No More Night

Shepherds were in the field watching over their sheep.  It was night, so darkness pervaded the atmosphere.  Perhaps there were stars in the sky, but because it was nighttime it was still very dark.  Suddenly an angel appeared in the sky saying to the shepherds, "Do not be afraid.  I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people.  Today in the town of David a Savior had been born to you, He is Christ the Lord." (Luke 2:10)  Then to the shepherd's astonished eyes the sky was filled with a host of angels praising and glorifying God!  The darkness had been turned to light! 

Because of  our Savior's birth,  His perfect life lived for us, and His death on the cross to pay for our sins;  our darkness has been turned to light as well!   If we have accepted the free gift of His salvation, we stand forgiven.  We are then children of the Light.  The Lord Jesus is then living in us through His Spirit.  His light is in us!  We have a spiritual inheritance and the promise of eternal life!  

Some day the Lord Jesus will return on the clouds of glory for a second time. He will not return to this earth as a baby again, but as our glorious and victorious Lord.  Until the day that He returns, however, we have not yet received our full inheritance as His children.  Although we experience joy in Him already; we still encounter trials, suffering, tears, and heartaches at times in this life.  When He returns Revelation 21 in the Bible tells us that He will erase all our fears, heartahces, and tears.  On that day there will be no more night.  All will be perfect joy in His presence!

As children of the light we need to tell others about this wonderful gift of light and life that we have received from the Lord.  We need to tell others this good news because of our appreciation to Him for what He has done for us and given to us.  We need to tell others so that they too can accept and experience this gift of light.  

Below I have posted a link to the song, "No More Night."  Just click on the link to enjoy and experience this song. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4iPIi7sunEU&list=RD4iPIi7sunEU&start_radio=1

Gifts

 

What kind of Christmas do you anticipate this year? Perhaps your Christmas will involve a lot of extra work for you in addition to the challenges and responsibilities of other life activities, or perhaps you are feeling isolated and ignored and all alone this Christmas in your daily burdens. Instead, however, perhaps you will experience Christmas this year as a reminder of your blessings and as a blessed respite from the drama of life's challenges.

Whatever we experience this Christmas and with every gift we receive at Christmas or at any time of year we have to open our hands to receive the gift; or the gift does not benefit us or give us any joy. The gifts we receive which are eternally precious, however, are the gifts which God wants to give us.

The Lord first offers us the gift of salvation which is what Christmas and walking with the Lord is all about. He further offers us the accompanying gifts of joy, peace, and hope. They are ours for the taking; and yes, they can coexist with the pain and heartache which often are present in life. Further, the Lord promises us a happy ending. That happy ending is eternal life. Christian reader, the heartaches that sometimes come in life are but a comma in your life story. They are not the end of your life’s story. They are not the end of your loved ones' life stories either.

We also can all receive other gifts. We can receive the gift of trust in God and letting Him control our lives. We receive this gift by resting in Him and by letting go of anything which we are holding onto too tightly or trying to control.

We further all have to let go of feelings of unforgiveness for people who have not been there for us. We further have to receive the gift of forgiveness for ourselves.  We have to bring to the Lord any true wrongs, and ask for His forgiveness. Further, we often carry around a lot of false guilt about things beyond our control. So whether false guilt or true guilt, we need to let it go. We need to give it to the Lord. Trust and letting go are great gifts to have in our lives.  Receive the gift of releasing it to the Lord.

One great gift we can give ourselves is the gift of acceptance of our situation. We often waste so much energy wishing circumstances were different, but we can rest assured that we are right where we are supposed to be in our lives. Dear Reader, your responsibilities may be emotionally overwhelming at times, but in the measure that you can accept where God has placed you now in your life you will find joy. It is a great gift you can give yourself.

Yet another wonderful gift we can give ourselves is the gift of being still in the presence of God. (Psalm 46:10) Doing this helps us grow in peace, wisdom, and insights. Finally, we can give ourselves the gift of gratitude. When we are grateful in spite of our circumstances our joy and blessings will multiply and resentments will flee.

Would not these be wonderful gifts to have in your life? These are wonderful gifts not just for Christmas but all year long!

A Surrendered Life

 

"I am the Lord's servant."  Mary answered.  "May it be to me as you have said."  These were the words of Mary after the angel told her that she would become the earthly mother of the Savior, Jesus.   These were words of surrender on her part.  It was a great honor for her to be chosen for this job.  Yet it would involve sacrifice.  Would her family and friends think she had committed an act of adultery?  Would Joseph think that?  Would she be ostracized by the people of her town and culture?  Mary's surrender would also involve great sorrow, as she saw Jesus hang on the cross. 

Mary was willingly surrendering from a heart full of love for her God.  She was not serving God just so she would be blessed, or because she was hoping the Lord would meet and fulfill her secret desires and agenda.  She was also not seeking to serve the Lord out of sense of obligation.  She was serving the Lord out of a heart filled with gratitude, praise, and love for Him.  Her heart was a heart that was truly surrendered to the Lord's will, purpose, and agenda.  Wherever the Lord placed her in her life or wanted her to do, she wanted to be there wholeheartedly serving Him.

Obstacles to full surrender to the Lord in our lives include doubt concerning His sovereignty and love for us, a desire to control circumstances ourselves instead of leaving them in God's hands, not focusing on the Lord, and a lack of thankfulness.  Other obstacles include fear, lack of true intimacy with the Lord, and no experience of the Lord's joy in one's life.

Like Mary, however we can experience the love of God and willingness to surrender to Him in our lives.  Mary Tutterrow says the following in her book, The heart of the Caregiver from Overwhelmed to Overjoyed, "We will EXPERIENCE the love of God when we are willing to do whatever He asks us to do, however, He want us to do it trusting Him completely for the outcome.  That is surrender!  It's only when we are doing things His way, for His reasons, according to His timing-not according to our own plans or will-that we can do things we never thought we could do, love people we never thought we could love, overcome obstacles that seemed insurmountable, and experience His love and power working in and through us."  

This is the surrendered life that Mary and a host of other Biblical people lived.  All failed and faltered at times, but they also experienced the joy of a surrendered life throughout their lives.  We can experience that joy as well.  

Blessings

We just celebrated Thanksgiving Day in the United States.  We are also entering the Christmas season.  It is a time of year when we think of God's blessings.  God's greatest blessing to us is that He sent Jesus into the world to pay for our sins and to pave the way for us to have a wonderful and intimate relationship with Him.

We also experience many other blessings from the Lord.  There are material blessings, and there are emotional and spiritual blessings.  Every day God provides good and wonderful blessings to our lives.  We just need to open our eyes to these blessings and to look for them.

In a book called The One Year Book of Hope by Nancy Gutherie Nancy points out, however, that blessings do not always come in the form of things we consider good.  Sometimes blessings come in the form of hardship.  This is because trials and hardships can grant us perspective on what is important and meaningful in a way nothing else can do.  This is because they often lead us on a pathway to the Lord.  As we surrender to the Lord in times of hardship, we find God in a new and vibrant way.  In times of trial God often reveals Himself to us.  He also often gives us a peace that we can find in no other way,

In times of hardship and trial God bends down to us.  He enters into our lives and meets our needs in a personal way.  He not only does that, but He reveals Himself and gives Himself to us in unique ways in those times.  It is because of this, in those times we receive God's blessings.  We receive God's blessings in and because of the trials.  We find the blessing in the Lord Himself and not in material outward things or in our own perceived achievements.  Let's thank God for our blessings.

(You may enjoy Laura Story's song "Blessings."  You can listen to it by clicking on the following link:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XQan9L3yXjc

Also there will be no new post next week.  Use this time to read some of my older posts.  I hope to post again on or around December 10th.)

Thanksgivng

 

All of us have so many things for which we can  be thankful.  The Lord provides us with our daily needs which often involves things that we just take for granted, like health, safety, daily food, sunshine, warm homes and beds, loving families and a host of other good things.  We also can thank the Lord for church, His Word, and above all that we know Jesus as our personal Savior and the spiritual riches which come from knowing Him in a personal relationship.

Yet perhaps for many of you the holidays can be a discouraging time, if you or your family are going through difficult circumstances.  It may be difficult to find things for which to be thankful in such a scenario.  Yet a thankful heart opens up blessings from heaven and foretastes of heaven that cannot be attained in any other way. A thankful heart further revives hope and allows us to communicate on a more intimate level with the Lord. A thankful heart does not deny the reality of life's challenges, and life certainly presents a host of problems and heartaches. A thankful heart does, however, recognize the Lord's presence and joy in the midst of those problems.

So perhaps the best place to start is to thank the Lord each day for His presence and peace. Also as you go through the day look for even the Lord's tiny treasures which He has placed on your path. Look with spiritual eyes for His wonders in your life.  Some years back I remember being challenged to write down each day at least three things for which I was thankful that day. That helped me immensely in persevering during a very difficult time in my life.

It is said that a thankful heart takes the sting out of trials and adversity,  Life often facilitates many challenges and trials. Yet we are commanded in the Bible to give thanks in everything. We may not always FEEL like giving thanks, but when we offer a SACRIFICE of thanks in spite of our feelings, God gives us joy in spite of our circumstances.

That does not mean we always feel happy. Happiness and joy are not the same thing, but joy in the Lord and grief can coexist. It may seem nonsensical to thank God in and for difficult circumstances. Yet in the measure that we do so we will be blessed, even though the adversities may remain.  Thank the Lord for His blessings even while going through trials. 

A few years back I read the following thoughts from some correspondence I received in the mail:  If you are holding a cup of coffee when someone comes along and bumps into you, it is not the bump which caused you to spill coffee.  This is because if you had tea in your cup, you would spill tea instead.  Whatever is in your cup will spill out, when you are bumped and shaken.  So it is with life.  When you face circumstances that shake you in life, what is inside your heart will spill out.  What will spill out of you and I in such times?  Will it be peace, joy, gratitude, and humility that will spill out?  Or will it be bitterness and anger?   Again thank the Lord today for His blessings from a heart full of love for Him because of His grace!

In the United States we are celebrating Thanksgiving Day in a few days. It is a day when we especially try to remember to thank and praise God for the blessings of the past year.  Life is often challenging and difficult. Yet there are many blessings in our lives even in the most difficult of moments,  Thank the Lord for your blessings daily and not just on special occasions. It will lift your burdens and add joy to your life.

(If you missed last week's blog post you can read it by clicking on the link below:  

https://christiancaregiving.blogspot.com/2023/11/it-was-good-for-me-to-be-afflicted.html  )

"It Was Good for Me to be Afflicted"

 

"It was good for me to be afflicted so that I might learn Your decrees.  The law from Your mouth is more precious to me than thousands of pieces of silver and gold," (Psalm 119:71-72)  Really, Lord, it is good to be afflicted?  How does that work, Lord?  Perhaps you as a reader join me at times in the sentiments I just expressed.  Trials and challenges are never pleasant.

So how can afflictions ever be good?  I think the Scripture passage begins to give us an answer to that question.  Afflictions makes God's Word more precious to us.  In times of challenge we run to God's Word for comfort and direction, and His Word becomes more precious to us than gold or anything else in this life in the process.  If one clings to the Lord in times like these, one's faith and relationship with Him aso becomes so much sweeter.  It is also a time when we begin to learn sweet surrender to the Lord's perfect timing and will.  This in turn leads to His peace.

How do I know this?  I know this because I have experienced this myself in my life in many ways.  I begin to experience this when my first husband developed a neurological disease which grandually made him more and more physically disabled until finally he became totally dependent on me and a wheel chair and lift.  I experienced it when I also developed breast cancer during that same time period and endured eight months of treatment.  I experienced it when my first husband died after four and a half years of decline, and I became a widow.  God's promises in His Word and His presence in my life were so very precious during those years of caring for my husband, and they still are in the years since.

I am also experiencing all these blessings, now as I face more pronounced ongoing back issues.  It is further something I am experiencing now as my second husband has been diagnosed with a different kind of neurological disease.  Does this mean that I always feel joyful all the time about the circumstances?  No, sometimes it is a struggle and a cause for sadness.  Becoming a  family caregiver a second time never was something I wanted to do.  

Yet thesse struggles have once again laid on my heart the need for sweet surrender to the Lord and the need to NOT try to "fix" things" in my own way and on my own terms.  It has impressed on me the need to surrender to the Lord and to trust His way and timing.  I fall so far short in this surrender to the Lord, but God is working on me.

I think afflictions and trials can also make us more thankful for all the wonderful gifts we have in our life like sunrises and sunsets, the changing of the seasons, and a host of other things.  It further opens our eyes to how God is using our difficult circumstances to help others and encourge others and for them to encourage us.  I saw that in my experiences with my first husband, and I am seeing it now in my present situation.  Finally, lessons learned in times of affliction and wilderness tend to be remembered the best and the longest.  So yes, as difficult as it can be at times, it is good to be afflicted.

Pray, Wait, Trust

Pray, wait, trust.  Such are the words that I found on a small plaque that I purchased a few mouths back.  Then I found these same words on a gratitude journal I recently purchased.  These are three simple words.  They are simple words yet often difficult to live, or we make them difficult to live by not surrendering all our worries and problems to the Lord.

Pray, just talk to the Lord when afraid.  The Lord invites us to do so.  I Peter 5:7 says,  "Cast all your anxiety on Him, for He cares for you."  Yet we so often try all own resources first before turning to the Lord and before surrendering to Him.  The Lord does not want us running around fretting and trying to come up with human solutions.  God tells us instead to "not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and petition with thanskgiving present your requests to God  And the peace of God which transcends all understanidng will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus."  (Philippians 4:6-7)  Barb Roose says this in her book, Surrendered, "When Fear tempts me to flee, fix, or force my way, I will choose to stop and pray."

Sometimes when we pray God does not give us exactly what we want.  He is much wiser than us.  So sometimes He may say, "No." to our prayers.  He also may say, "Wait."  If there is something of value for us to to learn by not answering our prayers immediately, God will make us wait.  This can be a difficult but valuable time of learning to depend on the Lord and grow spiritually.  "I wait for the Lord, my soul waits, and in His word I put put my hope."  (Psalm130:5)

Pray, wait, and the third word is trust. The book of Proverbs in the Old Testament says this, "Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and lean not on your own understanding.  In all your ways acknowledge Him and He will make your paths straight."  (Priverbs 3:5-6)  Trusting in God's leading and following His leading will bring joy and blessing in our lives.  Life may have may obtacles and trials, but leaning on the Lord for direction and strength is always the way to blessing and a life of purpose. Psalm 29:7 says, "The Lord is my stregth and my shield; my heart trusts in Him, and I am helped.  My heart leaps for joy and I will give thanks to Him with song."

PRAY.  WAIT.  TRUST.