Yesterday I knew I was to have a conversation with the director who puts together the sites where I do my consulting. The zoom meeting was at 8:00 am. I knew I was going to talk with her regarding my new assignment of “lay counseling”. I was going to leave open whether I’d completely step away from all consulting or maybe limit the consulting to one site which means one day a week. When I told her what I had been asked to do she teared up. She said, “Earnie, this is exactly what God wants you to do. You’ve wondered what He would want for you and He has made it clear.” We both choked up. Shortly after this zoom meeting my phone rang and it was our senior pastor. He was calling for two reasons he said, one to thank me for this new step I was taking with the church and to let me know how much all of the pastoral staff supported this decision. I was just overwhelmed! Even now I keep taking deep breaths as I write this.
I must confess at this moment how much my flesh is screaming at me with the “what ifs”. What if we have to simply live on our retirement income? What if our kids have an emergency and need our financial help? What if something drastic happens to Kathy or me–we’re not young anymore? I keep hearing God’s Voice whisper that He is right here and He IS ALMIGHTY GOD. I know this and want to solidly believe without question. So I’m putting into place what the Serenity Prayer says, “One day at a time, one moment at a time….” I do believe and I do trust this wonderful God I serve. I also thank Him for this glorious opportunity to serve Him in this capacity.
I had a remarkable discovery take place this morning as I was having my bible reading. I have begun to read the book of Luke in The Passion. In the first chapter, vs. 37, it reads, “Not one promise from God is empty of power. Nothing is impossible with God.” As I read this I knew immediately it is true. However, just as immediate was the thought, “why Jesus if this is true, did you not keep the promise of I Corinthians 10:13 while I was growing up and even through all my adult years? This verse says in part,…”And each test is an opportunity to trust him more, for along with every trial God has provided for you a way of escape that will bring you out of it victoriously.” How do these two verses align with the abuse of my brother and dad and the torment of all my adult years?
As I began to reflect on this as a “new creation” I was reminded that the tools of a new creation were not in place for my use during all of these years. These tools are: belief, trust, faith. I have learned so much about believing who I am in Jesus Christ and who He is to me. I am learning to trust the unknown and have faith that God will and does use every ounce of our past for His Honor and Glory. Huge in this is the truth that God’s way of escape for me has been to keep me from ever participating in the abuse as I entered my adult years. Satan has always tempted for this to happen, but God has been fully faithful for me. Lastly, the grip of the past is broken and the past mess is now God’s message He and I use for His Honor and Glory! Praise God!
Today, after our two worship services, is our Celebrate Recovery (CR) leadership monthly meeting. I am to bring the devotion and provide the training for it. I usually have a training topic in mind for the meeting well in advance, but that was not the case this time. Yesterday, getting home from the Montana trip, I realized I needed to get this together. I was immediately “reminded” of The Spiritual Man I had been reading. In my present reading I kept thinking about the content’s application to our daily living and I should bring this insight to our CR leadership. So, after being reminded of this, I went ahead and put together the parts I’d highlighted from a series of chapters.
This morning as I was having my devotions I was impressed with the devotional reading. It was all about obeying the Holy Spirit within us and praising God for what He is doing that we know nothing about. I then realized I had the devotion in hand which God wanted me to use today and it perfectly coincides with the training I’d typed yesterday.
It is good to be home! I always think trips like this that take one away from routines of home feel like time warps. I get to the location and from that point until I get home I’m only focused on it. Then, after 2.5 days I’m home again and wonder, just what happened? Anyway, the trip was very worthwhile. The evidence of God’s work and His Light shining into darkness is obvious. The penetrating Light of Jesus exposed more darkness, and now He will shed continued Light in the ways to address it. God is so GOOD! All I need for today is a long nap this afternoon.
I got up at my usual early time this morning, had my devotions, took my shower and it still wasn’t time to go get the breakfast served at the motel. I was wondering why I had this extra time when I realized I hadn’t written my daily blog. So, now it is being done and I can go get breakfast because it will then be time.
Yesterday was a surprisingly good day. The meeting I’d had with the superintendent on Wednesday had brought to light some steps he could take but was reticent to do so. I texted him yesterday after lunch to see if he was ready to take them and if he’d set a time I’d join him. This was finally done and the meeting took place. It turned out to be a tremendous success in every arena. God is so good! I even had an extra hour before this particular meeting so I went to the elementary hoping I could address an issue which I wanted to step into ahead of today. As only God arranges, the person I needed to talk with was alone and wishing to talk also. Once again, it was a big moment of success.
Surrendering to God’s leadership and being obedient to His nudges is a big step of learning for me. I’ve always questioned these moments in my mind and often dismissed them. However, yesterday I acted on each nudge and it was truly the right thing to do. Learning to lean on Jesus fully is totally the right thing to do!
A few years ago I had purchased the book, The Spiritual Man by Watchman Nee (a Chinese Christian). It is a hefty book with three sections. At the time of purchase, I was wanting to grow my “spiritual walk” with God by learning more about God’s Spirit and my own. I got almost halfway through the book and stopped. It was far beyond me at that time. Yesterday I brought the book for reading on the plane to Montana and I’m so glad I did. It addresses exactly where my walk with God is today. My commitment this year to live 24/7 for Jesus each and every day is seemingly impossible. All I have done thus far is to awaken to the fact that I live most of every day from my own self.
Watchman talks abundantly about our intuition as The Holy Spirit’s voice within us. Our conscience is its home. I know these two realities and I know God uses them and wants me to do the same. Reading this yesterday was not only a good reminder from over a year ago’s reading, it is now what I need to read and apply to my daily living. Respecting these nudges as “commands” rather than suggestions is a “must do” for my daily walk. I am committing to this for today–one day at a time and one moment at a time as the Serenity Prayer guides us to do.
Today begins extra early as I have to be at the airport by 5:00 am heading to Montana for the 3 days with the school district. When I got up I couldn’t see lights out the kitchen window only to find it was snowing rather heavily. My first thought was to pray it left quickly but almost as immediately I wanted to praise God for we are in short supply of winter snow. God simply reminds me that my trust is to be fully in Him, not in the road conditions. He will always prepare the pathway where He wants His work to take place.
My early morning started with me coming into the kitchen to find my coffee brewed and all over the counter and floor. When I set it last night I hadn’t pushed the carafe fully into place so it simply let the coffee run around it and onto everything else. It’s cleaned now and I’ve had my two cups, but I had to do some quick “surrenderings” in order to keep my mind and emotions in place!
Today has some obstacles in it which I know about, but have little if any influence. I have given them to the One who does have full control if others will allow. He Alone is always the right answer to our issues at hand.
When I saw the coffee pot’s mess earlier I quickly thought this would be a picture of my day’s outcome. However, after having my devotional time with God I can see that a little mess can be simply that–a little mess. The work of this day is to be done with my obedience to God’s Leading. When this got squared away within me my inner self became peaceful. Boy, our God is GOOD!
It is a new day and the start of a new week. I had this repeated dream during the night regarding a couple of Easter songs which I’ve sung many times in years gone by. As I began my devotions the words of It Is Finished, 4th verse were singing in my head: “Yet in my heart, the battle still rages. Not all prisoners of war had come home. They were battles of my own making. I didn’t know that the war had been won.” It goes on to verse 5, “Then I heard that the King of the ages, had fought all the battles for me. And victory was mine for the asking, and now, Praise His Name–I am Free!”
I went to see my prayer warrior yesterday afternoon when the grandsons had gone home. I was taking her a picture of the men in our step study so she could be praying for each of them and knew their faces while she prayed. The time turned into a wonderful opportunity for praising God and her reminding me once again of who I am to God. Everyone needs a Lois in their lives and I’m so grateful for her being God’s gift to me.
It is amazing what one learns about himself when you begin to commit to fully opening yourself to God. I’ve never wanted to see myself as selfish. I always compared myself to my dad so it was easy to “not be selfish”. However, now that I’ve moved beyond this to seeing Jesus as my barometer, I am nothing but selfish.
When Spring begins to arrive all I want to do is spend my time out in the yard getting everything ready for another season. I no longer want to be going to schools, even though I love doing this in the winter giving purpose to those days. I want to stay focused on what “I want”. God is teaching me to listen to Him more and more about the use of my time and does it honor Him? There is no better time than right now for this lesson. Everything seems to be a priority and God wants me to start by asking Him to keep Him as my first and only priority. The others are blessings as He gives time for them. It is a new way of seeing each day’s purpose.
Earnie Lewis 