Morning Coffee With Renae

I love to get lost in a book. I love to block out real life, and travel to another time and place. Through books, I’ve experienced everything from war to romance to space travel. Well, not much space travel . . . I’m not much of a science fiction girl. But the war and romance stuff, back in the Renaissance era with those great dresses and the hunky heroes and the drafty castles . . . I love that stuff. Yes, I’m a sappy romantic, and I’m not ashamed.

I’ve recently started Jan Karon’s In the Company of Others. I read in the evenings to help me relax, and I do love me some Father Tim. For those of you who haven’t jumped on the Mitford bandwagon, Father Tim is an Episcopal priest who thought he’d live out his days as a bachelor, but falls in love and marries late in life.

I love the way he loves Cynthia. It’s a sweet, enduring passion that causes him to think she’s sexy in flannel, causes him to get butterflies in his stomach when he sees her smile and knows she’s happy. It’s the kind of real, practical, everyday love most women dream of.

(Heavy sigh.)

I’m reading another book in the mornings. This book is more adventuresome than romantic, though it does contain plenty of romance. And the adventures are more of the raw, dark kind that do happen in real life, but that nobody likes to talk about much.

Yes, that’s right. I’m reading the Bible.

I wake up, start the coffee, and get out my Bible. Then I shuffle back to my bed, crawl beneath my covers, turn on the lamp, and yawn a couple more times before I begin that day’s passage. Since it’s a new year, I decided to start at the beginning.

Genesis. Creation and naming the animals and cute little Noah’s arks and all that. A little light reading to start each day.

Not.

So far in my reading, I’ve encountered murder, incest, rape, prostitution, drunkenness, theft, and more codependent, dysfunctional families than I can name here. That’s all in the first book of the Bible, and I’m not even finished with it yet. Talk about a waker-upper. Seriously. I couldn’t go back to sleep after reading all that, even if I wanted to.

All those heinous sins were committed by God’s own people. His chosen people. In spite of the fact that they knew better.

With every new tragedy, every new story, I’m learning about God’s grace. His mercy. His compassion. And I’m reminded, time and again, that nothing we do, nothing we experience takes God by surprise. He’s seen it all before. He knew it was going to happen. And He loves us anyway.

He knew all about our goof-ups and life crises long ago, and figured out how to use them for our good. He used Jacob’s lies and schemes and trickery to begin the nation of Israel. Later, he used Joseph’s jealous brothers selling him into slavery to save the nation of Israel.

God hates sin. But He knows we’re gonna mess up. He knows others are gonna mess up and hurt us, really bad. Everything we do, and everything that’s been done to us . . . God knows. He sees. He knew about it before it happened. He’s already planned for it all, and though the process is sometimes painful, the end results are always good . . . if we let Him lead us.

If I had to compare myself to a literary character, I’m probably most akin to Bilbo Baggins. I don’t like adventures. They’re troublesome, and they make me late for dinner. But God has other plans for my life. He wants to take me on a great adventure, filled with toils and snares and danger and war wounds and . . . yes, with passion and beauty and love.

I may not always know where He’s leading me, and I may not always enjoy the journey. But I know one thing for certain. He knows where He’s going, even if I don’t. If I stay close to Him and let Him lead, I know I’ll end up in a better place than I could ever imagine. And the best thing is, the story He’s written for my life is all truth. And if I follow Him, I know the ending will be glorious.

“For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future,” Jeremiah 29:11.

Eight days before Christmas, I finally got my tree up and decorated. I used to be one of those day-after-Thanksgiving folks, stringing lights and hauling out the stockings and tinsel. But not this year.

This year is hard for a number of reasons. My daddy isn’t here, and he always made Christmas special. It just won’t be the same without him sitting in his chair, acting like a bottle of Stetson cologne was the one gift he had hoped for every single day since last Christmas. It just won’t be the same.

Lots of things are going on this year, things that make Christmas a little less jolly than previous years. While others are ho-ho-ho-ing, honestly, all I want to do is boo-hoo-hoo. I don’t even want to eat chocolate. And believe me, when this girl passes on the chocolate, you know things are bad.

Now, before you walk away at this depressing opening to my article – and yes, I’m well aware of the pity party going on in the previous paragraphs – hold on a minute. Because in spite of my less than stellar mood this holiday season, I think I may have discovered something even better than holiday cheer. It’s found right in that little word – holiday – derived from “holy” day. Holy means “set apart, or reserved for special use.”

You see, the beauty of this season is even greater than the fact that a holy God sent His holy Son as a gift to us, although you have to admit that’s pretty incredible. But even greater than that is the reason for that gift: love. He loved us. And He knew we could never reach Him, even if we stood on our tiptoes and reached up our arms with all our might. He knew we could never make the journey to Him, so He came to us.

Even greater still is that He offered His biological Son to pay for my adoption fee. Yes, that’s right. He made me His daughter, and He paid a great price for me. And because I’m His daughter, I am now holy.

Yep. The most  beautiful thing about Christmas to me, is that Christmas tells the story of how God made me His own. He set me aside and said, “That one is mine.” He made me holy.

Oh, I’m not holy because of anything I’ve done. I’m not holy because I’m good or righteous or godly. Most days, I am far from any of those things. I am holy – set apart – because He loved me enough to set me apart for Himself. He paid the price, He adopted me, and now I belong to Him.

So this holy-day season, in spite of the fact that things aren’t exactly as I’d like them to be, I can rest in the fact that I have found favor with the Almighty God. I can walk boldly in to His presence because I have that right, as His daughter. And no matter what’s going on in my life or in this world, I can know He will never leave me. He will never forsake me. I belong to Him; He calls me by name, and He will always, always take care of me.

It’s because of that love that I want to be good and righteous and godly. It’s because of Him, not because of me, that I want to be holy. I want to please Him.

This season, though my heart is sad, I still have reason to celebrate. I may not have the jolly, bubbly happiness that is so prevalent in Hallmark Channel movies, but I have joy. I have eternal security in knowing I am His, and He is mine, and that will never change. And because I belong to Him, because He loves me, I know He has some pretty great things waiting in the future – He promised me that. So on Christmas Day, despite the fact that things aren’t exactly as I want them to be, I’ll sing carols. I’ll enjoy my family. And I’ll rejoice in the knowledge that the holy God of the universe took an interest in me.

“You are to be holy to me, for I the Lord am holy; and I have set you apart from the peoples to be Mine,” Leviticus 20:26.

“The words I have spoken to you are spirit and they are life,” John 6:63.

It’s been a hard week. And no, it has nothing to do with the recent political election, although that has been a real doozy, hasn’t it? Honestly, I wish I could tell you all the things going on that seem to weigh down my spirit. But I don’t have to, do I? You’ve been there. You’ve had your own stuff at some point, bogging you down, making you feel defeated and without hope.

I’ve spent a lot of time praying this week, asking God to help me “take every thought captive” (2 Corinthians 10:5,) but the tell you the truth, I’m not very good at that. Taking thoughts captive, that is, and making them stay where they should. Things just pop in my head—things that ought not be there—and instead of pushing them away and setting my thoughts on higher things, my mind just dwells . . .

Shame on me. And because of my tendency to dwell on things I shouldn’t dwell on, I feel pretty frustrated.

But right here, in John 6:63, is the answer! When we can’t get our thoughts to cooperate, we can bury ourselves in God’s Word. His words refresh our spirits. His words give us new life. His words restore our energy and our hope, and fill us with His peace, with His joy.

So that’s what I’ve tried to do this week—bury myself in God’s Word, spending more time than usual—and it has helped. I don’t know why I wait so long sometimes before I go there. But from now on, I plan to go to my life source at the first sign of distress, instead of waiting until I’m ready for a spiritual 9-1-1 call. I’m so glad I have the source of spirit and life at my fingertips, and can access it any time I want.

Dear Father, Thank You for Your words of life and truth. Thank You for giving me all I need to live a joy-filled, victorious life.

“For as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is his love for those who fear him. As far as the east is from the west, so far has he removed our transgressions from us,” Psalm 103:12-13.

Do you have something you feel deeply ashamed about?

Yeah. So do I.

And when I think of the difference between who I want to be and who I really am, I just want to crawl in a hole and hide. Seriously. I want to weep. I’m so, so far off the mark, in so many ways.

But then I remember . . . God doesn’t want me to feel ashamed. No, sir, He doesn’t. Psalm 3:3 tells me He’s the “lifter of my head.” He hates my sin . . . but He loves me. And when He knows I agree with Him about my sin, when He knows how very sorry I am that I keep messing up, He forgives me. He takes that sin into His mighty hand, flexes his enormous muscles, and casts that sin and shame as far as the east is from the west. Which is basically forever, since the east and the west can never meet.

But we do have an accuser. His name is Satan, and Satan wants us to live in shame. He wants us to be burdened down with guilt and despair, for that’s how he destroys us. If Satan can keep us bogged down, feeling like worthless failures, he wins. At least for a while, anyway.

Friends, God will win the war against Satan. But who wins the little everyday battles depends a lot on us, right here, right now. It depends on who we believe.

We can believe Satan. And if we believe Satan, we’ll walk around angry and bitter, or depressed, with no joy and no peace. Or . . .

We can believe God. In which case, we can lift our heads and smile at tomorrow. He loves us. He’s adopted us as His children and written us into His will. Oh, He’s aware that we’re not perfect, but instead of fussing over some mud we may have gotten on our clothes, He simply casts them aside, far, far away, and gives us new clothes. And when we mess up again, as long as He knows we’re really sorry and we’re really trying to stay clean, He’ll toss those dirty, sinful rags aside again and again. Each time, we’ll come out beautiful and smelling like roses.

His love for us never ends. His forgiveness reaches to the worst things we could ever imagine, and removes them from us. His mercy sent His Son to the cross, to take the punishment for those sins. And His grace invites us to sit next to Him—the King of Kings, and also our Father—at the banquet table.

And there’s certainly no shame in that.

Dear Father, Thank You for loving me so much, that love can’t even be measured. Thank You for forgiving me when I fail, and for not throwing those failures in my face. Instead, You remove them far away, into eternity, so I can hold my head high. There aren’t enough thank-you’s to express my gratitude, Lord. I love You.

“For John came neither eating nor drinking, and they say, ‘He is a demon.’ The Son of Man came eating and drinking, and they say, ‘Here is a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and ‘sinners.’ But wisdom is proved right by her actions,” Matthew 11:18-19.

Do you ever feel like you can’t win for losing?

Yeah. Me too. It’s frustrating beyond words to try and please people, because there are some people in this world who just won’t be pleased. A lot of them, it seems.

When I was a young pastor’s wife (or should I say younger? I am still young, thank you very much. But . . . my husband’s not actually pastoring right now, so I’m not actually a pastor’s wife any more. . . but I digress.) Anyway, when I was a young pastor’s wife, I got caught in the trap of trying to please people. I wanted to please everyone.

Yes, I can hear you chuckle.

I can’t even begin to tell you how many hoops I jumped through, trying to make everyone like me. And I did believe that unless everyone liked me, I must be doing something wrong. But then something so ridiculous and so insane happened, I couldn’t help but wake up and smell the dirty socks.

You see, for a while, I did everything that needed to be done, if I could possibly do it. I taught Sunday School. I lead the children’s choir on Wednesday nights. I taught a children’s class on Sunday evenings. I was a leader in our weekly visitation program. I lead our praise and worship team. And, I visited our widows every Tuesday morning.

Now, every one of those things was a worthy responsibility, but no one person should have to do all those things. Especially when that person is also a wife and mother, with responsibilities at home. But I did them with a smile, because that’s what pastor’s wives do, right? Until a couple of women in the church started criticizing me.

“No one in the church can do anything, because Renae thinks she has to be in charge of everything.”

Wait, really? I thought I was doing those things because we couldn’t ever seem to find anyone else who wanted to do them. But . . . really? Okay. I decided to step down from a few of my roles. I quit teaching the Sunday night kids’ class, and I quit teaching children’s choir, because word had it, that’s what my two criticizers wanted to teach.

A couple of months later, the same two women were whispering again, spreading the word  as if it were some sort of political campaign. “Renae just abandoned all the children’s classes. Poor babies.”

You’re kidding, right?

Right?

Not long after that, one of the ladies in the Sunday School class I taught was going to have a baby. Now, this lady was my good friend. Her daughter and my daughter were the same age, and they played together often. We ate lunch together, shopped together, and did all those things girlfriends like to do together. So I decided to give her a baby shower.

Oh, did I mention there were four other pregnant women in our church at that time?

Before long, the aforementioned duo was at it again. “She can’t do that. She’s the pastor’s wife. She can’t play favorites. If she’s going to give her friend a baby shower, she’d sure better give each of those others a baby shower!”

So . . . guess what I did?

Yeah. You can believe it. I gave a whopping five baby showers within the span of just a couple of months, despite the fact that at this point, I had many true and dear friends coming to my defense and telling me to ignore the criticisms. But, I wanted to please everyone . . .

Ridiculous, right?

You see, I was trying to find my self-worth in the approval of others. And no matter how many hoops we jump through, that’s never going to happen. Some people enjoy looking for things to criticize, and no matter what we do, we’re never going to please them.

Instead of wasting my time and energy, stressing myself out trying to please people, I should have just taken a deep breath, relaxed, and rested in the approval of my Heavenly Father. I don’t have to jump through any hoops to earn His love. He adores me. He thinks I’m wonderful, and pours out His love on me just because He is God and I’m His child.

Oh, sometimes he disapproves of my actions. But He will never hurt me by gossiping about me or trying to humiliate me or bully me. No, when my actions are out of line, He deals with me gently, with mercy and grace and love. Yeah, I’d have been a lot better off to just get on my knees and ask God for wisdom about how to please Him. And His list of requirements is a lot shorter than the average person’s list. All God wants from me is that I love Him more than anything. And that I do my best to love others the way He loves me.

Period.

End of list.

And when I am loving God with all my heart and loving others with His kind of love, most people will eventually figure out what’s what. When we live to please God, our actions speak in our defense.

So, that’s one lesson I learned from that difficult season in my life. But I also learned another one. Since I was on the receiving end of such harsh demands and criticisms, I want to make sure that I’m never on the giving end. I learned in a fresh new way to apply the old adage, “If you can’t say anything nice, don’t say anything at all.”

I believe God’s word said it even better though, in Ephesians 4:29: “Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen.”

So let’s not be like the people who criticized John for not eating or drinking, then criticized Jesus for eating and drinking. Let’s use our words to build others up, not tear them down. And when we are criticized by others despite our best efforts to please God, we can smile. We’re in pretty good company.

Dear Father, Help me to ignore the pressure to please others, for I know some people will never be pleased. Help me to look for my self-worth in the only place I can really find it: right in the center of Your love.

I have avoided writing about this next verse. Honestly, I had no clue where to begin, and when I looked up the opinions of various theologians and scholars, they didn’t seem to have a clue, either! Oh, they all had an opinion. But none of them seemed to agree with each other.

So, since a commentary is really just a person’s comments on a text, I figure, why not add my own thoughts to the mix? They can’t be any more far-fetched than the next guy’s. Well, maybe they can be, but I’m going to comment on this text anyway.

Without further ado, here’s the next verse written in the cover of Daddy’s Bible. (Thanks a lot, Dad. <3 )

Matthew 11:12 “The kingdom of heaven has been forcefully advancing and forceful men lay hold of it.”

Some translations use the word violently instead of forcefully. 

At first, I thought this verse was talking about spiritual warfare. And of course, there is that aspect. But as I’ve mulled this over in my mind, I’ve been reminded about all the violence that’s taken place against the kingdom of heaven.

First, let’s talk about the kingdom, itself. Is it a place? Well, yes. Of course it is. But more importantly, the kingdom of heaven is people. It’s all the saints. (That’s me and you, and anyone who has accepted God’s gift of salvation through His son, Jesus Christ.) And let’s just look at some of the more prominent saints throughout history, shall we?

There was John the Baptist. He was beheaded.

James, son of Zebedee, was also beheaded.

Stephen was stoned.

Philip, the apostle, was crucified.

James, the brother of Jesus, was beaten to death, after being crucified and stoned.

Matthew was killed with a halberd (an ax/spear combination).

Andrew was crucified.

Peter was crucified upside-down.

Paul was beheaded.

Bartholomew was flayed alive, then crucified.

Thomas was killed with a spear.

Luke was hanged.

Simon was crucified.

And that’s just a few of the biblical martyrs. There are others in the
Bible, and there have been many, many more throughout history.

Yet, Christianity is still alive and kicking.

You see, Christianity has advanced and advanced through the ages, despite the hostile, violent acts of those who would shut the mouths of Christians forever.

Even today, in many parts of the world, people are violently dying for their belief in Jesus Christ.

Even here in the United States, where we pretend to be tolerant of multiple beliefs, Christians are attacked for their belief in Christ.

One recent example that came to my mind was not a violent attack, but an attack nonetheless. You probably heard about it. Some high school cheerleaders in Kountze, Texas decided to paint banners with a positive message. Instead of “Kill the Vikings!” or “Maul the Bears!”, these girls decided to display encouraging scripture on their banners. They wrote, “I can do all things through Christ which strengthens me.”

How about that? A group of cheerleaders, cheering on their own team members without insulting the other team. And offering encouragement to the players on both sides. Scandalous, I know.

It really did become scandalous when an anonymous person complained to the Freedom from Religion Foundation, which in turn complained to the school district’s superintendent. The superintendent told the girls he appreciated what they were doing, but they had to stop.

Thus began a series of court battles that, last I heard, ended in the girls being told they could paint their banners with scriptures. Score one for the kingdom of heaven. But it didn’t come without a fight, or without controversy.

God’s Word tells us time and again that in this world, we will have many troubles. This world is not our home. We are strangers here; we are truly strange by comparison. We don’t fit in. We are aliens, and though we may reside legally here, we’ll still never really belong. Our home is a kingdom far away, in another time and place. As Christians, our true residency is in the kingdom of heaven.

So when we get home at the end of the day and we feel like we’ve been through a battle, we shouldn’t be surprised. When neighbors and co-workers gossip about us and treat us like we’re freaks, simply because we don’t live by the same code of ethics as the rest of the world, we should take it in stride. And every time we get treated poorly because of our belief in Christ, and the poor treatment doesn’t stomp out our faith . . . that’s another point scored for team heaven.

And even if the worst comes—which it probably won’t—and we are beaten or beheaded or crucified or killed because of our love for Christ, we can remember the words of the Apostle Paul: “For me to live is Christ, and to die is gain.”

“Do not suppose that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I did not come to bring peace, but a sword. For I have come to turn a man against his father, a daughter against her mother, a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law; a man’s enemies will be the members of his own household,” Matthew 10:34-36.

As I read through the special verses Daddy wrote in the front of his Bible, I can’t help but wonder why he included this one. If he were here, I’d ask him to explain it to me. One day, I will ask him what was in his mind as he wrote the words.

I do know that Daddy loved his Lord, his God with all his heart. And sometimes that love caused him to do things that the people around him didn’t understand. Sometimes, he’d give his last dime to a beggar on the streets. Once, he went to Mexico, right smack-dab in the middle of some pretty bad drug wars, and right after he’d been diagnosed with cancer. Needless to say, we didn’t want him to go.

But God calls us to love Him above all else, even above our families. When families all choose to love God this way, it’s a beautiful thing. But when one person in a family places God above all else, and others in a family don’t . . . problems are inevitable.

Human nature says, “Love me. Take care of me. Make me happy.” God’s nature says, “Love others. Take care of others. Serve others.” When those two philosophies collide, it really can set husband against wife, father against son, mother against daughter. Truly, any time one person in a relationship wants to be served, and the other person in the relationship wants something different, it sets the stage for war.

Jesus is called the Prince of Peace. But sometimes, to achieve peace, we must go to war. And war hurts. But anything worth having is worth fighting for, even if it means fighting those who live under our own roof.

One thing Daddy knew, however, is that the best place to fight this kind of war is on our knees. And he knew the sword Jesus spoke of was God’s Word. Daddy prayed, and prayed and prayed. He prayed for me. He prayed for my brother. And he prayed for my mother. He read scripture, he claimed God’s promises, and he poured God’s Word into our lives. And when one of us opposed something he felt called by God to do, he kept loving us, kept praying, and went right on and did what God told him to.

Friends, we must seek peace. We must pray for peace. But we mustn’t ever sacrifice God’s work or His direction for the sake of peace. When we choose family peace over God’s direction, we really don’t choose peace at all.

Dear Father, Help me to love my family. Help me to be a living example for them of what it means to love You, above all else. 

Daddy was a firefighter. During his career, he earned his arson certification, which made him a certified police officer as well. So I guess you could say he was a hero times two. Add in his days in the army, and well, I think Dad qualified as a full-blown superhero.

That said, I didn’t really think he was a superhero when he’d leave his badge and gun on, when boys came to pick me up for dates. He did it anyway. And somehow in spite of it all, I managed to keep my fair share of boyfriends. If my memory serves me correctly, I got all googly-eyed over several different ones. My heart would beat faster than usual, and I’d walk around on cloud nine, thinking about nothing but this boy or that boy.

But Daddy always reminded me that no boy was more important than God. He knew that anything we think about more than God qualifies as an idol, in God’s eyes. And when we have idols—things we think about and care about more than we think or care about God—we forfeit God’s blessings on our lives.

Let’s look at the next verse Daddy wrote in the cover of his Bible:

“Those who cling to worthless idols forfeit the grace that could be theirs,” Jonah 2:8.

Ouch.

If an idol is anything I think about or care about more than God, I have to admit I’ve had more than my fair share. All too often, my thoughts are consumed with housework or bills, or dreams of fame or fortune, or trying to reach my ideal weight . . . These thoughts crowd my mind and push out time I should spend thinking about my beautiful heavenly Father.

You see, God wants to be, in our minds, just like those teenage boyfriends. Only way better. He wants us to be so absorbed in Him that we can’t stop thinking about Him. He wants us to walk around moon-eyed, amazed at how much He loves us, consumed with how wonderful He is.

When we are consumed with anything else, it’s an idol.

Yep.

And when we allow other things to control our thoughts, we forfeit the grace that could be ours.

Let’s consider one definition of grace: good things that we haven’t earned or deserved.

So if we forfeit grace, we give up all sorts of good things, that we haven’t earned and don’t deserve, poured out on our lives.

Bummer.

But when we cast all those worthless thoughts, or idols, aside and allow ourselves to be consumed with our holy, beautiful, amazing, wonderful God, we clear the path for God’s unlimited grace to be poured into our lives.

Wow. I don’t know about you, but I’m feeling my heart beat a little faster already.

Dear Father, Forgive me for thinking about other things more than I think about You. I love You. Help me to fall in love with You even more. Amen

My daughter is one of the most thankful people I’ve ever known. When she was quite small, any time someone gave her even a tiny gift, she’d pour out her thanks to them over and over. She’d gush and rave about how much she loved the gift, how she couldn’t believe they’d done that for her, and how she’d “always wanted one of those!”

Which is one of the reasons my daddy loved to buy things for her.

When Charis was six years old, she said to my dad, “Poppy, I’ve always wanted a Baby Chou-Chou doll.” Now, he had no idea what a Baby Chou Chou was, but he promptly pulled out his credit card, went on the internet, and ordered her one. When it arrived, he was showered with little girl kisses and hugs and many thanks.

When she was seven, Dad took her to a hand-made chocolate shop, where she sampled dozens of chocolates. The conversation went something like this:

Poppy: “Do you like that?”

Charis: “Yes.”

Poppy (to clerk): “I’ll take three.” Then to Charis: “What about this one? Do you like it?”

Charis: “Yes.”

Poppy: “I’ll take three of those.”

Before they left, Dad had racked up a whopping $50 bill for chocolates, and he loved doing it. Once again, Charis showered him with all the thanks his Poppy-heart could hold.

When we have a thankful attitude, it makes people want to do stuff for us.

God’s no different. Let’s look at the next verse inside the cover of Daddy’s Bible:

Psalm 50:23 “He who sacrifices thank offerings honors me, and he prepares the way so that I may show him the salvation of God.”

Friends, God wants to save us. In modern-day language, that means God wants to be our super-hero. He wants to rescue us from all sorts of bad things. He wants to do kind things for us, and make our lives safe and good and peaceful and lovely.

And when He does those wonderful things for us, He likes us to shower Him with our thanks. He wants us to pour out our hearts and say, “Thank You, thank You, thank You!”

When we get excited about the little things He does for us, and we tell him how grateful we are, it warms His heart toward us. It makes Him want to do even more good things for us. Just like my Daddy delighted in doing special things for his granddaughter, who poured out her gratitude to him, God longs for our arms to wrap around His great neck. He longs for us to kiss His holy cheek and say, “I can’t believe You did that, God! Thank You!”

Dear Father, Thank You, thank You, thank You for all You do for me every day. I can’t believe You love me that much. I love You, Father!

Hello friends! Today is the first post in the “Lessons from Daddy’s Bible” category. I love this Bible, because my father gave it to me about two weeks before he died. He didn’t leave it to me; he gave it to me. Insisted that I take it right that minute and put it in my car, despite my protests that he might want to keep it and read it.

The first verse, written word for word in his own hand in the top left corner of the front cover of his Bible, is from Matthew chapter twelve. Let’s take a look:

Matthew 12:36-37 “But I tell you that men will have to give account on the day of judgment for every careless word they have spoken. For by your words you will be acquitted, and by your words you will be condemned.”

Wow.

Words were very important to Daddy. I am blessed, so very blessed to have had a father who spoke words of life into me, right up until he could no longer speak. That’s one of the reasons I adored him so; just to be around him seemed to fill me up and feed my spirit with good things. Some of the things he told me were:

I’m beautiful.

I’m good.

I’m important.

I’m valuable.

I have unique gifts.

I have important, essential things to offer, that no one else can bring.

I am loved.

I am cherished.

I am indispensable in the Kingdom of God.

I am holy.

I am righteous.

Yes, these are all things my daddy told me, things he poured into my spirit every chance he got. But they weren’t just his opinion! Daddy told me these things, because they are how God feels about me. God’s Word says all of those things. And you know what? That is how God feels about you, too.

Oh, Daddy never told me I was perfect. But I was made in God’s likeness, with a unique flair that makes me, me. Just as you were made in God’s likeness, with a unique flair that makes you, you.

Unfortunately, I’ve been told a lot of other things about myself, too. And they have left deep wounds in my spirit. Things like:

You are ugly.

You are spoiled.

You are lazy.

You are selfish.

You aren’t special.

You are annoying.

You have nothing good to offer.

You’re fat.

You’re vain.

You’re a terrible housekeeper.

You’re not smart.

And on and on . . .

But lest you feel too sorry for me, I have to be the first to admit that I’ve been guilty of saying careless, hurtful things to other people, too. Sometimes words just slip out, and we don’t realize how damaging they can be to people’s spirits.

Just this morning, I had to break up a little altercation between my two children. One of them said something unkind, and the other responded with a slap on the arm. First, I made the slapper apologize. I told that child that I’ve been guilty of responding the same way, but it doesn’t make it right. After the slapper apologized, I looked at the other child, the one who said mean words. I said, “Words hurt much more than a slap, and it takes much, much longer for the wounds to heal.”

Isn’t that the truth?

I’m so glad this was the first thing Daddy wanted me to see. He wanted me – and you – to know that words are important. And he wanted us to know that the only words we need to believe are the ones God speaks. The rest are lies. Cast them aside, and trust that God will deal with each of us for every careless word spoken.

Dear Father, Help me to control my tongue. When others don’t control theirs, help me to recognize the lies Satan wants me to believe about myself. Heal me from the wounds others have inflicted with their words, and help me to never inflict those wounds on others. Like You, I want to speak words of life, love and truth into those around me. Amen