The Better Part, Week #19

 

This week's FB posts....

The Better Part Day #115:

 

Luk 12:11 And when they bring you before the synagogues and the rulers and the authorities, do not be anxious about how you should defend yourself or what you should say,

Luk 12:12 for the Holy Spirit will teach you in that very hour what you ought to say." 

 

Yesterday- a day I was having enough trouble remembering my own name- I and Misty ran into a couple of missionaries from a church that, let me just say, is not of sound mind. And when something they told me showed me the tip of their iceberg, I begged off of listening further due to the valid point that I was running out of energy to stay upright.

 

Afterwards, I realized that it would have taken just one passage of the Bible to topple their "iceberg" and possibly send them away more educated. And while my condition at the time MIGHT have been a good excuse, the above passage tells me that I could have done it anyway- HAD I been doing a better job of asking the Holy Spirit every morning to give me the words to my opportunity.

 

Now I will give myself points for one thing today- which is that I have progressed enough to know that, if I am trying to give myself an excuse, I better be looking for the hole in said excuse. Satan may have sent them to show me what I couldn't do, but God allowed it to remind me what I DIDN'T do.

 

 

 

 

The Better Part, Day #116:

 

Luk 23:34 And Jesus said, "Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do." And they cast lots to divide his garments. 

 

 

When the Spirit inspired Paul to instruct us to pray for all men, he wasn't leaving out those two that cut up and bagged the guy they murdered (Note: Local news story). Those who mocked Christ and assaulted Him on the Cross did far worse. Yet Jesus prayed for them- and died for them. A reminder that it's not the sin, it's the sinner, so we pray even for them.

 

 

 

The Better Part, Day#117:

 

1Sa 26:8 Then said Abishai to David, "God has given your enemy into your hand this day. Now please let me pin him to the earth with one stroke of the spear, and I will not strike him twice."

1Sa 26:9 But David said to Abishai, "Do not destroy him, for who can put out his hand against the LORD's anointed and be guiltless?"

1Sa 26:10 And David said, "As the LORD lives, the LORD will strike him, or his day will come to die, or he will go down into battle and perish.

1Sa 26:11 The LORD forbid that I should put out my hand against the LORD's anointed. But take now the spear that is at his head and the jar of water, and let us go." 

 

 

In hearing this story told again the other day, it struck me the part that I keep missing about David. How many times he could have taken the easy way out, and remembered the Lord instead. And this could happen any day. Let me tell you a story about my being kept " personally stupid" the last couple of days.

Two days ago, someone must have gotten a roll of Ice Breakers out of the vending machine, and a second one popped out that they missed. So I grabbed it. 

 

 Flash foreward to today, and a Burmese girl was in front of me at the machine. I decided to count out my 55 cents for chips while I waited. At this point, I need to let you in on two things. First, our machines break five dollar bills with "silver" and "gold" dollar coins, usually the gold ones. Second, our machines, like most machines, give change as the item drops.

 

Here's where stupid comes in. I put what I thought was 55 cents in the machine- but one of my quarters was actually a silver dollar. When I looked at the display, it naturally said $1.30- but in my purposely stupid head, I had put my money in too fast, and her change got added to mine. I told her, bought my chips and had her take the change that I thought was hers.

 

About five minutes later, the cloud lifted, I did some calculations, and discovered I was an idiot. And as I realized it, I saw in my mind the Ice Breakers, and heard a voice say, "Even."

 

I don't think that was a lesson on how not to cheat someone- the day after the Ice Breakers, the machine left someone (not me) 3 packs of Juicy Fruit. I DO think it was a lesson in integrity has to start with the littlest of things.

 

 

 

 

The Better Part, Day #118:

 

2Ti 1:5 I am reminded of your sincere faith, a faith that dwelt first in your grandmother Lois and your mother Eunice and now, I am sure, dwells in you as well. 

 

 

Timothy was a third-generation believer. Apparently his Grandmother Lois was first brought to faith, and after his mother Eunice, despite her having married a pagan Greek father. Many of us of faith have that same gift. I remember watching Mom with her prayer book as soon as Dad and his brothers left for work. That is the faith that leaves no room for doubt.

 

Thank you, Lord, for a Christian mother. I remember a wall hanging we had with a poem on that very subject. It would mean so much more now, after all these years. Those of you that are mothers, Happy Mothers Day! Those of you that still have 'em, go love on 'em.