“Use what little obedience you are capable of, even if it be like a grain of mustard seed. Begin where you are. Live this present moment, this present hour as you now sit in your seats, in utter, utter submission and openness toward God. Listen outwardly to these words, but within, behind the scenes, in the deeper levels of your lives where you are all alone with God the Loving Eternal One, keep up a silent prayer, “Open Thou my life. Guide my thoughts where I dare not let them go. But Thou darest. Thy will be done.” Walk on the streets and chat with your friends. But every moment behind the scenes be in prayer, offering yourselves in continuous obedience” (Thomas R. Kelly, Holy Obedience — lecture, 1939).

I heard once that praying continually doesn’t mean walking around with your eyes shut spouting King James prayer language at all times.

It does mean keeping the lines open to God and living in a continual attitude of prayerfulness where everything in your life drives you seek God in the moment.

I’ve never been one to be able to pray for hours on end. I get five minutes in and my attention completely wanders off to anything and everything but God and prayer.

I can pray short popcorn prayers throughout the day as I feel the need. I can ask God to direct me back when ever I lose focus in prayer. I can keep praying badly until I learn to pray better (and what parent would ever turn away a child’s request because he or she didn’t ask correctly?)

For me, the goal is to pray more. My need is to pray especially when I don’t feel like it, when it feels like instead of ascending to the heavens, the words I pray are bouncing off the ceiling and coming right back at me. Even then, God is in the room with me and hears them anyway.

So this is me telling you and me to pray more.

Jesus taught His followers to pray, “Give us this day our daily bread.”

He didn’t advocate that we pray for a year’s worth so we could stockpile and hoard it all in the event of unforeseen calamity or disaster.

He didn’t say for us to manage our bread wisely so that we can always be sure to have enough.

He said to ask God for what we need today.

Enough strength for the day’s tasks.

Enough weakness so that we can see God’s strength made perfect.

Enough joy to carry us through.

Enough sorrow to keep us humble and dependent on God’s goodness.

Enough comfort to allow us to share with others.

Enough need so that we can learn that to receive with thanks is just as godly as to give.

God promises to provide daily what we need for that day, not the next nor the one following. That way we learn daily trust and daily hope as we see day by day how God provides.

Give us enough for today. Help us to know that You are enough for today.

I confess that I suck when it comes to appreciating what I have. I tend to yearn and envy over what others have that I wish I had. I grumble about all that I’d like to have that I think I need and still don’t have.

But gratitude, as I read recently, makes what you have enough. Joy makes your days full.

It can be a rude awakening when you see others who would give anything for those little things you take for granted– shelter, clothing, food, access to clean water, family, friends.

There are people who would do just about anything to have one of your bad days. Think about that. Your worst days are still better than what a lot of people would consider one of their good days.

Sometimes, what we take for granted gets taken, and only then do we fully appreciate what we had. So maybe start a daily habit of giving thanks for all the good things in your life, including those seemingly insignificant and minute things. Usually, those end up being the best things.

I’m asking the question again. I keep bringing it up because there’s nothing more soul-crushing than unforgiveness and bitterness (and conversely, nothing is more freeing than forgiveness and grace).

You need to forgive because

1. God forgave you. What anyone else has done to do or will ever do to you pales in comparison of how much you have rebelled against God. Jesus told a parable likening it to a man who had his $1 million debt forgiven but wouldn’t forgive his fellow man over a $100 debt.
2. One day you will need someone else’s forgiveness. We live in a beautiful but broken world and are ourselves broken and flawed people. You will screw up and hurt others, whether you mean to or not, and will need plenty of forgiveness before you leave this earth.
3. Carrying around the fruits of unforgiveness is toxic to your soul. The bitterness and anger you direct at someone else only ends up eating away at your own soul.
4. It is never easy but always worth it. Just about anything worthwhile and lasting is difficult. God never promised easy, but He promised that all things that seem impossible are possible through Him.

Once again, who do you need to forgive (even if it’s you)? From whom do you need to seek forgiveness?

For all those who are versed in all things Doctor Who, you know who I am referring to. It’s the companion of the Doctor by the name of Martha Jones, played by the lovely Freema Agyeman.

That’s where I am in my second time through Doctor Who.

Martha gets a bad rap for being the companion who pines unrequitedly after the Doctor, who still only has eyes for his first companion, Rose Tyler. I know, I know. It sounds like a bad plot line from a cheesy 80’s soap opera, but trust me, it’s much better than it sounds.

It’s unrequited love with killer robots, traveling through space and time, and assorted other creatures, both good and evil.

Does the new series have the same magic as the classic series? Probably not. Is it a good way to escape from the current climate of panic and pandemic? Absolutely.

And so the quest continues.

“Humility is to expect nothing, to wonder at nothing done to us, to feel nothing against us. It is to be at rest when nobody praises us and when we are blamed and despised. It is to have a blessed home in the Lord where we can go in and shut the door and kneel to our Father in secret, and be at peace when all around is trouble” (Andrew Murray).

Humility is not being a doormat for everyone to walk on. Humility isn’t having an extremely low self-esteem.

As I heard it said before, humility isn’t thinking less of yourself but thinking of yourself less.

It’s having a proper view of yourself, both who you are apart from the grace of God and who God says you are.

Humility isn’t synonymous with weakness. It is strength under control and harnessed for a purpose.

To be humble is to be at peace when all around is trouble. It is having a certain hope in a sea of hopelessness and uncertainty.

Lord, may we ever come to you in secret and find secret strength there. May we ever kneel before you to rise to your calling on our lives. May we live every moment for an audience of One, You. Amen.

“Thank God for mothers! Mothers provide the most powerful influence on a child’s life, and are the most important role models for positive change in our society. When people are in trouble, or know that they are dying, the first person they think of is their mother. When children start going wrong ways a mother’s prayer is powerful. Mothers remind us that there is a loving God above us who will take good care of everyone, especially children. Whenever a tragedy occurs – no matter where in the world this happens – you will always find mothers both weeping for the dead and bringing comfort and security to the living” (Johann Christoph Arnold, The Glue of Society).

First off, I understand not everyone in the world has the best mother. But for many of you, these words ring true.

You are who you are because of your mother. I am who I am because of my mother.

Be sure to let your mother know. If you can’t be there in person with your mother, then pick up the phone and call her. Don’t text. Don’t instant message. Make an actual phone call. Or better yet, do one of those Skype or Zoom calls where you can both see each other.

The very fact that God chose to be born into the world through a woman whom He would call mother elevates the position of motherhood and dignifies the worth of every woman who has ever been called Mother.

So celebrate your mothers– not just on this one day, but on every day God allows you to have your mother with you in this world.

Thanks, Mom!

“Scarcity and broken relationships aren’t about God finding out what I am made of-God knows what I am made of–it’s the other way around. In or out of friendship, in scarcity or abundance or just enough, my life is about finding out what God is made of” (Brennan Manning).

These circumstances aren’t for God to find out who you are and what you are capable of handling. He knows that already.

These times are for you to find out what God is made of– how faithful, how true, how trustworthy this God is.

I first saw this in an email. It’s interesting how all sorts of quotes and Bible verses have taken on a whole new level of meaning during these times of pandemic and self quarantining.

This one is by one of my favorites, Max Lucado. He has a way of speaking truths that at first glance appear simple, but in retrospect become more and more profound.

Let his words sink in deep. You will get through this!

“Sometimes God takes His time. One-hundred and twenty years to prepare Noah for the flood. Eighty years to prepare Moses for his work. God called young David to be king, but returned him to the sheep pasture. He called Paul to be an apostle and then isolated him in Arabia for fourteen years.
How long will God take with you? His history is redeemed, not in minutes, but in lifetimes. We fear the depression will never lift, the yelling will never stop, the pain will never leave. Will this sky ever brighten? This load ever lighten?

Life in the pit stinks. Yet for all its rottenness, doesn’t it do this much? Doesn’t it force us to look upward? The Bible promises, at the right time, in God’s hands, intended evil becomes eventual good. You will get through this!

Psalm 27:14 ‘Wait for the LORD; be strong and take heart and wait for the LORD.'” (Max Lucado).

“The earthly-minded person thinks and imagines that when he prays, the important thing – the thing he must concentrate upon – is that God should hear what he is praying for. And yet in the true, eternal sense it is just the reverse: the true relation in prayer is not when God hears what is prayed for, but when the person praying continues to pray until he is the one who hears – who hears what God is asking for” (Søren Kierkegaard, Provocations).

I have been guilty of treating the Almighty God like a celestial vending machine. I insert my prayer and hope for the spiritual blessing equivalent of a Kit Kat or a Mello Yello. My prayers tend to be one-sided with me reading off my laundry list of wants and wishes.

I wonder often why I never seem to hear from God.

Perhaps He is speaking, but I haven’t cultivated the discipline of listening. Maybe I haven’t learned how to quiet and still my mind for the still small voice that can easily be drowned out by all the noises both without and within.

Oswald Chambers, writer of the classic devotional My Utmost for His Highest, once said something to the effect of how prayer doesn’t change things, but prayer changes me and I change things.

I do think that prayer often changes my perspective on my circumstances rather than changing my circumstances. Maybe that’s when I can finally get to the place where I can hear the questions God is asking me.