Category Archives: Life Lessons

Life Lessons

When Things go Wrong!

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     It has not been an easy year for most people. Events have had to be cancelled, and other family things like funerals and weddings have had to be put off due to the lock down levels, and depending which one we happen to be in at the time. People have lost their jobs, and others have lost money they have paid for overseas trips that could not be taken. None of these things are easy to put up with.

    It reminded me of the time we had some visitors from another area, and were taking them around the local sights. One of these was a glass blower at  work behind the gallery that was selling a lot of his work. There were some beautiful pieces on display, all brightly coloured and different shapes. The man was in his workshop at the back of the gallery which was open for people to watch him at work.

    We went in and up the stairs where we could look down on him plying his art. The furnace was heated up and the tongs he was using were red hot. As he pulled the shaped vase out of the heat, he pulled and twisted at the neck of it to form a shapely edge. But time and time again, he had to put it back into the heat because he wasn’t satisfied with how it looked.

    It reminded me of the Master Glass Blower at work in our lives, as He moulds and perfects His people to make them become what He wants them to be. We may not like the heat of the fire we have to go through, or the pulling and twisting that we are subject to, but when it is all over, we are more like the finished article that He wants us to be….a thing of beauty and fit for His use.

   So when we think of the events of this year and how disrupted many of them have been, let’s remember to allow them to make us better, and not bitter. Just one little letter different, but what a tremendous difference in the end result of our lives!

Life Lessons

Our Good Friend Rameka.

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    Many years ago we had a good friend by the name of Rameka. He had come to know the Lord from a dark background and the difference in his life was noticeable to all who had known him previously. He now had a perpetual smile on his face, and went around singing all the hymns he knew. It was always a joy to meet him and to hear what he had been discovering as he read his Bible every day. He was growing in his Christian life noticeably from day to day.

     But there were things we learned from him too. His infectious grin was always heartwarming. He was always very careful where he put his Bible down. Never would he put it on the floor beside his feet when he was sitting down. To him, this was an insult to Almighty God. As far as he was concerned there were plenty of other places to put it, rather than on the floor. This was one thing we never forgot.

    One day he came to us very concerned. “I feel so ignorant of the Word”, he said, “How can I remember and learn it better than I do? I was never very good at school,” he went on, “What can I do about it?”

“Well, you know what a sieve is like?”, we asked

“Yes,” he said, “And that is just what I feel like, not able to hold anything at all!”

“Ah,” we said, “But the point is that the water going through all the time keeps it clean. In the same way, the Water of the Word keeps you clean as you read it, even if you don’t remember much later.”

His face broke into a big beaming smile. “Oh, I see it now”, he said, “It’s just a matter of keeping on keeping on!”

   Another time he was still worrying about his lack of knowledge. “What should I do about it?” he asked.

“Well, the Lord knows all about it and how you feel so inadequate,” we said, “But the main thing is to be obedient to the little bit you DO know, and then tomorrow or maybe the next day, He will show you the next step that you should do!”

“Oh, that’s great!” he said, “I’ll do it that way then!”

“It’s just a case of one step at a time…..as we do that one, then we will see the next step to take!”

    We moved away from the district shortly after that and heard of him periodically. But always, he was still going on for his Lord and rejoicing in Him until the day of his death some years later. We still smile as we remember our good friend Rameka and the things that he taught us as we interacted with him.

Life Lessons, Uncategorized

How Well Do You Know God?

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   Well, how well DO you know God? Or perhaps we could ask it like this…how WELL do you know God? Then again, how well do I know God?   Finally ask, how well do I KNOW God?

   Each of these questions puts the emphasis on different words of the same question thus needing a different explicit answer to each one.

    Firstly, how well DO I know God? Do I know Him at all? Have I had any dealings with Him? We can’t really know a person until we’ve had some experience of interaction with them.     

   For instance, if I were asked “do you know Queen Elizabeth”, I might answer yes, I know who she is, but that is not actually KNOWING her. I have read much about her, and I know that she has been a great horsewoman, and that she has pet corgi dogs. I could reel off a whole host of other things about her that I have read. But none of that means that I really know the inner person that she is.

    This is the same with our knowledge of God…we might know a lot about Him, but unless we have experienced His forgiveness and subsequently His peace, we do not really know Him at all. Until we have been in the depths of despair and turned to Him for comfort and solace, we cannot know Him fully. We need to come to Him with a contrite heart for the wrongs we have done to experience His forgiveness, and then we can say we know Him well. (Psalm 51:17)

  We come to the next question…..how well do I know Him? This gets down to the personal pronoun, I. It indicates that He must know me as well, and in fact we are told that He does indeed know us from the inside to the outside whether we like it or not. I cannot hide anything from Him, and until I can say wholeheartedly, “Search me oh God, and know my heart today, Try me and know my thoughts and see if there be any wicked way in me” (Psalm 139:23-24) ” I do not really want Him to find me out!

   After having pondered on, and answered these questions honestly, then we can evaluate how well we really do know God. It will be dreadful in a coming day when God pronounces on different ones, “Depart from Me, I never knew you!” (Matthew 7:21-23) when many of them will have been engaged in doing what they thought was His work..

   If  God feels far away from you,  guess who moved? Well, you might ask, “How do I get near to God?”

It takes a contrite  heart and a confession of sin to start with but  then it takes time, after that.  Knowing God well will not come automatically, it takes time and effort. We need to ask ourselves how much time we put into this,  and to remember that if we draw near to God, He will draw near to us (James 4:8). When we take the first step towards Him, He will take ten towards us!

Let’s make sure that we do this today!!

Life Lessons

What do you See?

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   Someone sent an email the other day telling the story of a professor who was setting his students an exam. He handed the papers all out upside down, and then told them to turn the page over. They found it was just a blank piece of paper with a large black dot in the middle of it. He told them to have a good look at it, and then write down what they were seeing.

   Without exception, they all wrote about the black spot, where it was on the page and the effect it had on the paper. The professor told them that not one had commented on the whiteness of the paper or the size of it in comparison to the black spot, and then pointed out the moral of the story….how much we concentrate on the wrong things around us instead of on the good things we see. That reminded me that I’m like that too, and it ought not to be !

  So whenever things annoy or grate on you, especially in these days of Covid-19 and all the restrictions that we have to go through to keep it contained, just remember to overlook the black spot of the virus in  the middle of the page and focus on the white size of the paper!! We are continually being told to count up to ten things we can be thankful for, and we won’t remember the black spot in the centre of our environment at the moment!

This time of restrictions won’t last for ever, and we will be free to come and go again as we once did. In fact, these times of the virus, will make us even more thankful when it is all over, to be able to enjoy what used to be normal for us.

Life Lessons, Uncategorized

What is Set Before You?

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We have choices every day, As we step along life’s way;

In God’s Word they shine so clear, So let’s take note, their message hear.

I have set before you life and death….Deuteronomy 30:19…..

God sets before each person born, The choice of life or death forlorn,

We must each one make this choice, Death to mourn, or life rejoice.

I have set the land before you….Deuteronomy 1:8,21…..

God sets the land before our eyes, The land that waits beyond the skies,

It’s joys we now can plainly see, Awaiting there, God’s gift so free.

I have set before you an open door….Revelation 3:8…..

God knows our works, He’s set before, Each one of us an open door,

As we go through to serve Him there, His Word and Work with others share.

Let us run the race that is set before us….Hebrews 12:1…

A course is set before our eyes, A race to run to win the prize,

Of knowing Christ who bore our sin, And gives us power this prize to win.

Set a watch before my lips….Psalm 141:3….

Before my lips a watch I set, ‘Tis only God this need has met,

Help me to hold my tongue each day, Be quick to hear, and slow to say.

I will set no wicked thing before my eyes….Psalm 101:3

Set your affections on things above….Colossians 3:2

No wicked thing I’ll watch or read, For on these things my soul will feed,

I’ll set my eyes on Christ above, And think of His amazing love.

God now has set these things before, Each one of us just like a door,

It is for us to open these, If we our Lord would seek to please.

Life Lessons

Are you a Leader?

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    There is no doubt about it, some people are natural leaders while others prefer to just follow someone else. Perhaps they don’t have the self confidence to take the lead, or perhaps they just can’t be bothered making the effort.

   How do we know we can be a leader if we aren’t sure about these things?  The quickest way is to turn around and see if there is anyone following you! We might feel that we aren’t important enough or have anything to offer….but, what is that in your hand? Moses had every excuse under the sun when God accosted him out in the desert and told him to go and tell the king of Egypt to let His people go.

 “How can I do that? I’m not important enough,” was his first excuse.

Then he said, “The people won’t listen to me. What do I tell them when they ask whose idea this is?”

   God was very patient with Moses, and He said, “Look, I will be with you. Just tell the people that ‘I AM’ has sent you; the One Who spoke to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob years ago. That is My Name. When you tell them that, they will listen.”

“But what if they don’t?” Moses persisted.

“What is that in your hand?” God asked.

Moses looked at his shepherd’s stick, and said, “It’s my rod.”

“Throw it down on the ground,” God said.

   So he did, and immediately it became a wriggling snake, and Moses hastily got away from it.

“Now pick it up by its tail,” God said, and as Moses reached out his hand and grabbed it, suddenly he found he had his stick back! Twice more, God had to show Moses the miraculous things that would happen when he did what he was told.

But he still hung back. “I can’t talk well enough”, was his next excuse.

   God’s patience started to wear thin. “Who made your mouth?” He demanded. “Very well, I know your brother Aaron is a good talker. He is coming to meet you now. Take him with you, and he can do your talking for you and you will tell him from Me what he is to say.”

Moses finally agreed, and did as God had told him, and became one of the greatest leaders there has ever been.

    We can see several things from this story that can apply to us. Firstly, we may think we are only an unimportant person, but if God is calling us to do something for Him, He will give us the strength. Not only that, but He will be with us as we make a start, and will give us others to support us  in the task that He wants us to do. That is on God’s side. On the other hand, we have to respond on our side. We have to be willing to hear His voice and obey what He is saying to us.

As we make the first move, God will step in and open up the doors for us. All we have to do is to use what we have.

   Perhaps you feel you are only a mother with little children, and ask what you could possibly do. Well, you have the most important job in the world, that of shaping the attitudes and manners of the little ones in your charge. All too soon they will grow up and be gone. Be a worthy leader under God’s direction, of your home and family, and He will bless you in it.

Life Lessons

In Fighting

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      Once again, it is that time of the year that we have put a bird feeder outside our dining-room window, and it gives us a lot of pleasure watching the little birds feeding there. But you know, even among the birds there is continual scrapping going on. The small silver-eyes stand on a branch nearest the feeder and fluff their little wings angrily at each other. The bold mynah struts around at the base of the tree and even jumps up on the branch to take a few pecks before he gets chased off. The sparrows take no notice of the others and greedily grab as many beakfuls as they can while the others are scrapping among themselves.

    It reminded me of how we as people often scrap among ourselves, sometimes vying for the better places or positions. This is not how we are meant to behave, especially in church situations. The Lord Jesus told us to be prepared to take the humble place and wait for others to give us a higher position rather than angrily (or sneakily)  try to take it from others.

    It is not smart to behave like this anywhere, and only causes hurtful situations that often can never be remedied. People can forgive, but they very seldom completely forget!

Our politicians as we get near the election time, too, seem to do all they can to take each other down so they can get the place they want. It almost seems that the good of the country is completely forgotten as the candidates each extol the virtues of their campaign hoping to gain that seat!

Let’s make sure that we aren’t like this, but be prepared to take the lower place and support those who have been promoted over us!

Life Lessons

Free at Last!

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Freedom at Last!

       We can hardly believe it! No more signing in when we go to a shop! No more having to stand out in the cold in a queue while waiting to get our groceries! We don’t realize how precious our freedom is until we lose it. We could see the reason for our recent lock down, but that didn’t make it any easier to put up with the restrictions.

   As we look around, we can see that there are many restrictions that we suffer from in life, and yet we don’t stop to analyse them. How many older folk are restricted by their failing bodies! This is something that we could all face in the future, and mostly through no fault of our own. As we look around our garden at this time of the year (winter), we see that this is a force of nature, and a natural time of rest and later, rejuvenation.

   Then again, others are restricted by their bad habits which have turned into addictions. In these cases, they only have themselves to blame, not that that makes it any easier to break them! The main thing is to not slip back into old ways if we have for some reason, been able to get free of  them.

   Some people are restricted from having a good relationship with others because of a bad attitude…either theirs or yours. To hug a resentment, refusing to apologise for some wrong done, does no-one any good. As it was once said, “There’s no point in getting on your high horse, because you will only have to eventually come down!”

   People today are so easily “offended” by some chance remark, and carry it until it becomes a full blown resentment that eats them up!

   There is only one way to become free of these restrictions (apart from those of old age), and that is through our Lord Jesus Christ. He can set us free if we will only ask Him. You might say that you don’t believe that sort of thing, but that doesn’t make it any less real. Have you ever asked Him? He has done His part for us, and we have to do our part in responding positively to Him!