Tag Archive | choice

The Hair On My Floor

I firmly believe that God speaks to us every day.

I believe He is always talking.

 

We just do not always choose to listen.

 

He speaks through every day things.

A sunset, a baby’s smile, the caress of your husband’s hand on your cheek.

I think He also uses other more insignificant things to speak as well.

 

Keep this in mind during this post.

I’ll share with you what He spoke to me about this morning,

Through the dog hair on my kitchen floor.

 

What on earth is she talking about! She’s off her rocker!

No wait, just stay with me.

 

We have a big dog. Really big. 165 + pounds of dog. Over 38 inches tall big dog.

That’s a lot of hair dog.

No matter how much I sweep my floor,

There is always hair.

 

During the day, when I walk around my kitchen, it looks really fine.

Fine, like I’ll just skip sweeping today fine.

 

That was yesterday.

I found it much easier to read blogs and play Words With Friends instead of sweeping the floor.

 

This is today.

I awoke to the sun shining in on my freshly unswept kitchen floor.

There on my floor that looked fine in regular afternoon light,

was awash in brilliant early morning light.

Hair. Everywhere. Every inch. Hair.

 

How could it have piled up so quickly?

All that hair, I’m surprised there is any DOG left!

 

So what’s this about God speaking to us all the time?

And what does it have to do with the hair on my floor?

Well it made me ask myself some questions.

 

My life looks pretty good.

Here in the regular every day light of the afternoon.

 

But what would it look like if the Light of my

Lord and Savior Jesus was shining on my life in full brilliance!

Full morning sunlight, on this freshly unswept heart of mine?

 

What happens if I just once skip sweeping it out?

Just a little sin. Looks pretty good. Just a little sin.

Can’t hurt much. Just a little sin.

Piling up all over the floor of my soul.

 

One day turns into two and pretty soon I ‘d have to wonder if it is

possible for my entire heart to be covered over with my sin.

 

In Sunday school this morning we talked about keeping short accounts with God.

I think the principle is the same as keeping my floor swept up.

 

If I sweep my floor every day,

I don’t wake up to the shock of possibly being overrun with dog hair.

Dog hair that gets on everything.

My feet, my clothes, my coat, tracking all the way out to my car.

 

My sin is a bit like that hair.

If I do not keep short accounts with God,

meaning asking Him to clean me up the minute I sin,

then my sin gets on everything.

My heart, my mouth, my husband and it can even track all the way out to those I work with.

 

It just piles up and up.

Soon I’d have to ask “Is there any room for God in there?”

 

What about you?

Not your kitchen floor, but your heart?

That part of you that is eternal?

 

Is it on your regular cleaning schedule?

Or does it get pushed off for something more fun?

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Psalms 139

13 For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother’s womb. 14 I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well. 15 My frame was not hidden from you when I was made in the secret place, when I was woven together in the depths of the earth.

 

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A Father’s Love

 

Detail from Albrecht Dürer

Image via Wikipedia

Do you remember the sense you got when you were in the presence of your father?

Was it a sense of abandonment?

Was it a sense of anger?

Was it a sense of bitterness?

Was it a sense of regret?

Was it a sense of disconnection?

OR was it a sense of something even worse, a sense of lust and usury,

and the sense that you were prey to be preyed upon?

Did you sense that you were collateral damage to fill the evil desires of someone else?

2 Peter 3:3 (NIV1984) First of all, you must understand that in the last days scoffers will come, scoffing and following their own evil desires.

 

If this is the sense you had growing up,

I want to express my profound sadness for the life of that child.

 

I also want to express my equally profound belief that the anger, the bitterness, the regret, the disconnection and the overwhelming sense of being a victim can be overcome.

 

But how you ask?

Here is what I believe due to the work I have done on my insides.

All of the above, the sense of abandonment, anger, bitterness, regret and of being prey to those much stronger than I, has always tried to triumph.

 

But I “did the work” so to speak, and continue to do so.

I call it an “Inside job”.

 

In the natural world, all of these barriers can be strongly affected by therapy of many different types.

Each of us is made very differently.  Different approaches will have different outcomes.

In the best case scenarios, the fix may be hard to maintain because of difficulty we still carry within the memories. We are still connected in our minds.

 

In my own case I found that new things could not be done in old ways.

I needed a new tactic.  I needed a new thing.

I embarked on a new process, a less natural, more spiritual process.

 

It was not a fast process by any means, but it was effective.  I could hear my Grandmothers voice telling me that “slow and steady wins the race”.

 

My first action in the “new process” was very purposeful.

           I picked up my Bible and began to read.

 

Isaiah 43:19 (NIV1984) See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the desert and streams in the wasteland.

 

You mean my life does not have to be as it is? 

I do not have to settle?

 

2 Corinthians 5:17 (NIV1984) Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come!

 

But I don’t feel like a new creation!

How can this be?   Is this normal?

 

What I did not yet know was that when we give our hearts to Jesus and ask Him for His help, He saves our spirits, to live with him forever, but we still have our same flesh until the day we leave this earth.  We still must overcome the old thinking and habits we have had since birth.

 

Psalm 51:10 (NIV1984) create in me a pure heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me.

 

We must be purposeful, intentional, and active.  For that pure heart and renewed spirit, 

we must choose to seek Him.

 

Genesis 50:20 (NIV1984) you intended to harm me, but God intended it for good to accomplish what is now being done, the saving of many lives.

 

You mean all this baggage I’ve been saddled with for so long can actually be good for someone else?

 

Isaiah 61:3 (NIV1984) and provide for those who grieve in Zion— to bestow on them a crown of beauty instead of ashes, the oil of gladness instead of mourning, and a garment of praise instead of a spirit of despair. They will be called oaks of righteousness, a planting of the LORD for the display of his splendor.

 

I, of course was the one “grieving in Zion”.

 

I began to learn about just how beautiful I was to God, and that His heart was to show me the TRUE love of a TRUE father.

He wanted to be my “Abba”.         My “Daddy”.

 

Romans 8:15(NIV1984) for you did not receive a spirit that makes you a slave again to fear, but you received the Spirit of sonship. And by him we cry, “Abba, Father.”

 

I began to see that He has always wanted to lavish His love on me.

 

1 John 3:1 (NIV1984) how great is the love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are! The reason the world does not know us is that it did not know him.

 

His heart was not to harm me.  Harm came to me, but not by His choice.  It was the choice of humans.  The days are evil, (Ephesians 5:16B) and man makes choices that go far out of the realm where God would have us to live.

 

He, God, my heavenly Father, my Abba, did however protect my life.  He gave me an open opportunity to choose Him.

 

This is when I learned that I could fulfill His purpose for me, by helping others, who may not have ever heard that there is a way out.

 

Jude 1:23 (NIV1984) snatch others from the fire and save them; to others show mercy, mixed with fear—hating even the clothing stained by corrupted flesh.

 

Is this a picture of you? 

 

Are you “grieving in Zion”?

 

 

Would you consider a new thing?

Would you pick up a Bible and read?

Would you take the step?

Would you “Do the work”?

Would you embark on the “Inside job”?

Would you ask for help if you need it?

 

If you answered yes to any of these questions,

Feel free to contact me here,

Or for more privacy, you can message me

At Significant Encounters on Facebook.

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For further research on “Abba” ->     http://www.orthodoxresearchinstitute.org/articles/bible/tarazi_name_of_god.htm

Significant Encounter Friday #10

I absolutely love it when I read stories that show the contrast between what the enemy of our soul meant for evil and what the lover of our soul, God of the universe can do with that when we turn our lives over to Him.

These stories stand the test of time.

These “testimonies”, stories, show just how far a loving Father will go for the children He loves.

At times quickly, and other times slowly, God enters our dysfunction, and begins to smooth the rough edges.

He knows just what we need and when we need it.

The following story was originally published in May of 2006.

The story is as potent today as the first day it was posted.

This is a real story of God literally saving me from death. I almost died at the age of seventeen and I met Jesus through a near death experience. In my past I’ve been a hardcore atheist, a Hindu, an agnostic with Unitarian Universalism ideas, and even a Wiccan (a new-age cult that practices witchcraft) when Jesus found me.

Click the link here to finish the story in it’s original form.

http://www.southasianconnection.com/articles/98/1/Encounter-with-Jesus-that-Changed-My-Life/Page1.html

 13 For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother’s womb. 14 I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well. 15 My frame was not hidden from you when I was made in the secret place, when I was woven together in the depths of the earth. 16 Your eyes saw my unformed body; all the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be.

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