content in my anger and annoyance of a person or situation.  

I have two tips I try to remember when dealing with challenging people.  The first is to remember that they may be dealing with a lot of stress or hardships, or even heartbreak that I have no knowledge of.  I recently found out that the co-worker who has been difficult with me is going to the doctor a lot for her skin cancer.  Her face has been poked and prodded, leaving dry, red spots.  That can not be pleasant to deal with, and it is most likely stressful to deal with the multiple doctor appointments.  Even though her stress does not warrant being mean to others, it does make a person understand why they have become more harsh or cross.    

Then the second one I try to remember is how I would like people to treat me even when I am being difficult.  I have had days.  I have had rough moments, and I have been a jerk sometimes.  I have been cross, and through it all, I have had friends and family members who have been there for me.  I have had friends who have just listened to me and loved me through those tough moments.  This is even why we have the Golden rule that is based in Scripture from Matthew 7:12, “So whatever you wish that others would do to you, do also to them, for this is the Law and the Prophets.”  Then I also need to remember that I have the extreme grace and love from the Father, who is constantly forgiving and loving me throughout my mistakes and my hard to love moments.  I need to remember how many times God has been gracious with me when I have not deserved it.  I can show a bit of that love to my neighbors and difficult people in my life.  

My challenge for you this week is to think of a person that can be sometimes very hard to love in your own life.  Sadly, it seems we all have at least one person who can make our days longer or our hours harder.  Who is the person who maybe doesn’t seem to vibe with you, maybe the person you don’t necessarily get along with the best?  It is alright to admit that sometimes you don’t like something about someone.  As the book, “Mere Christianity” says, that isn’t where the sinning comes in.  The sinning comes from us making poor choices towards those people or choosing not to show them love.  So, the second part of my challenge is to think of a way to show that person love this week.  What is something kind that you can do for them that will really help them out?  I hope through the acts of love to them, you will find it easier to show them more love in the future. 

Oh Lord, thank you for the news I get to share! This is all because of you! Thank you for the opportunities that you have given me to write what it is in my heart.  I know that my heart may want to lead me astray and become too confident that this accomplishment is all because of my ability, but I pray you remind me humbly that you are the one who gives me the words to write.  

I love to write.  I hope that was shown through my love of my weekly blog.  I hope my passion for words and messages has rang throughout my blog posts.  Because of my love of writing, I have always wanted to publish my own devotional or my own book.  I have had this dream since I was a child, but these last couple of years I have been thinking more and more about how this could possibly be accomplished.  Could I even accomplish this?  How would I really be able to see this through? Is this completely impossible?  The usual self-doubt talk was keeping me away from accomplishing or even pursuing this dream. 

But then I decided to do something, and that was to write.  I decided to start writing.  I started writing more and more for my blog.  I started to write down ideas I had for a book.  I started to brainstorm with others.  I started to have others read over my work and give me suggestions (shout out to my mom who is going to say something in the comments-yes, thank you for looking over a lot of my writings). I just generally started to write and write.  This increased even more as we were home in quarantine and after my grandpa passed.  Through the pain, I found great solace through writing.  Then I thought about the idea of writing a devotional breaking down every verse from one of the Psalms.    

Through many months of hard work of editing and writing, I have written a devotional book about psalm 66.  I spent months writing.  I initially looked at every verse in psalm 66.  I put down what I was originally thinking. Then I took some time reading through it as well as having others read through it.  There were some original entries I needed to completely rewrite and then others that only took a few edits.  If you have ever had to write a paper for class or for church or just because you desire to, you know the writing ideas part is fun, it is the editing that can take excruciating time and energy.  Writing this first devotional book has definitely been a learning experience to the hard work it takes to be a published author.  

This blog post is not only being used to talk about the exciting achievement I have to share in the writing world, but also it is being used as a sale’s pitch.  If you have never been a reader of devotionals, this one will be a good start.  It is 20 days long, a day dedicated to each verse.  It is broken down in 5 devotionals a week for four weeks along with weekly reflection questions.  It is short and easy, and follows just one chapter in the entire Bible.  

The verse that comes to my mind when I am thinking about this whole process is Proverbs 16:3, “Commit your work to the Lord, and your plans will be established.”  I have committed this plan to the Lord.  I have committed my writing to the Lord, and now I will see where it will continue to go.  I am praying I will have a continuous opportunity to write more books and blog posts that bring glory to God.  I have felt called to write as a way to grow closer to God and his beautiful love for me.  I hope that through my writing I can also show others God’s beautiful love for them as well.  

Before I end this blog post, I do want to take the time to, of course, thank those who have been involved in the making of this devotional book as well as my writing career as of yet.  I want to thank anyone who has read my blog or are a follower of my work.  I want to thank anyone who has congratulated me personally, and I am pre-thanking anyone who will purchase my book.  I want to thank my personal publishing assistant, Ben (Who is probably not reading this,but I appreciate all the work that you have done).  

Again, if you would be interested in buying a copy of my devotional, here is the link to my personal book page: books – Covenant Books.  Then below is a picture to the cover of the devotional book I have written.   God bless!

I just started the book, “3:16,” by Max Lucado this Easter weekend.  This book’s main inspiration is most people’s beloved verse, “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.”  It is a great starter to our religious faith, and this is why Max Lucado is taking time to break down just one verse in the Bible that holds so much significance.  This verse provides so much hope and so much joy, and this verse serves as a reminder of God’s love for us, even when we don’t deserve it.  Even if you have been a believer for years, it is still a verse that should be relooked and reviewed again and again.  

The first chapter already made a big impact on me.  Lucado referenced John 3:16 and the relationships that we should have with Jesus as a Mulligan shot.  For those of you who are not golfers,  a Mulligan shot is basically a do-over shot.  For example, if there is a really bad drive that a golfer makes, they can try that same drive over again.  Now, granted Mulligans are not actually used in golf competitions and in tournament play.  However, in casual rounds of golf, it is commonly used.  It is not used in every hole, but usually once in the round.  Every golfer would prefer to never have to use a Mulligan shot, but it is convenient when it is made available to us. 

We all would like to have Mulligan shots in real life.  There are so many times when we say the wrong thing to the person that we work with, or we hurt someone’s feelings or we accidentally sleep in past an important meeting.  There have been so many days I would pray for a Mulligan day.  We as people all need a Mulligan for our lives in general.  Sadly, everyone has made a mistake.  Everyone has made poor choices and has hurt others.  Everyone has done the opposite of what they said they would do.  We have all sinned.  Romans 3:23 says this perfectly, “For all have sinned and have fallen short of the glory of God.”  We all need a Mulligan, a do over.  We need one to cover our lives and make us renewed.  

I do have wonderful news, even when that last paragraph sounded harsh and tragic.  We have a Mulligan in Jesus Christ.  We have a chance for a complete do-over.  Jesus died on the cross for our sins.  Our heavenly Father sent his son to earth to die on the cross for our sins and for all the mistakes that we have made over the past and will make in the future.  He sent his son to die, even when people mocked him and rejected him, even when I mocked or rejected him.  Yet, he has chosen to love me and to save me.  I don’t deserve a do-over, I don’t deserve a second chance to do life, a Mulligan, but through Him, I have gotten one.  

Now, I will say that this means we get Mulligans or do-overs for our everyday decisions.  We are still going to make mistakes that will hurt others, and we will have to be responsible for that.  We may need to face consequences for some of our actions.  We are not made perfect in the sense that we will never make a mistake again. Similarly, after a mulligan shot is made in golf, there will still be some bad shots that will be taken, and golfers will need to work the way to the hole regardless of them. We need to be conscious of the choices that we are making daily. We will need to listen to our Holy Spirit, our guide to help us through this world and through our choices.  We may need to be humbled, we may need to apologize, but we will eventually make it to the home that we will have in heaven with Jesus and our Father. 

This is the Easter Season.  This is the greatest time to remember what the Lord thinks of His people, including you and me.  He loves us, even when we don’t deserve this.  I pray that when you are with your family or with your friends, that you remember the reason for this Easter season, that you remember everything that the Lord has done for you in order for you to have a Mulligan shot at life.  

I have two challenges for you this week.  The first is to spend your own time reflecting on the verse John 3:16. Through that reflection, I hope you can remind at least one person about God’s love through sharing this verse with them. Then my second challenge for you is to enjoy your week. Have the most blessed Easter week. Maybe even go golfing in the new, crisp spring air. Whatever you do, I hope you feel God’s love and the complete blessing of your do-over in life. Live out this re-do to the best of your ability.

The people we read about in the Bible really showcase a lot of different characteristics to us, its readers.  There is such a wide array of characters that are filled with bravery, hope, faith, but then there are also a lot of characters filled with anger, bitterness, and cowardice.  The other interesting thing about the Bible is that it really shows us the people’s stories from having moments of sin and completely missing the mark to being a champion of the faith.  The Bible gives us a realistic picture of humanity and what we all look like.  We have moments where we completely are filled with sin and make many mistakes to moments where we are filled with God’s spirit.  

At church this Sunday morning, we continued on our conversation and life story of Sarah and Abraham.  Today, we were in Genesis 20.  This was another time where Abraham would lie about who his wife Sarah was.  If you have ever read the book of Genesis, or if you have been following along in my blog post recaps of what we have been learning in church, you may realize that this is the second time when Abraham lied about who Sarah was.  This is the second time he has said that she is his sister as opposed to his wife, and this is also the second time that it has not worked out as he had originally planned. 

Abraham and Sarah were traveling through the land of Gerar.  Along the way, Abraham told Sarah to again pretend to be his sister.  He didn’t want someone to kill him and take Sarah to be their own wife, so instead he lied, and the King Abimelech took Sarah to be his wife.  However, nothing would really last long or happen before the Lord came to Abimelech and told him that Sarah was actually married to a man named Abraham.  The king was not impressed.  He would not have taken Sarah as his wife if he had known she was already married. Abimelech was then commanded to find Abraham, so he could reestablish the husband and wife.  

Something my pastor pointed out to us this morning was that this time he lied about who his wife was, was actually about 20-30 years apart from the original time he had lied about his wife.  Abraham had grown so much in his faith, yet he still went back to an old trick and an old lie that he had told many years prior.  Why had he told the same lie?  He had the same fear.  He had the fear of the people of Gerar and the king of the people.  Because of this, he took control as opposed to giving the control over to God.  Even though he had been growing in faith, he showed we are always growing and learning, even as we have been in the faith for years.  

This also brought me to thinking about a chapter I was recently reading with my Bible Study, Mere Christianity by C.S Lewis.  There was a chapter that is dedicated to the Great Sin which is pride. Because of pride, we can easily avoid admitting our need for help.  We may not want to admit that we need to change something about ourselves.  One quote I want to highlight from this chapter is,  “For Pride is a spiritual cancer: it eats up the very possibility of love, or contentment, or even common sense.”  Having a lot of pride can make it hard to grow our relationship with God.  Pride can be blinding.  We can stop seeing the things that don’t make sense or the evil in the world and actions because of pride.  

Sometimes we can have too much pride to really want to change our actions or evaluate our thought patterns that lead to some of our actions.  Another quote from the book of Mere Christianity is “As long as you are proud, you cannot know God.”  Taking the time to evaluate our actions and the things that we can learn is the first step.  Realizing we are proud can help us become aware of how desperately we need God and how we need him to grow.  

Getting back to the story of Abraham in Genesis, we actually discover that there is a happier ending than where it was originally headed.  Abraham meets up with the king, Abimelech when he brings him back to his wife.  Abimelech is at first upset, and he asks Abraham why he didn’t tell him that Sarah was his wife in the first place.  He says that he could have gotten himself in a lot of trouble through marrying a woman who is already married.  We learn, as well as Abraham, that even though this culture of Gerar may not be considered Yahweh followers, they do value marriage, and they have overall good morals. 

Abraham was honest with Abimelech that he was afraid of being killed and being in trouble with them.  He didn’t want to be killed because of his beautiful wife. He was very fearful.  Abimelech listened to Abraham and would eventually give him land and let him stay in the area for a long time.  He gave him back his wife and he never killed him in the hopes of grabbing Sarah back.  We see that all Abraham was fearful of, did not come to fruition because God ultimately had a plan.  

As the pendulum constantly is swinging, we will see in later chapters that Abimelech and Abraham’s relationship isn’t perfect, but that doesn’t mean we can’t gather great information from this particular interaction.  Abraham who was a child of God learned a valuable lesson from someone who wasn’t.  He learned something as a man of older age, and he learned from a mistake that he had made many times before.  The point is, you can actually teach an old dog new tricks.  It can be hard because we are sometimes more stubborn as we get older and filled with more pride, but there is alway something to learn and there are always more ways to grow.  

My challenge for you this week is to think about something you have recently learned.  Write it down or tell a friend.  What is something that you have learned through either personal study with God or with a fellow believer.  What are some ways you have grown in the past week?  Celebrate that growth! It is important to realize that amidst our trials and tribulations, as well as the shame that can so easily creep into our lives, it is important to find the ways that God is working amongst us for the good.  It is uplifting to see the fruit that he is bearing in each and every one of our lives. 

I was reading my devotional book by Micah Tyler, “Walk by Faith.”  This has been a very good and loving devotion.  I have been reminded a lot about God’s love, ways that I tend to walk away from God, and how I can grow in faith. This last devotional really struck me because it is something I personally struggle with and that is being afraid of following the rules.  I am not afraid of following the rules in the sense that I am scared of the rules, but rather I am afraid of what will happen if the rules get broken. I don’t want people to get upset and I don’t want to disappoint anyone, especially God if I end up breaking the rules.  

Micah Tyler talked about his oldest son who was the ever rule follower.  His oldest son, as a young child, whenever they would go to a new place would ask what the rules are, so that way he wouldn’t break any of them.  Micah mentioned this made it easy when it came to parenting in many regards.  He didn’t have to worry about getting teacher phone calls or having a lot of problems at home.  He was confident in his child’s ability to go to a new place and be respectful of his surroundings and people occupying the space.  

However, he did bring up his concern about not wanting his son to be so fearful of making mistakes and not feeling God’s grace.  God’s grace covers all of our sins.  He is the one that we need to ultimately be good stewards of the word and his messages, or in other words rule-followers.  He is the one that we need to be cleansed.  We are only going to do right with his guidance and his love covering us.  One quotation from this devotional that I want to highlight is “For far too many people, a relationship with Jesus becomes more about trying to not mess up than focusing on the freedom and abundant life he offers.”   Just like Micah Tyler’s son and so many other christians, we can start to focus on the law as opposed to love.  We start to become more legalistic than realizing how God’s spirit should make us joyful just to continue in his grace.  

Even the Pharisees in the Bible were far too focused on the law than they were on loving the people that God had set before them.  One of the most known and influential stories of the Bible is the story of the Good Samaritan.  However, if you have never heard this story, it is a story of one man who has been beaten and hurt on the ground as well as robbed. This man needed someone to help.  Two religious leaders were walking on the same street as him and decided to cross the street to avoid helping.  It wasn’t till a Samaritan, who was culturally an enemy of the man beaten, came and helped the man to the best of his ability. His best, happened to be awesome because he had him cleaned up, a place to stay, and others involved.  He went the whole nine yards.  

I want to take note about the two religious leaders who decided to walk on the other side of the road.  They were the ones that were pushing the law and telling people to not make mistakes, but then missed the perfect opportunity to practice what God’s law was actually teaching, which was complete and utter love for both God and one-another.  When we are so overwhelmed avoiding all mistakes and making sure we have every i dotted and t crossed, we may start missing the opportunities to love the ones around us.  Or we can start to really bring ourselves down.  We can start to be insecure and anxious that we still miss the ways that God is working in our lives and have provided us ways to grow closer to himself and be his servants.  

I have personally always struggled with this.  I have always been a rule-follower.  I like to follow the rules, I like to know I am doing the right thing, and I like to know that I am not disappointing anyone.  This has actually landed me in a lot of negative self-talk whenever I do make a mistake or don’t follow a specific rule perfectly.  One of the main reasons I decided to start going into therapy was because of my negative self-talk.  My therapist and I have had to talk quite a bit about the way that I speak with myself that then leads to a lot of anxiety and insecurities.  It has been a rough road, but I am growing more and more in realizing that God loves me and is helping me to continuously grow both to be closer to himself as well as a better person in general.  

Obviously, this does not mean I think we should go out and try to sin.  We shouldn’t go out there with the intention of breaking the law both man’s and God’s, but this means that we shouldn’t have the fear of sinning and of making mistakes.  There are going to be times when we will mess up or blunder.  We are sinful people.  Obviously and hopefully, this is not on purpose.  However, we can now know that when we do make a mistake or we do the wrong thing, we don’t have to be filled with shame.  We can know that God loves us even amidst our sins and the poor choices that we can make.  

To sum up my thoughts as well as this devotional, I am going to leave you with a verse from 2 Timothy 1:9 which says, “He has saved us and called us to a holy life—not because of anything we have done but because of his own purpose and grace. This grace was given to us in Christ Jesus before the beginning of time.”  We have been called to be rule-followers.  We have been called to be holy.  However, we can remember that God is the way that we are holy.  It is through him that we can follow the rules, and it is then his grace that will cover us when we inevitably fail.  Throughout this week, I will be praying you will be reminded of the freedom that you have in Christ through his grace. 

I have talked and thought a lot about leaving the teaching field.  I have been teaching for four years, and I have had a lot of opportunities and experiences.   Some have been incredibly high and extremely rewarding, but there have been a few others that have been very hard and discouraging.  I have thought about leaving because I have considered going into more after-school, non-profit work.  I love teaching, but I love nothing more than my summer job which is considered to be a more nonprofit setting. 

That being said, I have recently taken a job at a non-profit.  I will be working at an organization called the Job Foundation. I will be working with kids still, but I will be teaching them financial literacy. I will be able to work with all ages from elementary, just starting to understand money to seniors who are ready to take on the world. This organization is in Cedar Falls, which is actually where I went to college. I am going back to the city where I first discovered my love of learning and non-profit culture, the world around me and the people inside it, and became deeper in my relationship with God. It is a lovely place in my memory.  I never would have thought I would go back there, but here I am.  I am excited, but if I am honest, I am also undeniably afraid of saying yes to this new and unknown future.  

This was just the first step though, and now I have many afterwards.  Isn’t it funny how that can work sometimes.  You make one decision and then you have to make another, and then you have to make another.  It goes on and on.  Now, I get to make a lot of other scary decisions, but the first one has been made.  It has been decided.  Now, I get to make the rest of the decisions with the peace that only Christ can give me that I am making the right choices.  

Where should I live?  Should I live alone again in an apartment or should I find a roommate?  I already have some insight into churches, but which one should I go to?  Where will I make a lot of friends?  What are some things that I should be involved in?  Are there a lot of clubs and organizations or volunteering that I can be a part or a member of? Luckily, I did live in Cedar Falls for a few years, so that takes away a little bit of anxiety, but there is still some there.  Then I have to step away from my kids and the community that I have already been building in Buffalo Center.  It is a lot at one time.  It is exciting and it is good, and I believe it is completely ordained by God.  However, it is scary, and I know I definitely need a lot of comfort from God and those I love during this time.   

I think that any time in life that people want to make a change, it does take just one scary step to get them there.  This can be anyone who wants to start making healthier life choices like starting to exercise, or eating clean.  It can be deciding to join a Bible Study.  It can be deciding to start dating or putting yourself out there in relationships.  It can be to pursue a new career or a side job or signing up for extra classes.  The world has so many different opportunities for people to be a part of, but that means there are always a lot of scary steps to take.  

One example of a group of people within the pages of the Bible who had to make a scary first step (there are actually very many) was Simon Peter, James, and John leaving their fishing boat and deciding to follow Jesus.  Jesus came to them and helped them with their fishing originally.  They were struggling to get any fish into their nets.  They had been working at it for hours even though they were professionals.  Jesus came and by his miraculous appearance helped them catch a lot of fish, more than they could have ever done on their own.  

Because of the miracle, the three fishermen were able to see who was in front of them. They fell on their knees, and they asked Jesus why he was around them because they were sinners.  However, Jesus actually tells them that he wants to be around them a lot more.  He wants them to follow him, and he wants them to be a part of his ministry.  He wants them to fish for people.  This is what is said in Luke 5:10b-11, “Then Jesus said to Simon, ‘Don’t be afraid; from now on you will fish for people.’ So they pulled their boats up on shore, left everything and followed him.” 

 My favorite part about this section is that it says those disciples put their boats on the shore and they followed him.  That must have been a scary step.  They didn’t know how long they would be gone or how far they would travel.  Some of them had families and friends they may have wanted to spend more time with.  Then there were their fishing boats.  They were leaving behind their hard-earned fishing boats, but they did it for the chance to follow Jesus and have a more rewarding future.  

Hopefully, as I take this next step in my life, I will have the opportunity to fish for people.  I hope there are opportunities to volunteer, to get involved, and to really interact with the community.  I am excited to get to know people who are in the town.  I also want to take this time to thank all of the people who have been so supportive through this whole journey.  I have had so many people in my life wishing me the absolute best and giving me great advice.  I am so glad that I have so many people in my life who love me and want the absolute best for me.

Today at church, I was all ready to continue our way through Genesis.  This is where we have been the past two months, and I was excited to hear thoughts from the speakers on the next journey for Abraham and Sarah.  However, church was a bit different today.  They had a man named Merve give his testimony.  He is an older gentleman at our church.  I have probably seen him, but I don’t believe I have ever had the opportunity to talk with him.  

His testimony was very powerful.  He talked about leaving home at 14 and taking care of himself the rest of his life.  I find that really incredible because I would not have had the ability to take care of myself at the age of 14.  He does bring up that this is a downfall as he did not want to accept Jesus for good while into his life.    He says this is because he didn’t believe he needed anyone or anything else to survive.  He was all he needed.  He had taken care of himself and could continue to take care of himself. He was already married with a baby when he became a believer. It was a terrifying, yet miraculous, close to death experience that brought him to Jesus. 

One frightful day, he gets into an accident that could have and, in all honesty, should have taken his life.  It would have taken the lives of many others.  He became severely burned all over his body and this was because of an accident with his truck.  He somehow survived and because of this whole incident, he became a follower of Jesus.  He gave his life to God when the doctor who was saving his life, put the seeds of Jesus into his mind. He retells sitting laying down being transported from hospital to hospital, fearing death, but also fully aware that he had given his life over to God.  

For the rest of his life, he became a prominent member of his church.  He was a leader, both for his church and for his family.  However, there was one thing that he had not done since becoming a believer.  He had not had a believer’s baptism or an adult baptism.  He had a baptism when he was a baby, but he had not been the one to make that decision.  Through the years, so many people had just come to assume he had been baptized as a believer that he was afraid, a bit full of shame and embarrassment at the admission of not having a believer’s baptism.  

This brings us to the reason that we are here today at church, listening to him give his story.  Merve decided to be baptized today!   He had his family members, specifically his sons and his best friend baptize him.  They prayed over him while he was laying in the tub, and It was beautiful.  It had been weighing on his heart and conscience that he knew he needed to make this step toward his walk with Jesus.  He finally walked away from the shame and embarrassment and decided to step towards faith and become baptized, without anything holding him back.  Now he has been baptized as a believer, even as he is an 80 year old man.  

His overall message for us was not to let our shame or our embarrassment keep us away from doing what God has called us to do.  This can be really small to something really big. This can be talking to the people who usually don’t have anyone to talk to.  These are the people who are considered to be the outcasts, or they do not fit in.  This could be deciding to foster or adopt a child.  The Lord directs our steps, from the big to the small, so it is always good to get his insight on anything we do.  

There are many Bible figures who have shown risks and have given their heart to God in so many different ways.  There were so many who chose to share God’s Gospel, even by getting killed by non-believers.  One character from the Bible I would like to highlight is Nehemiah.  Nehemiah was a Jewish cupbearer who had felt compelled and challenged by the spirit to rebuild the walls and the city of Jerusalem.  This did include a lot of risk and hostility.  There were even a few threats that were made against him.  However, he kept leading his people on building the wall, until it was done.  Then it was a miraculous thing that had been accomplished. 

Nehemiah was also helping the poor while he was completing this role of building the wall.  He was giving back some of the things they had taken.  This was again something that was on Nehemiah’s heart because he knew that it was something that was on the Lord’s heart.  Nehemiah 5 discusses this in verses 15 and 16. 

“But the earlier governors—those preceding me—placed a heavy burden on the people and took forty shekels of silver from them in addition to food and wine. Their assistants also lorded it over the people. But out of reverence for God I did not act like that.  Instead, I devoted myself to the work on this wall. All my men were assembled there for the work; we did not acquire any land.”

Nehemiah refused to do the thing that the world had done or what the people before him had done.  He did what the Lord had laid on his heart. I hope through these two examples, one through Nehemiah from the Bible building the wall to Merve deciding to be baptized at the age of 80, to do the things that are on your heart from God.  

My challenge for you this week is to pray with God about what he has been putting on your heart.  Again, it does not have to necessarily be life-altering.  It could even be receiving an adult baptism like Merve.  I do pray that you spend that time in prayer to find what God really wants you to accomplish in the near future, and I pray you have at least one person to talk to about it this week.  Let us go out and be the Merves and Nehemiahs of this world. 

My mom kindly and graciously gave me a devotional book for Valentine’s Day.  It is called “Walking Free” by Micah Tyler.  I am already in love.  It has really short daily entries that help you think.  There was an entry that I read recently about Peter.  Peter, the man who was a disciple of Jesus and helped spread the message of the Gospel and Christianity, yet has been really known for his major mistakes.  He was the man who denied Jesus three times before Jesus was walked and sent to the cross.  That is a pretty major mistake.  

Micah Tyler brings up one of Peter’s main criticisms and mishaps which is the time that he sank in water after he was walking toward Jesus.  This moment is often criticized because of his lack of faith.  He didn’t believe that God could hold on to him in the midst of the storm.  However, if you think about it, I personally have never walked on water.  I have never had enough faith to walk on water for even a second, and Peter did.  Yet, he is the one who is considered by many to have no faith. 

Then, as I have mentioned many times, we are going through Genesis in church, so we are still learning about the highs and lows of Abraham and Sarah.  There were many moments when Abraham would show faith and have complete trust in God, yet there would be times when he would lose faith.  One of the more recent lows was when Abraham laughed at God telling him that he was going to be a father in less than a year.  Abraham did not believe this could happen at first.  The Lord simply asked, “Why did you laugh?”  Abraham quickly learned that he shouldn’t doubt God and what he tells him.  Even though Abraham had accepted at that point in his life to have no children, he quickly learned that this was not the plan that God had for him in his life.    

Later Sarah would also laugh at the idea of her being a mother in less a year while she is in her 90s.   Sarah and Abraham did, obviously, have a son in a year, and they named him Isaac.  Isaac actually means, “He will laugh.”  They are highlighting the moments when they did not believe in God and how wrong they were.  Their faith has grown, and they now know that God had complete control over their life.  He can make impossible things possible.  

My overall point in this blog post is that Faith takes time.  I think there are times when we want to address people as either faithful or unfaithful.   A person can either be one or the other.  However, I realized that faith really does take time to grow.  It is not one instantaneous moment where a person goes from being unfaithful to completely faithful.  It is something that needs to be challenged and stretched.  It will sometimes feel like two steps forward and one step back, but as long as there is progress being made, that is something that should be celebrated.  

There are going to be times when even the most faithful will fall.  There are going to be times when trusting God is very hard.  There are going to be times when believing in God’s sovereignty is going to take everything out of us.  Yet, the good news is that even the biggest advancers of the Gospel and God’s Word struggled with their faith.  They had moments of great faith and great growth, but then they had moments of great defeat and distrust.  We, as followers of Christ, can take this as a great encouragement.  Even when we have moments of failure, we can rest assured that we have been forgiven for our disbelief and given another chance to have faith later in life.  

One verse I want to highlight is 1 John 5:4 which says, “For everyone who has been born of God overcomes the world. And this is the victory that has overcome the world—our faith.”  Our faith is a powerful thing that we possess and can use against the Evil one and against the sins of this world.  That being said, it is important that we are constantly trying to grow in our faith and our confidence in God.  It won’t be easy, but we have also been given a Holy Spirit from God in order to help us grow closer to Him.  

My challenge for you this week is to think about the ways that you personally can grow in your faith.  What is something that you are struggling to trust in God?  What is the area of your life where you do not believe in God’s sovereignty?  Where is your faith really being stretched?  I have mentioned many times that I am in the process of making a career change.  I am currently a teacher, but I am looking to make a change to more nonprofit work.  This is a really scary thought, and I am definitely nervous.  However, I know I just need to have faith in God in this whole situation.  He will make a job for me that is perfect.  I am finding it is not easy to give everything to God in this situation, but I am growing in this all the time. 

I am going to end our time with a prayer that I hope you will pray with me on your own: 

Dear Lord, 

Thank you for your spirit that is constantly guiding me and the people around me.  I pray that you will help me find the faith to believe in your sovereignty all the time, but please help me not to be discouraged by the moments of disbelief.  I know that in you, I can find continuous strength to be faithful.  Thank you for love and forgiveness. 

In Jesus’ Name, 

Amen