Whose Wrinkled Arm Is This?

Posted on February 24, 2012 by jroesler728

If someone were to ask me if I knew I was getting older I would say, “Of course.”

In fact, I have given talks that include the perspective that our bodies are only designed for temporary use. We will all reach a time when some body part will start working poorly or stop working all together. This will eventually happen even if we are dedicated in our efforts to exercise, eat well and live a healthy life. Living in this body, as we experience it today, is not designed to be permanent

So, why is it, that this morning when I examined the palm of my hand and let my eyes travel to the crease of my elbow I was stunned to find a wrinkled arm?

I am really interested in your thoughts.

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What to Say When There’s Nothing to Say

Posted on February 22, 2012 by jroesler728

I received an email from a friend who is experiencing life altering medical symptoms and getting no clarity from a team of medical experts. This is part of my response:

First of all, thank you for trusting me with your cry for help. Tomorrow is my birthday and I am aware that I have had an expectation that I would reach a time in life when my cries for help would be filled with less anguish and the list of answers would be longer than the list of questions but neither is true.  

This much seems true to me today. We need each other for this journey of faith that is crammed with land mines. My husband’s brother was a Marine who was especially trained to deactivate land mines. Only the Holy Spirit can deactivate that which our common enemy has planned for our demise. The victory of the cross is our only hope.

I will walk with you on this journey and I know you will walk with me. If, in the mysterious administration of God, He is calling you to weakness then His power will be amplified in it. 

I will continue to pray for healing for you and for wisdom in knowing how to approach and respond to the complexities of our health care system.

 Thank you that when,in the past,I have come to you with a broken heart you have always led me to rest in the goodness of God. Today, my friend, I ask for the grace to be an echo of your wisdom and from the mountain you will hear, “Be still and know that I am God.” Love and Peace to you.

What do you say when there is nothing to say?

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Leave Room for Mystery in Prayer

Posted on February 20, 2012 by jroesler728

We have a web page now that brings up a page where a prayer request can be written, and with one click, it will reach someone who will pray and ask others to pray.

I received an email this week from a person who had tried to use this ,but added to the anguish of his prayer request, was the frustration that the message would not send. The writer detailed his prayer request and asked that I attend to the failed site on our web page.

I forwarded the prayer request to the appropriate person and emailed out communications team to check the web page. The answer I received: I tried the web page and it is working perfectly. I think this person needed to speak to a person.

I thank God that those who are gifted in technology can still recognize mystery.

This man was reached by phone and personally prayed with.

If something doesn’t work might it be that God has another plan?

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Can This Machine Run?

Posted on February 17, 2012 by jroesler728

Can you make this machine run? A friend advised me that a snow blower that I am trying to keep running might be beyond repair. “It is cheaply made,” he explained. I was surprised to hear this discouraging report because the paint is still shiny. It is only being used for a second year, but getting it started and keeping it running has made me hope it doesn’t snow. But is it really hopeless?

Before I made funeral arrangements for this snow blower I decided to ask another friend for his opinion. His answer was immediate. “Of course it can run. All an engine needs to run is fuel, compression and spark.” I became intrigued with this second opinion and eager to learn from this innovative artist for whom anything is possible. He taught me about the carburetor and I watched as every part was cleaned, installed and checked. When he was satisfied he pulled the cord for a manual start and the machine roared to life.

I went home and looked up the definition of fuel, compression and spark. This is what I learned. Fuel is any material that stores energy that can later be extracted to perform mechanical work in a controlled manner. Compression is force that tends to shorten or squeeze something, decreasing its volume. The term spark ignition is used to describe the system with which the air-fuel mixture inside the combustion chamber of an internal combustion engine is ignited by a spark. The resulting controlled explosion delivers the power to turn the reciprocating mass inside the engine.

Considering all of this leads me to ponder the work of the Holy Spirit in my life. The Spirit fills me with energy that can be released through me in His time. That with which He fills me in the morning is compressed by the experiences of the day He ordains so, that when the energy is released, it has increased in power but decreased in volume. (Especially if it refers to my talking.) And finally, the Holy Spirit is the spark that prompts action and delivers power.

Time will tell which mechanic’s appraisal of this snow blower was correct, but I am grateful for the mechanical lesson that has provided me with an analogy of how the Holy Spirit works in my life.

 Lord, produce a controlled explosion in and through me today.

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Let the Drum Beat

Posted on February 15, 2012 by jroesler728

I attended a meeting this week where the now predictable comment on music in the church surfaced: “the drums are too loud.”

I worshipped this morning at a service where the drumbeat was palpable, but the Spirit was so unleashed that the drum was muted. 

Is it possible that the control button for the volume level of the drum is in my heart?

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Asking Good Questions

Posted on February 13, 2012 by jroesler728

A friend recently asked, “What does it mean to call God personal?”

I answered: For me it means hope. God is real in a way that makes Him knowable to me, even if that knowing is like a sliver from an oak tree. He really feels, He really responds, He is really making me into who He originally meant me to be. Then I will be able to fully enjoy a personal relationship with him. To be personal is to be relational, something that we strive for and stumble at here. It means there will then be an answer to loneliness.

I am glad my friend asked the question.

I am glad that I was prompted to think about it, search my mind and heart and answer. The dialogue, though all by way of technology, nurtured my soul.

Do you have anyone who asks good questions? Do you ask good questions? Do you have any good questions for me?

I will watch for your comments.

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Letting God Get a Word In

Posted on February 10, 2012 by jroesler728

We all have found ourselves in conversation with a person where we wonder if they will ever stop talking so we can get a word in. We are longing for dialogue but instead feel we are listening to a monologue.

I wonder if God feels that way when we pray.

We often go to prayer with an urgent list of needs that we want God to respond to in ways that we understand. It is like meeting with a friend and already knowing what you are going to say before the conversation begins.

There is a real place for this pattern of prayer and God is gracious in meeting us there. But, I would like to invite you to join me this week in a prayer pattern where we begin by sitting quietly with God and asking Him what He would like to talk about. Maybe He will surprise us by bringing to mind that which is on His heart that we have not noticed.

Maybe He will use what you have read in His word as the topic for your prayer.

This morning as I read John 13, I was reminded that when Jesus knew His time on earth was short He ramped up His expression of love toward His disciples. It prompted me to pray that as Seniors we would use the chapters of our lives that we have left to be people who overflow with love more generously than ever before in our lives.

I am looking forward to comments on this post. I would love to learn what God says to you when you ask Him what He is interested in discussing with you. Let’s listen together as we stand amazed that God really wants to talk to us.

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What Does He hold Together?

Posted on February 8, 2012 by jroesler728

I have often been intrigued by the verse in Colossians 1:17 that references Jesus and says that in Him all things hold together. I understand it from a theological perspective and believe that there is a picture too big for me to comprehend in which this is absolutely and experientially true.

Yet, in most of our daily lives, we would be less than honest if we didn’t say that we see things coming apart. We acknowledge that we are broken people living in a broken world. Maybe it is like the seemingly random healings that Jesus did when he walked this earth.  On occasion we recognize that something is being mysteriously held together and we have no way to explain it.

This happened to me last week when I met a Senior Adult friend who has been having problems with back pain. She had returned from her orthopedic consultation and x-ray findings. She told me quite calmly that the spinal fusion she had had 5-6 years ago had never healed. The plates that were screwed in to hold the vertebrae in place where just hanging off the bones like Popsicle sticks. I asked her to tell me again as I was trying to reconcile this report with her leaning quite casually on her walker, standing upright and radiating with peace and joy.

On hearing a repetition of this same report I asked, “Then what is holding your back together?” She answered quickly with a confidence that closed the conversation. She simply declared, “The Lord!”

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The Teacher Waits

Posted on February 6, 2012 by jroesler728

We have a weekly Senior Adult prayer group that usually begins with the singing of a couple of old familiar hymns. One of our Seniors, in her mid 80’s, is a remarkably gifted pianist that adds strength to our weak voices and rhythm to our faltering pace. This lady is also a piano teacher. I took two lessons from her two years ago. (Taking more lessons is on the “want to do” list that I never get to.) But these two lessons were enough for me to know that she is a perfectionist and expects the same in her students.

I did take piano lessons as a child but after the piano teacher’s dog bit me my parents were not able to make me go back. Therefore, I play the piano with many mistakes but when there is no one else to play, I place my hands on the keyboard and do the best I can.

There have been a few times when I started playing the hymns at this prayer group, but when the pianist walked in (late), I would shout for joy, jump off the bench and insist that she take over.

Today, she was not there for the beginning of the hymns. They seemed particularly difficult today and I even wondered if I needed glasses as I strained to see the notes and somehow transfer their meaning to my fingers as they stumbled over the keys. When we finally got to the end of the last verse of the last hymn I breathed a sigh of relief.

As I was getting up from the bench the pianist/teacher walked in. She smiled at me and said, “Good job.” She had been waiting outside the door so that I couldn’t jump up and ask her to finish.

In John 13 Jesus refers to Himself as the Teacher. I wonder if when I think I am doing some work for Him, He is just behind the door waiting for me to finish so He can say, “Well done.” I wonder if it is only grace that allows me to be involved in that which the Master could effortlessly do without me.

I am grateful for a Teacher that waits.

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When a Nightmare Is a Wide-Awake Reality

Posted on February 3, 2012 by jroesler728

I don’t often remember my dreams but there have been times when I have had a nightmare and I am so relieved when I wake up and am able to comfort myself with the realization that it wasn’t real; that it was a only a dream. But, what do I do when the nightmare happens in broad daylight when I am wide-awake and there is no escaping that it is actually happening? The suffering of someone you love can be an example of this. When you think that the worst is already happening, something worse is added.

I recognize that I have a bias that there should be a quota for how much suffering each person is allowed. I don’t see that “quota” respected in real life.

I recognize that I am driven to do something that will deescalate suffering for someone I love. I don’t see that I have the power to control suffering.

I believe that God is strong and God is loving.  This means He can and He cares enough to want to.

Is this a place where the Sacrifice of Praise needs to me made? Is this a place where I bring my analysis of what is happening regarding the friend I love and even my discouragement with the God I worship and lay it all on the alter.

When there is a sacrifice something needs to die.  Before I can praise I need to add my hopes, understandings and despair to the sacrificial fire and praise the God whose ways are higher than mine, whose love is deeper than mine, and whose power is greater than mine.

Today I am driven to offer the Sacrifice of Praise.  Will you sing with me?

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