Monday 25 February 2019

How to Pray Like David.



https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Fallaner


I listened to a podcast called, Exploring my Strange Bible, by Tim Mackie the other day. It was about how to pray like the people who wrote the Psalms. He said the Psalms are there for us to learn how to pray. Many times I have prayed with the Psalms, repeating the words as my own prayer. But he wasn’t talking about that. He was teaching us how to pray like the men in the Psalms.

He said a third of the Psalms are about pain and sorrow. They are called “Lament and Protest Psalms.” In these prayers, David and others give a detailed description of what is going on in their lives how they feel about it. They hold no emotion back.

In our western culture, we don’t usually do that. We tend to think God already knows everything so all we usually do is ask for help. We might say, “Oh God, I’m so depressed, help me.” And I know God answers those prayers. But Mackie said that telling God everything helps us in a different way.

He said people do one of two things with their emotions. They either stuff them deep down and perhaps deny them; or they pour out our emotions to other people. Both of these reactions are more harmful than good. When we tell others all our sad, mad feelings, we can make them feel sad and mad.

For me, sharing my sad thoughts with people has not helped. They usually don’t want to hear it, casually brush me off or try to offer solutions that don’t work. I feel alone and misunderstood.

When I push my emotions aside and don’t deal with them, I become very depressed. I feel alone and despairing. Then I go to a counselor and pay them to listen to me. Which does help, but not enough.

The Bible says, “Pour out your heart to God.” Psalm 62:8, Lamentations 2:19. Mackie says after telling God our thoughts and feelings, then make a request. Don’t tell God what to do, just tell him the situation and your feelings about that and believe me, he will know what to do for us and it will be wonderful.

Mackie says we should do the same thing with our doubts about God. If you are doubting his goodness, then tell him that and then request he strengthen your faith.

Many times the Psalmists remind God of what he has done in the past for people. They usually reference the Exodus from Egypt. Reminding God of his past mercies seems a bit strange to me, but I’ve been doing it because it is a part of their prayers. “Remember how you helped Joseph when he was in jail? Help me too.”

Most Psalms end with praising God for all he has done. I think that is a great way to end our prayers. We start out looking inside ourselves at our sorrow and pain, then around us at the chaos in the world, and we are discouraged. But then we lift up our heads and look at God and know he sees and feels it all; and this life, this world, will one day be over and we will be with the amazing God of the universe and so we praise him.



Saturday 16 February 2019

The Wilderness.

Photo by:
http://www.dsmedia.org/resources/illustrations/sweet-publishing


I’m reading in 1 Kings now and found many interesting and beautiful things about God. And I learned something new about Elijah, a great prophet of God.

You may know the story of when Elijah was on top of Mount Carmel. It hadn’t rained for three years because the people of Israel were worshipping Baal, an evil god to whom the people would sacrifice their live children by burning them to death.

Elijah told King Ahab to bring the people and the prophets of Baal to Mt. Carmel. They would have a contest between Baal and the Lord God. They would build altars and pray; whichever God answered by fire, he was the true God.

After many hours of praying, Baal did not answer. Elijah prayed and immediately fire came down from heaven consuming the sacrifice and altar. The people said, “The Lord, he is God.”

Elijah thought the nation would change; he thought Ahab would quit worshipping Baal and turn to God, but this did not happen. In fact, his wife Jezebel sent a message to Elijah telling him she would kill him by the end of the day.

Elijah ran. He ran into the desert, the same desert that Israel had to cross to get to the promised land. And this is the part I had forgotten; he wandered in the wilderness for 40 days.

I thought of Jesus and when he went into the wilderness for 40 days. I thought of Israel and how they had wandered in the wilderness for 40 years. God has patterns throughout the Bible and here was another one.

Most commentators of the Bible say Elijah was discouraged by the outcome of his work for God. He probably thought his work was fruitless and wondered why he had risked his life for nothing. He couldn’t see what God was doing or why. His faith in God was tested.

When Israel wandered through the wilderness, their faith was tested also. They came to a day when there was no water. They thought they were going to all die of thirst so they complained and wanted to go back to Egypt. They got angry at their situation. God provided them with water, not just once, but many times. They had no food left and were frightened. They didn’t trust God to feed them. They said, “Can God make a feast in the wilderness?” Yes, he can and he did. These things happened to make their trust in God strong but it didn’t work with that first generation.

For Jesus in the wilderness the test was the same. Did he trust his father? Would he complain about being hungry and save himself? No, he didn’t. He could have made the stones into bread but he knew if you or I were in the wilderness, we could not do that. He came to live a human life, depending on God for everything.

Joyce Meyer talks a lot about Christians going through a wilderness time. Everything around them feels dark and hopeless. They cannot see the way out and wonder why God allowed this to happen to them. We have a choice in these times, to trust and praise God in the midst of them, or to complain and rebel against him.

I found two songs lately that are so inspirational. The words are fitting for this subject.

No one can take away, my hallelujah.
No darkness can contain, my hallelujah.
Your cross has made the way, for my hallelujah.
From the song: My Hallelujah, by Brian and Katie Talwalt.

Give me hope like Moses in the wilderness.
Give me faith like Daniel in the lion’s den.
Give me a heart like David, Lord be my defense.
Then I can fight my giants with confidence.
From the song: Confidence, by Sanctus Real.


“No darkness can contain, my hallelujah.” We must not allow darkness to stop our praise and love towards God. Remember how Jesus and his disciples suffered. No one is immune to suffering; you are not alone. This world of pain is not our home; Jesus walks beside you.



Monday 11 February 2019

Telling God Alone.




In my last post I wrote about watching too much television with my mom and having a struggle with that. Of course, God came through and helped me. As I said, Mom told me she would like to play some computer games. Well, that is what she wants to do every night instead of watching TV. I’m so thankful to God. Now I have more time to listen to Christian podcasts, read books about God and to pray.

In one podcast, a man said something like, “If you were raised in a legalistic, fundamentalist religion and are now free of it, be grateful for your upbringing. You grew up knowing the Lord’s name.” I agree with him and have thought about that a lot.

My sisters and I used to be upset at our religious upbringing, but now I am grateful. Because of my parents and my church, I have always believed there is a God; I’ve always known he hears and sees me; I’ve always known there is eternal life for those who follow him. I may have been terrified of God and when I sinned I thought he would kill me with a bolt of lightening, but hey, it was a start! I’ve certainly never been tempted to be an atheist.

Something happened this week that showed me how good Joyce Meyer’s advice is on not telling people when you are hurt by someone. I thought about telling only my husband but I realized there would be no point in that. He couldn’t change anything and would also feel sad that I was sad.

I don’t want to say what this person did. It was someone in my family. When it happened, I felt like a knife went through my heart. So, I spent time talking with God about the situation. I thought about what Jesus would do. I think he would have felt hurt, but he would have just accepted what happened. That night I prayed God would take away the pain in my heart and when I woke in the morning the pain was totally gone.

That day, another family member came over and talked with me about what happened. I didn’t bring it up, but she knew about it. What she said made me feel so much better. The situation was clarified and I could see there was no malice at all involved in it. That night we all went out to dinner and had a perfectly wonderful time together.

I love God’s way of dealing with our hurts. I love this way of not telling people I am sad etc. I know there are times we must confront people. Jesus said to go to those who hurt you and talk with them. I have done that before; sometimes it works out great, other times not so much. What I especially love is how God tells us not to spread these stories all over the place. We shouldn’t call our friends and tell them how horribly someone has treated us. We should go to God alone and he will help us.



Wednesday 6 February 2019

Distracted From God.



Photo from:  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/en:German_Federal_Archives


I’m having trouble spending as much time as I would like to in seeking God each day. I’m still doing that, but not as much as before. I’ll explain.

My mother was diagnosed with colon cancer around a year ago. We went through a lot together before the diagnosis. She broke her hip, seemed to have dementia, was in a nursing home and then came home to me. I’m so glad she is home.

When she returned, the doctors and I thought that lack of enough Vitamin B12 was the reason for her weakness and dementia. I’ve been giving her shots and she is slowly healing. She couldn’t read or watch TV at first; but that all changed with the shots. She does have short-term memory damage, but I hope it improves. A person can live 10 years with colon cancer and that is what I am hoping for.

For the last months Mom has not wanted to read as much. I think she forgets what she has read so I am ordering magazines. She enjoys those. She does like TV a lot, especially British shows. Most of those are written beautifully and the stories are compelling.

So, we started with Father Brown and Midsummer Murders. I’ve seen those before, so I would read and pray as she watched, or do that after she went to bed. But things started to change for me with Downton Abbey.

I love that show. I’ve seen it years ago so I thought I would not watch. But I’d forgotten a lot of it and couldn’t take my eyes away from it for weeks. Then this week we started Paranoia, a British police mini-series. Well, it is fascinating and the writing and acting are amazing. They certainly know what they are doing in England. My husband watches tons of American cop shows and they are boring so I am not tempted to spend hours watching them.

Last night, after watching a 5-hour marathon of Paranoia, I knew I had to do something! But when Mom got up to go to bed, she said, “Didn’t I used to play a computer game?” I told her she used to play Flipwords. She said, “I’d like to do that again.”  Well, thank God. She can play that for hours and love it. She told me she had had enough of that show. The story is complex and I think she doesn’t know what is going on.

I’m still going to watch the last four episodes. I’m no saint. I’m thinking that after this I can play Yahtzee with her and then she can play computer games. We will see how everything works out. All I know is I want my evenings with God back. I did take time with him after Mom went to bed, but I’m very tired by then.

I remember a woman in a church I went to. She said she had a dream from God. She saw Jesus and asked him why his people were not what they should be. He said one word, “Television.” Then she woke up. She believed or felt that Jesus meant we spend so much time watching TV that we have no time for him.

I can see it. Most people come home from work, make dinner, watch TV and go to bed. Nothing wrong about that, unless the TV shows are full of sex and violence. But we could watch nature shows all evening and it still takes us away from Jesus. The only way to be like Him is to be with Him. The only place for strength to live and power to work is beside him. He alone can make us better people. One thing he cannot do is seek himself for us. That is our job. That alone is, “working out our salvation.”

I need to update this post to say I do have worship with God every morning. But I need more of him. Like Daniel, who prayed morning, noon and evening.