Commune or Communicate?

If you've been in church for any length of time you've heard of communion. Maybe it brings to mind thoughts of tearing off bread and dipping it into a glass of wine, or images of individual cups of grape juice and small crackers. Perhaps you think of an ornate ceremony or a humble offering. Coming to the throne of the Lord in repentance, knowing you don't deserve the forgiveness He offers or approaching in triumph, grateful that He allows you to share in His victory.

Whatever comes to your mind communion is a time when we, as believers, approach the Lord to ask for forgiveness, declare His victory, and reestablish our relationship with Him.

One definition of the word commune is "to communicate intimately".

The definition of communicate is "to convey knowledge of or information about".

Do you see the difference? To commune is to communicate intimately. Just think about that word for a moment, intimately. It's very different then just conveying knowledge and information isn't it? It's the difference between going to God and saying, "Hey, so you know, I'm a sinner" (He already knows that!) and saying, "Lord, I'm a sinner". The first is to communicate information, the second is to acknowledge His place in your life, and your place under His authority once again.

So let's move past communion for a moment and talk about how we approach the Lord on a daily basis.

Do we come to Him with our problems to communicate with him? Telling him about our day and what we need? Or do we come to Him to commune with Him? Sharing about our life and dwelling in His presence?

Strength Will Rise

I'm reading this book called "Dangerous Calling" by Paul David Tripp and he talks about waiting. That's not a word I like to hear very much. 'Wait.' Especially when I hear it from God.
You know there's a song we sing in church a lot. It's by Lincoln Brewster and it's called "Everlasting God". The chorus says:

"Strength will rise as we wait upon the Lord
Wait upon the Lord, we will wait upon the Lord
Strength will rise as we wait up on the Lord
Wait upon the Lord, we will wait upon the Lord

Our God, You reign forever
Our hope, our strong deliverer"

Now I love this song. And I love the verse it comes from.
Isaiah 40:31
"but those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint."

But how often do I really take this verse to heart?

In the book Paul David Tripp gives examples of Abraham, and how as he waited his strength and faith in the Lord grew. But mine doesn't. The longer God tells me to wait, the more I tend to doubt. Instead of soaring on wings like eagles I plummet towards the ground, instead of running, I struggle to walk and instead of not growing faint I just want to lay down and go to sleep.

So what do we do?

Will the answer's right in front of us and always has been. Those who hope in the Lord. Our hope needs to be in the Lord, not in our circumstances or even the people around us but in the Lord.

Easier said then done but it also may be one of the most important lessons we can ever learn.

So There's This Country Song

I have a habit of starting conversations with my parents by saying "So there's this country song..." and they know that whatever comes next is because something we've been talking about or something I thought of reminds me of a song that I know and they just start laughing.

Well there's this country song by Rodney Atkins called "Watching You" and it talks about the things that this little boy does because he's seen or heard his dad do/say them.

It's amazing the things that kids do or say after watching us. My sister-in-law called me the other day when the 5 year old was having a tantrum and the 2 year old said "Sister, you need to go to bed!" because she knows that when they're throwing temper tantrums they get sent to bed until they calm down.

Or today when a different almost five year old says to me "Miss Katt, your eyes look tired." And I can practically hear her mom telling her that her eyes look tired so she needs to go to bed. Apparently Ellie thought it was my bed time!

The point is that sometimes we need to be very aware of what little eyes are watching and what little ears are listening so that we know what little mouths will repeat.

Well it's not a perfect theory though because trust me, kids come up with some hilarious things to say!

Another conversation from today with a 7 year old went something like this.

Zeke: Miss Katt I don't think you should get married.
Me: Why's that Zeke.
Zeke: Because I don't think that kissing part is very good. What if he has stinky breath?

Hahaha so a lot of the things they come up with are totally original but hopefully you don't have to be nearly as concerned about what they're going to come up with when you're not paying attention to what they might be hearing.

Forest Through the Trees

It's been a rough week. Not for me, for me it's been a pretty normal week of work, church, writing and so on and so forth. Others though, have had a much harder time. This week I've had several people from different cities come to me with very different prayer requests. Some of them have been smaller things in the grand scheme of life, a presentation or adjusting to a new school or church, others have the potential to be life altering. All of them have one thing in common. God cares about these things.

But when you feel like you're drowning and you can't keep your head above water, when you're at the end of your rope and you don't think you can hang on any longer, when you're too exhausted and beat down to take another step you start to wonder... Where is God?

That's the thing though, no matter what's going in your life God hasn't abandoned you, He's still there, He hasn't gone anywhere. But how do you know? I mean if He's still with you shouldn't you be able to see Him or hear Him, something?

How many times have you heard the phrase, "You can't see the forest through the trees?" That's how life sometimes is. Things get so dark that you can't see Jesus standing right next to, even holding you as you're going through hard times.

So what do you do?

You go on faith, there's nothing else you can do. You have to trust that the Bible is true, the promises in it are true and if you're a believer God has never left you and He's never going to.

I don't know what you're going through this week but please, if you're standing in the dark and you can't seem to find God, don't assume He's not there. Call out to Him, if you feel like He's not listening ask someone else to pray with you or for you.

God loves you, he hasn't abandoned you in that dark forest, He's still there with you, even when you can't see Him.