"Giving" is an act we DO.
"Generous" is a person we BECOME.
Kicked off a brand new series yesterday at The Well called IRRATIONAL GENEROSITY. The series looks at the spiritual gift of generosity - a gift I believe is just as important and impactful as preaching, teaching, praying or serving. In fact, nothing makes you more like God than when you give and give generously.
Read MoreThis past Sunday may have been one of the most powerful and inspired messages I’ve ever preached. I honestly felt like it was God speaking and not me. It was a Spirit-led and Spirit-inspired message if I’ve ever had one, and that I think everyone NEEDS to hear it.
So the natural result of that was that the A/V system decided to go haywire during the talk and we were only able to capture the last 18 minutes of the message on video (sorry sorry sorry).
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When you’ve tasted the sweetness of the living water, there’s nothing more unbearable than the dryness of the desert.
I work harder, pleading for His presence, trying to push myself to find some sort of emotional connection to the words I have read over and over in my Bible. Somehow, I still leave feeling empty and unfulfilled. I feel like saying with Isaiah the prophet, “My eyes grew weak as I looked to the heavens” (Isaiah 38:14).
I guess it’s because somewhere along the way, I’ve slipped into thinking that when I can’t feel God, He has abandoned me. In other words, I equate God’s silence with God’s absence.
But is that really the case?
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A typical Saturday morning in our house includes my two young boys (incapable of sleeping past 7 am) fighting over who gets to do something first, who plays with what toy, who gets the blue plate at breakfast, or something like that… I admittedly started tuning them out. Meanwhile, in my room, I’m washing my face and making frown-y faces in the mirror remembering what I looked like in the “good ole days” (in actuality, I was unhappy with the way I looked back then too). My husband is similarly groaning at the fact that it’s so early … on a Saturday.
I volunteer in the children’s program at my church where we have been discussing contentment this month, so the topic has been at the forefront of my mind. Specifically, what’s robbing us of our contentment?
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Meet Mamma Freda. Mamma Freda is an elderly woman that I met during a recent trip to Kenya. She lives with a crippling pain in her left leg, unable to afford medication to alleviate the discomfort. The pain is so immense that it prevents her from daily tasks such as cooking; in fact when we saw her, she hadn’t eaten in three days because of the pain!
Despite that, she received us with a most cheerful countenance. She struggled to greet us – using a huge wooden rod to steady her step, simply overjoyed that we were there to share a short prayer with her.
I wish I could find the words to express the blessedness of this woman – nothing I am capable of writing will do justice to Mamma Freda and her faithfulness to God. She lived with a debilitating pain in her leg, but despite that, she walked long distances every single Sunday just to make it to church. And she always did it with a smile on her face.
With Mamma Freda before me as an example, I had to ask myself: do I ever struggle for my faith? Do I ever seek Christ when it isn’t convenient and easy? Do I ever sacrifice my comfort to be with God or do something for God?
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“…looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.” Hebrews 12:2
One Saturday night, when I was 18, I went to visit some neighbors who recently moved to our area. I was actually going to apologize for a noisy party we were having at a friend's house next door. I thought they might be upset.
But to my surprise, they weren’t. In fact, when they opened the door, I saw a very thin, shy man and his equally thin, shy wife watching from afar. I was expecting them to be upset; but instead they invited me in for coffee!
Immediately I noticed something different about them. The wife brought out a tray from which the husband handed me what looked like a small bowl full of dark coffee. I didn't want to offend, so I hid my confusion and smiled and drank it all at once.
WHOA! I soon learned that the coffee, like my neighbors themselves, was Arabic in origin. Unlike my neighbors though, the coffee was extremely bitter! Very potent!
Soon after however, the wife brought out another tray – this time full of a sweet, rich pastry that our Lebanese neighbors call ‘baklava’. It wasn’t long before the level of honey in that dessert made me completely forget the bitter aftertaste from the coffee.
In the trials of life, in the confusing times, bitterness creeps up on us like a cup of my neighbor's coffee.
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Happiness. Everyone wants it. Many people define happiness in a certain way, claiming that they have the ‘secret to happiness’. The dictionary defines ‘being happy’ as ‘feeling or showing pleasure or contentment’.
In today’s world, it is becoming more and more difficult to define what happiness is. Personally, I've struggled with defining the concept of happiness. I don't remember anyone ever teaching me what 'happy' meant.
But as a little girl, I felt happy. I was satisfied with my life and I felt at peace. Looking back now, I wonder how I could have been happy. My family was not well-off, and we didn't have much. I wore my sister’s hand-me-downs, and I didn't own any toys. My family never went on vacations, and we didn't eat out at restaurants.
Yet, as a small child, I didn't feel as though I was missing out on anything. I made use of what I did have - a loving family and a wonderful church community. I had clothes to keep me warm, and even the hand-me-downs felt new to me!
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