Lessons Learned

Lessons Learned

 

God never wastes an opportunity to instruct us in our faith.  A saying of a wise man found in Proverbs 24:32, “I applied my heart to what I observed and learned a lesson from what I saw,” illustrates that fact nicely.  God has lessons surrounding us everyday, but unless we take the time to truly connect God and His promises with the trials, the distractions, and the miscommunications of our day those teachable moments simply become stressful moments we must endure.

The disciples were urged by Jesus to get in a boat with Him and cross over to the other side of a lake.  In the midst of their voyage, after Jesus had fallen asleep a ferocious storm suddenly developed tossing the boat wildly over the waves.  The disciples were in a panic and feared they would drown. They woke Jesus and accused Him of being insensitive to their overwhelming situation.  Jesus simply stood up and told the storm to quiet down and it did!  Then he confronted the disciples with a lesson about fear and faith. 

I recently took a very long road trip to the other side of the country. The trip was a very eventful one from Houston to Los Angeles in a Ford Explorer Sport with my daughter, Sarah, her two surfboards on top, a bicycle on the back and filled with all her worldly possessions. The goal of the trip was to find her an apartment and move her things into it before the next Thursday when we would be flying back to Houston.  We set out early one Thursday morning full of hope and anticipation.  However a few hours into the trip a ferocious storm engulfed us as we made it to the other side of San Antonio.  The sky grew as black as night, the rain was so heavy that I could not see but a few feet in front of me.  I decided to pull off the road into a convenience store parking lot in Comfort, Texas, of all places.  We definitely needed some comfort!  I began to pray for God’s protection as we sat in the parking lot. Looking down at my phone, I noticed a text from a dear friend saying she was praying Psalm 121:7-8 for us.  Interestingly enough, those were the very verses I had begun memorizing that week!  She had no idea of the storm we were in, but God did, as the verses proclaim, “The Lord will keep you from all harm – he will watch over your life; the Lord will watch over your coming and going both now and forevermore.”  I saw the words and tried to connect the promise to the thunderstorm in which I found myself.  My faith was shaky at best.

We drummed up courage and tried to convince ourselves that the storm was weakening.  However as we got only a few more miles down the road the wind began to blow so hard that it was a struggle to keep the car on the road. Sarah made a quick check on her phone and found that we were not only in an area where there was a severe thunderstorm warning, but also a tornado warning as well!  As I was fluctuating between faith and fear, my cell phone rang- it was my mom calling.  Just a couple of weeks prior to our leaving my mom had emergency surgery to remove a cancerous tumor from her colon.  My concentration on driving through a storm had caused me to briefly forget that my mom would find out that morning if the cancer had spread. As I answered the phone I braced myself for possible bad news.  To my great relief the words “The cancer has not spread,” brought peace and calm in the midst of facing a west Texas thunderstorm. It reminded me of a scripture I have often prayed, “Give me a sign of your goodness, that my enemies may see it and be put to shame, for you, O Lord, have helped me and comforted me.”  We had rain and wind the rest of that day until we reach our first day destination:  sunny El Paso!  The Lord had watched over our coming and going and brought us safely to the other side.  Another interesting fact is the meaning of El Paso:  “the crossing of the river.” 

As I reflect on this first day of travel many God lessons come to my mind, but one stands out:  When I trust in myself fear engulfs me; when I trust in God’s promise to watch over me His love covers me and causes the fear to subside.  Thank you Lord for calming the storms physically, emotionally and relationally in my life and for forgiving me of accusing you of sleeping in the midst of my storms. 

“He who watches over you does not slumber!”    Psalm 121:3

My Walk in the Park: A Parable of Grace

Early Tuesday morning, before dawn, my husband and I went to Memorial Park for a walk.  As is our pattern, we start off together and then he signaled for me to go on ahead of him, as I will walk and run while he walks. I found myself about one mile ahead of him and thought I might like to run for a while.  Well just as I started off running, the road literally rose up to meet me – or probably a better description would be:  “I came face to face with the dirt!”  I broke the fall with my hands and my left knee.  Being in a bit of shock I simply answered, “yes” to a passerby’s question of concern, “Are you okay?”  Pride lifted me up off the gravel trail and into a jog.  A few yards later I came to my senses and my jog became a determined walk.  I was determined to make it to the public restroom before the sun came up.  I didn’t want anyone to see me in such a disheveled condition.  I felt my hands throbbing as I clinched them into fists and tried to set my mind on finishing the course. 

I finally reached the restroom and discovered my hands were streaked with blood and dirt. I quickly made an assessment of my injuries and tried to wash up as best I could.  Then I made my way to the car where William was now waiting on me, totally oblivious to my fall.  He was compassionate and caring as he helped me into the car.

On the way home I sent a text to my workout partner that I had fallen and would come workout after I cleaned myself up.  Once at home, I realized I was pretty messed up.  I had chunks of skin that had been lifted off of my palms as the dirt and rocks had shoved their way into the wounds.  I had to lift up the torn skin from each gash and scrub out the dirt and pebbles followed by pouring in hydrogen peroxide to try and get any hidden bacteria.  I feared infection setting in and did everything I could to avoid that!  By this time, I realized there was no way I would be working out with my friend and sent her a text letting her know I would be nursing my wounds instead of lifting weights!  That day was a continuous cycle of resting, cleaning my wounds, bandaging my wounds and resting some more.

The next day I headed to the gym with about 7 bandages strategically placed on my hands and knee.  As I was explaining my accident to a friend she reminded me that I should leave the wounds open to air and that they would heal better and the chance of infection would be less.  This made sense, so I took her advice and noticed the healing process speed up. 

What seemed like a lost day or two became for me a lesson to be lived out; a lesson about God’s grace.  Before and after my walk in the park I had been praying and studying, seeking a lesson for Sunday.  I felt the Lord calling me to sit for a while on the lesson from last week of how grace teaches us how to live.  I had been studying for four days and felt no leadership or lesson outline emerge. 

Then on Friday, my eyes popped open at 4:15 am with Titus 2:11- 15 running through my mind.  At the same time I kept reliving my fall at the park and how I had been caring for my wounds.  First, I had to get over the pride and admit that no, I wasn’t okay. Then, I had to wash the wounds with soap and water and pull back the skin to clean out the visible dirt and pour peroxide in the wound to clean the dirt I couldn’t see.  I tried covering the wounds up, but saw that they really were not healing.  The Lord showed me that this is how we take care of our sin wounds.  We must first humble ourselves and come to Him “poor in spirit” as one who is helpless and unable to save ourselves.  Then we must allow the Word to wash over the dirt of sin, pointing us to the truth that convicts and the truth that heals.  It is a painful experience.  Opening up the wounds in our hearts caused by sin is hard, but just as allowing the dirt to remain in my physical wounds causes infection, so too covering up our dirty sin wounds and not cleaning them will result in an infected, bitter heart.

As I reflected on all of this I realized it was so much like our grace walk with Christ.

I thought of my hands being hurt and how I dependent I am on my hands.  I thought of Jesus willingly giving his life by allowing his hands to be nailed to a cross, the hands that had healed blind men, had lifted Peter out of the water; the hands that gathered children and the hands that wrote a message in the dirt, freeing an adulterous woman from being stoned.  I thought of Isaiah 41:13- For I am the Lord your God who takes hold of your right hand and says to you, Do not fear I will help you.  His hands bear the scars that brought grace to sinner’s hands, hands that have taken part in ungodliness, darkness and wickedness.     Properly dealing with the wounds of sin in our lives so that we can live in this present time as healthy purified followers of Christ – attracting others to His marvelous gospel of grace.   Here are the points to the lesson the Lord gave me: 

1.     Expose wounds to the light of the Word for healing to begin.

a.     “Everyone who has this hope in him purifies himself, just as he is pure.” 1 John 3:3

b.     This inward honesty brings healing and blessing.  Matthew 5:5

c.      The truth is peroxide to the old wounded self! 1 Peter 1:13-15; 2:1; Colossians 3:3-5

2.      Openly expose wounds for others to benefit from the grace received.  

a.     An authentic pure life leads to sincere love for others.  1 Peter 1:22; Hebrews 12:15

b.     Open honesty leads to healing and effective prayer life. James 5:16;

3.     Cast wounds on Christ, leaving the healing process to Him.  1 Peter 2:24

a.     To cast my hurt, wounds, worries and fears on Christ daily. 1 Peter 5:7-8;

b.     To take up my cross and follow Him. Luke 9:23;

c.      Only Christ can take away the shame of our wounds. Hebrews 12:1-2; Matthew 27:27-38

4.     Understanding God’s grace, in all its truth, gives you the courage to take another walk!  Colossians 1

My Never Ending Hope

Life is a cycle of endings.  People come into my life and they go - by distance or by death.
The day begins full of hope, of people, of plans that end with the dark silence of night.
I arise and remember that my days are numbered and they too shall one day end.
There is one ending that brings hope.   The ending of the desperate search for life in the finding of the One who has no end.
When all else and everyone else ends - when all alone I sit - My Forever Love whispers, "I am your Never Ending Hope.
Alleluia! My end will bring a glorious forever.
Psalm 90:12
Psalm 39:7