She laughed!

She has Alzheimer's.  She hasn't spoken or interacted with another human for as long as I've known her.  She sleeps all the time! 

But I discovered from her daughter that she is a Christian, loved studying the bible and had a passion for singing.  She loved the old hymns.

She lives in a facility I visit weekly.  I spend time with this sweet lady every time I am there.  This week I arrived as the facility sang hymns in the great room with the patients.  

My friend was there, asleep in her chair, as usual.  I sat with her and told her, "let's sing along!"  And I did!  No one would want to hear me sing, but I knew she wouldn't complain.  As each hymn concluded I spoke to my friend about our hope, about the great day when there will be "no more crying, tears or sorrow."  

At the end of one song that spoke of the great day when Christ will return I told my friend,  "won't it be wonderful when we have our new bodies, no more pain, no sorrow, we can run and jump and dance together!  Won't that be glorious? I can't wait."  

And she laughed!  SHE LAUGHED!!

I couldn't believe it, but I knew what she laughed about.  She was thinking of that great day too.  The day when we will see Jesus.

Having a hope is a wonderful thing, but it's even more glorious when the transformation will be as grand as the one my friend will experience.  I can't wait for the day when I see her running and leaping and praising God.  On that day I will laugh with her.

The Root of Bitterness

Dr. Adrian Rogers wrote these words on bitterness.  It's so important I copied his thoughts and wanted to share them here.  This is a subtle weed, one that, as Dr. Rogers says, "destroys the container."  I hope you will prayerfully work through this in your own life.  I have had to do so in mine. 

-Mike

The Root of Bitterness
Bitterness blows out the candle of joy and leaves the soul in darkness. Here is what God's Word has to say about bitterness:

Follow peace with all men, and holiness, without which no man shall see the Lord. Looking diligently lest any man fail of the grace of God; lest any root of bitterness springing up trouble you, and thereby many be defiled. (Hebrews 12:14-15).

The Germination Of Bitterness
The seed of bitterness is a hurt that is planted in someone. It may be intentional or unintentional. Someone does not mean to hurt you, but you were hurt. Sometimes the hurt is only imagined. No one has hurt you, but somehow you feel that someone has done something wrong to you. There are also times when the hurt may be the very chastisement of God upon your life. That is the context of Hebrews 12:14-15. 

The soil of bitterness is a heart that harbors hostility and does not deal with hurt by the grace of God. When someone becomes bitter, the bitterness takes root in the heart and grows deeper.
The world is full of people who have not dealt with an old hurt. They look for things to criticize, people to find fault with, and ways to justify the way they feel. Have you ever seen people who are hypercritical? Generally, they are bitter people. They know how to push your hot buttons until you react in a way to further justify their bitterness. Then, they can say, "Aha! I was right. I have a right to be bitter."

The Devastation Of Bitterness
We have learned about the seed and the soil of bitterness, now let's look at the root and the fruit of bitterness, which is found in our text from Hebrews 12:14-15.


The Root Of Bitterness
The root of bitterness is underground; it is easy to hide and camouflage. Seldom do you find anyone who will admit that they are a bitter person. They will either deny it or disguise it. A bitter person is hypersensitive, ungrateful, insincere, holds grudges, and has mood swings. The Fruit Of Bitterness
Bitterness will affect you physically, emotionally, and spiritually because the fruit of bitterness is an acid that destroys its container. When your heart is bitter, God will not be real to you be. Why? Because hatefulness and holiness do not dwell in the same heart. And without holiness you will not see the Lord (see Hebrews 12:14).

The Eradication Of Bitterness
There are three steps to eradicating bitterness:

1. Let God Reveal It.
Sometimes people say, "I know my heart, there's no bitterness in me." Truth of the matter is you don't know your heart. God's Word tells us, "The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?" (Jeremiah 17:9). A deceitful heart cannot diagnose a deceitful heart. You need to let God the Holy Spirit do radical surgery.

2. Let Grace Reveal It.
A response of bitterness is never right when someone has done something wrong to you. You need to ask God to forgive you, and He will by His grace. If someone has wronged you, cut it down and forget it. By the grace of God, bury that hurt in the grave of God's forgetfulness. Justice is God giving us what we deserve, mercy is God not giving us what we deserve, grace is God giving us what we don’t deserve.

3. Let Good Replace It.
Hebrews 12:14 says, "Follow peace with all men, and holiness, without which no man shall see the Lord." You cannot be holy unless you follow peace with men. It is so worth it when you forgive. But, you say, "Look what they've done! I am not going to let them off the hook." Well, they are not on the hook — you are! When you forgive, you set two people free and one of them is yourself.

You will discover that your life is more joyful when you uproot your bitterness. If God gave us justice, every person reading this would die and go to hell. Thank God for His mercy that removes His hand of punishment from us. Praise God for His grace that gives us a brand new life!

Just a glimpse

This morning I sat on the patio and watched the sun rise.  I watched the colors come and go in just moments.  If I had been 5 minutes late I would have missed it all.  It was a work of art by an amazing artist, but it was gone in moments.

And then I realized....it was just a glimpse of his glory, a moment to see his amazing artistry, to see a bit of what he is like.  He describes himself surrounded in light and color beyond our imagination.  

This morning I saw just a glimpse of it in the sunrise.  It was only a moment, but it made me realize he was revealing a bit of himself to us, a bit of his amazing glory and artistry to entice us to seek him and see more.

If this is just a glimpse imagine what it would be like to see what this amazing artist and creator is like all the time!  Glory and beauty are inadequate words to describe it.  We just don't have words for it, but one day we will see it...the glory revealed that is only hinted at in the sunrise.

This morning I saw God's brushes paint the clouds and simply said, "wow."  What an amazing God.

And others....

The topic of faith and what it looks like is quite confusing in our day.  For many faith is tied to outcomes.  It says, "if you have enough faith..."  In this view your faith is measured by quantity and judged by the outcome of what you believe.  "Well, I guess you just didn't have enough faith" is a frequent response to outcomes adverse to what the person was believing for.  It's a cruel system built on performance and results.  In this system it's your faith that gets it done and if it isn't done it's your fault.

But the Bible speaks of faith in such a different way!  The focus of Biblical faith is not the outcome, but the object.  In other words, it's not how much faith you have (Jesus said it didn't take much) but who your faith is in that matters.  If it only takes a mustard seed of faith to move a mountain it must not be the size of your faith that matters at all, but who your faith is in!  It's not the outcome of faith that is important, it's the object.

We miss that so easily.  Even in the chapter on faith, Hebrews 11, we easily see the faith giants based on outcomes, but none of them saw the outcomes they believed for and in fact, in this grand hall of faith are some who, in our day, would be told, "well, I guess you just didn't have enough faith..."

Here is their testimony from God,

"...And others braved abuse and whips, and, yes, chains and dungeons. We have stories of those who were stoned, sawed in two, murdered in cold blood; stories of vagrants wandering the earth in animal skins, homeless, friendless, powerless—the world didn’t deserve them! —making their way as best they could on the cruel edges of the world.

Not one of these people, even though their lives of faith were exemplary, got their hands on what was promised. God had a better plan for us: that their faith and our faith would come together to make one completed whole, their lives of faith not complete apart from ours."

God testifies of these 'others' that their faith would be rewarded as well even though it would appear they were complete failures at this faith thing!  "If you just had enough faith" seems a silly statement when you read about great men and women like this! Homeless? Wanderers? Murdered? In prison?  

Could it be it's not the outcome of faith but the object of faith that is the most important thing?  Could it be the poor widow who put in two pennies for the offering, all she had, was a great woman of faith even though she had nothing?  Could it be we have looked at faith all wrong in our day?  

It's not the outcome, but the object of faith that is the key to a faith that God will praise in his grand hall of faith on that day.

A simple act of kindness

I wish I had taken a photo, a video of the events this morning.  I kick myself for not thinking of it, but I didn't.  We simply watched in amazement.

This morning my wife and I went out for breakfast.  It was busy, crowded as usual, and every table was full.  Next to us, across the aisle, was an older frail gray-haired man sitting alone.  He had to be in his early 90's, sitting in his electric wheelchair at his table waiting for his breakfast order.  He was dressed in a suit and tie. It was an older tan suit, a bit wrinkled but he had dressed for the occasion, for a nice breakfast out. 

The restaurant was noisy, busy.  Wait staff running in all directions, but in the middle of it sat this aged gentleman.

The waitress brought his meal.  It was quite a big meal for a frail older gentleman, but she set it before him and then proceeded to take his knife and fork and cut up his food for him.  My wife watched in amazement, as the activity around us continued, but at that table time stopped while this amazing waitress took time for a simple act of kindness.

When she was finished she brought more coffee for us and we asked about this older gentleman.  She told us he comes for breakfast every Saturday, sits in her section and she takes care of him by helping him with his meal, by cutting up his food.

It's a simple thing.  A small thing really, but it's Jesus stuff, the kind of thing that all of us should be about.  I've thought about her act of kindness and her sweet spirit.  It's what the people of God should be about all the time....the little things, the small graces, the little simple acts of kindness that show the world a different way, a way marked by love.

Today we saw one of Jesus' kids living out a simple act of kindness that showed the love of God to a dear old man.

Sadly most in the restaurant missed it, they were busy with their visits, smartphones and meals, but in the middle of it all God showed up.  Her name is Kristine.

"One of the religion scholars came up. Hearing the lively exchanges of question and answer and seeing how sharp Jesus was in his answers, he put in his question: “Which is most important of all the commandments?”  Jesus said, “The first in importance is, ‘Listen, Israel: The Lord your God is one; so love the Lord God with all your passion and prayer and intelligence and energy.’ And here is the second: ‘Love others as well as you love yourself.’ There is no other commandment that ranks with these.”  Mark 12