Reflections: What is Faith?...

Please be sure to read this FaceBook note by my Daughter, Havalyn Nesler Duchenne. It speaks volumes.

Reflections: What is Faith?

Worth the reading...

Here is a blog that a friend of mine wrote. She is one special lady.

These Broken Vases: My People

I have prayed for so long, that God would give me fellowship like I get at camp, only closer to home and more frequent. I didn't realize that that is the very thing He is developing at Orchard View Alliance church. This post opened my eyes to that very truth. Please be praying for Andy and Ellen Stumbo (pastor and wife), the leadership and the congregation of OVA as God leads the church forward into this much needed ministry.

Freedom from fear...

People don't realize this, but when you are disabled, there is so much more to fear.

Think about it a minute, really think about it. You go to your local department store to pick up a few things and decide you need to use the restroom. Sound easy? Well it starts out that way until you find that you can't get off the toilet. So, you have to sit in the bathroom until someone else comes along and hears your cry for help.

Some people may find this funny and I guess in a way it is, but it isn't all that funny to the person sitting on the toilet. In fact, I happened to be that person a short while ago. It was very embarrassing and I'm still afraid that it will happen again, but this week God gave a truth to hold onto to battle this, or any other fear.

Jesus Himself was in the stern, asleep on the cushion; and they woke Him and said to Him, "Teacher, do You not care that we are perishing?"

Jesus was asleep in a boat in the middle of a terrible storm and I've been told the storms on the sea of Galilee could be bad. The disciples surely thought they were going to be washed overboard and killed. Jesus slept on until they woke him.

My question is, how could he sleep with the tempest raging around Him? Why wasn't He afraid like the disciples?

Because He knew what His destiny was. He knew why He was on earth. Jesus also knew that the Father was going to complete what He sent Him to do. Jesus slept through the storm because He knew He had more to do. The disciples didn't have that same assurance, at least not in writing, but we do.

"...being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus."(Phil. 1:6, NIV)

He will complete what He has to do in my life. Start to finish, it's in His hands.

The Bible also tells us that, "There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear...,"(1 John 4:18).

So the Bible's answer to fear is realizing how much God loves me. He loves me perfectly and His perfect love is what guides my life. I believe God is all powerful and that He is in control (see the truths that sustain: Truth #2). I also believe He is all loving and if His love is perfect then nothing is going to happen to me that isn't for my good.

I used to live a life of fear. What I mean is this, fear controlled me, my thoughts and my daily living. It wasn't a once and a while thing, we all have some of that in our lives, it was a daily, sometimes hourly thing. I feared what "could" happen in my life. I actually "borrowed" other peoples tragedies and wondered how hard that would be for me. Fear was taking over my life.

I finally realized some things that have set me free from daily, chronic, fear. The first is that God loves me perfectly. That means no mistakes on His part. The second is that God gives me grace for the moment I am living in. His grace doesn't come before I need it, and, He doesn't give me grace to deal with other peoples tragedy.

I need to relearn the lessons God gave me in the past about fear. I need to apply those lessons to my life as a disabled person. The verse about Jesus sleeping through the storm has reminded me that God has a plan for me and that He is going to complete that plan in my life. I can trust Him to carry me through whatever happens. His perfect love will see me through.

Thoughts on Prayer...

I think practicing the presence of God is good for our prayer life. I am forced, by my disability, to have times where I am forced to wait. I let those times of waiting be times when I can be open to hearing His Spirit whisper to my heart those things I need to be praying about, people I can be praying about. Silence is hard to find in our culture. The silence I am talking about is a soul silence. We can be in a noisy waiting room and still find soul silence if we decide to be still and just be. No cell phone, computer, reading material, TV, etc. It is during the times of soul silence when God can put people and prayers on our heart.

Practicing the presence of God is really about taking the time to invite God into our life. When we stay connected to God like that, it opens the door for the Holy Spirit to speak to us, to use us, to refresh us. Paul tells us to pray without ceasing. It doesn't mean shutting ourselves into a room all day and kneeling by our bed to pray. It means we should see ways we can bring prayer into our daily activities. Prayer needs to flow naturally from us as we go about our day.

When someone asks me for prayer, I stop and ask them, "May I pray for you right now?" I've never had someone say no. I usually pray a short, simple prayer right away with them and let them know I will be praying for them as the Lord brings them to mind.

In Responce to "Faith Healing"...

I came upon this quote last week:

"Our Substitute bore both our sins and our sicknesses that we might be delivered from them. Christ's bearing of our sins and sicknesses is surely a valid reason for trusting Him now for deliverance from both." F.F. Bosworth

I can't disagree with this assumption more. It is based on this verse:

"Surely he took up our infirmities and carried our sorrows, yet we considered him stricken by God, smitten by him, and afflicted. But he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was upon him, and by his wounds we are healed. We all, like sheep, have gone astray, each of us has turned to his own way; and the LORD has laid on him the iniquity of us all." (Isaiah 53:4-6)

So, am I saying I don't agree with this verse? No. What I disagree with is the belief that somehow this verse guarantees instant healing. Most people, who believe this, also believe that if instant healing doesn't come then it is the fault of the supplicant, that they must not have enough faith.

Nowhere in this verse do I see a promise for instant healing. Nor do I find that promise anywhere else in the bible. In fact I see this in the scriptures:

"Now if we are children, then we are heirs--heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ, if indeed we share in his sufferings in order that we may also share in his glory." (Romans 8:17, NIV)

" I consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us. For the creation waits in eager expectation for the children of God to be revealed." (Romans 8:18-19, NIV)

"Therefore I am well content with weaknesses, with insults, with distresses, with persecutions, with difficulties, for Christ's sake; for when I am weak, then I am strong." (2 Corinthians 12:10, NAS)

"Therefore we do not lose heart. Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day." (2 Corinthians 4:16, NIV)

I'm not saying the promise isn't real. He did bear our sorrows and iniquity and by his stripes we are healed. But, I don't see anything in the promise that makes it a now thing. A promise delayed is still a promise. Isn't that what Hebrews 11 is all about?

"All these people were still living by faith when they died. They did not receive the things promised; they only saw them and welcomed them from a distance, admitting that they were foreigners and strangers on earth." (Hebrews 11:13, NIV)

The Promised Land was promised to the Israelites, it was theirs, yet it took 40 years for them to get there. God's promises are no less true because we have to wait for them.

I know my healing is promised. I just have to wait for God to give it to me. In His time, not mine, and how much faith I have or don't have won't stop God from doing His will in my life. That's where grace comes in. He is giving me what I don't deserve: love, forgiveness, strength, power...the fruit of the Spirit. His grace isn't based on anything I do or don't do. Grace is exactly what it is, undeserved love. I deserve death. What I get is grace.

.Instant healing is not for everyone this side of heaven. For some of us, including me, it is the pain and illness that allows me to be the best witnesses in this world. It also allows us to better weep with a hurting world. I am called to do this as much as any calling God gives.

"I am healed of the need to be healed." From an interview with football coach with ALS

The Parade...

The pastor who discipled me (John Langlois) taught me well and left me with many truths that I still hold onto today. He had an amazing gift of making biblical truths real and relevant. I was reminded of one of those truths a few days ago by something a friend said. It is a truth on perspective and how it effects the attitudes I have in my life.

My life is like a parade and I am stuck watching the parade from behind a fence, with only a knothole to see it through. That means my view on life is what I have already seen and what is going by at the moment. I can’t see what is coming or how long the parade will last. I also can’t see anything that came before I started watching.

God, because he is omniscient (all knowing), sees the parade from over the top of the fence, from beginning to end. Not only does he see the parade, he also planned the parade and is over-seeing its progress. Nothing happens in the parade that he hasn’t planned or allowed to happen.

This analogy helps me maintain perspective. It reminds that what I see and experience now is only a small part of the big picture or, as one theologian (C.S. Lewis I think) observed, if it were a book, my life would be the first letter of the first word on the first page of a three volume set (and from an eternal point of view that is minuscule). It helps me most when I am hurting or suffering because it helps me see that this life is momentary and that what I am suffering now will be greatly outweighed by the eternal glory God has promised me. The Bible puts it this way:

“I consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us.” (Romans 8:18, NIV)

It’s also nice to know that someone bigger than me is in charge and that he knows what is going to happen. I can trust him because he loves me. I can put the parade of my life into his capable hands and sit back and watch what is going to happen next. I know that he is here with me and that he is giving me the strength I need to live. As the parade passes by, he is here giving it meaning.

"God is too good to be unkind. He is too wise to be mistaken. If I cannot trace His hand, I can always trust His heart." - C. H. Spurgeon

"Blessings"...

A friend shared this song by Laura Story with me. Thanks Ellen. Now I think I'll go buy it to download.