Something Positive I Found While Randomly Surfing the Web

computer-cat

Not everything on the web is useless. There are worthwhile things to be found (including, I hope, this little blog of mine). I found this while randomly googling the term “giving people grace.” On a side note, I try to always give people grace and the benefit of the doubt because many times I have needed both myself. Here’s what I found:

“When there is death, grace lives.

When a job is lost, grace can be found.

When memories are forgotten, grace is remembered.

When money is gone, grace remains.

When pain is too much, grace is even more.

When relationships fail, grace triumphs.

When friendship is split, grace repairs.

When lies are told, grace is truth.

When injustice lingers, grace overcomes.

When tears fall, grace uplifts.

When hope walks out, grace stays put.

When vows are broken, grace mends.

When fear keeps you quiet, grace proclaims.

When lies humiliate, grace praises.

When heights are unreachable, grace climbs.

When wars rage, grace fights.

When lust diminishes, grace values.

When pride crushes, grace restores.

When image is tarnished, grace is beauty.

When hearts change, grace continues.

When emotions unload, grace carries.

Grace. Grace. Grace.” (Jake Dudley)

Here’s the original source.

http://www.potsc.com/category/giving-grace/

A New Year’s Psalm

“It seemed like a dream, too good to be true,

when God returned Zion’s exiles.
We laughed, we sang,
we couldn’t believe our good fortune.
We were the talk of the nations—
“God was wonderful to them!”
God was wonderful to us;
we are one happy people.

And now, God, do it again—
bring rains to our drought-stricken lives
So those who planted their crops in despair
will shout hurrahs at the harvest,
So those who went off with heavy hearts
will come home laughing, with armloads of blessing.” (Psalm 126)

What Does God Look Like?

As a child, I read about the hand of God and I wondered what that must have looked like. I thought surely God had big, strong hands to carry the world and everything and everyone in it. Plus, he’d have to have good aim for throwing all that lightning around. I couldn’t even bring myself to imagine what size shoe he would wear.

As I’ve grown older, I realize that God’s hands look much different than I used to think. God’s hands are calloused with scars and dirt under the fingernails. God’s hands. His hands look a lot like mine. In fact, my hands are his hands in a way. So are yours. God has chosen to work through and reach out with your hands and my hands.

As for his feet, they’ve seen a lot of wear and tear. They know that hurting people aren’t just next door or across the globe. They’re in both places and everywhere in between. I believe my God wears a size 8 1/2, because my feet are his feet going out to reach the hopeless and broken. It’s just a matter of if I choose to walk in his footsteps.

Our job as believers is to show God to the world. They see us and how we work and live and play and see God through what we say and what we do. How we reflect the image of God determines what view of God those around us will have.

So for me, that changes the way I look at myself. If I am created in God’s likeness and his image-bearer, then I look exactly like he wanted me to look. It changes the way I act. It changes me.

I pray that as we are being transformed more and more into the image and glory of God, we will in turn reflect that likeness and image on to those around us so that they can also see the goodness and the greatness of the God we serve.

Maybe that’s a good mindset to have for 2013.

Freedom and Other Thursday Randomness

dog with gate open

I don’t understand a lot of what happens. I don’t understand why people act the way they do. I don’t know why I act the way I do half the time.

But I do know this.

The best kind of freedom is freedom from the expectations of others. The freedom from being a slave to whether someone else likes or doesn’t like you. The freedom to know and be your truest self, regardless of who sees or responds.

I’m not there yet. Maybe you’re not either. I have a strong feeling many people wish they were there, but aren’t just yet. It’s a precious few folks who find this kind of freedom.

People come and people go. You never know who will show up and who will leave. You never know who will be your friend and who won’t. You just have to trust God daily and cherish the people he brings into your life while they’re there.

Sometimes, when my life feels most unstable, that’s when I appreciate the most God’s unchangingness– how he is the same yesterday, today, and forever. His promises are true yesterday, today, and forever, too.

Cling to the eternal and let what is temporary go. Or, as Jim Elliot said, “He is no fool who gives up what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose.”

I’ve always loved that. And that’s what I intend to do, God willing and with God’s help. And today is one of those days when I need an extra helping of God’s help.

I’ve been told that God helps those who help themselves. But if we could help ourselves, we wouldn’t need God’s help in the first place. I think it’s more like this. God helps those who know they can’t help themselves, who have tried and tried and failed so many times before only to end up back where they started. Who know that they are poor and wretched and miserable and blind and needy without God. The poor in spirit.

Lord, may we fall into your grace and find that it is more than sufficient.

Amen.

A Bittersweet Christmas

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It’s been a bittersweet 2012 Christmas.

I’ve loved being with family and seeing my 14-month old niece getting the hang of walking and just starting to say her first words. Seeing my nephews’ faces light up with all their Christmas presents has been fun, too.

But today I’ve also been thinking a lot about my granddaddy who took his life 30 years ago tonight. It was Christmas Day 1982 when he decided that life wasn’t worth living anymore.

I still remember where I was when I found out about his suicide. I remember my pastor at the time coming over to tell me and how my 10-year old brain couldn’t process the news, so I went back to my room to watch the football game on my little black-and-white TV. I still don’t think I’ve completely processed it yet.

I have trouble remembering what he looked like, especially when he smiled, or what his laugh sounded like. I do know that I still miss him and I have so many things I’d like to tell him.

I’d tell him that he missed out on a lot. Like my sister and I growing up. Her getting married and having children. All of us getting older and closer together as a family. And most of all, how we’ve found God to be a comfort and a refuge.

I’d tell him that we all loved him so much. That we still love him so much, even 30 years after he left us. I’d tell him that there’s nothing so bad that family can’t help, and especially God’s love can’t get you through.

I’d say that I understand now a little better why he did what he did. I’m glad that he’s found peace at last in the arms of Jesus and has no more fears or worries or self-doubts.

I have something that belonged to him– an old tube radio from the 50’s that still works. It’s nice to be able to turn it on and think that I’m listening to the same radio that he kept on his workbench all those years. It makes me smile and remember him in happier times.

I’m a little more thankful for my family tonight. I hope to hug them more often, be more present in their lives, and tell them I love them as often as possible. You never know when it could be the last time you might have the chance.

Just About Everything About Your Nativity is Wrong (But Not Everything)

lego nativity scene

Disclaimer: if you love your nativity scene and don’t want anybody messing with it, you might want to stop reading here. Just FYI. Otherwise, keep goin’. Fun times are ahead.

First of all, the wise men were not at the birth scene. According to Matthew, they didn’t arrive until Joseph, Mary, and Jesus were living in a house and Jesus was probably 2 years old. Already, your nativity scene is getting less crowded.

Also, there was no mean inn-keeper (sorry to burst your bubble, all of you whose dramatic career consisted of playing this one character in the church Christmas pageant). There was probably no inn, either. According to what I’ve learned, the Greek word used for inn in Luke 2 is probably better rendered as “guest room” and was most likely in back of the ancestral home where the family beast of burden would normally stay.

That means there weren’t animals at the birth scene. Again, not 100% for certain, but more than likely not. I don’t know if any little boy showed up and serenaded the Christ child with a drum solo, but it’s doubtful.

As far as the wise men are concerned, there’s no indication in Scripture that there were three of them. Just because there were three gifts doesn’t mean that there were three of them. And they may or may not have been named Gaspar, Melchior,  and Balthasar. For all we know, they could have been named Larry, Curly, and Moe.

The one thing that’s right about your nativity scene is that Jesus is there. The Word became flesh and pitched his tent among us. God took on human skin and became Immanuel– “God with us.” The Almighty became an embryo and the Creator became a helpless infant boy.

So you can keep that part of your nativity scene. You can even add in snow if the spirit leads. But remember that Jesus was probably born in spring, not December, so there was likely no snow that night. I just burst yet another bubble of yours. You’re welcome.

God’s YES

“Whatever God has promised gets stamped with the Yes of Jesus. In him, this is what we preach and pray, the great Amen, God’s Yes and our Yes together, gloriously evident. God affirms us, making us a sure thing in Christ, putting his Yes within us. By his Spirit he has stamped us with his eternal pledge—a sure beginning of what he is destined to complete” (2 Cor. 1:20-22).

So many people think that Christians are all about what and who we’re against. And honestly, we  haven’t done a very good job in dispelling that sentiment. We’re sometimes too eager to condemn the sin and not nearly as willing to love the sinner.

But I have to look at a guy like Adam Lanza and say with all honesty, “That could have been me. But for the grace of God and different circumstances, that could have been me.”

That scares me and comforts me at the same time.

It scares me because it means that I’m not nearly as good as I sometimes think I am. It means that I am just as in need of a Savior now as ever and just as prone to wander from the One I love as ever.

But it comforts me because God has promised to stick with me through everything. He’s stamped his YES on me through Christ and nothing will ever change that.

I think we would do better to show love instead of judgment. We’d do better to reach out to those in trouble instead of later saying thing like “I could have told you that boy would end up like this. I could see it coming a mile away,”

While we were yet sinners, while we were at our most unlovable worst, Christ died for us. He reconciled us to God and now gives us a chance to be a part of reconciling others, too.

I don’t know about you, but I want people to know what and who I’m for. More importantly, I really want people to know that God is for me and for them and has a new start for anyone who’s willing to take him up on it.

That’s all.

 

Not-so-new Thoughts on Newtown, CT

theodentheoden2

“No parent should ever have to bury a child.”

That’s the line from the movie The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers that King Theoden uses when he talks about the death of his only son, the one that was to be king after him.

I’ve thought a lot about that line today, especially after hearing and reading so much about the senseless killings of at least 20 children and 6 adults in Newtown, Connecticut. I have no way to comprehend the level of sadness and grief that so many people are feeling right now, and I’m not going to pretend that I understand what they’re going through.

I know that no discussion about limiting handguns or locking school doors will ever bring these children back. This is so much more than political issues; we’re talking about human lives lost. Each one had a family who loved him or her and each one is deeply missed.

I’m reminded of another massacre. This one happened after the birth of Jesus, when Herod sent soldiers to the town of Bethlehem to kill all the male children under the age of two. Matthew says (quoting Jeremiah), “A voice was heard in Ramah, weeping and loud lamentation, Rachel weeping for her children; she refused to be comforted, because they are no more” (Matt. 2:18).

Again, I can’t begin to imagine what that must have been like.

Most of all, I am reminded that God himself watched as people took his only son and falsely accused him, beat him, mocked him, mutilated him, then killed him in the most excruciatingly painful manner possible. Even though Jesus’s death was ordained from the foundation of the world, it doesn’t change the fact that the Father’s heart was broken that day.

I think the Father weeps with all those who weep tonight. He sees his creation and his people broken and in disarray. He sees evil acts perpetrated by sick minds and his heart is broken.

I don’t pretend to have any answers. I don’t pretend to know why this happened or what the purpose was behind it. I do know that even in this, God works all things together for good to those who love him and are called according to his purposes.

I know that God is good and that he is in control. Still. And in that I put my hopes and I lay my head down to rest tonight.

I pray for peace right now in the hearts of all who are grieving and who cannot be comforted, for their children are no more. I pray for peace for the children who lost parents and teachers tonight, as well as the family of the mentally ill man who killed all these children before killing himself (who are probably in shock and grief as well right now). May you be present in these broken homes and lives right now. And may you set all things right one day very soon.

Come, Lord Jesus, come.

A Christmas Prayer

Lord, the time approaches yet again when we celebrate your arrival in human skin to make your home among us as one of us. We celebrate that you became Immanuel, “God with us,” and took your place among us, sharing our joys and sorrows, weaknesses and pains.

We confess that we have so often lost sight of why we celebrate this day. We have made it into the giving and receiving of gifts and of excessive shopping and spending. We have forgotten that at the heart of Christmas, it is your birthday.

Help us also to remember those for whom Christmas isn’t such a happy time. So many mourn the loss of loved ones and live in the midst of family strife and turmoil. So many are facing tough days ahead as many are without jobs, some without homes and even the basic necessities.

Help us to walk along side those who are hurting in this Christmas season. May they find you, O God, to be their burden bearer, their refuge, their safe dwelling, and their peace in the midst of storms. Comfort them, bring healing to their strife, and be in the midst of them as the Prince of Peace.

Help us to remember those less fortunate than we and to be generous to those around us who have needs, both physical and spiritual. May we serve you by serving one of the least of these.

May we remember Christmas every day by being living incarnations of your presence everywhere we go, for you are not only God with us, but you are God in us, too. May we never forget that what started out in a manger ended on a cross, and that we are alive and free because of that terrible price you paid.

So as we get into the days of celebration and merriment, help us to remember that you are the reason for it all. May the best gift we give anyone be to show them your love and point them to you this holiday season.

Why Jesus Came

“Tis the season to celebrate. Everybody knows that this is a season for festivity and merriment, but not everybody knows why. Most people know that Christmas involves the arrival of an infant born to peasants and laid in a feeding trough, but do we really know why that’s so significant?

We sing songs about the coming of Jesus to Bethlehem as a baby boy, but do we really know why he came?

Jesus didn’t come to tell us, “I’m OK, you’re OK.” I think that each of us can honestly admit deep down that we are deeply flawed, as evidenced by broken homes, broken relationships, and broken lives. We have to confess at some point that we can’t fix ourselves and that we need someone to step in and do for us what we can’t do for ourselves.

Jesus didn’t come to make us better people. To borrow something a friend said, Jesus didn’t come to build a better me. He didn’t come to make good people better. Or even bad people good.

Jesus came to make dead people alive. He came for the nobodies to make them somebodies. He came to the lost to find them. He came to the worthless to make them priceless. He came to the hopeless to give them hope.

Jesus didn’t come as an example of a better way to live or with a new philosophy to follow. He didn’t come to show us the way, but to be the way, the truth and the life.

It’s not about Jesus helping me to be the best Greg Johnson I can be. That’s not it at all.

Jesus Christ came to totally transform me into his own likeness. Not an improvement, but a new creation.

Remember that when you see the festive lights and decorations everywhere you go. Remember that of all the gifts you and I receive, the one we celebrate most is the gift of Jesus himself. The gift of life.