Christ in Me

A few weeks ago I was reading

a familiar verse from the book of Galatians:

“I have been crucified with Christ.

It is no longer I who live,

 but Christ who lives in me.

And the life I now live in the flesh

 I live by faith in the Son of God,

who loved me and gave himself for me.”

The line “Christ who lives in me”

hit me in a new way. 

The truth of it.

 The power of it. 

The humility of it.

It turned into a poem.

I’ve written very little poetry in my life,

so I feel vulnerable sharing it here.

But I’m hoping it will bless someone this week before Easter.

There is such POWER in Christ’s death and resurrection!

But it comes only in joining Him in His surrender.

Surrender is hard.

It’s scary.

But it is safe.

His love for you will not fail.

EVER.

If someone can love us this much,

giving our lives to Him is only reasonable.

Christ in Me

I gave my life to you my Lord,

Surrendered, yielded, bowed my knee.

It was no longer I who lived,

But it was Christ who lived in me.

But there are times I snatch life back,

My fear, my pain, my false control.

I wander from my Lord and God,

Who gave His life to make mine whole.

So I must choose to lay it down,

Each day, my self, my soul, my will.

To take my cross, the one He chose,

And walk like Him to Calvary’s hill.

Then when my heart spills real and good,

With truth, with love, humility,

I cannot own the smallest praise,

It is you, Christ, who lives in me.

                             JESSICA

What is White?

 The year 2018 is starting out in a big way for us. 

 We’ve purchased our own home!

It really feels crazy after almost fifteen years of marriage to say

 “our house”and really mean it’s our house!

The house is just down the lane and across the road from the farm where we live now.

It’s tiny, nondescript, and really not charming on the outside.

But inside there’s good character.

And we’ve got vision for the outside.

We feel so blessed to be able to put an addition on before we ever move,

 and just this week (after weeks of jumping through all the hoops for a permit)

the digging began!

This photo was obviously taken during the summer! :)

But I didn’t sit down to write about the house and all the

remodeling/building thoughts that have been consuming my mind.

I’ve actually had some time to just think lately.

Imagine that! 

Feels miraculous when that happens.

My daily schedule has changed to something like this:

Eat breakfast.

Do school as much as we can until lunchtime.

Try to fix something for supper 

(or at least know what kind of hotdogs or leftovers we’ll have. Ha!)

Eat lunch.

Pack up the kids and whatever we need to take to the house

 (leave all other housework behind).

Work at the house until we absolutely have to come home for supper.

I’m loving it!

Andrew usually has a good nap in the afternoon

 and the girls take things to occupy themselves,

so I often get to do my own thing for a few hours.

That’s including a lot of painting.

And painting means time to think.

 

I’m learning that “white” isn’t necessarily “white”.

Over the years I’ve done a good bit of painting, but until now,

I’ve never been the one choosing the colors.

After living in a house with lots of natural pine paneled walls

that make everything dark,

I’m ready for some white!

 

We took a trip to Home Depot to get some paint.

I started pulling out white paint samples.

Okay… what I thought was white really wasn’t so white.

This was more difficult than I thought!

Every sample that looked white, had a bit of a tint when I’d compare it to another.

In the end, I talked to Paul the Paint Guy,

and he gave me their truest brightest white that comes pre-mixed in a can. (Boring!)

As I’ve been covering the already “white” walls,

 (which I realize are actually quite creamy when compared to real white)

 I’ve been contemplating.

Thinking about this comparison thing.

How easy it is as a Christian to compare myself to another person I think is “white”.

But you know, all of us humans have a tint.

There’s only one Person to stand next to as a comparison.

When we are beside Jesus Christ, 

it’s only then that we can know what’s truly white.

Looking at everyone around us with their various shades of “white”,

will only make us confused and unsure,

 like me holding all the “white” paint chips.

But the beautiful thing is, when we’re all looking at Jesus,

being made like Him, our whites will all become more and more true.

Our unity will be real.

Our tints will no longer clash.

May we know HIM!

“Let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, 

looking to Jesus, 

the founder and perfecter of our faith.” 

Hebrews 12:1b,2a

A Hope That is Living - This is Not the End

This Christmas was different.

This Christmas there was the celebration and the joy,

the time with our families,

the excitement of the little ones.

There was also deep sadness.

There was the knowledge of profound loss.

Amidst all the activity, so many thoughts fluttered in.

Thoughts of my dear Aunt and my cousins.

Thoughts of my Uncle Henry going home to Jesus,

the day before Christmas.

These days come.

So unseen.  Unplanned. Unknown.

But we do not fear.

"Never be afraid to trust

an unknown future

 to a known God."

- Corrie Ten Boom

I grieved with my cousins and wondered.

I wondered, “why not me?”

How is it fair 

that I go home and my life continues,

mostly the same.

But suddenly, for them, life will never be the same.

But we know truth.

And we trust.

The preacher said:

“There is Saving Grace,

There is Living Grace,

And there is Dying Grace.”

Oh, God is good.

“Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ!

In his great mercy he has given us new birth into a living hope

 through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead,

 and into an inheritance that can never perish, spoil or fade.

 This inheritance is kept in heaven for you,

 who through faith are shielded by God’s power

 until the coming of the salvation

 that is ready to be revealed in the last time.

In all this you greatly rejoice,

though now for a little while you may have had to suffer grief

 in all kinds of trials.”

 1 Peter 1:3-6

 Just before the sun went down,

 I went to the grave.

A shadow fell in the shape of a cross,

on the fresh red dirt.

There is a LIVING hope!

By the power of Jesus and the cross,

this is not the end.

There is glory waiting on the other side.

 “Jesus said to her, ‘I am the resurrection and the life;

 he who believes in Me will live even if he dies,

 and everyone who lives and believes in Me will never die.

Do you believe this?’"

 John 11:25

Think About Such Things

 “Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, 

whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely,

 whatever is admirable--if anything is excellent or praiseworthy--

think about such things.”  

Philippians 4:8

At the end of a week that’s been full of troubling news, 

how do we respond? 

Ultimately we decide what we will dwell on,

 how our minds will be affected by what goes on around us. 

I’m not promoting sticking ones head into a happy little sand hole, 

but choosing to truly see reality and the whole picture is very important.

If I know God, I will know His Peace. 

If I know God I will know His Power. 

If I know God I will trust His unfailing Love and Faithfulness.

But I will not hoard these things in my own heart.

I will first overflow them to the family around me.

Then they will overflow to my friends and anyone I interact with.

If you know Jesus, choose to believe that 

“the waves and wind still know

His voice who ruled them while he dwelt below.”

Choose to think on the Right, the True, and the Noble.

 Here is a little bit of our afternoon yesterday.  

The littlest girl cousin, 

the one with the halo of blond wisps, 

was at our house.  

It was hot, in the nineties, with plenty of humidity to accompany it. 

We headed to the little creek down in the woods.

Along the way, there were flowers to smell.  

These are blackberry lilies.

 The woods seemed dark as we left the heat 

of the fields and open areas on the hilltop, 

and the air cooled as we neared 

the lowest point where the creek runs. 

Along the way were ferns and moss, so soft to touch. 

A half grown granddaddy longlegs sat in the path 

on a toadstool shaped plant.  

I took his picture and left. 

 He never stirred from his plant throne.

There are some things one should never forget 

when heading to a creek,

 a bucket being the most important.

This crawdad was a good size. 

It was a crawmamma I guess, actually.  

She had little bitty babies clinging

 to the underside of her tail.

“And God said, ‘Let the waters swarm with swarms of living creatures,

and let birds fly above the earth across the expanse of the heavens.’

 So God created the great sea creatures

 and every living creature that moves,

with which the waters swarm, according to their kinds,

 and every winged bird according to its kind.

 And God saw that it was good.”

 Genesis 1:20, 21

Listening or Talking. The title is not what you think.

Here’s a quote to stimulate some thinking.

“Most of your unhappiness in life comes from the fact

 that you are listening to yourself 

instead of talking to yourself.”   ― John Piper

I do believe there’s a lot of truth in that statement. 

 From deep inside us come those feelings of self-pity.

 The “I’m a victim” thoughts, the “life’s too hard” thoughts. 

 Those thoughts that justify irritability

because of the difficulties in our lives.  

 Or thoughts that make us critical of others 

so that we feel lifted up.  

Our flesh has a never ending well of lies.  

And it’s far too often we drink from that well 

and feed our distorted mindsets.

These debilitating attitudes are the ones that

 are often so easy to see in others, 

but the same ones we are not so likely to see in ourselves. 

 It’s easy to preach a little “mind sermon” to someone 

when we can “so clearly” see what their problem is. 

 A mind sermon is one of those things you imagine saying, 

but would never actually dare to.  

Ever do that?

But what if we took the counsel of Jesus, 

worked on taking the wooden board out of our own eye,

 and stopped looking for sawdust specks in someone else’s?

What if we did like John Piper talks about in his book 

When I Don't Desire God: How to Fight For Joy 

(long title, life changing book) 

and got into the habit of preaching to ourselves?

Here’s what he says, “Well, God does not mean for us to be passive. 

He means for us to fight the fight of faith—the fight for joy. 

And the central strategy is to preach the gospel to yourself.

 This is war. 

Satan is preaching for sure.

 If we remain passive, we surrender the field to him.” 

When I visit some of my friends homes, 

I can see one way they’re doing just that – preaching to themselves.  

Here’s what some of my closest friends have been preaching 

to themselves (although that’s probably not

 how they were thinking of it.)

Here’s my friend Mandy’s kitchen window.  

She’s our pastor’s wife, in the thick of the battle.

 My sister-in-law, Johanna’s, bedroom was full of 

sermons to herself before she got married last year.

  Bless this dear girl for her faithfulness.  

She’s been diagnosed with Fibromyalgia by the Mayo Clinic.  

Years of sickness and doctors is not an easy road. 

A diagnosis of a disease with no cure is not an easy road.  

And yet, truth doesn’t change when life does.  

That is when we need to hear the truth 

preached every day.  

Even many times a day.

 Here’s Alison’s kitchen window.  

She’s the creative one, so her sermons tend 

to be beautifully hand painted and crafted. J

 Life as a homeschooling mamma and 

pastor's wife requires living in truth!

 And on my dear Mother-in-law’s kitchen windowsill 

is this quote from Francis de Sales.

 And here’s what’s on our fireplace mantel. 

The quote from Jim Elliot, who died taking the gospel to Ecuador.  

“He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep, 

to gain that which he cannot lose.”  

I did this quote near the beginning of 2 ½ years 

of fighting Lyme and Babesia.  

For me, this sermon said,

 “Surrender your health to God, and trust Him no matter what.  

It is worth it!”  

This thing of surrendering all to the will of God 

for something greater – what a hard thing

 for us human beings to grasp. 

But so very essential to living with joy!

So if preaching to yourself isn’t something you’re already doing, 

why not start with something simple and visible?  

Pick a song, or verse, or quote that fits 

what’s going on in your life.  

Hand write it if you’ve got that skill, 

or just type it and print it out.    

It’s a fact that we all have stuff in our lives. 

 Sometimes we just need to listen to the right voices

 instead of the wrong ones.    

P.S. If you’ve got a favorite quote or something that challenges you,

 I’d love to hear it in the comments!

"Send out your light and your truth; 

let them lead me; 

let them bring me to your holy hill 

and to your dwelling!"

Psalm 43:3