Category Archives: Faithful

Two Doors Down

Faithful, God's love, Live Like Jesus, Prayer

By Kristen Mudrack

Perhaps the hardest thing about moving is making new friends.

And I don’t mean friends you can hang out with and have a good time with.  I mean friends that you can share everything with – the exciting things, but also the hard things – in your marriage, your kids, your eating habits, your exercise (or lack thereof) habits, your fears, and your dreams, your quiet times and your prayers.  Those friends don’t come overnight, and they take time.

When I lived in Michigan, I had that group of friends.  I didn’t have it immediately – it took a couple of years.  But I had a group of women who I could share anything with, and they could too.

Then I moved.  Twice.

I still have those friends, but they aren’t a quick car ride away anymore.  I still can tell them anything.  I still talk to them regularly.  I still count them among the people who know me best. But it’s not the same.

When I moved to TN, God knew that I’d need a friend or two, and he provided.  The day I moved into my new apartment, leaving my fiance back in IN, the other new professor in the department and his family moved in too.  Two doors down from me in the same apartment complex.

In talking to each other that day and in the days to come, we discovered that we had all grown up in the same area, attended similar churches, and so much more.  Their four year old daughter came over to my apartment and “helped” me unpack the day I moved in.  Their two year old now knows me as ‘Tisten’ and runs to hug me every time he sees me.  We started having dinner together once a week.

When Cody would come to visit me, we’d go over and play with the kids and play games with the whole family.  The kids loved Cody because he could do magic tricks with cards.  Now this family is our closest friends here in TN.  We share much together, and they even made the trip out to our wedding.

God provided more than I ever could have imagined in this family – friends who we hope to be near for many years to come.  I love this family, and am privileged to get to live life alongside them.  Two doors down, in fact.

Guest Post: Whiplash

Do Something, dreams, Faithful, Guest Post, Patience, Prayer

I only had the privilege of living with Jen in college for a year, but that year was one of transformation and change and following God’s will for both of us.  After our senior year, Jen went on to Princeton, where she competed seminary and has since been working at a church in North Carolina.  I have always admired Jen’s way of looking at life, and have appreciated the conversations we’ve had since leaving college.  It is a privilege to invite Jen to share on the blog today.  

By Jen Christianson

Sometimes my life as a minister gives me whiplash.

Today, I spent the afternoon in a retreat to close our summer internship program, celebrating a summer of grace and growth, and grieving the end and the necessary goodbyes.

Immediately after, I drove to the nearest hospital to visit with a congregant in his eighties, who’d survived a tricky heart surgery. He has a long road of recovery ahead, but in so many ways it’s a fresh chapter: life snatched back from death.

The end of one chapter. The beginning of another.

There are too many days like this, sometimes. Too many funerals and baptisms in the same week.

At times, I find it easier (but never actually easy) to strike a balance, and then there are days I scarcely know what to do.

I had a lot of those days in Kenya.

I visited earlier this summer with a group from my church, seventeen other travelers on a ten-day trip to reconnect with friends and ministry partners in and around Nairobi.

For fourteen of us, it was our first time there. And so everything was jarring, everything new, everything a revelation.

And I had whiplash all over again.

Except it looked like this: laughing children next to open sewers in the middle of the slum. Students learning in broken down buildings without light, without air.

Joy next to suffering. Light in the darkest places. Abundant hospitality in villages that know only poverty.

How can it be? How does this happen?

I kept remembering the question from John 1, the incredulous tone: Can anything good come from Nazareth?

And the answer: come and see.

Come and see that even in the midst of great hardship, there is blessing. Come and see the people who laugh and sing even when their stomachs are empty. Come and listen to the friends that we met there, young men like Jeff.

Jeff lives in Mathare, Nairobi’s second-largest slum, giving shelter to half a million people in an area about half a square mile. He is an exception to many rules, not a statistic: he has not succumbed to drugs, alcohol, violence or gangs. He spends his time in a ministry that seeks out young people in the slums, to make sure they know the same path is open to them. He spends Friday nights in church.

But to walk the streets where Jeff grew up, to stand in the classroom he spent years in as a student, and to sit and hear him talk about a God who protects and provides for him is to be profoundly confused. At how this kind of faith can grow, well – here.

I felt that way. Until one night, in our group devotions, when a fellow traveler made this observation: “the people we’ve met,” she said, “have so little. But because of their faith, they have so much. We have so much, and yet, because of our faith…we really don’t have much at all.”

And then I realized: I want Jeff’s faith.

I want to cling tightly once more to the idea that God cares about me, and is at work, all the time, doing something good in my life. I want to sleep secure in the conviction that God protects and watches over me. I want to pray with confidence that I will be heard and answered – even if it’s in ways I didn’t ask for or don’t understand.

I want to walk with intention again, the life of a disciple. To be guided by faith. To follow wherever God leads.

And I’m learning that God often leads straight into a whole lot of whiplash, that messy pairing together of things that just don’t go, that don’t make sense.

A savior who comes to a peasant girl in a stable. A Lord who eats with criminals and lepers and prostitutes. Life out of death. Hope out of despair. Light out of darkness.

The life of a disciple, I think, means witnessing to this kind of illogical, confusing, astonishing, grace and power. It means standing in the middle of these contradictions and proclaiming “yes” to all of them. Yes, God is in these both; yes, something good can come out of Nazareth.

It means remembering that the God who made us all will make it all well, bring it all together, in the end.

Thanks be to God.

Here We Go Again

Do Something, dreams, Faithful, Live Like Jesus, Testimony

Two weeks ago, I packed up my life in boxes, loaded a truck, and drove south.

If this sounds like deja vu, you’re not wrong.  I did this almost exactly one year ago, too.  And it was just as hard.

Last time I moved to the cornfields, this time I moved to the mountains.  Last time I only crossed one state line, this time I crossed four.  Last time I left behind a group of trusted friends and “adopted” nieces and nephews, this time I left behind all of that and a fiance.  Last time I knew it was a temporary move, this time I hope it’s permanent.

Funny how God calls you outside of your comfort zone, lets you get comfortable and then moves you outside of it again.

In my case, it has literally been moving me across the country.  And I wouldn’t have it any other way.

I can be a little bit like Moses, stuttering that I don’t have what it takes, that I’m not worthy, that God has to have the wrong person.  But God still manages to use me, to change me, to grow me into a woman after His own heart.  All because I choose to follow even though I don’t really know what He’s got in mind.

If I hadn’t gone to Michigan, I wouldn’t have the incredible friends and adopted nieces and nephews that I do.  If I hadn’t gone to Indiana, I never would have met my fiance.  If I hadn’t gone to Tennessee…well, we’ll see what God has in store.

For now, I’ll start by opening my home to people, teaching my students, opening my office door, and getting involved in a church.  And I’ll keep my ears and my eyes open for whatever God has in store, knowing that He has prepared me for anything He calls me to do.

Guest Post: Meno

Broken, dreams, Faithful, Guest Post, Prayer, Testimony

When I lived in Michigan, God brought me some incredible friends whom I have cherished greatly.  Our group of women (and their respective husbands and children) became a group I loved to get together with for anything – games, Bible study, babysitting, or girl’s night.  No matter what each of us is going through, we are always there for each other.  Last year, one of these friends, Heidi, went through a difficult miscarriage.  There were no words we could say, only hugs and shared tears and shoulders to cry on.  Heidi has written these words for you today, no matter what you are going through.  No matter how hard, God is still faithful.  It is truly an honor to invite Heidi to write for All For Him Life today.  

By Heidi O’Neill

Sometimes life just doesn’t make sense.  Sometimes you are rolling along and out of nowhere you get horrible news.  You’re knocked flat on your back and gasping for air, head reeling as you try to come to terms with your new reality.  Maybe for you it was hearing of a sudden death of a family member, a bad diagnosis, your spouse leaving you, or losing your job.  For me it was an ultra sound and a doctor telling me words that my ears would not register – we had lost our daughter to miscarriage.

We had a rocky first trimester but had made it to the second trimester.  My nausea and fatigue had lifted, our doctor felt that we only needed routine care from that point on, and we felt like we were spared.  We felt assured that our fervent prayers and those of our friends and family had been answered.

But then the spotting returned and I set up to go in for a heartbeat check later that day.  I went by myself because we had been told that spotting could just be a part of this pregnancy.  Two nurses couldn’t find the heartbeat.  “Sometimes we just can’t find the heartbeat with the Doppler at this point in the pregnancy,” the nurse told me.  “You are next in line for the ultra sound, we’ll check this out .”  I held out hope while I called my husband and waited for my turn in the ultra sound room.  It had always turned out fine so far.  We prayed together and held our breath.  Nothing could have prepared my heart to hear my doctor explain that although I should I have been 15 weeks pregnant my baby had died around 12 weeks.  We would never get to meet that sweet child here on earth.  Of all the hard things I have been through, nothing had ever rocked my faith like this.

My heart was full of questions.  So many questions.  Why her?  Why my little one?  How could she have died nearly three weeks ago without me knowing anything was wrong?  Why were there no symptoms earlier?  How was I going to tell my 2 year old son who couldn’t wait to be a big brother?  How was I ever going to be ok again?  How was I ever going to trust God again? How can a God who loves let something hurt me like this?  If God really loved me, why did he let this happen?  If God is all powerful, why didn’t he answer these prayers? Why her?  Why us?  Why does this happen to any little ones at all?

Why does a good God allow such awful things to happen to those he loves?

Through the moments, days, and weeks that followed I knew that I should trust God.  I’m a rule-following, people-pleaser by nature and inclined to “do the right thing.”  I told my heart, “trust God, he loves you,” but my mind hurled back more questions, doubts, and plenty of anger.  I knew that in all of the anger and pain I couldn’t make her come back.  I couldn’t fix this, and I couldn’t make it stop hurting.

God turned my mind to one word, meno.  I had fallen in love with this word from a Bible Study of 1 John I did last fall (What Love Is by Kelly Minter).  Meno is greek for remain, abide.  We had studied and looked deeply at this word, specifically in the passage where John calls believers to “remain in the truth.”  It is hard to force yourself to believe something.  I’m strong willed, but even I only have so much will power.  The most precious thing about this word is that it is translated in all of these ways: abide, be held in, wait with expectancy, continue in.

Be held in the truth.

God doesn’t expect us to be faithful to him on our own.  He sent his Spirit to live in us.  The power of God living in us, is helping us to remain in his truth.  He is helping us.  He was and is helping me.  God also warns us that “in this world we will have trouble,” and “Do not be surprised when you face trials of many kinds.”  He knows there would be hard things that will weigh on us and be painful.  When we walk through those things our hearts can feel betrayed.  It is hard to see why a loving God would allow us to walk through such suffering.  Our hearts can be prone to wander and wonder if God even loves us at all.  That is exactly why John calls us to remain in the truth – the truth of the Gospel.

You see, the Gospel is that God created and loves humanity.  He cares for us, provides for us, and in return we have sinned against him over and over and over again.  The Bible tells us that the wages for sin is death and that there is nothing we can do to pay that price.  Yet God, being full of mercy, gave up his own son to pay for our sin.  He sent  Jesus to die a painful, criminal’s death, paying for the sins of the world even though he was sinless.  Jesus died to pay the price for our sin so that through his work we could be forgiven and reconciled to God.  That is the truth.  That is love.  The truth of the Gospel, is that God does love me and gave himself up to be with me.

So in the pain I hold to that truth.  I hold onto it for dear life reminding myself that God is with me, that his promises are true even when it doesn’t feel like it.  It hasn’t been easy and there have been plenty of bad days.   Walking through this suffering I have let this word meno remind me to hold onto the truth of God’s love as well as other truths of scripture.

“I will never leave you or forsake you.” (Heb. 13:5)

“I will strengthen you, help you, I will uphold you with my righteous right hand.” (Isaiah 41:10)

“You have kept count of my tossings; put my tears in your bottle.” (Psalm 56:8)

“in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.” (Romans 8:28)

“God is near to the broken hearted and saves the crushed in spirit.” (Psalm 34:18)

As I have clung to these truths and prayed for strength and peace I don’t want you to think that my questions just went away.  I continued to feel angry, hurt, and so, so sad.  This made me think a lot about Job and how he wrestled with God through questions too.

One Sunday our pastor shared a video about Job(Reading Scripture: Job http://bit.ly/2n5ta5a).  Job went through awful things too.  He suffered and questioned why.  I was surprised that the video pointed out thought that the question of why bad things happen to good people is never answered in his book.  When Job questions God and demands his explanations God does not give him an explanation like he wants.  Instead he shows him that Job is not able to fill the position of God of the Universe and that he cannot understand all of God’s ways.  God invites Job to trust him and his wisdom when hard things happen.

Like Job, I am humbled by God’s awesome power.  I could never dream of running the world.  It is impossible for me to see how all of the pieces of life fit together.  So when hard things come I lean hard into God.  I still ask my questions, and beg for peace, but now I also pray for greater trust.  I pray that God will increase my trust in him and in his wisdom and sovereignty.  I feel so sad and upset that Lilly died, but I do acknowledge there must be more going on that God knew about and I did not.  I pray that God will help me continue to lean hard into him and be assured of his love and good plans for my life.

The day after I delivered Lilly I got the word “meno” tattooed on my left wrist.  I am so forgetful of God’s love and promises that I wanted myself to have a constant, visual reminder to remain in his truth.  I wanted to remind myself that I am held there by the power of the Holy Spirit and I don’t need to do it on my own.  When I see it I pick a truth to focus on and pray that God would help me believe it in my heart more than I know it in my head.

He is faithful.  He is walking with me and is answering those prayers.

He wants to walk with you too.  I pray that you will open your heart to him and let him love you and hold you in his truth too.

The Greatest Commandment

Crazy Love, Faithful, God's love, Live Like Jesus, Truth

By Kristen Entwistle

“How would my life change if I actually thought of each person I came into contact with as Christ – the person driving painfully slow in front of me, the checker at the grocery store who seems more interested in chatting than ringing up my items, the member of my own family with whom I can’t seem to have a conversation and not get annoyed?  If we believe that, as Jesus said, the two greatest commands are to ‘love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, and mind’ and to ‘love your neighbor as yourself,’ then this passage has a lot to teach us.  Basically, Christ is connecting the command to ‘love God’ with the command to ‘love your neighbor.’  By loving ‘the least of these,’ we are loving God himself.”  (Francis Chan, Crazy Love)

Throughout the Gospels, the writers record conversations that Jesus had with teachers of the law.  These teachers thought they had it all figured out.  They had their laws and their ceremonies and their rituals and customs.  They thought that if you followed everything to a T, that you’d be fine.  You’d be delivered from your sin and in right standing with God.

Then Jesus came and turned their world upside down.

Jesus came to fulfill the law, not abolish it.  But He had a different way of doing things than the teachers of the law.  He ate with tax collectors and sinners rather than the kings and priests.  He wasn’t afraid to heal a sick man on the Sabbath.  He walked with sinful people rather than try to prove He was better than them.

I love Jesus’ answer to the teachers of the law in Matthew 22.  The expert in the law is trying to trap Jesus, as they so often did, and asks, “Teacher, what is the greatest Commandment in the law?”

Jesus replied: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.” (Matthew 22:37-40)

The teacher of the law knew that there were hundreds of laws in the Old Testament that Jesus could have chosen.  And to the teachers of the law, all commands were important.  You couldn’t be right with God unless you upheld not just one, but all of the commands.  The teacher of the law was probably a little stunned by this answer from Jesus.  It probably didn’t make a whole lot of sense to him because it wasn’t about sacrifices for sins or not working on the Sabbath.

Unless you just love to study Leviticus and Deuteronomy and all of the hundreds of laws that the Israelites were given by God, you’ve probably not cared about the command to not boil a young goat in its mother’s milk (Exodus 23:19) or to not wear clothing woven of two kinds of material (Leviticus 19:19).  So why do we care about these two commands that Jesus mentions in Matthew 22?

All of the laws that the Israelites had to follow back in the day hang on these two commands.  All of the laws and customs and seemingly insignificant verses in the first few books of the Bible were to turn the people’s attention to God alone.  To give them parameters to live by so that they would love the Lord with all of their heart, soul, mind, and strength.  It wasn’t possible for them to do so on their own.  All of those other commands of not stealing, not lying, not coveting what your neighbor has – those fall under the second greatest command – to love your neighbor as yourself.

The laws that the Israelites were given weren’t to make them annoyed by all the little details.  They were to create a framework in which the Israelites could live together as a people and could worship the One true God with everything they had.  Now, I’d be a horrible teacher if I didn’t point out that they failed miserably on many occasions.  But that doesn’t mean that God didn’t still continue to pursue them, his chosen people, and continue to give them chance after chance after chance to turn back to him.

All of the laws and the things that the Prophets said were to fulfill the two commands that Jesus mentions in Matthew 22.  So it makes sense that Jesus would remind the teachers of the law that this was what they were really after.  Not making sure that no one did any work on the Sabbath.  Or inspecting the clothes their people wore to make sure it wasn’t some polyester blend.  But loving the Lord with all their heart, soul, mind, and strength, and loving their neighbor as themselves.

But what does that mean for us?  We don’t live in the age when we have to make sacrifices at the temple or worry about what we eat or wear.  Those rules don’t apply to us anymore because Christ came and was the ultimate sacrifice for our sins.  But that doesn’t mean that we can ignore the greatest commands.

To many people, these two commands seem disconnected and disjointed.  What does one have to do with the other?

“By loving the least of these, we are loving God himself.”  (Francis Chan)

How would your view of these commandments change if you thought of each person you came into contact with as Jesus?  Each annoying student in your class, each person you pass on the street, each child who cries in the middle of the Sunday service.

My challenge to you (and to me) is to keep the two greatest commandments connected, not separate.  To love God, and to love people as if they were God himself.  To keep these commandments in everything we do.

I never said it was easy.  But it is what we have been commanded to do.

Immeasurably More

Faithful, Prayer, Testimony, Truth, , ,

By Kristen Entwistle

I was cleaning out my desk the other day and found something pretty amazing: God’s provision.

I’m packing up my apartment to move a few hours away, and so, naturally, I was cleaning out my desk – you know, throwing away old papers that I really shouldn’t have kept in the first place, getting rid of the things that I just threw in the drawer over the last four years…and I came across some old cards.

I tend to keep things…probably longer than I should. But be that as it may, I’m glad that I kept these.  They’re cards from very dear friends that were written as I was graduating college and moving to Michigan.  I opened them up and started reading them…smiling at the memories and laughing at the inside jokes from long ago.

And as I opened each card, the same thing kept staring me in the face.  Each of these people who were so dear to me had written similar things, among the jokes and stories and laughs.  Each of them had said that they were praying I would find a good, Godly church in Michigan.  That God would bring me good friends at all of the right turns in my life.  That God would provide.

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And He has provided – all of those things.  More than I could ever have imagined.

He brought me to a church, where I have been able to serve and love and grow, where I have been blessed with a family of God that is so dear to me.  It’s been a place where I have seen the kids I watch grow up and change and learn.  Where a Sunday doesn’t go by that I don’t get a hug from at least one of my little ones, brightening even the darkest week.  Where I have been encouraged to lead and to write and to serve.  Where I have been loved.  Where I have walked life with some amazing people – the hard times and the good times.

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God has not only brought me good friends – He has brought me great ones.  Friends that I am going to miss terribly, but who will remain friends for the rest of my life.  Friends who challenge me, encourage me – friends who have changed me for the better.  Friends who let me love their kids – and who love me.  Friends who share life with me – and I with them.  Friends who pray with me and for me and let me pray for them.  Friends who have shown me the love of Christ.

When I read those cards four years ago for the first time, I trusted that God would provide through the prayers of my friends.  But I didn’t know until now, reading them again, just how much He has provided.  So if you’re wondering if God is good – let me remind you.  He is.  If you’re doubting that He can provide what it is you need – let me remind you.  He can, and He will.  If you’re in the middle of a trying season, and you’re hanging on for dear life – let me encourage you.  He’s got you.  He’s not gonna let go.  He will provide – and He will do immeasurably more than you could ever ask or imagine.

Fifteen Minutes

Faithful, Patience, Prayer, , , ,

By Kristen Entwistle

I was a distance swimmer in college.  The 1000 yard and 1650 yard (the mile) races were my favorite.

I think what I loved about it was that for ten or fifteen minutes, no one expected me to do anything but swim. 

Out of the water, every fifteen minutes was full of chaos and expectations and multi-tasking.  I was expected to have an answer for everything – what assignment was due tomorrow for any class, what lab the general chemistry students were doing this week, how my doctors were handling my latest illness, what songs we were singing at church this week, when choir was performing at church, when our next swim meet was, how much time I needed to drop to make the cut for any event…

But for those precious minutes in the water, all I had to do was swim.

Even now, when my life feels overwhelming, and the change is impending, and my to-do list is a mile and a half long, I wish for those fifteen minutes again. 

And I realize that I don’t only want those fifteen minutes – I need them.

I need that time to rest in God and in His promises.  I need that time to recharge, reset, and renew.

It’s not much, but it is enough for today.  Tomorrow, I’ll need it again.  Fifteen minutes.

rest

I believe. But help my unbelief.

Faithful, God's love, Prayer, Truth, , , , , ,

By Kristen Entwistle

It’s never quite the way you plan it, is it?  Life?

One day, you wake up, thinking it’s all going to be all right, and then – bam.  You get thrown a curve ball that you never expected.

A few weeks ago, my family faced one of those curve balls: the unexpected and largely unexplained disappearance and death of my uncle.

What do you say when something like that happens?  How do you make sense of the seemingly unexplainable?  How do you cope with the gaping hole that is left in his place – of a father, a husband, an uncle, a friend, a surgeon, a brother?  Where do you find peace in the midst of such turmoil?

“Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you.  I do not give to you as the world gives.  Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid.”  John 14:27

Hold on a second, God.  In the midst of all of this, I’m supposed to just not let my heart be troubled?  You’re telling me this is easy?  And just don’t be afraid.  Sure.  That’s just easy peasy.  But your peace, your shalom, can I feel that today?  Can you give me some more of that today?

“I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace.  In this world you will have trouble.  But take heart!  I have overcome the world.” John 16:33

Great, thanks for that reminder, God.  This life isn’t going to be a piece of cake, and we will have trouble.  Right old ray of sunshine you are.  But, you have overcome the world, even overcome death.  At a time like this, that’s easy to lose sight of.  But thank you for the reminder, and for overcoming the world.  It made all the difference.

john

“There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under heaven: a time to weep and a time to laugh, a time to mourn and a time to dance.” Ecclesiastes 2:1,4

Yes, a time for everything.  Even Jesus wept at the tomb of Lazarus.  But remember what He said just before He went to the tomb, to Martha? 

“I am the resurrection and the life.  He who believes in me will live, even though he dies; and whoever lives and believes in me will never die.  Do you believe this?”  John 11: 25-26

Yes, Lord.  I believe.  But help my unbelief. 

I don’t have all the answers.  I can’t explain why my uncle’s life was ended on this earth.  I don’t know how best to fill the hole that is left in his absence.  But I do know where to start finding peace:  At the foot of the cross, in the arms of Jesus.

Challenges, Speedbumps, and Mountains

Faithful, God's love, Live Like Jesus, Waiting, , , ,

I started off 2016/ended 2015 with this facebook status:

Honestly, I’m glad that 2015 is going to be in the rearview mirror. Praying that 2016’s challenges and speedbumps and mountains will be weathered with God’s grace and strength, not my own.

And boy, what a 2016 it’s been so far.

Challenges, speedbumps, and mountains?  Check, check, and check.

I can’t give you all the details (because I don’t know all of them myself) but suffice it to say that every area of my life has been … well, for lack of any other words, jumbled up … this year.

I am facing a year of giant changes.  I don’t know yet where these changes will take me – or when.  But I do know that God is unchanging.  Unyielding.  Immovable.

I am facing a year of the unknown.  I don’t know what is going to happen in this year, but I do know that God is all-knowing.  All-loving.  All-powerful.

2016 not my own

I am facing more than a year of challenges – I am facing a lifetime.  A lifetime of things that I don’t expect, don’t understand, and won’t soon forget.  But it’s a lifetime of challenges weathered with the God of the Universe on my side.

I am facing more than a year of speedbumps – I am facing a lifetime.  Some speedbumps may throw me for a loop, while others may slow me down.  But it’s a lifetime of speedbumps faced with my God in the driver’s seat.

I am facing more than a year of mountains – I am facing a lifetime.  I will climb, and I will fall.  And when I get to the top, there will be more mountains to climb. But it’s a lifetime of climbing mountains with the Lord of Creation by my side.

I can’t do this, but God can.  And He will.  Every step of the way, He is with me.  No matter what challenges, speedbumps and mountains come my way, I will not be shaken.  I will not be moved.  Because my God is with me, and He will never leave or forsake me.  Amen and amen.

 

More Than Just A Number

Broken, dreams, Faithful

By Kristen Entwistle

I am a Christian.  And I am a scientist.  And sometimes, I get caught up in the numbers, the data, and the predictions.  Particularly when it comes to CF. 

Because my life, for many years, revolved around a number.  37.5.  It was my expiration date.  What medical science said my life would be.  And the scientist in me held onto that.  Through the fault of no one else, I somehow had it through my head that my life had an end point and that I knew at least a general idea of when that would be.  I used to count up the years that I would spend in school, through a PhD program – when I finish I will be in my late 20s.  How many years did that leave me to make an impact?  To do something worthwhile with my life?

I’ve known forever that we can’t know the day or the time or how we’ll go home to the Lord.  It’s been engrained in my head for over two decades.  But somehow, the science and the medicine and the numbers had impeded my faith.

Because it’s not true.  I’m more than just a number.  More than just a disease.  More than just another n in a paper.    I’m more than just my life expectancy. 

number 1

My life already does mean something: because Christ has saved me and set me free from the bondage of sin.  I don’t need to worry about making an impact in this world, because all I can really do is lay down my life at the foot of the cross and ask God to use my life for His glory.

I am living for more than just a number.  I am living for the King of Kings, the Savior of the World.  I have been freely given salvation, grace, and mercy, and the promise of a better life in heaven, where there will be no more pain, no more sickness, and no more death.  I can’t wait for that. 

number 2

But as much as I am looking forward to that, I am going to, to borrow a phrase from La Vida, be here now.  I’ve got to live in the here and now, a vessel for God to use, no matter what.  I’ve got to choose to give the numbers to God, and trust Him to see me through, and to call me home in His timing.