God Doesn't Think Like We Do

This evening something happened that caused my feelings to get hurt. I was tired and sore and I most likely over-reacted (contain your shock) but I was hurt nonetheless. I cried for just awhile, but I know to take these things to the Lord. When I did, I asked Him why He allows me to go through this. It was not the first time and I am sure He had a lesson for me - and it's a lesson I would like to master so it can stop occuring! As I was praying I heard a the voice of one of dear friends in my head. The voice said: "God doesn't think like we do". I smiled just thinking of my friend and the words calmed me down. So I asked the Lord to give me His perspective on the situation. I felt the Lord say that just as He doesn't think the way I do, other people think differently than I do also. Whether consciously or not, we tend to think that people think like us. We put expectations on them based on our thought process (not theirs) and when those expectations are not met, we get hurt. I trust the heart of God. Therefore, when He sends something my way that I don't understand, I know He means no ill toward me. I think the same goes with those who are close to us. Their heart is good toward us - even if circumstances look different. I appreciate two things about this evening's lesson. First, at my time of need God was there. I called to Him and He answered me. He calmed me first, then He taught me in His loving Fatherly way. Second, the method He used was the words of my wise and Godly friends. I am so grateful that I have chosen friends who are more mature in the Lord than I am. Even in casual chatting, their wisdom is shared with me and God uses it when it's needed. So what started out as hurt, ended in a double blessing. And I am doubly grateful.

Spiritual Anemia

It's been a few weeks since I have written my last blog post. I usually write these posts after I have spent time with the Lord because I typically share what He is showing me. Unfortunately, I haven't spent that good, quality time with the Lord in awhile. I did not intentionally stop spending time with Him. So this morning I examined myself to see when and why I broke the habit of my quiet time. As you know, in early April, several trials hit me at once. Those trials forced me to the foot of cross because I had nowhere else to go. Being unemployed, I spent a ton of time with the Lord each day. I sought Him for peace and for the answers to my issues. Even though it was a very dark time for me, I felt His Presence so close - like never before. So what happened? Slowly but surely, circumstances turned around. I recovered two out of three of my major losses. Things started to look up again - and I stopped. I stopped looking up. Instead of throwing myself at the foot of cross every day, I threw myself into life. Nothing wrong, nothing bad - just busy with this, that and the next thing. I had a list of things I wanted to accomplish before heading back to work and I had people I wanted to spend time with before I got too busy again. For the past two weeks, I got out of bed and started running - just do, do, do. Slowly, I started to notice that while circumstances were favorable, something was not "quite right" with me inside. During worship on Sundays, I felt distant from God. (duh) I noticed that I was getting short with people in the grocery store or on the road. What was wrong with me? The Scripture tells us that He must increase and we must decrease. The only way for Him to increase in us is for us to spend time with Him. When we don't, the opposite happens, we increase and He decreases. The result is spiritual anemia. Obviously, it doesn't have to be this way. I think when circumstances are favorable, I just need more discipline to stay in the Word. I need to deliberately seek Him even when all seems to be well. I need to keep Jesus first in my mind and in my heart and not allow life (even the good parts) to put Him on the back burner. I am thankful for the trials that came into my life because they allowed me to experience a deeper intimacy and closeness with the Lord. At the same time, I am praying that I don't need Him to send any more trials in order to get my attention. With a new job and going back to college in the fall, I am going to be busier than ever. In that busyness, I must make time with the Lord a priority. Its only when I am spiritually healthy that I can be healthy in all the other ways. I am going to be meeting new people - new co-workers and classmates - I want them to see Jesus in me, not Raquel, and that can only happen when I stay focused on Him.

Jesus Held His Peace

One of the lessons God is teaching me during this time of trial is how to suffer well. I obviously did not sign up for this course! Nonetheless, God keeps bringing it to me time and time again and I bet He will continue until my thick head really gets it. Yesterday morning I was having my weekly chat with my spiritual mentor and like always she saw straight through me. She knew that I had been deeply hurt by someone very close to me and I have been struggling to forgive this person. In fact, I thought I had forgiven this person, but I kept rehashing what they had done to me and I would get upset each time. So I realized I had to come to a place of genuine forgiveness and I had to give this hurt to the Lord and not be upset about it anymore. So this morning during my time with the Lord, I asked His forgiveness and asked Him to help me forgive. He answered. I began my Bible study that I am doing on I Peter and don't you know today's lesson was about learning to suffer well like Jesus did. It talked about how He "held His peace" and gave the hurt and suffering to God who judges justly. The author managed to put it in poem form for us: The day when Jesus stood alone And felt the hearts of men like stone And knew He came but to atone That day He held His peace They witnessed falsely to His Word They bound Him with a cruel cord And mockingly proclaimed Him Lord But Jesus held His peace They spat upon Him in the face They dragged Him on from place to place They heaped upon Him all disgrace But Jesus held His peace My friend, have you for far much less, With rage, which you call righteousness Resented slights with great distress? Your Savior held His peace Wow. What can I add to that? Jesus is our example of how to endure suffering and hurt. He trusted that His Father would take care of it in His time and in His way. This morning I prayed that this Word would take deep root in me. The last thing I want to do it read it, blog about it, and forget it. We are on this journey to become more like Jesus until we see Him face to face. He's not letting me out of this part!

Two Way Trust

This morning begins week six of my unemployment. I have resumes in so many places I have lost track of them all. When I woke up, grabbed my coffee, and went to spend time with the Lord, one of my first prayers was asking Him to please let the phone ring today. Please, Lord, give me one interview. He gently reminded me to trust Him and I began my time in His Word. I am doing a study on I Peter, but I am also reading in a chronological Bible. This morning's reading was the book of Job. I've read the book of Job many times, but the beauty of God's Word is that He always brings something fresh from it. So this morning as I read about God giving Satan permission to strike all of Job's possessions, including the lives of His children, I realized something: not only did Job trust God, God trusted Job. When the Lord said to Satan: "have you considered my servant Job..." God knew that Job would continue to trust and serve Him no matter what tragedy he endured. In a good way, it made me feel small. Here I am learning and trying to trust God. I wonder if sometimes the angels laugh at me or shake their heads in disbelief. I imagine them speaking to each other saying "Look at her -trying to trust our good and perfect Father". While trusting the Lord is a good and necessary thing, I think it is more remarkable to become a person who God can trust. In Job 1:20, after Job heard that his children had all been killed, it says he tore his robe and shaved his head. In that day, these were signs of mourning. Of course Job was grieved and devastated to lose all of his children. However, the Bible tells us that he tore his robe, shaved his head, and fell to the ground IN WORSHIP. As I considered this, it began to make more and more sense to me. Job was not expected to be happy about his losses. He did grieve and suffer. However, his grieving and suffering were in response to the circumstances. His response to God was worship - the same worship he gave when everything was good. Verse 22 tells us that in all this, Job did not sin by charging God with wrongdoing. So now for the application. Yesterday Pastor Kent said in his sermon that if we hear the Word but do not obey (or apply) it, it equals nothing. I do not want my time spent in the Word this morning to amount to nothing so I need to contemplate how to apply this to my life. Last month, when I was hit with several painful losses in a short span of time, I knew better than to charge God with wrongdoing. However, my response was to ask Him why these things occurred. My response was not worship. I have spent these past six weeks learning to trust God more and more and while I do believe that is one of God's purposes for this season of my life, I am faced with a new goal: becoming a person who God can trust.

Seek Ye First...

When I was a child I didn't always listen to my Mother. I know, contain your shock. One of the things she used to say to me all the time was: "Raquel, do you think I talk just to hear myself?" I think God has the right to ask us the same question. I say that based on a "duh" moment I had this morning. Yesterday morning, it was my intention to wake up and spend my time with the Lord before beginning the days tasks. However, when I woke up I was still groggy and didn't want to get out of bed yet. So I asked my sister to give me her laptop and I stayed in bed playing on the computer for about an hour. I was still thinking that spending time with the Lord was next. After the computer, I wanted to get my shower. So I did, still thinking time with the Lord was next. After the shower, I remembered I had laundry that needed done and I needed to get quarters. So I ran out to do that and stopped at Dunkin Donuts for breakfast. When I arrived back home, I intended to put a load in the washer, then grab my Bible. Well, my sister needed a ride to work. One task lead to another and before I knew it I was on my way to Wexford for a 1pm lunch appointment. I did manage to sneak a peek at my devotional book - at 4pm! I didn't seek the Lord first, and I ended up not seeking Him at all. So this morning I was determined not to do that again. I got up, grabbed my coffee (at home, not Dunkin Donuts) and got into the Word. And guess what... He spoke to me with specifics for my day. Imagine that! I bet He wanted to do the same thing yesterday. I guess that's why His Word tells us to seek first, because if we don't seek first, we won't seek at all. It was then I was reminded of my Mother's voice asking me if I think she talks just to hear herself. Whether consciously or not, I wonder how often we think that God speaks the precepts in His Word because He is on an authority high. Does He give us these rules and lists of do's and don't because He has the power and authority? Nope. He gives them because He loves us and cares for us. Any good parent tells their child to not touch a hot stove or to make sure they brush their teeth. They do that for the child's well being. God is a perfect parent. When He tells us to seek Him first, it's not so that He has a better day, it is so that we do.

Eyes to See

Remember the show Touched By An Angel? When it was on primetime television, I watched it all the time. I thought some episodes were great, while others were a little cheesy. However, there was one episode that will stick with me forever - the series finale. When the series was coming to an end, they aired a two hour finale titled I Will Walk With You. The first time I saw it I not only cried like a baby (no surprise there) but the hair on my arms was standing up and I had chills down my spine. Well, thanks to Netflix, I watched it again this weekend. I won't tell the whole story, but there was town whose people were devastated by a terrible tradegy. As they struggled to deal with their pain and loss, both as individuals and as a community, their eyes had become blinded. All they saw was their own circumstance and their own pain. The scary thing was Satan himself was actually among them. He walked with them and talked with them. He lied and caused division among them because that's what he does. The people could not see him because all they saw was their own mess. As scary as that was, it was scary and sad to note what else they couldn't see: Jesus. Jesus was right there with them and they didn't know. In fact, they started seeing Jesus as the cause of their problems, not the solution. (The writers must have read Scripture before writing this episode). So I watched it again. I was amazed. I cried. I got chills. And I fell into the same trap. We fall so easily. Our circumstances become all we see. I wonder how many times I have missed the presence of the Lord in the midst of difficult circumstances. And I wonder how many times the enemy was at work and I thought it was other people. Oh for eyes to see. In the devotional I am reading, it says we can let our problems bring us down into a sea of self-pity. On the contrary, we can turn our problems into a ladder and climb up and see things from the Lord's perspective. I need that divine enablement to do just that.

Choosing Busyness

It's Thursday morning and though I hate to admit it, this is the first morning this week that I have spent time with the Lord. Oh I have prayed and I have glanced at my devotional book - sometimes at the end of the day - but I have not spent the quality time with the Lord that I need until this morning. I have felt it. I have felt the difference in my spirit which eventuallys flows through to my words and actions and emotions. So why did I allow this to happen? Let's see... Monday and Tuesday I overslept and had to run to scheduled events of the day. Yesterday, I woke up and notice a problem and rushed off to take care of the problem and then into the other events of the day. Last night as I realized "how busy" I have been this week, I realized that I was not a victim of busyness. I was a victim of my poor choices. Christians are famous for making themselves victims of busyness. Sometimes, we get so busy doing the Lord's work that we forget the Lord. Other times, we get busy and forget the Lord's priorities. The Lord always prioritizes the eternal over the temporal. So what is eternal? Only two things - our relationships with God and our relationships with other people. Those are the only two things that will matter for all of eternity. Yet when we get busy, those are the two things that we forsake. Now don't get me wrong... everyone today is busy. My to-do list today is long and what is on it does need to be done. However, nothing on that list is more important than the Lord or the people He puts in my path. Am I rushing from one task to the next and not noticing the hurt in someone's eyes as I rush by them? Have I filled my day so full that I have not five minutes to call, email, or text a friend who is going through a rough time and simply check on them? You know, when I was in Bible College I heard an acronym for busy: Being Under Satan's Yoke. While there is some truth to that, I think most of the time we are under the yoke we have chosen to place on ourselves. This is simply not God's way for us to live because when we choose to live this way, we end up hurting ourselves and sometimes other people. I have definitely hurt myself this week and have possibly hurt some others. I think if we allow ourselves to become too busy for God and other people, we are simply too busy. However, we are not victims of our busyness, we are victims of our choices. So this morning as I spent my time with the Lord, I've brought my to-do list before Him. I'm allowing Him to show me what His priorities are for my day. After arranging my to-do list according to what He showed me, He leaves me with this: Keep my eyes focused on Him while I do these tasks, and keep my eyes open for the people He puts in my path. His ways are always so much better than ours. :)