Preaching gospel to myself, as I do my best to walk by faith and not by sight. Trying with all my might to see the beauty and to hold on to hope. In doing so, I am so very grateful for music, which touches the soul, like a fresh rain on a hot day.

  And as I drove home today,....with the icy hand of anxiety slowly squeezing my heart, a song began to play on the radio and the words cut through the ice and the tears fall like rain..... And I lifted up my voice up and sang with everything in me. 

 You are my joy, You are my song

You are the well, the One I'm drawing from
You are my refuge, my whole life long
Where else would I go?

 

  About three weeks ago I took on the challenge of one little female pit-bull. Her rescue name is Appie but we call her Little Blue Dog.

  She came up from a shelter down south where a kind, soft spoken lady who is excellent with dogs had been unable to reach her. For some weird reason (I think it was meant to be this way) when she arrived at the rescue she came out of her kennel, wagged her tail and took a treat, ensuring her adoptability. That was the first and last time that she did so.

 After arriving she began to shut down. She would not leave the dog house and was terrified of everyone.  The rescue kennels are a very active place with a lot of dogs and a lot of noise. We assumed she was just having a hard time adjusting to it all and decided to move her to my house.

 I wrongly assumed that this would be just like all the other fearful dogs I have worked with, a little love, a little kindness and everything would be fine..... but it wasn’t. Nothing broke through her barriers. I was kind, I moved slow, I was patient. Chicken liver and black forest ham rained from the sky whenever I was around. I practiced appeasement and calming gestures that have worked well with fearful dogs in the past.  I would sit in her kennel and read just to get her used to me, never looking at her and always speaking soft yet confident. After three weeks although we had made some small progress it really wasn’t much.

 If she is loose she will run, she always runs at my approach, at anyone’s approach. If in her kennel or crate she hovers in the back and will only come out when the leash is attached to her collar. If inside she typically will hide inside her crate. Only one day, out of all the days did she come out and chew on a toy and just lay on the carpet. If you stand or move in any way she cringes and runs, if flight is not an option she goes down low, real low and awaits the displeasure that she is certain is coming.

   Once she is on a leash she will follow you, but she cringes at every move and seems to just be resigned to her fate and certain that you intend her harm.

 At certain points along the way she has been so shut down that she squints her eyes shut and just lays there as you touch her to put the leash on. Soft and gentle touch offers her no comfort and she just tenses up and allows it, certain that it is all a lie and harm is sure to follow.

 From time to time, and for only a fleeting moment, I see hope in her eyes, or something that I cannot quite put my finger on. If I sit down sometimes she will approach me, and if I walk about the yard sometimes she will follow and on occasion come up behind to sniff me, quickly fleeing if my head turns or I give any indication that I know she is there.

 She loves Patronus, my amazing Dog Whisperer dog. Through him I have been able to see a portion of her true self, as she greets him in the morning and dances in delight. For him her tail wags, for him she rains kisses, for him she bows and entices him to play. These moments are precious and beautiful to behold, for they show her as she was meant to be, as she was created to be, before some unknown sorrow broke her heart and spirit into fractured pieces.

 Working with her is heartbreaking. I have so much to offer her. Peace, rest, provision and a lot of love. I think of how it would be to have her in my lap and give her cuddles and rub her tummy….but to her this would be torturous. She simply cannot see all that I have to offer her for fear of some cruelty. I know not what she has endured in her short life, but whatever it was it has scarred her terribly.

 The lessons she teaches me are painful ones, not the normal happy and uplifting ones that other foster dogs have taught. She teaches me of sorrow, fears, hopelessness and brokenness, a tormented creature lost in the darkness. I see in her my own plight at certain times of my life, when God wooed me with His grace and mercy but I was so broken, so angry and fearful that I could not accept His wooing. Yet He never stopped pursuing me. I, like her ate crumbs from the ground when a feast beyond measure was there for the taking. I was just too broken to see it, and too disillusioned to believe it was real.

 Sometimes broken cannot be fixed, sometimes broken just will not come to the table offered. Yet God in His great mercy never stops asking, never stops pursuing, and never stops loving. I will do my very best to do the same, for the Little Blue Dog and in so doing, I will hope with all my heart that she will reach a place of trust where she will decide to eat from the bountiful table that is offered and know the peace of companionship with a caring human.

 Your prayers for her are greatly appreciated.

 

Little Blue Dog

I watch you huddled in the corner

Your eyes carefully watching my every move

Your body is tense, your tail tucked tightly

You are ready to flee…always ready to flee

Softness does not break through

Kindness and soft words do not penetrate

Tasty food has no appeal

You are convinced that nothing good comes from humans

Goodness and humans are a lie

I think you once believed that such things could be

I think your heart wanted it so very much

But someone trampled upon all that

And left you shattered and broken

Let me show you that beautiful is possible

Let me show you what grace can do.

Trust me little one…..trust me just a little bit

And we will behold the miracle of love.

 

 

 “Your beauty and love chase after me every day of my life” (Psalm 23:6a, The Message)

 

 

“But God showed his great love for us by sending Christ to die for us while we were still sinners.” (Romans 5:8 NLT)

  Today is Thanksgiving, and for some reason that strikes me as odd that one day out of the year could be called Thanksgiving Day, as if there is nothing to be thankful for on the other 364 days, or as if I could possible store up all the grace, all the blessings and then sit down with family on this one day and give thanks for them all. The table would break under the weight of all that grace!

  Every day ought to be Thanksgiving Day. A grateful heart is good medicine for the soul; in fact it is the key to a healthy soul. It took me over 50 years to realize this and it took me that long to realize that every day is so full of His grace that even when I try and capture it all I fail utterly and completely. Some days I fail in even attempting to capture the blessings.

 A few years ago, God used a little book and a wonderful lady from Washington State, to teach me about gratitude, or at least to start me on the journey of learning about gratitude. Times were hard then, it had been a long dark night of the soul with no end in sight. My little family had sent a loved one to war twice, had spent near two years holding our breath and trying to be normal while a dear one fought in faraway lands. We were also dealing with a dark and painful mental illness here at home, one we did not understand and often could not make sense of. One that took a heavy toll from me, and from both my sons. Then my husband’s company closed their doors and money became extremely tight forcing him to seek work out of state.  For two long years we lived apart, seeing each other one weekend out of the month and talking on the phone each evening.  Then at last the war was over for us, the husband found work here, and it seemed that things were looking up. But the dark mental illness continued and to add to it, the son we had held our breath for was now trying to deal with the aftermath of war and loss. Then we had the first suicide, my beautiful daughter in law who had struggled so hard against the darkness of mental illness. Her death hit like a wrecking ball, a wave of pain so intense, so awful that it just cannot be described.  I had just a few weeks to try and breathe try and make some sense of that which cannot be made sense of, try and keep my son alive and then came the second suicide, my handsome nephew, husband and father of two.  A few weeks after flying home from that funeral, a little book arrived in my mailbox, sent by a kind lady in Washington who had ministered to my daughter in law.

 “One Thousand Gifts, A Dare to Live Fully Right Where You Are”, by Ann Voskamp. It was almost an affront to receive such a thing at such a time. After all, what did I have to be thankful for?  And yet in reading it I began to see, I began to notice, I began to count the blessings. There were days when all I could come up with were the little things, “thank You Lord for coffee, thank You Lord for dogs” but as I practiced daily this art of counting the gifts I began to notice how blind I had been, and how wonderful it was to finally be able to see. To really see the beauty of life, the beauty of creation, the beauty of souls. My situation was still the same, nothing had changed about it, family members were still struggling hard in absolute darkness, and there were many times when we feared we would lose them to the darkness, feared yet another funeral, and yet something within me had changed.

 Giving thanks changes you, and the more you practice it the more you will be changed. There are ALWAYS the gifts He gives. There is beauty in the hard places, but we so often miss it completely because our lack of gratitude blinds our eyes to all the grace being poured out.

  So today, this Thanksgiving 2015, I give thanks to God most high, for the love, the intense and beautiful love that holds on no matter what, the love that just will not let go, the love that saves and redeems.  I give thanks for family, a family that looks out for each other, sacrifices for each other, and a family that has known pain and become all the stronger from it. I give thanks for beauty, the beauty of creation and the beauty of the human soul in all its suffering and in all its joy. I give thanks for sacrifice, for in sacrificing for others true love becomes known and understood. Love is pouring out your all for others. Like the Velveteen Rabbit, love hurts, your fur gets rubbed off, you get a bit ragged and worn, but oh how worth it is to truly love!  And last, but by no means least, I give thanks for the grace, grace poured out without measure, grace that falls like rain, grace that has sustained me and the ones I so love, grace that has saved and redeemed, grace that has blessed, marvelous outrageous grace.

  My prayer for us all is that the Lord most high would open our eyes to the gifts He gives, that we might always be a people of Thanksgiving, and that He would open our hearts that we might love with a measure of His love, and that we would be people of grace, giving it out to each other, as He gives it out to us.

 May your Thanksgiving Day be blessed. Remember our imperfections as you go about your day. No matter how hard you try, it will not be perfect. So give grace to the loved one that drinks a little more than they should, and grace to the one who arrives late to the table, and grace to the one that is loud and brash and ungrateful, and grace to the one who weeps and disrupts attempts to be happy, and grace to all the other disruptions and mistakes that might somehow mar your attempts for the Norman Rockwell Thanksgiving. For it is by grace that we are saved, and He has poured it out on us, so let us pour it out today on each other.

 Remember those with an empty chair at the Thanksgiving table, whether it be those deployed in harm's way, or those deployed to heaven.

HAPPY THANKSGIVING

Mm

  This week in my daily devotions I have been considering the subject of mercy. The main focus of these devotional readings ( http://www.ifequip.com/category/beatitudes) has been Matthew 5:7.

   Blessed are the merciful for they shall receive mercy.

   God blesses those people who are merciful. They will be treated with mercy!

   Blessed are those who show mercy. They will be treated mercifully.

   Happy are the kind and merciful, for they shall be shown mercy.

  They are blessed who show mercy to others, for God will show mercy to them.

  Looking at this one verse, in several different translations shows two clear points. A person will be blessed, and find joy and happiness in the act of being merciful, and God will be merciful to those who grant mercy to others.

    To whom am I to be merciful towards? Should my mercy be extended only to those who have earned it? Is there a certain type of character to whom I am to be merciful? Are there certain types that I should deny mercy to?

  I know of only one method of obtaining any kind of answer to my many questions on this subject. I go to Jesus and observe Him.

  Jesus describes mercy to us in a parable about a king and two debtors. The king forgave the debtor who owed him an enormous sum, a sum so great that it could not be paid back, but the one whose debt was forgiven by the king, ran right out and demanded a paltry sum be paid back right away by a man who owed him money. This man could not pay and begged for time, but the one the king forgave would not allow it and cast him into prison. When news of this reached the king he was very angry, and ordered the man whose debt he had forgiven to be cast into prison until the very last penny had been paid because he who had been forgiven so much, had no compassion and no mercy upon his fellow man who owed a tiny sum in comparison.

  Jesus was clearly merciful to the poor. He stopped by the roadside many times to heal beggars afflicted with leprosy, blindness, and lame. So it is clear that I am to be merciful to those who suffer from poverty or are afflicted by handicap or disease even if those handicaps or diseases are deplorable to society. (look up leprosy during the time of Christ.)

 Jesus extended mercy to the Roman soldier and restored to him his child. Rome was the oppressor in that day, the symbol of a tyrannical government. This did not stop Christ from showing mercy. I am to be merciful to those who oppose me politically, morally and to those who work in support of government and programs that oppose me politically and morally.

  Jesus was merciful to tax collectors, who were hated and despised by Jewish society. They were in a sense considered traitors. By their actions they betrayed their people and assisted the tyrannical government in oppressing them. Yet Christ demonstrated mercy to them. I am to be merciful to traitors and liars and cheats.

 Jesus was merciful to outcasts from society. Women of ill repute, lepers who were considered to be unclean and untouchable. He even touched the untouchable. So I am to be merciful to the untouchables of society.

 Jesus was merciful to the criminal hanging next to Him, one who according to scripture has earlier been mocking along with everyone else. A criminal who could do nothing at all for Christ, who could only call out "remember me, when You come into Your kingdom." Jesus was merciful. I am to be merciful to people without regard for what they can do for me, or have done for me, and regardless of their social stature.

  And last, but not least, in fact the most profound; Jesus was merciful to me! To the one who openly opposed Him, mocked Him, mocked His people, mocked His word, to the one who broke every commandment, to the one who did not extend mercy, who hated, who reviled, who stirred up trouble, who lied, cheated, stole, murdered with my words, to the one that did nothing at all, not one tiny thing to deserve mercy, to the one who earned and fully paid for condemnation with thoughts, words and deeds, HE EXTENDED MERCY. If He, in His outrageous grace, can extend mercy to me, then I should and must endeavor with all of my might to extend mercy to everyone.

 Now to some this is an unthinkable thing. But I think the distress comes from the understanding of what mercy is and how we go about extending it. Mercy does not automatically mean that we dismiss deeds committed by persons. Should someone commit a heinous crime, and murder another, being merciful to this person does not mean excusing their crimes, nor does it mean setting them free from the consequences of that crime. Perhaps mercy to this person would be to pray for them, to still see them as a living, breathing person, to see them as redeemable, to perhaps visit them in prison, or write to them.

  I think that extending mercy to all might become easy were we able to always see the humanity in another, even one who is opposed to us, maybe even hates us, or to one who has done the unthinkable, the awful, the terrible. In order to see the humanity in others I believe we have to see the capacity for inhumanity within us all. 

  There are those who murder with their hands, taking the life of another unjustly and without cause. Then there are those who murder with their lips, defiling the character, judging and condemning another, ruining their life, their peace and their reputation and refusing to extend any possibility of redemption. Both are murder in God's eyes.

  Okay, so I am to be merciful. I am clear on that, the next question is how. How do I extend mercy to the untouchables? Right now, in today's world there exists a group of persons who are hell bent to destroy us. Were I in their hands the most grievous torture would be enacted upon me, and I would most likely die, probably with my head cut off. We have all seen the countless videos and read the stories of the multitude of people murdered by the hands of Islamic terrorists. The fleshly me wants an eye for an eye, or in truth I want a head for an eye. My flesh screams out to nuke every last Islamic country that holds even a thread of terrorism within it into the stone age. My flesh cries out, assemble the armies and march upon them and bring destruction to every last living thing that stands in our path. But my soul cries out something different. I have to listen carefully, for I cannot hear it for the boiling blood and pounding heart of my flesh, but I pause, I consider, I remember the things I have been learning about mercy and I know that my cry for vengeance and destruction is not the cry of my soul. My soul cries for peace. My soul prays for the spirit of God to be poured out upon the Muslim people, be they terrorist or normal hard working folk, my soul cries for the eyes of those committing evil to be opened, for their hearts to be deeply burdened for the atrocities they have and are committing. My soul cries for the hate to stop, for the mercy of God to reside in the hearts of all men. My soul cries for peace on earth and good will to all.

 And I hear that still small voice saying "yes child", "pray for them, pray for this world, pray for grace, pray for mercy, pray for peace, and be a light."

 What does the Lord require of me? "He has told you, O man, what is good; and what does the Lord require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God." Micah 6:8

 

It is funny how God teaches us things, how numerous little things all come together across an expanse of time, all pointing at the same lesson, some subtle, some not so subtle. At some point, your eyes open wide and you get it…..and you exclaim.

 God has been doing that of late with me, many little lessons, many little road signs, all pointing to this one great truth….We are Jesus to the world. We are indeed the Fifth Gospel.

Matthew

Mark

Luke

John

Us

  I know a certain someone, whom I will not name here. His heart is big; it is very possible that his heart is the truest and the biggest of his entire family.

 He does not walk with Jesus, he does not know Jesus, or should I say that he does not know the real Jesus. He has seen what he thinks is Jesus, in many members of his family. Seen the stares, seen the disdaining looks, the turned up eyebrows. Heard the words of this Jesus in the mutterings, the things he hears from others who tell him that this Jesus does not want them to hang around with him, would prefer that they stay away.  He understands that He is outside the grace and mercy of this Jesus that he sees in them. His mistakes are too great for this Jesus to forgive. He should have gone to college, he should have gotten a real job, he should have….he should have…….he simply should not be who he is, nor should he have the things he has.

 He feels judged, condemned, misunderstood, unwelcome, unloved……by the Jesus he sees in their eyes.

 It breaks my heart to see this, to know that that instead of love and grace, instead of mercy and forgiveness, he sees judgment, he sees condemnation.  My heart breaks and I pray that it might be possible that God would allow him to see Jesus in me, I do not get to see him much, do not get to speak to him of these things he has seen, I only know second hand how he feels, what he has seen, how he must take in this false gospel of us.

The person of whom I speak has made mistakes in this life, has turned to things that were outside the law, but at the same time he has accepted full responsibility for every choice, another thing that makes him different from his critics. A lot of things have gone wrong, but he keeps pushing on, doing the best he can with the hand life has dealt him, a hand that he acknowledges responsibility for. Soon he will be moving on to a new life, where he will try and rebuild things, try to make things work. He will take the Jesus that he sees with him. Oh Lord let him see the real You, let him take the real You with him when he goes! Lord be merciful to him, go before him, pour out Your great grace and mercy upon him…..as You poured it out upon them…upon us. Forgive Your people for their lack of grace, and redeem that which is lost, that which was done wrong, that which showed to this lost one the wrong Jesus, the wrong gospel.

  We are a living gospel. We are His hands, His feet, and His voice. They watch us, so much more closely than you think. They take in each and every thing you do, each and every thing you say, they know that you profess Christ, and they watch you, to see if you are different, to see if you live what you say you believe. Think carefully.   Have you forgotten where you once were? Who you once were? Have you forgotten that there, but for the grace of God, go you?

 We are to live in grace, we are to show forth grace, we are to love and accept and forgive. It is not given us to change people with our looks, our condemnation nor our judgments, it is given us to love and preach the gospel. We can preach it with words, but we should also preach it with our very lives.

 I too have shown forth the wrong Jesus. I too have judged others, and failed to give grace, failed to extend acceptance and love. We all do. But we ought not.

 God forgive us for our failures, and redeem them. May our hearts shine forth Your great grace and mercy. I pray today, that You would remind me before every my mouth opens, before ever my gaze looks into another's eyes of this one question Lord....may it reverberate in my mind throughout my day......"If I am the only Jesus they see, and they are asked to describe Jesus, how will they describe Him?"

“A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another.”

“Do nothing from rivalry or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others.”

“Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God. Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love. In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through him. In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins. Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.”

“Above all, keep loving one another earnestly, since love covers a multitude of sins. Show hospitality to one another without grumbling”

“Make allowance for each other’s faults, and forgive anyone who offends you. Remember, the Lord forgave you, so you must forgive others.”

“Then the king called in the man he had forgiven and said, ‘You evil servant! I forgave you that tremendous debt because you pleaded with me. Shouldn’t you have mercy on your fellow servant, just as I had mercy on you?”

“…the one who says he abides in Him ought himself to walk in the same manner as He walked.”

“Therefore be imitators of God, as beloved children; and walk in love, just as Christ also loved you and gave Himself up for us, an offering and a sacrifice to God as a fragrant aroma.”