Category: Devotionals

 

Recently while we were cleaning the church, we started rearranging furniture a little as women like to do. When we were vacuuming the church sanctuary carpeting, we moved the pulpit and communion table, just a little. Oh, nothing too noticeable.

We spruced up the drapes over the window into the baptistery and refreshed the fake ivy in the opening. We moved the Elder’s and Pastor’s chairs on the podium so they were evenly balanced on either side of the stage.

Then we started putting everything back into place and being the perfectionist that I am, I wanted everything to line up straight and be pleasing to the eye.

I wanted the drapes to be open just enough to reveal the rough-cut cross of Christ with the crown of thorns hanging on it, and the purple cloth draped over it. I walked up into the baptistery to re-drape the cloth, hang the crown of thorns just right, and cover a pipe with material so it wouldn’t reflect the light.

Then we started lining up the pulpit with the baptistery window behind it. A couple of people moved the pulpit as I stood at the entry to the hallway and looked down the aisle toward the pulpit.

“A little more to the right. No, that’s too much. Back a little. That’s better.” I wanted to line up the pulpit with the cross.

Now when you walk in the front door, from the foyer into the sanctuary, your eyes are drawn to the oak communion table, the pulpit, and up, where dominating over all is the cross of Christ Jesus, with the crown of thorns He wore when He shed His blood for the world.

The communion table represents the shed blood of Jesus Christ, and when we receive Christ’s salvation, our communion with the Almighty God, Creator of the universe. The pulpit represents the Word of God preached in churches around the globe to hungry people who believe and to a dying world until the return of Christ.

Paul said, “But God forbid that I should boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ,” Galatians 6:14 NKJV

Everything in the church must line up with the cross of Christ.

 

My daughter loaned me her one-speed bike last week. I’m going to put a comfortable old lady’s seat on it and cruise the streets of Vinita, as soon as the heat wave is over.

I got my first bike for my birthday the summer before third grade, a used bike from my older sister’s friend up the street. I could only go as far as the ends of the block. Later Mama trusted me to ride down on the southside of town where my friend Victoria and I rode Canadian Street behind the rodeo grounds at top speed, screaming as we raced down the hill.

My little brother had a tricycle about that time. He and the neighborhood kids were always riding it. The trike couldn’t keep up with my bike. In fact, they were forbidden to have it in the street.

Top speed for my one-speed bike with a rider in great condition would probably be 10 miles an hour. 10-speed bikes with all those gears have the ability to go much faster, maybe 30 or 40 miles per hour. Compare that to a car that can go 120 miles per hour or a jet airplane at 500-600 mph.

If you were going to travel from Oklahoma to California, would you take off riding a tricycle? Bicyclists do ride long distances like that on bike, and many people drive to California by car, but I would guess the majority of us travel by plane. You usually travel by whatever means will take the shortest time.

In Ezekiel 1:16, Ezekiel spoke of seeing “a wheel in the middle of a wheel.”

 The little wheel inside the big wheel was turning faster than the big wheel. Many Bible teachers have used the explanation of the little wheel in the middle being the wheel of time and the big wheel being the wheel of eternity or timelessness.

If you step off the little wheel of time, the tricycle of time, and get alone with God, you can step out onto the wheel of eternity or timelessness, where God can plan your time.

The old song says, “The big wheel turns by the grace of God.”

 

Grandmother had a great shade tree in her backyard–giant silver-leaf maple tree. The backyard facing east was always so shady and cool, almost like being out in the country. Grandmother’s house was just a three-room cottage, so peaceful and quiet.

I don’t recall who discovered the silver-leaf maple tree had fallen over or even which day. There might have been some wind, we aren’t sure, but the weather had been sunny. Grandmother had moved to heaven several years before and no one was living in her house.

The tree was pulled completely out of the ground, with its roots showing, an empty hole left behind. The tree trunk lay on the ground, the trunk at the base about 3 feet in diameter.  The roots were all showing—little roots, fat roots, but no tap root, not a single long root going down deep into the earth.

Jesus told a story of the farmer who went planting seed. Some seed fell on stony ground where there wasn’t much dirt. Jesus said this was like certain “people who gladly hear the message and accept it right away, but they don’t have any roots, and they don’t last very long. As soon as life gets hard or the message gets them in trouble, they give up.” Mark 4:16-17 Contemporary English Version.

We’ve all seen people in the church, friendly, carrying their Bible, slipping a $20 in the collection plate. They come to church a couple of times a month and always show up on Easter and Christmas, but when hard times come, they fall away from the church.

When one loses his job or problems come in their marriage or they have trouble with the children, instead of running to God and the church, they seek out the advice of their non-Christian friends.

“The righteous shall flourish like a palm tree. He shall grow like a cedar in Lebanon. Those who are planted in the house of the Lord shall flourish in the courts of our God.” Psalm 92: 12-13.

It’s time to get planted in church and grow a deep root.

Every year when school was out, the other kids could be found playing baseball, roller-skating, riding bikes, or swinging, but I was inside reading a book. Oh, I roller-skated some and loved my bike, but reading was my first love. I got my first library card when I was eight years old in the third grade.

If you come to my home to visit, you will probably be amazed at all the books, magazines, and newspapers cluttering my home. Why is it that I have such difficulty discarding books? It all goes back to my mom and dad who trained us children to value books. From the day a little cloth book was put in our baby hands, we were taught to love them. “Don’t tear the book. Don’t write in the book. We love our books, don’t we?”

My school teachers influenced my love of books. At the beginning of the school year, when books were given out, I opened the first page to the label that showed who used the book the year before and proudly entered my name on the next line. If the book was new, we went through a procedure of “breaking in” the new book, by opening up to the middle and running our fingers down the middle, then opening to another place in the book and doing the same. We were taught to never open the book and bend it backward which would break the spine.

I can only think of a few times in my lifetime that I have actually thrown a book in the trash. Most times it was because the book was badly damaged, but several times it was because it un-Biblical. How did I know? Because I know what the Bible says.

It is said that banks train tellers to recognize counterfeit bills but giving them the real bills to study. If you know what the real thing looks like, you should instantly know when something is counterfeit.

Paul wrote to Timothy, “Be diligent to present yourself approved to God, a worker who does not need to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth.” II Timothy 2:15 NKJV.

How do I know the truth? I study the Bible for myself.

The temperature of Wichita, Kansas, rose almost 20 degrees Wednesday night, right after midnight, (actually Thursday, June 9, 2011) when a rare weather condition called a heat burst occurred during a thunderstorm.

The National Weather Service explained there have to be perfect weather conditions for this to happen. There were strong gusts of winds up to 69 mph, then the storm collapsed onto the winds that were keeping it aloft. This caused the air to heat up as it rapidly fell. Another factor contributing to the heat burst was the dry condition, since the area received almost no rainfall in May. One report said the air starts its descent from very high up, and comes down rapidly.

So briefly here are the heat burst conditions: strong winds with strong gusts; dry conditions; a very high atmospheric storm.

The conditions were just right for something rare to happen on the Day of Pentecost.

“When the Day of Pentecost had fully come, they were all with one accord in one place.

And suddenly there came a sound from heaven, as of a rushing mighty wind, and it filled the whole house where they were sitting.

Then there appear to them divided tongues, as of fire, and one sat upon each of them.

And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak with other tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance.” Acts 2:1-4 NKJV

Fully come. Conditions were just right, all the conditions had been met for the Pentecost celebration to take place.

Rushing mighty wind—strong gusty winds.

Tongues of fire—heat burst, sudden temperature change, the air heated up.

The Holy Spirit—sudden downburst, as the Spirit of God descended from heaven on high.

However unlike the temperature increase to 102 in Wichita which dissipated by 3 a.m., the spiritual temperature on this earth has never decreased.

The Holy Spirit who came to earth on that day to dwell in Christ’s disciples is still here, burning through the world with a heat burst , with a rushing mighty wind and tongues of fire, giving utterance to His people.

Several years ago I was torn between planting blackberries or raspberries along the fence-row. I have always wanted to grow berries and have longed over the pictures in the seed catalog, but I have heard that raspberries are hard to grow in Oklahoma. And I hate the thorns on blackberries, but now thornless blackberries have been developed.

Our yard isn’t quite right for a garden like I had at our other house, which covered about a fourth of the yard. We grew tomatoes, beans, squash, okra, but those plants require space. Blackberries take up a a lot of room too, spreading rapidly in every direction.

I love to garden, but gardening is hard work. What I really love is the dreaming, the planning, the thinking, the studying about a garden. The actual doing of it is where the hard work comes in.

Two years ago I finally made up my mind and planted thornless blackberries along the chain-link fence on the south side of my yard. Last year I harvested 50 blackberries from my four plants, but this year the plants are loaded down with blooms and little berries. I might get a gallon or more.

My problem is I sometimes have trouble making up my mind. James 1:6-8 says, “he who doubts is like a wave of the sea driven and tossed by the wind, …for he is a double-minded man, unstable in all his ways.”

Double-minded. Unstable. Unable to make a decision, unable to choose what seems to others to be a very simple choice.

The Lord has set a choice before us that will determine our whole destiny.

Deuteronomy 30:19-20, ” I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing; therefore choose life…for He is your life and the length of your days.” God gives us a choice and then He even tells us which to choose. He knows what is best, but He leaves the choice up to you.

Choose life. Choose blessing. Choose Jesus Christ.