CamDevo

What is the most self-sacrificial thing you have ever done? Have you given of yourself in a lot of little ways to a variety of people or do you have one huge sacrifice that comes to mind?

Short of jumping in front of a bullet to protect someone, the biggest sacrifice that comes to my mind is parenthood. Raising another human from birth to adulthood requires a nearly complete sacrifice of your time, your energy, your resources, and for women, even your very body.

Jesus says that is love.

“No one has greater love than this: to lay down his life for his friends.” (John‬ ‭15‬:‭13,‬ ‭CSB‬‬)

Of course a parent loves their child. But Jesus said the verse above right after repeating His command for His followers to love “one another.” Not just the children we happen to bear.

Does that mean He wants me to put some stranger through college?

Maybe.

Jesus defines love as being self-sacrificial. To the extreme. Christ-like love isn’t just smiling at a stranger; it’s taking time to help that stranger afford groceries, even if it means I have to forgo mine. Christian love isn’t about waving to neighbors. It’s about checking in on neighbors, spending time getting to know them, mowing their lawn or weeding their yard, watching their kids. Real love is more than giving the homeless guy a gift card. It means working at the homeless shelter on my weekends and days off. Christian love isn’t easy. It requires a lot. It may require everything I have in this life, even my very life.

Jesus modeled His brand of love for us. He gave His all. But then He rose again. And He promised that when I give my all in the name of love, He will raise me up again too.

Dear God, what you ask seems so hard. Help me to trust you and be generous with my life. Thank you for the opportunities I have already had to love sacrificially. You have greatly blessed me through them. Open my eyes to the new ways you have in store for me to love.

No one can prevent God from doing something He wants. No power exists that is capable of impeding His will. Almighty God is omnipotent and omniscient — an unstoppable force that cannot be thwarted.

The funny thing, though, is that He wants me to help Him in His work. He could get it done so much more efficiently without my involvement, but that doesn’t interest Him apparently.

God loves me so much that He wants to see me grow and learn. He wants me to understand His plans as I carry them out. He wants my trust in Him to grow as I discover success with His methods and guidance. What an amazingly generous thing!

But He doesn’t force me to participate. I still have free will. I can choose not to follow Him or obey Him. I can go my own way, do it my way. This is how evil first entered the world. God is good, so any choice other than following Him leads to evil, darkness, failure, and ultimately death.

Sadly, there is even more to it than that. When I choose not to participate with God in accomplishing His plans, I forfeit the joy, blessings, and reward for a job well done. I forfeit life itself.

“Therefore I tell you, the kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a people producing its fruit.” (Matthew‬ ‭21‬:‭43,‬ ‭CSB‬‬)

God will still accomplish everything He has set out to do. He will work with someone else instead of me on that project He intended for me. And they will receive my joy, blessings, and rewards in my place.

Dear God, I very much want to participate in your good, beautiful, and perfect plan. Please teach me the value of putting aside my desires and show me my role in accomplishing your will today.

I have visited some amazing cathedrals and churches including Notre Dame in Paris, Sagrada Familia in Barcelona, the Church of the Savior on Spilled Blood in St. Petersburg, the National Cathedral in Washington DC, and too many to name in Rome.

Each time I enter one of these grand edifices, I feel a sense of hushed awe and reverence. The buildings were designed for worship with their high ornate ceilings and beautiful stained glass. Somehow these surroundings make it easier to contemplate God, to honor His power, wisdom, and holiness. There is something to be said for this kind of church.

However, this is not typical of the churches I have attended more regularly in my life. They have been much more modest, although some did have stained glass windows.

For several years I attended a so-called mega-church with an enormous parking lot, a coffee shop, and a stage more suited to performances than to reverent reflection.

I guess it’s a matter of taste. To a point…

“He said to them, ‘It is written, my house will be called a house of prayer, but you are making it a den of thieves!’” (Matthew‬ ‭21‬:‭13,‬ ‭CSB)‬‬

I don’t think God cares where you worship or what it looks like. Folding chairs or pews, it’s all the same to him. He doesn’t care what types of songs you sing or what clothes you wear. He doesn’t care about the height of your church ceiling or whether you worship in a field with no ceiling.

What matters is that He is welcomed and honored wherever we worship Him. When our priorities for worshiping Him deviate from God’s priorities, He gets pretty angry. Church — the people who seek to worship and follow God — is very dear to His heart.

That’s why Jesus got so angry at the money changers and dove sellers in the temple. The spot that had been set aside for seekers to find God through prayer and worship had been overrun by businesses. The focus shifted from God to profit.

When I attend church (of any kind), I must evaluate and adjust my priorities. I’m not there to meet people and network. I’m not there because I enjoy singing. I’m not there to show off, and I’m not there to check a box. I’m not even there to be enlightened by a sermon. My number one priority when going to any church is to worship, honor, and praise a God infinitely more awesome than the grandest cathedral ever built by human hands.

Dear God, thank you for church. Thank you for the opportunity to join with other believers to worship you in one place at the same time, wherever that may be. Thank you also for the many amazingly beautiful places of worship I have had the great fortune to visit. Remind me every time I go to church that worshiping you is my one and only goal.

My husband has been working from home ever since the Covid-19 pandemic. That is the one good thing that tragedy gave us.

Working from home provides a lot of‬‬ freedom, for the both of us. We have more free time because he has no commute. We can eat lunch together, too. And if I need to talk to him, I can just walk down the hall.

His schedule is largely his own to make. There are scheduled phone calls and meetings, but other than that, when, where, and how he gets his work done is entirely up to him. If he wants to play tennis in the middle of the day, no problem. If he thinks of something important in the middle of the night, his office isn’t far away. And He is here to take care of things at the house during the day if I have to be somewhere else.

This doesn’t mean he doesn’t work as hard. He still has an important job to do with goals, deadlines, frustrations, and successes. He just doesn’t have to worry about the clock as much or office politics or traffic or scrutiny of a boss or coworkers. As long as he does his job well, he is free to keep doing it his way.

“For you were called to be free, brothers and sisters; only don’t use this freedom as an opportunity for the flesh, but serve one another through love.” (Galatians‬ ‭5‬:‭13,‬ ‭CSB)

Following Jesus is like that work-from-home job. Jesus gave us freedom from the 600 or so laws of the Old Testament. He left us with two simple commands: love God and love other people.

As long as I do my job well, I am free to do it however I please. I can do it at home, in an office, on a tennis court, or in a bar. I can do it early in the morning, over lunch, and in the middle of the night. Love is my only job description. It’s a full-time job. It’s a tough, demanding job and a very important job, but it comes with an awesome benefits package.

Dear God, thank you for simplifying my job description and giving me the freedom to work at it without a lot of ancillary rules to worry about. Remind me to stay focused on my job and not get distracted with my own desires and agenda. And thank you for the promise of your amazing retirement plan for a job well done.

I’ve come to the dispiriting revelation that I just can’t do all the things I used to do. And some of the things I can do are now very difficult, while they used to be easy.

For example, I used to do a “boot camp” type work out twice a week. I was pretty fit. My friend’s son even used the word “ripped” when describing me. That was an exaggeration, but it made me smile.

Then I moved, losing access to that class. In addition, the Covid-19 pandemic arrived stagnating my exercise routine.

Now, I am trying to regain some of the muscle I have lost, but my older body is resistant. I tried to do a workout yesterday consisting of many lunges, which are excellent for increasing overall leg strength. However, my knee joints decided this was not going to happen. I tried to do some pushups. I used to be able to do 30 or more from my toes. I was perplexed to discover I couldn’t even do one really good pushup. I settled for some partial pushups from my knees.

So disappointing.

Even though it will be very hard, I know that consistent and dedicated effort will eventually provide some gains to my physical strength and fitness.

My spiritual fitness is similar in a few ways. If I don’t use it, I will lose it. That is, if I don’t make time to talk with God and read His word, my ability to fight off attacks from the devil will be diminished. Unhealthy or unwise cravings and urges will be harder to deny.

Fortunately, there are also a few ways my spiritual fitness differs from my physical fitness. My spiritual health is not affected by my age or aging body. I can even be stronger as I age because I have more experience with God.

Also, God has promised to provide what I need when my own strength fails.

“I am able to do all things through him who strengthens me.” (Philippians‬ ‭4‬:‭13,‬ ‭CSB‬‬)

This promise actually covers spiritual and physical needs. If God asks me to do something, He will provide all the strength I need to obey. No matter what it is. Part of that provision may include my own efforts toward spiritual, physical, mental, and emotional health. But anything beyond my current capabilities will come directly from His infinite supply.

Dear God, thank you for the promise to provide exactly what I need to do everything you ask of me. Teach me to trust you and not become overwhelmed when contemplating the tasks you assign to me. Show me how to be ready and willing while you provide the able. I know you can do great things through me as long as I do my part, then get out of your way.

I wonder if every generation has periods of time that feel alarmingly unstable, like society is about to fly apart or collapse. I’m guessing things felt dire during the Great Depression for most Americans. And I figure it wasn’t too fun for anyone here during the American Civil War.

I do know the current situation in the United States, as well as our place in global society, feels very unsettling. Leaders aren’t leading. Chaos has settled in to rule. The strain on people trying to live their lives and make a living seems to multiply daily.

“Then he said to his disciples, ‘The harvest is abundant, but the workers are few. Therefore, pray to the Lord of the harvest to send out workers into his harvest.’” (Matthew‬ ‭9‬:‭37‬-‭38‬, ‭CSB)‬‬

In Jesus’s time, this kind of struggle was prolific as well. Challenges mount up against people whether they are good or bad. Pain, poverty, disease, injustice, and grief are rampant. Greed, pride, and selfishness exacerbate the challenges.

Life here on earth is very hard.

This is not how God created His world to be. He did create it with free will though, and unfortunately, we chose evil. We brought this mess upon ourselves.

One day God promises to make it all new, a fresh start, without the evil. That will be such a beautiful relief.

But until then, He has a plan to mitigate, minimize, and ameliorate our pain. What is that plan? The plan is for you and me to do the ameliorating.

Every day, my job is to look for ways to make someone else’s life better. Healing, helping, praying for, giving generously, and talking about how the God of the universe loves them.

God loves you, and He doesn’t want you to live in pain. Trust Him with your life today, get to work ameliorating, and put your hope in that beautiful new day to come.

Dear God, I know you understand how difficult life in our mucked up world feels. You came here to live it yourself. You saw how your people suffered from disease, greedy leaders, and myriad struggles. You spent your days healing, loving, and teaching about love. And then we killed you. Thank you for not ending our story there. Thank you for forgiveness and the hope of a beautiful new world. Until then show me how to be an effective harvest worker.

I don’t have much experience with sacred things. I don’t really understand what holy means either. These are churchy words, not used in my daily life.

In the church I grew up in, the room where the sermons were given (the sanctuary) seemed more holy than the rest of the building. And the stage with the pulpit and altar area seemed the most sacred part of the sanctuary.

But as a kid, I ran around playing tag with my friends after church, and these areas weren’t off-limits. They weren’t really sacred or holy in and of themselves.

God made them special. Sacred. Holy. When we gathered and worshiped Him in that room, He came and joined us there, making it sacred and holy. In fact, wherever people are gathered in His name to praise and worship Him, there He is providing His holiness.

When Jesus came, His cleansing sacrifice allowed God’s holiness to leave the Holy of Holies, the sacred part of the ancient temple, and flow out into all the people. He dwells inside His children now. He is always with us, providing His sacredness.

“Don’t you yourselves know that you are God’s temple and that the Spirit of God lives in you?” (1 Corinthians‬ ‭3‬:‭16,‬ ‭CSB‬‬)

I often don’t feel adequately holy to house God. But even though God has agreed to live inside me, with all my ugly flaws, He isn’t less sacred or holy. My filth does not affect His pure holiness. Instead, His holiness affects me. It cleanses me from within every day.

God’s love is a non-stick coating when it comes to sin. But that doesn’t mean I should keep flinging mud and grime into my soul. Each day, when I commune with His Spirit inside me, I am touched anew by His powerful bleaching holiness.

Dear God, you are pure, untaintable, holy, sacred. Thank you for your generous forgiveness that washes me so clean that you feel welcome in my life. I am thrilled to have you always with me. Teach me how to keep my soul hospitable to one such as you.

What do you suppose heaven will be like? I used to spend time dreaming about it as a kid. I imagined that skinned knees would heal instantly. An unlimited supply of cake and ice cream would be freely available, without making me sick or fat or regretful. The sun would shine but wouldn’t burn. Rain would come when wanted but wouldn’t spoil my plans or rust my bicycle.

It’s fun to dream about. And I bet God enjoys listening in to my fantasies. He is a God of love, after all. And He delights in blessing those who turn to Him with humility, trust, and obedience.

The problem comes when His children turn away from Him and reject His love. The blessings are rejected as well. This makes God very sad. So sad that He devised away to redeem me even when I have taken this dark path. Through Jesus, I can be forgiven and returned to the light of His blessings.

“No weapon formed against you will succeed, and you will refute any accusation raised against you in court. This is the heritage of the Lord’s servants, and their vindication is from me.” This is the Lord’s declaration. (Isaiah‬ ‭54‬:‭17,‬ ‭CSB)

Isaiah prophesied about this coming blessing, when the New Jerusalem arrives, heaven and earth are made new, and all those who choose to turn back to God are vindicated. He talks about a world without fear but full of beauty and justice and joy. He describes the heaven of my childhood, and current, fantasies. The best news is that it’s freely available to anyone at all who chooses God.

Dear God, thank you for your free offer of forgiveness and salvation. Thank you for the reward of a new world where evil is destroyed and goodness and love rule forever. I know no matter what I dream up about your kingdom, your version will be better that anything I can imagine. I can’t wait.

The name Jesus has a lot of power. The devil knows this too and it scares him. He tried to take the power away by turning it into a flimsy curse word or a common exclamation of surprise or indignation. “Jesus! That’s a big fire!” Or “Jesus! You stepped on my toe!”

But when a follower of Jesus calls on His name with sincerity, humility, and faith, Jesus listens. He promised to make His unlimited power available to His disciples when calling on His name to accomplish His will in the world. The power to heal, to save, change hearts and lives for good.

“There is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given to people by which we must be saved.” (Acts‬ ‭4‬:‭12,‬ ‭CSB‬‬)

In the Bible, miracles abounded before and after Jesus’s death. His name was used to heal, cast out demons and mental illness, forgive, and make the world a better place for the lost and broken.

We lack miracles today. And we are sorely in need of some. Perhaps it’s because we forgot how to call on Jesus. We’ve lost our sincerity, humility, and our faith when saying the simple, but oh-so-powerful name Jesus.

Don’t get me wrong, “Jesus” is not a magic word. It won’t open some secret door like “Open sesame.” Rather, Jesus is the name of God incarnate. He came to earth to connect with us and save us. When we call on Him as we call a dear friend, He will be show up with all His power and all His love.

Dear God, thank you for the power you have given your followers to heal, save, and love by calling on your name. Thank you for my salvation through your name. Please fill me with the humility and faith required to accomplish your will through your power.

When I was diagnosed with a brain tumor I was scared. I had an appointment to speak with a neurosurgeon to discuss the options, but I couldn’t think straight so I asked my husband to come along and take notes. It was very helpful having another set of ears to hear and understand for me, but I felt childish, like a kindergartener on her first day of school. Will you come with me?

In the scary, challenging times of life, it is very comforting to have someone next to me whom I know and trust. Somehow it’s easier to face the unknown with a friend at my side.

“And He replied, ‘My presence will go with you, and I will give you rest.’” (Exodus‬ ‭33‬:‭14‬, ‭CSB)‬‬

Moses was leading a bunch of unruly strangers into an unknown wilderness at God’s command. He was really scared. God comforted Moses in the best way possible: He said He’d come with him.

We are so lucky that this same God promises to come with us too whenever we step out in faith and obedience. The road may be rocky ahead, but God will be there every step of the way.

I think sometimes I forget this and feel alone and afraid. The God who created the universe is always near. Near enough to hold my hand.

Dear God, thank you so much for your promise to always be with me. Forgive me for letting anxiety take hold and turn me away from you. Remind me to reach out for you whenever I’m feeling uncertain. I know you are here. Always.