In remembrance of…

 

I’m standing in a desert watching a man stacking stones, placing one atop another until he had a respectable looking pillar of stone, I ask “what’s it for?” He turned and said “remember”.

Joshua 4:7 then you shall say to them, ‘Because the waters of the Jordan were cut off before the ark of the covenant of the LORD; when it crossed the Jordan, the waters of the Jordan were cut off.’ So these stones shall become a memorial to the sons of Israel forever.” 8 Thus the sons of Israel did as Joshua commanded, and took up twelve stones from the middle of the Jordan, just as the LORD spoke to Joshua, according to the number of the tribes of the sons of Israel; and they carried them over with them to the lodging place and put them down there.…

We honor people with memorials, we dedicate parks, buildings and books in remembrance of some service or deed.

In the bible they set up and dedicated memorials to remind themselves of what God had done in their lives.

When was the last time you purposefully dedicated something to God in remembrance of what He has done for you?

I have been thinking lately about the statement “God wants to be with us”

Yes He does want to,

Take out “wants to be” though and you have “God with us” it’s how they viewed God in the bible as ever present in their lives.

I forget that sometimes…

He wants us to remember that He IS with us not “wants to be”

I worship, I praise I give thanks but what have I dedicated in remembrance?

Psalm 111: He has caused his wonders to be remembered; the Lord is gracious and compassionate.

Remember God He hasn’t ever forgotten you…

It’s all coming back to me..

 

Thinking about that post I made last night reminded me of something I had forgotten, let me share the story with you.

I usually do the grocery shopping for our family, and when I went to the store every once in a while there would be an old man sitting outside the store with his old dog and a clothes hanger full of something I couldn’t quite make out what it was. Curiosity finally got the better of me one day and I walked over to him after I exited the store to see what it was he had.

  The first thing I noticed was this old man was blind, the second thing was a donation sign and finally what made me curious in the first place was the hanger which I could now see was full of little yarn dolls that he apparently had made himself.

Well he had a tin cup in his hand for the donations so I said hi to him and put some money in his cup and petted his dog for a minute, he told me to pick out a doll and I thought “I’m not gonna take his stock I’ll leave it for him to sell again” so I rustled the hanger around so he would think I was taking one said thanks and left. Looking back on that interaction I felt a little bad about taking advantage of his blindness like that,

But I was about to feel much worse…

This exchange went on for months, he wasn’t there every week but when he was I would stop chat with him a minute, pet his dog, put some money in the tin cup and rustle the hanger, it almost became routine until one day as I put the money in the cup and was about to rustle the hanger he grabbed my hand and said ” son I’m not a beggar, I make these dolls and give them to folks kind enough to help me out so if you’re not going to take one then take your money back I don’t need hand outs”

He had been counting his dolls every time I left and he was on to me!

I was so ashamed, not for the deceit but because I was robbing this old man of his dignity. There’s not much left to the story, I started taking the dolls and gave them away to little girls in the store.

God bless that little old man,

Not everyone with their hand out is out to take advantage of you he reminded me of that.

So give it just a little extra thought before you say no..

Stainless

So… I had a dream last night which involved a conversation I had with a few of my new brothers back around the beginning of October it was about a thought I had which went something like this.

Stainless

Have you ever thought about how stainless steel is made? You take iron a soft and easily shaped and corrupted metal and to it you add in various elements and convert it to steel, now steel is much stronger, tools hold a sharp edge better but still it doesn’t resist corruption too well but take steel and introduce enough heat to burn off impurities and add chromium to it and it develops a coating that greatly increases its resistance to corruption, it’s not completely stain proof as the name implies but its a whole lot better than when it started. Right now I’m iron but I hope to be stainless some day.

I know, I know, it’s a silly notion but I thought,

If “I” could be stainless

Then “I” will be perfect!

If “I” can fix my flaws

Then “I” will be worthy!

all “I” have to do is..

There was a whole lot of “I’s” in that conversation, that’s how the dream started, with ME and MY game plan for MY life, and then God shows up.. and He says to me ” you have it all wrong you should be like copper”

COPPER!? you have got to be kidding me! are you serious?

“trust me” He says, but it tarnishes Lord! “I know” He says, and it’s so soft it dents and gets scratched easy Lord! “I know” He says, but Lord it’s one of the lowliest metals, we make pennies out of it, it’s even the smallest denomination of our currency! “I know” He says. I just don’t understand Lord why? then He says to me ” You base it’s worth on values set by man. He says “Copper SERVES to provide warmth for your home, Copper SERVES to provide electricity and run every electronic device on earth, Copper SERVES as a bonding agent to bring dissimilar metals together and Copper SERVES as an anti-bacterial anti-fungal agent to ward off disease, it does all of these great things hidden from view yet you call it lowly?” It sank in, I don’t even know why I thought I could out argue perfect logic but He is right, I don’t need to be perfect to be useful, I don’t need to be spotless to have value. I have thought about that dream and thought about it and I have come to the conclusion that I really do enjoy SERVING I am at my happiest when I feel useful, I receive joy from it which makes perfect sense because I now realize it’s how He shaped me,

the little Copper pot