Tag Archives: Jesus

Trampled Pearls

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I spend a lot of time thinking about things I have read, watched or discussed and wondering about interesting or different connections. I love to call these long and extended thought processes my secret thoughts.  My sweet husband always listens faithfully, and sometimes I share them with others, but not often.

One passage in the bible that I have been thinking about on and off for a while is Matthew 8:28-32.

And when he came to the other side, to the country of the Gadarenes, two demon-possessed men met him, coming out of the tombs, so fierce that no one could pass that way. And behold, they cried out, “What have you to do with us, O Son of God? Have you come here to torment us before the time?” Now a herd of many pigs was feeding at some distance from them. And the demons begged him, saying, “If you cast us out, send us away into the herd of pigs.” And he said to them, “Go.” So they came out and went into the pigs, and behold, the whole herd rushed down the steep bank into the sea and drowned in the waters. 

What is the point of this?  Why are the pigs included? Originally I thought of it as a followup to Leviticus when the Israelites were told not to eat the flesh of the pig.  I figured that this was further confirmation on how much God dislikes pigs, but this explanation never really felt right.

Then this passage came up again and I was thinking about it immediately on the heels of reading, Matthew 7: 7-8…

Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives, and the one who seeks finds, and to the one who knocks it will be opened.

And it occurred to me that the demons had asked Jesus to send them into the herd of pigs, and He had given them their request.  Maybe what God is demonstrating in this passage is that if even a demon can ask and then be given his request, then we must realize how much more Jesus and Our Father in Heaven desire for us to ask so that They can give us our request.

Obviously I don’t know the answer, but I know my thoughts and I know the time put into pondering and developing this secret thought can be thought of as time spent polishing a little pearl God buried within my heart.  When I did share this thought with someone new, I finally experienced what it was like to cast my pearls before swine.  My thoughts were trampled and dismissed and I was upset and hurt for a little while, but now after the hurt has passed I am left regretfully wondering whose pearls have I trampled?

Sweet Lord, please help us to tread gently so that instead of trampling the pearls of others we might have a chance to discover them, learn from them, admire them and cherish them!  Also please help us to ask YOU with full faith that YOU will give!  You have proven it time and time again… it is our memories that constantly fail!

Pray with confidence

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Sweet friends, we must pray with confidence in our Sweet Father’s ability to do anything and believing in full faith that our sweet Father in Heaven longs to answer and provide the purest desires of our heart!

Do not pray in fear, instead pray in confidence. In our minds and hearts we must release Him from whatever box we have tried to build around Him and place all confidence, trust, belief, faith in Him.

We might watch the news, see the homeless, see the refugees, see the slaves or look in the mirror and see our greed, see our sin and then for a moment teeter on the brink of despair, but look up, look up and see Him, the biggest, bravest, strongest and most amazing Father who knows it is all worth it, everything is worth it… and then smile as the sweet Holy Spirit renews our confidence in Him.

Thank You sweet Father for everything, thank You sweet Holy Spirit for our renewed confidence and faith moment by moment, thank You sweet Jesus for being YOU!

Our powerful tears…

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So many believe our tears are a sign of weakness, because they don’t know Your secret sweet Lord.  They don’t understand that in the moments of our tears, we are powerful as You fill us with Your Holy Spirit and He fills us with Your strength!

Lord,  thank you for all of the tears that flow so freely from my eyes in moments of both joy and sorrow. I feel so close to You in these extreme and powerful moments of my life and I long to fill these moments with gratitude and prayer.

Please soften our hard hearts sweet Lord, and release the flood gates of the tears that so many hold back in fear of what the world believes.

Crazy on a soap box…

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I used to live in Chicago.  I worked downtown and walked by the corner of State and Washington almost everyday.  As I was walking by, almost every evening  a preacher  was standing at the corner with a microphone and speaker addressing everyone walking by.

I never stopped to really listen, but in the hundreds of times I walked by I know I heard him talk about the fires of hell and our need to repent.  Unfortunately the few times I even took notice of him, I thought to myself, “Oh my… he’s crazy!”

As I read a passage about John the Baptist this week, I thought about John’s passion and how many at that time thought he was crazy, and my friend back in Chicago came to mind.  I am starting to think it would be better to be standing next to him and labeled “crazy” than to be swept away by the desires of this world.

Lord, thank you for creating  other souls that are overflowing  with passion for You.  Please open my eyes to their example of love and zeal for You alone and rise up in me a great passion for You and Your Will and please remove my internal and self imposed obstacles so that I too might someday provide a safe harbor for at least four of Your little souls from the rushing river of this world.

Broken

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I always find it so interesting that we are broken and living in a broken world, yet there is still so much more within us that must be broken in order draw closer to God.

He wants to break us slowly, like a mighty cliff that is gradually broken down by the ocean into individual grains of sand, but so often He comes across our resistance and it is then that a great rock from our cliff will come crashing down all at once and oh how it hurts.

Oh Lord, please remove our resistance so that we might all one day flow within your great ocean.

Thy Will Be Done, Oh Lord!

High on a hill

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I saw a man high on a hill.  As I climbed the hill trying to reach him, the terrain became steep.  I called out to him asking for help.  He didn’t move and I realized he could not hear.  I waved my arms trying to get his attention and then realized he could not see.

Oh the irony and the great sorrow, that I have ears to hear and eyes to see my endless failures and flaws that keep me from ever reaching that beautiful summit, and his ears do not hear and his eyes do not see to let him realize that he has reached that beautiful summit.

Oh my sweet Lord, the thought of this is frightening and painful… please open our eyes to see and our ears to hear.

Sitting in limbo

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Sometimes I feel as if our sweet Lord is letting me sit in a state of limbo because I refuse to fully accept His will.  He gives me opportunities to prove my trust and faith in Him, and I fail time and time again as I stress, obsess and can’t sleep at night over little situations in my life.

He could really shake things up for me by ripping everything I grasp so tightly away, but instead of feeling His temper flare I feel His love as He again gently gives me another chance to prove my trust and faith in Him.

Please my Lord, deepen my faith and trust in You, turn me towards prayer instead of stress and obsession, and continue to gently guide me out of limbo towards an eternal union with You!

The circle of giving!

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Imagine a place where we passed on our things every day.  We didn’t sit around with full pantries, closets,  or attics, but instead cleaned out and passed on every night before bed.  Imagine the cleansing we would do, and the new opportunities that would arrive right on our door steps!

I am pretty sure I am a break in this circle, but how I would love to mend my broken piece.

Please pray for us my friends.  Please pray that the spirit of generosity will rise up in our souls like a burning fire, and there will be nothing that will quench this desire of ours but to give, give and give!

Maybe our universe is like a bubble?

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Last week I watched some documentaries about the universe and I must admit I love them!  I saw one that reminded me of the fact that our universe is still expanding and is now expanding at a faster rate than it did just after it’s birth.  I find this so interesting, amazing, strange and difficult to understand.

As I was watching a few days ago, I was thinking a lot about bubbles!  Maybe our universe is a like a bubble, a little piece of something that is where it doesn’t belong.

Imagine a bubble rushing towards the water’s surface.  As it rises, it expands, and as it expands it rises faster, causing it to expand even more and then rise even faster.  I am not a fluid dynamics expert, but I think this is correct at a very high level.

Now imagine that our universe is this bubble rushing through a substance where it doesn’t belong, and maybe as it is approaching a surface the surrounding pressure is decreasing which would explain why our universe is expanding faster than before.  If so… what do you think will happen when our bubble finally reaches the unknown surface?  Will it BURST?

If so, then I hope when our bubble bursts we will finally find ourselves where we do belong, in the singularity (the point where a function takes an infinite value) of GOD!

Keep us on Your path!

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We went for a hike about a week ago and my sweet 8 year old and I sat down on a rock for a minute.  On the rock where we sat, someone had carved the words “Hate satan”.  I asked her what she thought about it.  She just sat there for a min and then said, “It isn’t right to hate, especially since that is what he wants us to do, he wants us to hate.  I think the person who carved this should have written, Don’t follow satan”.

I couldn’t have put it better myself!

Lord please keep us on Your path to follow You and only You!