Blessings & Benedictions -- from The Chosen
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My husband and I have been watching The Chosen. For those of you who are not familiar with this truly riveting dramatic series, here is the storyline of the first season:
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His Qualifying Life and Death
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A few years ago, I spent spent several hours in an exercise that I never would have dreamed would be so valuable. And so I would love to share the fruit of my “what I thought would be agonizing” afternoon and evening with you, my dear readers. My project? Transcribing just a ten minute sermon into pages of type. But in the process of it all, my mind received greater clarity and understanding and my heart just leaped with joy and thanksgiving for my beautiful Lord Jesus, who is my Savior and indwelling Life.
So please watch the video first. It is truly powerful. And then if you long to understand and relish the message on a deeper level, read the transcript that follows.
Read MoreAre You Still Taking Flowers to Your Grave?
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One line of the lyrics for “Got to Let It Go” by MercyMe draws a picture that is in keeping with Jan’s most recent post “Are You Guarding an Empty Tomb?”
“Stop taking flowers to the grave of the old you that died.”
Read MoreAre You Guarding an Empty Tomb?
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It is Finished!
But why are so many of us "guarding an empty tomb," trying to keep the shame of memories, regrets, sins of the past from impinging themselves on our present as if these offenses are still alive...and unforgiven?
Read MoreEaster Bonnets and Bunnies: Living in Newness of Life
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I have two younger sisters, Linda and Nancy. At Easter every year, our mom would dress us up in our ruffly Easter dresses, shoes, purses, and of course, bonnets. Since I am the oldest of the three, my Easter clothes were usually brand new. My younger two sisters, on the other hand, had hand-me-downs, but they were “new to them.” This was especially true when it came to our Easter bonnets.
Read MoreFocus on the CROSS: the Last 7 Sayings of Christ with B.C. 2001
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It is truly "holy ground" to reflect on the Cross — what our Lord went through … but more than that, what He accomplished there. Would you meditate along with me ... and revisit Christ's seven sayings from the Cross? [links below]
What a perfect preparation for the joy, freedom, and release of the Resurrection.
Read MoreWords from the Cross: a Word of Reunion
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Now I lay me down to sleep. I pray the Lord my soul to keep. If I should die before I wake, I pray the Lord my soul to take.
So goes a traditional nighttime prayer taught by American moms to their children for generations. It may seem odd to us today that there would be the mention of death in a child's prayer. But scientists say that sleep is the closest we come to death while still alive. The Greeks even had a proverb,
Sleep and death are brothers.
However, in the first century, Jewish moms taught their children a different bedtime prayer...quoting Psalm 31:
Father, into Your hands I commit my spirit.
Read MoreWords from the Cross: a Word of Completion
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Tetelestai!* It is finished! The death of Christ on the Cross is the HINGE of human history...and nowbefore He breathes His last breath... a cry of victory,It is finished!
What's finished? It must be something BIG,...look at what happened when Jesus died:
At that moment the curtain in the sanctuary of the Temple was torn in two, from top to bottom. The earth shook, rocks split apart, and tombs opened. The bodies of many godly men and women who had died were raised from the dead.
Read MoreWords from the Cross: a Word of Personal Need
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Thirst is a primal need in all of us humans...more demanding even than hunger! We can go quite awhile without eating, but a very short time without drinking. Jesus on the Cross had refrained up to this point from satisfying His thirst. Instead He drank the Father's cup to the very last drop! He became sin for us...the Sinless One! Jesus took our place, and the Father turned His back. The punishment for sin had been accomplished...spiritual separation from God....for US!
Now in fulfillment of prophecy, Jesus expresses His own physical need:
After this, Jesus, knowing that all was now finished, said ( to fulfill the Scripture), “I thirst.” A jar full of sour wine stood there, so they put a sponge full of the sour wine on a hyssop branch and held it to his mouth. John 19:28-29 ESV
Read MoreA Word of Abandonment
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Abandoned. With no Rescuer in sight. What happens next in the unfolding drama of the crucifixion of our Lord is a mystery. Let's watch it unfold...
It is noon.
Read MoreWords from the Cross: a Word of Family Affection
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Dear woman, behold your son...behold your mother. (John 19:26)
Jesus has a special love for His own. As we've already seen with His forgiving and saving attitude in the midst of excruciating agony, His concern was not with His own suffering. Rather His attention was next drawn to His precious loved ones at the foot of His cross, His mother and His beloved disciple John.
What agony Jesus must have seen on Mary's face.
Read MoreWords from the Cross: a Word of Salvation
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Truly I say to you, today you will be with Me in Paradise. Luke 23:43
Jesus seems to have a special love for lost people ... This makes me think of the criminals executed with Our Lord Christ. They certainly were the lost sheep, ...the lost coins, ...the lost sons...and Jesus came to seek them.
For the Son of Man came to seek and to save the lost. Luke 19:10
They obviously had been running away from God...who knows what kind of crimes they had committed! The Bible just calls them "criminals" [thieves, malefactors KJV]. Maybe God didn't come into their thinking...but that's the point. They had gone their own way.
Read MoreWords from the Cross: a Word of Forgiveness
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Christ’a first saying from the Cross ushers us into our basic need as fallen humanity. Listen in and reflect on the amazing love and grace of our forgiving Lord …
Alexander Pope (1688-1744), English poet, once said,To err is human; to forgive, divine.
So true...but we humans more readily echo what someone else has said,
To err is human, but to get even? THAT is divine.
We struggle so, with forgiving our offenders! Perhaps that's why we are amazed and awestruck to realize that Jesus' first words from the Cross were ones of forgiveness.
Read MoreLast Words: Hearing the Words of Christ
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The last words of a dying person are significant. They can communicate good or ill to those left behind. Because the last words are so final and so revealing of what was uppermost in the person's mind as he was leaving this earth to face his Maker.
Read MoreThe Wave -- Abandoning to God
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I read an article recently about the revival going on in KY and how it has spread around the world. The author used the word “wave” and how we need to catch the “wave.”
It made me think of this entry from Penny Mandeville’s and my manuscript, Glory in Disguise: Experiencing God in our Every Day. This is the wave that is always available to us.
Read MoreThe Prayer of Relinquishment, part 2
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Welcome to part 2 of an article by Catherine Marshall entitled, the Prayer of Relinquishment. If you missed part 1, be sure to read the previous post before today's post.
Read MoreThe Prayer of Relinquishment -- Part 1
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Years ago, I was captivated by A Man Called Peter, the story of Peter Marshall, the former chaplain to the Senate, as told by his wife, Catherine Marshall. But it was Catherine herself that really drew my attention. She had experiences with God that made me long for more than what my "camp" of Christianity had systematized. So I began to read everything I could find about that fascinating woman. And I searched for her writings, which at that time were few and far between...or so I thought. Though I couldn't seem to find much (that was before internet), I started to piece writings together and grew to love how she responded to the Spirit of God.
Read MoreDust to Glory...a fresh reflection on Ash Wednesday
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Enjoy this preview of one of our devotions in our manuscript, Glory in Disguise: Experiencing God in Our Every Day by Jan Loyd & Penny Mandeville.
Dust to Glory: Honoring a Sanctuary
… for you are dust,
and to dust you shall return.
Genesis 3:19 ESV
These words, spoken every Ash Wednesday in many Christian churches, has taken on a new meaning for me since my 91 year old mom passed away.
Read MoreCan You Start a Revival through Old People? A morning conversation with my FRIEND
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…So as reports of a move of the Spirit at Asbury University (Kentucky) and now at Cedarville University (Ohio) exploded social media and news outlets, this was my conversation with my FRIEND this morning:
ME: Lord, can You start a revival in and through OLD people? …
Read MoreA Love Song to Jesus
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When my husband John and I were seniors at the University of Arizona, the Carpenters were at the top of the music charts. We embraced them as our group who sang our songs as we were "a-courting." Their mellow sound and rich melodies fed our romantic feelings toward each other and toward life in general. At our wedding, we danced to, you may have guessed it, "We've Only Just Begun." Lyrics like "White lace and promises, a kiss for luck and we're on our way" made it the perfect song to start out a new marriage...or so we thought.
But as the years have rolled by and reality and maturity have set in, so has the realization that the romantic expectations of youth are so unrealistic and can only truly be fulfilled by an Almighty God.
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