Tag: Jesus saves

Extravagant Love

A couple weeks ago a friend of ours passed away. He is someone my husband and I have known since we first got married. He was in his 40s and died of cancer.

Over the years we met his mother, his ex-wife, and two of his brothers. Today, none of them are still living. He came from a background of extreme poverty, prostitution, drug addiction, homelessness, and petty crime. And in the middle of all that, he found Jesus. Got saved. Got baptized. Got into a church community.

We did life with him for a period of time and it was rough.

Some people have miraculous testimonies of how God freed them from addiction, turned their lives completely around, and they moved forward a completely different person.

Other people struggle their entire lives to overcome. Overcome addiction. Overcome abuse. Overcome the physical harm that comes with drugs and living a life of desperation.

When we were in the trenches with our friend, suffering some of those things you suffer when you are close to someone with an addiction, I remember crying out to God about the whole situation. “What are you doing God?” And he answered me very clearly. So clearly that I can still remember where I was, in my car, on the interstate, when he answered me. “I am showering him with extravagant love.”

Grace. Mercy. Compassion. Our thoughts are not God’s thoughts. How many times should I forgive my brother? Seven? No, seventy times seven.

How much does God love? When does he throw in the towel and say, Ok, you’ve screwed up one time too many, I’m done with you? He doesn’t. His love never fails. HIs love is extravagant, beyond measure.

Our friend passed away. He never hit that golden moment where society would say, ok, you’ve overcome completely so we will now call you worthy. His life was a struggle. But, he believed. No matter how small that faith looked, he believed. And he was loved by a God who gives generously, extravagantly. And I am pretty excited about the fact that he is now with Jesus and been completely healed and made whole. One day I will see him again and we will rejoice together at the extravagant, generous, abundant love of God.

Who Does God say that He is?

This last week I had some new/different experiences. As is typical for me, it made me feel insecure, unsure of myself. And when that happens, I have this lovely little voice in my head that loves to tear me down as low as possible. Insulting. Mocking. Sneering. 

By this time in my life, I have learned to not sit and listen to the voice but fight back instead. As I was pondering my battle strategy, I thought I’ll focus on,  ” Who does God say that I am?” But, then I felt a check. No, that’s not what I need to focus on. What I need to focus on is Who do I say that God is? Who is this God that I serve? 

I changed the title of this blog to “Who Does God say that He is?” instead of “Who do I say that God is?” because in our current society we have decided that truth is not absolute. It’s playdough that we shape and mold into our own image and then worship. Truth is no longer considered solid, immovable, unchangeable. It’s just whatever whim we decided to hold onto tightly. 

I know that this is not right. Truth is not whatever we want it to be. Truth is something we have to search out, seek, look for like we look for hidden treasure. Truth is what we find in scripture, God’s word. So, what does God’s word say about Himself? 

There are books and classes and studies that focus on this. I am in no way going to be able to cover everything that the Bible tells us about God. Not going to even try. I’ll just tell you the parts that I have learned to focus on. 

God is all powerful. Creator. He made me. He made the Universe. He made this world I live in. He made all the people around me. 

God is good. He is Holy. There is no wrong in him. I can trust his work and his plans because I know that they are good and holy. 

God is Immanuel – God with us. Jesus came to earth to be with us. To come and live a holy unsinful life in our place. To take on all of our punishment that we deserve for the sins we have committed. He gave his life so that the barriers that kept sinful us away from holy Him would be taken down. And now all of us can be in relationship with Him. 

God is merciful. He has shown compassion and forgiveness to me. 

God is full of grace. He offers me free and unmerited favor. 

God is our Father. He cherishes me. He protects me. He provides for me. 

God is love. He is not angry with me. He enjoys my company and wants me to draw near to him. 

This is only the slightest scratch of the surface in exploring who God is. 

What I have discovered is that when I turn my focus on God and spend time dwelling on who he is, all of my insecurities fade away. They become so insignificant. If I serve such an amazing God and that amazing God created me and loves me, what on earth do I have to be afraid about? What do I have to worry about? The lies that my brain tries to dump on me turn into nothing when I focus on the ultimate truth that God is who he says he is in his Holy word. 

Are You Ready?

Last night I dreamed that the sun didn’t come up. The sky was dark, covered in clouds. I kept waiting for things to start lighting up. And they just didn’t. I finally realized that we were in the middle of the day and it was still dark. Wasn’t this one of the things they talked about in the Bible in the book of Revelation? Wasn’t this one of the signs that Jesus was going to be coming back soon? In my dream I felt this shock. It’s happening. Do people realize this? I need to tell my family! I was trying to rush off to tell everyone I knew when all of a sudden there was a small break in the clouds, a little hole, and I realized that on the other side of this extremely thick, unusual cloud bank, the sun was still there! Wheew. Thank goodness. 

I’ve had several of these dreams lately. 

Each time, I am convinced, This is it. Jesus is just about to appear. And then it turns out it was a false alarm. But, each time, there is a little space in between, where I am convinced. And in that little bit of time, I start looking around me. I’m ready. I can’t wait for Jesus to be here. But most of the people around me aren’t ready. And there is a sense of running out of time. There’s no more time to tell you about Jesus. No more time to get everyone else ready. This is it. Game Over. 

Every time something big happens on a global scale, we Christians tend to pull out the book of Revelation. Is this a sign? Does this line up with what we’ve been reading about all our lives? Are we in the End Times?  While I can read Revelation and say, hmm, it sure does seem like a lot of this stuff is happening…I do know that, historically, Christians have thought they were in the End Times for a really long time. I think back in the year 999, people were convinced that the year 1000 was it. The end. All done. So yeah, we have a long history of being wrong. But here’s the thing. Everyone is going to meet Jesus. Either he’s going to show up in bright living color here on earth, or we are going to die and stand before him in judgement. There is no escaping it. So, the urgency of wondering whether people are ready or not is very real. Very necessary. 

Even if I don’t know what day Jesus is coming, I do know that the Coronavirus is coming. On Friday, according to the news, as of Saturday morning, 627 people died in Italy from the Coronavirus. I was talking to my husband last night about whether we should put our two daughters, who have asthma, in a closer quarantine. He was puzzled. What is that going to do? Do you really think you can keep them from ever getting exposed to the virus? Social distancing is slowing down the exposure of everyone to the virus, but in the end, I don’t know how we can avoid all getting exposed to it. And a small percentage, right now they are saying 2%, are going to die from that exposure. This is real. Not made up. People that we know personally are going to die. And, let’s say you totally avoid the virus, you are not one of the 2%, all is well. Well, hey. Statistically, 100% of all people die. Eventually. 

As someone who holds the key to life in her hands, I am feeling the need to share what I know with you. 

First. We are all created by God. Human life is not a biological accident. It was planned. We are God’s creation and he created us in his image. 

Second. We all have sinned, done the wrong thing. In our humanist way, we say, Well, I’m not perfect. We can all acknowledge that we aren’t Perfect. Right? Here’s the thing. God IS perfect. And he is perfectly Holy. He can not have any sin in him. Our sin keeps us separated from God. 

Third. There’s going to be a punishment for sin. The Bible says that the Wages of Sin is Death. Our punishment for sinning is death. There isn’t anything we can do about that. And I’m not just talking about the death of our body. I’m talking about eternal separation from God. 

Fourth, God loves us. He loves us so much that he came to earth, fully human, fully God, to die for our sins on the Cross. Jesus lived the perfect life. He didn’t sin. He did not deserve death. As a perfect person, he was the only one who could voluntarily take our place. He willingly died and took the punishment for our sins. So that our sin no longer had to separate us. 

Fifth. If we believe that Jesus is God and he came to earth and died for our sins, and if we repent of our sins and openly confess that He is now our Lord, and that we want to follow him and let him be the one who tells us what to do, then we can know that we are saved. When our earthly bodies die, we will go to heaven and live forever with Jesus. This is what we call Being Saved. 

When we are saved, Jesus not only becomes our Lord, the one we follow, he also becomes our friend. The one who listens to us and guides us and helps us in all things. 

If you would like a much more detailed version of what I just tried to explain, Click on this link The Roman Road .

Guys, I love all of you. I’m so glad that you have been willing to read my blogs. We are living in crazy times. I don’t want death to suddenly be looking you in the face, and you aren’t ready. I also don’t want you to have to live in fear. Death is scary. But if you know what is going to happen afterwards, it’s not nearly as scary. In fact, it can be something that you look forward to, in its proper time and place. 

I fully intend to live a long full life. But, I know that whenever my time to die comes, I will be excited. Finally. I get to see Jesus face to face. I want each of you to have that same confidence. 

If you have any questions feel free to reach out to me. There’s a place to contact me on the blog. 

May the Lord bless you and keep you during these crazy times.