If we are the Body

For the past six years I have been one of the people everyone calls crazy when I participate in a 3 ½ day bike trip that travels 300 miles from one state to another. I’ve always loved it; the people you get to know, the fun you have but most of all the dozens of life lessons you learn.
Bike trip isn’t easy. Actually if you’re not someone who exercises a lot, and if you haven’t trained enough prior to bike trip, it can be very painful. You learn perseverance, and you develop a back bone for pushing even when it hurts. You learn that you need other people, to pull you in draft lines, and to encourage you. But most important you learn that it isn’t all about you. Other people hurt, everyone struggles at some point and everyone needs encouragement and love. This is a lesson I have had to relearn year after year. This year though, I began to see this concept in a new way.
Each day we are given a Bible verse to tape on our bike to read throughout the day. The verses this year had to do with the Body of Christ.
One of the verses was 1 Corinthians 12:24b-26.

“But God has combined the members of the body and has given greater honor to the parts that lacked it, so that there should be no division in the body, but that its parts should have equal concern for each other. If one part suffers, every part suffers with it; if one part is honored, every part rejoices with it.”

On bike trip this needed to be our mindset. We all had a different part to play, yet we were equal, none of us were more important than another. And when one of us was hurting, we all needed to be hurting along side of them, carrying their burden. I often knew when one of the other bikers was struggling. Their legs slowed up, they peddled on alone. Their shoulders sagged in. You had at that point had a choice to make, to continue on passed them or to slow up and give them encouragement or maybe pull in front of them to break the wind.
I began thinking about it, if this is how the Body of Christ needs to operate on bike trip. And if bike trip is like life, than I have been living life all wrong. People are hurting all around us. Our own families and friends are struggling. We know it yet we fail to come along side of them, to serve them and to carry their burden. Life is hard, downright painful at times. We are human and we have a sin nature. We all sin and fall short of God’s best. We fail. As Christ’s followers we have to see the hurting people and to reach out and have compassion and love them for who they are and what they are struggling with down deep inside.
I have failed to do this so many times. I have lived for myself and for my interests and have missed the bigger picture. “But if we are the Body, why aren’t our hands reaching.”

Why should we do this?

“Now that I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also should wash one another's feet. I have set you an example that you should do as I have done for you.” John 13:14-15

Because Jesus did so much more.

Experiment

I am considering deleting this blog.
You may have noticed that I rarely update it.
You also may have noticed that the amount of feedback I receive is zero. Not that feed back is what's important but it is rather nice to know you are not speaking to an empty audience.
So here is the experiment. If you do read this blog and appreciate what it says, then please let me know. I will delete it in one month if I don't hear from you.

You shall teach them to your children

And if you will indeed obey My commandments that I command you today,to love the LORD your God, and to serve Him with all your heart and with all your soul, He will give the rain for your land in its season, the early rain and the later rain, that you may gather in your grain and your wine and your oil. And He will give grass in your fields for your livestock, and you shall eat and be full. Take care lest your heart be deceived, and you turn aside and serve other gods and worship them; then the anger of the LORD will be kindled against you, and He will shut up the heavens, so that there will be no rain, and the land will yield no fruit, and you will perish quickly off the good land that the LORD is giving you.
You shall therefore lay up these words of mine in your heart and in your soul, and you shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. You shall teach them to your children, talking of them when you are sitting in your house, and when you are walking by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise. You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates,

Deuteronomy 11:13-21

Only be careful, and watch yourselves closely so that you do not forget the things your eyes have seen or let them slip from your heart as long as you live. Teach them to your children and to their children after them.

Deuteronomy 4:9


Pass the Baton to the next generation.
Lest we forget the Lord.

Generations will reap what I sow.

This song really put in perspective how important it is that Christians pass on the truths of God to the next generation.
Lest we forget.

I can taste the fruit of Eve
I’m aware of sickness, death and disease
The results of our choices are vast
Eve was the first but she wasn’t the last

And if I were honest with myself
Had I been standing at that tree
My mouth and my hands would be covered with fruit
Things I shouldn’t know and things I shouldn’t see

Remind me of this with every decision
Generations will reap what I sow
I can pass on a curse or a blessing
To those I will never know

She taught me to fear the serpent
I’m learning to fear myself
And all of the things I am capable of
In my search for wisdom, acceptance and wealth

And to say that the devil made me do it
Is a cop out and a lie
The devil can’t make me do anything
When I’m calling on Jesus Christ

Remind me of this with every decision
Generations will reap what I sow
I can pass on a curse or a blessing
To those I will never know

To my great, great, great grand daughter
Live in peace
To my great, great, great grand son
Live in peace
To my great, great, great grand daughter
Live in peace
To my great, great, great grand son
Live in peace, oh, live in peace

Remind me of this with every decision
Generations will reap what I sow
I can pass on a curse or a blessing
To those I will never know

Oh, remind me
Generations will reap what I sow
I can pass on a curse or a blessing
To those I will never know
Oh, I may never know

Generations
Sara Groves

A childrens program part 2. Together for good

"God always has a reason for what He does."

God wanted to do something in this church this year through the children's Christmas program. Over and over again He reminded me of this. If God was going to do something, we wanted every one's hearts to be ready. Friends from all over prayed. They prayed that the hearts of every single teacher, sound guy, piano player, child who sang and every person in the audience would be soft and open. They were there for a reason.

At times my heart would tell me that I was just making it all up and everything was of my own doing and nothing was going to happen but I had to remember what God had told me through His Word and remember the lessons that I learned the hard way because I had wanted to be sufficient in myself. God is sovereign. He always has a reason for what He does.

The big day arrived. Oddly enough, I wasn't nervous. Someone far greater than me was working and whatever happened would be apart of the plan.
The children entered and filed onto the stage. This was the moment. I stepped out and began.
•A couple Christmas carols
•Three verses from Isaiah each prophesying the birth of Christ.
•The children sat, lights dimmed. Scene one of the skit began.
The story of a grandfather telling three children about the birth of Christ, one of the children commenting that he thought the manger story was a bit of a fairy tale.
"That is because you have not heard the rest of the story" The grandfather replied.
"The rest of the story?" The child asks. "Yes,” the grandfather replies "the story of God coming from heaven in the form of a child and dying a terrible death on the cross"
•Scene one finishes. The children stand and sing a song about His death.
•More verses from Isaiah prophesying the death of Christ.
•Scene two begins. The cruel story of Jesus' death yet this wasn't the end of the story. Jesus rose from the dead.
•The children sing a song about Easter.
• Verses from Isaiah about Jesus setting the captives free.
• Scene three. What now? Right before Jesus went back to heaven He said "All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age."
•The program ended with one of my favorite song titled "Our heart"
And as the children sang, elders, ministers, missionary committee member, and spouses came forward and sang these words
"Our heart, our desire, Is to see the nations worship.
Our cry, our prayer, Is to sing your praise to the ends of the earth.
That with one mighty voice, Every tribe and tongue rejoices.”
Everyone stood, and one of the elders prayed.

I do believe God was glorified.

A Christmas Program. Part 1. Not my Program.

"The glories of Christ Jesus are far greater then anything any man could ever do on their own."

I love seeing God work...especially when it is so obvious that it is Him, and when it is a direct result of prayer.
He worked in such a way today.

July 2008. God began this work by filling my head with ideas for that my churches children's Christmas program that year. And though everything was not completely clear, He had laid the basics in my mind. The story of Christmas, not just a baby in a manger but the man on the cross, the Resurrection of Christ and the great commission.
So with much thought and prayer, I volunteered to direct the program.

September. I started teaching the 2-5year olds the songs they would sing.
As I planned out the details, I was advised to maybe do a skit.
With more thought, I decided to write my own script. As I started the process,
I made two goals: 1. To have the script finished by end of September and 2. Have cast lined up by the beginning of October.

News flash. God's plans are not our plans and God's time is not our time.

I tried to write the script on my own in my time. But first God had a big a lesson to teach me. And as I labored for the write words to say, I found myself frustrated that all I could write was shallow and stupid jabber. And as the days passed to no avail, I became more and more stressed to the point of tossing and turning at night and when I would think of the unfinished script I felt great panic.

During this time I would ask myself what exactly was I thinking when I volunteered to do this program.:)

Finally I had had enough. I stopped, I cried. Then I gave the pen to God. I told Him that He could have it all. I would be the tool in His hands. I gave Him the script and the cast. He knew best.

God had the pen and the words began to flow. After others had edited, I finished the script mid October. The cast came together shortly there after.

Many more times I would cry out to God and give Him the burden that wasn't met for me. Many more times I would give Him each song, each verse, each teacher, each child, each prop, each motion. And most of all, I would give Him myself.

God in return, filled me with peace. All was well, and with the advice of others and the continueal leading of God, the program slowly began to take shape.