Finding time

So how are you doing with the RMMR program? Are you letting the main points of the meditation passage roll through your mind and heart as you go about your day? Or do you find that the passages are difficult to understand? (I would encourage you to ask a pastor or your care group leader for help on that.) Are you keeping up? Or are you struggling with finding the time to sit down and read?

To all the busy moms out there (and I know there are several of you): this is for you.

Dear Mom,
Let me give you a little peek into my life. I have eight children and two in heaven I never got to meet. My kids are currently 32, 30, 27, 23, 21, 18, 15 and 13. I also take care of my mom who has Alzheimers and have four grandchildren age 2 and under! Although I'm not exactly in your shoes right at this moment, I do know what it feels like and I so understand what "tired" means.

When my first four or five kids were all young, I had to focus so much on survival (for me and everyone else), that there were very few holes in my day to focus on time with the Lord. I wish I could tell you that I handled that like a spiritual giant and breezed through without struggle, but then I would just have to confess it the next time Nancy teaches on honesty!
I wish we could sit down together someplace peaceful and visit for a while. Since that's probably not going to happen, I would love to share a few insights that come as a result of years of living where you live and from the perspective of being a little further down the road.

God declares in His Word that your kids are a blessing and a gift. They are not an interruption, a mistake, or a hindrance to God's will in your life; they are God's will for your life.

Since these kids, at the ages they are at this moment, are God's will for your life, does He intend to speak to you in the next decade or so when you don't have free time? Of course He does. So how is that going to happen when you have so little time you can control?

Here are some practical tips on creating space to hear from the Lord:
1. First, think through the last 48 hrs. Any time-stealers come to mind? Facebook, Twitter, TV, email, Internet, phone calls, or texts? Make sure the enemy isn't robbing you of God-moments by offering a "harmless" substitute.

2. Time with the Lord takes intentional planning when you have a full, noisy, busy house. Some days, gather your kids around and read a passage to them. If you can make it interesting to listen to, you might get through several verses. Write a few verses out and leave them in the kitchen, laundry room, or car so you can contemplate as you cook, fold, or wait for your kids.

3. Place Bibles in several spots around your house so anytime you do get to sit down you can snatch a verse or two to ponder.

4. Use the first few minutes of nap time to get rest for your spirit. You probably won't be reading chapters or books at one sitting, but the Lord can use even snippets to instruct and encourage your heart. If you have kids who no longer nap, make a quiet zone where they can read or color while the little ones sleep and you get refreshed. Occasionally, this will actually work!!

5. Escape for a few minutes if you can after your husband gets home or right after dinner. I have had quiet times on picnic tables at the park, in my car at Sonic, on my driveway sitting in my car, and in my laundry room or closet.

6. Practice God's presence "in the midst" of your crazy days. He doesn't leave because your life is hectic. He can minister grace to your heart as you comfort that child or chop veggies for dinner or sort dirty socks. Christ knew what it was like to wash dirty feet. He is not absent when we are surrounded by lots of them! Remember that the Lord had many moments when He sought to draw apart to seek the Father. Sometimes that happened, sometimes He was moved with compassion and returned to the multitudes. His heart was to do the will of His Father every moment of every day, but He didn't live apart, He lived in the midst.

7. Ask the Lord to give you wisdom and discernment as you discover what will work for your family. Since it is God's will for you to know Him, ask Him to enable you to creatively pursue that in this season of your life. God's Word is eternal. The lives of those who come to know Him are eternal. Houses, stuff, and even time will all pass away. We won't regret time invested in His Word and in raising our kids to love Christ.

Proverbs 2:1–10 says:
My (daughter), if you will receive my words
And treasure my commandments within you,
Make your ear attentive to wisdom,
Incline your heart to understanding;
For if you cry for discernment,
Lift your voice for understanding;
If you seek her as silver
And search for her as for hidden treasures;
Then you will discern the fear of the LORD
And discover the knowledge of God.
For the LORD gives wisdom;
From His mouth come knowledge and understanding.
He stores up sound wisdom for the upright;
He is a shield to those who walk in integrity.

I hope this helps,
Holly

From truewoman.com

Gleaning

This week I am playing the part of Naomi and Brooke is Ruth. Both our husbands are out of town for 5 days. They are not with each other, it is just coincidental that their work should take them away from their families at the same time.

The Naomi - Ruth connection began on Monday when our husbands left town. It continued on Tue. when Brooke came over for dinner. She called early in the day and asked if she could bring dinner!! "How fitting" I thought. Ruth was bringing food to Naomi.

Then today was the gleaning (only I, the Naomi, was the one doing the work). This was fine with me. It was reminiscent of years gone by. Gleaning was something I did many times when the kids were little but hadn't done in several years. Alina recently reminded me of the cranberry harvesting and how after the harvesters left the bogs we returned to glean. Those were good times as we gathered up the remaining cranberries and froze them for holiday baking.

So today I decided to venture off to glean the fields again. Only this time I was alone. No little ones. It takes a lot longer getting a bucket full without my little helpers, but it was a good time for me to be alone with the Lord, in the fresh air gleaning. I may be a Naomi, without a husband this week, but I am far from bitter.

As I was picking the berries, I was thanking God for His many kindnesses to me. Not only do I have a Ruth (Brooke) who served me dinner last evening, but I have three other daughters who excel in many ways, especially in their love for God, their families and their church. I am rich indeed. I had no reason to feel poor (as were the gleaners in Bible times). I am feeling absolutely stunned by the lavish blessings from God.

Now I have something to share with my Ruth (and her sisters). I think I'll go bake something.

Lost Coin

Have you ever lost something valuable? I mean really, really valuable? I remember a sister-in-law of mine once lost the diamond from her engagement ring. Her family searched the house, the drains, the vacuum cleaner bag. Nothing. It was a huge disappointment to her to lose this stone that symbolized her husband's proposal (and her acceptance) of marriage. For weeks, wherever she went in the house she kept her eyes searching for that stone. Then came moving day. Everything was packed and loaded onto a truck. She cleaned and swept the house one last time. And guess what? After everything else had been taken from the house, as she swept she noticed a shiny stone lodged in a crack in the floor board.

Did she yawn and pick it up obligingly? Most assuredly, NO!! She quickly bent over, picked up her diamond and announced to the family the discovery of her lost treasure. Her excitement didn't end there. She quickly told any who had heard about her loss and whenever she had opportunity, with great joy she recounted her story to others. It was impossible to hear her story and not share her excitement even years later.

This is the joy (only more so) God has when a sinner repents. This is what we read in today's RMMR passage:

Or what woman, having ten silver coins, if she loses one coin, does not light a lamp and sweep the house and seek diligently until she finds it? And when she has found it, she calls together her friends and neighbors, saying, 'Rejoice with me, for I have found the coin that I had lost.' Just so, I tell you, there is joy before the angels of God over one sinner who repents. (Luke 15:8-10)

God rejoiced over you when you turned from your sin and turned in faith to Christ for forgiveness. God rejoiced over you and still rejoices.

The LORD your God is in your midst, a mighty one who will save; he will rejoice over you with gladness; he will quiet you by his love; he will exult over you with loud singing. (Zephaniah 3:17)

Now that should impact my day.

Continuing Education

Tonight Tim left for a week of classes at the Pastor's College in Gaithersburg, Maryland. While there Tim will be learning from very wise and godly men. He will be sitting in a classroom filled with men preparing for ministry and men presently in ministry. All men will be there to learn more about what it means to be a pastor-shepherd for the people of God. Our pastors' responsibility to continue their education in the things of God never ends.

Ours doesn't either. I was thinking about that today as I observed one young mom hand another young mom a book entitled, Shopping for Time by Carolyn Mahaney. I thought to myself, "Now there's a woman who wants to keep learning." Then, I learned about another young mother spending the evening with another woman and again I thought, "I know their time will be spent in some form of teaching-learning exchange." I know of another young woman continuing her education in biblical womanhood through the relationship with an older woman. Yesterday after worship I observed a young woman (a Christian for less than a year), speaking with a godly woman about learning how to live the Christian life.

Is your education continuing? Sometimes we tend to have grand ideas for what to learn, and where to go to learn it. But the most important learning and the best teachers are available to us within our church. Besides our four pastors, there are many in our church from whom we can learn much. Not the least of which is other women. Every time a recipe is shared, someone is learning something. Every homemaking tip shared is domestic education. Every theologically sound book shared or recommended and read is continuing education. Every sharing of cares, prayers and biblical counsel is an opportunity for growth in our understanding of God and His Word. And every trial is the school of suffering which God uses to grow us in many, many ways.

What are you learning these days? Who is the Lord using to teach you? Let's keep our education continuing, for the Glory of God, for our own growth and for the good of others as we share with others what we ourselves have learned.

"Love to the loveless shown, that they might lovely be"

It's been a while since I posted a Jonathan Edwards 'Resolution.' Tonight, it is 'Resolution 25' that deeply touches me.

"Resolved, to examine carefully and constantly what that one thing in me is that causes me in the least to doubt the love of God; and so direct all my forces against it."

Learning from Edwards, let us take serious thought and mental effort to grow in our understanding of God's love toward us. Understanding the love of God is an infinite pursuit--we will never fully get there. But, surely, we can (by God's grace) grow in our knowledge of it.

God tells us what His love is like. It is free, vast, unconditional, unmeasurable, sacrificial, consistent, boundless, eternal...we could go on forever (and we will...). 

Doubting God's love is doubting the very character of God. What we see from Scripture is that God loves to love. God is love!

When I doubt God's love, I doubt God's word. I'll say to myself, 'I just don't feel like God loves me because...fill-in-the-blank.' The truth would be to say, 'I don't like the way God is loving me right now!' And that is my problem, not God's.

So why do I so often question whether God really loves me? Unbelief.

God is not a man that He should act, think, or love like one. Human love fails; God's love for me is eternal and unchanging...because He says it is.

We never did anything to 'catch God's eye,' to warrant His love, to woo His affections, so why do we think that God stops loving us when we mess up or are just plain unlovable? It's actually pretty arrogant and prideful to think that God's love for us changes based on how we 'perform'--that would imply that we were ever deserving of God's love (and we're not!).

Behold the amazing love of God--He loved us when we were unlovable and He will continue to love His children for all eternity. Bask in the love of God and drink freely at the never-depleting pool of His grace!

"My Song is Love Unknown" by Samuel Crossman

My song is love unknown, my Savior's love to me 
Love to the loveless shown, that they might lovely be 
Oh, who am I that for my sake, 
Oh, who am I that for my sake, 
My Lord should take frail flesh and die? 

He came from heaven's throne salvation to bestow 
But they refused and none the longed-for Christ would know 
This is my friend, my friend indeed, 
This is my friend, my friend indeed, 
Who at my need, His life did spend. 

Sometimes they crowd His way and His sweet praises sing 
Resounding all the day, hosannas to their King 
Then, "Crucify!" is all their breath, 
Then, "Crucify!" is all their breath, 
And for His death they thirst and cry. 

Why, what has my Lord done to cause this rage and spite 
He made the lame to run, and gave the blind their sight 
What injuries, yet these are why, 
What injuries, yet these are why, 
The Lord Most High so cruelly dies. 

With angry shouts they have my dear Lord done away 
A murderer they save, the Prince of Life they slay 
Yet willingly, He bears the shame, 
Yet willingly, He bears the shame, 
That through His name all might be free. 

Here might I stay and sing of Him my soul adores 
Never was love, dear King, never was grief like Yours 
This is my friend in whose sweet praise, 
This is my friend in whose sweet praise, 
I, all my days would gladly spend.