Cherishing Joy Each Day

Dear Friends,

Please excuse my long absence. As you may know from my last post, I'm in the midst of a dry season and seemingly endless computer problems. Medication adjustments make me feel wonky and sitting down to blog is difficult. On more than one occasion I've fallen asleep while typing - actually that's kind of funny. What's not funny is my inability to latch on to a thought before it disappears. However, I'm learning to let go and...

 I cherish the joy in the moments of each day. 

On Sundays I usually post a God story, but my brain's so foggy, it wouldn't benefit you. Instead, I hope you'll enjoy one of my favorite pictures from the Holy Sepulchre Church in Jerusalem. This is an enormous mosaic of tiny tiles and it's an astounding piece of art.

Turn to me and be gracious to me, for I am lonely and afflicted.

Relieve the troubles of my heart and free me from my anguish.

Look on my affliction and my distress and take away all my sins.

                         Psalm 25:16-18

A prayer: Heavenly Father, we know you are good upon good and your love never fails us. Teach us your ways Lord, give us strength to endure and bless our weakened bodies. We know your power is made perfect in weakness. We love you and we praise you in Jesus' name. Amen.

The God Who Sees Us

By Erika Rizkallah

...You are the God who sees me,  for she said, "I have now seen the One who sees me." Genesis 16:13

Do you ever feel like God's forgotten about you or afflicted you?

I have to admit that sometimes I do. When I wake up stiff, sore and utterly unrested, I groan and whine, "Why?"

Today was one of those mornings. I'm in the beautiful Blue Ridge Mountains attending a Christian writer's conference. The six hour drive was exhausting, even though my friend, Andy, drove me.
             
                        Now, as I write, it feels like I'm on fire, even though it's cold here.

Fire. In the Old Testament, God is often represented by fire, but really . . . I don't want to feel like the fire is on me.

In the scripture above, the "she" is Hagar. Hagar is the Egyptian maidservant of Sarai, the wife of Abram.  Sarai desperately wanted a family but she couldn't conceive. In those times, women were the chief family builders. Sarai was old and God hadn't given her any children, so she decided to build her family through Hagar. She gave Hagar to Abram as his new wife and told him to sleep with her. Abram doesn't argue (although he should have) and Hagar gets pregnant, and a little haughty.

Now, Sarai doesn't like this, so she blames Abram, complains to him and then physically abuses Hagar.
                                                     Poor Hagar.

She didn't ask to be in that terrible situation. She didn't ask to be a slave, pushed into a sexual union or be physically abused, so she ran away, into the desert. That's where God's angel finds her and speaks to her.
                                                     He says, "...the Lord has heard of your misery." (v.11)

Hagar responds, "You are the God who sees me. I have now seen the One who sees me."

It does us no good to question God and ask "Why?" He has a plan and the why may never be known to us on this side of Heaven. The one thing we can be sure of is that He's heard of our misery and He'll love us through it.

 I'm praying for us today. God had big plans for Hagar and he's got big plans for us too!