Lesson from Life - God's Grace

This past Sunday, our pastor shared a sermon on grace. Before he spoke a video was shown of two little boys who woke up early and went out to the barn to play. After a few minutes, they found a mud puddle and proceeded to play in it. After a little bit of play time -- long enough to get good and dirty -- their dad showed up. He had a stern face, and both boys looked up at him sheepishly. If you've had guilty children, you've seen the look. The camera pans around to the dad's back where he was hiding a water hose. A twinkle appeared in his eyes as he started squirting his sons with water. He started a full-fledged water fight, with lots of smiles and laughter.

This is a picture of our Father's grace. We are dirty, and he takes the anointing of Holy Spirit and washes us when we ask for forgiveness. It's not something we earn or deserve, but He gives it freely.

Then my quiet time Monday was about grace. I did a little studying, and here is what I found...

Grace means favor, goodwill; a manifestation of favor; mercy, clemency, pardon

Then I found a few verses:

• Eph. 2:8-9 - God saved us by his GRACE
• Rom. 6:15 - God's GRACE has set us free from the law
• Rom. 11:5 - God's GRACE is a manifestation of undeserved kindness

What does grace mean to YOU?

Blessings,

Ginger

Lessons from Life: God, Our Cleanser and Healer

As I was washing dishes tonight, I decided to oil my butcher block table/counter. It's gotten a little dry where we cut vegi's and bread.

In order to prepare it to receive the oil, I have to scrub it to get off any excess food that's dried on there. So I got out my little green scrubby, wet it, and starting scouring the surface. When I was finished, I dried it with the white towel I had draped over my shoulder. Bad idea. The towel soaked up all the extra dirt left by my scrubbing.

After it was completely dry, I poured on the mineral oil generously and took a paper towel and spread it around. I made extra sure more oil was slathered on the dry places. Then I left the wood to soak up all the extra oil.

Where's the life lesson?

We are like the dry wood, dirty and thirsty. And God is the oil. Unlike the counter, we don't have to get ourselves cleaned up before God pours out his healing touch on our lives. If we did, none of us would experience that glorious feeling.

Sometimes, though, just like my scouring of the counter, God needs to pay extra attention to an area in our lives that is dirty. The sin in our lives clogs up the pores and won't allow Holy Spirit access. The pores need to be scrubbed.

Hebrews 12:11(NLT) says, "No discipline is enjoyable while it is happening—it’s painful! But afterward there will be a peaceful harvest of right living for those who are trained in this way."

Ouch!

"No discipline is enjoyable...BUT afterward there will be a peaceful harvest of right living..." Oh to have that peaceful harvest. It doesn't come easy however. *sigh*

Just like my counter will soak in the oil I applied, so must we too rest in his healing touch, and wait for Holy Spirit to fill all the empty and dry places in our lives.

Blessings,
Ginger

PS. If you get anything out of these little life lessons, please comment and let me know. It's hard sometimes to pour out my heart, wondering if anyone is even reading. Thanks.

Lessons from Life - God, our Protector

Every once in a while, life will give you a lesson and as I was thinking about you all this morning and what I could post, I thought about our loss last week.

We lost a member of our family. My son's teddy-bear hamster escaped, which he's done a number of times in the past. This time however, we didn't realize it until it was too late.

See, we have this other member of our family who enjoys the chase. And unfortunately, Teddy happened to be his prey. (BTW, this is the cat eating a steak bone. He thinks he's part dog.)

Teddy had camped out behind my dryer. How he got there from upstairs is beyond me, but such is the way of rodents. :) Peeta, the cat, found him back there. I found Teddy in Peeta's mouth.

Where's the lesson in this?

God wants to be our safe place, just as Teddy's cage was his safe place. When we step outside of that protection, we open ourselves up to all sorts of danger. Teddy couldn't see past the need to escape and be "free". His freedom cost him his life. How many times do we want to escape our safe place and do something daring, or say to ourselves, "just this once" when confronted with temptation?

Teddy was okay the first few times he managed to gain his freedom. No big deal, right? And yet...

Think on that today.

Blessings,
Ginger