Pardon Me

By Cheri Cowell –

The other day I ran across these idioms for the phrase “pardon me.”

Pardon me, what did you say your name was?

I beg your pardon! I didn’t see your foot there!

Pardon me; does this train go to Oakland?

Pardon me, but I think you’ve got it backwards.

In each of these, the word pardon means, “excuse me.” In some of them you can hear the sarcasm dripping from the words. In some you can hear the formality and see the raised chin as the person speaking looks down upon you.

Isaiah used the word pardon when he spoke of God’s willingness to excuse. If you listen, you can also hear the meaning behind the words. Some translations render the word pardon as forgive, but it is the word before pardon or forgive that adds the context and meaning. That word is freely, abundantly, or lavishly. When you and I give up our way and accept God’s, our God doesn’t simply excuse us, nor does He only forgive or pardon (although that is a big deal). No, our God freely excuses, abundantly pardons, and lavishly forgives.

Do you hear the love behind those words?

“Let the wicked forsake their ways and the unrighteous their thoughts. Let them return to the LORD, and he will have mercy on them, and to our God, for he will freely pardon” (Isaiah 55:7 NIV).

PRAYER: God, thank You for freely excusing, abundantly pardoning, and lavishly forgiving me. Help me hear the real love behind these words today.

The Prettiest Mann I Know

By Mary Sefzik –

Some people come into our lives and quickly go, but others leave footprints on our hearts, and we are never the same. I met such a person my freshman year of high school. I heard about Melissa Mann through a mutual friend and was excited when my Braille teacher, Linda, arranged for us to meet.

Melissa greeted me with a big hug. “I’m so happy to meet you.” Her voice always sounded as if she were smiling.

I felt drawn to this positive, bubbly, blind lady who had overcome so many obstacles: diabetes, two kidney transplants, and multiple heart stints.

Melissa was a shining witness for Christ and the story of her kidney transplant is a testimony in itself. She recounted the day the doctor examined her chart and slammed the door in frustration. He discovered her kidneys were functioning at only eight percent. She should have been on dialysis much earlier. Almost 16 months later her doctor delivered more bad news. Her heart had swollen. Without a new kidney she had six weeks to live. Then a miracle happened. Two small kidneys belonging to a three-year-old child were available. Those kidneys, which Melissa affectionately named, Bert and Ernie, gave her nearly twenty years of life.

Melissa never met a stranger. One evening we were so engrossed in our dinner conversation the waiter couldn’t get a word in edgewise. When Melissa realized he was ready to take our order she said, “I’m Melissa and this is Mary. We’re two blind women who love to talk so if you have something to say just jump right in and say it. We won’t mind.”

Her joy always encouraged me. “Melissa,” I confided one day. “I’m so tired of waiting. I’ve been looking for a job for a year and a half.”

“Mary, at times like these you need to hang on to God. Hold on tight now, and give Him the reins to your life. He promises in His Word that He will never leave us or forsake us.” Tears stung my eyes as she shared this gem of truth.

“Do you know what keeps me going through all of this?” she continued. “As long as Jesus is in my life, everything’s going to be all right. St. Paul says it doesn’t matter whether I live or die because I’ll be with Jesus whatever happens. And those of us who are believers, we’ll be together forever. Sure that time when we’re apart will be tough. We’ll miss each other, but honey, we’ll all be together forever in the end.”

Melissa is with her Savior now enjoying a new glorified body. I know I will see her again in heaven. Until then I will strive to leave my own set of Christ-honoring footprints on the lives of those around me.

Microwave Mastery

By Hally Franz –

The year was 1980, the day a Saturday just prior to Christmas. My dad was excited with the gift he’d bought Mom and eager to get home and try it out. Along with the very first microwave oven our home would have, Dad picked up a couple frozen Fox DeLuxe pizzas.

We sat down for lunch, and Mom served up the pizzas. With anticipation, we bit into our very hot slices, most likely burning the roofs of our mouths with molten cheese. Then, instead of the expected crispy crust, we found ourselves pulling on rubbery, soggy dough.

Microwave pizza hadn’t come along yet, and we had no idea microwaves didn’t just cook the same way traditional ovens did. My eternally-optimistic mother pretended it was great, but we all hoped the new microwave could do better. And, it did; we just needed to learn how to use it.

While the Bible is the exact opposite of a new-fangled gadget in any decade, we do sometimes puzzle about how to best use it. When we read our Bibles we may be discouraged if we don’t understand or know how to accurately interpret the lessons He has provided for us.

Here are a few suggestions. Carefully select the Bible version(s) you will use. Seek opinions from church family, and find those that are both authentic and understandable. A study Bible is a wonderful resource as you dig into the scriptures, as is a timeline chart. Supplement your reading with detailed studies on specific topics or Bible books. Finally, be willing to ask questions of the Bible scholars in your life. They’ll appreciate an opportunity to help.

We learned our way around that microwave, and I wouldn’t live without one now. When we get well-acquainted with His word, we won’t go without that either!

PRAYER: Lord, as I read and study Your word, please help me to use the tools and take the time necessary to gain the wisdom You desire me to have.

“The Lord’s teachings are perfect. They give strength to his people. The Lord’s rules can be trusted. They help even the foolish become wise” (Psalm 19:7 ERV).

Organic Truth

By Cindy Martin –

We live in an age where our focus has shifted to eating organic food to protect us from the harmful effects of GMO (genetically modified organisms) as well as toxic chemicals found in pesticides, growth hormones and food additives. It’s all about eating food in its purest form so that we can maximize its nutritional value in order to experience optimal physical health and healing.

As I pondered this trend in our thinking, I couldn’t help but think of the correlation to the effect God’s Word has on our lives. Organic by its very definition refers to something living. Hebrews 4:12 tells us that “the word of God is alive and powerful” (NLT). Psalm 119:9 tells us that the way to stay pure is to follow God’s Word.

The anticipated result of eating organic is that we’d live stronger, healthier lives and experience healing in parts of our body that require it. Psalm 119:50 reminds us, “This is my comfort in my affliction, That Your word has revived me” (NASB).

I am of the opinion that the transforming power of scripture has been greatly overlooked and underestimated in our culture. Our fast-food drive-thru approach to scripture reading and/or memorization has left us spiritually anemic and empty of things of lasting value much like fast food leaves our bodies devoid of any lasting nutritional value.

Trying to “do life” without the direction, truth and power of scripture is indeed like trying to eat burgers and fries hoping they won’t have any effect on our heart or our health.

A regular steady diet of God’s Word is absolutely essential to having a healthy spiritual heart. When we’re faced with temptation or difficulty, which is inevitable (“Here on earth you will have many trials and sorrows” John 16:33 NLT), we need to follow the example Christ set for us. During His temptation in the desert, His immediate response to every antic of the enemy was “It is written…It is also written…It is written” (Matthew 4:4-10 NIV).

Christ knew the irrefutable power of God’s Word and leaned on its strength when His own was being tested. Friend, in all the moments of our lives, we need the truth, correction, comfort and guidance that God offers us in His Word.

“Every part of Scripture is God-breathed and useful one way or another—showing us truth, exposing our rebellion, correcting our mistakes, training us to live God’s way. Through the Word we are put together and shaped up for the tasks God has for us” (2 Timothy 3:16-17 MSG).

Prayer: Lord, thank You for the power of Your Word. Create an appetite in my spirit for its transforming work in my life.

Premature Season Change

By Cynthia Ruchti –

As I write this, I’m surrounded by the wonder of a warm autumn day, one that smells like toasted summer. The autumn light spotlights the bright colors of the autumn trees and autumn-crisped grasses, perfuming the autumn air with that mellow, smooth, ripe fragrance of cottonwood at its peak and rusty pine needles, of apples begging for picking and tomato plants giving up their last fruits of harvest.

By the time you read this, few places this far north will have leaves on the trees. The staccato dance of color and rustle will have given way to the rattle of bare boned branches against one another, brown against a gray November sky.

Autumn seems too short of a season, most years. And sometimes that’s my fault. I cheat it of its shelf life, because I know what’s coming–winter.

Winter–not my favorite time of year, living in this land of ice and cold, snow and blizzards, closed roads and colorlessness; unless you count white as a color.

Winter–the season that seems endless, its days short and bone-chilling.

Autumn, on the other hand, calls for sweatshirts and long hikes through the opening woods, for s’mores over the campfire and quilt cocoons, great sleeping weather with the windows open and the down comforters piled high, pumpkins and earthtone decorations and Thanksgiving and putting up the garden’s produce.

But I hesitate in autumn, never taking a full breath, because I know what the season right behind it will demand.

A cancer patient in remission might fail to take a full breath, knowing she’ll have another biopsy six months or a year from now. A parent of a pre-teen might miss some of the beauty because of a premature, imagined chill still years distant. A marriage might suffer from a similar syndrome: “We made it through that crisis, but there’s bound to be another one ahead”.

When God said through Solomon that there was a season for everything (Ecclesiastes 3), I wonder if He also was telling us not to cheat the season we’re in. To plan for, but not pre-live, the crises of the next or opposite season.

“Don’t you be talking when it’s the season to be silent,” He might rephrase that instruction. “Don’t feel loss when it’s the season of gain. Don’t pre-worry about a season of death and miss the season of living.”

PRAYER: Father God, why should thoughts of an icy wind trouble me on a day like today when the sun is blindingly bright against the yellow leaves, the breeze merely cool, not cold? So fill my sense with this present moment that I don’t miss Your Presence in it!

“There’s a season for everything and a time for every matter under the heavens” (Ecclesiastes 3:1 CEB).

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