Down for the Count

By Candace McQuain –

As a writer, and a human being with goals and aspirations, rejection is not an uncommon occurrence. As a matter of fact, it’s become a way of life.

For a while, I allowed every rejection to hit me in the gut.

We appreciate your submission. We are sorry to say that we don’t have a place for it in our publication at this time.

Left jab!

Thank you for your interest in the position, but after reviewing the applications received, yours was not selected for further consideration.

Right jab!

For various reasons you are not what we are looking for at this time. Really? There are various, as in more than one, reasons?

Knock Out!

The constant rejection became debilitating and forced me to lose sight of my goals and God’s calling on my life. Beat up and exhausted, I eventually kissed the canvas. No need for the ten-second count.

In this darkness, God showed me something very special through His word that forever changed me.

“The stone the builders rejected has become the cornerstone; 23 the LORD has done this, And it is marvelous in our eyes” (Psalm 118:22-23 NIV).

Understanding that the person delivering the successes in my life was the same one sending the rejections changed my whole way of processing the good and the bad. Every Yes was His yes and every No His no. No longer did I feel personally attacked at the sight of rejection and gone were days of giving myself kudos for what God orchestrated for me.

My perspective on the way my life unfolds has grown substantially at the realization that it’s not about me. Each success, rejection, and everything in between are but tiny pieces of a gigantic puzzle that I will never see completed until I meet Jesus. Agonizing over the no’s of yesterday when the yes’s of today requires my full attention is selfish and will only keep me face down on the canvas.

Jesus was rejected, not only by strangers but also by those in His own hometown. Through all of the pain and loneliness, He never once stopped and said, “This just isn’t worth it. I’m giving up!” He persevered, remaining focused on His goal—to spread the Gospel.

I pray Lord, that we never lose focus on our goals when we get into the ring with rejection. Fill us with the strength to instinctively lift our head upwards and seek you and the assurance of Your perfect love and direction. In Your glorious name, Amen.

Snow, Snow Glorious Snow!

By Liz Cowen Furman –

We live in the mountains above Denver, Colorado. We often have big snows, especially in March. One year, we had the daddy of all storms, one of those historic six and a half foot heavy wet snow storms.

Our three boys were in elementary school and the school was closed for a whole week. In Colorado that almost never happens!

The storm was so big, the weather guys saw it coming and predicted its arrival way in advance. We, being very scout like, went to the grocery store to stock up on provisions. Even shopping was fun as there was an air of excitement of the coming blizzard. Everyone was shopping for supplies. Many of the shelves were empty. We bought lots of food we could cook on the wood burning stove and eat without cooking just in case. And of course baking supplies.

Then it hit.

Unshoveled decks and roofs were collapsing all over town under the incredible weight of the heavy spring snow. Trees snapped and power lines were down.

Miraculously, we lost power for only a few hours the first day. Others went without for more than seven.

That glorious week holds some of my fondest memories of my children’s early years. We made snow ice cream (several times). We took clothes baskets outside and used them to make snow blocks, then stacked the blocks into an igloo. Our entire family, dogs and all crawled in to play cards by lantern light. We went sledding (of course), skiing, snow shoeing and even jumped off the wall into the snow drifts then crawled out. We made snow men (and women) that looked like us. Even a snow ball fight or two ensued battled behind snow walls.

We trudged to neighbors houses to offer our freshly baked cookies then sat by wood burning stoves drinking hot chocolate and eating s’mores while we warmed up. We watched movies and played Dominoes and Parcheesi. Bliss beyond words. Then we dug out!

Several of us able bodied neighbors and our kids went digging driveways and shaping paths from houses to garages, especially for our elderly neighbors. It really felt like a community.

There were so many times during the storm when neighbors helped each other out. A dear friend, just weeks before the storm, had given me a little plaque that read: Sometimes He calms the storm; sometimes he lets the storm rage and calms His child.

The new plaque, which I loved, sat right above my kitchen sink and almost every day I would read it and be reminded of something. One morning I thought, as I looked out the window at the group of snow shovel toting residents, how great it is that He uses His kids in each other’s lives to bring comfort and help.

Another day, as I watched the snow swirl and drift with the incredible force of the wind I was reminded that every storm we encounter in our lives whether emotional, physical or actual weather related, He controls. He can calm or let rage as He determines necessary. But the best thought of all came to me one morning as I was reading in the book of John. He can calm His child no matter what is happening around her, I found great comfort in that one.

Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid. John 14:27

Ad to the Kingdom

By Hally Franz –

Today is the eve of Super Bowl 2012. By the time you read this devotional, the game will be history, and the highlights of the evening will be old news. I have to confess I’m not feelin’ football, but my husband does. So, I know that tomorrow evening he will expect junk food and a prime seat for the big event. I’ll busy myself with laundry and will tune in to the half-time show and commercials. I do enjoy the commercials.

Isn’t it funny how certain ads entertain and captivate us? My tween daughter gushes over any featuring cute, cuddly babies, and my teenage son howls at those with obnoxious and generally gross boy themes. My husband enjoys crazy animal commercials, and I, of course, being more cerebral than the rest of my family, enjoy those with clever writing.

How’s that for obnoxious?

The products are varied, from beverages and snack foods to cars and investment firms. There are big-budget marketing campaigns designed to bring in big bucks long after the conclusion of the biggest night in football.

Lately, there has been a new trend in advertising. Not only are individual church assemblies advertising on television, there are also entire faiths turning to the media to spread their message. Those messages may be geared toward educating others about their groups, re-energizing those who have left, or inspiring others to learn more. I like this; faith should get some air time.

Isn’t the goal of every Christian to sell our faith? Isn’t it God’s expectation that we make it our business to get our message out? I recently heard someone say that we can’t really make others give up or change their sinful ways; however, what we can do is show them how great life can be when we chose to live for Christ. Cleverly written messages and gimmicks may entertain and get attention, but, ultimately, the best sales pitch for God is demonstrating to others what He has done for us, and this message is free and easy to deliver.

PRAYER: Almighty God, help us be walking billboards for You. May Christian salespeople demonstrate what You will do in the lives of all who believe and seek the saving grace of Christ.
“But thanks be to God, who always leads us as captives in Christ’s triumphal procession and uses us to spread the aroma of the knowledge of him everywhere” (2 Corinthians 2:14 NIV).

The Miracle Manifested Part Two

By Lori Freeland –

Quick Recap of Where is the Miracle?
I ask myself, what happened to The Miracle? A question I mulled a lot while Kyle suffered. What sin kept The Miracle away? What treatment did his doctors leave out? What did I do wrong? What did I miss? What prayers did I leave out? Why did Kyle suffer for four years before we got our lives back? Why did the sweet little girl in the hospital room next to ours go through three years of agony and never get her life back? We all ask these hard questions—controversial faith altering questions and God tells us, “…my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways” (Isaiah 55:8 NIV).

What if The Miracle did occur and I missed it?

What if The Miracle had nothing to do with the end result?

And everything to do with the journey?

In the middle of Kyle’s battle with leukemia, my friend Robin and I were having coffee and talking about our kids and the worst thing that could happen to them. At the time, caught up in Kyle’s cancer, I immediately said, “death.”

She shook her head to disagree. “Eternal separation from God.”

Wow.

All I could think about revolved around Kyle’s life now. Here. With me. And what it would be like to live without him.

But what if my earthly perspective on suffering and death didn’t fit with God’s perspective on eternity? Wrapping my head around The Miracle in the journey seemed as impossible as stretching out my hand in Plano, Texas to touch my mother in Madison, Wisconsin.

What if God saw suffering like this—the life of one small, vulnerable child or one broken-hearted mother could impact the eternal lives of two people? Or four? Or forty?

What if The Miracle in the journey gave me a glimpse of God in a way I never would have seen? I am a new person. A different person. A better person in so many ways. And so is Kyle. What if I learned that trust came in different forms and brought unique blessings—one of them being my son’s relationship with Jesus and his life goal. After high school graduation this May, his heart’s desire is to go to nursing school and then work in pediatric oncology.

I need to re-examine my journey. The moments. The day by day. I need to stop looking for The Miracle at the end and open my eyes to search for it in the midst—the midst of pain, fear, frustration, and hopelessness.

That takes a special pair of eyes.

Eyes that I don’t have.

But I know where I can get them. God’s Word spills over with His perspective. His ways. His miracles. I believe the Bible when I am encouraged to, “Trust in the LORD with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding” (Proverbs 3:5 NIV). I hang onto to the promise that, “Blessed are those who find wisdom, those who gain understanding” (Proverbs 3:13 NIV).

What could it hurt to ponder The Miracle being in the journey rather than at the end of it? We’re going to walk the walk no matter what. If suffering, pain, and death must be part of that journey, anger and denial won’t change a thing.

But looking for The Miracle in the midst just might.

Shouldn’t I Be Scrubbing Toilets?

By Jodi Whisenhunt –

The end of the month was fast approaching. That meant deadlines. Several deadlines. So I faced the blank computer screen and dared it to a staring match. It won.

There I sat. Fingers finally glided over the keyboard. Backspace, backspace, backspace. No, that’s no good. Typing frenzy #2. Better. A few keeper sentences, but something nagged the back of my mind. I checked Facebook. Hmm, nothing going on there. OK, back to work.

A few paragraphs were complete. I read back over them and smirked at the computer. Perhaps it had not won our contest after all. Alas, the article required more, so I stared at the screen again, when a sudden thirst overwhelmed me. I felt as though I’d traversed the dessert with not a drop to drink. I downed cool water to refresh my parched mouth, then returned to my seat with renewed vigor. (A march across the dessert is very inspiring, you know!)

Alrighty, back to task. Write, write, write. Done. Right? No, backspace, backspace, backspace. Sigh. Shouldn’t I be scrubbing toilets?

Have you ever had moments like that? Moments when you know you need to get your work done, but you just don’t want to do it? Moments when you’d rather do anything, anything—even scrub toilets—to avoid the job at hand? What do you do in those moments?

Here’s what I have done. First, I have made a commitment to the Lord that in all I do, I want to glorify Him. I desire to live my life in a way that pleases Him. I want every decision I make, every action I take, every word I write, every breath I breathe to be what God desires. I don’t want to get in His way, because when I do, I stumble and struggle.

Second, I pray. First Thessalonians 5:17 says to pray continually, or pray without ceasing. I must be diligent to do just that. I must make a conscious effort to stop and pray before I ever sit down to write or perform any dutiful task. I know the Lord has blessed me with desire and ability, and I must use it for His purpose. I will be useless in all areas if I do not seek Him first in all I do.

Matthew 6:33 says to seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness. Jesus promises that if I do that, He will give me the things I need and perhaps some blessings I hadn’t requested as well. If I seek the Lord first in prayer and devotion, He will reward me with countless ways to glorify Him.

As my writing endeavors turned out, I decided scrubbing toilets wasn’t worth it. So I sat back down, BIC as they call it (bottom in chair), sent up a silent word of prayer, and finished the article you are reading right now. Take that, you rascally computer!

“Teach us to number our days aright, that we may gain a heart of wisdom” (Psalm 90:12).

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