by Sharon O | Apr 8, 2010 | Uncategorized
Sometimes life’s moments come in and interrupts our day.
We get out the calendar and focus on our ‘to do’ lists for the week.
Planning menus and shopping trips, work days and play days, what we need to prepare to get it all done.
Then a child will get sick. Or we get sick. Or the dog gets sick.
Or the car won’t start.
Or …. you fill in the blank.
We all have had those times of frustrations and disrupting moments.
Interruptions can rearrange our agenda and goals.
My question for us is how flexible are we?
If I have a plan … and another need ‘is more pressing’.
Do I grasp it with enthusiasm and an earnest desire to do what needs to be done?
Or do I grumble and complain and gripe
and have a bad attitude?
I have to admit I am sure I have done both.
Jesus was interrupted.
Throughout the New Testament he always had others rearrange his day. People with needs would come to him for healing and for teaching.
He accepted the interruptions as a time for ministry.
He healed others when it was not convenient or acceptable in the laws of the people.
He performed miracles when others could not provide.
It was all for a purpose.
When he took the fish and bread and made so much that there were buckets of left overs. He was glorifying the Father.
Everything He did… gave glory to the Father.
So for us… how does that move into our lives?
Can we examine our hearts and ask how well we receive interruptions.
It is not about me. It is about who I serve.
It is not about my selfish need to get MY things done first.
It is about my friend who is hurting and needs time to talk.
It is not about my selfish need to have quiet time alone.
It is about the child who wants to come see grandma and have quality time together.
I pray this writing challenges us all to be more ready for interruptions.
For it might be ‘that’ phone call…that is life giving to a soul,
or that smile, or that note in the mail, or that email.
It is taking time for others.
It is taking time for God.
It is Praying without ceasing for the endless needs around us.
Lord may we be people who are willing to be rearranged for your purpose
so that we might be able to serve others with a cheerful heart.
by Sharon O | Apr 5, 2010 | Uncategorized
Luke 20:11
Mary was standing outside the tomb crying, as she wept, she stooped to look in. She saw two white-robed angels, one sitting at the head and the other at the foot of the place where the body of Jesus had been lying. “Dear woman, why are you crying?” The angels asked her.
“Because they have taken away my Lord.” she replied. “And I don’t know where they have put him.” She turned to leave and saw someone standing there. It was Jesus but she didn’t recognize him. “Dear woman, why are you crying?” Jesus asked her. “Who are you looking for?”
She thought he was the gardener,”Sir,” she said,”If you have taken him away, tell me where you have put him, and I will go get him.”
“MARY!” JESUS SAID.
She turned to him and cried out. “Rabboni!” (which is Hebrew for “Teacher”.)
“Don’t cling to me,” Jesus said. “For I haven’t yet ascended to the Father. But go find my brothers and tell them. I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.”
—————————–
WOW… can you even imagine?
Jesus. Saying your name.
He knew her, but she only recognized him after he said her name.
It is relationship.
It is a deep knowing.
Mary… I know you…and you know me.
She was grieving. She experienced his death. A terrible death on the cross.
Her tears wet, dripping down her face from a heart that was broken.
She was hopeless when she looked inside. For he was gone.
Then she saw them.
The two angels who spoke her language and she understood them.
Then she saw Jesus.
What a moment.
What a wonderful experience.
What a glorious reunion.
Go tell… my brothers so they will know too. Jesus said.
I am going to my Father.
He didn’t leave me or forsake me.
I am going to My God and Your God.
Easter is here.
by Sharon O | Apr 3, 2010 | Uncategorized
“[Jesus Again Predicts His Death] Now as Jesus was going up to Jerusalem, he took the twelve disciples aside and said to them, “We are going up to Jerusalem, and the Son of Man will be betrayed to the chief priests and the teachers of the law. They will condemn him to death and will turn him over to the gentiles to be mocked and flogged and crucified. On the third day he will be raised to life!” Matthew 20:17-19 (NIV)
I imagine the disciples were listening.
Thinking that they would be a part of something big. To be observers of a significant moment, but not really realizing that this JESUS…
who they have been walking with, talking with, sharing a friendship with, sleeping alongside and sharing meals with…. would be the SON of Man.
They thought they would just go see something deeply moving to the soul.
A significant moment in time that they would be witnesses to.
Can you imagine for a minute…Jesus?
Knowing the cross and it’s terrible torture it holds for the accused.
It was something HE knew. HE KNEW. He knew.
I know a lady right now who is on hospice dying. She knows in her heart she is going to a better place.
Yet she doesn’t fully know the suffering that is ahead.
No one does till we are there in the reality of the moment.
Was it like that for Him? For Jesus.
He knew the task was ahead. That it was going to be hard and painful.
Yet he also knew it had to be done. He knew HE would win. He knew the final outcome.
He wasn’t always willing.
IN the garden he prayed….FATHER is there a different way?…
FATHER are you listening? Can you take it from me?
Silence answered HIS prayer. silence….. answered his prayer.
silence… answered his prayer.
Have you ever been in a a deeply silent moment?
Remember how empty it feels?
Today it rained.
It rained hard and it was cold.
The wind blowing in many directions.
I could see the ladies weeping at the foot of the cross.
Crying as tears mingled with rain falling down faces so filled with sorrow.
Weeping for a loved one.
Clinging to an old rugged cross with drops of
HIS blood dripping down. dripping down….dripping down….
In rain. In sorrow. IN DEEP DESPAIR. dripping down… mingled in rain…
Jesus… now bruised and battered.
Jesus SO loved and so hated in one afternoon.
The agony of death. The agony of ‘the FATHER rejecting the Son.’
The FATHER rejecting the SON. rejecting His SON….. rejecting… turning his back… from the son…who was so close to Him.
Father… why are you rejecting me…?
Daddy…… I need you……bring me comfort…
why are you rejecting me??
Haven’t we all felt rejection some time in our lives?
Father… I ask you to forgive them…
Do we have unforgiveness that needs to be dealt with?
Father Forgive them………Forgive them…..
For they know not what they are doing….
it is a pleading of the heart that is full of agony and pain and love and agony again.
JESUS. Our hope.
Jesus… our peace.
Jesus… our redeemer.
Can you imagine for a minute what it would have been like to have walked with him.
Talked with HIM. Eat with him. Laugh with him and experience the miracles that HE did.
When He prayed… he made demons flee.
When HE prayed it would bring chills down ones back.
Can you imagine the intimacy of prayer for HE knew the Father.
I wish I was one of them. For I know I would kneel at his feet.
I would WASH his feet as the lady did.
I would never leave.
I would weep at HIS DEATH. Just as they did.
I would grieve DEEPLY.
But I would also know… the ending to the story.
Although HE was beaten beyond his capacity.
HE was not defeated.
Sunday is coming.
by Sharon O | Mar 31, 2010 | Uncategorized
A follow up on my last writing.
If you want a reflective writing that stirs your heart and mind with many emotions this Easter week. Click onto the Holy Experience button on my recommended blogs to read. Awesome reading and I noticed she was the writer I borrowed a line from. (sure hope it was ok) Have your sound on. She has beautiful music too.
I pray we can encourage each other as we grow and mature in spiritual wisdom. Help us to have a heart for the Lord and a desire to be deeply committed to His love and His teachings.
by Sharon O | Mar 31, 2010 | Uncategorized
“Only when the interior of a life becomes a chapel can the outward life echo with the clear word of the Lord.”
I read this on another writer’s blog and really wanted to share it.
(hoping it is ok).
Thinking about that concept I move into memories of when I have walked into a chapel type setting. I can see the stained glass windows. The wooden pews carved in ancient wood attached to the floor with black iron bolts. I visualize how many others have sat on those rugged wood seats or knelt down on knees ready to release the burdens they carried. I can see the variety of ages of singers in robes accompanied by the pumped organ.
The choir director standing with arms outstretched moving to the count of every note.
Old and young with voices mingled sitting together. Rich history accompanies every word in multitudes of notes sung from hardback hymnals donated by someone.
It is all visual… I can see it. I can hear it. I value the experience. I love the old fashioned worship. The hymns of long ago.
On a hill faraway stood an old Rugged Cross.
There is power power wonder working power.
Onward Christian soldiers.
Blest be the tie that binds our hearts in Christian love.
Can you go there with me in memory? Is the picture clear?
Just to say the word CHAPEL…. brings forward a reverence. A holy thought. A place of comfort and a place of welcoming.
If our interior condition is to be like a chapel. It means we would have a place carved out for the Lord, the word and the Spirit deep within our hearts. If we are not centered on the word, we cannot echo the Love of God to anyone.
It would not be possible.
Thinking about an echo… it is a sound that repeats whatever is heard. So if we hear and read and study the word then we will be able share … the sound with others.
I hope this brings you encouragement and moves you into a thinking process.
This writing is not to say I dislike the new way of worship.
I value it. The singers and muscians who bring it to us are gifted and talented.
As we worship by ourselves or with others. I am praying that our thoughts will bring us to a new kind of chapel. For that is when the Lord can use us.
