Appreciate the you God has made!

My mother tells me I’m clever.  She has expressed this notion more times than I can count.  But with this statement she also says that she is not.  It goes something like this.  “Sherida, you are so clever,” as she looks at a piece of clothing I have sewn or has heard a goofy comment I’ve just made.  “I don’t know where you get it, but it sure wasn’t from me,” she finishes.

After listening to this for years and years, I finally decided to chime in and say, “Yes, Mom, when God was passing out the good stuff, you happened to be in the bathroom.” Everyone laughs and that’s the end of it.

My mother has no reason to make such statements about herself.  Of all the women I know, she is the best and most compassionate Registered Nurse, and now caregiver, I have ever known.  She was good at her job and the nurses aides who were lazy did not like her very well, which means she was really good at her job. She now meticulously cares for my dad and he is happy. She is a good mother and a good wife in every way and we all in the family are very blessed.

Everyone is a product of the God of Heaven and everyone has something unique to share, especially those folks who suffer great physical or mental hardship. Hidden underneath the suffering is a wealth of gifts that can be dispersed to their fellow man. 

All you have to do is look at the many amazing stories people share on Facebook, or the stories that are broadcast at the end of a television news hour about those who have overcome great odds or have exhibited extraordinary care for someone else. 

We love to hear these uplifting stories, and we all can be an uplifting story!  Our day to day encounters with people can be exercises for us to show kindness, compassion, humor, and patience.  We can brighten someone’s day and bring out the good that may be hiding under a weight of care and worry. 

Instead of beating ourselves up because we don’t think we are talented or clever we can do something better.  We can be Jesus to someone today.

Take to heart the words of the Psalmist when you start looking down on yourself: I praise you (God), for I am fearfully and wonderfully made.  Wonderful are your works; that I know very well. Ps. 139:14

How to recognize God watching you

Do you believe that God is too busy to pay attention to you? Do you think He doesn’t know you exist or that He doesn’t care because there are so many other “more worthy” people to look after and interact with?  I think we all have entertained these thoughts. If you are troubled with such notions, maybe this will help.

“Recognizing God’s Presence in Your Life 101”

1. Is this it?

You may have all you need and then some.  You may live a life of fun and adventure,  have all the toys you could ever want and have need of nothing yet you wonder, “Is this all there is?” or, “There must be more than this.”  This is a void speaking in your heart which has been placed there by God and nobody but God is allowed to enter it.  It is reserved for Him and when He has not been invited there by you, you feel its emptiness.  The only way to find the answer to “Is this all there is?” is to give God what He wants: His place in your heart.

2.  It’s just a few bucks.

On the job, do you fudge the books a little, or take a few pills from the med drawer?  Do you spend the work day on the phone with a friend or produce less widgets than you could? You reason that your boss can afford it, but your conscience tells you that what you are doing is dead wrong.  This is not a case of scrupulosity, but the Holy Spirit trying to correct his naughty child.  God is telling you He loves you and wants you to behave.  He sees every nickel you take and every minute you waste. If He didn’t care about you, you would not feel the guilt.

3.  I don’t know why I feel lonely.

If you have no reason to be lonely but you have this ever abiding feeling of loneliness, it is your heart and soul yearning to be Home with the Lord.  You don’t necessarily want to die right now, but you pine for the time when you will be where all tears will be wiped away and all will say “Let us go into the House of the Lord!” It is also God pining for you and for the day when you will be with Him and see Him as He is!

The perks of obedience

Every day I struggle with putting aside my own wants for this or that to happen and my desire to make plans for the future. And most every day those things I think  I will do are things that God puts aside in order for me to do what He wants me to do.  

When the day is through, I recall what was done and say, “Thank you Lord for helping me do what You wanted done today.” And if I haven’t scratched and clawed for my way but instead in calm obedience done what was assigned for me, the day will have gone like clockwork. It is amazing.  When I give God what He wishes, my obedience, I not only live in peace but I truly gain my life.  

I recently came across a story written for a publication by a friend of my husband. This amazing woman, now in her late 60’s, chose to forsake all the world had to offer her when Jesus came to her and redirected her back to a calling she accepted when she was a young girl. Driving her car on the highway to somewhere, He came and she instantly fell “madly in love with the Lord”.

She immediately drove to her downtown office, resigned from a lucrative career as an executive secretary to one of the biggest television networks in the country.  In this, she gave up world travel, a boyfriend, and even a chance, at Steven Spielberg’s coaxing,  to be cast as the Bionic Woman in the late 1970’s show with the same name.  She gave it all up to become a hermit nun who prays daily over a mountain of prayer requests that come to a hermitage in southern Minnesota where she and a handful of other nuns live and pray.

I don’t list her accomplishments and opportunities to impress but to illustrate that one can have the world at her fingertips and still feel there is something missing. For her, giving up all the tinsel of Hollywood was easy because Jesus knocked her off her feet and assured her that there is something better and something far more important to live for: Him and the work of helping Him save countless souls.

Reading this story helps me stay focused. During my stay here I should not be focused on accumulating stuff, hoarding stuff, or saving stuff so that there’s plenty of it when I die.  I should not be focused on making a name for myself. And I should not strive to be like friends who seem to be able to turn everything into gold. 

These things to not bring peace and in them I do not gain my life.