Home Alone … Well, Not Really

My wife and daughter are in New York City with friends and family and Zach and I are bacheloring it. For supper tonight he has already had pizza, spaghetti, 4 small powdered donuts, and 2 strawberry pop tarts. I have some oven baked barbeque wings cooking.

Tomorrow my daughter Rebekah is singing at St Patrick’s Cathedral with the chorus from her last year’s school in Cape Coral, Florida. She was invited to sing with them again this year. Today her and her friends Sarah and Rachel had a birthday party at the American Doll Store and left with more than they went in with. I hear I bought my daughter a small doll for her American Girl Doll. They are doing the open top bus tour tonight.

Zachariah and I are doing well so far. I have stopped up one toilet but should be able to unplug it. He has hid the TV remote for the living room and, so far, has not revealed its hiding place. Hopefully it is not in the garbage. Yes I did look, but did not see it. I also looked under the couches, the tables, in the cabinets, bedrooms, closets, toy bucket, kitchen, drawers, bathrooms, the fridge and even the cat’s litter box.

God Is Also In The Ordinary

So here's what I want you to do, God helping you: Take your everyday, ordinary life—your sleeping, eating, going-to-work, and walking-around life—and place it before God as an offering. Embracing what God does for you is the best thing you can do for him. Don't become so well-adjusted to your culture that you fit into it without even thinking. Instead, fix your attention on God. You'll be changed from the inside out. Readily recognize what he wants from you, and quickly respond to it. Unlike the culture around you, always dragging you down to its level of immaturity, God brings the best out of you, develops well-formed maturity in you. (Ro 12:1-2 MSG)

If what God does has to be some big spectacular thing in order for us to recognize it as being His activity, then we will probably miss a lot of what God is doing around us. God is involved in the ordinary everyday living of life and is constantly revealing Himself, His purpose and His ways in ordinary life.

I like it when God shows up and does something incredible, but if that is the only time I am excited about Him or even recognize His activity around me, then I am mostly missing out on God’s involvement in my life and the lives of those around me.

We must live in the now, interacting with God and others in the present moment we are in. Anything other than that and we are disengaged with life, out of balance with its rhythm, and out of sync with God’s Spirit.

Let us cry out to God that we might see Him not only in His extraordinary supernatural dealings, but also in His involvement in the ordinary issues of life.

Wake Up, Pay Attention, And Pray

Let no debt remain outstanding, except the continuing debt to love one another, for he who loves his fellowman has fulfilled the law. The commandments, "Do not commit adultery," "Do not murder," "Do not steal," "Do not covet," and whatever other commandment there may be, are summed up in this one rule: "Love your neighbor as yourself." Love does no harm to its neighbor. Therefore love is the fulfillment of the law. And do this, understanding the present time (emphasis mine). The hour has come for you to wake up from your slumber (emphasis mine), because our salvation is nearer now than when we first believed. The night is nearly over; the day is almost here. So let us put aside the deeds of darkness and put on the armor of light. (Ro 13;8-12)

A few mornings ago the Lord seemed to be saying to me that this is not a time to have our eyes shut, to be not paying attention, or to be slumbering. It is a time to be awake and alert.

Shut eyes, drowsiness, and slumbering indicate a lack of understanding, a lack or ignoring of revelation, and inattentiveness to warning signs or problems.

For it is light that makes everything visible. This is why it is said: "Wake up, O sleeper, (emphasis mine) rise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you."
Be very careful, then, how you live—not as unwise but as wise, making the most of every opportunity, because the days are evil. Therefore do not be foolish, but understand what the Lord's will is. (Ep 5:14-17) (Emphisis mine)

We need to be paying attention to what is going on around us, what is happening in this country, and what is happening around the world. We need to be awake, alert, and prayerful.

Pray in the Spirit at all times and on every occasion. Stay alert and be persistent in your prayers for all believers everywhere. (Ep 6:18)

Be Present

Forget about what's happened; don't keep going over old history. Be alert, be present. I'm about to do something brand-new. It's bursting out! Don't you see it? There it is! I'm making a road through the desert, rivers in the badlands.
(Is 43:19 MSG)

Have you ever had someone start talking to you, and your mind was elsewhere and you neither heard them nor answered them. You will usually end up receiving a rather loud “Helloooooooooo, anybody there?” In that moment we were not living in the present.

When we are obsessed with the past, we are always looking back over our shoulders in time and are frozen in place, never able to move on. Disappointment with our present life and circumstances will result in us discrediting the present and always looking to the future when it is going to happen, what ever it may be, that will result in our being able to enter into our destiny, and again we are unable to move on. Either way we are neither living in the present nor in His presence.

We neither live in the past nor the future. We live in the here and now. If we are not alert and present, we will miss what God is saying and doing right now. Destiny is a journey to be lived out, not a destination to be arrived at. Value the journey, value the sights, value the places, value the people, and value His presence. When we are present, we give value to the things that are important, and we are engaged in the process of living out our destiny.

Steering Lesson

Then they were quite willing and glad for Him to come into the boat. And now the boat went at once to the land they had steered toward. [And immediately they reached the shore toward which they had been slowly making their way.]
(Jn 6:21 AMP)

The other evening the family and I went to the grocery store, pure adventure for the kids My son decided nothing would do except that he push the shopping cart. The last time I let him push the cart, he all of a sudden did a 180 with it and took off at high speed. Having learned from that experience (me, not him), I knew it would be needful for me to keep my hands on the cart and steer it.

Wow! What an adventure! He rocketed along at excessive speed while I tried to slow the pace, miss other shoppers and displays, steer in the direction we were supposed to be going, make stops so my wife could stock the cart, and all the while act like I was the one in control!

In the middle of it all I had a thought. Well, actually I had a lot of thoughts, but this one might have value. My thought was something along the lines of “Wow, this must be what it is like for God sometimes when He is guiding me.”

He guides me in the paths of righteousness for His name's sake.
(Ps 23:3 NASB)

Bad Tongue Moment

My dear brothers, take note of this: Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to become angry, for man's anger does not bring about the righteous life that God desires. (Jas1:19-20 NIV)


Most of us have had bad hair days. It is not something we usually enjoy because we do not want to be seen with ugly up on top of our heads. However, a bad tongue moment gives people a glimpse of the ugly in our hearts.

After a bad tongue moment the other day, I came to the same conclusion that I am sure others have already come to. That I sometimes live out the opposite of the above verse. I have been know to speak quickly and abundantly, listen poorly and misunderstand, and be angered easily because of being overly sensitive or misinformed.

In Matthew 12 we see that out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks. What comes out of us when we are jostled speaks loudly about what is inside of us. When what comes out is displeasing to God, we need to take appropriate steps.

Proverbs 10:19, which is worded When words are many, sin is not absent, but he who holds his tongue is wise, should surely slow down how quickly we speak and the amount of words that we say. A good prayer about this is ‘Set a guard over my mouth, O LORD and keep watch over the door of my lips. May the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be pleasing in your sight, O LORD, my Rock and my Redeemer.’ (Ps 141:3; 19:14)

I came across the following prayer by Don Schwager and it also seems to fit here: "Lord, make me an instrument of your peace. Where there is hatred let me sow love. Where there is injury let me sow pardon. Where there is doubt let me sow faith. Where there is despair let me give hope. Where there is darkness let me give light. Where there is sadness let me give joy."

John Dixon Wilson

Born December 12, 1919
Crossed Over March 2, 2008

The Passing Of John

For we are to God the aroma of Christ among those who are being saved and those who are perishing. To the one we are the smell of death; to the other, the fragrance of life. And who is equal to such a task? (2 Cor 2:15-16)

John is surrounded by life as he is passing from life to Life. The sounds of family life fill the air around him. Those he loves, sit and love him. Those he used to stroke, now stroke him. He may be passing from this earth, but the earth has been changed by his love. Generations surround him who have been effected by his love. Loved ones celebrate his love, and loved ones who have passed over await his arrival. John won’t need his wheel chair anymore - he will be able to soar. He will live above, yet he shall live on in the hearts of those he loved and those who love him. We are his legacy, the fruit of his life.

Let us remember the words of Micah 6:8

He has told you, O man, what is good; and what does the Lord require of you but to do justice, to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God?

John’s Poem

My family and friends got to say goodbye
I saw my children’s faces one more time
I held hands with my Rosa who was at my side
Yes, we all got to say goodbye

Preparations were made for me to pass
And my body prepared for the grave
All was quiet in the room as I left
And I was free at last

Family and friends were waiting for me
Here and the other side
One group waiting with me to pass
The other for me to arrive

Don’t mourn for me that I have passed
For I am looking into the face of Christ
It was worth all that has been
For I am with Him at last

Yes, we all got to say goodbye
And then I was free at last
There were others waiting for me to arrive
And I’m with Jesus at last