Devotional Times with a Difference

Some time ago, the question of my devotional time was on my mind. You see, I’ve never been one to sit down and actually read my bible at a set time during the day. 

Most of what I know was taught to me as a child at Sunday school, group Bible studies and through the sermons of faithful parents and ministers in the churches that I have worshipped in over the years. 

Setting aside a daily amount of time, for my own personal reading, has been met with limited success. 

I tried it once and found that like the disciples Mark 14:32-42, Matthew 26:36-46 and Luke 22:39-46 that I would just drop off to sleep. I have even on occasions used prayer to get myself back to sleep during the night. By using prayer, I mean I have started to pray knowing that because the devil doesn’t want me to pray, he will make sure I go back to sleep quickly.

It has been through the posts of other members of the Photo-a-day group and a message from a friend asking what devotional material I had that I started to wonder if I need to spend more time doing a “devotional”. I was mowing the lawn when this question arose. As I pushed and pulled the following thoughts went through my mind. 

I often do my best thinking while mowing. I had a conversation with God that when something like this.

“What is a devotional time?”  

“It is devoting time thinking, talking to and thinking about God and His word.”

When do you do that?

While I’m mowing and writing my stories each day!

The light went on! Oh wow, I am having a devotional time because now I am actually writing my own devotional each day.

So now I say Hello God, I want to talk to you while I'm doing the dishes, mowing the lawn, knitting and even making meals. I know that you can also teach me things in the midst of my busyness. What would you like to teach me today?

Things will be different at your place but God will listen and speak to you no matter where you are.

Flower like a Rose

It had been really dry for weeks. The ground was crying out for rain. Cracks were opening up at an alarming rate. The Rose garden had suffered accordingly as it hadn’t been given the attention that it should have. It seemed that there had just been a long list of jobs and events which pushed watering the garden a long way down the list of priorities.

Yet, one morning I looked out my kitchen window to see one bush covered in blooms.

Previously to this someone had remarked to my daughter on my strength and my ability to come through the other side of life’s storms. There were many days when I didn’t feel very strong. On other days, the stresses in my life threatened to swamp me. So, to have someone comment on my strength was surprising.

One thing I did know however, was that any strength that I had come from only one place, God. His Holy Spirit lived within me and it was the only way I got through each and every day.

Just like the Roses that had flowered in my garden, my strength is evidence that God is very powerful. In fact, my lack of attention could be paralleled to the stresses and troubles experienced by most of us.

Yet, when we soak ourselves in the care of the God who created us we will flower with a beauty that will tell the world just how powerful the Holy Spirit is that lives within us.  

We get these assurances when we read John 14:16-18.

^“16 And I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you for ever;

¹⁷ Even the Spirit of truth; whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth him not, neither knoweth him: but ye know him; for he dwelleth with you, and shall be in you.

¹⁸ I will not leave you comfortless: I will come to you.”

You may not think that you are flowering very well but remember that God dwells within you and sooner all later, maybe when life is at its hardest, you will see the evidence of God’s love and care.

Soak or Scrub

There is only one type of dishwasher in our house. Yes, is a very hands-on one! To get our dishes clean either myself or my husband have to fill the sink with water and start scrubbing. Someone recently tried to tell me how to do this job. They insisted that I didn’t soak my dishes long enough before I started to clean up. Now, I don’t mind soaking my dishes sometimes. You need to be careful not to soak them too long, otherwise, you have to empty the sink and replace the water because it has gone cold. I listened to the advice but thought that sometimes soaking can just be an excuse to put off getting our hands into the sink and start working.

As I reflected on this, I wondered if this isn’t a problem for us as Christians sometimes. Isn’t it easier to let things soak for a while? We might defend our lack of action by saying that we need to pray about an issue for longer. Yet, sometimes, like soaking the dishes, it would be of a greater profit for us to get in and do some hard scrubbing.

Psalm 14:23 says “In all labour there is profit: but the talk of the lips tendeth only to penury.” This not only relates to our earthly work. Poverty is the result of not getting in and doing the things that need to be done. 

I believe that spiritual poverty is also a result of waiting too long to get our hands dirty working for the Lord.

“And whatsoever ye do, do it heartily, as to the Lord, and not unto men;” Colossians 3:23.

So, please when it comes to working for the Lord, let’s all put on our gloves, put our hands in the sink and start scrubbing.

Green – The Colour of Hope

Isaiah 43: 16-19

Green is the colour of hope! This passage speaks of hope. As we welcome in a New Year many of us are looking for hope. Many have experienced grief, often during the closing weeks of the year that is closing. These and many other people are entering a wilderness that has to be undoubtedly navigated

.

As I thought about wildernesses, I found myself realising that there are at least two types that I know of. One is dry, barren and looks as if it goes on forever. Even in this type of wilderness we need a path to follow or else we will find ourselves going around and around in circles and getting nowhere. The other wilderness is overgrown with undergrowth that has to be hacked down in order to make progress with many hidden dangers lurking just out of sight.

We are reminded in verse 16 to forget what is old and behind us. So as we move into the new year let us look forward in hope as God makes a path for us to move forward.

Mary’s Faith

Luke 1:26-38

When we talk about Mary’s faith when Gabriel announced that she was going to be the Mother of God’s Saviour we so often focus on the virgin birth. Yet, there is something that I missed until recently. Gabriel visited her while she was living in Nazareth. She would have known enough Scripture to realise that God’s Messiah was to be born in Bethlehem. 

Was this part of her question “How shall this be, seeing I know not a man?”. 

Did she wonder if Joseph would be willing to travel to Bethlehem? After all, he already had his own trade and family there.  Did she even want to go to Bethlehem herself? Maybe it was one of those places that she had often been grateful she did not live in.  

To Gabriel’s words, “with God nothing shall be impossible” she responds with immense faith and commitment; “Behold the handmaid of the Lord, be it unto me according to thy word.” Somehow, God was going to have to move her and the baby to Bethlehem. I wonder if she thought that she might even have to go alone? She knew that regardless of how they got there the journey was going to be dangerous.

No matter what the future held for her, she was still willing to do what God required of her.

When God calls us to the mission field that He has for us, regardless of whether it is overseas, at home or writing and speaking, we have different hurdles to overcome than the ones Mary could see. Possibly because they are often unseen they are less daunting. 

Yet, I find it so hard to step out and remember that with God all things are possible even, keeping me safe in dangerous circumstances.

Helping Lazarus

I was thinking about Lazarus one night and what a powerful picture is drawn here for us. Here we have two people living two completely different cultures. The rich man who has all that he wants and needs. I picture him coming out of his safe secure home each morning, nodding to Lazarus. Some mornings greeting him with "good morning Lazarus, how are you today", he might even throw him a coin or two if he was feeling particularly good that day, before walking to the city gate. 

Lazarus not only wanted help, he needed help. Here is a man in great need and from a completely different culture. 

The rich man had all those resources at his disposal and God wanted him to help Lazarus but the question is, how. I think that we just expect the rich man to take Lazarus into his home and share all his wealth with him. 

What sort of help did Lazarus want or need?

Lazarus didn’t want to live with the rich man, his life and existence was meant to be outside the rich man’s compound and that was where he wanted to stay. His home and family were already established and they relied on him for their survival.

So, how was the rich man supposed to help Lazarus? 

The rich man should have come out and sat down with him, listened to him to find out how he had got into such a position. It is too easy to assume that the Lazarus’ of this world have made poor decisions or made silly mistakes that leave them facing really bad consequences.

This is not always the case. 

Often they find themselves in such positions due to the greed, business decisions or power plays by other people around them. The other causes could be droughts, that kill stock, floods which wash away the infrastructures, fires or winds that burn or blow away feed and grass. So it was important for the rich man to come out and sit with Lazarus and listen to his story in order to understand the issues that he faced. It was not something that he could do in a few minutes or even a few hours. It’s imperative that the rich man give Lazarus a lot of time, even to the point of taking his mat outside and lying beside Lazarus and letting him talk long into the night. It was only by engaging with him over the long term that the rich man or men in this world can get to understand the differences in the cultures that exist.

I know that the Bible tells us that the dogs came to Lazarus and licked his sores, but I have to wonder if the rich man was even aware of how much pain Lazarus was in. Now you are going to say how could the rich man miss it. It is very easy to hide the pain that we feel often because we imagine that the world doesn’t care. I think that many of the Lazarus’ out there also try to follow the Bible’s instructions “And when you fast, do not look gloomy like the hypocrites, for they disfigure their faces that their fasting may be seen by others. Truly, I say to you, they have received their reward.” Matthew 6:16.

So in order to discover the extent of Lazarus' pain, the rich man has to be compassionate and bring out a bowl of warm water, slowly and gently wash off the different layers of dirt, mud, blood and dust that have collected on his feet. Only then will he be aware of just how hurt and damaged Lazarus is. It is only then that the rich man can know and understand what treatment is truly needed and what will be most effective.

There are many people in our country who are Lazarus but we know them as Bill, Jack, Ian, Tom, Robert, Mary, Jane, Sue, Lisa or Jenny.  

Eyes

They say that eyes are the windows to the soul, which means that when you look at a person’s eyes you can see more about how they are feeling. That look will tell you if a person are joking around, serious, sick, sad, angry or in a world of their own. When I was little, we had a couple of sayings, for those who were in a world of their own. One is no longer politically correct but the other was “the lights are on but no one is home”. For some reason or other these people have decided to switch off from the world around them and take a break. When we really look at people and see the message in their eyes we are only seeing a snapshot of them. We can only see what they are feeling at that precise moment.

It is the same with everyone, when we see them we can only see how they are today, this minute or this hour that we spend with them. When we walk away from their company we cannot see the pain, drama or joy that they experience while we are not in the presence.

This applies for authors as well. Our followers read what we write and they see into our hearts but it is only what is there at the time of writing. They do not see the dirty dishes on the sink, the laundry full of washing, the kids’ bedroom mess. For farmer’s wives that write, they do not see the hours working alongside the husband, regardless of if it is in the office or the paddock. They do not see the drama of animals having to be cared for and saved from predators.

Psalm 139:1-8 says:

O LORD, thou hast searched me, and known me.

2Thou knowest my downsitting and mine uprising, thou understandest my thought afar off.

3Thou compassest my path and my lying down, and art acquainted with all my ways.

4For there is not a word in my tongue, but, lo, O LORD, thou knowest it altogether.

5Thou hast beset me behind and before, and laid thine hand upon me.

6Such knowledge is too wonderful for me; it is high, I cannot attain unto it.

7Whither shall I go from thy spirit? or whither shall I flee from thy presence?

8If I ascend up into heaven, thou art there: if I make my bed in hell, behold, thou art there.

What a wonderful thing that He sees all this and more!