Jesus loves me, this I know. This category is about Jesus, the Living Word, my prayers to Him, my worship of Him, His relentless pursuit of my heart and His invitation to me to come to Him in Sabbath, my Savior, my Rest.
“She was an adulteress, a cheater, a sinner. She was a disappointment, a law-breaker. She had let so many people down.
Now she was being exposed to the Light of the World.
The scribes and Pharisees brought her to Jesus as He was teaching in the temple. They’d caught her in “the very act of adultery,” they told Him. They were testing Him, who claimed to be the light of life, the One who, “being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped.” (Phil. 2.6)
“Moses, in the law, commanded us that such [a person] should be stoned to death. But what do You say?”
Would Jesus respect and follow the ancient law? Would He condone her sin?
Their purpose, those learned and religious men, was to trip Him up – to find a way to discount His teaching and refute His words.
Jesus says nothing, but stoops down, writing with His finger, ignoring their demand for a verdict.
The religious kept asking, pressing the matter like the playground tattle-talers they were.
His answer was short. “He who is without sin among you, let him throw a stone at her first.” Then He leaned over and continued writing on the ground.
And none of them wanted to be the one to start the stoning. From the oldest to the last, one by one, they walked away until only Jesus and the woman were left. He looked at her and asked her, Where did your accusers go? Hasn’t anyone condemned you?
“No one, Lord,” she answered.
“Neither do I condemn you; go and sin no more,” the Embodiment of the light-glory of God said to her. Your sin is not unto death. I will not serve you a death-sentence, either. Go. Be well. Be whole. Be at peace. Find true love. Live in honor. Sin no more.
Jesus didn’t condone her sin. God hates sin because it interrupts the beauty and wholeness of the life He planned for us. God didn’t forbid adultery to mess up our good times, but He forbade it because it will hurt us and some one else and probably more than one other person. It will wreck lives and break trust and hearts and disrupt the peace of homes and rip families apart. It is violence towards the “one flesh.”
People often wonder what Jesus wrote on the ground. Did He list the sins of the people standing there that were also punishable by death? I don’t know. Did they leave because they were ashamed or did the encounter with Truth fill them with mercy?
I just know that I have always related to the woman. I have always been keenly aware of my sin, my inability to measure up to religious standards imposed upon me. In church life, my imperfections have been publicly touted, I’ve felt shunned by fellow Christians. I’ve read this account of the woman and felt what she must have felt. I have ranted and raged against the people who told me what a disappointment I was. I have pointed out the futility of religion and condemned the spirit of religious superiority that hurts people as being no different than the scribes and Pharisees of Jesus’ time.
Then today, very quietly, Jesus wrote upon the ground of my heart. Suddenly I wasn’t the woman, left with her head hanging – thinking I was about to die at the hands of the holier-than-thou religious. I was one of them – I was in the crowd – looking at her: the Church, the Bride of Christ, the one for whom, because of great love, Jesus died.
In my hand I have held stones. The church has sinned. She has been unfaithful and faithless, a disappointment, a cheater. She has hurt people and broken hearts and sinned against God. And I have stood in the crowd, ready to take my stand, taunting God, “Well – can you see this? What are You going to do about this?” I have been one of them.
I opened my hands toward the ground, symbolically dropping the stones I have wanted to hurl with great pain-infused force at churches and pastors and leaders in the Church who have let me down.
I am turning my hands upward with this prayer, “Replace the stones I have wanted to throw – with mercy for Your Church. She has failed. She has let me down, but show me how I can be an agent of Your mercy towards Her, as You have been towards me.”
It is humbling to get a new perspective of yourself and see the enemy you have been flailing against is yourself. It is humbling…”
Come back tomorrow. We’ll dig through the archives again! :)
I love this tagline from the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association’s website:
Because when you are talking about what Jesus Christ came to do – isn’t it true? It’s “Always Good News!”
I just finished reading a letter Billy Graham wrote asking us to pray with him. See it {{HERE}}. I’m in, Billy, praying with you!
The Cross on TV
Hey – over the next week or so, they are going to be broadcasting what Billy Graham is calling his last “message to our nation” and I just wanted to tell you that I will be watching and I hope you will, too. It will be available on several different networks at various times, check local listings.
This man has had a tremendous impact in the world during his 95 years. My husband received Jesus Christ as his Savior at a Billy Graham event at mile High Stadium here in Denver in 1965. So, his influence at a very personal level cannot go unnoticed!
This is historic. This is big. He is not the latest-greatest, he isn’t the hippest-coolest. But he is a man who has lived his life sharing really, amazing Good News.
Let’s show honor to an honorable patriarch of the faith and invite friends and family to stop and watch. Will you? Bring the kiddos, in, too.
With all my heart, I want to remind Americans of God’s amazing love and, as simply and clearly as I can, call people to ‘a repentance that leads to salvation’ (2 Corinthians 7:10, ESV). ~Billy Graham
Thank-you, Dr. Graham, for a lifetime of sharing the life-changing love of God and the great hope we have in Jesus Christ.
The official family tree included everyone in the entire congregation—their small children, wives, sons, and daughters. The ardent dedication they showed in bringing themselves and their gifts to worship was total—no one was left out.
There is room at the table.
Who among us hasn’t experienced intense loneliness even in a crowd? Who hasn’t peeked in to some one else’s life via social media in these minute-by-minute times, or on a blog (even like mine, heaven forbid) we see pictures of celebrations, read family stories and see moments of glory (the only ones we generally share) – and felt left out, experienced longing to be a part, to get to have a seat at that table?
Me, too.
That’s why I love the picture of the Good Shepherd preparing a table before us (Psalm 23). In these days leading to the Thanksgiving celebration, as I ponder how to situate for 30 people I wholly adore, I cannot quit thinking about the joy the Father must have to invite us to be seated with Him. Ephesians says we’re accepted in the Beloved, His sacrifice bought our ticket to be included in the family – a chair at the table awaits.
I sense God’s great love in extending Himself to us, an invitation written in blood. And though we have so often ignored His pursuit, chasing after our own list of dreams and desires and for acceptance in places that will never satisfy our deepest heart’s desires, He prepares a table before us – He raises us up and seats us with Him (Eph. 2.6). In heavenly places – now that is a place of honor, a major party where you’re a treasured guest!
Something about the thought of it – the table, all set in loving anticipation, is just stirring in my heart. I have let the sacredness of a regular shared meal, in these crazy-busy days, the invitation for dinner to people I don’t know that well just pass by. But I hear God calling me back to a time I wholly practiced the beauty of the sharing of a regular supper. Oh good grief, He is killing me. I am too old to think of fixing big meals again, right? Yet, I want to reflect the heart of God, on earth as it is in heaven, as He prepares for the Marriage Supper of the Lamb. It’s a big deal.
I am picking up my library-borrowed copy of Shauna Niequest’s Bread and Wine today. SO looking forward to it. I have a feeling you’ll be hearing more about the family-table from me because this 1 minute and 52 seconds of video just fired. me. up!
1 John 1.4 Amplified
And we are now writing these things to you so that our joy [in seeing you included] may be full [and your joy may be complete].
We have not been excluded from the festivities. We are accepted and beloved. Let’s share that amazing joy!
“I Loathe, Despise & Abominate Halloween” BUT wait: I LOVE the trick-or-treaters!!!
This is my nearly-2000-word {highly-opinionated} essay (w/no pictures) on WHY I hate Halloween~
I don’t hate little kids, all cute and dressed up coming to my door with an open bag. That actually requires a lot of trust in this day and age and I look at it as a chance to bless the little children, a chance to be a nice neighbor. Trick-or-treating does not bother me, really, because the kids (young kids only, please – you kids that are old enough to work – go buy your own dang candy) are just excited to get to wear a costume and eat more candy than they should. I hate, literally loath, despise and abominate Halloween, but maybe for reasons different than you’d imagine…
The Horror of Retail {mwa, mwa, mwa….}
For 5 years I ran a retail party store. Halloween was the BIG ONE. It drove our sales for the year and I had to be number one (I just HAD TO!…and was!!, ok – strike that last prideful statement), so can you imagine my deep loathing for both milking-Halloween-for-all-it-was-worth for the money we could rake in and just hating the symbols that have come to represent it all? I set everything and worked my head off (can you say 90+ hours a week during the evil-season??) to sell to people who would purchase useless styro-headstones, “bloody” goblets and giant fuzzy spiders. Fog machines were the biggest rip-off and anything witchy-skeletony-or-ghoulish you could add double-D batteries to so it would light up or make some horrific noise were big sellers.
And then there were the costumes. We sold all those crappy costumes plus face paint and fake blood, stitches, etc.
And people would FILL those carts and spend hundreds of dollars. I both loved racking up the sales AND I disrespected seeing people waste that much money on something like Halloween, a “holiday” that really celebrates nothing that means eternal anything to me.
The worst part though? The company “encouraged” (read: forced) us to “dress up” – the whole month of October! It is fun for like, three days. The other 28, not so much. I have been a nun, a gypsy, a bunch of grapes. There were platinum blond wigs, Cleopatra headdresses and hot pink beehives. I was never “evil,” just dressed, all the while managing a hopping Halloween staff, chasing shoplifters, receiving Christmas and trying to make that transition as fast as humanly possible and just gritting my green-hick-farmer teeth to get through.
Suffice it to say I had more Halloween than I ever wanted and enough to last 37 people a lifetime. Yuck.
The Great Halloween Debate
And to top it off, I have spent almost a lifetime in the middle of the great Halloween debate: Is it OK for Christians to Participate?? OR Is it an evil-pagan holiday dedicated to devil-worship that we should avoid at all costs? I gotta tell you, I DO wish to avoid it all costs, but not for spiritual reasons, necessarily because the devil doesn’t own my days – not any of them. Dare I say I think it falls under the Romans 14 directive for disputable matters?…I do. Let the stoning begin…
Jesus loves me this I know, for the Bible tells me so!
This year my home church decided not to have the Halloween alternative they usually have. And nobody knows quite what to do.
When I was growing up (in my very Christian, very strict Pentecostal preacher’s home), our parents let us trick-or-treat. In retrospect, that seems crazy. I couldn’t cut my hair, wear make-up or listen to the radio, at least “legally”, but I got to trick-or-treat. Strange. The church hadn’t been super-sensitized to the meanings and origins of the day back then. They still really thought it was just kids dressing up and getting lots of candy. And even after it became a “test of righteousness” in Christian circles, the churches my dad pastored still usually offered an alternative like a “Harvest Fest” with fall activities and the kiddos dressing up. I remember church bulletins reminding everyone that no “ghosts, ghouls or goblins” were allowed to attend, but costumes were welcomed.
Dave’s family was an absolutely-not Halloween family. I was from the use-the-opportunity-to-witness stream. My earliest memories are of my mom explaining to me that I had to do a “trick” to get a “treat,” and wow, was I ever willing! My trick was always to sing a song of some sort and since we didn’t do secular music, my song always had something to do with Jesus. The first year I could sing it all, I did – at every. single. house. “…for the Bible tells me so.” Deep breath, the person tries to give me candy, I whip my bag away from them , my mom reminds me, and whale on, “Yes, Jesus loves me! Yes, Jesus loves me!…” They were prisoners to the end. But I would not take that candy until I had witnessed of the Lord’s love the full way through.
Pagan Roots
It seems H’ween has its roots in pagan Celtic festivals, the Druids dancing around bonfires and offering sacrifices to the spirit world for the harvest. So actually – having a church “Harvest Festival” is not an improvement on Halloween, necessarily. During the ancient pagan fetsival, Candy Corn would begin to fall from the sky, just kidding…just checking to see if you are still reading. ;p Haha.
In the 8th century, the Pope moved All Saint’s Day to November 1, so October 31st became “All Hallows Eve” and most people think he did it to claim the 31st back for Christians, which frankly, I applaud. What I bind on earth is bound both here and in heaven. We do have some authority in Jesus’ Name, people!
I digress.
So, then there is a biblical scripture-storm that erupts annually against having any part. One of the scriptures often cited is Ephesians 5.7-12 NLT:
7 Don’t participate in the things these people do. 8 For once you were full of darkness, but now you have light from the Lord. So live as people of light! 9 For this light within you produces only what is good and right and true.
10 Carefully determine what pleases the Lord. 11 Take no part in the worthless deeds of evil and darkness; instead, expose them. 12 It is shameful even to talk about the things that ungodly people do in secret.
Or, there is Deuteronomy 18.10-12 NLT
For example, never sacrifice your son or daughter as a burnt offering. And do not let your people practice fortune-telling, or use sorcery, or interpret omens, or engage in witchcraft, 11 or cast spells, or function as mediums or psychics, or call forth the spirits of the dead. 12 Anyone who does these things is detestable to the Lord. It is because the other nations have done these detestable things that the Lord your God will drive them out ahead of you.
And there are lots of other verses that are used to promote total abstinence from any type of Halloween participation. And they are important scriptures with definite guidelines for what we should and shouldn’t be participating in. But I honestly don’t see them saying “Little kids dressing up and trick-or-treating is anti-scriptural.” I just don’t. My grandbebes, who will dress as Nacho Libre or a Strawberry or as princesses or Batman this year? They will NOT be calling forth spirits of the dead or hosting seances. We will not sacrifice them as burnt offerings. They will NOT participate in drunken parties and godlessness of that sort and I will teach them to speak up for righteousness through their vote as citizens and to protect the helpless and feed the hungry. That is how they are being raised. They are being raised to be who God created them to be (light!) and to do what God has ordained for them to do and to fulfill their destiny for God in their generation. Period!
The devil doesn’t get my grandbebes. I truly and humbly do not see trick-or-treating as the step into a dark realm. If anything, I see it as “Hallowed,” like the old Pope wanted it to be because he went to enemy’s camp and took back what was stolen (know that song? Don’t make me sing it here!). My days are the LORD’S. All of them! And it is a great time to show our babies the difference between light and darkness by not worshipping death, not giving in to demonic influence and avoiding rebelliousness (which is as the sin of witchcraft and rarely gets corrected in Christendom).
Renunciation.
You know what, though? If you came from an occultic background where you used the 31st as part of demon worship and you have walked away from it being born into Christ and you have renounced that past – by all means, don’t participate. It holds something for you it doesn’t for me. Don’t be enslaved into any bondage you have been delivered from again! I would stand with you in that, and I mean that! Or if you just have a strong conviction that you don’t want your family to participate, because to you, it seems like being part of an agreement with the world, part of this godless generation and you’d rather make a stand here – then make that stand. I support you in that, but Romans 14, again {“disputable matters”}…
Accept other believers who are weak in faith, and don’t argue with them about what they think is right or wrong. For instance, one person believes it’s all right to eat anything. But another believer with a sensitive conscience will eat only vegetables. Those who feel free to eat anything must not look down on those who don’t. And those who don’t eat certain foods must not condemn those who do, for God has accepted them. Who are you to condemn someone else’s servants? Their own master will judge whether they stand or fall. And with the Lord’s help, they will stand and receive his approval.
Figure it out. Study it through. Pray. Ask the Lord. Listen. And be obedient there and let’s not let a disputable matter polarize us as Christians, or get us fighting one another in scriptural-sword fighting. Because? Then the stupid-head devil wins. Geesh, people – it is when he breaks our unity that we are trashed – not when some low-level demon flies around a room impressing the idiots who want that sort of thing. RESIST HIM, seriously. He HAS to flee!
I loathe, despise and abominate* Halloween because of how it separates us and causes holier-then-thou crap and we make each other the enemy instead of THE enemy. And I hate all the blackness and darkness because I am of the Light, but oh, by the way, I shine ever so much more brightly in the dark places. I say kick-him-in-the-butt and bless the little children when they come to your door: give the best candy, the biggest smile, the greatest encouragement and give ’em a God-bless-you, because that actually is within your power to do. Heaven will hear and attend to your blessing! May His will be done on earth as it is in heaven! On Halloween, even!
‘Nuff said.
*In the book version of Meet Me in St Louis, the sisters show their distaste for things by saying “I hate, loathe, despise and abominate {fill-in-the-blank}”. I think it is used a time or two in the Judy Garland movie, too. It is a fav family quote.
“Live as people of light!”
RT @ pastormark via ryan may: “If you’re one of those Christians who is going to give out tracts for Halloween, also give enough candy to make a kid a diabetic!” Haha!
So this Thursday, October 31, 2013? I stand by it. The devil can’t have that day or that night in my life, my neighborhood or in my family! We are a holy people redeemed by the LORD!
OH, and…if you’d like to be really super missional this year (have they been talking to my mother???), THIS SITE has tons of ways to redeem Halloween and makie it a teaching and being-a-nice-Christian kind of thing!
This image looks really early 1900s. I google-searched for poets named “Mamie” and there are actually quite a few.
I like October because it reminds me of innocent childhood, shuffling through piles of leaves on the way to school, before the days when people felt the incessant need to banish the sight of them immediately at all costs. Have you noticed, in these newer neighborhoods, it’s almost impossible to get a decent pile for jumping in?
Because I’m still in love with you
I want to see you dance again
Because I’m still in love with you
On this harvest moon. (Neil Young, lyrics – Harvest Moon)
I like October for the crimson and pumpkin, for the eggplant and rust, and all the colors of the deepening, mature, lusty, whole and passionate part of the year when the autumn moon hangs heavy in the sky like the warm embraces of a tattered, weighty quilt sewn years ago for the need of heat and not some contest of a county fair. Have you ever been covered in one of those?
I like October because the coffee is richer, the evening cricket is less frantic, more rhythmic. The sun slants and schedules fall into an easy ritual, the day in and day out are much more organized. Tans fade, memories are made, soup is stirred, cakes are baked, sweaters come out and life is rich.
Well, it’s a marvelous night for a moondance
With the stars up above in your eyes
A fantabulous night to make romance
‘Neath the cover of October skies (Moondance, Van Morrison)
I like October because my neighbor’s Maple tree explodes into multichromatic, vibrance and dances merrily in a dazzling production for me through my big window each time I walk through the room. From dark, living green to lime to yellow to orange to scarlet to blood-red and back. Then, just as all the colors begin to subside, like the finale of a summer fireworks display, a wind scatters the leaves far and wide and they glide and twirl and settle on the lawns with a promise to do it all again – same time next year.
The tree of which I speak…from the window (this was 2 years ago)
I do like October. Love it, even.
And yes, in all of it, like the poet said, “the opulent Giver I see.”
Brothers and sisters, think of what you were when you were called. Not many of you were wise by human standards; not many were influential; not many were of noble birth. But God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong. God chose the lowly things of this world and the despised things—and the things that are not—to nullify the things that are, so that no one may boast before him. It is because of Him that you are in Christ Jesus, who has become for us wisdom from God—that is, our righteousness, holiness and redemption. Therefore, as it is written: ‘Let the one who boasts boast in the Lord.’ 1 Corinthians 1.26-31 NIV
Jesus was humbled all the way to death. Still, we are utterly surprised and shocked when we are, too. #Don’taskmehowIknow
I am at the start of a new year. Because I got another year older. But I am choosing to focus on the part about starting a fresh, new thing, instead of the wow-a-lot-has-happened-over-the-course-of-my-very-long-long-long-life.
I love new things, don’t you? I love fresh starts and second chances. I love beginnings and renewals and refreshment. They are always so full of hope, so anything-amazing-can-happen.
Listmaker that I am, a new year or season or even month (not to mention any Monday morning) will get me looking ahead with excitement and hope and jotting notes about all the things I want to see and experience and accomplish and produce and become…
Today, this:
I want to unleash my creativity (it’s been much too locked away) and have all the crazy creative thoughts I can find that will lead to a life of abundant fruitfulness and productivity and wholehearted living. Because wholeheartedness is HUGE to me (why be anything else, ever?) and it includes being both WHOLE (this is me cooperating with the work of God in my life in all areas: spirit, soul and body) and HOLY (which can come about only by the completed work of Christ and the blood He shed). This is actually possible because of the aaaa-mazingGRACE of God, “the empowering work of the Holy Spirit to be everything God created us to be and to do everything He created us to do.”**
Yep. On my list. Happy New Year!
**That definition of grace came from James Ryle at his conference Grace! Grace! Grace! sometime back in the 1990s.
It is not only Sunday, but also the birthday of the only boy I ever had (until the reward of Tristan, Dave and Ryan), but his birthday blog will com later.
Meanwhile, this is a song I shared with the birthday boy, Rocky, and his wife Jovan the other day. It has been a challenging couple of weeks for them, with three young daughters and flooded out of their house. They are worn out from everything you have to do to make your house livable again.
This song has amazing words and is full of hope and promise. It basically reminds us that no matter where we are, the GRACE of God (that empowering Presence of the Holy Spirit that enables us to be everything He called us to be and do everything He created us to do) will come and find us again and again.
…there in the sorrow and the dancing, Your great grace, Oh such grace…
How do we know this is true? Well, for Rocky and Jovan and any of us in situations beyond our control and overwhelming to say the least: we recall His goodness through the years, His faithfulness. In every good thing and bad, in the birth of our children, at our weddings, when loved ones have died, when we are rich or when we have been poor – always, every. single. time – His GRACE has found us, has come to us, has filled our lives with His great hope and joy. It all just proves the old hymn true, His grace is AMAZING!
From the creation to the cross, There from the cross into eternity Your grace finds me, yes, Your grace finds me
The fist video is Matt Redman leading the song live. The second is his intro about how and why he wrote it. Watch that and you’ll want to go back and worship along again with the live vid. :) Pretty simple song, you’ll be singing along after the first few lines. Listen for the strains of “Amazing Grace,” too.
So I’m breathing in Your grace and breathing out Your praise…
You are not lost enough that His grace cannot find you. I know this for a fact.
