Captured joy

I love pictures and I hate pictures.  They have the ability to capture great joy and happiness but also great sorrow and pain.  This picture above, captures both.  My dad spent the last 6 months of his time on earth in the hospital...with a 2 week "vacation" at home in the middle of it. Hospitals are not like home.  I used to work in them and love them until they represented brokenness and bad news for me and my family.
I was reflecting today on joy in the midst of pain and suffering and thought of this picture above.  He was truly joyful in the moment.  Why?  Because God delivered on his promises.  The Lord was his strength and was faithful in His promise to comfort, give peace, and ultimately heal.  Plus, he had "his girls" at his side.  We laughed hard, tried to have fun, I cried a lot, but despite it all we were a family who was waiting on the Lord.  We had hope. We didn't know the answer, but we knew Who the answer would come from and trusted in His good plan.  This morning my mom text me a picture (below) of what she found in Dad's bible where he had written, "teach me" by a verse.

God is faithful.  He did teach him.  Who could endure such suffering (details I can't even begin to explain) and still wear a heartfelt, pure and honest smile that overflowed from a joy filled heart.  No one apart from Christ.  Human flesh is incapable of it.  It flows from Love.  I remember that moment I took the picture. He wasn't just putting on a smile for us. He was happy in that moment.  Christ promises us a peace that transcends all understanding as we trust and rely and wait on him in this life,  and He delivered.  I was blessed to witness the fruits of the Spirit lived out, daily, and have forever been encouraged by his faith and hope.   A faith and hope I pray will continue to be a legacy in my family for generations to come!

If it's not the weather...

I am so tired of fear.  If it's not a result of my own thoughts, then it's the weatherman who tries to stir up anxiety.  I turned on the TV (first mistake) a couple nights ago and was warned about a "possibly fatal snow storm" that's heading our way.  Come on!  It's snow people! Happens all the time all over the world.  Yet they feel they need to use adjectives like "deadly" and "fatal" to rouse us to tune in. Worked.
Our society is so fear evoking.  You have a lump, probably cancer.  Your blood pressure is a little high or your cholesterol is borderline, then you're at high risk for a heart attack.  I could go on. Lately it's been driving me crazy.  Why are we so fear based?  We have a God and Father who is in control of all!  The storm, our lumps and bumps, and our every heart beat.  We are not in control.  Yet I feel our society tries to tell us we are.  Do this to avoid that...try harder...it's all up to you. Not true.  Sure we have to make wise choices and do our diligence, but this can be done without fear being our motivating factor.

John Ortberg said, "I find that every moment I worry is a chance to practice letting go of the need to control outcomes.  There is a God.  It is not me."

I fell in love with this when I read it.  So true.  Why do we worry?  We worry because we want to control our own life.  We don't want cancer, we don't want a heart attack, we don't want a sick child, ect...but we are not in control.

Jesus says it best, "Your Father knows what you need before you ask Him" and "..do not be worried about your life..and who of you by being worried can add a single hour to his life..you of little faith! ..For your heavenly Father knows that you need these things.  But seek first His kingdom and His righteousness, and all these things will be added to you.  So do not worry about tomorrow; for today will care for itself.  Each day has enough trouble of its own."  Matthew 6: 8 and 25-34

"Just as a father has compassion on his children, so the Lord has compassion on those who fear him.  For He himself knows our frame;  He is mindful that we are but dust."  Psalm 103:13

John Ortberg summed up the topic of worry reminding us that we only go through life once.  Some good things will happen, some bad things will happen.  But we can choose to be worried or draw our peace and strength from the Lord, who is Lord over ALL.

"Life is too short,

Joy is too precious,

God is too good, 

our soul is too valuable, 

we matter too much to throw away a single moment of our one and only life on anxious striving.  

For the Spirit God gave us does not make us timid." -John Ortberg

Sorry weatherman, you were wrong.