Deny Yourself An Oreo And Find God

/ Lori Lawe / 3 Comments

Her t-shirt said, “Do what feels good.” She was morbidly obese proudly flaunting her worldview, emblazoned across her chest. Sure, maybe eating whatever we want whenever we want would feel good. But how would our knees feel if that was our consistent mantra so that eventually even walking became painful?

No, this worldview didn’t quite line up with reality. We all know that short-term joy can lead to long-term pain and vice versa. There must be a wiser worldview than this one.

Jesus said, “WHEN (emphasis mine) you fast . . .” When. Ouch. I had been a Christian for 30 years, and the time hadn’t seem to have yet come when I needed to fast.

I mean, I didn’t want to be legalistic about this whole thing. Kingdom living is not about ticking off a bunch of boxes.

The early monks got a bunch of theology wrong, we later learned, looking down our academic noses at them hundreds of years later, from the CORRECT vantage point of CURRENT theology.

The early monks and nuns would flagellate themselves. They would deliberately wear horse hair shirts that were itchy, take vows of poverty, and . . . . the theme of today . . . they would FAST.

Sounds like archaic Christianity, I mumble, crumbs from a half-eaten box of Oreos spewing from my mouth as I speak. I play another round of Candy Crush on my iPad. I know what spirituality REALLY is because I’m a modern.

Huh? What? I spew more Oreo crumbs accidentally in an effort to talk. Do you think the monks may have gotten some things right, that we don’t do today? I scoff and wait.

“Yes. They fasted,” you continue.

Every time I read my bible and get to the part about Jesus saying that we will fast, of course, I feel a pang of guilt. Why didn’t I fast, anyway?

So I started fasting.

I thought that I would start with fasting to sort out some of the global mishaps. I would pray about Ukraine and Russia. Stuff like that. World-changing stuff.

So I put away my Cheerios and milk for an hour one morning and had a go at fasting and prayer.

And Jesus was pleased.

Me? I wasn’t so pleased with myself.

I fell flat on my face. I was distracted, hungry, and then gave up after a half hour or so. What’s the point?

Get up, Jesus seemed to be saying, holding out His hand to me. Try again. He gave me a smile and a hug. How could He be pleased with me?

The next week, another fall, a big, lamentable flail. And the next and the next.

Jesus helped me up each time and His pleasure grew with my impending sense of failure.

The two are not unrelated.

Finally, I asked a friend to pray with me, to fast breakfast together, and to encourage one another. He prayed for me, that I would have the strength to complete this most pathetic of tasks.

And I did it.

Not with a conspicuous finish, like that of a victor, sweeping across the finish line, grabbing the trophy before heading to the winner’s platform.

But more like a worm, slithering in the rain, a couple of my worm friends showing me the way.

I didn’t end up praying about world peace, or really anything outside of myself really.

I prayed, “God, help me to be able to fast breakfast this morning!”

And He was very pleased.

Because I realized my need for Him.

Well done, He said, the Father embracing the teen longing for affirmation.

I grew stronger in my understanding of who I am, of my feeble state.

No, I’m not a bold warrior, able to have God bless me so that my superpowers can help solve world crises.

I am pathetic, and barely able to delay my breakfast without His constant help.

And He is pleased with me.

And who will I become, as I rely on God to help me to have the strength to learn to pray?

Demons quiver at the thought.

Is Anyone Else Suffocating, Unnoticed?

/ Lori Lawe / 3 Comments

I am in the struggle of my life. The enemy’s hands are closed around my neck. I gasp for breath, lashing out with my hands, struggling to break free. I accidentally strike the enemy as I violently thrash about.

At church, people stand near me, sipping tea and laughing together. Quips about the weather. To all outward appearances, I am sipping tea with them, laughing too. But the reality that is more real than the reality that can be seen is that I am at war. I can’t breathe.

The enemy has taken me to my knees now, where the life-or-death fight resumes. I feel death about to engulf me.

And then, like a person on a lifeboat, come to the rescue, to reach out a hand to a drowning man, she arrives. She hauls me into her boat. I am exhausted, soaking wet, and cold. “Thank you,” I gasp. My enemy is nowhere to be found.

“Who are you?” I ask. She is a random stranger. She shows me her clothes under her rain cloak. She is a fellow pilgrim, like me. Her clothes are dirty from months on the road. “God sent me to breathe life into you,” she explains.

She administers CPR and I feel stronger for a while. She offers me tea, biscuits, and a listening ear. She offers a blanket that calms my racing heart.

And that is how I met Aja, a random internet connection who opened my eyes a little wider regarding God’s path for me to follow.

I was afraid to journey further on, so God sent me a companion, for a while. And the journey has been easier with her around. She shoots the enemy with arrows from afar.

And she has been helping me to gather strength and to regain balance, to be ready to take the next baby step, leaning on her.

Because we are at war. For our future destinies with God.

What is He whispering about the next thing for you? Is it too big for you to succeed in?

That’s one of the ways you know your assignment is from God.

Are you strong enough to stand today, dear one, and to take the next step? Lean on my arm. Let’s listen to what God may be saying to you and let’s take the next step, together.

Peace to you. Just as the Father sent me, I send you. The Message

Lord, help us to have the humility to receive the ones that You send to us. I am reminded of the man stuck in flooded water, who refused help from the boat, the helicopter, and the swimmer with the extra life vest. “God will save me,” he explained.

God didn’t save him.

Once in heaven, he exclaimed, “God why didn’t You save me?” God replied that he wouldn’t receive the help that He had sent via the boat, the helicopter, the swimmer.

May we not be that stubborn Lord! Help us to ask questions, to humbly listen, to apply what we are learning from the guides that you send. And may we also, next week, help someone else get unstuck from the mud, even as our boots have just recently been cleaned from the same experience. Help us, Lord, to help each other, we pray.

Consider asking God, “Who should I be opening the depths of my heart to, sharing the thoughts that keep me awake at night? Who has wisdom to hear? Is there anyone that I can help to take one step out of their muck?”

How To Make Homeschooled Kids Clean Up (Avoid Insanity, Parents!)

/ Lori Lawe / 3 Comments

This post could make you feel like a Superhero Mama in Clark Kent clothes (OK – Clark Kent clothes with a bit of spit-up on them. Who’s looking THAT closely?) because this post is filled to the brim with advice about how to make your homeschooled kids clean up.

(Or at least there is one piece of advice somewhere in this post. I hope you can find it. While you’re looking, have you seen any pencils? We lost all of ours so it’s becoming harder to do our math.)

We moms sit on the floor, despair weighing us down as the kids fly paper airplanes around us, laughing, and the dog follows. We had a great day, yes. The homeschooling party is over for the day, yes. Mom is exhausted and she can’t even find a few inches of kitchen space to drag out the carrots to chop for dinner tonight.

HOW do you make the little rascals clean up???

This was the subject of many years of my careful research. I scoured homeschooling stores and dumped piles of regular dollars in exchange for a few cheaply printed “Mom Dollars” linked to “rewards that all children love,” believing the promise that THIS TIME, they will clean up.

It all failed.

In fact, sensing an inner weakness with their sixth sense (the one only accessible to children), one child purposely hid random items all over the house because “It was easier than putting it away,” she confessed, eyes downcast.

They are purposely trying to wear you down.

Don’t let them.

I printed this small quip that my brain construed one random Wednesday evening. And the sign stuck. And it worked. Voila!

For the price of – well, nothing, really – you can make your Grade 4 student practice their cursive and you’re got a sign too! But here it is – the magic formula…. Drum roll, please…

A touch of brilliance if I may say so, however immodestly. No eating until there is enough tidying that at least one clean bowl surfaces. AND since they EAT, and since the sign is staring you in the face AS you serve the food, you remember to enforce this new “homeschooling rule,” so Voila! Magic!

Notice the algebraic ORDER of things. FIRST clean up. THEN face stuffing.

The homeschool magic key unlocking every child’s inner Mr. Clean has arrived! You don’t eat until you’ve dumped a dozen or so shovelfuls of horse manure outside.

That would be if you were a farmer.

In our case, it is partially used math supplies and dirty cups with unfinished, carefully measured daily water allocation goals for each child. But you get the point.

And yes, I am aware that the phrasing implies that we are knee-deep in moldy, forgotten science experiments and half-finished math pages strewn about when it says “Clean up the place.” Duh – we are.

Also, I am aware that the words “stuff your face” don’t exactly imply dinner manners appropriate for Ms. Lovelybottom’s approval (I’ll explain her someday too since I have already told you other embarrassing stuff and you still like me).

The point is, the cleanup gets done. I can sit at the table with my feet up, sip a lemonade, watch them work, and realize that actually, I am doing a good job. Everyone is happy. Even, and especially, me.

For a few minutes at least.

But who’s counting?

And if it takes a ridiculous sign to make it through another week, another year? Well, print away, dear homeschooling parent.

So let’s not allow ourselves to get fatigued doing good. At the right time we will harvest a good crop . . . The Message

We take a little homeschool bliss where we can get it.

At least we’ve got our priorities in the right order.

A clean house is overrated, anyway.

How To Interact Normally With Teens

/ Lori Lawe / 1 Comment

I really needed a relaxing afternoon with a chick flick movie and popcorn.

I asked my 17-year-old daughter to join me that afternoon after church. Fun!

At church, I felt the call of God to invite the 21-year-old woman to join us.

She had phoned me earlier in the week to ask for some advice about a boyfriend. I hadn’t had a chance to get back to her yet.

We picked up the 15-year-old after church and they all came for lunch.

After the movie, the four of us sat on the floor and whispered about boys and love and life and wisdom for two hours.

I thought only a few minutes had passed but was surprised that we had forgotten about supper.

But this is normal for us, in kind of an abnormal way.

We attend the women’s prayer meeting together – youth and teens and young women. We go to the women’s retreat together – all ages.

Why not?

This is what we do in the church.

My mind recollects 25 years back when I was taking a course for my Master’s degree. The Professor said that the church is the last place where we can collect sociological data that reflects all ages.

That surprised me like a 2×4 aimed at my head.

The church is the LAST place in our culture where people of diverse ages interact.

Wow.

Just because something happens frequently doesn’t mean it’s normal.

Maybe tossing our teens in the basement with a jumbo pack of Cheezies and a few other youths, knowing they will be staring into their phones and doing “who knows what?” is not “normal”.

Maybe hoping for the best for them as we try to forget them for a while, while we watch our own movie upstairs is not “normal”.

This is common in our culture of highly segregated ages. It is common for youth to share their hearts almost exclusively with people in the same age demographic, give or take 6 months, but is this normal?

No. Look to the church for normal.

There are some alternatives we can take to insert some “normalcy” into the “common un-normalcy” of our cultural expectations around how we interact with teens. Here are a few:

1. Push them out of the way at the buffet when you are trying to get at the cheese. Hey, you never know! It worked for me!

2. Wear weird pants and wait for teens to come to you. Hey, you never know! It worked for me!

3. Buy a Christmas present for yourself and pretend to give it to some youth. This may guilt them into interacting with you. Hey, you never know! It worked for me!

4. Bring your kids and youth to church. Try this while you are still bigger than them if they are physically resisting you.

The 70-year-old lady told me a story this week of the 7-year-old from our church who came over to sit next to her on the public bus. This child was genuinely curious about what the older lady was doing that day. They love each other because they have had some time in each other’s company.

That’s kind of cool.

The 90-year-old wise lady in my life, when I was a teen, turned me down a narrower, healthier path many times.

And I loved her too.

Anyway, let’s keep being the uncommon normal.

Society may depend on it.

Apollos was accurate in everything he taught about Jesus up to a point, but he only went as far as the baptism of John. He preached with power in the meeting place. When Priscilla and Aquila heard him, they took him aside and told him the rest of the story. The Message

After a moment of thankfulness, and of laying the well-being of a teen we love humbly at the feet of God, does a particular person come to mind as someone who can potentially connect with them? For example, an aunt, uncle, business associate, elderly person, neighbor, or friend?

Jesus, we pray you would show us the wise adult in our beloved teen’s life who may have a key to open their heart.

When can we cook our youth their favorite meal and invite this person to join us? Let’s keep praying for the uncommon normal.

I Can’t Find My Hope! Have You Seen It?

/ Lori Lawe / 1 Comment

I wiped the sweat from my brow, and sat on a rock nearby, breathing hard from the exertion of the climb. I grabbed a swig of water from my dusty canteen and looked around.

No view.

How long until I reach the summit, I wondered? I had no idea. I sat back on the rock, leaned my head against the dusty slope, and closed my eyes. I was tired.

I could just see – what that the sunrise? – cresting over the mountain? Renewed, and excited, I hurriedly put the lid back on my canteen bottle, tightened my loosened boots, slung my small dirty pack over my shoulder, and clamored with fresh vigor.

Hope enlivened my steps.

The weariness seemed to fall from my limbs when hope arrived, like light dissipating darkness. Darkness has no power where there is light. So the burdens of our lives fall off of us where hope lies within our reach. Or perhaps it is our muscles that grow stronger, our strength that returns, where there is anticipation.

There is no view in the valley bottom. Only the sweat, dust, and hard slogging of the climb reward us with hope. How had I been satisfied in the valley bottom for so long? I wonder at my past self, a being alien to me now. How could I have been happy with the odd pine-comb I found there, the odd mushroom, most of them rotten or poisonous?

How had I lived a distracted life for so VERY long?

I am stronger now, both physically and mentally from this spiritual climb.

You see, I am following someone I heard about.

Have you seen him?

He is the one who encouraged me to climb, to begin this journey.

There are no fellow travelers, as each one of us has our own path to follow. However, I have met many whose hearts have been knitted with mine for a time, a season, as we stopped at a cabin along the path to rest.

Is He calling you, too? Do you hear him? Come on, then, let’s walk together for a while.

The mystery in a nutshell is just this: Christ is in you, so therefore you can look forward [hope] to sharing in God’s glory. It’s that simple. The Message

In your moments of rest ask God, “Where have I lost my hope? Can You help me find it?”

God Is Handing Out Destinies – Do You Want Yours? (Part 2)

/ Lori Lawe / 4 Comments

I was frantically searching through a box of clothes, trying to find myself. Would I wear this outfit more often, the career woman’s attire? This outfit with spit up still on the shoulder, to volunteer more frequently in the children’s ministry? My lounge pants to relax and enjoy an afternoon martini a bit more regularly (OK NO – I don’t drink martinis. But don’t you want to be the kind of person who does, sometimes?)

All of the outfits were too tight or were ripped and unusable. I even bought martini supplies and then returned them to the thrift store a couple of years later (True story! My inner James Bond didn’t emerge, disappointingly). The point? Ah yes, the point. Who am I becoming, and what is new, in this next season? A mentor suggested that I ask God this very question.

“God, how do You see me,” I asked. He showed me a picture of me in my daughter’s red gown, dancing again, free. Huh? I didn’t get it. The following week, my daughter wore that red gown when she was chosen as the Princess of the city, a City Ambassador.

This was the exact same title that I was given 30 years earlier. She was asked an impromptu question and the question was about… me! She had the same sponsor as.. me! There were several other coincidences. I brushed off the co-incidences though many people remarked about them.

God often speaks through co-incidences. “Could He be speaking here?” I asked a mentor. When she spoke, tears ran down my cheeks. She spoke of freedom, a belief in the possibilities over my future that I once had as a youth, that had been lost. She spoke of the freedom that I felt when I wore the red gown for a few minutes, remembering that anything is possible with a God who has dreams for all of us, even us – ahem – older ones – for all of us, even, yes for me.

I am older, yes, but if my heart is beating, then God has a vision for me that is stretched out so far into the horizon that I can’t see its effects. That is His way. Will I reach forward in faith, a blind person with arms stretched out in front to block obstacles? Will I let Him guide my arm because I can’t see what lies ahead?

Will I trust Him, to teach me to dance, with Him? Will I throw away the old rags of fear and complacency that I was wearing? Will I humbly bow before a God who asks me to stand, hold the scepter, and declare “Your Kingdom Come”? Will I step into the Princess robe? Will you?

Wake up, wake up! Pull on your boots . . .! Dress up in your Sunday best . . .! . . . Brush off the dust and get to your feet . . .! Throw off your chains, captive daughter . . . The Message

Lord, please take off the eye patches covering our eyes that make us unable to see the bright future You have planned for every one of us. Help us to believe, that just as you used stumbling clods throughout all of history, You can use us, too. Let us take our eyes off the filthy rags we have made for our own clothing, and have the courage to touch the silk gowns of promise that You hold before us, as we align our lives with Your purposes.

After a few minutes of thanksgiving, ask God “How do You see me?”

God is Handing Out Destinies – Do You Want Yours? (Part 1)

/ Lori Lawe / Leave a comment

When no one was looking – and shhh! Don’t tell anyone! – I closed the door to my bedroom and put on the dress. No, not my dress. My daughter’s dress. And yes, the red ball gown. I couldn’t leave it on the hanger. It was calling, calling to me. Wear me! Put me on! Dance in me! And so I obeyed it. The gown and I were friends already.

I swayed to and fro watching the material billow on either side. Then I twirled and “snap!” My husband took a picture of me. I laughed and continued dancing. I was a young girl again. Possibilities were endless. Who would I become?

A few minutes later, it was time to return the dress to the hanger. To give it back to its rightful owner: the one with a future stretched out so far in front of her, the horizon is still a blur. Don’t they give scholarships and opportunities to the youth?

Aren’t “they” searching for youth to raise up, to hold their hand on the giant escalator roaring into the sky? “There are opportunities for you”, the dress reminds. “Who you are is much more beautiful than what you recognize in yourself on an ordinary day”, the dress said to her.

So I went back to the dishes. To the laundry. To scrub the floor. (Wait – I never scrub my floor but don’t ruin the effect).

I surrendered my identity, the identity that God was whispering to me to remember when I took off the dress. “Gracefully surrendering the things of youth,” I thought stoically. I am mature now. Time to pass on the torch to stronger runners, to those without back pain.

Maybe it’s time for me to get out the TV and to stare numbly for the next few decades (Wait – I don’t have a TV either, but again… keep the mood!).

The point is, who am I? Am I the young girl, dancing in freedom, wondering what new doors of opportunity will open for me tomorrow? Am I catching hopes and dreams wherever I wander, storing them in a basket that I carry with me, overfilling with possibilities?

Or am I me? The has been, has gone. I had my opportunities. Am I the flower, wilted, with a bit of brown at the edges? Am I a cactus? Come too close to me with a balloon of freedom and I will pop it? Am I living in a box when God wants me to be free? Are you?

“Who knows? Maybe you were made queen for just such a time as this.” The Message

Lord, help us to stop groveling on the ground like common beggars. Help us to stand, while leaning on Your strength. Wash us in your love. Help us to have the courage to take hold of the royal robes that You hold out to us. Let us never live in the lie, that just because we are beggars, we aren’t also daughters and sons of the King. Thank You for adopting us into Your love. May we run free into our destinies, we pray.

After a few minutes of thanksgiving, ask God “What blinders am I wearing, so I am unable to see the next thing You are showing me?”

How To Love To Read The Most Influential Book Of All Time

/ Lori Lawe / 3 Comments

Which book?

According to Guinness World Records as of 1995, the Bible is the best-selling book of all time with an estimated 5 billion copies sold and distributed.

Have you read it?

If you have a copy, could dust be blown off the cover?

Yeah, mine had that problem too.

In fact, J.I. Packer, in Knowing God challenges us to admit it if we don’t love reading our bibles.

To not put our backs to our dusty bibles and to our vague feelings of guilt. “I SHOULD love reading this book but ACTUALLY,” we think…

I realized that even though I have been a Christian for decades, I hated reading the Bible.

(!)

This honesty, like all honesty, proved key to finding my true joy.

I asked for help from the older couple in the church.

You know the ones.

They have been sitting at the back of the church for decades. They attend the prayer meetings. They loved you the first day you arrived.

I asked them why they love to read their Bibles.

At their encouragement, they suggested that I read The Psalms and highlight words that seemed to stand out to me.

How do we read the Bible with Holy Spirit at our sides, nudging our elbows as we read? How does the Bible come alive in our hearts?

I still have many things to tell you, but you can’t handle them now. But when the Friend comes, the Spirit of the Truth, he will take you by the hand and guide you into all the truth there is. The Message

I diligently highlighted a mishmash assortment of odd words that seemed to be highlighted in my soul as I read: Deep. Water. Heart.

And I was still confused.

“God! If you are trying to speak to me, could you please be clear!!”

But [the disciples] didn’t get it, could make neither heads nor tails of what he was talking about. The Message

If the disciples were always confused when Jesus was speaking, why couldn’t I also expect confusion when Holy Spirit may be speaking to me?

But speaking He was.

When the guest speaker showed up at our church many months later singing a new song that she had created, with the theme of many of these words that I had highlighted in my Bible, I knew God was whispering to my heart.

That is His way.

God delights in concealing things The Message

He doesn’t want to bark a clear order to obey, but to pour a little rain into our parched souls, that awakens our hearts and gives a spring to our steps. His words refresh as His love sinks a little deeper into the soil of our hearts.

He clothes His words in love so that we have to come to Him again and again, asking for understanding. And a little of His love sticks each time we run back to Him.

And without our knowing it, as we allow the rain to sink deep, fruit is produced in our lives.

This fruit nourishes us and others.

And makes us run back to His word again and again.

We are hungry.

And we receive nutrients from His word.

Are you hungry? Do you also, like me, need to come off the baby’s diet of milk, and learn to eat?

You’re . . . capable of nothing much more than nursing at the breast. The Message

And when we learn to enjoy solid food, then reading the bible and prayer gets exciting.

Joy is coming. Do you feel it?

Forget about what’s happened; don’t keep going over old history. Be alert, be present. I’m about to do something brand-new. It’s bursting out! Don’t you see it? The Message

Prayer Is More Fun Than Saturday Night Dancing

/ Lori Lawe / 3 Comments

Five steps to grow to love prayer are:

1. Be still and listen. Expect him to speak. We expect the unexpected. What is on God’s heart as we come humbly to Him with our empty plates, our stomachs rumbling again? We learn to discern the words of God from the mumbo jumbo that our inexperienced ears hear by opening His Message to us, the Bible.

2. Love our bibles. How? I used to hate reading my bible, though I felt guilty as I had been a Christian for decades. Now, I love my Bible and treasure it more than any other thing. How to learn to love our Bibles will be discussed in a future post.

3. Worship and thanksgiving clean out our ears. Prayer does this too. Most of the gunk that weighs us down seems to rest in our ears. When we clean out the gunk, our whole selves can lift like a helium balloon up to the loving Father.

Treat my prayer as sweet incense rising; my raised hands are my evening prayers. The Message

Then we can simply open the door when Jesus knocks. We are in a state of rest, not striving

4. Remind Jesus what He has been saying and ask for more. What is on His heart as He tries to wake us, spiritually? These are the things that he has been saying to us. Similarly, we remind Him of our empty plates, our growling bellies, and of our need for Him to fill our plates with His promises.

5. Surrender to His plan for our life. What is God saying that we get to obey? What flower will grow on our plants as a result of this obedience, is the question of hope that keeps us running back to Him. Prayer brings life.

God, just like Froot Loops that don’t satisfy us two hours after we have eaten them (No offense Big Food but your food really stinks), God you have oatmeal for us to eat. The really good stuff. The stuff that keeps us satiated for hours. Change our taste, Lord. Help us to love to eat that which is good.

Teach us to pray.

May we seek and search until we have found that precious jewel that is You.

God’s kingdom is like a treasure hidden in a field for years and then accidentally found by a trespasser. The finder is ecstatic—what a find!—and proceeds to sell everything he owns to raise money and buy that field. The Message

Help us to recognize the difference between junk food and healing food. We pray.

“But there is nothing more dreadfully unimpressive than extemporary prayer which leaps about on the surfaces of things, a disorderly dance of empty words, going we know not whither,–a mob of words carrying no blood, bearing no secret of the soul, a whirl of insignificant expressions, behind which there is no vital pulse, no silent cry from lone and desolate depths.” The Preacher His Life and Work

Happy Easter (Every) One!

/ Lori Lawe / 1 Comment

It’s kind of disturbing to me that my post with the most readers (and you know who you are – shame on you!) was a post where I had written the smallest amount. Take that to its logical conclusion! Are you trying to say that the less I write, the better it is? Huh?? Huh??

I’m joking, of course.

I love all one of you.

Well, actually back at Christmas time, I only had one reader, but now I have many more!

Yes, many of them live in my household, and I do cook for them, so yes, I do have manipulative capital. “Have you read my post yet? No, you can’t eat.”

I’m not saying I would do that (family members – no comments, please) but that is one strategy to increase readership!

It’s OK. I’m actually having so much fun writing this stuff that I don’t seem to care much if anyone reads it because writing is proving cathartic to me.

Maybe I should pay you to read this stuff because I feel so much better after I write?

Ha! Nice try!

Wow. Marketing is everywhere!

Now, let me get back to ignoring you so I can write properly.

What were we talking about? Oh yes, Easter.

Happy Easter!

And since my most enjoyed post was the shortest I’ll leave it at that.

May your heart long for more, spiritually, in this season. May chocolate eggs no longer satisfy. May everything else that you have put your hope in, like a bridge that will eventually collapse with too much weight, be seen for what it is. May we learn to cast our burdens, cares, anxieties, and joys upon Jesus, His back broken for our sin.

And because He was broken, because it is Easter again this year, we have a strong arm to grasp hold of as we walk through the tribulations of this life.

Lift up your eyes! He is risen!

I look up to the mountains; does my strength come from mountains? No, my strength comes from God, who made heaven, and earth, and mountains. He won’t let you stumble. The Message