Category: Devotions

I sat by the fire and talked about life to a friend. One of the questions we asked was what if church was where people could be open and ask each other how life was and we all felt comfortable enough to tell the truth. Now it seems to be don’t ask me how I am and I won’t tell you.

Attention, all! See the marvels of God! He plants flowers and trees all over the earth, Bans war from pole to pole, breaks all the weapons across his knee. “Step out of the traffic! Take a long, loving look at me, your High God, above politics, above everything.”

Psalm 46:8 – The Message

My verse for the day. And as I read and ponder, my view for the day.

Beauty: Gods beauty. It isn’t hard to see God in his creativity. It isn’t hard to see God in the way he moves the clouds and stirs the water. It’s pretty easy to see God in a wee baby… especially when they look at you with wonder. It’s the stepping out of traffic that I sometimes have a problem with. I love to travel. I could easily be packed and ready to go in 2 minutes if someone said, “do you want to go?” I am not sure why I love to go. But what I don’t love is along the way somewhere in the midst of ecstasy, beauty and adventure is traffic. I spent part of last week in Denver. Denver has traffic. If you have to go anywhere north and south or east and west you probably have to encounter I25 and in the dictionary when you look it up there is a picture of traffic beside the word. Traffic irritates even the calmest of people. We all want to know why we are sitting still or crawling at a speed I could actually walk faster than. Horns honking, people losing their bodily control and waving hands at you that by the look on their face you interpret as not happy campers. People trying to get into your lane, others not slowing enough, fender benders, people keeping you from merging into their lane and eternity looming with us sitting perturbed. We don’t handle traffic well.

So the things we don’t handle well, God uses as illustrations so we get the picture. God says, ” step out of the traffic.”

If you remember your last traffic jam, getting out isn’t always easy. Getting out also means you lose your place in line: the very line you are silently calling names and tapping your foot at.

If we were like God, we could be above the traffic and see the accident. We could see the pile up with 2 very upset people. We could see the stuff that gets us so worked up. Admit it; I am not the only one who doesn’t like traffic jams.

God is simply trying to get me to see the bigger picture. Sometimes stepping out of the traffic or life is when God can talk to us. It’s a time when other things aren’t taking away our attention from God.

I had the wonderful opportunity this past week aside from the traffic to sit on the couch and visit with old friends, sit in the mountains in a hot tub and watch the sunset and see Baihley get her Masters Plus Degree from Denver University. To do those things I had to endure the traffic of life. But when I stepped out of the traffic God gave me a few ” ahh” moments with him. The key is recognizing when God is saying step out and then doing it. May you find traffic a bit less stressful and may you step out of the traffic long enough to take a long, loving look at God and what he is trying to tell you.

I like Home Depot. I just bought my new stove there. I thought Home Depot was all about building supplies but I heard today something that changed my mind. I sat for a long time in a hot gym with thousands of other parents, grandparents, friends and I guess others who had nothing to do on a hot day in Denver…the reason to be there when Baihley graduated from Grad school. The bagpipers, the music, the grand processional, the robes, the cheers and the pageantry with so much tradition all for a few hours on a Friday afternoon to celebrate accomplishments. We need to do that more; celebrate accomplishments.

The keynote speaker was a gal from…no less than Home Depot. What she said was great for more than just graduates. And of course I had a pen and pad to write it down. One of the first things she said to-us was that “everyone needs to feel relevant and have a stage to hear applause. ” That is so true especially as we grow older and kind of feel like we aren’t needed anymore. We all need to feel needed, feel care for and feel that there is something the world has need of that we can offer. Then she brought up what life is all about. ” Your life is not about you. It’s about everyone else.” She went on to say she climbed the ladder of success and was the self described deal queen and the symbol of success was accumulating deal toys. Trophies, awards, and stuff you get given when you make a winning deal, create a winning world and create business success. She woke up one day and wondered what would her tombstone say and realized it would be about stuff not people..She decided she wanted her tombstone to say, ” she made a difference in my life” and began to make changes to people would say that. She challenged the graduates to declare their purpose in life and then change their life to reflect that purpose. It’s all about serving others in life and legacy and leadership. She had some cool quotes from women she admired. ” do what you love and do it so well that people can’t take their eyes off you.” And her mother’s advice, “it isn’t working when you see it working.” And then she added, the most important decision of your life is who you decide to spend your life with. Spend it with someone who loves you.

How would my life had been lived differently had I heard that advice when I was graduating? Probably not a lot but definitely having a purpose in life and helping others reach their highest potential I would have grasped differently. She mentioned having a purpose in life and changing her life,, changed her approach to family, work, friends and God. She challenged the graduate students to make that change earlier in their career than she did.

I left Denver University with tons of pictures of graduation. I also left thinking much higher of the people running Home Depot. A company whose leaders feel people are more important than things and deals, and leading people with integrity is by example. Oh yes, I am sure there are people in the high office that may not reflect the values that she shared with us, but for today, we are thankful for a leaders vision and her ability to challenge and encourage not just graduates but all of us sitting and listening in a hot gym in Denver.

Not every morning do I wake up and look out the window of a log cabin to see beautiful mountains. Actually this is probably the first in many years.

There is something about a mountain. Yesterday I drove down through colorado and to my right was beautiful mountains. Majestic, some snow peaked, royally dressed with clouds as halos, and speaking to me. I am. It going crazy hearing mountains talk but the things they say about our creator and about his desire for us to enjoy beauty keeps reminding me of a loving father who just wants to make his children smile. As a parent I would get excited about a gift that knew would make the kids get all excited. Something they had wanted or something they needed or perhaps something that would make them jump up and down and laugh. I wanted to do that yesterday but I was the driver. I wanted to laugh at the beauty, shout out Gods majesty. And I even had thankful for the ugly mini-van I got to drive. I wanted a cute little economy car. The rental place evidently didn’t realize the paperwork when I reserved the car had meaning. Along with 20 other people standing in line for 45 minutes, they began upgrading people to get the line moving. They didn’t have my car clean, they said, although it was an hour after my reserve time. Would I want a mini- van and be gone now? I must have had the “you are offering me a mini van” look cuz he added a free tank of gas with it. And actually as I headed south. The mini van did give me a much better view of God’s beauty so I could marvel. As we watched the sunset, while suffering sitting in a hot tub on a log cabin deck, I watched the mountain peaks change color, yellows and reds and pinks and wondered how many times God has done sunsets just to make people pull over and marvel? How many times do we look in our rear view mirrors and go ahh…..that is so beautiful. How gratified God must feel when we look up and say, wow God. Is he as excited as we are when the colors and leaping out of the sky and making our hearts skips beat? I look out at the mountains and I think of the Psalms. Psalms 104 reminds us, Psalms 98 especially talks to me… let the ocean breakers call out, “encore” and the mountains harmonize the finale….. the whole chapter is screaming about Gods creation and how it applauds him and makes us thrilled to be apart of it. And today, I get to sit here looking at the beauty simply because God loved-me, chose me, saved me, gave me friends, loves me, still chooses me, still forgives me, still reminds me of that by relationships with others and when he shows his creation to me…it’s still one of those ahh moments…there is something about a mountain… and yes, for the record, I have always wanted to live in a log cabin in the mountains….but because God can and will answer prayers, I would request a mountain lake to go with it too….

I am reading Matthew 6 in about verse 25 and out. I have no problems worrying about what Jesus talked about. Got my check mark done. But before I go on, it bothers me that Jesus didn’t talk about the other stuff…the stuff I do worry about. Most of the time we worry about the basic needs. I just spent some time in Africa. That’s what they worry about; basic needs. They don’t worry about the other stuff because it’s stuff. Basic needs are so much more relevant. God tells us he will handle the basic things: food, clothing and then he throw in tomorrow for those who plan ahead and worry about what next. That’s probably me, in the what’s next part.

I came back from Africa wondering many things but the one most pressing is why was I chose to be born in rural Minnesota on a dairy farm and not in a back hut in Rhodesia? Perhaps that’s what urges on my worry..or concern as us Christian Americans put it to make it sound more spiritual.. I am concerned about stuff..because God says not to worry I will change the word. Changing the word does not change its intention. I worry.. I am concerned. I take energy that could be used in other places to spend contemplating on what God has said he would handle so what do I do with my concern? Nothing according to verse 32…God knows all these things. He knows I am worried regardless of what words I use to make it sound better. The solution? Seek him first. Not just seek him first but try adding some righteousness and work a bit more at being Jesus and not quoting Jesus. And then after I seek him, don’t worry about what he is going to do about my problems that I have created in my mind… and just to make me worry a bit more he adds….sufficient for the day is it’s own trouble. Come on God..I already have concerns about tomorrow. And you have the gall to say drop them.. I had no problems when I went to bed…already have a few that popped up overnight..and I didn’t worry about them. I wasn’t concerned about them yesterday cuz I didn’t know.. That’s what God was getting at. We can’t be concerned over everything so let him handle it. And have nothing to worry, sorry I slipped: be concerned over? You have got to be kidding? What will I do with all my free time? Oh that’s right…seek Him.