Category: Conversations

Conversations between my Daddy (God) and me.

Conversations

Sweet, Sweeter, Sweetest

Sarah StewartLeave a comment

How sweet are your words to my taste,
    sweeter than honey to my mouth!
–Psalm 119: 103

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Many Christians (myself included) often begin January with a kind of “reset” – a specific re-focusing on our individual relationship with God through renewed or increased prayer accompanied by fasting of some kind. Some go all out and do a “Daniel’s Fast” or further still some fast solid foods for a couple of weeks (so far the Holy Spirit hasn’t led me to do that one!). Usually I look forward to the beginning of the year reset and fast time. Usually I have a fresh excitement about giving the first-fruits of my entire year to God. Usually I ask the Lord a couple of weeks prior to the start of our “21 days” about what I should be praying about and focusing on and sacrificing as a constant reminder to talk to Him. This year however had a very different start. I don’t really know why (I haven’t given my very analytical brain the space to dive deep into that question), but I ended up not sacrificing anything and really justifying not fasting anything at all for the first 10 days of our 21 day fast. I had my quiet time with the Lord every morning and almost every morning would question what I should fast and if I even should fast. I wound up having full discussions with myself going back and forth: “To fast or not to fast? That is the question.” … My justification not to fast was that the only thing I seemed to be able to come up with doing was to fast sugar and I thought that was “too easy” and it felt more like a diet than a reminder to stop and talk to God. So I didn’t do anything.

But God, with the grace and perfect love for me that He has, continued speaking to my heart and one Sunday morning His voice was a little louder. Our pastor was talking about fasting just for a couple of minutes and mentioned something along the lines of “…if its so easy, why not just do it?” It was so brief and that wasn’t even the topic of his message. It was one of those God-voice things and I immediately latched on to it.

The next morning during my quiet time the Holy Spirit reminded me again “If its so easy, what is holding you back from doing this fast? What will it hurt to fast sugar in favor of extra time listening to The Father? Do you think He cares whether or not you started on the ‘right’ day?” (another of my justifications for not doing the fast) “He cares for your attention. Just start.”

So I did. I gave up sugar for the remainder of the 21 days. It didn’t all the sudden become hard, nor did I have huge, earth-shattering moments and even the temptation for sugar wasn’t that bad. But I did experience something different – a different sweetness.

The week that I gave up sugar, I was reflecting on the choice to fast sugar and again feeling like “Why am I doing this specific fast? Does it even mean anything?”

God is so good. His love is so tender. … and sweet.

As I was reflecting and reading, the Holy Spirit whispered to me that God Himself is the sweetness that I long for.

The name of Jesus is the sweetest name. His Word is sweet, “sweeter than the honeycomb”.

I gave up sugar, a physical sweetness, and then I saw even more all around me the sweetness of God. And He took me further and showed me that He wants me to be sweeter, just like He (my heavenly “Daddy”) is. He wants me to be sweeter towards others – to use kinder, more gentle words, to consider others before myself, to have more patience with my children and co-workers and family, to brighten someone’s day with a sweet smile, to speak life and hope and love – those sweet things that we all need to hear.

Throughout the rest of my sugar fast I was reminded again and again of the sweetest Name, the sweetest One, the sweetest Word, the sweetest Gift. And each time I reflected on my fast, I was warmed by the sweetest Love of God for me and also challenged to be the sweetness of Christ to the people around me.

Conversations

Thinking About You

Sarah StewartLeave a comment

You who fear the Lord, trust in the Lord!
    He is their help and their shield.
The Lord has remembered us; He will bless us;
    He will bless the house of Israel;
    He will bless the house of Aaron;
He will bless those who fear the Lord,
    Both the small and the great.

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I love how songs, especially worship and praise songs, can actually be an encouragement to us while also glorifying God at the same time. I love that one chapter in the Psalms often contains great richness in just one or two of it’s verses. I love how scripture reminds us where our blessing and help and hope comes from; it always does a focus adjustment on our “lenses”.

Its so easy, going through the day-to-day, to start to forget that all that I have, all that I need – it all comes from God and His strength, blessing, and grace. I try so often, without even realizing it most of the time, to give myself my own blessings, to help myself, and protect myself. This inevitably eventually leads to a lot of feelings of being overwhelmed and the fact that I absolutely cannot do all those things by myself. I’m not saying that God doesn’t use the skills and abilities He’s created me with to accomplish things in and with me. What I am saying is that my lenses gradually get smudges and fogged up when I “forget” God throughout the day and try to use those skills and abilities without asking for His help and wisdom for how to use them. When my lenses get all blurred, because I can’t see clearly that all of this that I already have is from God and because of God, I start to forget. I forget that God has, and is, and will always help me through all of this swirling and churning. I forget that I’m not alone to figure it all out by myself. I forget that His shield is already raised, protecting me right where I’m standing, in His perfect will. If I would just stay put, keep my focus on Him and remember He’s already got this and He’s helping me through it all, I would be absolutely ok.

This verse wipes the smudges off my glasses and reminds me to trust the God I know because I’ve seen how He remembers me, how He has blessed me before, how He has remembered and blessed so many people, all through history. It is a reminder He still remains true to His name and His character.

With verses like these, Daddy-God lovingly wipes away the fog and smudges once again. “See there?” He says gently, as He places the clean, smudge-free glasses back on my face. Now I can see again! He has pictures hanging on His walls – of me! And over there, on His fridge are some of His favorite things I’ve done. And He whispers as we walk together, “I have never forgotten you nor will I ever. You are my precious, beloved child, and I see you. I have and always will give you exactly what you need and more than you know to desire because I love you and nothing you can do, nor anything that could happen to you will ever change that. My strong arm is fully able to both help you and protect you. You are my most precious and prized child and I love you more than you know.”

My glasses get smudged and foggy from time to time, so I need the priceless Words of my Daddy-God to clean my lenses and remind me of all that I’ve seen, and heard, and experienced – all of the evidences and reminders that I can fully trust Him.

He has shown Himself loving and kind toward me over and over, and even if He had only done it once with The Cross, that alone would be an undeniable example of how unimaginably great His love is for me. He gave me the best blessing I could ever even wish for – the promise and hope of eternity with Him because of His own sacrifice and the resurrection of His Only Son. Because of His Son Jesus’ obedience to death and His resurrection power, I also am now considered God’s very own child, His family! And I have a crazy-good inheritance because of how He remembered me and blessed me.

Oh! How He loves us (me and you)!

And those He loves, He remembers.

And those who remember Him, He blesses; He blesses us with and because of our knowledge of Him.

He is Trustworthy and has given evidence after evidence of such.

Let us remember to trust Him even more today. We are and will continue to be blessed by our Daddy-God as we do.

Conversations

Not My Glory

Sarah StewartLeave a comment

Not to us, O Lord, not to us, but to your name give glory, for the sake of your steadfast love and your faithfulness! – Psalm 115:1

Worry comes very easily for me. I suppose its part of the territory for an analytical thinker who takes things apart in their mind in order to understand them, and plan, and organize, and fix, and problem solve. I don’t think I’ve met anyone (yet) who is highly analytical and detailed, that doesn’t struggle with worry more than they probably should. However, that’s not really the worst part for me. Worry is bad enough, but worrying what someone else thinks about me or whether or not they think I’m worth some specific amount of effort or money – that in my mind, is the worst kind of worry there is. Worrying about what another person thinks of me or what they think I’m “worth” is worry about my own glory. That is self-exalting on more than one level! On the first level, the worry itself is saying that I am trying to do something on my own without God or without trusting the details to God. On another level, this kind of worry is somehow being so consumed with myself that I seek my own glory and am concerned with whether or not I will get it.

That is painful to admit and shocking to read myself type those words. I will readily admit I struggle with pride. But when I look at these words: worrying about my glory – that puts things in a more truthful context that is difficult to “run” or “hide” from. I know I’ve grown “comfortable” with the concept of pride because it kind of hides what’s really going on. All pride is based in seeking after one’s own glory, and what the scriptures tell us very plainly is that the only One who deserves any glory is God. Even more plainly, if anyone or anything else gets glory, that is idolatry.

When I was reading a devotion on this topic the other day, I happened to be putting myself through some heavy stress about work – trying to be and do all the right things and feeling frustrated that trying to make one person happy was making another unhappy. I was struggling (code for “worrying”) a lot with feelings of worth and un-successfulness and comparing myself to other people – just overall feeling very upset that I wasn’t better at my job, more loved, further along in my career, more respected – you know all those things that would be evidence of “glory”. So God, in His infinite wisdom and knowledge and with such gentle and gracious love, saw what my heart was struggling with. He knew that it wasn’t pretty, but not just because I was sad and stressed and lashing out at people. He knew that the ugly, not great part about all of it, was that I was blind to a much bigger problem, a much more dangerous, viral kind of problem: self-glorification. And He walked me, gently, into this verse and the study of it for a couple of days.

When I read the first part of this verse (which I have read many many times before) it was as if someone turned on the light and took a heavy weight off of my back. I didn’t get any answers to the questions I was asking about “Am I worth it?” and “Doesn’t anybody love or even like me?” and “Why in the world would anyone want me around? Don’t they want to fire me already?” But I didn’t get the answers to those questions because those were the wrong questions to ask. What I did receive is a reminder of the fact that first and most importantly, God Almighty is absolutely worth it and worth my time, energy, attention, and worship. In fact, He’s the only One worthy of all this praise, and love, and admiration, and I most certainly want Him around! The second really big thing I was reminded of is that this amazing, unmatched, wonderful, almighty God absolutely loves and likes me and thinks I’m worth His time and His purpose for me. This knowledge and understanding may be beyond my ability on my own to really fully grasp, but the fact doesn’t change that He does have a perfect, loving purpose and a fierce, no-strings-attached love for me and all of this (His purpose and love for me) is all for my own good and His glory. Not my good and my glory.

So this verse is a beautiful reminder to give all praise and glory and honor to Him who deserves it all. To our magnificent, loving, wonderful, almighty, creator God who’s glory is well earned, and who’s love is well given, all far beyond what I could earn in my own strength. To God be the glory, not to me and all that I’ve accomplished (which would never have been accomplished without so many things from Him), but to God be the glory. Great things He has done!

Conversations

Running Toward You

Sarah StewartLeave a comment

“So he returned home to his father. And while he was still a long way off, his father saw him coming. Filled with love and compassion, he ran to his son, embraced him, and kissed him. His son said to him, ‘Father, I have sinned against both heaven and you, and I am no longer worthy of being called your son.’
“But his father said to the servants, ‘Quick! Bring the finest robe in the house and put it on him. Get a ring for his finger and sandals for his feet. And kill the calf we have been fattening. We must celebrate with a feast, for this son of mine was dead and has now returned to life. He was lost, but now he is found.’ So the party began.
Luke 15: 20-24

 

This particular parable is no doubt very familiar to a lot of people and I’m certainly no exception. I can’t remember how old I was the first time I heard the story, but it must have been at a very young age because it seems like I’ve known the story my entire life. It is a great parable, full of rich content for many a sermon. At a pretty simplified level, its about how our Good Father, God, loves us, His sons and daughters. As many times as I’ve heard and read this story, recently for the first time I was overwhelmed with very vivid imagery while listening to a sermon on the passage. Perhaps it was because I was listening as a parent. Perhaps something the teacher said struck a chord. Perhaps I identified with the son more as a child this time instead of a bystander. Whatever the reason, I haven’t been able to stop thinking about the picture I still have stuck in my head.

By this point in the story, the son realizes that it was a stupid choice to disrespect his dad (essentially telling his dad “I wish you were dead”) because even servants in his dad’s house were treated better than where he found himself. He was homeless, penniless, and starving – so much so that he was willing to defile his body just to have something to eat. He was doing worse than the equivalent of dumpster diving – which is pretty gross just in itself! So he decides to go home and try to convince his dad to give him a job – knowing that even to get a job cleaning toilets for his dad’s servants would be better than what he was doing right now. If it were me, I’d be convincing myself that after the way I’d treated him, there’s no way he’d take me back even as a servant to the servants that was “paid” in 3 meals a day and a place to sleep.

Walking weakly along the road, each step a difficult task but knowing he must go on and at least give his dad the chance to reject him, he continued his weary walk toward home. Coming over the last hill, with the house in sight but still a somewhat small structure in the distance, feelings of nervousness and dread start to flood his mind – but he continues on. After a few minutes he sees someone emerge from the house quickly, appearing to scan the horizon as if verifying what had been seen from inside the house. Looking down at his feet and the broken ground he is walking on, full of rocks and weeds, and critters, its an all too familiar path back to the house he once called home. When he returns his gaze to the house, he notices the person who had been standing staring at the horizon was not standing there any more. Instead they were running. They were running fast! In his direction! For a second, he paused thinking that this person running toward him might be coming to tell him to get lost and never dare return again. He hesitated, thinking it might be safer to turn back. But, deciding that whatever came of this, he probably deserved the beating, he continued on, one foot in front of the other.

The person running was closing the distance rapidly between them and now he could see – it was his father! Not sure what to expect he paused again, still watching his father close in – faster and faster, closer and closer. He wasn’t sure what to think or do. He started practicing his speech again. He wanted to at least try to get it out before his father banished him never to return again. He thought for sure his father would slow down the closer he got, but as he watched, he just kept running! He was getting so close – he’s going to run right into me!

running-prodigal-fatherThe Father was overwhelmed with love and compassion as soon as he saw his son way off in the distance. Every day since his son left he would watch the horizon, waiting for his return. This day was different. Today, he was certain he saw his son on the horizon! He couldn’t wait to make sure. He couldn’t wait another minute without his precious son. He broke into an instant run. He kept his eyes fixed on his son’s location the entire time – straining to see if it truly was his son and not wanting the young man to leave. The closer he got, the more certain he became – this is his son! He has returned home to me! The insult long ago was nowhere close to the father’s mind – his heart had forgiven him long ago. As his son’s face became clearer, he began to weep. His son whom he loved more than his own life, was home! His prayers have been answered! Why can’t these legs move any faster?!

The father collided into the son with nearly the full force of the speed with which he had been running. He ran into his son so hard he almost knocked them both over. Flinging his arms around his son’s neck he hugged him tightly, determined never to let his child go. His sobs of joy and love came all at once. The son, taken back by this welcome and still feeling completely worthless tried to start his speech, even though his face was buried in his father’s chest. As he started in with a muffled voice “Father, I’m not worthy….. Father I’ve sinned….” he started to weep as well, but his weeping was a broken weeping. And as he wept at how he had hurt his father, he was able to hear his father was saying something too! He was repeating over and over through his own tears, “My son, whom I love, is home! My son, whom I love, is home!” The son flung his arms around his dad and tried again to get his speech out through his sobs. But the father pulled his face towards his own and looking him straight in his tear-filled eyes he said again “My son, whom I love, is home!”

The Father, carrying his son’s arm around his own neck to support his weary legs, walked with his son back toward their home. As they came closer, the Father was now shouting, announcing to everyone to prepare the biggest feast ever, as if his son had just been born and there was a party to be had! Because truly, there was.