making much of JESUS

It's the night before Good Friday

Good because 

Jesus, God the Son

obediently

gave His Life

as a payment for my sins

God killed Him

sin needed to be dealt with

sacrifice needed to be made

God the Son,

the lamb without blemish

the ultimate and the only sufficient one.

heart wrenching

every year

so very, very important to remember

came back from Israel two weeks ago, reality driven deeper into my soul

 experienced more intimately

thankful that through what He did, I, a Gentile

 was now able to be added to the family

thanks to 

my brother,

Jesus

full of passion for Him, my heart overflowing with a love like no other for Him,

teaching on the Early Church this week

I challenged the ladies that we too need to live like they did

doing life together, 

authentically

serving, loving, encouraging, supporting, learning, 

drawing closer and closer to Him

together

standing up and speaking truth

sharing who He is with all those around us,

 in deed and word,

and love

a friend shared this:

Gospel Truth + Gospel Culture = Power

tonight,

tomorrow 

and every day

I want to make much of Jesus

I want to live in such a way 

that others can see that He is indeed who He said He is

God's Son,

the King of Kings

the Lord of Lords

with Him as my Lord,

with the Holy Spirit in me

I can choose not to sin,

forgive instead of becoming bitter

consider others more important than myself

bringing His light into dark situations.

By His unending grace and for His sake.

We NEED to!

..obedient to the point of death... Israel take three / Caiaphas' house

the house of Caiaphas... the night before the crucifixion..
in the pit, an old cistern, let down by a rope, or maybe with a ladder...
left alone there for the night.
Jesus.
He knew what was going to happen.
all man.
all God.
He could have freed Himself, easily.
He could have changed it all.

but... for the joy set before Him He decided to stay.
instead he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.

He did that for me.



a week ago,
I too was in that place

so humbling, to be in the exact same spot where God, the Son surrendered Himself to go ahead and pay the price for my reconciliation to the Father.

challenged to consider what I needed to surrender it didn't take long for me to come up with it.

I knew it before. I have been struggling with this for a long time.
it just has been highlighted once again in the last few months.

the need to protect my children.

it's as "easy" as that.

all I have ever known, seen in my life has been the mother trying to protect the children from the cruel and heartless treatment by the father.
my mother was still trying to do just that right before she died.
sad, considering that the "child" she was trying to protect was 51 at the time.
what seemed necessary when we were small definitely was out of place and rather detrimental even for that grown child later.

as a mother I too felt that need. I think as much as I learned as a follower of Christ that I needed to trust the Lord for them rather than trying to defend them all the time, I struggled.
truth is most of the conflict between my Ex-husband and I was about the children.
I learned to not get involved, not get in the middle as they got older, that my intervention actually made things harder for them...

once divorced I could only watch from afar and pray, and if needed help to put the broken pieces back together. I prayed a lot.

sadly lately I have been feeling a little more protective once again.
never expected a scenario like this, I guess it is just another consequence of broken families.

God is bigger than this and I just didn't want to stand in His way anymore.

so I surrendered.

I don't know about Jesus, I would assume that surrendering once was enough for Him.... after all, He is God and I am not.
My prayer is I won't pick it up anymore.
But rather leave it in God's capable hands.

when He gave Himself up for those the Father had given Him He did so in obedience to the Father.
when I give up my need to protect my child I do so trusting Him to love her more than I.
I trust that His plans are indeed to prosper, not to harm.
that all He allows or orchestrates is for His glory and for our good.

He is GOOD. All the time!

Thank you Jesus for what you have done for us.

living life on the altar...as a living sacrifice... Israel take two

I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God,

to present your bodies as a living sacrifice,

holy and acceptable to God,

which is your spiritual worship.......

Romans 12:1

have I told you how much I LOVE memorizing scripture??? I really do love it!!!

this is one of the verses that I have memorized! so good to dwell on the Word...

since leaving Israel on Wednesday lots has been going through my mind.. can I say my faith is even more real to me since seeing the places where it all happened... not that it was not real before.. the visual of those 10 days is being combined with what His Spirit has been showing and teaching me  over the last 24 years... it's amazing...

this morning in church during worship time I felt even more uplifted and moved than before... and I am emotional always..

at the Garden Tomb, from where you can see the place where Jesus most likely was crucified and where we looked at a grave that could very well have been the one that He was buried in, we had a sweet time of communion and sang Amazing Grace together... for me that was the most touching time of the whole trip... singing His praises this morning I thought if there was anything I would love to do differently if ever I went back it would be that I would want to take the time to sing His praises in all those places.. 

coming back to the scripture... living our lives as living sacrifices...... not like all the goats and lambs and doves who had to be killed.. but alive, continuing to live,  surrendered, fully sold out.. giving up everything, our whole lives... living in a way that keeps us without blemish like the animals had to be, not possible without what Jesus has done for us on the cross, when He offered His body as the ultimate sacrifice... how does this work itself out in our every day life situations..

when we are hurt, disappointed and wounded, when life is hard and boring and frustrating... will we take these moments as ministry opportunities? will living a life on the altar make us more like Jesus as we choose to do what is so against our nature: forgive, keep on loving, honoring, fervently serving, humbly surrendering to His sovereign will in our lives???

as we were driving home from church, in a nice car, going back to a nice house, in safety and comfort my thoughts were : How can we not????? 

having been in the place where Jesus chose suffering because that was what God's will had for Him, when He decided to consider this suffering to be pure joy because it was going to allow us full access to the Father.... even though we ourselves had destroyed that relationship in the first place..... How can we not ....

live as an ambassador for Him, bringing glory to Him, by His Grace and strength alone obviously.....

How can we not worship Him as living sacrifices... giving our all, always?????

walking in His footsteps... Israel take one

still dizzy from my travel induced vertigo, sick with a cold I have been fighting for a week, waiting for the next load of laundry to be done and just not quite up to go grocery shopping yet, I am listening to an old favorite song I was reminded of by a blog post from 7 years ago......

"... sometimes I wish I  lived when Jesus was walking this earth, I would have wanted to be Mary, sitting by His feet and listening to what He had to say, soaking in His presence, basking in His gentleness and love.... hearing truth , spoken by the "Way the Truth and the Life"..... but then I would have had to go through the heartache of losing Him, seeing Him again, just for Him to leave for good... to have known Him "personally" though would have been so amazing... wondering if I would have loved Him more than I do now... or believe in Him more...

Though you have not seen him, you love him; and even though you do not see him now, you believe in him (1 Peter 1:8 )

Loving Him, enjoying His presence.. staying at His feet, pouring out my love, my heartache and my sadness... my joy and my excitement... my worries and my brokenness...letting go of any selfish notion.. makes me think of a new favorite song...

Here before Your altar

I am letting go of all I've held

Of every motive, every burden

Everything that's of myself

And I just wanna wait on You, my God

I just wanna dwell on who You are

Beautiful, beautiful

Oh, I am lost for more to say

Beautiful, beautiful

Oh Lord You're beautiful to me

Here in Your presence

I am not afraid of brokenness

To wash Your feet with humble tears

I would be poured out till nothing's left

And I just wanna wait on You, my God

I just wanna dwell on who You are

I just want to dwell on who He is, how much He loves me, how much I love Him, and how I can serve Him and follow Him... "


returned two nights ago from a 10 day visit to Israel. the amount of impressions, information and emotions is totally overwhelming... percolating, as always, the Lord, the Spirit, His Word and His nearness... walking on roads and steps He walked on, overlooking landscapes He was overlooking, sailing on the Sea of Galilee, like He was... standing in the places of His suffering, dwelling on who He was and is... I am getting new glimpses of my Jesus.....  too much to process right there and then I am excited what He will show me through all of this..

having studied the Old Testament over the last 6 months more intensely, being where King Hezekiah ( my absolute fav king, what can I say ) build a tunnel to have a source of water in the city in case of a siege by the Assyrians, just almost blew my mind....

one of the words that are bubbling up through all of this is AWE.... total AWE ..

from the beginning, we, God's creation, have always messed up so royally, it is almost incomprehensible that He has not totally ERADICATED us...
but instead He kept on forgiving, He kept on hearing the cries of His people, coming to their rescue, again and again...

MERCY... GRACE... not getting what we deserve and receiving what we do not deserve....

all of the Old Testament makes one very clear point.... mankind is not able to live up to what God rightfully expects of us... we are irredeemable ...

HE, the Redeemer had to come, goats and lambs were never going to be enough of a sacrifice to atone for our relentless sin... not until He came... and He did....
never have been able to get my head around this, and I never will, I am sure until I see clearly, not like in a mirror.. when He finally calls me home to spend eternity in His presence, finally...

His love is uncontainable and I want to sit at His feet, I want to absorb it all, down to the last little bit... and with it, I want to love Him back and those He has put into my path... so as to not hinder Him from accomplishing what He wants to accomplish through me... that they too would know Him... and that He would receive the glory and honor He deserves... it is and will always be only about HIM!

SOLI DEO GLORIA