As I was starting my devotions this morning I had a couple situations on my mind needing attention and I was unsettled because I knew how I would deal with them would not be as a new creation.  I was delaying until I had insight.  God showed it to me this morning.  In the book The Nature of Freedom it says:  “Grace doesn’t see what is wrong, but sees what is missing.”  That really hit me as truth.  However, I still didn’t know how to see what was missing.  All I could see was what was wrong.  As my devotions continued and I got to journaling, I asked God to help me with this.  He pointed out that throughout my life my problem has been largely with fear.  What was missing for me was trust.  He is now teaching me to replace my fear with trust.  As I applied this to the situations I wanted to address I could easily see the missing elements.  I don’t need to address at all what is wrong.  Addressing what is missing takes care of the wrong.  God is so magnificent!

Today is a beautiful spring morning.  What is even more beautiful is the love and grace of our God, Jesus and Holy Spirit.  Learning to trust them and to actually know how to trust them is simply amazing.  How long I have waited to learn this.

Today started with getting 4 grandkids to their respective schools once they were up and fed.  It has been a while since Kathy and I have done this.  They made it fine and we did too.

God is showing me something that I’ve not ever experienced until now.  I am free and also a new creation.  He is wanting me to know that the chains of my past are not only broken and erased with Him but they are also broken and released from me.  I wish I could put into words what this freedom feels like.  Unless one has been severely bound over a lengthy period of time, it is hard to describe what this is like.

I feel like God and I are a team.  I know He’s my God, but now, after all these years, I no longer have a dread of what may be forthcoming.  I look forward to living the day and being part of whatever God has in store for me.  To God be all Glory!

The road trip yesterday to get my grandson was an adventure.  Most of the traveling was through desolate area in eastern Oregon.  A semi had flipped on its side blocking the entire highway in the middle of the afternoon.  As we came upon it we found it would be at least 2 hours until a wrecker could get to our location from Ontario, OR.  The weather was nice so we hiked the mountain sides.  We were able to have some excellent sharing time.  It is always an awakening for me realizing the changes that take place in our bodies during adolescence.  This time has equal impact on our thinking processes.  I want to be available for our grandkids during this time.  It is not good for us to hold this type of thinking in silence.  Satan has too much manipulative ability during this vulnerable time.

Today’s lesson in our Celebrate Recovery step study addresses journaling and its importance.  The key to it is holding us accountable to taking a look at our day and seeing where we need to make a correction and thank God for the successes.  Men are not good in this area.  Every guy in the group makes excuses as to why journaling hasn’t happened yet for them.  Each one tries it for a time but quickly stops the process before the habit is fully formed.

I began journaling as an assignment from the first counselor I had back in 1989.  I journaled off and on from that time until Celebrate Recovery started.  It gave journaling new meaning for me and the counseling I had from 2009-2012 added even more substance as well as doing it daily.  It has been the means for me to not only hold myself accountable, but it has also provided the means for God to reveal Himself to me much more intimately.  I pray for others to find this tool purposeful for their lives.  No, it isn’t an easy habit to start, but it is one of the good habits we want to develop and keep.

There may be an April Fools for man, but with God, there is no fool.  The beauty of following God removes the old fool we were–how I love that.

Have I told you how much I love spring?!  Today is one of those reasons–two days ago it was raining hard most of the day, yesterday it was windy all day and today it is gloriously calm, clear and sunny.  Nothing in spring is typical except the changes in weather.  Each change is short lived and then it changes again.  The changes always include sunshine.  The need for winter is important, but the assurance of sunshine is always present in spring. (Plus, my daffodils are in abundant bloom all over the yard)!

Today I make a 6 hour road trip to get one of my grandsons.  He has been spending the spring break week with his other grandparents and his dad’s family.  I enjoy the time we have to ride together.  Even though he sleeps some of the way, we always have good connecting time during the drive.  He’s in his early teens where long periods of silence are building.  There is so much happening in our bodies and lives during our teen years.  I want him to know I’m there for him and God is too.

I remember a few times when I was a teenager and my dad and I were in the pickup traveling to a rented field or to a place where dad was doing custom work and I was silent.  Not often, but a few times, he asked me why I was so silent?  I never did respond to the question.  Even then I knew I didn’t respond because I didn’t trust him and I always feared any response I’d get from him. I don’t want that kind of relationship with my kids or grandkids.  I pray for that relationship door to always be open between us.  We really do set an example for the trust our kids develop or lose during these years.

The assignment I said I needed to do yesterday was done and it was simple and easy.  I started to write that I don’t know why it was being faced with fear, but I know exactly why.  These situations in life, though not too often faced anymore, are always emotionally seen by me as a threat.  My reactions are as though I’m needed to challenge my dad with his actions and then face the consequences of that.  God showed me again yesterday that this situation was not with dad and it was so easily accomplished.

I love spring.  I think I’ve told this many times.  Today my little grandsons are with me again.  I have some plants to get in the ground which I know they will love to help with.  It is fun to do these things with them.  The one approaches these times like a science lesson and the other ones see them as an adventure of life.  Either way, it is a joy to experience life with them.

Yesterday I happened to see the name of someone on social media that I hadn’t been in contact with for well over 10 years.  We had gotten acquainted while Kathy and I lived our year in Turkmenistan.  We had begun to meet weekly while we were there for spiritual accountability.  He was a single guy wanting companionship and I was wanting accountability.  God used us to give help to each other and the friendship developed.  I’m sending him a book today.  It will be fun to connect to him afterwards.  He hasn’t been in touch since all of these current years have brought about significant changes for me.  God is so rich in His love and kindness.  I look forward to seeing Him work.

I am always amazed at God’s thoroughness and patience–He waits for us to be thorough in completing what He wants us to do.  A couple things happened yesterday I knew I was to do.  One had to do with a meeting for the Aslan ministry which went very well.  The other one was about helping my daughter take their bigger dog to a new home.  They were fearful of doing this.  However, she witnessed their dog falling in love with the new home.  I won’t go into all of this but it just made you smile.  There was one more thing I knew God wanted me to do yesterday that I didn’t do.  I didn’t do it strictly out of fear.  This morning God reminded me who He is and who He is not.  He is God my Father–intimate and the giver of Grace.  He is not the man I feared so much.  I will complete the unfinished assignment today.  I truly appreciate God’s loving patience with me. He is so faithful in helping me destroy the defects of character I still possess.

God is good all the time–all the time, God is Good.

If you read yesterday’s post, you will know that I had the conversation with my grandsons about pruning.  Well, the 7 year old didn’t bring his ipad with him yesterday.  He spent the entire day with me outside and we had a tremendous time.  I’m always amazed at the minds of little ones and how simple life’s decisions are for them.  How much we adults could learn by this.

The lesson last night with our 7-Pillars class for men with sexual addiction had us putting down facts which led us into an addiction.  We were then to tell specifically what the addiction was.  I have spent all these years overcoming the hurt of my past and coming out of the denial for the amount of it.  It is another thing I’m finding to come out of my denial in the addictive side of this.  It is painful to admit, but it is always freeing just as God promises.  I got home last night feeling raw but free.  During the night I kept having repeated dreams of my bother trying to abuse me.  He was being assisted by two people who were important to me during the times of my abuse and hurt, yet in this dream they were assisting his desire to abuse me.  I would wake up and question this but go back to sleep and it would happen again.  As I got up I knew I needed to take this to God and ask for clarity.  I’m always amazed by God’s help.  He told me the mind is a powerful tool.  Satan likes to manipulate it for which he can do with dreams.  He didn’t want the freedom I’m finding to be genuine so he was trying to confuse it by inserting two powerful people God gave me to help during the times when I was so vulnerable.  I didn’t need to believe what this dream was telling.  I could let it go as an attempt by Satan.  It was very freeing to do so.

God’s grace is abundant.  How much I am learning about it.  God Himself loves us intimately and He wants to free us of all our past bondage.  He then wants to give us a purpose for living each and every day without the bondage.   I want to stay right here with Him in this.

Yesterday I had my two youngest grandsons for the day and will again today.  They are on Spring Break.  We got our leather gloves on, grabbed the pruning tools, got the garden cart and proceeded to go to work trimming a row of plants called Russian Sage.  The boys are 5 and 7.  They were a great deal of help mainly putting what I was cutting into the cart so I could haul it to the burn pile.  While we were working I told them I’d pay them $5 each for their help.  They said, “Grandpa, you don’t need to pay us–this is FUN!”

In the midst of the pruning I was asked by the older one what pruning meant?  He hadn’t heard that word before and he is a lover of learning.  I told him we were cutting away the dead part of these plants and that was pruning.  I asked him if he had any habits that he needed to do away with?  He said he spent too much time on his ipad and he wanted to reduce the time.  I told him that would be pruning a habit.  I told him I was pruning a habit too.  We should always look at our lives and see what isn’t good so we can prune it.  That made perfect sense to him.

Today we are going to start gardening.  We will rototil a part of the garden and plant what can be planted this early in the spring.  I’m sure we will have just as much fun as yesterday.  God is Good!

Yesterday I was feeling like I would be well after all.  I had several things to get done early in the morning and then to church to be part of worship team.  Thus, I didn’t get the blog written.  Kathy had gone to McCall over the weekend with some of our grandkids and our youngest daughter.  She is staying until tomorrow with one granddaughter and friend while our daughter came back with the two youngest boys.  I’ll take the boys today and tomorrow as they are on spring break this week.  We will have good ole boy time!

Yesterday’s step study lesson with the new curriculum for Celebrate Recovery was on Habits.  I have finally learned that most of my past was dealing with hurts and the hang-ups (character defects).  It was good however to see the habits I’ve formed that are both good and wrong.  Most of the wrong ones I’m facing but something came out in doing the lesson I know I need to face.  God actually had me write a list of relationships I have with people close to me.  He asked me to identify if my actions with them were those of a new creation or of the old me.  It was sad but simple to do this.  It was sad because I immediately knew there are a couple of these relationships where I do deal with them almost always as my old self.  The conflict has run deep.  Today God is asking me to step into them as a new creation.  I’m not sure what that will mean but I do know I will do this.  I’m asking God to help me see what He sees and respond as He would.  I sure don’t want a close relationship being hampered with me being my old self.  It will never be pleasing to God until I go into it as the new person He created me to be.  What was a God-thing about this was that making the list wasn’t even part of the lesson.  God had me doing that a day before I’d done the lesson.  The lesson brought out the habit I’d created about responding to these relationships.  God is truly Amazing!

There will probably be more to report on this, but for now, this is the first step.

God is so Amazing.  He told me yesterday I am forever on His Mind.  That isn’t a problem for Him since He is Omnipresent.  He has no problem having all in the universe on His mind since that is Him.  It is difficult to wrap one’s mind around this thought, but I’m so grateful to know I can trust Him to be intimately connected to me as well as to all that exists.  It’s quite amazing!

Today I still feel rather rotten.  However, I’m up and going to the funeral so our quartet can sing.  God will take care of these details just as He does all others when we relinquish our control to Him.  This morning’s devotions had me write down all the things and the relationships I have–at least those God placed on my mind.  I was to then take a look at which ones are being handled as though I’m living as a new creation or as though I’m the old man I use to be.  It was rather easy to see this.  The triggers within each relationship and area of work are easy to see when one looks at them from this lens.  God is challenging me to be a new creation in all areas of my life.  It is sad to say that the ones closest to me are where I tend to be less aware.  I know God is wanting me to take me into these and so we will do so one one day at at time, one moment at a time.  Being a new creation in all areas of my life is my total commitment and surrender.  Here we go.