SPIRITUAL DEMENTIA HAPPENS

Hebrews 11:7b

“He {Noah} obeyed God, who warned him about things that had never happened before.”

I’m in the middle of things that have never happened before.  Are you?  Maybe these things have happened to other people, but not to you, and not to me.  And even so, since they’ve never happened to me or you, because of God’s great creativity in making you & me, those same things are now different, since they’ve never happened before in our lives.

I’m facing the loss of my mother to dementia.  Dementia is a terrible disease:  the slow fading away of a loved personality, the morphing of a person into someone unknown, the slipping away of a sharp mind into a shadow-world where no one can follow, and the fear that someday I will  follow her into that gray place.  Words can’t convey what dementia is.  The only medium for explanation is personal experience.

God knows her, though.  He is there with her in that place where she lives.  He can understand her fears, her paranoia, her need to escape.  I can take comfort in that.  When He spoke her into motion, He knew this day would come.  She is no less His today than she was when she was 12 and meeting Him for the first time.

I’ve been thinking about the spiritual dementia in my life.  I forget God’s goodness when I experience loss or when I don’t get my way.  I major on minors, like my mother worrying over not having a car anymore (and what would she do with a car?).  When I’m slighted, I get irritated, as if being slighted has any eternal significance at all!  Sometimes I make up stories to explain away my insignificance in the universe; my mother is sometimes a spy, a much-sought-after “person of interest” in a non-existent crime she witnessed, or the victim of abuse who needs sympathy and support.

There are many spiritual lessons to be learned from experiencing dementia close-up and personal.  I watched my mother the other day trying to find the fish she had secreted in the cast on her wrist; of course, there was no fish, but she spent a good share of visiting time looking for and stressing over this fish.  

And it occurred to me, how much time do I waste looking for something that isn’t there while ignoring what is right there in front of me?  Is He watching me like I was watching my mother, with pity and sympathy, trying to get me to see what He sees?  Maybe He wants me to see my co-worker’s need instead of focusing on some insignificant want in my own life.  Maybe He is asking me to step up and out of my little boxed-in comfort zone and risk something for another’s soul.

Maybe, just maybe, as I go and visit my mother frequently, there might be some ministry opportunity in that place where she lives.  Who knows?  I need to find that box-cutter!

Father, please help me to use this opportunity

To learn all that You want me to learn, and then by Your

Grace get out of my boxed-in comfort zone and use all that

Learning to display Your majesty to those in my world and in

My mother’s world.  Amen.

AM I IGNORING?

Hebrews 2:3a

“For what makes us think we can escape if we ignore this great salvation …”

I used to think this verse was only for unbelievers-those who have yet to trust Christ for salvation.  Not anymore!

This verse is for me.  My salvation is in progress.  Yes, I have trusted Christ as my personal Savior and He will bring me to His house when I die or He returns.  Those are settled facts.  But He continues to help me “work out my salvation with fear and trembling”. (Phil 2:12) 

So, having said that, what’s the next logical thought?  It’s this:  how do I ignore this great salvation?

Well, it’s simple.  I ignore this great salvation …

• ·       when I deliberately choose to ignore God’s commands to me

• ·       when I go my own way instead of His

• ·       when I don’t forgive

• ·       when I say by my words and actions, “Nevertheless, not Your will but mine be done”

I can fill in the blanks with heaped up sins in my own life.  Can you?  Will you?

Let’s NOT ignore this great salvation!  Let’s pay close attention to it!  As God helps us “work out our salvation”, He is glorified, we are blessed with His nearness, and our paths cross with people who need to hear about this great salvation-and we’ll be in the right place to tell them.

Father, please help me today to not ignore this great salvation!

Thank You, Father!  Amen.

NO FEAR!

Acts 5:11

“Great fear gripped the entire church and everyone else who heard what had happened.”

Henry Blackaby says in several of his books that believers today have lost the fear of God.  I believe it.  I believe it because I know my own heart!  I sin so casually, not counting the cost to myself nor to those who are watching me.  And worst of all, I “forget” the nails!

Loss of the fear of God plagues the church today.  We go our own way, deliberately disobeying God’s command to “be holy” as He is holy.  He’s not asking us to be perfect; He’s commanding us to be obedient.  He’s not asking us to be little robot believers; He’s asking us to willingly make the daily choice to fit our feet into His footsteps, to allow His heart to grow into ours so that His agenda is accomplished.

The fear of God is a magnificent thing!  It’s what gives me access to His wisdom, His peace, His plan.  It’s what keeps me out of trouble and allows me to worship Him in Spirit and in Truth.  It’s what makes His presence in my life evident to those around me.  As they say, “A little fear is a healthy thing!”

Father, please teach me daily to fear you reverently;

To walk with you, not cowering in fear, but

With my hand in Yours, always with my eyes firmly fixed

in Your direction so I don’t wander off the path

You’re walking.  I love You, my King!  Amen.

LET'S ROCK & ROLL!

Mark 16:3-4

“On the way they were asking each other, ‘Who will roll away the stone for us from the entrance to the tomb?’  But as they arrived, they looked up and saw that the stone, which was very large, had already been rolled aside.”

Can you picture this?  We don’t bury people inside caves anymore.  And when we do bury people, we have backhoes to dig the grave.  So this picture is one we really have to think about and conjure up.

The women were on their way to the tomb thinking about the obstacle they would have to overcome once there.  They were wondering out loud, they were trying to make a plan, they were worrying about that large rock in their way.  What to do?  Could they possibly move it themselves?  Not likely!  Could they hire someone or several someones to do the job?  Also not likely-all they had on them were the burial spices and linens for Jesus.  And dynamite was out of the question, of course!

Imagine their surprise when they arrived and “saw that the stone, which was very large” had already been pushed aside by someone!  The Scriptures say the women were shocked. (vs 5)  And not only was the rock out of their way, but there was a lone young man all dressed up in white sitting there!  You can read the rest of the passage to find out what happened next.

How many times have I had a large stone in my way?  How many times have I stewed about it, tried to figure out a way to move it myself, climb over it, go around it, get some dynamite to get the thing out of my way?  God sometimes places large rocks in our way.  (Or sometimes we put them there ourselves, called disobedience, then wonder why we can’t move forward.)

The point is this:  God had already moved the rock for these women.  He knew it was there and what He would do about it before the women even got up that morning!

There are always obstacles when we serve God.  We might as well just accept that. But He knows they’re there and what He’s going to do about them!  So, I’ll just stop worrying about them and trying to get around them.  I’ll rest in the thought that as long as they’re there, God is still teaching me and He’ll move them when He’s good and ready.  I just need to keep watching Him so I’m good and ready when He does!

Father, thank You for the large stones in my life.  Please help

Me to trust You with them; You will move them or not

Move them as You see fit.  Amen.

THAT OLD ROOSTER

Mark 14:19

“… am I the one?”

As Jesus looked at the Twelve seated around the table with Him, His heart must have been bursting with joy and sorrow at once.  He knew where He was going but His beloved disciples didn’t yet grasp it.  And then He had to say the hard thing to them.

“I tell you the truth, one of you eating with me here will betray me.” 

And with those words, the tone of the evening changed again.  The disciples, by now, had an inkling that Jesus wasn’t there to overthrow the Roman oppressors.  They knew that the plans they’d harbored in their hearts were not in His.  But this?  One of them a betrayer, a traitor?  Unthinkable!  They began looking around at each other.  Which one?  Slowly, I think, very slowly, their eyes turned inward, as they wondered, “Am I the one?” 

It’s always like that, ever since Adam and Eve pointed at each other in Eden.  It takes God awhile sometimes to force us to ask ourselves, “Am I the one?”.

So, I ask myself as I read this passage:  Am I the one?  Have I betrayed Jesus?  The sad answer is “yes”. 

Each time I do not respond to God’s Spirit with a “Yes, Lord!” I am the betrayer!  God requires immediate, complete obedience from His children.  For the creature to say to the Creator “maybe later”, or “You can’t possibly want me to do THAT”; or “I don’t think You understand my gifts, Lord.  I’m not the right person for that job” is disobedience, betrayal.

I betray Jesus when I study a passage of Scripture and immediately apply it to someone else instead of to myself.  I betray Jesus when I hear the voice of God and ignore it.  I can hear the rooster crowing as I type these words!  Am I the one?  Yes!

Father, please forgive me for being the one!  Please

Help me to follow closely in Your footsteps, instead

Of “standing out in the courtyard” as Peter did.

May I recognize the rooster crowing every single time

And immediately repent of my betrayal.  Amen.