Be Bold

Borders Books is having a going-out-of-business sale; being an avid reader, I went to check it out. The Religion section was quite small–two rows, one for Christianity and another for everything else. While browsing the books, a tall young man with shaggy black hair, around 19 years old, crossed in front of me and said aloud, “Nothing here on Buddhism?” I pointed behind me: “Maybe around the corner.” He headed that direction and I thought to myself, Why did I just help him head in the ‘wrong’ direction? Within seconds he was back in the Christianity section engaging me in conversation.

“Isn’t Buddhism the same as Christianity?”

“No.” 

“Do you believe in karma?”
“I believe in consequences for our decisions.”
“Don’t you believe we all have the kingdom of God within us. Jesus said so.”


I won’t repeat the entire conversation except to say that this guy knew the Bible. It was obvious that he had read the gospels. It appeared to me that he was in that bookstore for one purpose: “evangelizing” someone - me! Or perhaps he was looking for answers to nagging doubts. His comments centered on his belief that if we all just loved others we would go to heaven.

He asked me if I loved Buddhists, to which I said that Jesus commands us to love others... and yes, I do. He seemed surprised that I would love people who weren’t Christians (thanks, media!). I said, "Simply loving others does not get us to heaven. Did you know that Jesus said, ‘I am the Way, and the Truth, and the Life. No one comes to the Father, except through Me’”?
This young man considered Jesus a prophet, but I suggested that Jesus couldn’t be a prophet or even a good man if he was a liar. Only a liar would make that claim if it weren’t true.

My words didn’t seem to faze him until I brought up the cross.

As a challenge to his pride in having read the Gospels I asked, “Why did Jesus die on the cross?” He replied something about teaching us to love others. “No,’ I said, ‘that’s not why.’” Finally, after his three failed attempts to explain why Jesus died on the cross, he asked me, “Why, then?” I said, “He died for you, your sins, the sins you committed even as a kid. Mine too. He took our sins on himself so we would not have to be punished for them. His purpose for dying, when he suffered on that cross, was to take onto himself all the sins of all people, evil or not, in all generations. All we have to do is believe, to be saved. It cost us nothing, but it cost him everything. It’s called grace.”

He stared at me for a few seconds, pondering the word grace. Grace, a gift no other religion offers. I suggested he study grace in the Bible. As he opened his mouth to challenge me again, I said, “You aren’t going to convince me of anything today. I know the Truth. I know Jesus.” With that, he briskly stepped around me and walked off. I could see the angst in his gait and said to his back: “I admire your passion, but it’s all about Jesus.” He didn't look back.



I have several reasons for sharing this story. Not at all to say, look at me I’m not afraid to speak up. I am afraid to speak up; I often don’t when I should. In this case, God clearly gave me no choice but to answer this man's questions. Later I thought of other things I could have shared; more convincing arguments. But in the end, I have to believe that God brought him into that store, to that section, at the same time as I, so he could hear whatever it is the Holy Spirit wanted to say to him through me. That’s the neat thing about having God’s Spirit.  Just open your mouth in His name, and He can take over. When the encounter ended, I felt really great. I had stood up for Jesus!

In Matthew 28:19a Jesus said: Go and make disciples of all nations. For those who claim him as their Lord, this is not a suggestion, it’s a command. I wonder, apart from being ambivalent about the lost, why we are so afraid to speak up. After all, we have the words of eternal life!

This "chance" encounter on a Saturday afternoon reminded me that in today’s culture, Christians are the subtle and even outright targets of defamation religiously, politically and socially. Now is the time to stand strong in faith, and to know what we believe. Christian persecution has been tolerated in our nation only in the past 20 years and will probably escalate.

When and if the time comes we are forced to take a stand for Jesus, we can have the confidence of Mark 13:11: 
Whenever you are arrested and brought to trial, do not worry beforehand about what to say. Just say whatever is given you at the time, for it is not you speaking, but the Holy Spirit. Our children need to see we are willing to be ridiculed for our faith. They will possibly be tested under greater pressure as adults.

If you’ve read to this point, you know I didn’t write this so we could feel all comfy and warm about our salvation, but that we would be reminded that God expects us to stand and boldly speak what we know is right no matter the cost. It cost me nothing for that half hour conversation with a stranger. Someday speaking out boldly could cost us our life. Will we be ready? Oh, I pray so.

Ponder
Consider what changes of heart, lifestyle and attitude you need to make so you can:

Be ready to...
Give an answer and...
Share the hope of eternal life...
With gentleness and respect.

Pray
Lord and Savior Jesus. I've been a coward in this area. Give me the selflessness to spend more time in your Word, learning, growing, understanding, so that I can give an answer to those who ask. By your Spirit, draw me so near to you that I am compelled to speak out. When opportunities arise, open my mouth to speak truth in love.


© copyright 2011. Sandra Dowling Housley. All rights reserved.

Maggie's Final Gift

As I walked with Paul and Maggie into the reception area of her doctor’s office, a nurse opened her arms to Maggie and hugged her close. She then escorted us into the exam room where we waited for the doctor. In a manner of minutes he opened the door and came in. After Paul introduced me as Maggie’s sister, her doctor leaned in and gave Maggie a long and tender embrace. The gesture surprised me.

Maggie sat on the exam table with distended belly and sunken, yet hopeful crystal clear, blue eyes. We all tried to read the doctor’s expression as he opened her 2” thick medical file. For the next half hour he read and interpreted the results of each test taken the previous week. Maggie’s countenance did not reveal any fear when she heard those awful words, “aggressive liver cancer.”

Her body had been her enemy for years. Lung cancer required cutting away a lung lobe 10 years ago; Crohn’s disease and the removal of her colon followed. Subsequently, she was diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis and later shingles which attacked her eye, face and head for months (and which she shared with me was the most painful of all her ailments). Then 8 months ago, a fall down several steps broke her shoulder and hip, causing an emergency hip replacement followed by months of painful physical therapy. And only recently she was required to have extensive oral surgery. If you didn’t know Maggie, you would have no idea of the pain she lived with everyday. Her enduring fight for life overshadowed any self-pity that might have sidelined someone with less courage and zest for life. I often marveled at her tenacity and strength. Daily she tenderly gardened portions of their 12 acre mountain property in northern California. She had an amazing capacity for appreciating nature and life.

While in our mid-20’s she prayed with me to invite Christ to be her Lord and Savior. Over the years, her quiet, private love affair with God expressed itself through loving others, even strangers. Our niece wrote recently, “Whenever you were around her you felt good about yourself.”

A few days after the doctor visit I went back to Colorado with confidence that I had not said my last goodbye to her. I knew she would fight the disease, not so much for herself, but for the love of her life, Paul, and sons, Tony, Michael and John.

I was home just two days when I learned she was back in the hospital and would be starting chemo there. I called her everyday, working at not showing my fear but engaging in short, encouraging conversations. In our last coherent talk, she made the point of telling me, “Don’t worry, honey. I’m ready either way. I have loved Him all my life, and I’m ready.” She then went on to name the qualities that she loved about me. I interrupted, choking back the tears because I wasn’t ready to say goodbye. After a long pause, she said something that struck me as very odd, “Sam,’ (her nickname for me), ‘Don’t not be who you are.’” I thought about that double-negative for a moment, and then asked, “What do you mean?”
“Don’t not be who you are,” she repeated.

Another long pause as I tried to make sense of her words and asked a second time, “What do you mean?” Silence. She was dozing. I decided to tuck away her comment in my memory, hoping it would be made clear to me in the future.

“I love you,” I said
“I love you, too.” (kiss, kiss, kiss)
I didn’t want to hang up. “I’ll call you tomorrow, ok?”

Just three weeks from her first doctor visit for this ailment, and after just one chemo treatment, Maggie’s lungs couldn’t sustain her. She went to be with her Lord on May 27th.

In the midst of deep grief, I reminisced about my only sister’s beautiful spirit; her quality of love and her unrelenting generosity. She gave of herself and what she had so unashamedly. I cherished what a weeping hospital nurse shared with me as we stood outside the room where she died. “Maggie had a beautiful soul. We all loved her.”

A few days later, I was struggling with how different I am from Maggie and praying that God would show me how I can be more like my sister. I had been thinking of her love affair with people and with life; pondering it for days, wishing I could be more like her. What was it about her that made strangers want to embrace her? What was it that caused a former employer to openly sob when he heard she had cancer again? What did she have that I need? We both have your Spirit, Lord, so why don’t I express your love like she did?

In the midst of my prayer her words resounded in my heart as loud as if she were there in person, ”Don’t not be who you are!”

Don’t not be who you are!!!! I am confident that God chose to speak that warning through my sister during our last meaningful conversation, so I would hear it in context after she was gone. I get it! I must not try to be who I am not. I need to be who God made me to be.

1 John 4:7, “Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God.” Maggie’s love for others came from God. She allowed God to express His love for others through her. I should not try to be like my sister, but to allow my Lord to express His love through me as she did ─ to draw so near my God that I can do nothing less than love.

Psalm 139 says, “He knit me together in my mothers’ womb… I am fearfully and wonderfully made.” God knit me together in the same womb where He gave life to my sister two years earlier. He made her one way and me another. Both wonderful. Each with a unique purpose but a joint objective: to bring glory to God with our lives by loving Him and others.

Thank you, my sister Maureen Ann (Maggie) Dowling Beers, for that final gift of truth from your heart and God’s, “Don’t not be who you are!” Be who you are. Be who God created you to be – for His glory. What a gift.

What’s So Good About Good Friday?

As a child, my Catholic parents instilled in my siblings and me the discipline of reflection each Good Friday. We were instructed to find a quiet place in our home and sit from Noon to 3pm and think about what Jesus did for us as he suffered on the cross those three hours before his death. I would climb up into my Dad's easy chair and contemplate the nails and the crown of thorns, the blood and the pain. I remembered his cry, “My God, My God, why hast thou forsaken me?” I can’t say that I spent the entire 3 hours on Good Friday meditating on Jesus, but I did learn as a young girl, the significance of the Cross of Christ.

While reading Psalm 22 and Isaiah 53 this morning, these prophecies of the coming Messiah touched my heart. Written centuries before his birth, they gave great detail about what Jesus would suffer for the sins of the world. They told of his hands and feet being pierced with nails, his features being ordinary, his clothes divided up in a gambling match, his reputation besmirched, and his terrible suffering for mankind.

As I reflected this morning on His suffering, I was saddened that he experienced all the sins, past, present and future, of the very creation that he loves; sins of lying, pride, rape, torture, theft, murder, abuse and more. To realize he experienced the wickedness in the hearts of we who committed these sins is a sad enough thought. But that he took those atrocities onto himself in order to pay for the penalty in our stead, seems to be so unfair to him.

As I continued to contemplate these things, God reminded me of the passage in Hebrews 12:2 where the writer tells us to “… fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.”

Jesus endured the cross of his own volition, for the joy of redeeming mankind through this one terrifying act of love and submission. He was not concerned for the shame others heaped on him. He knew his purpose. He obeyed his Father. He bought back the human race, those who would believe in his name. He endured the cross willingly, for me. For you!

So, on this Easter weekend, I have to ask myself if I am willing to “scorn the shame” for his sake. Am I willing to be vocal in today’s atmosphere of political correctness, no matter the consequences, to speak boldly of his love and sacrifice for all who would believe?

What’s so good about Good Friday? Jesus redeemed us from the penalty of our sins! Although our sadness today over his suffering is appropriate, let’s not forget … Sunday is coming!

Happy Easter!!





©copyright 2011. Sandra Dowling Housley

Wings and Tassles

For months I had been dreading my 2011 birthday on April 5th; a milestone which only serves to remind me that my life and ministry are not what I had hoped for during this season of life. Hope for a specific ministry had long been buried, along with my late husband, Mark. This is not to say that I'm ungrateful or unfulfilled. I have joy in how He has blessed me with work, friends and family, as well as through opportunities to serve Him. It has simply been a time of serious reflection, wondering if I will still be "fresh and green" as I age (Psalm 92:14). My recent health history has been a catalyst for these ponderings.

January 3, 2011 is when I first noticed another kidney stone. The familiar pinching pressure had returned. The same twinge of pain which I had experienced 3 times last year before undergoing surgeries. Because my insurance would improve dramatically on April 1, I was determined to wait until then to see a doctor, so  long as the pain didn't get unbearable in the interim. For those 3 months I had varying degrees of 24/7 pain, anxious to get it blasted and be done with it.

Friday, April 1st arrived with my doctor confirming the presence of blood and the evidence of a stone. A CT scan was scheduled for the following Tuesday. On Sunday morning, I was in the worse pain I'd had since January. The discomfort during worship singing forced me to sit down during the last song.

Pastor Matt Heard's teaching was the last in a series on the Lord's Prayer. In his message, Submitting to His Shield, Matt shared two things that sank deeply into my heart. One was about wings from a psalm I am quite familiar with, Psalm 91. It reads in part, "Under His wings you will find refuge." I learned that in scripture, the Lord often referred to his "wings," representing his protection, covering, and healing." This reference to wings can also be found in Malachi 4:2, "For you who revere my name, the sun of righteousness (prophecy of Jesus) will rise with healing in its wings." Jesus' statement in Luke 13:34 also references wings, "How often I have longed to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings..." I was profoundly touched by the tender heart of God toward us.

Tied into that symbolism was Matt's demonstration of the rabbi's (and Jesus') robe. On each "wing" (corner) of the robe were four tassles, again representing the healing, covering, and protection of God. Together the wings and tassles were referred to as the hem of the garment.

Jesus was wearing this robe in the account in Luke 8:43-48 of the woman with an issue of blood for 12 years. In her desperation to be healed, she came up behind Jesus and reached for the wings, the hem of his garment, and the healing power of Jesus went from him to this woman and she was immediately healed.

On hearing about the symbolism of the robe and the wings, I was undone. Tears flowed because I was intensely aware of the deep and tender love of God for me and those around me. After leaving church, I couldn't get it out of my mind. I got home and read Luke 8. As I was reading and painfully aware of the kidney stone, I prayed something like this: "Jesus, you are my Healer, I'm under your wings, and I'm reaching out and grabbing the tassles of your robe, the hem of your garment. Won't you please break up this kidney stone."

That night I slept well. Upon waking, the first thing I noticed was a lack of pain. As I got ready for work and throughout the day, I kept waiting for the pain to return; it didn't. The next morning, Tuesday, was my birthday. During my prayer time, the Holy Spirit reminded me of my prayer for healing. I asked, "Lord, could it be that you healed me?!" Later that morning I kept the appointment for the CT scan. I felt great all that day, lighthearted and pain free. It was as if a load had been lifted from my body and mind. As the day progressed, so did my confidence that God had, indeed, heard and answered my cry for mercy. I just knew that no matter what the results of the CT scan would be, that God had performed a miracle. Even if the scan would reveal a trapped stone, the fact that I was out of pain for the first time in 3 months with no medical intervention, was a miracle in itself!

The next day, I finally heard from the doctor with the results of the scan. She said, "We could find no large stone or blockage - only a few very tiny stones that will easily pass on their own without incident - no procedure is necessary"

My birthday miracle! 91 days of pain ended after one despairing prayer while "touching" the hem of Jesus' robe. My heart was humbled that the Lord of the universe, the God of gods and King of kings, chose to hear my prayer for his healing and covering. His timing made it all the more wonderful. The birthday I had dreaded and had such angst and prayer over for the last several months, is the very day He chose to assure me that I am still His precious daughter, under His wings ... valuable to Him. Not only did he heal my stones, but He also healed my heart. A double-whammy birthday miracle.

I can't explain why God chose to heal me this time and not grant dozens of other prayers for myself and others'. I do, however, trust that He knows when His "yes" to our prayer will be the best for us and will ultimately bring Him the glory He deserves.

So, I encourage you, and myself ... don't stop praying. Continue to go to our God for healing, hope, deliverance and protection. He is our mighty Savior who longs for us to find comfort and refuge under His wings. I hope you, too, can praise God with me for this birthday miracle!

Read
Luke 13:34
Malachi 4:2
Psalm 91
Matthew 9:20-22
Mark 6:56

Reflect* In what ways do you need God's protection, covering or healing?
* Is God asking you to endure by faith in your difficult situation?
* Is there something holding you back from believing God for His promises?
Take these to God in prayer, take hold of the hem of His garment and pray

RespondUnder your wings I find my refuge, Lord. You are my hiding place, my healer, my hope, my covering. As I take hold of the hem of your garment, bring yourself glory in how you respond to my prayers. For you alone, deserve all the praise and honor. Your mercy and love are undeserved, yet I receive them with gratitude and humility. Amen.

To listen to or watch the sermon I referenced, go to one of the following links:

http://www.woodmenvalley.org/interact
http://vimeo.com/21998245

© copyright 2011. Sandra Dowling Housley.