"This resurrection life you received from God is not a timid, grave-tending life.
It's adventurously expectant, greeting God with a childlike
'What's next, Papa?'"
Rom 8:15 The Message
She would have celebrated her sixtieth birthday today. And I remember the twinkle in the eye of our English retired pastor friend with the beautiful radio voice when he showed us the brand new sunflower tattoo with a "Bravest & Best" halo above the golden flowers strung on his upper arm. (Fiona would have enjoyed it, I think.)
Today Ps. Chris took us to Jakob's deathbed, and to Joseph's as well.
Sad, but not hopeless.
Because Jacob remembered the Lord's promise to his grandfather Abraham, and wanted to have himself buried where the Lord said they would settle again one day.
And years later, Joseph also remembered the promise of the Lord to his great-grandfather Abraham, and he tells his brothers to set a reminder on Alexa to remind them to take his bones back with them when that promise of the Lord comes true.
Unshakable faith.
Hundreds of years after the promise.
Sometimes our faith falters before it can properly hit puberty. But like teenagers, maybe we should give our faith the same benefit of the doubt as the strangers who suddenly came to squat in our house.
Like teenagers, my faith sometimes requires great patience.
It needs time to grow and develop and by impatiently expecting it to be able to handle well what it is not yet ready to handle, it becomes reluctant to raise its hand when the next act of faith is required.
Great faith did not start out as great faith.
It started with small faith in a great God.
And no matter how they try to deny it, teenagers like honesty.
They can sense insincerity from miles away.
It may sound like a contradiction, but my faith continues to grow when I sometimes have to admit that it doesn't feel like my faith is growing.
Because the Lord is faithful and He will take your feet on the same path as you have walked before, up the same hill, just so you can realize how much easier the climb has become.
Like teenagers, my faith asks for love and acceptance.
Have you noticed how much easier it is to believe in the promises of the Lord when you dive headfirst into His love and acceptance?
And, like teenagers, my faith is sometimes fallible.
With my husband's very limited sight, I am the nominated driver and reader and spell checker and ironing lady and poo-picker (our Katie's hahahaha). So, we were in a bit of a hurry that day and there was no time to pick the poo – we just had to get to the Wendy house quickly. But it was okay, because hubby told me to just show him where to put his feet, then I can do a proper poo-pick later.
Five steps in, I carefully showed him where to step, and he decides to go 30 degrees and three steps to the left. Right on top of one of Kate's poo packages!
To this day we still joke about it because there was really no reason why he couldn't trust me at that particular moment. He's been doing it for so long.
Fallible faith.
Unfailing grace from the hand of our Great God.
Like teenagers who go abroad to au pair, my faith has outgrown a bit of her teenage shoes here in England. And yet, sometimes, she lies on the ground, ready for a major meltdown about her own undeserved fallibility, but then my dear poo-stepper reminds her:
He has always taken care of us.
Why would He stop now?
He is still the same.
Your inspiration for the week: Chosen
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