Faitful Friday Faves: 2 Samuel

Posted by Lisa Laree to Beer Lahai Roi

Once again, I had a difficult time deciding which verse to choose. I think I just need to state it now: it's gonna be a hard choice each week.

This week's choice is pretty much because we just sang a song in choir that included a paraphrase of this verse:

'I will celebrate before the LORD. I will become even more undignified than this, and I will be humiliated in my own eyes.' - 2 Sam 6:21b - 22a

We have somehow turned worship into a list of appropriate behaviors and attitudes; David's wild dance of celebration would be way out of place in most houses of worship today.

I think we tend to forget Who our audience really is...not our fellow churchgoers, but the One who created us.

We all know the story of David's words with his wife Michal over her opinion of his uninhibited worship...but somehow, in reading this in the past, I missed the part where he said, 'I will be humiliated in my own eyes'.

It's one thing to disregard others' opinions about one's own behavior...but to choose to do something personally humiliating as worship is a whole 'nuther level.

I'm not gonna try to make judgments about what real worship is; I'm just going to let this verse raise a couple of questions:

How predictable is my worship? How can I get out of the rut and let my spirit really respond to the true awesomeness of God?

Movie Musings: TRON (1982)

Just did something with the family that I haven't done in I can't remember how long...we actually all sat down and watched a movie.

A pretty old video, actually, dating from many many moons ago when we actually were cable subscribers.

It was Disney's 1982 TRON. The Princess's Beau had never seen it.

I, on the other hand, well remember being dazzled in a theater by it.

But, you know, the Gospel is in that movie.

Leave Flynn's lack of plan aside for the moment and consider:

The Creator takes on the form of His Creation and leaves his place of power to interact with His Creation

Evil forces rampant in the Creation recognize him immediately and try to destroy him.

Ultimately, he sacrifices himself in order to defeat the evil and restore communication/communion between the creator and the creation.

Yeah, I know, it's a stretch.

But it's there.

I don't necessarily think the sequel coming out next month will continue that train of thought, but I've thought that was cool ever since I figured out the similarity about the same time the movie ran on the Disney Channel...

Friday Faithful Faves: 1 Samuel

Posted by Lisa Laree to Beer Lahai Roi.

I had a difficult time picking out a scripture today. But one stirred up some old memories as I read it, so I thought I'd talk just a minute about it.

Who can lay a hand on the LORD's anointed and be guiltless? - 1 Sam. 26:9b

Let's just say we spent a looonnng time in one particular church. Like, 20 years long.

You don't stay that long in a church and not see stuff. Good stuff and bad stuff and sometimes truly awful stuff. People are people and sometimes we lose sight of what it's all about.

Sometimes it's the pastor that gets his priorities slightly off kilter; sometimes it's the church lay leadership. Sometimes it's both...or one leads to the other. Anyway.

Anybody who's ever been in a church meeting in which folks who have not attended the church in time out of mind come for the 'vote of confidence' in the current pastor will recognize where I'm coming from.

Now, I'm not here to excuse gross abuse of position. I'm talking about situations in which the pastor and the lay leadership find themselves at odds over procedures or processes or what color carpet to put in the sanctuary, and some well-meaning person who believes the Pastor is totally out of line feels it is their duty to the congregation to lead the charge to see the Pastor replaced.

Be careful. Proceed only by much prayer and seeking God, with honest evaluations of one's own motives, according to all scriptural (and denominational, if it applies) directives for handling such things.

And remember David's caution.

Mysterious Ways...

So, early last week I walked into Publix and saw vacuum packed pork loins on sale for, like, $3.50/lb. I didn't have an immediate need for one, but thought I could make use of it before the 'sell by date'. Besides, I'd seen a recipe online for crock-pot pulled pork that I wanted to try. So I put a 6+ lb piece of meat in the cart and went about the rest of my shopping.

Fast forward to Monday. I needed something to cook for a church-staff carry in dinner yesterday and decided I could do the pork loin in the crock-pot overnight and it'd be ready to take. I was just gonna cook about half of it and stick the other half in the freezer, but My Sweet Baboo suggested I just cook all of it. I had to cut it into two pieces to get it to fit into the crock pot, but it fit. I woke up at about 3:30 yesterday morning and smelled it cooking all the way upstairs. Yum.

I pulled the pork before work, put half of it in the fridge and took the rest to church (in the crock pot). I was one of two folks who brought pulled pork, and mine was down the table a bit so the other one got mostly eaten. Mine mostly sat in the crock-pot (which was on). So I took it home and figured we'd eat a lot of pork this week.

But, no sooner had I gotten it into the fridge than I got a text message from The Actor. Rehearsal was running late; was there any way I could pick up pizzas or something so the cast/crew of the one act could eat?

Y'all, I had enough pulled pork already cooked to feed 'em. I put the leftovers back in the crock-pot, along with the first part I'd stuck in the fridge that morning, added a bit of water and put it on high while I went to Target and got a case of water (on sale), a couple bags of chips (on sale) and some cheese sticks and buns (on sale). By the time I got home, the meat was all heated through, so I unplugged the crock pot, set it in the car and headed to school.

I marveled all evening that I had food ready. And it was just exactly enough. I brought home an empty crock-pot.

That's the way God causes us to work a lot of the time...no goosebumps, no visions or trumpet blasts...just, wow, He makes everything work out.

Even with pork. ;-)

Repeat as Necessary

Posted by Lisa Laree to Beer Lahai Roi

Back in late August, my pastor boss came in to my office and rather casually said, 'I want you to find out who did the photography for the West Campus directory and get us set up to do one.'

Well, one thing leads to another and, believe it or not, the church directory has sort of turned into my project.

And there have been moments when I have not been the happiest camper in the park. Just bein' honest.

Kind of as a joke, when the 'poor me's ' began to creep in, I started declaring, 'Thank you, Jesus, that I have this opportunity to crucify my flesh, grow in grace and develop the fruit of the Spirit in my life.'

But after one particularly potentially frustrating afternoon in which I had repeated that little phrase several times over, I made a discovery.

It made a difference in my attitude. It made a difference in my focus. It made the frustration recede.

It was spiritual warfare. Who'd a-guessed it?

I think that little statement is going to find its way into my thoughts on a more regular basis.

Because I *do* thank God for the opportunity to grow and mature. I just need to remind myself of that - out loud- a little more frequently. ;-)

Faithful Friday Faves: Ruth

Posted by Lisa Laree to Beer Lahai Roi.

What a respite the book of Ruth is! After the dismal end to Judges, suddenly a little story that is full of hope and promise appears to remind us all that God is in even the small details for those who love Him.

I've got a special place in my heart for Ruth...it was the first study I did on this blog (it's linked on the sidebar...read from the bottom up if you click through). I still go back and re read the study from time to time to remind myself that God is working even when it looks like everything is falling apart.

But...I've decided that, since I've looked at some pretty heavy choices from Joshua and Judges, I'm going to go with the obvious pick from Ruth:

But Ruth replied, 'Don't urge me to leave you or to turn back from you. Where you go I will go, and where you stay I will stay. Your people will be my people and your God my God. Where you die I will die, and there I will be buried. May the LORD deal with me, be it ever so severely, if anything but death separates you and me.' - Ruth 1:16 - 17

That, my friends, is a Quality Decision. True commitment. I'm not going to harp on today's standards of commitment...just hold that up as a shining example for all of us of how to put one's hand to the plow and not look back, no matter how hard the going gets.

Fading Gold - RD Exeunt

Who can blame her? It's been rolling for quite a while now...continually amazing me at the seemingly unending supply of really random questions.

But, sooner or later, wells run dry, inspiration fades, what was fun becomes a chore and then a burden. So Linda's giving serious thought to letting (at least the weekly version of) Random Dozen go the way of all flesh.

Maybe the loyal RD Fan Club could develop a rotation, and take turns hosting it each week? Each person's turn would only come around once every three months or so...but it's Linda's baby, so if she continues it monthly, well, we'll have fun with it once a month.

Anyway, this week's Random Dozen is a Random Pair...sort of.

1. What scares you the most

A) Physically
B) Emotionally

Why does it scare you, and how do you cope?
I'll be honest. I Do Not Want To Answer This Question.

So I'm going to wimp out and only answer it halfway.

Because it scares me to see my fears in print. Out in the open. Exposed. I've had long journal entries discussing my fears and why I have them. Some I understand. Most I don't.

Physically...I'm afraid of a lot of things. Big dogs. Or little dogs with bad tempers. Spiders. Being in a car wreck. Severe storms. Heights. House fires. Snakes. Terrorist attacks.

The Usual.

Coping with physical fears...well, we all do what we can to avoid those things that scare us. The things that can't be avoided, we try to prepare for to minimize the impact. As if we COULD prepare, but at least that's a way of dealing with the fear of an event. Dealing with the event itself is entirely different and I have to completely rely on God's grace to give me whatever I might need in the event of a true emergency.

Emotional fears...I was telling the truth. I can't put that out here. Not yet(and that, in and of itself, says a lot, no?). Because one of the ways I cope with my emotional fears is to give them as little air time as possible. Out of sight, out of mind...mostly.


2. What comes to mind when you read the phrase, "Nothing gold can stay?
Honest? The first thing that came to mind was, 'Stay gold, Ponyboy...'

After that, it's a whole host of golden moments that flashed by and were gone. The feel of my grandmother's lawn on my bare feet; the crunch of snow under my rubber one-button boots; singing in the school Christmas program; pulling numbered ducks from the tub at the school fall festival; making music in the high school band; wienie roasts and hayrides, My Sweet Baboo stopping time for about three heartbeats during the last week of December in 1979 by asking, 'Will you marry me?'; laughing with friends; holding each of my children for the very first time; those and many, many others...all gone. Pass the Kleenex.

But, then comes the thought that there are just as many yet to come in different places and with different people. And then, the final gold, the great sunrise, which never fades.

And the ship went out...and passed on into the West, until at last on a night of rain Frodo smelled a sweet fragrance on the air and heard the sound of singing that came over the water. And then, it seemed to him that as in his dream in the house of Bombadil, the grey rain-curtain turned all to silver glass and was rolled back, and he beheld white shores and beyond them a far green country under a swift sunrise.

I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth were passed away, and there was no longer any sea. I saw the Holy City, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, 'Now the dwelling of God is with men, and he will live with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God. He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away.'