Mercy vs. Truth

A few months ago, I was challenged to pick a word to summarize what I needed to work on the most this year. The first word that came to mind was mercy. A lot of people commented that they thought this was an odd word. How could mercy be hard? What is so difficult about showing mercy? Some said that I seemed like too nice of a person to have issues with showing mercy. However, this is something I have struggled with.

I have been hurt many times by many people. I may be quick to forgive them, but I have issues showing mercy. The problem is truth gets in the way. The truth hurts sometimes. I’m not talking God’s truth, by the way; I’m talking about truth as we perceive it. Let me give an example. When my husband says or does something that hurts me in some way, my truth says “What a jerk!” “ He doesn’t deserve me ever being nice to him again!” and “He doesn’t really love me or he wouldn’t treat me like that!” But mercy says, “He’s your husband. You made a promise to love, honor, and cherish”, “Treat him the way you want to be treated,” and “Love him the way Christ loves him.” But mercy is SO hard for me! If someone hurts me, I want him/her to hurt. If someone is mean to me, I want to be mean to him/her. If someone makes me feel left out and alone, I want him/her to feel that way too. And THIS is why I am committed to working on mercy.

In one of the books I use during my devotion time, Sparkling Gems from the Greek, I came across a passage this past week that was talking about Judas Iscariot betraying Jesus and how Jesus never treated Judas with the way truth said he should be treated. He showed him mercy beyond any mercy we’ve ever known. Jesus knew what Judas was going to do even before Judas knew he was going to do it, and yet he chose to show mercy. There were a few sentences in this passage for that day that struck me right in the heart.

“If that person chooses not to respond to the mercy, grace, and patience that is being poured out to him through you, he will have to live with the results of his decisions. Just make sure that you fulfill what God is requiring of you in this relationship. It may seem difficult to do, but you need to be thankful that God has kindly entrusted you with the responsibility of giving that person another chance!”

Ugh. Right in the heart. God has entrusted me. Me. If He is the God of second chances, why do I feel like I cannot give people a second chance? How would the lives of the people around me change if I chose to show mercy instead of responding to the truth of the situation? What a witness to them if they could see God’s love and mercy through me in the way I treat them after they have hurt me!

So that’s my word I’m working on, and I’m doing pretty well…this week.

Luke 6:36 Therefore be merciful, just as your Father also is merciful. 

By Lisa Powell/@mamaof3gs 

A Father Is . . .

When I was in my twenties I was oh so young and immature resulting in an off-kilter picker.  Luckily with some age, heartache, and experience under my belt, my picker was finally ripe for the picking in my 30s.  Thus, enter the man of my dreams who ended up being the consistent ever-present father for my girls I had always yearned for . . .

So, with this, a warm father's day to all the men blessings out there who . . .
"loves [their] . . . wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her"  Ephesians 5:25

care and nurture their children from birth into adulthood

Not Missing a Feeding in the Special Care Unit

 

love other children (including animals) as their own

 

A Cat Inherited through Marriage

London Bridge with a Daughter and Her Friend

Volunteering

spend quality time with their children

Building a Snowwoman

Father/Daughter Dance

"Mother"/Daughter Tea Party at the Library

So, here's to all of the fathers out there who have earned the familiar name of dad.  A prayer of thanksgiving to you . . .

Courtney Winkler

Lessons from the Corn Wagon

We live in the country. We have a corn/pellet stove that heats our house in the winter.  We also have a small corn wagon that we store corn in. This morning I was outside and noticed this terrible smell coming from that area. I went over to the wagon and what I discovered turned my stomach for many reasons. Apparently my husband and I assumed that the wagon was empty. We also apparently thought the wagon was dry. Both were very very incorrect. What I discovered was some of the smelliest and most rotten substance I have ever encountered and hope to never encounter again. As I was shoveling it out and holding back the urge to vomit, the thought occurred to me that this wagon of disgusting rotten corn is ME!!

Me? How? The wagon full of rotten corn reminded me of me because it made me think of my "hidden sins."  The sins I have in my life that I don't want anyone to find out about, or maybe the sins that I haven't confessed to God because I'm so ashamed, or maybe the sins that I think are "not that big of a deal" so they go unrepented.   Whatever the case may be, all of those sins are still sitting there, rotting away my relationship and closeness to the Lord.  What I realized as I was shoveling out the corn wagon grossness was that this is what my sin is like to Jesus.  The sins that I commit daily turn His stomach too, if left unrepented.  He wants me to acknowledge my sins on a daily basis and come to Him with them and ask for forgiveness.  It's a free gift that He offers to me, and yet sometimes, I choose to not accept it.  I choose to think "it'll be ok."  And just like me thinking the corn wagon was "ok," it's not.  The unrepented sin sits in my heart and soul and rots.  It spoils my relationship with Jesus.  It keeps me from being closer to Him and feeling His presence.  And just as I had to shovel all of the rotten corn out of the wagon, I realized that I needed to get rid of all the unrepented sins in my life.  I needed to acknowledge them all, everything weighing on my heart and spoiling my relationship with Christ, and clean out my heart, ask for forgiveness, and be ready to be filled again, just like I did with that yucky corn wagon today. 

"If we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just and will forgive our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.  If we claim we have not sinned, we make him out to be a liar and His word is not in us."  1 John 1:8-10 NIV

Lisa Powell

Momma Pigg

I am a mother.  However, it is another title that is just as important, for I am a MOMMA.  Momma Pigg to be exact.  How did I get that beloved name?  Read on.

About five years ago, I started a search for how to fill my empty nest once our son, Andy, left home to join the Navy.  Our daughter, Amanda, and son-in-law, Peter, have lived in Korea and Germany for several years now, which made another gap in our home. Many of you know me through Troy United Methodist Church for organizing “Treasure our Troops” at the holiday times for sending care boxes to those military members associated with our church.

"Mom Sandwich" Picture

Another "Mom Sandwich" Picture

But first, I was a Momma through Molly’s Adopt-a-Sailor.  I began writing letters to young men and women at our Navy boot camp, who were not receiving any mail from home.  My group of  12 Moms (isn’t 12 a familiar number?) had children leaving at regular intervals to join boot camp, and our hearts broke when we learned some of our finest were not receiving mail.  So we started letter campaigns.

As these young sailors then left on business trips, they wrote back to us about their shipmates who were not receiving any care packages, either.  Our hearts broke again.  And we started shipping love out once a month to groups we adopted through our networks.  Our first adoption was 250 people, and we worried we would not be able to stretch our group of then 50 Moms to cover them all with some love.  So, we asked our friends for help.  With God’s blessings, our mission to provide 250 international calling cards grew to 750 calling cards!  We knew our hearts were healing.

Throughout the past five years, we have sewn pillowcases, neck coolers and head wraps for troops.  We have sent warm scarves.  We have provided socks, shampoo, toothbrushes and toothpaste.  We have sent peanut butter, nuts, beef jerky, and donated Girl Scout cookies and Boy Scout popcorn.  Our families have grown.  We have made emergency runs to the Dollar General Store with flat rate shipping boxes and address in hand to provide a birthday box to those whom we learned were ignored on their special days.  Our church has provided shipping money and gifts to keep our troops surrounded with love.

The emails and letters have been sporadic, but constantly I have been called Momma Pigg.  It is a name badge to wear with honor.  It is a testimony to the love of Christ that has blossomed to full bloom.  It has been on the lips of those whom have returned and needed to talk with someone about their newfound problems.  It has accompanied me to military funerals.  It is shared with our family without any jealousy. 

Momma.  What a sweet sound.  

Momma Pigg (a.k.a. Carol Pigg)

Packing Away the Past

Currently our home looks like a tornado knocked on the front door and spun around in every room leaving only mass chaos in its path. We are in the process of packing for a move coming up in just a few short…very short days. Although, having moved 6 times in our 12 year marriage, this is the first move where I was not completely consumed with caring for very small children and felt I had the opportunity to not only start months ahead, but to take the opportunity to open all the boxes that have traveled with us through the years and have yet to be opened and to purge, purge, purge. I really wanted to do this move right, do it organized, do it as stress-free as possible. Having all my kids in school full-time has made a huge difference in the process already, but with the flu arriving at our house and deciding it really likes it here and staying on and off for the past few months and having two snow days this week leading into a long weekend, it has felt a bit like I do have little ones at home again.

During the process of opening up these long-term parked boxes, rummaging through their contents and deciding what is trash, what gets donated and what gets packed, I realized I was moving at an incredibly slow pace. What I had envisioned as being a freeing and fun process directing me down the path of super organized she-woman was turning me more into a woman painfully trying to crawl through the sludge and pain of my past, a past staring back at me for the first time in years. It was released from its sleeping chambers, gasped breaths of fresh air and without hesitation pulled me into at moments paralyzing and painful flashbacks of the past. Seeing pictures of old friends who weren’t such a great influence in my life or finding love letters written by past relationships that should have been destroyed years ago all reached their long boney fingers up from their boxed graves and tried to pull me down to the depths of darkness and sin in my past. It was as if I could feel the shackles tighten around my wrists, and I could feel the weight of condemnation and despair flood my soul.

Just as quick as the darkness of my sinful past tried to cover my spirit and breath death into my heart, the light that burns inside of my soul spoke out with an even louder voice of truth. I heard as clear as day a voice say to me with strength and certainty “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here!"  2 Corinthians 5:17.  Such comforting words during this time. I felt my soul cry out “Create in me a pure heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me,” Psalm 51:10.

Joy filled my soul like water filling a bathtub. I once again had strength that only comes from Christ to keep the past in my rearview mirror and to look with great anticipation and hope to the future. The words of Jeremiah 29:11 whispered ever so sweetly in to my heart, “For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.”

We know without a doubt that this upcoming move is a gift from God and is His way of preparing a future for our family that we could not have even imagined only four years ago when we were homeless and surviving off of generous gifts from loved ones and government financial support while my husband was desperately searching for a job to support our family. Our present and future looked like nothing but a long, cold hike down the path of uncertainty and suffering. Not a great place to be with a one-year-old, a three-year-old and a five- year-old in tow. Feelings of helplessness and anger were pervasive. As He always is, though, God was moving even then. We were focusing on the challenges of the moment and were finding it extremely difficult to turn our eyes up to heaven. As He promised though, He was preparing a healing path for us to take that would restore our souls.

When God is moving, Satan uses his elite forces to distract, confuse, depress and lead astray God’s chosen children. I also know without a doubt that there is a war raging every day for our souls. We are distracted by our business, we are confused by relational conflict or our current circumstances, we fall deep into depression and our eyes fall from looking up to the King of Glory to focusing on haunting memories of our past or the place of suffering we are journeying through today. It is important to remember that there is a war going on right now for your soul. Ephesians 6:12-13 tell us “For our struggle is onto against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.” The apostle Paul then tells us how to put on our spiritual armor of God in order to defend our souls from the enemy. Read Ephesians 6:13-20 to hear his instructions.

When is the last time you allowed distraction or business to create a hole in your armor for the enemy's poisoned arrow to lance your soul? When is the last time you took time to quiet the noise of life in your head and heart and to abide with the lover of your soul?

My encouragement to you is even amongst the business of moving through life, never knowing what the next box life has for you to open, but living and moving by faith that you would grasp ahold tightly to God’s word. That you would carve out time in your busy day to abide with Him, even if only for a few minutes. That you would fill your heart with His promises and that you would navigate your life with purpose and fervor towards your new identity in Christ.

May you fight the good fight.

Heather Budwell

Daily Wisdom

We do not draw people to Christ by loudly discrediting what they

Believe, by telling them how wrong they are and how right we are, but by

Showing them a light that is so lovely that they want with all their

Hearts to know the source of it.

~Madeleine L’Engle~

 

"Another of my fav authors, especially the book A Swiftly Tilting Planet."

Submitted by Carol Pigg