Category: March

What Happens When It’s All Gone?

On By Judy GlasserIn MarchLeave a comment

Her home was demolished.

Everything she knew was gone.

Her city was burned down by foreigners.

All of her friends and neighbors were killed, only her family was saved.

Things didn’t look good for Rahab.

She and her family were still alive but every one and everything else from her life was gone.  Burned. Demolished.  Now she had to live in the enemy’s camp.  What good could possibly come from this situation?

Well, we know the rest of the story.  Rahab’s name would later show up in the lineage of Jesus!  She was Jesus’ great, great, too many greats to count, grandmother.

God had unbelievable plans for Rahab when he saved her from being destroyed as Jericho burned.  She didn’t know it.  I’m sure there were times as she started up a new life in the camp of her former enemies when she wondered what – if any – good was going to come from this.  Everything that she had known before was gone.

Rahab had no way of knowing that God was going to bless all of creation through her lineage.

I’m just like Rahab.  I have no way of knowing what God is doing as I struggle through the twists and turns of life, trying to figure out how to transition from phase to phase.  Looking back, the pieces often make sense.  But it can be very hard to navigate through the maze of today.

I just don’t know.

But God does.  So I focus on him, trusting him to show me the way one day at a time.  Its often just one step at a time.  Me trying to control the world causes frustration and stress.  Me trying to control even my little space in the world is impossible.

This last 5 years after my son who was a Phoenix Police Officer was killed in the line of duty have made it crystal clear to me that any control I think I have is fake, a lie. My life before Davey was murdered is gone, crushed.  Everything I had known before is forever changed.  I  have ended up in a place I never thought I would be – never wanted to be.

But God is working good things out of the evil that is done.  I am already seeing some of the good things he is doing and I know there will be many more that I will never see.

Like Rahab.

So I will trust you, Abba Father.

 

I’ll Step In

On By Judy GlasserIn MarchLeave a comment

I’ll step up.  I’ll make the first move in faith.

I often ask God to direct my steps.  My prayers regularly include requests for him to open my eyes to the opportunities he gives me to do what he wants me to do.

Because I’ll do it – I just want to know that its his direction and his timing.

And God responds.  Right before my eyes, he will give me an opportunity to do something he wants done or say something he wants said.

Every time one of these opportunities presents itself, I have to take the first step of faith forward, not knowing where my next step is and never knowing how this is all going to work out.

I just have to take that first step and obey.

So the story of the Israelites crossing the Jordan into the Promised Land is significant to me.  God told the priests carrying the Ark of the LORD to go first.  God told them he would make a way for them but, first, they had to step into the Jordan which was running at flood stage.

The overflowing water of the Jordan river was roaring down its path…..

and God told them to step in.

An act of faith.  An act of obedience.

“Now the Jordan is at flood stage all during harvest.  Yet as soon as the priests who carried the ark reached the Jordan and their feet touched the water’s edge, the water  from upstream stopped flowing.  It piled up in a heap a great distance away…” Joshua 3:15.  The priests had to take the first step of faith and then they saw God respond.  They watched as God opened up a path for them to the Promised Land.

It’s important for you and I to understand how this process works.  Too often we want to see God move in our lives but we haven’t stepped out in faith.  We want the blessing first and then we’ll move but that’s not how it works.  We want God to invite us to do great things but we haven’t stepped up to the plate on the things we already know God wants us to do.

For example, Jesus told us clearly, “Love God and love others.”  These are the two main things I need to be about – I already know that.  No question about it.  I don’t need to ask God if he wants me to do this – he’s already told me to do it.  I find that when I’m focused on doing these things God has already told me to do, I see God part the waters for me.  He blesses my steps – one at a time.

But the first step of obedience is mine.

Where is God asking you to take that first step of obedience?  Go ahead – step into the water and watch it part in front of you.  It will be worth it.

I believe, Abba Father, so I’m stepping in.

A Second Chance

On By Judy GlasserIn MarchLeave a comment

I’ve been there more than once – have you?

It’s the times where I wish I had a second chance – a redo.  When my heart is aching with regret and my head is rolling with things I shouldn’t have said or things I should have done but didn’t do, I wish I could go back.

If I had the chance to do it over, I would do it so differently!

With people, there is never a 100% redo.  The deeds are done, the words have been said.  Forgiveness is possible but wiping out the memory is not.

One of my favorite things about God is that he can redeem these situations.   He can and he does make something good come out of them.  He teaches me to grow through these times – helping me mature as he molds my character and thinking.  When I ask for wisdom, he always gives it to me which helps me avoid situations where I need redo’s.

As I read about Rahab in Joshua 2, I can visualize this huge headline on it –

God’s Power of Redemption.

Rahab was a prostitute in Jericho when she met the two spies Joshua had sent into the city to check it out before the Israelites attacked.  Rahab made the courageous decision to put her life on the line for the spies when she hid them from the men the King sent to kill them.  She lied to the king’s men telling them the spies had gone out of the city so the kings men quickly went in pursuit just as the city gates closed for the night.

Meanwhile, the spies were safely hidden on the roof of Rahab’s house.  Rahab knew the Israelites were going to attack – everyone knew it and were very afraid.   When she begged the spies to save her family, they agreed because of her courage in hiding them.  Then Rahab helped them escape out of the city and sent them on a different direction from the men who were looking for them.

Later, we will read that Rahab and her family were the only survivors of the attack on Jericho.

It’s obvious that God saved Rahab for a purpose.  He had bigger plans for her.  After God saved her, she totally changed her direction, married, had children and became part of the lineage of Christ.  A prostitute was the great, great, too many greats to count,  grandmother of Jesus, God’s son, who came to save the world.

God is extremely serious about his redemption business.

Rahab’s story was obviously shared down through the generations as a popular redemption story because she shows up in the New Testament, “was not even Rahab the prostitute considered righteous when she gave lodging to the spies and sent them off in a different direction.”  James 2:25.

A prostitute – used as an example of a righteous woman, related to Jesus.  If it can happen to her, it can happen to anybody!

God is still redeeming your life and my life today.  I don’t have to be stuck in my failures and rebellion of yesterday.  By putting my faith in what Jesus did for me on  the cross, all of that has been forgiven.  I don’t have to be weighed down by the mistakes I’m making today – those have also been forgiven.  I don’t have to be worried or afraid about the things I might mess up in the future because all of it has already been forgiven.

Today I live in grace provided by Jesus, unconditionally loved by my heavenly Father.   I am free.

I am redeemed.

Thank you, Abba.

Courage

On By Judy GlasserIn March2 Comments

What does courage look like in my life?  What does it look like for you?

What do I need courage for?  What is God asking me to do that’s a little scary and out of my comfort zone?

I know God is challenging both you and me – it’s his nature.  As our Good Father, he wants us to grow and develop a strong, courageous character.  So he provides opportunities for us to be stretched.

Where does he want to stretch you?  If you can’t think of any place he is trying to help you grow, I recommend spending several hours with him as you read and meditate and listen to him speak to you through his Word.  You will come away from that time challenged by something – I guarantee it.

God presented Joshua with a huge challenge by giving him leadership of the Israelite nation after Moses was ‘gathered to his people’.  The Israelites were finally ready to enter the Promised Land and they were facing the daunting task of conquering the land and taking control.

There seemed to be a lot of  valid reasons for Joshua to be fearful and worried – except God had already declared victory.  “Have I not commanded you?  Be strong and courageous.  Do not be afraid, do not be discouraged, for the LORD your God will be with you where ever you go.”  Joshua 1:9.

God was in total control – there was no reason to be afraid.

Have you ever had a situation like this where you knew you didn’t need to be afraid because God had already declared victory?

I had a major experience like this several years ago when I thought I had just caught a weird respiratory virus on a trip to the Midwest but then found out, when I finally went to the doctor and then the emergency room ending up in ICU, that I had a dozen blood clots in my lungs.  While the doctor in ER was explaining to me that this was a life-threatening situation, God spoke into my mind.  He told me that he had already taken care of this – I was not going to die from it.  I was going to have to go through all the tests and days in the hospital and months of blood thinners but God was going to walk beside me, every step of the way.  I felt a blanket of peace come down over me and I was not afraid.  God had it all under his control.

My doctor was amazed at my attitude – she kept reminding me that I was going through a life-threatening experience.  I guess I wasn’t acting worried enough.  Four other doctors told me that this should have killed me within an hour of when it happened – they were afraid for me.

God had already declared victory – there was no reason to be afraid.  I obviously didn’t die from it and I realized that God had given me a new story to share about his faithfulness and love and care.  He is still doing miracles today!  I am here because it wasn’t the day he has already decided will be my last day here on earth.  He’s in absolute total control and I have proof.

It was a truly amazing experience to watch God’s victory play out in my life right before my eyes.

So I have some knowledge of how Joshua must have felt when God told him that he had to lead the way in conquering the Promised Land and God would give him victory.  Joshua was going to have to wake up every day and show up to do his part, but God was going to be with him, making it all happen.

Where is God challenging you?  If he’s asking you to do something, he will be right there beside you helping you accomplish it.

Be strong and courageous.  Experience God’s victory in your life today.

Thank you, Abba Father, for the miracles you are doing right now in our lives.

What Are We Doing With Our Excess?

On By Judy GlasserIn MarchLeave a comment

Do you and I have boxes of stuff we haven’t looked at in years?  Do we have closets full of clothes that don’t fit us anymore?

Are we just letting all this ‘stuff’ sit there and accumulate?

God tells us what he wants us to do with our excess in Deuteronomy 24: 19 &20. “When you are harvesting in your field and you overlook a sheaf, do not go back to get it.  Leave it for the foreigner, the fatherless and the widow, so that the LORD your God may bless you in all the work of your hands.  When you beat the olives from your trees, do not go over the branches a second time.  Leave what remains for the foreigner, the fatherless and the widow.”

This was unheard of at that time.  The farmers went over all their fields twice so they could keep the entire harvest for themselves.  Every.little.bit.of.it.

God wanted to make it clear to everyone that the Israelites were different – they were his.  One of the ways he did this was by creating laws to protect the weak, the poor and strangers.  Nobody else had laws like this.

The majority of us don’t have crops…..but we have a lot of ‘stuff’.

What are we doing with our excess stuff?

What does God tell us he would like us to do with it?  Are there poor people or strangers or widows who could benefit if we cleaned out our garages, sheds and closets?

I’ve never had the urge to keep a lot of stuff.   I’m on the minimalist end of the spectrum – always parked 2 cars in a 2 car garage, don’t like clutter.  Most of my adult life I have taken the time each year to go through each box and every closet in my house to purge things I haven’t used.  But that doesn’t mean I don’t have any extra ‘stuff’.  I have moved several times in the last 10 years so I am very aware of how much stuff I actually have.

I moved out of state a year ago and I decided to be extremely critical of what I packed because this was the first time in my life I was putting anything into storage and it would have to stay there until we got a place to live.  So I not only gave away things I hadn’t used in the last year, I also gave away things I had only used once or twice in the last year.  Sure – I might be able to use whatever it is ‘someday’ but could I find it when I wanted to use it?  And, most of the time, I still have something that works fine as a substitute.

It’s a year later and I don’t miss any of it.  It makes me smile to know that someone else is using all that stuff rather than having it packed into my house, taking up space and gathering dust.

It was all excess.

Please help us be generous with our excess, Abba Father.

Equal, But Different

On By Judy GlasserIn MarchLeave a comment

I love it.

God is not limited by cultural rules.  He created justice, he is just and he acts justly.

Whenever we see God’s actions and directions not lining up with current culture, we need to take note of it.  We know that God is right and our culture is wrong in every one of these instances.  Sometimes it takes our culture thousands of years to catch up to what is right.

The historical account of Zelophehad’s daughters in Numbers 27 is one of my favorite examples of this.  I’ll just call them Z’s daughters.

At that time in history, women were considered to be the property of men and most men had more than 1 wife.  When Z died without having any sons, Z’s five daughters asked to inherit his property.

What!?

That just wasn’t done.

Women didn’t inherit property.  They WERE property.

When Moses took this case to God, God said, “What Zelophehad’s daughters are saying is right.  You must certainly give them property as an inheritance among their father’s relatives and give their father’s inheritance to them.”  Numbers 27:7.  He stipulated that they had to marry within their tribal clad so that the land stayed with in the family.  If you think about it, that makes a lot of sense since the land was physically divided by clans.  This kept everything organized as God had designed.

I bet there were many long and heated discussions by the male leaders of the families as they gathered around the campfire at night!  This story is only 4 paragraphs in the Bible but I’ll bet the arguments against doing this could fill up several scrolls if they had all been written down.

I’m sure the same concern came up that was discussed with King Xerxes later in the book of Esther.  If these women received this request now, they are just going to ask for more and more.  A dangerous trend was starting!  But we read that they made the right decision and obeyed.

It took thousands of years but – yes, women inherit and own property now.  As recently as the 1950’s women were generally considered not capable of inheriting and running large properties and businesses.  But way back in ancient times, God knew he had created women equal to men.  Different, but equal.  He set a spiritual leadership hierarchy in place within marriages that has everything to do with order and process and nothing to do with intelligence and aptitude.

And our culture has finally caught up to God’s truth in this area ….. in most cases.

Please help us live by your truth, Abba Father.

Hold Loosely

On By Judy GlasserIn MarchLeave a comment

Stuff

Boxes of stuff.

Rooms of stuff.

Garages, sheds and basements full of stuff.

Stuff we’re not using but someone else would use it – if they had it.  Stuff that hasn’t fit us for many years but we still can’t give it away.  Stuff that’s broken and we’ve never found the time to fix it but we still keep it because we can’t part with our stuff.

God never meant for us to keep all of our stuff for ourselves.

God told the Israelites that their 50th year in the Promised Land was supposed to be a Year of Jubilee.  During this year, all of the poor people who had sold themselves as slaves were supposed to be freed and all property which had been sold was given back to the original owner.  It was intended to be a year consecrated for redemption and freedom.

Does it surprise you that my research shows that there is no evidence that the Year of Jubilee was ever observed?

I’m not surprised.  Many of us like to hold our belongings and our stuff very close. A lot of us  don’t want to give stuff away, if it has to go, we sell it.  We worked hard for these things.  We earned them.  Some of this stuff might be ‘worth something someday’.

Well, a lot of our stuff could be worth something to someone else who has less than us today if we could just loosen our grip on it and give it away.  Some of our stuff is broken and worthless and shouldn’t even be given away.  The bottom line –  we need to be able to let go of it.

The Israelites couldn’t do it, either, so they lost the chance to see God work in a supernatural way in their lives through celebrating the Year of Jubilee.  They didn’t experience the joy and freedom of having open hands when it came to their ‘stuff’.

God wanted the Year of Jubilee to be a holy year for the Israelites where they would see his provision for them as they gave the property back to the original owners and set the slaves free.

But there’s no evidence that it ever happened.

I was personally challenged by this many years ago when my husband and I decided to sell the house we lived in for over 14 years and go into Apartment Life ministry.  This meant we were moving from the 4 bedroom, two-story house with a pool where our two children grew up to an apartment.  We knew God was calling us into this ministry so it had to happen.

I remember walking through my big house packed with awesome memories and full of stuff crying with my hands open, pointed down, asking God to help me hold all these things loosely.  We sold and gave away rooms full of ‘stuff’ and moved into the apartment where the small amount of things we had left fit very nicely.  What a great lesson about how much I had that I didn’t need!  Since then, my hands hold onto people and God tightly but I hold onto ‘things’ very loosely,

It’s a great way to live – holding tightly onto God while loosely holding onto my belongings.  It’s awesome to see God obviously working in my life as I have more time and energy to spend loving him because my ‘stuff’ takes up less space in my life.

If your stuff owns you to any degree, take the challenge – start holding it loosely today.

Please help us hold loosely to everything that is not about loving you and loving others, Abba Father.

You Probably Have Heard of It

On By Judy GlasserIn MarchLeave a comment

You may even have felt that you were one –

a scapegoat.

This is where someone who is innocent is punished for something someone else did.  I know I have often heard this term used when a big corporation is sued for something they did and they fire a person with a relatively minor role in the situation who was just doing what their bosses told them to do.  The corporation does this so it looks like they took action to remedy the issue.  This minor player is a scapegoat – taking the blame for everyone else who had a hand in the bad decision.

Did you know that this term comes from the Bible?  Thousands of years ago the Israelites actually had a scapegoat.  God started this ritual in order to temporarily deal with the sins of the Israelites.  He told the head priest to lay both of his hands on the head of a goat and

‘confess over it all the wickedness, rebellion and sins of the people of Israel.  In this way, he will transfer the people’s sins to the head of the goat.’  Leviticus 16:21

Then the scapegoat was driven into the wilderness, carrying all the people’s sins with it.

Until the next time they sinned.

You can see how temporary this was.  I think God used this process to help make the people aware of all of their sins and to visually show them their sins had to be paid for and taken away.

This is a very clear message about how much you and I need a Savior.  Something had to be done about our sins.  You and I can’t rebel and disobey over and over again while having a personal relationship with a Holy God.  Someone had to paid the price and provide a way for us.

And his name is Jesus.

He is the Way.

And the Way is open for everyone.

Jesus paid the price for our sins – once and for all.  We are saved from the penalty and condemnation of our sin by recognizing our Savior and putting our faith in him.

You and I don’t need a scapegoat anymore.

We are saved through the sacrifice Jesus made on the cross – erasing our past, present and future sins from God’s sight.

Thank you, Jesus.

My Story

On By Judy GlasserIn MarchLeave a comment

It’s a story of redemption.  I can see God orchestrating his love and grace in every step.

It’s clear to me that the story of Ruth is the story of everyone who has put their faith in Jesus.  Without him in our lives,  you and I would both exist in a famine, without purpose, without hope, stuck in our guilt and shame.

But in Jesus we have found our kinsmen redeemer!  Hallelujah!

Jesus paid the price of our sins for us so we could become a part of his forever family.  Now we live under God’s umbrella of grace and blessing.

“Praise be to the LORD, who this day has not left you without a kinsmen redeemer.”

Thank you, Abba Father.

 

 

He Always Responds

On By Judy GlasserIn MarchLeave a comment

The next step I’m suppose to take is often not clear.  There are a lot of blind curves on this road I’m on – I can’t see what lies ahead.  I’m usually pretty sure about the final goal but the specific actions God wants me to take to get there are smothered in a fog of options, questions, and unknowns.

When I’m in one of these ‘unclear’ spots on my road, I ask for a confirmation from God that I’m on the right path – or not.  And he always either gives me a confirmation or opens up my eyes to a change in direction.

So I know how Gideon is feeling in Judges when he is putting out fleeces, asking God to confirm that he is doing the right thing.

For me, I have decided not to ask God to do a specific ‘sign’ for me.  It feels too much like asking God to do a trick.

I’ve developed my own process of asking God to give me clear guidance sometime today and I will be watching.  When I do this, I try to stay extra aware of anything that could be encouragement from God telling me to “keep going’ or something that opens up my eyes, helping me understand a different direction I should be taking.  I believe my process works because it acknowledges that I know God is always trying to guide me and show me the way.  Asking for a response today also helps me maintain a special awareness of God moving in my life in the next 24 hours.

And he always responds.

And then I smile.   Of course he does.

Thank you for your faithfulness, Abba Father.