We were climbing to the peak that morning and had been at it for two hours.  It didn't matter that we were in deep shade and temperatures were only in the low 50s.  We had already crammed our jackets in the back pack and tied our sweatshirts around our waists.  We were pouring sweat in our tee shirts.  The higher we climbed, the steeper the trail became.  At my height, I often had to pull on a sapling to manage the natural "steps" the State Park had left for us.

              Suddenly we heard a rustling in the branches above us and a scattering of pebbles came rattling down around us.  Up ahead two hikers were headed our way, having started on the other end of the trail and just come over the top.  Ragged, sweating and panting, we must have looked like we needed some encouragement.

              "You're almost there," the woman hiker said.  "The top is really steep but the way down on the other side is all switchbacks."

              It was hard to imagine anything steeper than we had already encountered, but it soon became that way.  Only the knowledge that we were "almost there" kept us going, and the relative ease of the promised switchbacks meant the worst was almost over.

              That is the power of exhortation and encouragement and that is one reason God designed fellowship. 

For I long to see you, that I may impart unto you some spiritual gift, to the end ye may be established; that is, that I with you may be comforted in you, each of us by the other's faith, both yours and mine. (Rom 1:11-12)
For I would have you know how greatly I strive for you, and for them at Laodicea, and for as many as have not seen my face in the flesh; that their hearts may be comforted, (Col 2:1)
Therefore encourage one another and build one another up, just as you are doing. (1Thess 5:11)
But exhort one another every day, as long as it is called “today,” that none of you may be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin. (Heb 3:13)

              Even when we do find ourselves alone, He has left us with "a great cloud of witnesses," pictured as spectators cheering us on in Hebrews 12.  Too many times what should be the home crowd might as well be the heart of enemy territory.  Why is it that a young woman announcing her pregnancy brings on every horror story of labor and delivery that every woman around her has heard or experienced?  Probably the same reason that preachers who gather together for moral support in areas where the church is small and scattered wind up trying to top one another with their bad experiences.  Brothers and sisters alike seem to focus on the negative rather than the positive.  Just exactly who will that encourage except the enemy?

              "We all sin all the time."
              "Even the best of us sin every day."
              "It's impossible for even a strong Christian to overcome sin."

            I have heard these things all my life.  They certainly give an unscriptural view of our power to overcome with the help of Christ.  And they made me feel hopeless.  Until I learned better I didn't even try that hard.  That's what focusing on the negative accomplishes—failure.

              God expects better of His children.  He expects us to help each other, not cast stumblingblocks in the way.  And He has some strong words for those who do the latter.

              I might not have made it to the top of the mountain that day if those hikers hadn't come along with encouraging words.  As you pass others making their way up the mountain of life, remember to lighten their steps with a supporting cheer.  You wouldn't want them to give up when they are so close to the top.
 
Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for he who promised is faithful. And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near. (Heb 10:23-25)
 
Dene Ward

Some have called eggs the perfect food with their own perfect container.  I recently heard a TV cook say they are “hermetically sealed.”  Eggshells themselves are stronger than their reputation says.  After all, birds sit on them for days, and it takes a good deal of effort for a baby bird to peck its way out of one.

            However, it doesn’t take more than one instance of carelessness to discover just how easily they will break.  Mine usually make it home from the grocery store in one piece, in spite of being placed in a cooler with a couple of bags of groceries and an ice block, and then traveling thirty miles, the last half mile over a bumpy lime rock lane.  Only once in over 30 years have I opened my cooler to find eggs that have tumbled out and cracked all over the other groceries.

            You must also be careful where you put them on the counter.  Most recipes require ingredients at room temperature, so I take the butter and eggs out a half hour or more before I plan to use them.  I quickly learned to put them in a small bowl so they couldn’t possibly roll off the countertop onto the floor, even if I did think I had them safely corralled by other ingredients.  Somehow they only roll when you turn your back.  As I recall, that recipe required a lot of eggs, and suddenly I was short a couple.

            Because of their relative fragility, we have developed the idiom “walking on eggshells.”  When the situation is tricky, when someone is already on a short fuse, we tread carefully with our words, as if we were walking carefully, trying not to break the eggshells under our feet.  Sometimes that is a good thing.  No one wants to hurt a person who has just experienced a tragedy.  No one wants to carelessly bring up a topic that might hinder the growth of a babe in Christ.  Certainly no one wants to put out a spark of interest in the gospel.    But sometimes the need to walk on eggshells is a shame, especially when the wrong people have to walk on them.

            I suppose every congregation has one of those members who gives everyone pause; one who has hot buttons you do your best not to push;  one who seems to take offense at the most innocuous statements or actions.  The shame of it is this:  in nearly every case I can remember, that person is over 50, and most over 60.  “You know old brother so-and-so,” everyone will tell newcomers.  “You have to be careful what you say around him.”  Why is it that younger Christians must negotiate minefields around an older Christian who should have grown in wisdom and forbearance?

            Do you think God has nothing to say about people like this? 

            The vexation of a fool is known at once, but the prudent ignores an insult. Pro 12:16
            Hatred stirs up strife, but love covers all offenses. Pro 10:12
            Good sense makes one slow to anger, and it is his glory to overlook an offense. Pro 19:11
            Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. 1 Cor 13:7
            Above all, keep loving one another earnestly, since love covers a multitude of sins. 1 Pet 4:8.

            Now let’s put that all together.  A person who is quick to take offense, who is easily set off when a certain topic arises, who seems to make a career out of hurt feelings is a fool, imprudent, full of hate instead of love, divisive, and lacking good sense.  That’s what God says about the matter.  He didn’t walk on eggshells.

            On the other hand, the person who overlooks insults, who doesn’t take everything the worst possible way, who makes allowances for others’ foibles, especially verbal ones, and who doesn’t tell everyone how hurt or insulted he is, is wise, prudent, sensible, and full of love.  Shouldn’t that describe any Christian, especially one who has been at if for thirty or forty years?

            So, let’s take a good look at ourselves.  Do people avoid me?  Am I defensive, and quick to assume bad motives?   Do I find myself insulted or hurt several times a week?  Do I keep thinking that everyone is out to get me in every arena of life?  Maybe I need to realize that I am not the one that everyone always has in mind when they speak or act.  I am not, after all, the center of the universe.  Maybe it’s time I acted the spiritual age I claim to be.

            Maybe I need to sweep up a few eggshells.
 
Put on then, as God's chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience, bearing with one another and, if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other; as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive. And above all these put on love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony. Col 3:12-14.
 
Dene Ward

The first few years I only had one catbird at my feeder, a chary fellow who only visited during winter when he couldn’t find anything easily on his own.  He sat clumsily on the suet cage, which was almost too small for him, and pecked away, but it only took a micro-movement from me on the other side of the window to scare him off.

            Although I had read that the catbird got its name from its call, I had never heard him utter a peep.  He quietly came to the square of suet, ate his fill, and left.  The other morning, as I sat by the window he flew into the nearest azalea on the other side of the feeder and I heard it, a “mew” just as clear and sweet as a newborn kitten’s.  And what caused him to mew?  There on the suet perched another catbird--he was jealous.  Suddenly he flew at the interloper and chased him away.   

            Within a week, a third catbird had joined the fray, this one a bit smaller and slimmer, probably a fledgling.  Now they all go at it.  It isn’t enough to chase one away and then eat your fill.  They think they must sit guard and keep the others from getting any of it.  This is not the catbird personality I had always seen before, and I hear that mew more often too.  Now I know what truly lies beneath those slate gray feathers.

            I have seen it happen with people too.  You think they are one sort of personality but when circumstances don’t go their way, suddenly they morph into someone you have never met before.  Sometimes that’s a good thing, like quiet mothers who instantly, and fiercely, protect their young, but others times it means we have not really become new creatures, we have just hidden the old one and stress made him rear his ugly head once again.

            Becoming a better person is difficult.  Baptism doesn’t instantly fix the flaws in your character.  They have deep-seated roots from childhood or traumatic experiences in your life.  It takes effort to change yourself.  You have to first realize where the problems lie.  Then you have to prepare yourself to meet those stressful situations with study, prayer and meditation, deciding ahead of time how you will react should the same thing happen again.  You have to learn to accept the help of others, even if it does come in the form of a stern rebuke or disapproving look.  Finally, you have to be on watch.  Most of us just let life happen to us, then wonder why we weren’t able to do better “after all these years,” as if time were the only thing that mattered.  Doing better must come from being better or it won’t last.

            God will not remove the stress from our lives.  He won’t make the trials suddenly disappear.  Any time we convert someone with the promise that all of their problems will now be solved, we are giving them false hopes.  The true hope is that now we have help with our problems, but only if we use it.  God does not allow trials so we will have an excuse for bad behavior but so we will become stronger and better able to handle those trials. 

            I watch those catbirds and wonder if I have really become a new creature.  Today it’s time to get up out of my chair and work on it.
 
For the love of Christ constrains us; because we thus judge, that one died for all, therefore all died; and he died for all, that they that live should no longer live unto themselves, but unto him who for their sakes died and rose again…Wherefore if any man is in Christ, he is a new creature: the old things are passed away; behold, they have become new. 2 Cor 5:14, 15, 17                                                         
 
Dene Ward

A long time ago I accidentally learned what to do about all those New Testament quotes from the Old Testament:  LOOK UP THE ORIGINAL STATEMENT!

              Let’s look at a quote or two.

              ​You hypocrites! Well did Isaiah prophesy of you, when he said: “‘This people honors me with their lips, but their heart is far from me; in vain do they worship me, teaching as doctrines the commandments of men.’” (Matt 15:7-9)

              I heard that passage quoted all my childhood and applied to religious denominations.  They were making laws that were not in the Bible and so they were guilty.  Then the preacher would list things like “once saved, always saved,” instrumental music, and quarterly communion.  I used it too when I talked to my friends at school because that’s the way I had always heard it used.

              Then one day after I was grown and teaching classes, I decided to look up the context of Jesus’ statement and was I in for a shock when I saw that he was addressing it to the scribes and Pharisees—conservative parties of his own people, the Jews.  He was NOT addressing it to pagans who worshiped incorrectly at all.  So then I went back to Isaiah where, Jesus tells us, this statement was originally made.

              And the Lord said: “Because this people draw near with their mouth and honor me with their lips, while their hearts are far from me, and their fear of me is a commandment taught by men, therefore, behold, I will again do wonderful things with this people, with wonder upon wonder; and the wisdom of their wise men shall perish, and the discernment of their discerning men shall be hidden.” (Isa 29:13-14)

              Like Jesus, Isaiah is talking to God’s people, a people who have given nothing but lip-service to God.  They go to the Temple on feast days and Sabbaths, anxious for it to all be over so they can get back to “real life,” cheating in their businesses, afflicting the poor, and focusing all their attentions on self-indulgence.  They have polluted the true worship with idols in the Temple, priests who no longer teach the Law, and prophets who preach for hire.  They want to be more like the nations around them than like the Father who protected and provided for them.  God says they have broken the covenant and He is about to destroy them.

              Do you think those Jewish leaders missed what Jesus was saying about them by using this passage?  Of course not.  Do you understand now why they were always so angry with him?  He did not avoid confrontation and he had no problem speaking plainly, plainly enough that they knew exactly what he meant.

              Now notice again who these people were:  the conservative parties of God’s people who were trying their best to follow the Law exactly.  Do you know anyone who fits that description today?  And do you think we don’t have any problem with the same things they did?  Then think again.  I grew up knowing people who carefully compartmentalized their religion.  What they said and did on Sunday had nothing to do with how they lived the rest of the week.  “I’ve been baptized,” became their mantra.  I was blessed to have parents who showed me that faith is about every aspect of your life, not just Sunday mornings, otherwise I might be in the same situation.

             Do you think we don’t have trouble teaching “commandments of men?”  Have you ever heard things like, “You can’t wait on the Lord’s table without a tie on?”  How about, “Women are not allowed to wear pants here,” or “You have to say amen at the end of your prayer or you will not be allowed to pray the public prayer.”  And just like those first century Pharisees we sometimes make a bigger deal out of people breaking our Man commandments than we do God’s.

               All that just because I finally checked the context of two passages, the New Testament quote and the original Old Testament passage.

             Here’s one you can work on yourself.  Jesus told a vineyard parable in Mark 12:1-12.  It was not a direct quote but a strong allusion to Isaiah’s vineyard parable in 5:1-7.  Jesus was speaking to the chief priests, the scribes, and the elders, people who certainly knew the book of Isaiah.  Make a two column chart and find the comparisons between those two parables.  Once you do, you will understand why, when Jesus finished his, those men wanted “to arrest him.”

            Did you ever wonder why the New Testament is so much shorter than the Old?  Maybe it’s because God didn’t think He needed to say things twice!  He expected us to look at these quotes and their originals and figure a few things out ourselves.  And when you do that, you will learn more than you ever knew there was to learn.
 
And beginning with Moses and all the Prophets, he interpreted to them in all the Scriptures the things concerning himself. (Luke 24:27)
 
Dene Ward

I started thinking about it when the man from the phone company called, trying to get us to add to our basic service.  “We have a package for ___ dollars that will give you everything you want,” he said. 

            “But I don’t want those things,” I told him.  “I’m perfectly happy with the basic package,” which is nothing actually, but a phone on the wall that works.

            “But you can talk long distance as long as you want.”

            “I don’t make that many long distance phone calls.”

            “But you can have call waiting and never miss a call.”

            “I don’t receive many calls.”

            “But you can have digital internet service and not tie up your phone with dial-up.”

            “I’m never on the computer longer than ten minutes and if it’s important, they’ll call back.”

            He was stumped.  He had never run into someone who was not held captive by their telephone.

            We do it all the time about everything.

            “Lather, rinse, repeat,” the bottle says.  Do you realize you don’t have to repeat?  If you wash your hair regularly, once is all you need.  Can’t get enough lather, you say?  Add a handful of water to the lather you already have and that usually does the trick.  Saves you money, too, because your bottle goes twice as far.  Yet most follow those directions without even thinking about it—held prisoner by a bottle of shampoo.

            How about the calendar?  I learned this lesson long ago from my mother.  We lived a thousand miles away and couldn’t get down for the holidays.  She left her decorations up until we got there the end of January, not worrying about the strange looks she got from the neighbors.  I have done the same with my children.  A holiday or birthday is when you can be together, not when the calendar says it is.

            Twice I have had eye surgery on our anniversary.  We celebrated several weeks later.  It isn’t about the date as much as it is about the sentiment.  If it isn’t about the sentiment, you are simply a slave of your calendar.

            Women are held captive by fashion.  I went to the mall—another place that holds us prisoner with the obsession to shop, shop, shop—and came away with nothing.  Everything I saw was just plain ugly.  Most of the clothes in my closet are well over ten years old.  Why buy a new dress when the old one still fits, is in good condition, and especially if you don’t like the new style?

            It’s amazing to me that we Americans, a people who pride ourselves on our independence, can let things take us prisoner so easily.  It’s horrifying to me when the same feeling makes us prisoners of sin. 

            I read an article several years ago in which European women were asked what they thought of American women’s clothes.  “Americans dress like prostitutes,” was a common opinion.  (Check out Prov 7:6-12!)  In fact, considering my last visit to that mall, I would have to agree.  It looked like I had been dropped into the middle of a streetwalkers’ convention.  I remember the first time the miniskirt came into fashion.  A few years later the hemlines dropped again.  It’s a shame that some Christian women only dropped theirs because their masters, the fashion designers, said to.  Dressing like a pure and godly woman had nothing to do with it.

            But that is not the only way sin can take us captive.  Do you want to be liked?  Do you want to be accepted by your peers?  Do you want to be popular or cool?  Guess how that affects your behavior given the general sinfulness of society, which you are making your lord and master with those motivations?

            God has set us free from sin and expects us to act like it, completely independent of the culture we find ourselves in.  Think today about the things you let take you captive.  Maybe it’s time you broke out of prison.
 
So Jesus said to the Jews who had believed in him, "If you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free." They answered him, "We are offspring of Abraham [We are Americans!] and have never been enslaved to anyone. How is it that you say, 'You will become free'?" Jesus answered them, "Truly, truly, I say to you, everyone who commits sin is a slave to sin. The slave does not remain in the house forever; the son remains forever. So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed. John 8:31-36
 
Dene Ward

A long time ago as we were packing for a camping trip, my frustration got the better of me and I snapped at the boys.  Nathan looked up and said, “I hate getting ready for a vacation.  You’re always so mad.”

            How is it that an innocent ten-year-old can make you feel an inch tall?  I beat myself with the guilt whip for the rest of the day, determined to keep my cool despite anything and everything that could possibly go wrong doing so.  A few days later, as we laughed and played on the side of a beautiful creek in the bowl of mountains where our tent was pitched, I gave myself a break.  Although during my childhood we could never afford what people now seem to expect in a “vacation,” we did visit family for a week or two each summer, and I remembered my parents behaving the same way I had in the stress of packing and leaving on time.  It must be written somewhere in some book called How to Be a Parent, that you must become so stressed out getting ready for a vacation that you make sure no one else really wants to take that vacation with YOU!

            It isn’t just vacations.  Why is that we can make every joyful occasion a trial to get through?  What did you do just moments before you said, “I do?”  Did you snarl at your mother?  Did you snap at the best friend who came a thousand miles at her own expense to be your maid of honor?  As a wedding musician I have been growled at more than once by the mother of the bride when I simply asked if someone could move the piano a foot to the side so I could see what was happening and know when to play what.

            What happened the day of your precious child’s first birthday party?  Did you forget that he won’t remember a thing about it and let yourself get so tired and stressed out you couldn’t even enjoy it?

            I wonder how many couples would have gladly given up their 50th wedding anniversary celebrations so they would not have had to hear their children bickering at one another about it.

            I am afraid this tendency of ours might also spill over into our preparation for that vacation we are all planning at the end of our lives.  How are you spending your life today?  Are you stressed out with a to-do list that gets bigger all the time, things that are good, that you feel you must do without fail or you are sinning because “To him that knows to do good but does it not to him it is sin?” Are you trying so hard to be all things to all people that you forget to be a wife or a mother or a friend?  Do you think that being right and doing right means there is no appropriate time to say, “No?” 

            Being a child of God and a disciple of Christ means we must suffer at times.  Yet as much as possible, God wants us to enjoy our lives.  In the beginning he made a perfect place for his children, a place where everything was “very good.”  That’s what he has always wanted for us.  Sin ruined it, but he still wants us to be as happy as possible, even if just a little while at the time.  But the only way we can is to recognize those times, and for goodness sake, don’t choose to ruin them!

            Today, while you run those errands and do those good deeds, while you feed and care for the family you love and see to the needs of your suffering brethren, remember to enjoy each moment.  You are packing for a real vacation, a time when things will once again be “very good.”  Don’t let Satan steal the excitement with annoying neighbors, aggravating drivers, and stressful situations at work.  Don’t give in to the temptation to whine and complain when things don’t go to suit you.  People are watching you.  Your children must deal with the effects of your frustrations.  After watching your preparations, will anyone even want to think about going on that trip with you? 
 
Then he said to them, "Go your way. Eat the fat and drink sweet wine and send portions to anyone who has nothing ready, for this day is holy to our Lord. And do not be grieved, for the joy of the LORD is your strength." Neh 8:10.
 
Dene Ward

Neighbors are different out in the country.  First of all, they are a whole lot further away.  Instead of zero lot line houses barely five feet apart, they are 5 to 50 acres apart.  You seldom even see one another to wave, except maybe at the lineup of mailboxes out on the highway.  In the country, if you want to see your neighbors, you have to make it happen.

              In the city a good neighbor often boils down to this:  he’s quiet and doesn’t cause any trouble.  There may be a particular neighbor or two you really become friends with, taking turns having one another over for dinner, going fishing together, loaning your lawn mower and babysitting once in a while, but the rest are confined to a nod when you pass one another on the street and a quick word over the backyard fence if you both happen to be out at the same time.

              In the country, because you are so far out of town and away from help, “neighbor” takes on a much larger meaning.  The very lifestyle means you have far more need of one another.  You pull one another’s vehicles out of the mud.  You tag team generators when the power goes out for more than a couple of hours.  You feed one another’s livestock when the other one has to be out of town a few days.  You swap garden tilling for tractor mowing and tomatoes for blueberries.  You help one another shell peas and shuck corn, and then work together one hot afternoon to get it all put up.  You help load sick, but heavy, pets in the pickup for a trip to the vet.  You trade shooting lessons for help wiring the shed.  You loan cars when one is in the shop, or chauffeur a sick neighbor to the doctor if you need it yourself.  If a widow is alone, you load up her woodstove and get it set, ready to light on a cold night.  If a husband is away and there is a household emergency—like the refrigerator door falling off!—you head down the lane immediately and screw it back on.  When a storm passes through and leaves a live oak half out of the ground leaning over a house, all the neighbors drop everything and run with their tractors, chains and chainsaws to help.  There is something a little more primal about being a neighbor in the country.

            We’ve had neighbors like that and we’ve tried to be neighbors like that in return.  I think it’s the sort of thing Jesus had in mind when he told the story of the Good Samaritan.  This isn’t a matter of borrowing a cup of sugar.  It isn’t about keeping the TV low in the wee hours or not parking on someone else’s property.  It’s about real life and death matters, real trials and suffering, and aiding in whatever way you can.

            Maybe the Levite and the priest were used to city neighbors.  This guy on the side of the road certainly wasn’t being a good neighbor to them, causing them all sorts of trouble and a delay in their schedules if they had stopped to help.  But the truth is, you can be a bad neighbor anywhere, country or city, and the Lord expects a whole lot more from us than that.  He expects us to do just as that Samaritan did, helping beyond the expected—just think what a couple night’s lodging would cost today—and yes, for a perfect stranger.  Was he a good guy or a good-for-nothing?  We don’t know and that’s the point.  If someone needs our help, we help, even a stranger and even when we don’t have time to check and see if we are being good stewards of our money.

            “Love thy neighbor as thyself” was recognized by Jews as the second greatest commandment.  Yet they argued long and hard over who exactly their “neighbor” was.  It most cases it boiled down to a good practicing Jew.  We’re big on castigating those Pharisaical Jews who knew the Law but explained it away.  I think we have the same problem.
 
For the whole law is fulfilled in one word: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” (Gal 5:14)
 
Dene Ward

I grew up in Tampa.  I learned to drive down Busch Blvd when there were actually empty, weedy lots between Temple Terrace and Florida Avenue.  I drove on I-75 with a learner’s permit, what is now I-275, and even into downtown Tampa where my eye doctor had his office in a 20 story “skyscraper”—by Florida standards anyway.  I drove down 75 past Howard and Armenia to shop at the only mall in town, Westshore Plaza, in an era when sometimes you wouldn’t see more than 3 other cars on your side of the interstate.  Yes, it was a long, long time ago.
 
             I took Driver’s Ed at King High School.  They had a little driving course in the back of the school.  A two lane “street” painted on a parking lot with stop signs, yield signs, diagonal parking, and pylons for practicing parallel parking.  I could drive that course without a hitch and usually even managed to parallel park without crushing a pylon.

              But we never practiced U-turns.  So one day after I had passed my exam and had my own brand new driver’s license complete with the requisite peon-home-from-working-the-field picture, I was headed west on Busch Blvd and realized I had passed my turn-off.  Time for my first U-turn.  I pulled into the left lane and patiently waited for the traffic on the other side to clear.  It may have been years ago, but traffic was not kind that day.  Those cars were spaced just so that I had to wait far longer than if it were a normal left turn.  I knew I needed time to straighten out the car and get back up to 45 mph before any oncoming traffic reached me.

              Finally there was a break, just barely big enough for me to maneuver, if I hurried.  So I spun that wheel hard to the left and pulled out and hit the gas.  My little Mustang made it to the far right lane before completely turning, but almost immediately I was in trouble.  I had kept the wheel turned too long.  The tires screeched as I crossed back over all three lanes and was headed for the median.  Even though I needed to let go of the steering wheel I couldn’t.  I had thrown myself nearly into the passenger seat and was hanging on for dear life.  Thoroughly panicked, I finally let loose enough for the wheel to slide between my hands and allow the car to straighten.  I took my foot off the gas and shifted back into the seat just in time to miss the median and straighten myself out in the left lane.  No one and nothing was hurt but my pride.  I slunk in the seat as the oncoming traffic caught up and passed me, hoping no one I knew had seen that.

              That’s what a lack of experience will do for you.  I was old enough to drive.  But I had never performed that maneuver before, and had probably never paid enough attention to my parents as they did.  “It’s just a longer left turn,” I thought.  No, it’s a bit more than that.

              U-turns in life can be difficult too.  I have seen so many young people completely disillusioned because they thought making those U-turns after their baptism would be a cinch.  Now that I’ve turned my life over to God I won’t feel those temptations any more, they think.  I will suddenly be a changed person, able to live perfectly from here on in.  Once again a lack of experience is showing.

              We can be forgiven from our sins, but very often the consequences are still there to live with.  That can mean things as difficult as serving jail time or fighting addiction or dealing with people we have hurt physically or emotionally.  It can also mean the urges of a besetting sin.  You will still have to work on it.  You may need to change not just your life, but your schedule and your friends in order to see a difference.  The same things that tempted you before will continue to tempt you, and the Devil will try even harder because he thinks he might have lost you.  Why work on the ones who are securely under his belt?

              Tell your children these things.  Tell that neighbor you are trying to convert.  If they are not prepared for reality, they may lose hope.  But also tell them that now they will have help, help that can strengthen them enough to overcome anything—not necessarily easily, but certainly.  Help that understands what you are going through and will bear with you as you learn and grow with experience.  You may throw yourself across the highway the first time or two, but eventually you will learn to navigate the roads of life, and those U-turns will become easier to make. 

              And, if you have been “raised in the church,” you may find that the U-turns you need to make are of a completely different sort.  It is all too easy when you have never been involved in what we call “the big bad sins” to look down one’s nose on those who came from that background and judge them unworthy because they still struggle.  That is the U-turn you must make:  away from a judgmental attitude toward compassion, the same compassion Jesus showed for an adulterous woman, a thieving publican, and a convicted criminal.  Your U-turn may be the most difficult of all, but he still expects you to make it.
 
But [I] declared first to those in Damascus, then in Jerusalem and throughout all the region of Judea, and also to the Gentiles, that they should repent and turn to God, performing deeds in keeping with their repentance. Acts 26:20
 
Dene Ward

The kitchen must be the favorite room in nearly every home.  It’s where the family meets to share their meals and their day, to gather important information—“Mom! Where are my good jeans?”—to pick up sustenance when the time between meals is long and the activities vigorous, and a place for sharing thoughts, dreams, and childhood troubles over chocolate chip cookies and ice cold milk.  When the kitchen is full of people and laughter, all is right with the world.

            That makes the kitchen floor a microcosm of how we all live.  All you have to do is drop something small, something that requires your face to be an inch above the floor trying to spy the odd shape or color, and suddenly you know everything anyone has eaten, spilled, or tracked in, even if you clean your floor regularly.  If I had every dustpan full of sweepings over my 38 years of marriage, it would make a ten foot pile high of sugar granules, flour, cornmeal, panko, cookie crumbs, Cheerios, oats, blueberries, chopped parsley, basil, and rosemary, the papery skins of onions and garlic cloves, freshly ground coffee beans, tiny, stray low dose aspirins, grains of driveway sand, clumps of garden soil, yellow clay, limerock, soot, and burnt wood, strands of hair from blonde to nearly black to gray and white, frayed threads, missing buttons, assorted screws, and loose snips from the edges of coupons.  If I had never cleaned the floor at all, it would be layered with coffee drips, dried splashes of dishwater, bacon grease and olive oil splatter, tea stains, grape juice, and sticky spots from honey and molasses spills while I was baking.  Put it all together and you would have a pretty good idea how we live our lives.

            Every soul has a kitchen floor, places where the accumulated spills of life gather.  We must regularly clean that floor, just as I am constantly sweeping and wiping and mopping, trying to stay ahead of the messes we make. As soon as I miss a day or a week, I have even more to clean up.  It would be ridiculous to think I could ignore that floor and no one would know about us, wouldn’t it? 

            Jesus said, “Out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks,” Matt 12:34.  You can deny it all you want, but what you speak shows who you really are.  I can say I never bake, but whoever sweeps my floor will know better.  I can pretend we don’t like Italian cuisine, but the evidence is right there.  I can tell everyone we live in the city instead of the country, but the soil on my floor will say otherwise.  It is getting harder for me to see those things now and to sweep them up perfectly, but my blindness to them will not keep others from knowing exactly what I do here all day long.

            That kitchen floor of a heart will tell on you too.  All you have to do is open your mouth.  If you don’t keep it cleaned up, if you don’t monitor the things you store in it, it could belie your protestations of a righteous life.  Sooner or later a word will slip out, a thought will take root and become a spoken idea.  I heard someone say once that you cannot imagine in others what is not already in your own heart. 

            Of course, what’s on your floor could prove your righteous life instead of denying it.  So take a moment today to examine your kitchen floor.  Let it remind you to examine your heart as well.  I had much rather people see sugar and cookie crumbs than Satan’s muddy footprints.
 
Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in your sight, O LORD, my rock and my redeemer, Psa 19:14.    
      
Dene Ward

If I asked any one of you if Bible study was essential to a godly life, I would be surprised to hear anyone say no.  We all understand that God expects us to learn His Word.  We devote a lot of time, energy, and funds to our class systems to make sure our children are well-taught, even expecting the church to do our duty as parents, but that is another post for another day.  Still, we do understand that Bible study is essential.  We put “edification” in those ubiquitous “acts of worship” lists and if questioned about it will happily list Bible classes along with sermons as the means for that particular “act.”

            But is knowing God’s Word the purpose of Bible study?  I would hope we all know better than that.  There may well be theological knowledge we must all have to appreciate our salvation and keep our faith strong, but the practical purpose for Bible study is to learn how God wants us to live our lives. If your Bible study does not affect your life, why do you bother?

            So how are you doing in the practical application of your study?  Here is a test for you.  When you hear a sermon, does something about you change?  When you learn something in a Bible class, do you think about it and perhaps alter your schedule, toss a few things out of your wardrobe, raise your contribution, pray more often, or put a few TV shows on your family’s verboten list?  Do you forgive a wrong, pray for an enemy, or stand up for the truth in a room full of atheists?  Does what you learn affect you in any way at all?  And does it go past a onetime thing to a life-changing habit?

            All right, so maybe you have been a Christian for a few decades instead of just a few weeks, and you have already made many changes.  Good for you.  But do you think there is nothing you can make better, that you already have all your ducks in a row, perfectly aligned so they waddle in step and quack in unison?  I’m not there yet.  Surely even you can make a few adjustments, tweaking your life just a bit.

            Sometimes the changes you make can be a little more philosophical and effect the genuineness of worship.  I passed my Psalms lesson book on to a Bible class teacher in another church many miles from here.  He told me that it has made a definite difference in his prayer life—the Psalms may be poems set to music for both individual and group worship, but they are also prayers.  And, since he also leads singing, he told me it has changed how he does that as well.

            The class had just finished Psalm 89, a long psalm that praises God by discussing His attributes—love, faithfulness, righteousness, justice, power, holiness.  So the next Sunday he chose his songs according to that pattern, God’s attributes.  They sang “Wonderful Grace,” “Great is Thy Faithfulness,” “Holy, Holy, Holy,” and “Because He Loved Me So.”  He told the good people there what he was doing and why.  They paid more attention to the words they were singing and their song service was, in spite of singing “boring old songs” as some these days might call them, more moving and admonishing, and sung with much more “understanding” than usual.

            Just a little Bible study caused a whole church to worship more sincerely than they had in a long, long time.  What has your Bible study done for you lately?  It’s up to you how much you get out of it and what you do with what you learn.
 
​Give me understanding, that I may keep your law and observe it with my whole heart. ​Lead me in the path of your commandments, for I delight in it. ​Incline my heart to your testimonies, and not to selfish gain! ​Turn my eyes from looking at worthless things; and give me life in your ways. ​Confirm to your servant your promise, that you may be feared. Ps 119:34-38
 
Dene Ward