Blog : Give Me Grace

Grounding : On Vision – He Sees You {Day 7}

Posted on October 9, 2014October 10, 2014 by lisha epperson

“God never overlooks a single sparrow. And he pays even greater attention to you, down to the last detail – even numbering the hairs on your head!” (Luke 12:6-7 MSG).

Then Jesus entered and walked through Jericho. There was a man there, his name Zacchaeus, the head tax man and quite rich. He wanted desperately to see Jesus, but the crowd was in his way—he was a short man and couldn’t see over the crowd. So he ran on ahead and climbed up in a sycamore tree so he could see Jesus when he came by. (Luke 19:1-4)

We don’t always see Him. Pillars of life experience block vision. We observe life in seats marked – obstructed view. Whether its narrow focus, bias or natural barriers…we don’t always see him.

Sometimes his seeming absence is protection. His passing by, a gift of shelter from attack. Sometimes the blood of a lamb posted above a door means this time, the answer will be no. And maybe that’s a good thing. It took me a while to realize that everything I thought I wanted wasn’t a good and perfect gift.

Sometimes His vision offers sanctuary from suffering, other times it’s a healing refuge. He isn’t here to protect us as much as He’s here to make us – like His son. Trials will come – so vision, God vision helps us rest when we think He isn’t working.

He sees you. He knows the details of your situation. The one who numbers your hairs holds you when you cry. He sees it all. I think Zacchaeus encourages us to pursue him anyway. Push aside any barriers and position ourselves to see. Hone in on the gift of god given vision. Then wait.

Wisdom teaches us to wait. The blessing is usually a story of long-suffering where we learn to trust a God we can’t see. We begin to trust a vision for our future based on His word that says his plans are to prosper us…to do us good..to make us happy.

But that isn’t the whole story. We have to trust His vision. We have to believe he sees.

And I do. But this season is new and different. Uncertainty and doubt peel me raw. I know everything and nothing. Most days I feel unseen by the God who sees all. I write this as encouragement for others but Jesus, it’s for me too. I have to remember He sees.

—————–

I lay back and cradle myself in the comfort of my favorite cozy spot. It’s late and I’m in the living room listening to the sound of a sleeping city. In a few hours I’ll be up and at the rink with my skater girl. A lot of my life takes place like this. Me, prepping for the late night grind. I love it but it just means my day is super long…the grind leaves fewer hours for sleep.

I’m not complaining. I love this part of the day.

Just a few hours earlier and this quiet didn’t exist. My littles would have found the security of my resting body and pushed themselves into my softness. A book to read, a hand to hold. A head to cradle. A few hours ago my day was lost in the overflow of motherhood.

I plan for the breakthrough of bedtime. And trust a limited view of the future to offer a slice of silence. The promise of time…to get the job done. But laying here…He sees me. God works out the details of my day to offer these moments. God makes space for my dreams.

He sees.

Even the small things.

———————–

He sees.

He sees you.
In the middle of your mess.
His love is greater. Stronger.
It can’t be overcome. His love has come. Sin undone.
No disappointment. No trial.
No heaviness of heart can conquer it.
His love is infinite.
Part tragedy, part suffering
All glory, one victory.
Catch the vision. Live the mystery.
He is the known and unknown.
The chasm between your present and past. He is your future.
Your first and last.
The One who holds it all together.
He is.
And He sees you.

Still pulling it together for the #31Days Writing Challenge.

31 Days of Grounding : Remembering Who and Whose You Are

Grounding : Remembering His Touch – On Leaving and Coming Back {Day 6}

Posted on October 7, 2014October 8, 2014 by lisha epperson

When the woman realized that she couldn’t remain hidden, she knelt trembling before him. In front of all the people, she blurted out her story—why she touched him and how at that same moment she was healed. – Luke‬ ‭8‬:‭47‬ MSG

“Touch has a memory.”
― John Keats

I remember the year I walked away. I turned my back not so much on God but all my efforts to be what I thought a Christian should be. These were the years of naming and claiming, back in the day when my faith was new and I thought I could get anything I wanted from God if I believed enough. I thought I’d get brownie points for doing good deeds – everything was based on works and a tally in heaven recorded each one.

My holy lifestyle was new and this strategy wouldn’t last. I didn’t know about grace, I just needed more faith. Faith to believe the boyfriend who left would return, faith to believe this Christian mumbo jumbo wasn’t just a phase. I gave God a frame of time to work this thing out and when that didn’t happen I walked.

And felt justified. I wasn’t getting answers to prayer – not the answers I wanted. It seemed each week His glory passed over the congregation – dropping healing and treasures and wisdom, like the candy explosion from a piñata and everyone would get a piece…except me. I’d raise my hands, reaching, searching, believing – if I could just touch him. Like the woman with the issue of blood, if I could just touch him. Maybe then he’d remember me. Maybe I wouldn’t have to go to the altar…again.

I got tired of missing the mark. I tried to get it right but good girl guilt consumed me. God’s silence, His “no” to things I wanted, confused and hurt me. So I left.

I left NYC and began a new life. I found a new love. My life took off on a completely different trajectory and I could finally see myself living the way I thought I deserved. I had every distraction. Everything. Except peace.

I’d felt the fire of his touch before so I knew what I was missing. His touch was real. But by then I was so far down in the pit all I could hear was a flat, single note groan of a girl – gone. That and every now and then…a song.

A song that pierced through the cloud covering over my heart… a song that moved me to remember His touch.

His touch could change everything. So I had a choice. I could stay just out of reach and excuse my life away – become one with the crowd. Or I could press in and touch Him.

I wasn’t sure what I wanted. Because touching him means responding to his power. And what would I do then? I’d be accountable for every action of faith I put on display. I’d have to live the manifestation of healing publicly. I’d have to tell. How would I handle the disappointment if everything I said I believed, didn’t happen. Could I go to the altar again?

I held myself responsible for Gods will. And that was wrong.

Touch remembers. It feels and sees. So try as I might I couldn’t forget. I couldn’t forget what it feels like to know Him and I couldn’t walk out on a life of faith without reaching for Him.

I remembered His touch. I came back because for all the times I reached for him, there were a dozen more where He’d reached…for me. Marked by His affection, sealed with His love – our communion was a promise to never leave. He wouldn’t let me forget. I came running back and knew the moment as forever.

Ground yourself in this truth:

Be strong. Take courage. Don’t be intimidated. Don’t give them a second thought because God, your God, is striding ahead of you. He’s right there with you. He won’t let you down; he won’t leave you.” – Deuteronomy 31:6 (The Message)

You encircle me from back to front, placing your hand upon me. Psalm 139:5

Joining The Nester for the #31Days Writing Challenge and happy to link up with Jennifer at #TellHisStory again…I’ve missed her.

Grounding : In the Kitchen – Dying To Self {Day5}

Posted on October 6, 2014October 6, 2014 by lisha epperson

For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. – Colossians 3:3

I’m starting with the man in the mirror, I’m asking him to change his ways
If you want to make the world a better place, take a look at your self and make the change – Michael Jackson

I hate having to clean the kitchen before cooking but it was one of those days. Leftover work from the day before created the mess of a kitchen I walked into. Pensive and prayerful, I took my place at the sink mumbling mommy prayers…each one beginning with “Oh Lord Jesus”.

I never want to do it. But kitchen ministry usually provides ample time to think on the many ways God works in a life. There’s no other place in my home where I can count on a daily stripping to set my heart right. It’s where I begin and end my day – dying to self. It’s time well spent.

Today I washed dishes while catching up on one of my favorite television shows on Hulu. Actor dialogue and a steady stream of running water fought for my attention. I solved that problem by working only during commercial breaks. Kitchen ministry was slow.

God and I have partnered in this life altar-altering since 1989. It’s been a long time. Through daily, repetitive work He shows me the art of dying to self…to live for him. But I’m a lot like an onion. Somehow I keep forgetting that just as I peel back one layer, there’s another…just as strong, just as thick. It’s a process.

Work in the kitchen is all about dying to self. It reminds me of the daily cleansing I have to do to keep myself on track. From the washing of dishes to the baking of bread…he reveals short but important messages on how life requires patience. How in the washing we’re made ready to serve and in serving…we receive. He shows me how, to truly live, I’ll have to meet him in the kitchen….again.

He encourages me to get back up and go back in. To turn off the leaking faucet of words and thoughts that hold contentment hostage, to bend low, to reach high, to hold fast – there’s grace and hope in believing His fire will create something new. He and I , we’re chopping, slicing and dicing that old nature. Denying myself and picking up my cross in the kitchen is a humbling life practice where I allow Him to make me over, day by day. It starts with Him – grounding me in my marriage, my motherhood, my friendships.

So I wash myself with the word of God. I listen to the work of gifted speakers and inspiring music. I practice peace with silence. I look myself in the eye at least once a day to make sure the new me is winning. And in the kitchen I don’t need a mirror to do it. I catch soul glimpses of my reflection in boiling water, in the whisper thin skin from a piece of garlic clinging to my fingers.

Sometimes, the new me is covered in unforgiveness, other times, it’s doubt or fatigue. To be sure, there’s more, but those few keep me busy. Today it was poor choices and my stubborn addiction to late night tv (I could have been in and out of the kitchen in half the time if I didn’t have to watch season 1 episodes 11 and 12 of the The Good Wife – can you believe it took me that long to turn it off?) Checking in with myself helps me make sure I like what I see. It keeps me grounded and alive to the source that sustains me.

Ground yourself in this… Listen for the lesson. It’s in the doing of life…in the small and mundane…the grind of life. Listen for Him and let go. And…don’t forget self check-ins are mandatory – in the ‘hood we say “check ya self before ya wreck ya self”.

Joining The Nester for the #31Days Writing Challenge and Kelli for Unforced Rhythms

31 Days of Grounding : Remembering Who and Whose You Are

Give Me Grace : Grounding – Making the Connection {Day 4}

Posted on October 4, 2014October 8, 2014 by lisha epperson

First this: God created the Heavens and Earth—all you see, all you don’t see. Earth was a soup of nothingness, a bottomless emptiness, an inky blackness. God’s Spirit brooded like a bird above the watery abyss. (‭Genesis‬ ‭1‬:‭1-2‬ MSG)

While I know myself as a creation of God, I am also obligated to realize and remember that everyone else and everything else are also God’s creation.
Maya Angelou

Earth, air, fire, water

I wish I could put a handle on either side of these words. Then, I’d pick them up and take them with me – wherever I go. This is something I need to remember. Before I knew God, before I had a name for my abba, my father. I knew His love through my connection to the elements.

Earth’s crammed with heaven…
But only he who sees, takes off his shoes. -Elizabeth Barrett Browning

I’ve always believed my connection to God was tangible. Sacred but touchable. Not because of any teaching I received at home. Or any ideas about idol worship or beliefs about the elements as lesser gods. No, my parents agreed to disagree when it came to religion. Christians and Muslims still need Jesus. The solution in my home? It wouldn’t be an issue. My father would drop knowledge on history, race and Islam when he came to town. My mother would take us to church on Easter Sunday. She’d show us Jesus in the little ways mothers do…without trying. This was our normal.

The wind blows hard among the pines
Toward the beginning
Of an endless past.
Listen: you’ve heard everything.
– Shinkichi Takahashi, Zen Poems

But the elements. Feeling a deep connection to the elements was my true north. I loved books on earth science and geology and marveled at the cracked segments of concrete beneath my feet. You couldn’t tell me Brooklyn wouldn’t erupt from the molten hot lava I pictured under its surface. Crossing the distance between my apartment and the next on wings, I dreamed of flight. I’m an air bending lover of freedom. I practiced deep belly breaths and pinched my nose under a sink full of water – just because. Fire is mercurial. Unpredictable. Irresistible. A burning abandoned building and a match lit stove filled me with fear and fascination. Water, full body submersion or a simple shower…it’s called hydrotherapy, but as a child, it told me everything I needed to know about God as a healer. Rain, poured as tears of love, taught compassion.

Heat cannot be separated from fire, or beauty from The Eternal.
Dante Alighieri

So giving my life to God was easy when I knew him as the creator of all. A connection to the elements grounded me. My spirit found it’s home in the middle of these extremes. My relationship to a God who delighted in the differences but inhabited the totality of each element made sense.

Who hasn’t felt a tap on the shoulder while watching the sun set. Who hasn’t seen him wink in the eye of a storm? His power in the expanse of water called an ocean is breathtaking. The way he Jekyll and Hydes us with the miracle of precipitation. Who hasn’t thought of God when he shows himself through Every. Thing.

Every dewdrop and raindrop had a whole heaven within it.
– Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Ground yourself in this : You are earth. Terra firma, fertile soil receptive to his planting. You are air. Unconfined and free to fly. You are fire, ablaze with passion for the one who saved you. You are water, a river of grace poured freely… and every day made new.

Let your handmaiden find grace in your sight…#GiveMeGrace Continue reading “Give Me Grace : Grounding – Making the Connection {Day 4}” →