GOD'S LOVE

GOD’S LOVE

God loves us unconditionally. Matthew 5:45 says God “maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust.” And Romans 2:4 tells us: “The goodness of God leadeth thee to repentance.” Sometimes it takes a lot of convincing, but even in our human relationships, if we absolutely know and see it in action, that someone truly loves us, we want to reciprocate. 

 

Everyone wants to feel that they matter to someone, and you matter to God. He has a wonderful plan for your life. I once heard a Bible teacher give the listeners this challenge: “I want you to say, ‘God loves me unconditionally,’ 50 times a day and then watch for His love.’” So, I tried it.

 

Wow did I have some big surprises. I was doing pretty well until I went out on my patio and started to re-pot a few plants. One of the plants was super heavy, and I was very intense on getting it out of the one pot and into the other without hurting myself. Then I was moving everything around and sweeping and working hard. I love doing this, but I realized that I was so intense that I didn’t think about God much.

 

During those intense times when we’re working so hard to produce, we may forget that the Lord is right there with us. The first time I did the “God loves me” challenge, the transplanting project knocked the challenge right out of me. I didn’t say, “God loves me unconditionally,” even one time! Maybe if I’d relaxed a little more and said my quote, I would have enjoyed myself more and not stressed out my shoulder muscles!

 

But the next day after the flowerpot incident, I was at work, and I had a project that was on a tight deadline. All day long I was saying “God, You love me unconditionally. I matter to you. You have a wonderful plan for my life.” I kept a tally, and during work alone, I said this or a version of it 75 times. And in spite of the difficulty of my project, I finished it in time. I was happy while I did it, and it turned out well.

 

How about taking on this challenge for the upcoming week? Keep a record and try to say some version of “God loves me unconditionally” 50 times each day.  Let’s see what happens.

 

Love, Carolyn

 

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THE WOMAN WITH THE SPIRIT OF INFIRMITY

THE WOMAN WITH THE SPIRIT OF INFIRMITY 

 The Gospels are filled with some of the wonderful healings and deliverances God did through Jesus Christ. By faith, we too can receive and give the same kind of miraculous blessings. The record of the woman who Jesus “loosed” from the demon of infirmity is what the Lord gave me to talk about today, because it is one of the demons attacking and trying to attach itself to many of God’s people in our world today. The story is in Luke 13:11.

 

“And, behold, there was a woman which had a spirit of infirmity eighteen years, and was bowed together, and could in no wise lift up herself.”

 

The Greek word for “infirmity” is astheneia. This is the definition:  The “want [lack] of strength, weakness, infirmity A. of the body, its weakness and frailty, feebleness of health or sickness. B. of the soul, want [lack] of strength and capacity requisite [required] to understand a thing, to do things great and glorious, to restrain corrupt desires, to bear trials and troubles.” All of the above is in the definition of what infirmity is.

 

We all know people with this problem, or you may have it yourself. In this woman’s case, her frailty even affected her posture, and she was bent over under the overall strain of life itself.

 

“And he [Jesus] was teaching in one of the synagogues on the sabbath. And, behold, there was a woman which had a spirit of infirmity eighteen years, and was bowed together, and could in no wise lift up herself.  

 

“And when Jesus saw her, he called her to him, and said unto her, ‘Woman, thou art loosed from thine infirmity.’ And he laid his hands on her: and immediately she was made straight, and glorified God” (Luke 13:10-13).

 

The woman knew this was from God and she honored and celebrated Him for healing her. Life could no longer push her down. Jesus gifted her with the understanding and the strength to do great things and overcome corrupt desires and bear up under trials, things she could never do before.

 

We all have things that bother us about ourselves, but Jesus is here to heal us of all that. As He said to the man whose son was suicidal: “If thou canst believe, all things are possible to him that believeth” (Mark 9:23).

 

Got a problem? Jesus has the answer. Let’s respond like the man who had the suicidal son: “And straightway the father of the child cried out, and said with tears, Lord, I believe” (Mark 9:24).

 
Hebrews 11:1 tells us: “Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.” The Amplified version puts it this way: “Now faith is the assurance (the confirmation, the title deed) of the things [we] hope for, being the proof of things [we] do not see and the conviction of their reality [faith perceiving as real fact what is not revealed to the senses].”

 

Faith believes what God says, before it’s seen in our reality. God wants us to “walk by faith, not by sight” (2 Cor. 5:7).

 

We have the kind of faith like the woman in Luke 13. She went to where Jesus was. She sought his teaching, his wisdom, his love. And she received what he offered. She was lifted up—she was straightened up and set free, relieved from all her weaknesses. Faith in the Lord Jesus Christ makes us strong. And faith connects us to God.

 

For more examples of faith, check out Hebrews 11.

 

Love, Carolyn

 

STAND AND BE GRAND

 

STAND AND BE GRAND

The Lord is involved in everything we do, including our choices politically, socially, and emotionally. When we voice our choices publicly, we better be ready to be criticized. Nobody really likes criticism. It can be hurtful, but we need to learn to deal with it. It’s better to take a stand for something and be criticized than to remain apathetic and fearful. Even in olden times, kings respected strong enemies who were brave enough to stand tall for what they believed. God’s Word has a strong Word for those who He deems lukewarm:

 

“I know thy works, that thou art neither cold nor hot: I would thou wert cold or hot. So then because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will spue thee out of my mouth” (Rev. 3:15-16).

 

Wow, that’s powerful!  I used to be more afraid of offending friends and family, than of offending God. I wanted people to like me, and I didn’t want to argue or get into any debates where I had to defend what I thought. But after a while, I learned that no matter what I did, I wasn’t going to please everyone.  There are many adult children who are still trying to please their parents, and it just isn’t happening.  I was one of them.

 

Finally, in my mid-forties, I realized I didn’t have to try to please my parents anymore. The very middle verse of the Bible says: “It is better to trust in the Lord than to put confidence in man” (Ps. 118:8). When I changed my focus to pleasing God, it was shortly afterward that my parents began to totally respect me as an adult person and not as a needy child anymore.

 

I was taught to be polite (which I think is a good thing), but polite became timid, and timid became fearful. I’m not fearful now, and you don’t have to be either. We can speak our minds openly and disagree. Paul and Peter disagreed about certain things, but they didn’t hate each other. They were loud and proud. I’d rather say what I think and be criticized than be lukewarm and have God’s opinion be that I’m too “milk toast” to even swallow, but rather, as He says in Revelation 3:16: “I will spue thee out of my mouth.”

 

Peter was a bold guy. He boldly told Jesus that He shouldn’t have to die. Well, Jesus rebuked him. But Jesus didn’t forsake Peter. He just corrected him, and they went on being friends. If we think that not voicing what we think is going to make us a better person, it’s not. We all have opinions, and God knows what they are. When we don’t speak them out, we might not even be fully aware of what we really think.

 

Putting a pen to our thoughts, or a voice to our thoughts helps us to articulate what we think. When we know what we think, we can either keep thinking it or we can change it. Changing what we think is part of growth. People change what they think all the time.

 

But when our thoughts are fuzzy and unspoken, they aren’t clear, and they aren’t cold or hot. They become lukewarm like the Bible says. And that goes for what we say to ourselves as well as what we say to others. Our thoughts about ourselves need to be lined up with what God says about us. Isaiah 61 is a prophetic word about what Jesus Christ would do for those who believe. It’s our job to boldly declare His truth if we are to be true disciples of the Lord.

 

Verse 1 says he was anointed “to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to them that are bound.” So, if a person feels like they are bound to some addictive action, for instance, Jesus is here to set us free from that, and we must boldly claim ourselves free in Jesus’ name. Later, in verse 3, part of Jesus’s mission is “to give unto them beauty for ashes.” This gives us the right and responsibility to boldly declare to ourselves: “I am beautiful.” Or a person could boldly say: “I am not beautiful,” and in the 5-senses that may be true. But our mission is to get to where we are “hot” to God’s truths, helping others to do the same.

 

Taking a stand, hot or cold, on what we think, requires boldness in either case. Boldness is a quality God admires. Just take a look at your Concordance to see how many times the word “bold” is used in the Bible!

 

Let’s be brave. Let’s step out without fear. As Paul writes in Romans 13:11: “And that, knowing the time, that now it is high time to awake out of sleep: for now is our salvation [wholeness] nearer than when we believed.”

 

We want to keep growing, “with open face beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord” (2 Cor, 3:18).

 

It’s time to Stand and be Grand!

 

Love, Carolyn

 

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HOPE AND VICTORY

     

 

 

 

    

 

 

HOPE AND VICTORY

This past week I was inspired to move my HOPE chime out to the end of my trellis. When I went to take a photo of it, I noticed that one of the sticks that the chimes are attached to is broken and ragged, like we all were before Jesus came into our lives, and the trellis formed a cross, like the cross Jesus bore for us so many years ago.

 

The trees are still blooming, the doves are still loving on each other and making babies, and we have the ultimate victory because of that cross and because God raised him. When Jesus was killed and put into the tomb, it looked like all was over. But to those who had hope in the scriptures of old and in the words Jesus spoke himself, after three long days of grief and fear, their dream came true, and their prayers were answered. Jesus Christ was raised from the dead, thus defeating death for every person who believes.

 

Matthew 28:6 – “For he is risen, as he said.”

Mark 16:6 – “He is risen.”

Luke 24:6 – “He is not here, but is risen.”

John 21:14  - “This is now the third time that Jesus shewed himself to his disciples, after that he was risen from the dead.”

 

JESUS IS ALIVE NOW, AND WE WILL BE WITH HIM FOREVER.

 

Love, Carolyn

(the "victory" painting isn't done yet, but I thought it was a good one to represent Victory :-))

 

DON'T BE AFRAID TO FAIL - GOD IS FAITHFUL TO A HUMBLE HEART

DON’T BE AFRAID TO FAIL - GOD IS FAITHFUL TO A HUMBLE HEART

I remember the day when I discovered I was totally okay with my own failure. After three days of trying to make a piece of Masonite look like a piece of maple, I’d run out of ideas. I’d completed hundreds of wood samples that looked great, so I was shocked with myself when I realized I just could not do this one. I had to admit failure, and the result was surprisingly wonderful! In that moment, I was totally set free. I did fail, and I was actually happy for myself. Odd, yes, and yet this was a deliverance for me! I was very prideful growing up. Failure was never an option. I was good at almost anything I tried, and I avoided activities I couldn’t do well. No one really likes the idea of failing. But sometimes it can be a good thing – a lifesaver, actually.

 

Though I’d accepted Jesus as my Lord and confessed my sins, pride kept popping up in other categories. It’s funny how God can use the most mundane things in our lives to show us the most important spiritual things we will ever experience. This incident with the wood sample was one of those things.

 

Many of you have experienced similar awakenings. We go along in our regular life, no real “Las Vegas” moments to speak of, no bells and whistles, just plodding along, and all of a sudden, in the middle of doing something we normally do, God opens an amazing realization about a very big thing in our lives that we never expected.

 

One thing I’ve learned over the years is that if we are faithful to seek God and read His life manual, the Bible, He is faithful to us, to reward us with revelations, insights, and deliverances that we not only wanted but some we didn’t even know we wanted! A preacher once said: “God can make taking out the garbage the most exciting thing you’ve ever experienced.” I‘ve found this to be absolutely true.

 

The key on our part is to be faithful to Him. Jesus tells us a parable in Matthew 25 about a man going to a far country who gives his goods to his servants to take care of while he was away. 

 

“And unto one he gave five talents, to another two, and to another one; to every man according to his several [own] ability; and straightway took his journey. Then he that had received the five talents went and traded with the same, and made them other five talents.

 

“And likewise he that had received two, he also gained other two. But he that had received one went and digged in the earth, and hid his lord's money.

 

“After a long time, the lord of those servants cometh, and reckoneth with them.

 

“And so he that had received five talents came and brought other five talents, saying, ‘Lord, thou deliveredst unto me five talents: behold, I have gained beside them five talents more.’ His lord said unto him, ‘Well done, thou good and faithful servant: thou hast been faithful over a few things, I will make thee ruler over many things: enter thou into the joy of thy lord.’

 

“He also that had received two talents came and said, ‘Lord, thou deliveredst unto me two talents: behold, I have gained two other talents beside them’. His lord said unto him, ‘Well done, good and faithful servant; thou hast been faithful over a few things, I will make thee ruler over many things: enter thou into the joy of thy lord.’

 

“Then he which had received the one talent came and said, ‘Lord, I knew thee that thou art an hard man, reaping where thou hast not sown, and gathering where thou hast not strawed: And I was afraid, and went and hid thy talent in the earth: lo, there thou hast that is thine.’

 

“His lord answered and said unto him, ‘Thou wicked and slothful servant’” (Matt. 25:15-24).

 

The servant that received one talent was afraid of failure. He didn’t even try, didn’t risk anything, didn’t step out in faith to gain anything more. He buried what he had. He reminds me of Christians who stop reading the Bible, stop praying, stop exploring and questing after more of the Lord’s intimacy in their lives. They bury their desire for Him or get snared by fear that it might not work, or they may look foolish even trying.

 

In the above parable, the two servants who were faithful to do more with what they had, were the ones who were brave enough to step out. And look what the Lord told them: “Enter into the joy of thy Lord.”

 

As Christians, we are still human, and we are going to fail sometimes. But failure isn’t a crime. “As it is written, ‘There is none righteous, no, not one’” (Rom. 3:10).

 

We were failures when we came to Jesus the first time and admitted we weren’t very good at being our own Lord. Don’t be afraid of being a failure at something. It’s worth a try.

 

We must pick ourselves up when we fall and continue to seek the Lord’s guidance. Let’s be like David, who said to God: “Unto thee lift I up mine eyes” (Ps. 123:1).

 

Humility is a sweet smell to our God. And pride is a stinker. Shut it down by going back to the scriptures with a humble heart for truth.

 

God is faithful to us. “Know therefore that the Lord thy God, he is God, the faithful God, which keepeth covenant and mercy with them that love him and keep his commandments to a thousand generations” (Deut. 7:9).

 

In the New Testament, the Lord promises: “He which hath begun a good work in you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ” (Phil. 1:6). And God keeps His promises.

 

Love, Carolyn

 

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CULTURAL EXPLANATION OF THE JAEL AND SISERA STORY

Bishop KC Pillai was an expert on the culture and customs of the people of the Bible. My friend, Doug, sent me this write-up on the story of Jael and Sisera that I talked about on last Sunday’s preach letter. I think this will give everyone a deeper understanding of that record – well worth the reading!

 

Eastern Customs and Idioms of the Bible: Orientalisms

Bishop K.C Pillai

Jael Defends Her Honor

Judges 4:18-21

And Jael went out to meet Sisera, and said unto him, Turn in, my Lord, turn in to me; fear not. And when he had turned in unto her into the tent, she covered him with a mantle. And he said unto her, Give me, I pray thee, a little water to drink: for I am thirsty. And she opened a bottle of milk, and gave him drink; and covered him. Again he said unto her, Stand in the door of the tent, and it shall be, when any doth come and enquire of thee, and say, Is there any man here? That thou shalt say, No. Then Jael, Herber’s wife, took a nail of the tent, and took an hammer in her hand, and went softly unto him, and smote the nail into his temples, and fastened it into the ground: for he was fast asleep and weary. So he died.

And then, as Barak pursued Sisera, Jael came out to meet him, and said to him, “Come, I will show you the man whom you seek.” And when he went into her tent, there lay Sisera, dead with the peg in his temple. (Added for clarity, it was her tent.)

 There was a war at one time between the Israelites and the Canaanites in which the Israelites defeated the Canaanites. The captain of the army of the Canaanites was Sisera, and he ran when he saw defeat. He came to a tent where Jael lives and (1) she gave him refuge. He asked for water and (2) she gave him milk. (3) She also covered him with a mantle. These three actions of her were very significant. Jael belonged to a neutral party, so Sisera was sage there. In the tents, there is one part for men and one part for women, divided with a tarpaulin. Men could never enter the women’s side and vice versa. Only family could visit back and forth. Even military or lawmen could not go into a woman’s apartment. Sisera was a stranger to Jael, so why should she help him? It is believed that to give a man refuge who is running for his life is doing the word of God. Otherwise, it would have been against her culture to speak to the man.

She put him in the men’s side of the tent and covered him up with a mantle. A mantle is a three to four foot long cloth, folded in four parts and worn around the neck. The mantle represents authority, or protection, or when it is torn in two, it signifies an outward sign of inward grief or anger. Authority may be transferred by transferring the mantle from on to another. Jael invited Sisera in. Whenever a guest comes under the shadow of one’s roof, he is treated as if he were God or an angel. The host would rather die than allow any harm to come to the guest. He may be “no one” but when serving him, one is serving God. Receiving a guest is a religious thing and even the government would not interfere with it.

When Jael gave Sisera milk (buttermilk) in which there is salt, she took a covenant of salt with him, which is inviolable. She gave him three assurances of protection: (1) invited him in, (2) covered him with a mantle, and (3) took the covenant of salt with him. Being an Eastern man, he should have understood the significance of these three things. He then asked her to tell a lie. In their philosophy is an unwritten law: one can tell a lie to save someone’s life, but one can never tell a lie to profit or save one’s self.

She was offering to Sisera God’s assurance for protection. She would lay down her life for him (indicated by her standing in the doorway for him), rather then betray him. Later on, she comes inside from standing in the doorway and found him fast asleep. Sisera had three assurances, but he snuck into the women’s apartment. He did not stay where he was put. Any man can come into a man’s side of the tent. So Sisera began thinking, “maybe they will chase her away and come into the tent—although she means well, she could not defend me if men walked in. But if I get into a woman’s tent, no men, no power, no army can come in. I will be safer here.” So his unbelief in the three “securities” or assurances, led him into her apartment of the tent. His unbelief killed him. The woman found him in her apartment and carried out her part of the contract. She took a nail of the tent and drove this nail through his temple and he died. Why? 

If a person makes the covenant of salt with another person and one of the two breaks this covenant, the punishment is death. The reason that she drove a nail through his head was because he moved over into her side of the tent (verse 22). He broke the covenant of salt by doubting her protection, so he deserved only death. She was dealing with his unbelief by driving tent nail through his head. She had no animosity, she was not his enemy. She covered him with the mantle, exchanged the covenant of salt and she called him inside.

Because we do not trust in God, we try to make our own securities. Because of our unbelief, we forsake the sufficiency give to us in God. We do not believe because we do not understand. Knowing God is different from knowing about God. We must understand our security, freedom, heritage and rejoice in God for the rest of our lives.”

 

 

HIT THE NAIL ON THE HEAD - BE BRAVE

HIT THE NAIL ON THE HEAD – BE BRAVE

My mom was a faithful woman when it came to the Bible. At 89 years old she was once again reading through the whole Bible. When I came to visit, she was on Judges 5 and we read it together and talked about the great lesson it teaches. It’s the story of a woman named Jael, a story of bravery and the courage to do the right thing. Judges 5 is a song sung by the prophet Deborah concerning the overthrow of Israel’s enemies. In verse 2 she sings: “Praise ye the Lord for the avenging of Israel, when the people willingly offered themselves.” The Lord was able to work in them to bring peace to themselves for many years because of Jael bravely yielding to the will of God.

 

The people were being oppressed. Verses 6-8 tell us:

 

“In the days of Jael, the highways were unoccupied, and the travellers walked through byways. The inhabitants of the villages ceased, they ceased in Israel. . . . They chose new gods; then was war in the gates: was there a shield or spear seen among forty thousand in Israel?” The answer is no.

 

The land was full of anarchy and confusion, everywhere infested with bandits. No public road was safe; and in going from place to place, the people had to take unfrequented paths. Village life ceased. Not only was life hard under the oppressors, but they also confiscated all weapons, so the Israelites could not fight. By spiritual analogy, we can say that Satan not only wants to oppress the Christian; he also wants to disarm us as well and make us feel small and unable to do anything to change any situation.

 

Sisera was an enemy leader who fought against God’s people. We are told in Judges 4 that “Sisera gathered together all his chariots, even nine hundred of iron, and all the people that were with him” (v.13). But “the Lord discomfited Sisera, and all his chariots, and all his host, with the edge of the sword before Barak; so that Sisera lighted down off his chariot, and fled away on his feet” (v.15).

 

Sisera had spiritual help from the devil and he was getting away. But God had a plan and He had someone who was bold enough and brave enough to take care of the final problem, Jael. She was a simple married woman, one of the ones who “willingly offered themselves” to do the Lord’s bidding. Sisera came to this married couple’s tent and expected to be treated well. Sisera’s king was friendly to the clan of Jael’s husband so Sisera thought he was perfectly safe in the presence of Jael and her husband. He was not! When it comes to loyalty to God versus loyalty to family friends, God is always going to win for committed people like Jael.

 

“Sisera fled away on his feet to the tent of Jael the wife of Heber the Kenite: for there was peace between Jabin the king of Hazor and the house of Heber the Kenite.  And Jael went out to meet Sisera, and said unto him, Turn in, my lord, turn in to me; fear not. And when he had turned in unto her into the tent, she covered him with a mantle.  And he said unto her, Give me, I pray thee, a little water to drink; for I am thirsty. And she opened a bottle of milk, and gave him drink, and covered him” (Judges 4:17-19).

 

Jael was not going to let this enemy go. She knew what she had to do. She made him comfortable, gave him the favorite drink of the culture, curdled milk instead of just plain water, and she had his confidence. He lay down to rest after pursuing and killing God’s people, totally unaware of what was about to happen. As he slept, “Jael, Heber's wife, took a nail of the tent, and took an hammer in her hand, and went softly unto him, and smote the nail into his temples, and fastened it into the ground: for he was fast asleep and weary. So he died” (Judges 4:21).

 

Deborah in her song puts it this way (Judges 5:26): “She put her hand to the nail, and her right hand to the workmen's hammer; and with the hammer she smote Sisera, she smote off his head, when she had pierced and stricken through his temples.”

 

This is where we get the phrase, “You hit the nail right on the head!” In other words, you got it totally accurate and final.

 

What bravery and confidence to believe that she had the means and the right to carry out this act to deliver God’s people from their oppression. Deborah ends her song with this: “So let all thine enemies perish, O Lord: but let them that love him be as the sun when he goeth forth in his might. And the land had rest forty years” (Judges 5:31).

 

My mom and I read this together and talked about bravery and truth. Every time I read God’s Word, the Lord teaches me more about trusting Him and being willing to fight for the freedom and peace of His people. I love the Word of God and I sure loved my mom for being a faithful and brave woman too.

 

We may not always hit the nail on the head, but we stay faithful and brave, doing our part to follow Jesus, confronting our own spiritual battles, and standing up for our families, our friends, our nations, and God’s people around the world.

 

“What shall we then say to these things? If God be for us, who can be against us?

 

“He that spared not his own Son, but delivered him up for us all, how shall he not with him also freely give us all things? Who shall lay any thing to the charge of God’s elect? It is God that justifieth.

 

“Who is he that condemneth? It is Christ that died, yea rather, that is risen again, who is even at the right hand of God, who also maketh intercession for us.

 

“Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?

 

“As it is written, For thy sake we are killed all the day long; we are accounted as sheep for the slaughter. Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him that loved us” (Rom. 8:31-38).

 

Love, Carolyn