4 The cords of death entangled me; the torrents of destruction overwhelmed me. 5 The cords of the grave coiled around me; the snares of death confronted me.
6 In my distress I called to the Lord; I cried to my God for help. From his temple he heard my voice; my cry came before him, into his ears.
16 He reached down from on high and took hold of me; he drew me out of deep waters.
When I put these verses together, I read my life. I read my struggle with mental illness. I read my salvation from suicide.
Today I am thankful there is no pit deep enough, that his love can not reach down and resue me.
Matthew 5:14-16 (MSG):1Here’s another way to put it: You’re here to be light, bringing out the God-colors in the world. God is not a secret to be kept. We’re going public with this, as public as a city on a hill. If I make you light-bearers, you don’t think I’m going to hide you under a bucket, do you? I’m putting you on a light stand. Now that I’ve put you there on a hilltop, on a light stand—shine! Keep open house; be generous with your lives. By opening up to others, you’ll prompt people to open up with God, this generous Father in heaven.
I read the above verses from Matthew this week and jumped for joy! I found a way I can serve God, by serving others. He has created me to be a light in this world filled with darkness. Created to bear light with the power to dispel the darkness wherever I go.
Do you realize what this means? You, my friend, are a superhero! However, this is much more powerful any superhero power! My light is the word of my testimony. It is my past and all of its good and ugly experiences. My voice is my light. It will show the pathway to survive anxiety, depression, and PTSD by leading people to the one true Light of this World.
God did not create us to sit in pews on Sunday morning and the occasional holiday. He did not create us to read and pray, then do nothing about it. He created us to be a light to this world. We come to bear the light of Jesus by the power of the Holy Spirit. We are to open our mouths and share with people, love people, hold people and take them to the one who can heal them and prepare them to be more light in this world.
Whatever experiences you have dealt with in your life, these are your passions. These are the stepping stones to lay out for others who travel the same road. Let your voice be heard. Let your light shine. Tell people they are not alone. You have been there and done that. Wear your superhero cape with pride! You are no longer Clark Kent. You are SUPERMAN!
Galatians 5:1So Christ has truly set us free. Now make sure that you stay free, and don’t get tied up again in slavery to the law.
Every battle begins in the mind, at least that is what I have been told every time a New Year comes around and the infamous resolutions come out. Actually, I don’t care if it is a new year, new month, new job, new relationship or new whatever! I tend to have the same idea. This is a fresh start and I won’t let blah blah blah happen again!
Now, don’t get me wrong, I am all for fresh starts and beginning again. I mean that is what grace is all about. What I need to remember is to not let my new goals enslave me. I must find a way to keep balance in my life without chaining myself down. The minute I chain myself down I will break my “rule” and then I will hate myself and get frustrated and just walk away from it completely. That will get me nowhere!
Religion can sometimes get that way also. We get caught up in all the “rules” of the church and forget God set us free from the pomp and circumstance when He sent Jesus to die for us. We don’t practice all the old rituals. They are not what the new covenant is all about. The new covenant is about two simple things, love God and love others. Do those two things and everything else will fall into place.
If WE, as what my pastor husband likes to refer to as the Big C- Church, remember those two simple things, we will find it much easier to commune with the lost. If WE can concentrate on love and not let things like the way a person dresses, speaks, what he eats or drinks, smokes, the way acts, or who he is involved with, get in the way WE can show them what Christ was really about.
If WE can just love our neighbors, we will win the battle in our minds and truly be set free.
Habakkuk 3:18 yet I will rejoice in the LORD. I will be joyful in God my savior.
When depression, anxiety, and PTSD hit, they take me down, down deep into the pit. I feel like I am drug swiftly and hard. I grab for anything around to hold on to, but it breaks within my grasp. I can see I am losing touch with reality, but I cannot stop it.
The weight is heavy on my heart and mind. The darkness surrounds and swallows me up. It is too late. No turning back now. I must survive.
How long will it last?
How deep will I go?
Will I find my way back?
Am I lost forever this time?
I don’t know. I need to focus on surviving this moment.
I need to laugh. I need to smile. I need to fight back.
I’m too tired. It hurts. I have nothing left in me.
Then, I hear it, a small distant voice. I am not sure if I am imagining it. It is so faint. “Let Go. Let me hold you.”
Soon, I catch a glimpse of a very faint light. A flicker. It takes all my remaining strength to focus on this beautiful sound and light. I fight the urge to turn away. Then I let go. I don’t fight. I just sit and wait.
A familiar peace starts warming my soul. The light brightens. The voice gets louder. It soon repeats in my heart, “yet I will rejoice in the LORD. I will be joyful in God my savior” (Habakkuk 3:18).
My lips tremble at first. My voice is silent. No air passes my vocal cords, not even a squeak. I am being choked and cannot scream out for help.
I press on with determination from deep within. “Let your voice be heard” starts pounding now, in my head. LET! YOUR! VOICE! BE! HEARD!
My lips part. They begin to move, “yet I will rejoice in the LORD. I will be joyful in God my savior.” Again! AGAIN! A-G-A-I-N!
My voice is now booming. The darkness struggles to hold on. It loses its grip. It scrambles and tightens its talons, but I slip through.
My strength returns. I stand up tall and straight. The light around me is so bright. The voice is loud and harsh and together we dispel the darkness.
Key Verse: 1 Peter 4:8 Above all, love each other deeply because loves covers over a multitude of sins.
Christianity is not a restaurant and the bible is not a menu. You don’t get to pick and choose what you want and when you want it. You can’t choose one verse to judge or condemn someone and then another to set you free.
You have no right to hate anyone for any reason. You have a right to disagree. You have a right to not participate. you even have the right to an opinion. You DO NOT have a right to not love one another (1 Peter 4:8), not to offer hospitality to one another (1 Peter 4:9), or not offer grace to one another (1 Peter 4:10).
Jesus didn’t just hang with other Christians and shun everyone else. As a matter of fact, the only people he shunned and rebuked were the hypocritical, holier than thou, religious leaders. Read that again! THE. RELIGIOUS. LEADERS.
Wow! Hold the bus! You mean Jesus didn’t go around hating on the sinners? Nope! He hung out with them. He loved them. He showed them what being a Christian was supposed to look like, LOVE not hypocrisy!
There is a good reason the story of the woman brought to him by those so-called “religious leaders” is in the gospel of John (8:1-11). They came to ask him to condemn her. He chose to teach them a lesson on grace, love, and forgiveness.
We have been on both sides of the fence in this story. We have been the woman so ashamed we thought for sure even Jesus himself would turn his back on us. We have also been the religious leaders, poised with a stone high above our heads ready to pounce and judge someone else.
Jesus offered grace, love, and forgiveness to the woman. He also offered it to the religious leaders. He gave them a chance to walk away from their lives. He told them to go ahead, throw that stone, but you better be darn sure you have no issues in your life because you will be next. However, walk away now, recognize your own faults and grace, love, and forgiveness are yours also.
Where do you stand today? Are you going to throw that stone or are you going to accept your own need for grace, love, and forgiveness? The best way to receive it is to offer it yourself.
Psalm 119:18 Open my eyes that I may see wonderful things in your law.
Have you ever ask God to open your spiritual eyes to show you the glimpses of glory you cannot see by yourself?
Without God’s help, we are simply “natural” persons with natural eyes. Paul reminds us, “The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand [see] them because they are spiritually discerned” (1 Corinthians 2:14).
The goal of our Bible reading and study is simply to know and enjoy Jesus. “Seeing they do not” was Jesus’s phrase for those who saw him and his teaching only with natural eyes, without the illumining work of the Spirit (Matthew 13:13). This is why Paul prays, “that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give you the Spirit of wisdom and of revelation in the knowledge of him, having the eyes of your hearts enlightened” (Ephesians 1:17–18).
By seeing through God’s eyes, we see the beautifully and wonderfully made children we are. We see each other as God’s children. We spend less time competing and more time serving.
Today, I hope you will join me in praying not just for the gift of spiritual sight, but for the gift of seeing wondrous things in God’s word and world around us.
Galatians 3:28 There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor female–for all of you are one in Christ Jesus.
My mom and I went to see the new Hotel Transylvania 3 Summer Vacation. Don’t worry I promise no spoilers. The idea behind this one is the same as the other two. Humans and monsters should be able to live together in peace.
This got me thinking about how we all should be able to look past our differences and live together in peace. I mean we are the ones that give ourselves all these titles, tags and labels.
I invite you for a moment to look through God’s eyes. When He looks at us, do you think He says,”Oh, there is Tabetha the overweight middle aged, conservative, Christian, dog lover from the midwest of America.” No! He does not! He doesn’t see any of these labels. These are all labels we humans have created to define ourselves.
It is perfectly Ok that we are different. Yes, we are different genders, ages, body types, religions, races, and cultures. We have different opinions on politics and even pet choices. However, those things were never meant to define us.
When labels begin to define us, we begin building walls. We create shackles that hold us back. We set boundaries. We decide what is wrong and right and who is wrong and night. We become haters.
Jesus came to set the captives free (Luke 4:18.) He came to free us from our defined labels. He brought grace to us so we could look through grace eyes. We could see each other just a God sees us, His children, holy and dearly loved (Colossians 3:12.)
We are to show mercy and grace to those who chose to define us and dislike us. As Murray the Mummy likes to say, “We gotta be greater than the haters!”
