Bind Up Our Wounds

By Makenzie Allen –

Shopping can be a dangerous thing for all of us. Whether it’s at the mall or in Best Buy, money soon vanishes from our pocket and now resides in the nearest cash register. I admit it; the farm supply store in the spring is what gets me. Dozens of chicks and ducklings are just begging me to take them home. Last spring I got suckered into buying two ducklings. This year I decided to buy five bantam chicks.

Walking downstairs to my room, I peer over the side of my makeshift chicken home. Alarmed, I see blood on the smallest chicken’s back and immediately turn a glare towards the biggest, scrappiest chicken in the bunch. Sure enough, not moments later the larger chick turns towards the runt and picks at it’s bloody back. My amateur instincts guide me towards the nearest google search engine, and I am quickly scanning blog posts for how to take care of my chick’s wound. After researching, I learn that if chickens see blood on a companion they will peck mercilessly at the raw skin. With no special supplies, I run back into my room and lift the runt up. Taking makeup from my bag, I gently apply concealer and some brown eye shadow to my chick’s back. With the blood hidden, the chicks all forget the wound and go back to pecking the wood shavings covering the ground.

Turning my teary eyes to the gymnasium floor, I walk self-consciously towards my waiting basketball team. The hurts I had shoved way down inside came skyrocketing out all in those few moments. It was the night marking an end to my basketball season and as all of the girls on my team lined up waiting to be called out by name, my name somehow was forgotten. Embarrassment clouded me as I waited minutes that seemed like hours for my name to be called and my turn to run out and accept a t-shirt and hug from my coach. As I meet my basketball team it takes everything in me to push out an “It’s okay that you forgot” and a smile.

After my makeup party with the chicks, it struck me how relevant to life that scenario really is. Just as chickens won’t stop pecking at an open wound, experiences continue to scrape at the secret hurts in our hearts. After a season of keeping the bench warm at my basketball games, I tried to suppress feelings of inadequacy yet could not because the pecking would not cease. The night of my teams closing ceremony was an extra large peck, but all the little ones that I brought on myself kept the wound fresh and ready to be struck that night. And I wonder, how do you heal fast enough to erase the blood and ward off the pecking?

It has been a year since I waited on the sidelines for my name to be called and to be recognized as part of a team. It has been fifteen years however, since I have been pulled away from the sidelines and into the body of Christ. God is the only one who can heal feelings of inadequacy, doubts of being loved, times of loneliness, and wounds of the past.

“He healeth the broken in heart, and bindeth up their wounds.” Psalm 147:3 (KJV) Someone once said that Jesus is the only one who will have scars in Heaven. He will and we won’t because only God can cover our bleeding wounds with Jesus’s blood, and heal a wounded heart.

Transparent

By Makenzie Allen-

Opal is a precious stone made from silica, taken mostly from sandstone, and water. This solution runs along cracks and crevices where the water then evaporates and the silica hardens. If repeated many times, this process forms an opal.

I was given an opal ring a few weeks ago from my grandma. It seems that the colors held inside that stone are endless. One moment I will see an electric green and the next it will be a rosy pink. Recently I was marveling at how vibrant it was when my dad gave the best description, “It’s as if there is a light inside the stone causing it to glow like that.” Out of my mouth popped the response; “It reminds me of us as Christians.”

Again and again the Bible establishes that God is light. I can’t even fathom what it would be like to have Him shine fully in me the way an opal shines. He is there all right, a light inside my heart and soul. The problem is not His absence of light, but the overabundant presence of myself. My flesh covers the light inside of me, and I long for those rays to break free. One of my biggest prayers is that I would forget my flesh and remember to glorify God in all things. I want to be transparent so that God can be apparent.

My brother leans forward eagerly, watching as I unwrap his gift. A small jewelry box is revealed, but I am no closer to guessing the contents. I lift the lid, exposing a pair of earrings inlaid with opal stones. Raising my face to share a smile with him, I see his grin and the addition of a dimple. My little brother has the gift of giving. When he exercises that gift, the joy and love of God shines.

Sitting beside my not-so-small brother, I listen as he tells of his desire to preserve a pure mind. It’s never easy striving to live God’s way in a world bent opposite, but my brother is growing into a young man who sees the importance. He has the gift of perseverance. As he uses this gift, the purity and deliberateness of God radiates. God has given us all a gift that we can use to glorify Him. In using our God-given talents we have the opportunity to be a beacon of God’s light.

An opal is made from silica and water, not much, yet multi-colored lights burst throughout its surface; potentially opening blind eyes to see the Creator. A Christian is made from a sinner, saved by a loving God, redeemed every day by the blood of the Lamb. The construction of a Christian has immensely greater components than the construction of an opal, which can only mean one thing; we have all that is necessary to trump an opal’s heavenly light and bring glory to our loving King.

“Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven.” Matthew 5:16 (KJV)

Untainted Love

By Makenzie Allen –

To: My man of God
Love: Your girl, Kenzie

It has been a year since I last wrote you a published letter. I pray God would give you comfort knowing I am here waiting for you. I’m sure you are feeling pressure to date, as am I, but praying for you has helped me to focus on the long term rather than the short, and I have grown content waiting. The triangle is only getting smaller, closing the gap between God, you and I.

Perhaps you’ve noticed the three-way relationship that comes into focus when you start to pray for your future husband. As you pray that he will be a God Lover you quickly start to see that your own relationship with the Lord has room to grow too. Do you see the triangular relationship that is formed through prayer? You, your future husband, and God. God is at the top of the triangle, while you and your future husband are at the corner points at the bottom. The closer each of you becomes to God, the shorter the distance between the two of you. By praying for the man you will marry one day, you are drawing closer to the Lord. –Robin Jones Gunn

On my left ring finger still sits the purity ring that many people are curious about. I have had humorous stories revolving around my ring, from gruff cowboys asking if I was married, to my little cousin saying my ring meant I was not going to kiss anyone but my future husband. The latter being true, of course. My ring stays firmly on my hand and my heart stays solidly rooted on faithfulness toward you.

As this year begins, I am excited and nervous to see where the Lord will take me as graduation is nearing. Whether you are out there or not, I have been blessed by the experience of praying for someone else and promising my purity to God. It’s as if the love I am saving for you magnifies how much love God has stored up for me.

One of my biggest prayers for you this past year has been that you would find joy in the Lord and not search for happiness in the world. The pleasure found in our world is bound by time; the joy found in our God is ever flowing. I hope that you have been blessed by this abundant joy and that it causes you to be at peace. Can you imagine the testimony? A couple satisfied with God’s love and content watching for His plan to unfold. This is how relationships are meant to be. God did not give us rules on purity just for the sake of having rules; He gave them in order to bless us with untainted love.

This triangle relationship we have illustrates God’s kindness. Not only did He make you and me, He made a plan for us that, when followed, produces blessing. God did not leave us to stumble through life, but rather, extended love and guidance.

Time has passed, and even more will sweep by. I will be here, praying that we yearn for God’s plan and fulfill it. He will bless you and I with untainted love, and we shall bless Him with lives that display His glory.

Someday soon,
Kenzie

Exceeding Sweet Delight

By Makenzie Allen –

“They say there is a young lady in New Haven who is beloved of that Great Being, who made and rules the world, and that there are certain seasons in which this Great Being, in some way or other invisible, comes to her and fills her mind with exceeding sweet delight, and that she hardly cares for anything, except to meditate on Him—that she expects after a while to be received up where He is, to be raised up out of the world and caught up into heaven; being assured that He loves her too well to let her remain at a distance from Him always.” Jonathan Edwards

This story was titled “Sarah Pierrepont”, and it is believed that Jonathan Edwards wrote it as letter to his future wife whom he had never met. It goes on to say that Sarah could not be persuaded to do anything wrong or sinful because of the sweetness in her mind.

Meditating on God and being filled with the delight of Him deteriorates the strength of the flesh. In a culture where immorality is pushed, our thinking can easily become polluted with all kinds of evil. I’ve been noticing the grip Satan has on the media especially.

If we, as children of God, desire to honor Him in the decisions we make, we must remove the earthly lies from our thoughts and replace them with the loveliness of God and His word. The earth has fallen into sin, but the King is risen!

“If ye were of the world, the world would love his own: but because ye are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you” John 15:19 (KJV).

So although it can sound convincing to believers that we should act like the world in order to reach the lost, it is far from what God’s word says. We are expected to have the exceeding sweet delight that Sarah Pierrepont had for our King, not the corrupt longing for sinful deeds. When we learn to fill our mind with whatever is true, noble, right, pure, lovely, and admirable, we then naturally make decisions that honor and glorify God, and that is what reaches the lost.

They say there is a body of believers throughout the world who are beloved of that Great Being who made and rules the world. And one day, they shall be received up where He is, to be raised up out of the world and caught up into heaven being assured that the God of the universe loves them all too well to let them remain at a distance from Him always. Until that anticipated day, this body is needed here, on earth, to embrace the lost souls still searching for exceeding sweet delight.

Blueprint Through the Ages

By Makenzie Allen –

“The fact is fiction.” –Switchfoot

In the field of science there are many examples of facts being rooted in emotions thus creating the contradictory statement, “The fact is fiction.” Many people are set on denying God, and for this reason we have evolutionists. Evolutionists like to claim that they have the evidence and creation scientists don’t. Evolutionists have the facts, we have the religion. When in reality, they have the religion; we have the relationship plus evidence for a Creator.

Why evolutionists see the need to believe they evolved from apes, I’m not sure. What I do know is that evolutionists don’t want to accept that there is a God and that He is above them. This kind of biased outlook should have never been allowed to take over such a large portion of the scientific community.

The scientific method starts with a question, makes a hypothesis, conducts a series of experiments, analyzes the results, and finally, draws a conclusion. This solid way of proving facts is not being used in modern science often enough. Instead of following the blueprint, scientists are following their emotions.

God doesn’t want us to be robotic, He gave us emotions and they are good. However, emotions should not be used to make conclusions without comparing them to what the Bible says. Just as scientists should follow the blueprint of the scientific method, we should follow the blueprint of God’s Word.

My childhood dog passed away recently, just barely missing my eighteenth birthday. In my mind, it almost signifies the end of being a kid. The problem with this thought is that I love being a little girl. And I loved having my puppy sitting beside me when I stayed up late into the night writing these articles. Emotion and I have been in close proximity these past few months. I have to say, it is a tiring relationship.

Emotions can be draining, but God’s Word is so reviving! Words written by inspired men thousands of years past still have the ability to remedy my festering emotions. As I continue to miss my dog, I am reminded of God’s perfect plan and mercy towards me. The Bible is God’s blueprint for overcoming the death and decay we see around us today; it is the only way I am set free from emotions that would leave me crippled and captive.

My emotions have never left me longing for the relation between man and ape, but they have caused many other circumstances that could be labeled as fact becoming fiction. There is friction between truth and falsehood, fact and fiction, evidence and impulse.

“The Word of God is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any two edged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart” (Hebrews 4:12 KJV).

The Word of God is a sword that divides the truth from the false. It is sharp and piercing, able to cut through fiction and nonfiction and discern which is which. What a comfort it is to know that God has given me the truth to combat my emotions. The blueprint of the ages is available to all who long for structure founded on truth.

“The fact is fiction.” Not so with my God!

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