Jesus – Page 27 – Pastor Susan

Complimenting One Another

October 10, 2009October 10, 2009 tlc4women3 Comments

http://www.flickr.com/ photos/ werner_schnell_images/ 3373428662/

In part three we wrap up some thoughts on just being human and letting our attributes and God-given differences be just fine! To read part two click here.

As we talked about yesterday, I grew up in a home where I felt my parents worked together. I never felt as if I couldn’t talk to my dad about anything. My dad took me to buy my first bra. No big deal. Why? Because my parents worked together when it came to us and I only saw a parent, someone who was there to take care of me. Yes, they did things differently. My mom was the parent who saw danger in horseback riding in the washes of Arizona, where we spent our summers, and my dad saw fun. My dad was the one in which if I didn’t want to comb my hair that day, it was summer who cared? My mom saw a tangled unruly mess which must be tamed. They were different, no question about it, but they were both necessary to my well-being. My mom worried, my dad thought we’d be fine.

Men and women are different in character and needs and desires and yet God say we are equal. He doesn’t love one more than the other. God says we are necessary, both of us, male and female, we were created with our unique abilities. He doesn’t say one is better than the other. A man is not more than a woman and a woman is not more than a man. We are different and equal. Each of us was designed with a different purpose. I, for one, am happy and grateful for that. It means I don’t have to go out of my comfort zone to try to be something that I am not. I can just be who I am supposed to be.

Does that mean that I advocate a woman to stay home and cook and clean and a man to go off to work? No. I believe we can do whatever we want but I do like to see a child being taken care of by a parent who loves them and not by daycare. I also understand that for some it is a necessity that they work. I am also honest enough to say that those who have necessity are few and far between. Lifestyle choices, not food on the table, dictate that necessity to me. I don’t believe a woman can work, have children and do a good job at it all. I have yet to see it and I lived it, one always gives way to the other. A sick child sidelines your work and a deadline sidelines your child. Something has to give and most of us don’t have great support systems at either place. Yes, there are exceptions but let’s face it they are very few.

Can I ask a question? Why do we demand organically grown vegetables but we don’t want organically grown children? Why do we scream about vaccinations while attempting to raise artificially designed androgynous children? If we are about all natural then let’s be about all natural. I don’t see many boys today who are allowed to be boys. We don’t seem to want or need men and we are a lacking society for it. What is wrong with a boy who wants to conquer and a girl who wants romance?

The silence of Adam kept us from achieving the goal the first time around in the garden. The silence of Adam still keeps us from acheiving the goal set before us today. Adam where is your voice? Eve, please let him speak. He has something to say and what he says could change the course of where we are going. Will we listen? I hope so because the reality is you’ve been sick and tired for far too long. Adam, if there ever was a time to speak now is it! Adam, where are you?

Different But Equal

October 9, 2009October 9, 2009 tlc4women3 Comments

We started a conversation yesterday about children and how we try to change who they are. I brought up the fact that women are still allowed to be at the core women, but we don’t give men the same grace. Here’s part 2.

We are so busy building an androgynous society that we have clearly messed with the original design and purpose of what God had intended. We have people who are confused about what their heart tells them to do and what the world tells them to do. Women have taken the brunt of the responsibility away from the men as they decide they no longer need them anymore. We have built a society that despises men and neuters them on every level. Then we sit back and complain that they do absolutely nothing for us and are worthless. I know little boys who do not have one single masculine toy. Without any sort of warrior spirit we have removed the essence of who they are.

Why do we disdain men so much as a society? I believe it happened when we began to believe the lie that women could do it all. We decided that as women we didn’t need men for anything but sperm and they can toss that in cup any day of the week for us. We decided they were the enemy that was keeping us from our destiny and desire. They made more money and position in the workplace, they had expectations we no longer wanted to live up to and they were foreign to our way of thinking. So the goal became to get rid of them or at least sideline them. In the silence of men, just as Adam’s silence sealed the deal in the garden we together have created chaos.

Only something has happened since that thought process invaded our society. Women now are more tired and unhappy than ever before. They work full-time in the workplace in every single occupation imaginable, then they come home to cook and clean and take care of children as they attempt to build relationships with others and they juggle constantly between their pull for their children and the demands of their jobs. They live feeling guilty for the most part because the lie is just that, a lie and we can’t have it all. At least we can’t have it all at the same time. We struggle to balance a life that is so off balance that it becomes a losing battle. Now we are so far into this song and dance it feels as if it is too late to quit. Besides, the message is still that we can do it, so pride enters in and also insecurity that maybe it’s just the individual, me, who can’t do it all. In the meantime, we try figure out what is wrong with us that we can’t seem to live up to the expectation. So we fake it and pretend to be tough.

This conversation is nothing new. We had a similar one a few weeks ago, only something has got to give. The fact of the matter is that God created man and woman to compliment each other and to work together side by side to build a better world. He created us too raise a family with children who learn both perspectives of their parents being both male and female. In my home as a child, we had a family unit that worked together.

He-Man Vs. Barbie

October 8, 2009May 23, 2010 tlc4women3 Comments

When Anthony was a three-year-old he collected all the He-Man figures and watched the cartoon, subsequently, I learned the history of He-Man. He-Man was an action figure who lived in Castle Greyskull. He was dressed like a gladiator and had a huge tiger named BattleCat that he rode off to battle. His enemy was named Skeletor and he was always causing havoc from his home on Snake Mountain.

Anthony had a sword that when you flipped the switch lit up just as He-Man’s sword did. He took this sword everywhere he went, including to bed and carried it hooked to the back of his shirt where he could easily grab it in case of danger. He was always looking for an enemy to fight and I remember one day when we walking out to the car and we encountered a big bullfrog sitting on the sidewalk. Anthony quickly pulled out his sword and said in his toughest three year old voice, “Stand back mommy, I’ll take care of this.” As he took his sword out and lit it up for battle he took the warrior stance against the bullfrog. I played along and carefully walked around the scene while he stood guard. When we got into the car, I thanked him for his protection and he smiled proudly and said, “That’s okay.” All in a day’s work for my little He-Man. Anthony’s dreams for his future was to be either G.I. Joe or on the team of M.A.S.K.

http://www.flickr.com/ photos/ 32981894@N06/ 3165157741/

When Casey was three she collected Barbie. Barbie was a doll who along with her friends, Midge, Skipper and Ken went to the beach and had parties. Barbie married Ken on a regular basis. There were no wars and there were no swords, only fun and lots of changing of outfits and shoes and cutting of hair. Barbie at some point or another also married He-Man and GI Joe which Anthony swore, would never happen in real life.

Casey’s dream was to marry Prince Phillip, from Sleeping Beauty fame, and they were going to live on the Rhein River in a castle. She would tell of tales of riding off on a unicorn to pick wildflowers and fruit in the forest. The danger for her was keeping a diligent eye out for a wicked witch. Prince Phillip would fight the Pirates on the river before dinner and he would always win.

This is an area of my children’s lives where fantasy and imagination ran wild. I would often play along and I know for a fact that Casey would have approached the bullfrog much differently. She would have wanted to catch it and see if he talked and if he turned into a prince when we kissed it. Yes, she would want to kiss it just in case it was her prince. Her life was about love and romance. Anthony’s life was about war and protection. Anthony still carefully watches over his sister and I as the man of the family and Casey is still relational looking for romance in her adventures.

I say all this to say that God didn’t create us male and female to be the same. That is a lie and puts a lot of pressure on each of us to be things we are not. Can women be warriors? Yes, they can in moments of danger and they show extraordinary strength but not in the same way a man can. A woman was not designed for war instead she was designed to nurture. Yes we as women have had to step into places that were never intended for us as a means of survival but it is not our original design. Can men be nurturing? Yes and they are, but the expectations in today’s society is that they act and think like women and they aren’t designed to do that.

Tune in tomorrow….

The Silent Treatment

October 7, 2009October 6, 2009 tlc4women4 Comments

Amos 8:11. “The days are coming,” declares the Sovereign Lord, “when I will send a famine through the land– not a famine of food or a thirst for water, but a famine of hearing the words of the Lord.
12. Men will stagger from sea to sea and wander from north to east, searching for the word of the Lord, but they will not find it.
13. “In that day “the lovely young women and strong young men will faint because of thirst.

I read this today and burst into tears. I began to imagine the Lord telling me that because I wouldn’t submit, because I told his prophets to shut up then I was to be cut off. How this passage hurt my heart. I can’t even imagine, nor do I ever want to imagine a day when I couldn’t hear the voice of Jesus.

Lord, I never want to be apart from you. I never want to feel that isolation, I never want to be where you aren’t. My Lord, I ask that your presence be with me always. There just simply is nothing without you. In the mighty name of Jesus I pray! Amen

No wonder this is my favorite song!

When Romanticism Becomes Idolatry

October 4, 2009 tlc4women1 Comment

We all know her. It’s not us of course but we all know her. You know the one. Your friend, the one who is over all the time for coffee or to hang out as long as there is not a man in the picture. This isn’t so bad, you think to yourself, because we all do it to a certain extent. In those first few weeks of a relationship when lust permeates our thought process and we see are the wonderful attributes this man has. Yes, we all know her.

We all see her. She’s in church on Sunday and at TLC (or your form of it) on Monday evenings while she’s alone but once her man comes around she drops out. She’s beautiful on the outside but so insecure on the inside. Her convictions are solid until they are tested. You see, actions speak louder than words.

Then her new boyfriend asks her to sleep with him. She knows her God and His point of view on fornication but she shoves all the knowledge aside because someone actually loves her. Well, you see, he hasn’t actually said those exact words but we all know they are coming at some point, right? We all know she said she’d never date ‘the mission field’ but her new man has promised he’ll come to church and well, we all know how that will turn out.

She tells us he drinks a little too much. It’s okay, she continues, because she know it’s just the stress of his baby mama drama. You see, he wants to change. He just needs a little sex, a little fix-it and a lot less nagging.

So you ask her about his ex-wife. Only he doesn’t have one. You see, he got hooked up with a slutty girl and she got pregnant on purpose. She was a party girl and your friend, well, she just goes clubbing with her man now because it’s where his friends hang out. They don’t do anything there, they just go to dance and drink and relieve their stress. By the way, you tell her, she hasn’t brought him to church yet. No, she says, because he’s afraid of being judged and last week he wasn’t feeling well.

She tells you that he’s asked her to move in with him. He wants to have a big wedding and give her a big ring, only he can’t afford to right now. She knows it’s not what God would want but she knows if she just hangs out a little while longer he’ll give her the things she wants. She also mentions that he’s been too stressed out to see his child but he just needs her to pull him out of his slump.

She tells you that he quit his job and now she is the sole support of her family. You remind her of the scripture that says if a man doesn’t work he shouldn’t eat but she informs you he is trying to find himself. He’s not spending too much time with his child yet. She wonders if she should pay his portion of the child support payments so he doesn’t fall behind?

So now your friend has abandoned her belief system for her man. The Holy Spirit leaves and she doesn’t even know it. She has traded God for a man. Her heart has chosen its treasure. You mourn for your friend but her romantic notion of what love is supposed to look like has become idolatry. God says He will never be second. She missed that part I guess.

Six months later she comes to you and now she is pregnant. Now your friend is the slutty party girl and her boyfriend has moved on to the next best thing. You won’t say you told her so. You just hold her and try to be there for this next difficult phase of her life. She now has more hard choices to make. Move home to her parents house to raise a child or put the child up for adoption. Her life has been irrevocably changed.

Don’t be like your friends. Smart women stick to their beliefs. It’s the core of who they are. It’s what defines them. Remember that. No man can ever take the place of God in your life and no one can ever tell you who you are. That has to be determined between you and God. You have to be worth more than that.

Mislabeled Christianity.

October 3, 2009October 3, 2009 tlc4women2 Comments

My friend Elizabeth was cooking and pulled a can of green beans out of her cupboard. When she opened it she found a surprise. The outside didn’t match the inside.

Matthew 7:16 By their fruit you will recognize them. Do people pick grapes from thornbushes, or figs from thistles? Likewise every good tree bears good fruit, but a bad tree bears bad fruit. A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, and a bad tree cannot bear good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. Thus, by their fruit you will recognize them.

When I saw the picture I had two instant thoughts. “Man! I hope she had another can or she’s going to have to figure out what to do last minute to make the meal all come together.” The second thought was, “This is why people are so freaked out by us who follow Christ. We put on this label but when they get close to us they realize who we say we are isn’t always the case.”

The Lord quickly showed me the thoughts were along the same vein. Just as Elizabeth had opened the can to find a surprise, she also had to figure out what she was going to do with the contents and how she would improvise with what she had on hand. She also will never again assume that just because a can is labeled a certain way that the contents will necessarily match up. Everyone who sees this picture also experiences to an extent what Elizabeth experienced. It sounds dramatic but it really isn’t. Think about it.

How many people have you met who have a negative story about their encounter with a follower of Christ? How many have met a green bean label only to find the contents to be a little fruity? If those of us who follow Christ have too many stories to count then so does the world. And we wonder why they are put off?

At this point in the story, many will say, yes but we are only human. They are right to an extent. We are only human but are we human living to the best of our ability or are we human living below the standard Jesus laid before us all while making excuses?

Romans 2:17 Now you, if you call yourself a Jew; if you rely on the law and brag about your relationship to God; 18 if you know his will and approve of what is superior because you are instructed by the law; 19 if you are convinced that you are a guide for the blind, a light for those who are in the dark, 20 an instructor of the foolish, a teacher of infants, because you have in the law the embodiment of knowledge and truth– 21 you, then, who teach others, do you not teach yourself? You who preach against stealing, do you steal? 22 You who say that people should not commit adultery, do you commit adultery? You who abhor idols, do you rob temples? 23 You who brag about the law, do you dishonor God by breaking the law? 24 As it is written: “God’s name is blasphemed among the Gentiles because of you.”

I heard a woman on Dr. Laura Schlessinger’s show call in about an affair she had been having. Dr. Laura asked her why she didn’t leave her husband and the woman said that it was because her lover could not care for her financially as well as her husband could and because she was a Christian. Dr. Laura went nuts! She told her not to bring Jesus into this. The woman clearly was Mislabeled Christianity.

Acts3:6 Then Peter said, “Silver or gold I do not have, but what I have I give you.

What are we giving the world? When they get close enough to look inside of our lives do they see the rotting stench of a pretend life or do they see authentic Christianity? Do we bible thumpers who say we want everyone to get their hearts right before the Lord and have everlasting life set the example by excusing why we sleep around, lie, cheat, steal, connive just as the world does?

Let’s make sure we are who our label shows us to be!

Respect

September 29, 2009 tlc4womenLeave a comment

Is it earned or given?

1 Peter 2:17 Show proper respect to everyone: Love the brotherhood of believers, fear God, honor the king.

Most people have it backward and think people have to earn their respect. People do not have to earn your respect; you give your respect to everyone. People can lose your respect, but they do not have to earn it and the only way they lose your respect is only after they have shown a lack of character.

If we are to live humanely, then we are to treat each other with respect. I don’t know where we get the idea that we can treat people without respect and make them jump through hoops to earn it. How much do I have to earn and for how long do I have to work for your respect? I don’t see that modeled in the bible anywhere. Even the Pharisees who Jesus did not get along with received his respect. He may have begged to differ with their belief but he showed proper respect. Notice the people who were disrespectful of others were not thought of well in the bible. What makes us think things have changed?

I see a lack of respect today almost everywhere. I see mean people who treat others callously and it’s wrong. On the most basic level of living on this planet, it’s wrong. We are now afraid of each other. Road rage is prevalent because no one drives respectfully. We tailgate, cut people off in traffic and when someone signals to merge in a lane we speed up to block them. We don’t care about one another’s things. What’s mine is mine and what’s yours is mine if I can get it. Teachers are told that they have to earn the respect of the student and that the student does not have to respect them until then. We bash the President without regard and call it our right, yet when the right you have in the world infringes on the right you have in the WORD then you’d be wise to choose the Word. Employers lay off employees days short of their retirement esteeming them of little value. Today we have children who threaten their parents and parents who threaten their children. Where did we get so twisted up?

The general lack of disrespect is ungodly and what does it say when we can’t even live at a humane level? Even if you aren’t in relationship with God, does it not move you that respect is woefully lacking in our communities? Think about something with me, would you go up to a group of teenagers in a McDonalds who were tearing the place up and ask them to stop? Of course not! Not only would the teens tell you off or worse take it to another level, the parents would show up and tell you off too. It’s ridiculous and it needs to change.

Respect is not earned. It is a gift freely given to each living thing on the planet. Respect can’t be bought. A lack of respect says more about the person who is being disrespectful than it does the person to whom respect is not being shown. Remember to live by a principle by the same measure you give that’s the same measure you get. It behooves us to respect others.

All I Got Was A Rock 2

September 28, 2009September 27, 2009 tlc4women1 Comment

This part 2 of a series we started yesterday. If you missed it, click here.

http://www.flickr.com/ photos/ 23564393@N06/ 2913006759/

In that moment when Eve decided to go for the wisdom that was being offered, her flesh craved that wisdom more than her soul craved God. She opted for the momentary pleasure knowing full well that death would follow. It really is about whom you feed the most, flesh or soul. I think this is why the bible says things like, “taste and see that the Lord is good”, “my soul thirsts for you”. God knows that the flesh is hungry for things we desire that aren’t always what we need. We were created to crave both in our flesh and soul. And often our soul loses as we feed our flesh. Just like Adam and Eve lost when their flesh craved a piece of fruit more than their soul craved God.

John Bevere said, I believe it was in his book A Heart Ablaze, where he had read ancient writings of the life of Adam and Eve after the garden. In these writings it says Adam was depressed and despondent. That he spent days sitting in caves, that he attempted suicide but that God would not let him die. He had lost everything; he was for the first time alone and desolate as his soul sat starving. He rarely spoke again. How incredibly sad to lose it all! Think about when a spouse decides to have an affair the pain of that affair is inflicted on the family and the effect to their husband or wife as they pull the rug out from under their lives. The aftermath of that is also devastating if there are children as sin is always personal but never private, it affects many. The incredible sharp crushing pain to the heart. Now imagine that pain multiplied by infinity and you begin to catch a glimpse of Adam’s loss. It no longer mattered that his death wasn’t physical, he had died spiritually. I believe this is what happens when people commit suicide. They are empty internally and all that is left is flesh. They have lost all hope of anything ever filling them again.

We were all created with a soul that craves the things of God and God himself. Every single one of us needs relationship and love and acceptance. We all were made to crave those things that sustain like food can’t. Babies die without a loving touch and old people wilt away without a family. We are all created to need each other.

If in fact, we can’t help it and feeding the flesh becomes a bigger priority than feeding the soul then we are dying a slow and agonizing death. There is no long-term pleasure in the pain it causes. If we truly can’t control the cravings, if that’s in fact true, then we are living no better than the animals we profess to be above in the food chain. In the meantime, your soul is dying out because it needs the ties of humanity and to something bigger than itself to exist.

People live year after year, gathering rocks in their pillowcase, always expecting a different result but never experiencing the full life that was set before them. To really want to live a life with purpose and passion isn’t all about self and selfish cravings, it’s about giving yourself what you need and thereby feeding others something more than the rocks that have been collected. If we are really going to live a life worth living then that’s about deep friendships, beautiful love, a life of service and a heart that worships God, those are the things that the soul desires. Those are the lasting things.

All I Got Was A Rock

September 27, 2009September 26, 2009 tlc4women2 Comments

http://www.flickr.com/ photos/jenromo/ 2978143711/

Gen 3:1 Now the serpent was more crafty than any of the wild animals the Lord God had made. He said to the woman, “Did God really say, ‘You must not eat from any tree in the garden’?” 2 The woman said to the serpent, “We may eat fruit from the trees in the garden, 3 but God did say, ‘You must not eat fruit from the tree that is in the middle of the garden, and you must not touch it, or you will die.'” 4 “You will not surely die,” the serpent said to the woman. 5 “For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”

We all remember Charlie Brown’s Halloween cartoon that we watch each year on TV. Charlie Brown could never catch a break. He went trick-o-treating with his friends and while each one got candy, Charlie Brown would dejectedly profess, “All I got was a rock.” Yet, year after year we would watch him go through the same motions again, getting dressed up, just to be disappointed, hoping that this year it would be different. He craved acceptance and to fit in and just get some candy!

In the garden while most of us would say Adam and Eve needed nothing, that isn’t exactly true. They needed air, they needed relationship, they needed food and shelter. Each of us was created with things our bodies crave. All you have to do is go on a fast and see how fast your body craves food. In this passage of scripture we see where Satan preyed on the natural temptation of a craving in Eve. Because we were created in the image of God we have a need to feel powerful and in control. We have a need to know what the secret is. Forget the fact that because we are are made in his image we are powerful and in control and we already know what the secret is, our humanity thinks this is found outside of ourselves. God created this need for craving so that we would crave him. Everyone even the atheist has a craving in his being for a relationship with something bigger than himself.

Cravings are something we all have. Temptations to indulge in the cravings come along all the time. Ask the drug addict if he’d rather have drugs than food and he’ll answer that drugs is what he craves; yet he understands his need for food, it just doesn’t satisfy his craving. Ask the dieter what they crave and it’s never a diet bar, it’s always a food item they can’t have that they crave. Sometimes cravings tell us what is missing from our bodies. The person who craves crunching ice needs to have their iron levels tested, as it’s sometimes a symptom of an iron deficiency.

The key to cravings is to master them and not have them master you. The challange becomes to rule over your cravings and put them in perspective. Just as your flesh has its cravings and desires so does your soul. Everyone was created with cravings both flesh and soul. The question becomes can we control our cravings or do they control us? Can the things that are not good for us be done away with?

I have an allergy to dairy. I break out in horrible big splotchy red welt-like hives that are so incredibly itchy. Sometimes, I have a baked potato with a little sour cream and I break out all over, sometimes I have a scoop of ice cream and I get a few welts but nothing major. See, I never know when I go to eat a dairy product what the results will be. I’ve had this allergy all of my life and so you’d think now that I am 44 I would stay completely away from all dairy products but that is not the case. Sometimes, I crave a scoop of Jamoca ice cream from Baskin Robbins. Usually, when the craving hits and it’s a couple a year, I can go a few weeks without giving into my craving but eventually I go for it. The reason I do this is because the momentary pleasure is worth the pain.

What are you craving that you know is not good for you? What do you keep going back to when you know it only result in same outcome as always? We’ll discuss more tomorrow. For now, reflect on these things.

For When It Rains

September 25, 2009 tlc4women1 Comment

Umbrellas are important on rainy days. We don’t think about them much any other time but when we wake up in the morning and we look out the window, and it’s raining, we look for that umbrella. We also look for that umbrella on extra hot summer days when we want to be protected from the sun. We don’t want to risk being burned.

Matthew 5:45 that you may be sons of your Father in heaven; for He makes His sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust.

Umbrellas are covering. As a married woman I count on my husband to cover me. As a woman who lives in a family whose umbrella is God I count on my husband to cover us in prayer, in character, in morals and as the head of my family we walk according to his plan praying that my husband walks according to God’s plan.

What happens though when he doesn’t? We never think it will happen to us. It’s other women whose husbands get depressed, or fall and suddenly they find themselves out in the elements dragging their family behind them. It’s never us, but the reality is, sometimes it is.

What do we do then? Do you know how to access your umbrella? Do you know how to pray for your family and cover them in the meanwhile? Can you lift your husband up in prayer while he deals with his issues? Can you keep your family out of the elements when you’re going through a storm? You see, rain is going to come for each of us we all must know how to take cover. The sun is going to get hot sometimes, we need to access that umbrella.

It’s going to call for serious relationship with God. It’s going to require deep faith. It’s going to require amazing love. Can you access the umbrella that will shield you and keep you until things get back to normal?