Do you like the word Perseverance?  No? Me neither! 

Perseverance is one of those words that make us cringe because of all the connotations it brings. Living in a society of instant fixes and instant results, perseverance is slowly getting squeezed out of our character. In the world where nothing is made to last, we are asked nothing more than to give something a go and if it doesn't work or you don't like it you are free to move on. It almost seems like there is no place for perseverance or that perseverance is somehow becoming redundant; or is it? 

In James 1:2 we are asked to consider it pure joy when going through trials and temptations because it is through the testing of our faith that develops perseverance (NIV) - which is also translated “patience” (NKJV).  Another word that makes me cringe! Verse four in the NIV is, “Perseverance must finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything."

Perseverance is not just a good idea, but also a Biblical principle. As Christians we have a responsibility to ensure that perseverance does not disappear from the men and women of today or the children of tomorrow. We have a responsibility to ensure that perseverance does not succumb to its redundant fate. As James points out, perseverance must finish its work. This is not an optional extra! James offers us no other option if we are to become mature and complete. Once the excitement of a new project has worn off, what drives us to finish it? When the honeymoon is over and you have each gained a few extra kilos and a large mortgage, what keeps our marriages together? James calls us as Christians to finish what we start; he calls us to good old-fashioned stick-ability. What James highlights is that if perseverance does not finish the work, then what does? More and more as people abandon perseverance the work is not being finished. Deadlines are not being met, marriages are not lasting, renovations aren't being completed, and scrapbooks remain unfinished. But what is perseverance? What is this essential trait that spurs us onto maturity and completeness? 

Well, if perseverance were a woman, she would be the one sitting in the corner of the office. Easy to miss at first, there is nothing to draw attention to her except the contentment on her face as she goes about her work. She is not loud or flashy but if you ask her boss, she is spoken of highly. Words such as dependable, reliable is what she is noted for. Her boss points out the asset she is to the company because she will always get the job done, and on time.

Perseverance is a loving wife who, thirty years into the marriage, is still looking for ways to be a blessing to her husband and show him that he is loved. She has stood firm and guarded her marriage. She has settled disagreements quickly so that they have had no time to fester and take root. Perseverance does life with her husband day by day, investing into their relationship.

Perseverance is a mother who lovingly walks the journey with her children. She endlessly encourages them in their pursuits and is there with compassion and support when they encounter disappointment. She can't recall how many times she has heard her son play that piece of music on the piano. She can't count the number of times she has driven her daughter to ballet or soccer and cheered from the sidelines; however, perseverance will tell you that she will continue to support, encourage and teach her children for the rest of her life.

Perseverance is also the astute businesswoman; she has taken some big risks and had a couple of losses. Perseverance however cannot be held down for long. With each loss she assesses her learning, picks up and starts again. She is not afraid of hard work and she remains determined to see her dreams come true.

Perseverance is an athlete. She trains hard and is consistent. Whether rain, hail or shine, you will find her running the oval or training in the gym. There may be a day when she falls and there is no chance that she can win now (even with all her preparation), her perseverance is resolute, and she will complete the race she started.

Perseverance is you and I each time we choose to rise above our circumstances and finish what we start. When we feel unappreciated or just plain worn out, we keep going because we understand that perseverance must finish its work. As Christian women, let us be determined and resolute; let our lives reflect perseverance so that we can become mature, complete and lacking nothing. It’s not easy, but we know Someone that will give us what we need to get it done. We can’t, but He can!

 Ahhh, Spring!

It’s spring!  The flowers are blooming, the trees are budding and winter is gone (at least we hope so!).  It’s a time of new birth, new energy and new joy.  Reminds me of 2 Corinthians 5:17 “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new.”, and Revelation 21:5 “Then He who sat on the throne said, "Behold, I make all things new." And He said to me, “Write, for these words are true and faithful."

Spring is a time of year when the days start to get a little longer and we have more sunshine.  But, even on rainy days we can have Son shine!  2 Corinthians 4:6 “For it is the God who commanded light to shine out of darkness, who has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.“ 

So, what’s going on in your life?  Do you feel like there is a cloud hanging over your head?  Is discouragement or disappointment raining down on you?  It is time to let the Son shine in!  John 15:11 says “"These things I have spoken to you, that My joy may remain in you, and that your joy may be full.” Jesus wants us to have joy, no matter what is going on.  We are given a choice.  We can have misery or we can have joy.  I know what I want – JOY!

Time for spring cleaning!

It’s almost Spring!  And there is just something about this time of year that makes us want to clean out stuff and freshen up our homes.  But, for now, let’s put aside thoughts of cleaning our house and think more about cleaning out our heart.  We tend to keep lots of things inside our heart that have no business being in there.  Didn’t we forgive that transgression years ago?  Then what is it still doing lurking in the corner?  What about that bitterness?  It looks like it is starting to grow roots!  I see some negative thoughts floating around like dust in the air.  What about that prideful attitude stuffed inside and bursting at the seams?  And how about that spot of anger that needs to be cleansed?  Time to clean up!

Galatians 6:22-23 has just what we need:  “But the fruit of the spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control.  Against such there is no law.”  Let’s grab some joy and splash it on that hard and crusty attitude and spray a little kindness around for a sweet-smelling aroma.  A little longsuffering here and a little goodness over there mixed in with some faithfulness and self-control creates an atmosphere of pure love.  Ahhhh, feel the warm gentleness breeze as it blows through our heart giving us that wonderful peace.  How refreshing God’s Word is when we apply it to our lives and allow the Holy Spirit to cleanse our hearts.

Another good verse to get us in the right mood is Philippians 4:8 “Finally, brethren, whatever things are true, whatever things are noble, whatever things are just, whatever things are pure, whatever things are lovely, whatever things are of good report, if there is any virtue and if there is anything praiseworthy – meditate on these things.”  If we spend our time doing what this verse says, there won’t any room to store those “things” we don’t need .   Cleaning is so much easier when we don’t have a bunch of “stuff” in the way.  So, pack it up and give it to God.  Then we can fill our hearts with lovely things.

Spring cleaning is good but Spiritual cleaning is the best! 

 Needle Little Love

Needle little love.  Catchy name.  One of my friends came up with it.  As you probably have figured out, it’s a play on words - need a little love.  Who doesn’t need love?  I need love and I know that you all do too.  Everyone needs love.  People who say they don’t need love are lying. So, everyone needs love.  Well, isn’t it just a lucky coincidence that God is love?    So, when we say we need love, what we are really needing is God. 

We hear things that we already know.  Jesus loves you.  Yes, we know that.  And I am not going to tell you anything that you don’t already know.  Hopefully you will walk away with a greater sense of how much Jesus loves you.  We all know the “love” chapter - 1 Corinthians 13:4-8

“Love suffers long and is kind; love does not envy; love does not parade itself, is not puffed up; does not behave rudely, does not seek its own, is not provoked, thinks no evil; does not rejoice in iniquity, but rejoices in the truth; bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.  Love never fails.”  Then verse 13 “And now abide faith, hope, love, these three; but the greatest of these is love.”

I may say that I love someone but when I put my love up against verses 4-8, I can’t honestly say that I have kept all of it.  Sometimes I don’t suffer very long - I’m impatient.  Sometimes I do get envious, sometimes I want recognition, sometimes I provoke an argument, sometimes my ego gets in the way.  Sometimes my love fails.  But I know that God never fails.

I John 4:7-8 tells us specifically that God is love: “Beloved, let us love one another, for love is of God; and everyone who loves is born of God and knows God.  He who does not love does not know God, for God is love”.  And again in 1 John 4:16: “And we have known and believed the love that God has for us. God is love, and he who abides in love abides in God, and God in him.”

Twice in the same chapter John says that God is love.  Not just that God loves us.  Not just that God has love.  But that God is love.   There is a song “Your Love is Extravagant” by Casting Crowns – it has these words: “Your love is extravagant, Your friendship it is intimate.  I find I’m moving to the rhythms of your grace, your fragrance is intoxicating in our secret place. Your love is extravagant.  Spread wide in the arms of Christ is the love that covers sin.  No greater love have I ever known, You considered me a friend.  Capture my heart again.”

That should be our prayer - that God would capture our heart again and again and again - like falling in love for the first time.  God’s love is extravagant.  He spared no expense in showing us His love.  My prayer is that we can also have an extravagant love.  Love is the most precious of all the gifts we have and yet it does not have a monetary value.  We can afford to be extravagant.  Amen to love? Amen!

 Sacrifice

Sacrifice - not my favorite word.  But it is an important part of my life.  When we become Christians, we become living sacrifices.  It used to be just a saying.  Of course my life is a living sacrifice.  Until I am put to the test and actually become the living sacrifice.  Everything is easy in theory or in word only.  But then that day comes when we are tested.  My day came on Tuesday, July 10^th, 2007, as I said goodbye to my new husband at the airport.  Yes, I knew that he was going on a mission trip before we got married.  Yes, I knew it would be a long trip - 5 months.  Knowing this ahead of time didn’t prepare me for the actual event.  I cried so much that I am surprised my tears didn’t end the drought that was in the area at the time!  But God is faithful, and He began to minister to me right away.  He spoke to me in my devotion time in Genesis 22:1-14

Now it came to pass after these things that God tested Abraham, and said to him, “Abraham!” And he said, “Here I am.”  Then He said, “Take now your son, your only son Isaac, whom you love, and go to the land of Moriah, and offer him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains of which I shall tell you.”  So Abraham rose early in the morning and saddled his donkey, and took two of his young men with him, and Isaac his son; and he split the wood for the burnt offering, and arose and went to the place of which God had told him.  Then on the third day Abraham lifted his eyes and saw the place afar off.  And Abraham said to his young men, “Stay here with the donkey; the lad and I will go yonder and worship, and we will come back to you.”  So Abraham took the wood of the burnt offering and laid it on Isaac his son; and he took the fire in his hand, and a knife, and the two of them went together.  But Isaac spoke to Abraham his father and said, “My father!” And he said, “Here I am, my son.” Then he said, “Look, the fire and the wood, but where is the lamb for a burnt offering?”  And Abraham said, “My son, God will provide for Himself the lamb for a burnt offering.” So the two of them went together.  Then they came to the place of which God had told him. And Abraham built an altar there and placed the wood in order; and he bound Isaac his son and laid him on the altar, upon the wood.  And Abraham stretched out his hand and took the knife to slay his son.  But the Angel of the LORD called to him from heaven and said, “Abraham, Abraham!” So he said, “Here I am.”  And He said, “Do not lay your hand on the lad, or do anything to him; for now I know that you fear God, since you have not withheld your son, your only son, from Me.”  Then Abraham lifted his eyes and looked, and there behind him was a ram caught in a thicket by its horns. So Abraham went and took the ram, and offered it up for a burnt offering instead of his son.  And Abraham called the name of the place, The-LORD-Will-Provide; as it is said to this day, “In the Mount of the LORD it shall be provided.”

Next to verse 2, I wrote in my Bible that this is the 1^st time love is mentioned in the Bible.  This really spoke to me because the Lord had asked me to surrender my husband, whom I love.  Just as Abraham trusted God to return Isaac to him, I could trust God to return my husband to me.  I wish I could say that I surrendered him and that was it and then I just waited for him to come home.  But I can’t.  I have to confess that I needed to surrender him every day, over and over.  My flesh wanted to take him back.  So, every day I had to place myself back on the altar and give myself as a living sacrifice.  It was hard to stay there and not try to wiggle off.

Abraham isn’t the only one who surrendered to God.  In 1 Samuel chapter 1, we read about Hannah and how she promised God that if He would give her a son, she would give him back to God.  I can remember God speaking to my heart and asking me about Charles.  I wanted to marry Charles and I was willing to be his support system so that he could serve the Lord in the mission field.  Hannah kept her word to the Lord and I had to keep my word. 

Sacrifice is doing something that your flesh doesn’t want to do but you know that it is part of God’s will so you do it anyway.  Our flesh will fight it every step of the way.  I know my flesh does.  There is no way we could do it on our own.  Thank goodness we don’t have to.  God will not call us to do something that He hasn’t already equipped us to do.  We can’t out give God.  No matter what we sacrifice for His kingdom, God will reward beyond anything we could possibly imagine.  Each one of you is a living sacrifice.  Every day you have choices to make and most likely there will be a sacrifice involved.  I want to encourage each of you to be that living sacrifice - allowing God to do His will for His glory.  You will never be sorry you did.

I will leave you with this.  Psalm 73:26 “My flesh and my heart fail; But God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever.”  In my notes written in the margin it says: God is enough!  Amen!

 What is your food?

Food is mentioned everywhere in the Bible.  You will find it in Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy, Judges, 1 Samuel, 1 & 2 Kings, Job, the Psalms, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Isaiah, Lamentations, Hosea, Joel, Zechariah, Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, Acts, Romans, 1 Corinthians, Philippians and Revelation.  I am not going to go thru all the Scriptures - but I do want to touch on two that are in the New Testament where Jesus was specifically involved.

One of those verses is in John 6:12.  This is the story of how Jesus fed the 5,000.  Verse 12 says: “So when they were filled, He said to His disciples, ‘Gather up the fragments that remain, so that nothing is lost.’” Jesus used leftovers.  The next time your family complains about eating leftovers, read them this verse!  Even though Jesus could make more out of nothing, He said to gather up the fragments so that nothing is lost.  That spoke to me.  We may be blessed with enough money to buy what we need when we need it.  But are we being good stewards of what we have already purchased?  Buying food and then throwing it out because it wasn’t used in time is a big waste of money. When Jesus fed the 5,000, He could have made just enough to feed them with nothing leftover, but He didn’t.  We can learn from this.  There will be days when we will have just enough - nothing left over.  But what are we doing with the “leftovers” when we have it?  Leftovers don’t have to just pertain to food.  We can have money, time, and resources leftover.  Are we using them or wasting them?

The other verse is in John 4:32.  This is where Jesus has just had an encounter with the woman at the well and His disciples have just returned with food and telling Jesus to eat.  Verse 32 says “But He said to them, ‘I have food to eat of which you do not know.’” Jesus isn’t talking about physical food but spiritual food.  He goes on to say in verse 34 “My food is to do the will of Him who sent Me, and to finish His work”.  What are we doing with our spiritual food?  Are we taking the Word that we have fed on and nourishing others?  Jesus went without physical food for 40 days.  I would probably have a problem going without food for 40 minutes.  How did He do that?  He was nourished by God the Father.  Are we getting enough nourishment from the Word?  Or are we on a diet?  We need spiritual food as much or even more than, physical food.  Are you in the Word everyday?  Do you skip a day, a week, a month?  Think how that would affect you if you skipped meals for that long.  I want to encourage you to feed on God’s Word everyday.  Doesn’t matter what time of day you do it or how long you spend on it.  Just do it.  Chances are you won’t skip a day without eating (unless you are fasting), so decide to not skip a day without feeding on God’s Word. 

 Resolutions Anyone?

It’s a new year  . . . did you make any resolutions?  We have just completed the first week of January - have you broken any of your resolutions?  Did you give up?  The beginning of a new year is not the only time we can make a new start.  We have the ability to start over every day.  Actually, we can start over at any time, whether it is every morning or every minute.  Just because we "failed" does not mean we are done.  Think of it this way:  F.A.I.L. = First Attempt In Learning

Lamentations 3:22-23:  Through the Lord’s mercies we are not consumed, Because His compassions fail not.  They are new every morning; Great is Your faithfulness.

Discouragement is a great tool of the enemy, and he would want us to quit as soon as we fail.  But we have a gracious God that willingly gives us grace and mercy every day – He never runs out.  We are a “work in progress” and God knows that.  God is also the one who will complete the work He has started.

Philippians 1:6:  being confident of this very thing, that He who has begun a good work in your will complete it until the day of Jesus Christ;

So, consider this your opportunity to make a new resolution.  Resolve to run to the Lord for your help.  That is one resolution that will never fail!