Potty Prayers

²Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. — Hebrews 12:2 (NIV)

The other night I was playing with my church’s women’s softball team. It was my turn to hit. I stepped into the batter’s box and watch the first pretty pitch go by — “Strike” the umpire said. In this league you only get 2 strikes (instead of 3) unless you foul one off — supposedly it hurries the game along. I got set in my head how everything was going to go with this next pitch. I was going to hit the ball no matter where it was (inside or outside of the plate, high or low) and then I was going to run. All I can tell you is that I swung and “whoosh” was all I heard. I completely missed the ball by about 3 feet. I walked back to the dugout shaking my head. What happened?

It hit me today why I missed the ball completely. I had taken my eyes off the ball. I had lost focus. I was concentrating so much on the way I was standing in the batter’s box and how I was going to swing the bat, that I totally missed the ball — the whole point of being there in the first place.

I do that with Jesus too. When I was pregnant with my daughter, I had done all the research, gone to all the classes, and had it perfectly staged in my head. Contractions would start. They would be painful but I would go to the hospital and get medicine. I would be ok. They’d tell me to push when it was time. Baby girl would be born. All would be well. So many times we get caught up in how we think things are going to go that we lose sight of Jesus. It seems that we’re walking in a fog. That’s what I was in the other night — a fog. My head was not in the softball game or focused on what it should be focused on.

Really soak up these words from one of my favorite hymns, Turn Your Eyes Upon Jesus:

O soul, are you weary and troubled?
No light in the darkness you see?
There’s a light for a look at the Savior,
And life more abundant and free!

Refrain

Turn your eyes upon Jesus,
Look full in His wonderful face,
And the things of earth will grow strangely dim,
In the light of His glory and grace.

Through death into life everlasting
He passed, and we follow Him there;
Over us sin no more hath dominion—
For more than conquerors we are!

Refrain

His Word shall not fail you—He promised;
Believe Him, and all will be well:
Then go to a world that is dying,
His perfect salvation to tell!

Refrain

Prayer: Oh Lord, thank you so very much for reminding me to be focused on You. Help me not only to start out my day focused on You, but to continue through everything I do totally focused on You. There are so many things going wrong in this world, and I dare say most of it is not important when we look upon Your face. Thank you for conquering sin for me because I am weak and couldn’t even come close to doing it myself — no matter how perfectly pictured it was in my head!

¹⁴“Again, it will be like a man going on a journey, who called his servants and entrusted his property to them. ¹⁵To one he gave five talents of money, to another two talents, and to another one talent, each according to his ability. Then he went on his journey. ¹⁶The man who had received the five talents went at once and put his money to work and gained five more. ¹⁷So also, the one with the two talents gained two more. ¹⁸But the man who had received the one talent went off, dug a hole in the ground and hid his master’s money.” – Matthew 25:14-18 (NIV)

A few months ago, a good friend and new Christian asked me, somewhat jokingly, “what does the Bible say about cleaning?” I know the Bible has answers for anything and everything you could ever come up with to ask. So I prayed about her question and thought about it. I kept coming back to this parable. [You can read the whole parable at Matthew 25:14-30.]

In this parable, Jesus equates talents to money, but really a talent is anything God gives us. After all, everything on this earth is God’s — He just made us the managers of it. Later in this parable, the master comes back and wants to know what the servants have done with what he gave them. To both of the servants who doubled their talents, the master says “well done, good and faithful servant.” Both of these servants did well with what they were given. One was not better than the other simply because he was given 5 instead of 2 or because he made 5 more talents. They both did what they were supposed to do with what they were given.

For the servant who buried the one talent he was given, the master says “you wicked, lazy servant!” Ouch. The master continues by explaining that if the servant was worried about losing the talent, he could’ve at least went to the bank and deposited it there gaining interest. So what good is money if we bury it in the back yard? It’s a total waste!

God is our Master and He gives us talents according to our abilities. It’s our responsibility to take care of those talents — to use them as they should be used. When God blesses us with money, we give, invest and spend wisely. When God gives us a home, we keep it clean, make repairs and share our home with friends. When God gives us a few extra “free” minutes we didn’t already have something planned, we invest it in our relationships — with God, with family, with friends.

I know my friend was looking for advice on keeping her house clean and that’s something that I really detest doing myself. But the talents don’t have to be spotless. We just shouldn’t bury the talent in the dirt either. Somewhere in there, there’s a nice balance.

Prayer: God, thank you so very much for all of the talents you’ve given to me. Help me to know what I should be doing with each and every talent. Help me to not only take care of them, but to grow and multiply them that I may share them and bless others.

For God hath not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind. — 2 Timothy 1:7 (KJV)

This is so awesome I just had to share! It’s not about me, and I hope Heather will not mind me sharing

In my previous post Fear of what others think, I had shared some examples of fears we might let control us. Heather told me the part about not inviting people over because the house is messy so spoke to her. Heather is aways encouraging to me in regards to my writings and telling me how much they mean to her. This means a great deal to me — not because it validates me in any way, shape or form — but because I know God’s working through me to share with at least one person. To see what God’s doing in Heather’s life is truly amazing to watch from where I’m sitting and I’m so thankful God’s let me be a part of her life!

Today Heather shared with me that she had a house full of people yesterday, and they had a really good time. I absolutely love what she said next:

I think there were so many people here that you couldn’t see the imperfections.

How truly awesome and insightful is that!?!? She was not worried at all about what she perceived as imperfections in her home or herself. She opened her heart and her home to this group of people and she had a wonderful time! God wants us to fellowship with other believers. He wants us to have that friendship, but even more importantly, support from other Christians. If you don’t take the first step and put yourself out there, you’ll never realize some of the blessings God has in store for you!

Prayer: Lord I just want to thank you and praise you right now for the great and awesome blessings you are laying on Heather. I pray that you reach down to each and every one of your children, give us a spirit of power, love and a sound mind. Help us to overcome our fears so we might help others overcome their fears as well. Thank you for helping me over my fear of writing. Use it to bless every single person who reads it.

For God hath not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind. — 2 Timothy 1:7 (KJV)

When I wrote the post the other day entitled “Fear of ____” my mind was literally racing with all kinds of things that I’m afraid of — fear of failing (what if I think I can write and I really can’t?); fear of sharing my faith with others (what if they don’t believe what I believe?); fear of having friends over for dinner (yeah, right! my house is a mess!).

When I really started looking at all of these fears, I realized they all boil down to just 1 fear — the fear of what others think. Who decides whether or not I can really write? There will always be people who don’t like what I write. What happens when others don’t believe what I believe? Nothing. I keep on loving them and sharing with them as God leads me. After all, they aren’t rejecting me, they’re rejecting God. What happens if I have friends over and there are toys all over the den floor? My friends might just see how much I love my daughter and spend more time with her than I do cleaning everything to perfection.

Seriously take a minute and look at your fear(s). How many of them can essentially be reduced to worrying about what others think? We need to be more worried about what God thinks about what we are doing than what others think. God thinks I can write, so I write. I don’t have a clue who’s going to read it or the lives it will touch, but that’s in God’s control — not mine. God thinks I should tell others what great and wonderful things He’s done for me. God thinks I should reach out to my friends — especially the ones who don’t believe like I do — because they are hurting and need support.

So what are your fears?

Prayer: Lord, please help me to realize I don’t need to be concerned with what others think. Help me to only be concerned with what You think. Lord I want to fit in so badly that sometimes it doesn’t matter what I fit into. Help me to know without a doubt that I fit into Your family — that I am a child of God. Help me not to have a spirit of cowardice or fear. Give me strength to accomplish the things You think are important.

For God hath not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind. — 2 Timothy 1:7 (KJV)

Fear has been on my mind a great deal lately. I’m sure you have something (if not quite a few things) you can fill in the blank with. I’ve been familiar with this verse for a long time. I know fear is not of the Lord, and I often feel guilty when I have a fear of something. Is my faith not strong enough? Am I not walking close enough to God? What’s wrong with me that I’m fearing when I shouldn’t be?

Whenever I want to study some scripture, I go to a set of commentaries we have written by J. Vernon McGee. I love the way he puts things in a way I can understand and relate to. I love what he’s written about this verse. He explains that fear is a natural thing. He uses the example of a lion. If you saw a lion loose, fear would cause you to find a really good hiding place. This would be a good thing, because who would want to be eaten by a lion?

However, Paul is speaking not of a good kind of fear, but of cowardice. Paul is saying, “God hath not given us the spirit of cowardice; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind.”

“A sound mind” means discipline. In other words, God does not intend that defeat should be the norm of Christian living. We should be disciplined Christians rather than slaves to our emotions. We are all moved by our emotions. That is why people will send money to organizations that advertise with the picture of a poor, hungry, little orphan. But Christians are not to be motivated by their emotions. Our emotions are not to master us. We are to be disciplined.

How does this apply to the question of fear? Is it wrong for me to have a fear of flying? No. It would be wrong for me to stay at home. You see, If I am a disciplined Christian, I am going to grit my teeth, go down and get that ticket, and take that trip because God has called me to an itinerant teaching ministry. Overcoming emotions means not letting your emotions stop you from doing something you should be doing. When you have a fear of flying, you discipline yourself to fly anyway. But you still live with your emotions. — J. Vernon McGee from “Thru the Bible”

He said all that way better than I could! It’s really made me stop and think. What fears have I let control my life? What is God calling me to do that I’m afraid of? What am I afraid will happen? I’ll be looking specifically at some fears of mine this week. If you have any that you’d like to share, let me know. I’ll write about them as well.

Prayer: Lord, please help me to remember not to let my emotions rule my decisions and actions. I want You to control me and give me a sound mind. You know how badly I need a sound mind! Help me to distinguish between the good fear and the areas I need to be self-disciplined in. Thank you Lord that Your Word is so applicable to my life today — thousands of years later.