Archive for the Category »1 Corinthians «

07
Jul
A Weak but Willing Vessel
meg

I’ve been feeling less than worthy lately. I compare myself to others and see all the areas in which I drastically fall short.

Sometimes I wonder why I sit here at home, writing, instead of having a job out in the world. “Why has God called me to this?” I ask. “There are so many better candidates.” I look at all the mistakes I make, at the gifts I don’t have, and even at the time that I don’t invest into writing day in and day out. I berate myself for not sticking to the schedule I set up. I wonder what it’s all about. I don’t see the purpose in it all. But God does. While I see the shortcomings, God sees the opportunities to work.

It’s amazing how the words of others can speak to me at times. This morning, encouragement came through the blogs of two special ladies, Lysa Terkeurst and Sarah Markley. Both of these ladies reminded me that God has a specific calling on my life as a writer. He has placed me in this moment in time not as a perfect candidate, but as a willing vessel that He can mold and form into whatever he chooses. He understands my weaknesses and shortcomings, and loves me because of them.

Is that amazing or what? While I hate my shortcomings, God doesn’t. He sees them as part of His perfect creation.

And the same is true for you as well. God created you intentionally, with a purpose. Even if you don’t understand that purpose, God does.

So embrace those imperfections today, and be ready for God to move in your life. A life surrendered is the best place to be.

“But God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong. He chose the lowly things of this world and the despised things—and the things that are not—to nullify the things that are, so that no one may boast before him” (1 Corinthians 1:27-29 NIV).

“But he said to me, ‘My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.’ Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me. That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong” (2 Corinthians 12:9-10 NIV).

What area of your life do you feel extremely weak at the moment? Is it in your job? In your home as a military wife or mother? In a new city where you feel all alone? What verses do you turn to during times of trials? What is God trying to teach you at this moment in time?

Lord, thank you for the reminder that you work through the very things that I see as weaknesses. Please help me to depend on you for strength today and everyday.

Category: 1 Corinthians, 2 Corinthians  Tags: ,  Leave a Comment
23
Feb
A Broken Truck and a Lesson on Love
meg

Sorry world. I know I’ve been a bit silent as of late. Perhaps I really haven’t had anything to say, or perhaps I haven’t slowed down long enough to truly hear from God. Hmm. Something to think about.

The military life can be a crazy one. Right now my husband and I have been demoted down to one car, which means I’ll be doing a lot of driving out the Air Force base and back everyday. I’ve certainly need a lot of graciousness and patience when it comes to all of this driving. And it doesn’t look like it will be over soon.

It all started yesterday when my husband called me to tell me that there were some serious issues with his New/Used truck. As he talked to me, I found myself having to make a choice. I could take an “I told you so” attitude or a loving attitude. Thankfully I chose the later. I know I would regret it today if I hadn’t.

I’m learning more and more what it takes to be a supportive wife. As I watched my husband last night at home, I could tell he felt down in the dumps. He needed my hugs instead of my criticism. He was feeling sad about the seemingly bad investment we’d made in this truck, so he didn’t need criticism from me on top of it. Instead he needed a warm smile, and encouraging word, and a prayer partner.

I’m sure we’ll have many other such experiences in our married life. The military and life in general will throw us many curve balls. What will matter is how we react to each situation.

On our wedding day the officiating pastor read us some wonderful words from 1 Corinthians 13. I’ve talked about these words before on this blog. Today, as I write this, I felt the urge to once again read through these words that tell us what true, godly love is like.

As I read these verses, there were a few specific phrases that stuck out to me in particular:

Love is patient: I’ll need to be patient as my husband and I share one vehicle. There will be a lot of give-and-take as we share this car.

Love is kind: While it wasn’t my first original desire, I knew God wanted me to respond to the news about our truck with kindness. That was what my husband needed most of all yesterday.

Love always trusts: Just because my husband made a mistake, doesn’t mean he’s lost my trust when it comes to future monetary decisions. In fact, my respect for him only grows as we learn these lessons of life together.

Love always perseveres: We keep on trying, we keep on growing, and we keep on learning each and every day.

Love never fails: My husband cannot lose my love, even when he makes mistakes. (Not that the truck was fully his fault. Don’t think I’m saying that. It was mine as well). Just as God’s love for us never ends, I chose to love my husband each and every day with a never-ending kind of love. This isn’t easy, and I’m not always sure how it’s done. I just know that I have to rely on God each and every day for this kind of love. I can’t do it on my own.

And so we persevere. We move on, and we learn each and every day what it means to be a military wife. Someone who loves God, loves her country, and loves her family.

How have you shown love to your spouse today?

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21
Dec
Christmas Love
meg

With the military comes a good bit of traveling. Last week my husband was out of state, this week the two of us will be traveling half-way across the country to visit with family and friends. The time together will be a good one, but I’m sure it won’t be without it’s drama. What family isn’t? Isn’t that part of what makes family get-togethers so precious? Here we are, stuck together in a family for life, forced to love through flaws and shortcomings. I was reminded yesterday in church that it’s not my place to change my family, or to make their lives better, but to just simply love them. What a simple task, but we often make it so overly complicated. We think loving is such a hard thing.

To be honest, I would never have the capacity to love, if it wasn’t for Christ. He is the one who showed us all what true, sacrificial love is all about. He is the one I want to love like.

I’ll be honest, I in no way have this all figured out, but my resolution for Christmas this year is to simply love. If this means not bringing up certain issues or topic, then so be it. I’ll love, and let God do the rest.
“My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you” (John 15:12).
“Whoever loves his brother lives in the light, and there is nothing in him to make him stumble” (1 John 2:10).
“There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love” (1 John 4:18).

“And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love” (1 Corinthians 13:13).

Category: 1 Corinthians, 1 John, John  Tags:  2 Comments
15
Dec
TDY
meg

I’ll admit it here and now, I’m not a fan of TDYs, (temporary duty assignments). They’re often last minute and throw all of our plans out of whack. Just the same, I recognize that they’re just one more way that I have to learn to be more flexible and supportive as a military wife.

It’s tough at times being home alone, managing the household finances, and keeping life rolling while my husband is away. I miss his company, his voice, and even his smelly clothes while he’ away. Just the same, I’ve found reasons to be the thankful for TDYs.

How can I be thankful, you ask? Because with TDYs my husband is more than likely still in the states and will be home in a matter of days or weeks, instead of the long months in a deployment. With TDYs I feel as if my husband is still relatively close by. If I really needed him, I could jump on a plane and be with him in a matter of hours. With TDYs my husband is just on a military business trip, relatively safe and sound and another military institution in the States. When I look at the scope of things, TDYs really aren’t that bad.

For me it’s all about support and flexibility. I can’t change when my husband is leaving or how long he’ll be gone. That’s completely out of my hands. What is up to me is my attitude. I can whine, complain and cry about him leaving. I can be miserable on the phone whenever he calls and make him not want to be home. Or I can be encouraging, kind, and uplifting, telling him time and again how much I miss him and love him. The second would make him want to come home all the quicker, wouldn’t it?

Who knows when my husband will be gone again, for today I chose to be the supporting, loving wife I know I can be, deep inside. I chose to act out the “Love Chapter” in 1 Corinthians 13. I encourage you to pry open your Bible today and read this special chapter. Then leave a comment and let me know what you got out of it. Loving and encouraging our husbands is a full time job, whether they’re next to us or in a completely different country.

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10
Nov
You Are My Strength When I Am Weak
meg

I was sick, really sick, like you don’t want the details gross kind of sick. At first, my husband was a wonderful helper, getting me ginger ale from the store, retrieving ice packs from the freezer and putting different DVDs in for me to watch. It was wonderful having him there to take care of me. And then, the inevitable happened, he got sick too.
Now I don’t handle sickness on a good day. Just imagine how I felt now that we were both on our backs on the couch, neither of us feeling like we could help the other at all. It wasn’t fun. Just the same, I knew what I needed to do. I needed to be there for my husband. I needed to get him wet rags and cups of ginger ale and the throw blanket from over in the corner . I need to love with a sacrificial kind of love, the kind of love that would take care of my husband even when I myself was feeling pretty sick. This was the first time loving my husband was truly a sacrifice for me. For the most part loving him is pretty enjoyable. This wasn’t, so I definitely need some help from God.
And so I prayed to God to help us through this day. I prayed to God to help me find the strength to care for my husband and to love him with a truly sacrificial love.
And amazingly I did it. I still wasn’t completely well, but God gave me the strength to do the menial tasks that needed to be accomplished. I cleaned up after us, kept our glasses filled with ginger ale, and with the help of God made it through the rest of our day of sickness.
I don’t think that God made us sick on Sunday. But I do think he had something very important to teach me on that day. He wanted me to truly see what sacrificial love feels like, and what it’s like to depend on Him to get from one moment to the next. This isn’t a lesson I’ll forget very soon.

Here are some verses that were on my heart today. I hope they bless you too:
“He gives strength to the weary and increases the power of the weak” (Isaiah 40:29 NIV)
“Sitting down, Jesus called the Twelve and said, “If anyone wants to be first, he must be the very last, and the servant of all” (Mark 9:35 NIV).
“Love is patient, love is kind…. it is not self-seeking…. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails. (1 Corinthians 13: 4-5,7-8 NIV)

Category: 1 Corinthians, Isaiah, Mark  Tags: , ,  Leave a Comment
30
Sep
Flexibility and Love
admin

The Love Chapter, in 1 Corinthians 13, holds a special place in my heart. Not too long ago I spoke these words to my husband, as we stood in front of family and friends and pledged our lives to each other. I promised to love him this way, but I often fall short when it comes to this type of Godly love.
My selfish tendencies often overtake my desire to love my husband wholeheartedly. This problem is amplified when it comes to his career in the military. At times, I am anything but loving and supportive. I am anything but flexible.
I tried to look up the word “flexible” in the Bible, but nothing came up. And so, instead, I decided to look harder at 1 Corinthians 13. I found three phrases there that seem to correlate with the trait of flexibility:
These phrases tell us that love: “does not seek it’s own,” “endures all things,” “never fails” (NASB Version).
This is the kind of love I strive to have for myself.
But what do these above phrases mean?
Let’s delve a bit deeper and look at their original meaning the Greek.
Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance is my good friend when it comes to looking up the original meaning of the words. Here’s what I found for each of these phrases:

1 Corinthians 13:5 tells us that Love “Does not seek it’s own.” The Greek word for “does not seek” is zēteo. So this phrase is telling us that Love does not crave, or demand something from someone.
Wow, this is a tough one. I know that I often make demands of my husband that he can’t fulfill because of his job. I want him to call me during the day, come home early just to be with me, and spend the entire weekend going places with me, entertaining my every whim. But this verse seems to be saying that true love doesn’t look like this. It seems to be saying that I shouldn’t demand things from my husband, but should instead focus on doing things for him.
1 Corinthians 13:7 says that Love “endures all things.” I was so excited when I looked up these words. First, the Greek word for “endures” is hypomenō, which means to remain, to bear bravely and calmly. The word used for “all things” is pas which simply means “everything.”
True love remains through everything, good times and bad, times of deployment, and times of safety, times of stress and times of peace. True love goes through these times calmly, knowing that God will provide.
This isn’t easy, I’ll admit. At times, I am anything but calm. I stress, I worry, and I make like more difficult overall. God is slowly working on me when it comes to this sort of love. I know that I need to be flexible and love my husband through the tough times.
1 Corinthians 13:8 says that love “never fails.” The Greek word for “never” is oudepote which simply means never. The Greek word for “fails” is piptō which means to perish, i.e. come to an end, disappear, cease. In other words “never fails” means to never come to an end.
True love never ends. It always perseveres, through good times and bad. Our society today seems to believe that people fall in and out of love. God’s word tells us that agape love never ceases to exist.
My paraphrased version of theses three love above attributes is this:
Love does not crave or demand something from someone. It remains through everything. Love never comes to an end.
What does this mean to me? It means that I will need God’s help immensely in order to love my husband this way. I can’t do it on my own. If I tried, I would fail. But instead, I depend on God to see me through each day. I ask him to help me love my spouse, to help me remain constant through the touch times, and to put his needs before my own.
As I remain through those tough times, I ask God for flexibility. I ask him to give me a heart that can support my husband and whatever changes may come up in our day-to-day life. I don’t hold onto my own plans and goals too much, but instead, ask God to help me follow wherever my husband may lead.

Category: 1 Corinthians  Tags: ,  One Comment