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I am Known!

5/13/2020

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The past couple of days I have been pondering the concept of knowing and being known. As small children we often tell people exactly what we are thinking and feeling without shame or fear of what they will think. In this, we are transparent and have the ability to be known. Maybe it's just me, but as I grew up, I gained a sense of not always being the person that others really wanted to know, so I became very careful what I revealed and to whom I revealed it. Consequently, loneliness became part of my everyday experience. Along the way, God sent people with whom I could be more vulnerable and share more of my thoughts and feelings and struggles. I am so thankful for these dear people. Some were just in my life for a season, and some (like Tucker) have been walking alongside me for decades. 


Why is it so important to be known? Why not just tread the path of life as a lone ranger? Work hard, get rich, buy stuff, make a few surface level friends to share good times with and then die. There are those who do exactly this. Perhaps they have a family--even a beautiful and successful family--but their hearts are empty and lonely. No one really knows them--especially not themselves. 


Our Creator wishes to be known. "Thus says the Lord: “Let not the wise man boast in his wisdom, let not the mighty man boast in his might, let not the rich man boast in his riches, but let him who boasts boast in this, that he understands and knows me, that I am the Lord who practices steadfast love, justice, and righteousness in the earth. For in these things I delight, declares the Lord.” (Jeremiah 9:23-24) God desires that we know Him! In fact, Jesus said that eternal life was knowing God. "And this is eternal life, that they know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent." (John 17:3) Eternal life isn't about some far off land called heaven in the future when our life on earth is done. It is NOW! It is knowing the one true God at this moment and knowing him increasingly more day after day. 


So, He wants to be known and eternal life is knowing Him. How do I do this? Jeremiah also recorded God saying, "You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart." (Jeremiah 29:13) Seeking Him with all my heart in part means laying down everything I think I have or believe I am and surrendering to His plan for my life. Right before this verse in Jeremiah 29, God said he has good plans for His people. Plans involving "a future and a hope." His people had been faithless, yet, he wanted to be known by them and had a future for them. The same is true for me and you. I know I have lacked faith in His provision. I have gotten distracted from seeking Him with all my heart. 


In Genesis 1 we learn, "So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them." (Genesis 1:27) We are created in the image of the Creator Who wishes to be known. No wonder I felt so lonely as a child when I was hiding myself from others! I was created to be known.  You were created to be known...and we were all created by the One true God Who desires to be known by us and to know us! What an overwhelming privilege. As the apostle Paul wrote in Philippians, knowing God often comes through great trial. "Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God that depends on faith— that I may know him and the power of his resurrection...." (Philippians 3:8-10a)


This storm in my life is of eternal value. It is showing me moment by moment how much more I need to desire to truly know Christ and that I must seek Him. In the uncertainties of each day and the pain, I have no inner resources, I must seek Him. Hallelujah that He so desires to be known my ME that He will walk through this fire with me. 


This song by Graham Kendrick sums up my desires in the midst of this storm. 

~meredith 

(All Scripture quoted from the English Standard Version) 
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With All Her Heart, a short story...

12/31/2013

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It was Christmas Eve and thirteen year old Sarah was sitting at the window looking gloomily at the snowflakes falling outside in the sunset. Behind her, the Christmas tree was dazzling with lights and her older brother and sister were finishing the decorating.  That was why she was so unhappy, her brother and sister. She loved them, most definitely, but she was tired of what they were doing. They quarreled, and not just some of the time, all the time. Sarah wished that she could help them, but she wasn't sure how. She wished she could bring peace to her whole family, but wasn't sure how to do that either.  She finally decided she couldn't stand it anymore. "I'd like to go for a walk, Mama; would that be okay with you?"

"Of course, Sarah. Please don't stay out too late okay?"

        " Yes Mama; thanks." She slipped on her coat and headed out the door breathing a sigh of relief as she did so. "It's awful to be glad that I'm out of there. I wonder what tomorrow will be like. Maybe I'll go over to the Christmas Eve service." Sarah thought as she wandered along. Soon she reached the church that she and her family attended on Sundays. Music floated out as she slipped in the door and took a seat in the back.

As she did so, the choir finished singing and the pastor came to the front. "I'm going to read from Hebrews today, and even though you may think it strange I think that it will be fitting for what I have to say." Then he began to read. "Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God."  There was a moment of silence and then he spoke again, "Jesus is the founder and perfecter of our faith, and with that faith we are to lay aside everything and run the race he has set before us. Look to Jesus, the only really reliable example that there is when you think about it. He endured all the pain, all the shame, and all the hardship that was set before him, and is now seated at the right hand of the throne of God. The same goes for us too, despite all the trials and hardships in life, be joyful and endurant and then, if our faith is truly real, we will go to live in heaven with God forever!"  

         Sarah sat transfixed as she had never heard the Christmas story in this way this before.

         The pastor was speaking again and his voice brought her back to the present. "This is why Jesus was born, this is why God sent his son to take away all our sin, so that we could be close to him once more! He loves us so much that even though we did not listen to him in the garden of Eden he already had a plan and was willing to send his son, his only son, to take away forever all the sin of the world! Ladies and gentlemen, this is what we celebrate on Christmas Day; this is what we are celebrating all the time!"

          As the pastor closed in prayer, Sarah slipped out of the church and went a few steps down the road. Then she stopped and knelt on the side.  "Lord Jesus," she whispered "I am a wretched sinner and am in dire need of a savior. Thank you for the wonderful gift that you offer to all who choose to accept it. Please give me your gift of life forever with you, and thank you so much for bringing me here so that I could hear the message  of your eternal life." A sudden thought sprang into her head, "Please allow me to be able to share this message with someone else who hasn't heard it before. Thank you, thank you, thank you, in your name I pray Amen."  There were tears in her eyes as she rose and started for home, tears of gladness and peace and thankfulness that she had never experienced before. 

As Sarah stepped in the door of their house something seemed different, then it came to her, it was quiet! Wondering, she went upstairs to the bedroom that she shared with her older sister, Faith. She opened the door and then closed it behind her, Faith was sitting on the bed crying. "Why, whatever is the matter, Faith?" Sarah asked in surprise. 

          "Oh Sarah, I've been simply awful to Mark. I'm sure he won't ever forgive me for being so horrible, Oh Sarah, it doesn't seem like Christmas Eve at all." Faith broke down and cried bitterly. 

Sarah sat down on the bed next to her and spoke gently but excitedly.  "I went to the Christmas Eve service this evening and was really blessed by the message." She launched into a full account of the sermon, how amazing the news was, and how she had asked Jesus into her heart. When she had finished Faith was silent for a minute, then she said brokenly, 

"I'm sorry Sarah, I've been a bad sister to you too, please forgive me."  

"Of course I will!"  

"And would you please pray with me, Sarah? I want to ask Jesus into my heart too." Faith turned toward her pleadingly.

"I'd love to," Sarah said, giving her a hug.

        When Sarah left the room a little while later her heart was singing and there was a smile on her face, "Thank you Jesus for the opportunity to share" she prayed quietly as she went downstairs. When she reached the kitchen she found Mark, her older brother, sitting at the table with his head in his hands. 

"What's wrong Mark?" She asked. 

"I've been awful to Faith lately, Sarah," he replied looking up. "Do you think you could help me?" 

"Gladly." Sarah smiled as she sat down at the table and prepared, for the second time, to share about God's wonderful gift of salvation to us. This was how she could bring peace to her family, and with God's help she would do it with all her heart.

Written by Bethany who is twelve years old and a follower of Jesus, the King of Kings. She is part of a family of seven and is homeschooled along with her other siblings. She is the second oldest with two brothers and two sisters. Some of the things she enjoys doing include singing gospel and classical music, playing her recorder, knitting, crocheting, mending and sewing small things, swimming, writing stories, playing with her brothers and sisters and spending time with her family. 

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True Love & Sacrifice

7/28/2013

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This morning I read the following....


 "Even if I dole out all that I have [to the poor in providing] food, and if I surrender my body to be burned or in order that I may glory, but have not love (God’s love in me), I gain nothing."  
I Corinthians 13:3

No matter what I sacrifice--if I don't have God's love in me, it's worthless to me.  It's also worthless to God because my motivations are not honoring to Him.  A true martyr is one who gives up everything for Christ out of a pure heart full of love for Him.  

Oh, that my heart would burn for Him each moment of each and every day....


~meredith




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