Memories That Sting

I was stung by a bee once in my life. It was a horrible experience. The burning feeling lingers for a while. It is recommended that you remove the stinger quickly to minimize the amount of venom that is released into the body. Last Sunday yet again I was asking God to help me to forgive. I don't know about you but whenever a sermon on forgiveness is taught certain people come to mind. I pray tearfully to God to help me forgive. Unforgiveness has a way of leaving you in state of paralysis that is hard to overcome. You can't pretend it away, you can't speak it away honestly I don't even think you can take pragmatic steps to wiping it clean. It's a work of the Holy Spirit. That being said, in my prayer I heard God speak quietly to me that He was removing the stingers. In essence the memories will remain but the sting of those memories, He is removing. I would love to be spiritual and say how I allow God to remove stingers quickly. However, that's not always the case. I have admittedly allowed a lot of poison into my system. The poison of unforgiveness is bitterness that leads to hatred that leads to vengeance and the such. Its affects are nasty and vicious. Matthew 5:22-24

A few months back I had a conversation with one of my sisters where she explained forgiveness being like a debt owed. When you forgive your releasing the person from that debt. That was liberating for me. In my brain I saw an itemized spread sheet carefully recording the cost of each incident. Words that were spoken, actions done and undone and their cost. Some people owed me several thousand  forgiveness dollars. Others had been paying off their debt slowly and things where evening up. Then God in His love begins to show me my debt to Him. The amount owed supersedes anything I could pay back and on the cross it was all paid. It is something about seeing you own itemized debt that is sobering. It will shake you like coffee from the stupor of a self-centered hangover. I could begin visualize myself deleting the amounts owed from my spreadsheet. What's really amazing is when God begins to show you what you said and did that deeply hurt others. Matthew 18:21-35

I heard these lyrics and thought about unforgivness: 

 When the darkness fills my senses When my blindness keeps me from Your touch... Jesus come

  When my burdens keeps me doubting When my memories take the place of You... Jesus come 

Unforgivness will fill your senses to the point of blindness. You find yourself no longer being able to see yourself, people or even God rightly. If He doesn't come to you in His grace there is no hope. Unforgivness is like the heavy load that is carried around weighing on a persons shoulders. Matthew 11:28-30 Finally here we are full circle where the memories take the place of God. The memories take up more space than they should. They only do that because the stingers are still there. The pain is what drives us to prove ourselves and protect ourselves. Once the stinger associated with memory is gone the memory can take its rightful amount of space providing lessons and love. Let's allow Jesus to come and remove the stingers.

Still In Love...

Still in Love with him

God and His amazing love and grace... Sadly, my life goes so quickly and busily that I don't always have time to quietly reflect on the sweetness of God. There are so many facets to Gods nature ranging from holy to omnipresent. So for me to stop and think on Him being sweet, it sounds crazy. However, today that's the part of God I was reminded of. My husband on the way out of the door turned around to plant a soft kiss on my lips and whisper "you are, amazing" I feel teary eyed even now at the thought of that moment. To some it may sound crazy that in that instance my affections where not just stirred for my husband but for my God. God in His wisdom and love chose my husband for me. God in His grace and mercy have given us two beautiful children. He's given me the desire of my heart.

When life is going great we can take God and our loved ones for granted. When things are difficult we can become irritated and disenchanted with God and our loved ones. Its not easy to give thanks to God in every season, for this is the will of God for us in Christ Jesus 1Thes. 5:18 Nevertheless, its a discipline I can now see more than ever is necessary. In every season there are glimpses of Gods sweetness. The moment when it seems the walls are closing in and yet you have peace you shouldn't. In the moments when  your doubled over in laughter in the midst of good food and good friends and yet you can inhale Gods kindness even in that moment. 

In our home we have a tradition at dinner for every person to say what was their high, their low and what they are grateful for in that day. There have been days that simple tradition has dragged me out of a deep funk. When a day has been hard and I can think of a myriad of lows. On the other hand finding one high is difficult and being grateful for anything is even harder. However, I do every time. Some days I've had to dig deep for it but i found it or it found me.

In essence  I pray that not matter what state we find ourselves in we can still sense the unchanging love of God and the gentle sweetness of His grace.