Beauty in the Broken

 

There is a certain beauty in experiencing brokenness in our lives.  Kintsugi, a Japanese expression of art expresses that concept beautifully.  In this expression of art a broken piece of pottery  is repaired with gold.  The cracks in the piece of pottery are filled in with gold.  This makes the repaired piece of pottery more beautiful,  exquisite,  and valuable than the original piece of pottery.  The broken piece of pottery repaired by gold surprisingly also becomes more resilient and strong.

So also our lives are often broken and even shattered by life's trials and struggles.  Yet if we submit these things to Lord, He restores us and makes us more beautiful people for His glory.  In His strength we become stronger and more resilient servants of Him. 

 In Job 23:10 in the midst of horrendous trial after trial Job said this concerning the Lord God, "He know where I am going, and when He tests me I will come out as PURE as GOLD.  The Lord God knows what He is doing when He allows trials and testing in our lives.  That is a time to pray, to wait in hope on the Lord, and to trust in Him.

Our Only Hope in Life and Death

 

The Heidelberg Catechism asks this question:  "What is your only hope in life and death?"  The Catechism answer is this:  My only hope in life and death is that I belong to my faithful savior, Jesus Christ."  I don't think as a child I found that catechism question particularly comforting, but as I am getting older I most definitely do find it comforting.

In my life I have lost to death grandparents; both my parents;  a mother in law; a father in law; a dear sister who was younger than me; and two husbands, Wayne in 2011 and Bob in 2024.    I do know what it is like to grieve, and I have also experienced the blessing of the comfort that only the Lord can give.

One day I too will join the Christians that have gone before me.  As the sweet hymn says, "My hope is built on nothing less than Jesus' blood and righteousness.  In Psalm 139 it also says that all the days ordained for me are already written in the Lord God's book. Why would I not seek to love and serve Him every day?  Why would I not place my hope and trust in Him?

(On the top picture is pictured Wayne's gravestone.  On the botttom is Bob's gravestone.)

Mother's Day Blessings

 

Mother's Day is now over in the United States as of Sunday, May 11.  I hope all of  you Moms had a lovely day.  The Lord God loves Christian mothers and woman in general.  I had a lovely lunch with family and with my grandchildren doing the cooking for the woman in our circle.  Personally, I also received the lovely orchid pictured above, some sweet smelling bar soap, and some lavender flavored tea bags from two of my granddaughters.   I also had a phone call from my Iowa son and text greetings from my two stepdaughters on Mother's Day itself.

A few days before Mother's Day I received a card. and I received these lovely roses from my stepdaughters.  I pictured them on Facebook, but in case you missed them here they are  pictured again:

Then earlier yet I received this Mother's day card from my son who lives in London.  They call their mothers or moms "Mum" there, and they celebreted Mother's day in March.  Here is a picture of the card that I thought you might enjoy seeing:

 I praise the Lord for the blessing of family who show love for us! 

 

Lessons Learned in Spring

 

Spring has been slow in arriving in our state and county this year.  Yet there are subtle signs of spring starting to show.  The minutes of daylight are getting longer each day and some seasonal flowers are beginning to emerge.

Perhaps you are beginning to emerge emotionally from a winter like season of grief or discouragement in your life as well.  Perhaps your grief is slowly emerging from a season of emotional winter to a spring time of joy and peace.  Just as spring is transitional, often reverting to winter like conditions, so perhaps you have reverted at times to periods of deeper grief as well.  Yet you also are experiencing greater  renewed hope and joy.   Perhaps your night of sorrow is slowly developing into a dawn of joy and peace.

Spring  is also a wonderful picture of new life in Christ.  As spring brings new emerging flowers, newly revived green grass, and longer and warmer hours of daylight; so new life in Christ brings new joy and purpose to our lives.  It brings salvation and forgiveness and a personal relationship with Him.  It brings the assurance that the Lord will always guide and protect and that He will never leave us or forsake us,  This new life brings an assurance and peace that we can trust our Lord God, and we can trust the promises He has made in His Word.  If you have not yet accepted this new life in Christ, I pray you will do so; or if you have strayed away for a time from the sweetness of  a relationship with Him, I pray that you will embrace it again.

God's Plan From the Beginning

 We have just celebrated Easter a couple of weeks ago.  In thankfulness for what He did for us on the cross and in celebration of His rising from the grave we should want to live for Him.   For this week's blog post I am again going to use a devotional which comes to my e-mail every day. It is by Pastor Rick Warren:

"“Your hearts and minds must be made completely new, and you must put on the new self, which is created in God's likeness and reveals itself in the true life that is upright and holy.”

Ephesians 4:23-24 (GNT)

From the beginning, God’s plan has been to make you like his Son, Jesus. This is your destiny. God announced his intention at creation: “Then God said, ‘Let us make human beings in our image and likeness’” (Genesis 1:26 NCV).

In all of creation, only human beings are made in God’s image. But the image is incomplete and has been damaged and distorted by sin. So God sent Jesus on a mission to restore the full image that we have lost.

What does the full “image and likeness” of God look like? It looks like Jesus Christ! The Bible says Jesus is “the exact likeness of God,” “the visible image of the invisible God,” and “the exact representation of his being” (2 Corinthians 4:4 NLT, Colossians 1:15, Hebrews 1:3 NIV). 

People often use the phrase “like father, like son” to refer to family resemblance. When people see my likeness in my kids, it pleases me. God wants his children to bear his image and likeness too. The Bible says, “You were . . . created to be like God, with a life that truly has God’s approval and is holy” (Ephesians 4:24 GW).

Let me be absolutely clear: You will never become God, or even a god. That prideful lie is Satan’s oldest temptation. Satan promised Adam and Eve that if they followed his advice, “you shall be as gods” (Genesis 3:5 KJV).

Many religions and new age philosophies still promote the old lie that we are divine or can become gods. This desire to be a god shows up every time we try to control our circumstances, our future, and the people around us.

But as creatures, we will never be the Creator. God doesn’t want you to become a god. He wants you to become godly by taking on his values, attitudes, and character.

As you work to fulfill your calling, remember that God’s ultimate goal for your life on earth is not comfort but character development. He wants you to grow up spiritually and become like Christ. 

In The Message paraphrase, Ephesians 4:22 says, “Take on an entirely new way of life—a God-fashioned life, a life renewed from the inside and working itself into your conduct as God accurately reproduces his character in you” (Ephesians 4:22). That’s what you are meant to do! "