Running After Me

"He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High will abide in the shadow of the Almighty...For He will deliver you from the snare of the fowler and from the deadly pestilence. He will cover you and under His wings you will find refuge; His faithfulness is a shield and buckler.... For He will command His angels concerning you to guard you in all your ways...Because he holds fast to Me in love, I will deliver him; I will protect him, because he knows My name. When he calls to Me, I will answer him;   I will be with him in trouble;   I will rescue him and honor him. With long life I will satisfy him and show him My salvation." (Ps. 91:1, 3-4,11,14-15)

So many times in my life, I realize that I am operating out of a works-based lifestyle--doing devotions vs. being in my Savior's presence.  Tonight I was reminded that I have a bad habit of taking even the things that are supposed to be part of the essence of grace and make them works.  Like resting.

Instead of simply resting in His presence, I make the whole resting idea out to be a process. If I can just find the rest, my actions say. I treat resting as if I'm hunting dry firewood in a forest that just underwent a hurricane. As if it were a nearly impossible task, I seek rest as if it were way out of reach and something I have to work at.

Psalm 91 is about God being our refuge. On the surface it is a beautiful depiction and an encouraging word for believers.  But digging deeper into the syntax of the sentences yields a freeing truth. (I know, this is where all my non-English major friends tune me out... but hang in there.=)  In grammar class, Dr. Stavick has been encouraging us to notice the use of pronouns both in comparison to the percentage of nouns and in analysis of the meaning of a text.  When I was reading through this, I particularly noticed how much focus was put on God and what He is doing.  Most of the chapter, we are the direct objects--the action is being performed upon us.  This is the opposite of my hunting for rest idea.  I am not the subject of most of these verses.  God is the subject, and He is performing the action.  He is delivering, protecting, covering, commanding, guarding, answering, rescuing, honoring, satisfying, and showing; all the difficult actions are His.  I am only dwelling, abiding, finding Him faithful, holding fast, knowing His name, and calling on Him.  None of the actions I am performing here require me to be running about.

All this time I've been running after refuge, Refuge has been running after me.

Christians are like Kites

Christians are like Kites…


A gust caught my kite, sending it diving. I quickly began pumping the string and walking backwards to keep it in the air. Still it continued plummeting. Hard I as tried to give it encouragement, in a few seconds it was lying upon the grass.

I enjoy kite flying and look forward to doing it every spring. It is calming and quiet, a simple pleasure. I especially enjoy those days when there are slight gusts, making it a challenge to keep the kite in the sky. This day was that kind of day and I was using the quiet time that I had to pray. I had been failing in an area of my thoughts, and every time I failed, I was struggling with going to Jesus for cleansing because I “had done it, again.” I was allowing Satan to fee me lies, and having trouble claiming forgiveness and grace to get up and fight again. Little did I know that the Lord wanted to challenge me, through an analogy concerning my kite and my Christian walk.


I walked toward the fallen kite. Upon reaching it, I hoisted it back up in the air and let go. Pump, pump, pump, release more string. Pump, pump, pump, release more string. Minutes later, I was quietly standing flying my kite when the Lord began to speak to me through my thoughts.

Imagine with me for a moment that you, as a Christian, are a kite in the sky of Life. Salvation, the string that connects you with the handle, Jesus, who reconciles you to the Father, the flyer, never breaks, but holds fast to you. Oftentimes a tail will help a kite to stay up; therefore, the tail is the promises of the Word of God. God, as the kite flyer, “pumps” you, encourages you to new heights as you respond to Him. And how much more does He send you encouragement when “gusts” of temptations come your way. Sometimes we, as sinners, fall even amid the multiple encouragements of our Lord. He comes and lovingly picks us up, offering us forgiveness and the chance to try again because of His Son. What would you think, if, coming upon your fallen kite, it looked up at you and said, “I don’t want to try again. I’ll just fall. I might as well give up.” After you got over being taken aback at your kite talking to you, you would probably be saddened. Don’t you think God is saddened when we refuse to accept His help, His forgiveness, His grace to try again?

Lost in my thoughts I tugged at the kite string. Confessing my sin, I asked Him to lift me up and help me fight the battle for holiness again. How foolish I had been to accept Satan’s lies as the truth! Now I saw them as they were, gusts from the enemy that were trying to keep me from doing what the Lord had called me to do, what He was encouraging me to do, what He was making possible through His Son – to keep flying higher for Him.

Rejoicing in Jesus!

Rejoicing in Jesus!





A close friend moves out of state. You get sick on Christmas. A friend has a miscarriage. You have a bad day where EVERYTHING goes wrong. The kitchen sink is so full of dishes that it is overflowing. And to top it all off, you have three Geometry lessons calling your name.

Although the above scenarios are quite varied in their difficulty, they normally all produce the same response from each one of us. A complaining spirit, a sigh and perhaps even a root of bitterness. If we are wise we turn to the Lord, and he whispers to us a single word: “rejoice.”

Rejoice?! We say. “Lord, I can’t rejoice in…” And yet our loving Father stays firm in His command. “Rejoice.”

How can we rejoice in all, obeying our Lord’s command to “Rejoice in the Lord always and again I say rejoice”? Let me exhort you, my friend, it is possible, by God’s grace. The Lord has been teaching me and leading me in this path of rejoicing, and though I am still learning, I feel as if He would have me pass on the wonderful truths and joys I have found in rejoicing in Jesus.

One day right after my two closest friends had moved away, I got into a conversation with my friend, Mrs. Booth, about it at church. I was discouraged and lonely, yet Mrs. Booth encouraged me to JOY in my Savoir, even though I did not know what He was trying to teach me. Little did I know, that one of the main things that God was trying to teach me was … REJOICING!

Through the past few years, one of the main things I have struggled with is how I could rejoice when I was sad. After a while, I decided to study the words: joy, happiness, rejoicing, etc. as they are used in the Psalms. During this word study I discovered that in America and the English language, we use the words joy and happiness interchangeably, but incorrectly. Happiness is a state of the emotions, easily changed by circumstances and surroundings. Joy is knowing (a state of the mind and will) that God is in control and choosing to believe it. When I am not happy about something does not mean that I cannot rejoice in it, rather that is precisely when I must rejoice. Rejoicing is a choice, yet it is a command. (Philippians 4:4, I Thes. 5:16) Rejoicing is an act of the will, emotions can only follow.

How many times do we pour out all our complaints at the throne of our Heavenly Father, not pausing to listen to His reassuring promises to help us perform all that He commands? If we would only listen and rest in our Lord, we could find true joy. It is there, patiently waiting, but how many of us are wiling to make the effort to reach out and take it? An evangelist that once visited our church made a very true statement. He said: “There is always a way of escape and there is always sufficient grace. When we sin, we are not accessing that grace.” Think about that for a moment.

These principals may seem simple and unimportant to some, but if one person and failed to rejoice, Jesus would have come to ransom him. Someone wise once said: “My only contribution to the plan of salvation was the sin that required it.” Even though I may not be happy about all that has happened or all that is happening right now in my life, I choose to believe that his way is perfect (Ps. 18:30) and rest in the knowledge of His love. Even when I get lonely for my friends who moved away, or when everything seems to go wrong all in one day, I must choose to thank the Lord for EVERYTHING, and JOY in Him.

Satan has a very large stronghold in Christians when we have “bad days”. Jesus Christ has died for us, ransomed us, and is now in heaven, waiting for us. This is exciting, friends! Instead of focusing on the negative, on the things that are going wrong, focus on Jesus and all the rich blessings that He has bestowed upon us all as His children. As Mrs. Booth once told me, “When I am rejoicing in Jesus, I can “throw a party” in the trial.” When Satan tries to steal your joy with a “bad” day or you find yourself in the midst of a trial, rejoice in Him, brethren! “Throw a party” for your God is greater than ANY problem!

Even in the little things, such as washing dishes or working a geometry problem, we are given daily opportunities that our heavenly Father lays before us, to see if we will obey His words and commands, to test our love for Him. Even though it is hard to remember to rejoice at times, the peace that goes hand in hand with choosing to rejoice is well worth it. And He is there to give the strength to press on!

Throughout all our lives as Christians, we must remember two precious words: He knows. Sad? He knows. Lonely? He knows. Depressed? He knows. Multiple temptations? He knows. The future? HE KNOWS! Praise our dear Lord! We can rejoice in all our ways!

The next time you are struggling with anything, big or small, talk to the Lord about it, bringing all in your heart before Him, and purposing to rejoice in your situation. He knows! You may not feel any better about it, but you will know in your heart that you are obeying the Lord and rejoicing in His perfect dealings with you. And in this, there is true joy.