Fitting the Pieces Together

Over the last few years, I have enjoyed puzzling. By this I mean working puzzles. I have strangely found it relaxing, sitting at a table and sorting pieces by shape or color, taking time to notice details and reach for that missing piece. When my kids want to watch a movie I’m not interested in, I’ll sit in the back of the room, sipping tea and puzzling. When I need a minute to myself, I’ll turn on an audiobook and get lost in the story and sorting pieces. We now have a round table in the basement affectionately called the puzzle table, although we do sometimes have to move my setup and use it for other things.

However, I have found I’m somewhat particular in my preferred puzzles. I have one puzzle that’s 2000 pieces and it almost broke me. I generally reach for 750-1000 piece options. I like beautiful pictures or something sentimental. Or cats and flowers. Anything with a cat or flowers. I have worked a few mystery puzzles, where you don’t know what the end result will be and those are fun.

As I’ve sat in my chair, turning over pieces, scanning the scene of already completed portions, I noticed many similarities between working a puzzle and studying the Bible. Of course, like all analogies, it falls apart in some places but I found it very helpful to think through this way.

Some pieces seem confusing until you view them in the whole puzzle.

Often, as I’m beginning a puzzle and sorting pieces by color or edge, it’s impossible to tell what that piece represents. Is this black piece part of the cat or the night sky? We don’t know until we put other pieces together and can see where it fits in the whole. When we study the Bible and we only focus on certain books, some of the accounts seem strange. Why did God give us page after page of cleansing rituals in Leviticus? Why does Judges record such evil and hard to read stories of wickedness? When we read chapters or verses or stories in isolation, it’s like looking at a piece of a puzzle and deciding it’s not necessary because it doesn’t look like anything else in the puzzle.

This verse could be the theme of the entire blog post but II Timothy 3:16 says, “All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness.” ALL Scripture. Every section that is included, God preserved for a purpose. The pieces might seem strange in isolation but they all point to who God is and the redemption story woven throughout the Bible. The seemingly random lists of rituals show how God wanted his people to live differently than the other nations. God is holy and perfect and he wanted his people to live in light of that reality. The stories of evil in Judges give proof to what happens when everyone does what is right in his eyes instead of living by God’s commands. They also serve as a contrast to Ruth in the next book.

Just as we don’t discard puzzle pieces we don’t think are necessary, we should never discount parts of the Bible as unimportant because we don’t understand them or they make us uncomfortable. God preserved His Word the way he chose.

All the pieces are important.

This ties in with the first point but it’s worth repeating. One of the most frustrating things in putting a puzzle together is when you are missing that final piece. It’s enough to make you feel crazy. You start crawling on the floor, looking under every possible thing, interrogating your family to make sure no one carried a piece away {yes, that’s happened to me}. Even though you can see the final picture fine without that one piece, it’s frustrating! And so it is in Bible study when we forget that all 66 books form one cohesive story. Maybe we can recognize the redemption arc through the Old Testament and how it foretells the Savior coming to save us. But there’s that one story that bothers us so we want to cut it out of the biblical narrative. It doesn’t fit our 21st century minds so clearly it’s not worth studying and it doesn’t matter because we still believe in salvation!

Don’t be trapped into this thinking! Again, God in his sovereignty preserved His Word just as he wanted us to know it. He could have given us more, he could have given us less. He could have taken out the bits that make us scratch our head. But he didn’t. Every word of the Bible is inspired — literally God breathed — and therefore deserves our attention. Even if we know what the picture looks like, we want to find and place every piece where it belongs.

Border pieces serve a purpose.

I’ve never worked a puzzle with someone who didn’t put the border up first. These edge and corner pieces are distinct because one side is flat; you know they go around the perimeter of the puzzle and all the other pieces will fit inside. In terms of Bible study, while we read various passages and dig deeper into specific parts, we need to keep in mind our border pieces or framework. We know the whole of Scripture fits together and it is ALL profitable, valuable, etc. {II Tim 3:16}. When we read something that confuses us, instead of discarding it we need to return to our border pieces. I like to think of the border as two truths: the over arching story of redemption and who God is. When we view all the interior pieces, every verse that makes up those 66 books in the Bible, we come back to these two things that are containing them {much like the border of the puzzle}.

Why are they important? Because they help us understand why certain events and people are given space in the Bible. When we read the laws for offerings and cleansings in Leviticus and the complete wickedness happening in the time of the Judges, it’s easy to say those don’t matter today and we can ignore those books. However, ALL Scripture is profitable for teaching us so we ask what the lesson is. When we consider these books in the framework of asking, "What does this tell me about God” instead of, “What am I supposed to do with this” it keeps us from throwing out portions we don’t like. Because all the Bible shows us something about God and his plan of redemption.

Leviticus teaches us God’s holiness cannot abide sin and he wanted {and still wants} his people to be set apart and different from the world. If the heathen culture was doing it, you don’t! We must keep in mind, Israel had been in Egypt for 400 years. They were surrounded by idolatry, pagan worship practices, and temple sacrifices to false gods. In Leviticus, God is telling them how he will be worshipped and how he wants them to live. And even though we don’t practice sin offerings or uncleanness until evening standards, these things should humble us to realize how serious sin is and how holy God is. Judges shows what happens when we forget God and everyone lives the way he wants. It shows people standing up against the culture for God and how God uses them. It shows how wicked people can be when they choose to wallow in sin. And it also shows God’s faithfulness. Israel abandoned him again and again for other gods, but he continued to send judges to rescue them physically from their enemies {think Samson, Gideon} and to point them toward their need of a perfect Judge {Jesus}.

Remembering these border pieces keep us grounded when we study and keep us from looking to ourselves for the reason a passage is important. It’s not about us; it’s about God.

You can’t judge the full puzzle from one piece.

If I handed you a blue puzzle piece and asked what the puzzle looked like, you might say a picture with sky or an ocean. But maybe it’s actually a city scene and the blue is a shop window. Even if the piece I handed you had a clear outline of a dog, that doesn’t mean the entire puzzle is about dogs. It might be a park with a dog walking through it. You really can’t get a feel for the whole by just looking at one piece. And so it goes in Bible study. So many people look at one thing, such as God commanding the Israelites to wipe out the Canaanite nations, and immediately shake their heads. “God is too mean, too vengeful. He isn’t loving, he can’t be trusted. God in the Old Testament is a bully.” And they come to that conclusion through misunderstanding one text and not considering the message of the Bible as a whole.

Remember we talked about border pieces? A border is more than just one piece and God is much more than one attribute. In the above example, the Canaanites had been doing their thing for hundreds of years and chose to not turn to God. They sacrificed their children to false gods and did all manner of wickedness in the name of worship. God kept judgment from them for generations and nothing changed. Sin has consequences and God will judge. But consider the mercy of God in the account of Ruth. Ruth was not an Israelite but a Moabitess. She chose to leave the idolatry that her people practiced and serve God {Ruth 1:16}. God blessed her and not only provided her and Naomi with food and provision through Boaz, but God also made her descendants future kings {David, Solomon, etc., Ruth 4:22} and the Messiah {Jesus, Matt. 1:5}.

It is a great injustice of ours to limit God to what we observe in one passage or story in the Bible. The whole Bible speaks to who God is and God doesn’t go against himself. If one passage demonstrates God is omniscient {think of when God told Abraham that Sarah would have a son in Gen. 18:10-15, 21:1-3} and another passage shows his mercy {God saved Rahab and her family from destruction in Josh. 2:12-14, 6:25}, we need to recognize that both those attributes are part of God’s character. God is multifaceted and there are parts of him we won’t fully understand this side of heaven. And it’s a good thing! If we knew everything about God or everything he knows, we wouldn’t have a very powerful God!

Just as a puzzle’s full picture and beauty isn’t revealed until you can see the entire thing, we don’t see a full view of God or his redemptive plan when we focus on only parts of His Word. The individual pieces can be confusing or misinterpreted unless we take an overhead look.

It takes time, dedication, and patience.

This last point is important to remember when you get frustrated. Unless you are working a child’s 24 piece puzzle, it will take time and patience. Usually the first time I sit down to a new puzzle, I am only sorting pieces, looking for edges and corners, and flipping all the pieces to right side up. My children have been known to wander past the table at some point and say, “You haven’t even started? What have you been doing?” It looks like it wouldn’t take long and piles of pieces sorted by color or shape and edge aren’t exciting when you want to see the completed result. However, this initial time is crucial to the success of your puzzling and it lessens your overall frustration at hunting for pieces later.

When we think about Bible study and Christian growth, there are no shortcuts. We can read other books and resources, listen to sermons and podcasts, watch interactive videos. But we won’t really “get it” or see the full beauty of the Gospel if we aren’t regularly in our Bibles for ourselves. I’ve attended church my entire life, gone to Bible studies, taken Bible classes in high school and college. But some of my biggest “a-ha!” moments have come when I’m reading the Bible on my own. It’s the daily exposure, the slowly reading and taking notes and making observations that will truly make everything click. But just as you can’t pour the puzzle pieces onto a table and have them magical build the puzzle, you can’t read isolated passages — or worse never read the Bible — and expect to understand what those passage mean and how they connect to everything else.

I have never regretted time reading my Bible. In fact, I have a whole list of people, passages, and themes that I want to dive deeper into. But as you read and study, don’t get so hung up on one piece that you quit reading and start making ignorant statements about what the Bible does or doesn’t say. Keep reading. Keep clicking the pieces together. God wants you to know him and understand His Word and he will help you. One piece at a time.

Photo by Hans-Peter Gausteron Unsplash

Bible quotations from the ESV {English Standard Version}

Why is Prayer so Difficult?

I have been thinking about my prayer life recently and prayer in general. Prayer seems like an obvious, simple part of the Christian life but I know I often struggle with it. Why is prayer so hard at times? Here are a few challenges I’ve faced and am still working through.

1. No Time

   Prayer is something that we often say we don’t have time for. When I imagine myself not having time to pray, I’m thinking of sitting in a chair for an hour. Yes, in that moment it’s easy to say I have no time for that! However, we see in I Thess. 5:17 the simple verse, “Pray without ceasing.” And we have to acknowledge that can’t mean walking around with eyes closed 24/7, but God wouldn’t give us something impossible to do so…. I’ve heard it said this way — we are to continually, as things pop in our minds or happen around us, bring them to God in prayer. I have started praying a quick prayer for the day before I get out of bed in the mornings. I will pray for specific people before I read my Bible. When I hear of a need, I stop and pray for just that request. We somehow have in our minds that prayer doesn’t “work” unless we are on our knees. Yes, we need to make time for structured prayer {more on that below} but we can also be sending on-the-spot prayers up all day! Consistency builds a habit that slowly becomes natural.

2. No Thought

   This sounds like a weird one but let me explain. I was having a conversation with one of my children the other day and he said he sometimes feels like all his prayers are the same and he asked what to do. I was brought up short for a minute. We talked through what he usually prays, what other things he could pray for, and to remember Who we are praying to. I walked away from that conversation thinking about my own prayers. Was I mindlessly praying the same thing? Could I remember what I prayed that morning? Sometimes an activity can become so routine we perform it without thinking. While prayer should be part of our daily routine, it shouldn’t be aimlessly quoted. And that leads into the next point…

3. No Plan

   Beyond having a set aside time to pray, we should go into that time with a plan of what to pray. Back to the conversation with my son, he told me at camp, the speaker had mentioned praising God for what he has done before asking for what we want done. You might have heard of the ACTS method* of praying: Adoration, Confession, Thanksgiving, Supplication. This helps to put the focus on God and less on us. By starting our prayers with praise to God, confession for any sins in our lives, thankfulness for what we already have, and then asking for our needs, we’re reminded of who we are compared to Who we are praying to. Thinking about how we pray through these keeps us focused during prayer.

4. No Desire

   This is the one we might struggle with but don’t want to admit. What Christian doesn’t want to talk to God?! But sometimes seasons of life or circumstances leave us fumbling. What can we even pray? God already knows so why do it? Things just seem to get worse! If this sounds familiar, I encourage you to start praying the Psalms back to God. It doesn’t have to be word for word. But read through Psalm 1, then pray it:

   Lord, help me be someone who doesn’t stand with the wicked. Give me a desire for your wisdom and your Word. Help me manage my time so I can meditate on your Word. Plant me in your truth and bring people into my life to encourage me.

   When we are going through trials or a dry season spiritually, it’s difficult to have the words to say. Praying the Bible, particularly the Psalms, back to God is a helpful way to stay in the habit of praying.

Be encouraged, friend! There are ways to tackle the excuses and difficulties we can find ourselves struggling with. It’s always good to have an accountability partner for things like Bible reading and prayer, someone who will keep you on track and ask how things are going.

If you still don’t know where to begin, simply start talking to God! Bring your worries to him, praise him for the beauty of nature, give thanks for what you have. The more you become used to talking to God, the easier it will become.

*I have no idea who first came up with this acronym but I like it and take no credit for it!

Photo by OC Gonzalez on Unsplash

Jesus Died for...All

My kids and I went to see The King of Kings movie this week. I didn’t know much about it except for reading one review. The premise is Charles Dickens {yes, the novelist} wants to teach his son about the greatest King who ever lived. So he tells the story of Jesus, from birth to resurrection. As he hears the story, the boy “lives” the scenes his father is describing, trying to warn the family that Herod is killing babies, showing Mary that Jesus is teaching in the temple, etc.

At first, the intrusion into the biblical narrative of a Victorian dressed boy and his cat was a little jarring. But as the boy “experiences” miracles, the Garden of Gethsemane, and the crucifixion, the movie watcher is also welcomed into the narrative; maybe to experience these Bible events in a fresh way.

While this post is not an endorsement for the film {it does have some biblical inaccuracies}, it did make me consider a few things through a new lens. And that’s the lens of people — the individuals who lived what we are prone to breeze through in our Bible reading.

The scenes portrayed are ones I knew in an instant: the blind man healed, the paralytic lowered through the roof, Jesus walking on water and feeding thousands. But thinking what it would have been like to experience them in person made me pause. Especially in one scene: when the woman caught in adultery is brought to Jesus.

In the movie, you see the crowd grabbing rocks, yelling it is lawful to stone her for her sin, the Pharisees smirking, the woman crying. Jesus stands from writing in the dirt and simply says, “Let the person who has never sinned throw the first stone.” In the movie, he looks around as the angry faces in the crowd turn to surprise, confusion, guilt. Hands lower, rocks fall to the ground, and everyone walks away.

That realization that we have all sinned. That there is no ranking in God’s eyes. Sin separates us from the perfectly holy God. Lying is a sin just as pride is, just as adultery is, just as murder is, just as idolatry is. We have no merit or goodness on our own. And that is why Jesus came. For all sinners, because we need a Savior.

It’s hard to believe I need to say this…but that person you disagree with politically is saved by the same sacrifice of Jesus that saved you. Those family members who don’t follow the same life rules you do, Jesus died for their sins when he died for yours. Salvation isn’t limited to who we think deserves it. It’s an open invitation that every person has to choose to accept but that God freely offers to all.

If you are trying to do good works, be a better person, reach God on your own merit, please stop. Jesus died for you. Maybe you don’t feel worthy of his sacrifice. Maybe you’ve rejected him in the past. Come now. Repent of your sins, ask Jesus to save you, admit you are a sinner in desperate need of a Savior. Meet the King of Kings at the foot of the cross.

Photo by Duncan Sanchez on Unsplash

The Value of Memorizing the Bible

This semester, one of our ladies Bible study groups has been reading a wonderful book about Bible memorization. Memorizing Scripture: The Basics, Blessings, and Benefits of Meditating on God’s Word is exactly what is sounds like: a guidebook to how and why we meditate on the Bible.

Memorizing is quickly falling out of favor in all areas of life. Spelling tests, multiplication facts, state capitals, things everyone had to memorize a generation ago are no longer required or even encouraged in some spheres. Why? Because we have phones, tablets, the Internet is available 24/7 with all the answers. When your math teacher told you to memorize the 12s times tables because you wouldn’t always have a calculator with you…that no longer applies. So why spend the time, effort, and brain space on things that we can look up faster than we could recall?

The case for Bible memory is stronger than any other subject because God’s Word is different than any other subject. It has the power to change us, help us, comfort us, guide us, convict us, and the list continues. While I still encourage my kids to memorize facts that others look up, my encouragement to memorize the Bible is far stronger because the Bible isn’t man’s ideas, it’s from God.

My own road with memorizing is shaky. As a kid, my mom would record herself saying Bible verses on an endless cassette tape {if you don’t know what I’m talking about, ask Google}. As I played or colored, I would listen and absorb those verses. It was multitasking in the 1990s. As I got older, I would read verses to myself on repeat, look away, and try to say it as fast as possible before it slipped away. In high school and college, it was required to write out our memory verses for tests and quizzes and I learned that writing something memorized is not the same as repeating it.

As an adult, memorizing became less of an emphasis in my life. I read the Bible and studied it, but not to the point of being able to quote a passage I was going through. It was now readily available on my phone! I could search for a phrase and get a whole list of verses! Surely we had arrived!

But after becoming a parent and going over verses with my kids on repeat{we no longer have endless tapes}, I became more and more convicted about my previous lack of conviction about Bible memory. I started finding a verse in my daily Bible reading and repeating it over and over throughout the day, trying to seal it in.

When Glenna Marshall, an author and pastor’s wife, posted that she had written a book on memorizing, I preordered it. And when our Bible study decided to read it together, I volunteered to lead the study and write discussion questions. It’s been a true blessing to learn about this topic, encourage each other in our personal memorization habits, and discover why this is a crucial part of the Christian life.

I don’t want to give away Marshall’s points because I want you to purchase the book and read them yourself {wink, wink}. But I will say Bible memory is not as daunting as I believed it to be. She breaks down every excuse for why you haven’t been memorizing and offers so many helpful tips to get you started. She also goes through biblical principles of why Bible memory helps us in various times.

I am currently memorizing Psalm 107. Unlike previous attempts at remembering a jumble of words to repeat as quickly as possible, I’m letting the words soak in and make sense. I’m connecting the thoughts and allowing the truth to grow my love for Who God is.

Bible memorization is for all Christians. Your age, time constraints, stage of life, profession mean nothing. God’s Word is profitable for all people to know, love, and hide in their hearts.

Photo by Sixteen Miles Out

Final Week in Proverbs

We made it! A month in Proverbs.

I hope it was a blessing to you and that you see the relevance for today’s world in this 31 chapter book. Here is a brief recap from the last seven days of reading.

• Several times we are reminded not to be jealous of the wicked {23:17; 24:1, 19} because they will be punished {24:16; 24:20; 26:27; 28:18; 29:6}. This is a theme throughout the book, where we see the ultimate end of the evil.

• More pleas from a father to a son to listen, heed, obey his voice/commands {23:19, 22, 26; 27:11}. We first saw this in 1:8 and it runs throughout the book. Think of Solomon, the wisest person in history, pleading with his son to listen and not make the same mistakes he did.

• The difference between the wise and the fool are listed many times {23:9; 24:7; 27:12; 29:9}. The fool continues in his folly until judgment while the wise strive to live upright and gain reward.

• The last two chapters are a slight break. Chapter 30 has a pattern of, “these three things, yet four…” which is a way of drawing attention and repeating for emphasis. Chapter 31 is most famous for describing a virtuous woman and all the ways she looks after her household.

June is over and with it, our first reading of Proverbs for the summer! In June, I read the New King James Version and for July, I’ll be reading the Christian Standard Bible. I hope going through a chapter a day for a month was helpful for you to get a good overview and see some of the themes and repeated words in Proverbs.

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Weeks Two and Three in Proverbs

We are moving right along in our monthly reading of Proverbs!

Over the last two weeks, we’ve entered a section I like to call compare and contrast. While not an absolute, the majority of verses in chapters 10-24 follow a pattern.

“The righteous…but the wicked…”

“Wisdom says…but the fool says…”

Like I said, there is some variation in this and it doesn’t follow a perfect pattern. But throughout most of these chapters we see a compare and contrast between doing what God says and what the wicked say.

From this, we can pull out several themes that God is warning us about: our words {tongue, lips, mouth}, our friends {counsel, advisors}, and our work {diligent, lazy, slothful}. These are not the only themes but are continually repeated in several varieties.

Why is the compare and contrast helpful? Because it shows cause and effect, that one decision impacts tomorrow’s decision, that the opposite of God’s Wisdom is earthly folly. Consider just a few examples from the last two weeks of readings:

A slack hand causes poverty,
but the hand of the diligent makes rich. {10:4}

When pride comes, then comes disgrace,
but with the humble is wisdom. {11:2}

The thoughts of the righteous are just;
the counsels of the wicked are deceitful.
The words of the wicked lie in wait for blood,
but the mouth of the upright delivers them. {12:5-6}

Better is a poor person who walks in his integrity
than one who is crooked in speech and is a fool. {19:1}

This barely scratches the surface of what we have read the previous 14 days! But can you see the pattern I’m talking about? Sometimes in this compare and contrast, we read several verses before we see the opposite action. However, you can always see how the right and wrong paths diverge.

I believe this is so critical in our culture today. All around we hear that there really are no wrong choices. Just choices that aren’t the best for us but could be the best for someone else. Proverbs {and the Bible in general} makes it clear that there is sin. Sin makes for bad/wrong/evil/wicked choices. That is a universal truth. What the Bible calls sin is wrong for everyone and will have consequences.

I have found true, and maybe you have also in reading Proverbs, that I can think of current, real-time examples for many of the warnings given. Warnings about deceit, false witness, judges showing favor, anger, pride, friendship, and we could go on.

These are not outdated, useless principles. On the contrary, they offer helpful guidance and boundaries in a world set on removing all boundaries. Read these words with care and set your mind and life on following them.

Photo by Veronika Bykovich on Unsplash

Week One in Proverbs

I’ve been reading a chapter of Proverbs a day for a week now and I have thoughts.

Let me begin by saying that no overview is ever going to be exhaustive. On several days, I read the previous chapters again because in reading chapter two, I was reminded of something from chapter one and chapter five started similarly to chapter four. I will be learning and noticing things from this book every time I read it. But here are a few observations from the first seven chapters.

• Chapter one opens with why we read Proverbs in the first place: to know, to perceive, to receive, to give, to hear, to attain, to understand. All these words are connected to words used for wisdom: wisdom & instruction, understanding, instruction of wisdom, prudence, increase learning, wise counsel, proverb, words of the wise.

• We also see the reverse of being wise — listening to the enticements of sinners {v10} and the consequences of that action {vv11-19}.

• Chapter two begins with the same call to wisdom with an “If…then…” statement that runs from verse 1-5.

• In 2:21-22 we see good and evil contrasted. We will see more of these contrasts in coming chapters!

• We are very familiar with 3:5-6. It is often memorized and quoted. But I loved connecting it with vv7-8. Part of trusting God and not leaning on our understanding {v5} is humility, meaning we shouldn’t consider ourselves wise {v7}. By acknowledging him and follow his path {v6} we gain strength and health {v8}.

• Again we see the contrast in good and evil {3:33-35}.

• Chapter four ends with a lengthy reminder that choosing wisdom over foolishness is a definite action. We can’t be passive in seeking wisdom, because wisdom will cover every aspect of life. Read 4:23-27 and note the actions mentioned for how we should seek wisdom and abandon evil.

• I had to chuckle at the repeated tone of, “Listen, my son, hear me, children” in so many of these chapters. what parent isn’t constantly reminding their children to pay attention! Listen! This is important! It’s very relatable. But also shows how much we need to actively seek after wisdom! We won’t stumble onto the right path any easier than children making good choices without prompting, reminders, and encouragements.

• I found 5:21 to be an encouragement in our present day when wickedness and sinful people seem to be winning. Have courage, Christian. God sees, God knows the ways of all people.

• We see two physical examples here that we can observe. First, the ant, diligently carrying food and storing it {vv6-8}. Second, the picture of fire and what happens when you carry it {vv27-29}. Just as it is impossible to not be burned, so is it impossible to sin — particularly in adultery — without physical consequences.

• Chapter seven is a sad picture of how easily and quickly sin can overtake us. Just like a harlot, sin looks appealing, maybe even like something we could get away with. But the end result is always a tragedy. It always leads to death.

This is just scratching the surface of what I learned and observed in my readings this week. There are certainly more points I could write out but these stood out to me.

If you haven’t been reading along, please consider joining! We are only one week in and it’s not too late to grab a Bible, open a Bible app, and start reading {or listening} to one chapter of Proverbs a day.

What are some of your takeaways from this week? I’d love to read in the comments!

Photo by Tomoko Uji on Unsplash

Stay Encouraged in Bible Study

I wrote previously on the similarities between Bible study and working a puzzle. But with more puzzling and more studying, I have continued to think about this. :) I realize people have different methods and habits when it comes to puzzling and Bible study. But here are some observations and tips I have found helpful, in both habits.

Beginning

Whenever we start a new puzzle, my kids are all excitement…until I insist on picking out the edge and corner pieces and turning every piece so the correct side shows. They quickly lose interest and disperse to other activities, leaving me to sort through 1000 pieces on my own.

When my son asked why we always begin a puzzle this way, I told him it makes the process of working the puzzle easier. Having the frame set before you tackle the actual picture of the puzzle is helpful because 1) you clearly see how large the puzzle will be, 2) you can begin to see where the inside parts of the puzzle will connect, 3) the picture starts to make sense.

A few times, my kids have started working the middle of the puzzle before the edges are put together and it is rough! The picture on the box gives us a reference of what we’re going for but without the borders, we have no overall vision for size or placement.

In a similar way, when we approach Bible study by choosing our favorite verse and reading it multiple times, we are bound to not understand it completely. We need the context of the surrounding verses, the chapter, the book. By skipping this crucial step that might not seem important, we are making it more difficult and frustrating to get to the meat of the passage and what it’s about.

Let’s consider the book of Ruth. I’ve seen on walls and wedding announcements and everything in between, “For where you go I will go, and where you lodge I will lodge. Your people shall be my people, and your God my God.” {Ruth 1:16b} Now, this is a lovely sentiment and one I agree with BUT Ruth is speaking these words to Naomi, her mother in law and not her future husband {she hadn’t met Boaz at this point in her life and had no idea what was coming. But she was demonstrating a loyalty to her deceased husband’s mother and to the Lord}.

Without looking at the context of the first chapter, we can easily be confused about who is actually talking to whom. And without studying the background and historical placement of this book, we don’t understand the cultural significance or why Ruth’s dedication to go with Naomi is so shocking. Those beginning study tips before diving into the “meat” of a passage will serve us well in the long run.

Middle

Once we have the puzzle edges outlined, my kids continue to be frustrated at my process: grouping colors. I do not like simply picking up two puzzle pieces and seeing if they fit, then moving on to two others, two others…. That is not helpful or efficient to me.

But if I look through all the pieces, study the picture on the box, and group pieces together that are a similar color or show a similar texture or image, I have a much smaller group of pieces to try and match. Suddenly, I have many small sections of the puzzle complete and ready to piece together.

When we apply this practice to Bible study, we see the importance of context. We cannot grab two random verses that we think should go together and make up a new interpretation. What is the whole chapter or book focusing on? What themes or key words do we see woven throughout the passage?

The whole of the Bible is one story. It is not a collection of interesting stories or sayings. It is the story of God’s redemptive plan and every part of the Bible tells us something about that plan and the God who holds this universe. When we try to grab a handful of pieces and make sense of the puzzle, it doesn’t work. When we focus on the verses that make sense to us and declare the rest unnecessary, we will never understand God’s complete message.

Again, we can go back to Ruth. On the surface, the book seems to be a straight forward Cinderella story of a widow who was loyal to her mother in law and it paid off by finding a kind husband. But that’s not the reason Ruth is in the Bible, and if that’s all we get from it, we are missing a lot!

Taking the time to read God’s instructions about leaving harvest in the fields for widows and poor {Lev. 19:9,10; Deut. 24:19}, the idea of a kinsman redeemer {Deut. 25:5-10}, how God sees those in need, etc. we begin to understand more than just a casual read through gives us.

I’ve also noticed that the more I look at the puzzle, the more quickly I recognize pieces I need. I notice the color or shape of the piece and I can grab from the pile of pieces and fit it into the larger puzzle more easily.

In Bible study, this looks like recognizing a theme or reference and plugging it into the greater picture of the Bible. As mentioned above, when Naomi tells Ruth to go and glean in a field because they have nothing, we can pull from our biblical knowledge and remember what God commanded the Israelites in Leviticus. When we reach the end of Ruth, we recognize the names Jesse and David and we can put together the significance of including the story of Ruth and Boaz in the Bible. The more we read the Bible, the more familiar we become with it.

Near End

You probably thought the next part would be to complete the puzzle. But as a puzzler, I’m here to tell you, unless you’re working a 100 piece children’s puzzle, there will come a time in every puzzle I like to call the near end. This can be the frustrating time in puzzling. You can almost see the whole picture! You have a smattering of pieces left! The end is in sight! And yet, it seems so far because all the pieces remaining could go anywhere. They have no distinctive coloring or marking to indicate where they belong.

And so you have to try every remaining piece in every location still blank. After a while, it seems like you’ve tried every piece from every angle and when will this puzzle be finished?! But you are so close and so you keep going, trying every piece again.

In Bible study, it’s not as obvious when we’re at the end…because we will never finish. There’s always going to be something else to learn from our Bible reading and study. But at times, we can feel like we are going in circles in our studying or standing still; we might feel like we don’t understand a passage or a chapter any better than when we first read it.

Just as in working a puzzle, we cannot be discouraged by what we see as an impossible problem. There are many difficult things in the Bible — topics and stories and instructions that we struggle with. That doesn’t mean we gloss over them or ignore them. We can pull out commentaries, dictionaries, and other translations and take the time needed to arrive at an answer.

The third chapter of Ruth has always been a head scratcher for me. Laying at the feet of someone winnowing grain? Checking with another man to redeem her? What is going on? The events of the Bible happened in the midst of cultural traditions and geographic locations that are very foreign to us. So commentaries and dictionaries and maps become a friend for us in unraveling some things that don’t make sense.

However, it is important that we don’t give up! When we read something in the Bible that has us confused or staring into space, we ask questions, we consult reliable commentaries, we press in. Of course, we won’t learn or understand everything in the Bible. Our finite minds can’t comprehend it all. But we do what we can to understand what God has revealed and pray for his guidance as we study.

End

And now we’re there! Every puzzle ends the same. That last piece. It’s never in the same place for every puzzle, but there is always one piece left that once placed, signals the end of this picture and time to start on new one. There is a great feeling of accomplishment and joy when you put that final piece. I usually let one of my kids do it but then, I run my hands over all those beautiful pieces.

Individually, the pieces don’t look like much. They certainly don’t look like they will become something beautiful. But placed and linked in the right place, all those single pieces make one cohesive picture.

As I said before, we never reach the end of Bible study the same way we finish a puzzle and mark it complete. There will always be something to learn and apply from studying God’s Word. However, we will finish a certain study we’re doing in the Bible, whether it’s going through a particular book or topic.

While we might not have all the answers, with careful study we can get a beautiful picture of God and his plan. I already mentioned how the Bible is one story — from Genesis to Revelation, it tells of how man fell, sin entered the world, and God provided salvation instead of punishment. That’s the beautiful, final picture of our puzzle that guides us as we study.

In Ruth, we see not only a picture of God’s care for one family. We see God providing the foundation for the salvation message. Ruth became part of the lineage of Jesus {Matt. 1:5}. The story of Boaz redeeming her is a picture of Jesus redeeming us. It is not an insignificant, inconsequential event in biblical history. It’s a picture of God’s mercy on mankind and his plan for salvation.

I hope this encourages you to not give up on those difficult puzzles {wink} but more important, to not give up on studying your Bible. Any time spent in God’s Word is never wasted.

Photo by Nathalia Segato on Unsplash

A Summer in Proverbs

In May, I wrapped up a Bible study with some ladies. We had been going through Proverbs for several months and as we ended, I realized I was only starting to understand it. There are so many themes and pictures and repeated ideas.

So I decided for the next three months {June, July, August} I would read a chapter in Proverbs a day, make notes, study deeper into word meanings and comparisons. So over the course of the summer, I read Proverbs three times. Here’s {some} of what I learned:

1. The line between the wicked and the righteous is distinct. There is no straddling a fence when Proverbs talks about these two. The evil choose one path/decisions that lead to death and the righteous choose the opposite path/decisions that lead to life.

2. The mouth is important to God! I was amazed at how much this one book had to say about the mouth, tongue, lips, gossip, etc. Sometimes it was phrased in terms of, “Speak like this…” Other times, it was clear warning, “The fool speaks…” I was very convicted by these verses about how we use words and what we say. I anticipate a deeper study into just this aspect of Proverbs in my future!

3. The five types of fools. As I read several different translations of Proverbs, I noticed several words were used to reference a fool or a foolish person. My dad {who was teaching Proverbs in Sunday School} gave a very helpful breakdown of how five words for a foolish person were different from each other. They ranged from a simple ignorance to a blatant turning from God. I found it very helpful to keep these in mind while I read.

4. I still have a lot to learn! One would think reading the same thing three months in a row would give me a leg up! And while I do feel like I learned a lot and understand Proverbs better than I did before, I still found myself, reading chapter 28 and thinking, “This seems familiar, what chapter was this already in? What does that word mean?” Inexhaustible is definitely a word I would use to describe reading and learning from the Bible!

Now that the summer of Proverbs has ended, I’m slowly reading through Psalms and studying it as time allows and keeping up with my chronological study. There’s always something to learn!

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Why We Read the Bible

I know hard things aren’t bad; in fact, many times it’s the difficult, frustrating things that grow us the most. But if we had a choice, I think we would gravitate toward the easy side of things. I think this is also true of our Christian growth. We WANT to be more biblically literate, we WANT to have a close relationship with God, we WANT to have wisdom for how to live. But those take time, effort, energy. It doesn’t happen overnight or reading the Bible one morning. It takes commitment for the long haul {your lifetime}. You will read hard truths, you will come across things that take extra time and study to understand. But you will grow.

I believe Bible reading and prayer are two of the hardest disciplines we need to cultivate. In theory, they sound so easy but in practice, it takes commitment and a conscious decision to include both of these in your day.

One of the most helpful things for me to remember when I’m struggling with Bible reading is that God wants me to know him. He gave us the Bible so we could know him personally, so we would know how to live in this world and what he has promised. This isn’t an impossible task set before us by an impersonal God. It is an invitation to grow closer to the One who created all things. Yes, maybe it’s hard some days but it’s worth every effort and every moment of time.

I’ve found it the most difficult to read my Bible when it becomes a task, a checklist instead of something I’m looking forward to. So how do I look forward to it? Below are some ideas.

• I always have a notebook with me when I read the Bible. I write down questions I have about the passage, verses that stick out to me, and things I hadn’t noticed before. This helps keep my mind engaged and it keeps familiar passages/stories fresh.

• I look for what the section I’m reading is teaching about God. When I was younger, I was always curious why God included some things and not others. Out of all the history of the Israelites or miracles of Jesus, why were these given to the biblical writers to record as inspired? God doesn’t do anything on accident or mistake. So what we have in the Bible has been given for a purpose: to teach us about God and who he is compared to who we are. {NOTE: this is one of the things I love about The Bible Recap podcast and book. The host/author offers a “God Shot” of what in that day’s reading taught her about God. It’s so helpful!}

• Some days when I know it’s going to be crazy, I choose to listen to my Bible app for that day’s reading. This engages my mind in a different way than reading and it keeps me in the Word even if I know I won’t have time to sit a read. I also like having it on for my kids to listen to.

• Ask a friend to keep you accountable or have someone you can text each day with one verse or thought from that day’s reading. I love hearing what my friends are reading and learning from the Bible and I often benefit from their insights.

Imagine a world without the Bible. It truly is an amazing gift from God that we can read, listen to, and share it. But it won’t just happen. We need to make the decision to include it in our day and then to live out the principles we discover. I’d love to hear what you are reading! Comment below and let’s encourage each other on!

.Photo by Rachel Strong on Unsplash

Psalms for Rest

I usually don’t feel anxious. I often don’t realize I’m worried or struggling with something until it suddenly occurs to me that I’m not sleeping, I’m constantly thinking about the same thing, I have a headache, I feel irritable.

Anxiety has a way of sneaking in and getting comfortable in our lives, slowly retraining our minds and attitudes until it seems normal. We don’t remember NOT feeling nervous and worried. We don’t believe we can get out of it.

That’s one of the reasons I love the Psalms. So many of them calm my fears and point me to the truth of God’s character. Instead of dwelling on my worries, I can recite Scripture or sometimes sing it. If you are anxious about the future or overwhelmed in current circumstances, please read and dwell on the following Psalms. I know they will bring comfort and peace.

Psalm 4:8 In peace I will both lie down and sleep; for you alone, O Lord, make me dwell in safety.

Psalm 40:1-2 I waited patiently for the Lord; he inclined to me and heard my cry. 2He drew me up from the pit of destruction, out of the miry bog, and set my feet upon a rock, making my steps secure.

Psalm 62:5-8 For God alone, O my soul, wait in silence, for my hope is from him. 6He only is my rock and my salvation, my fortress; I shall not be shaken. 7On God rests my salvation and my glory; my mighty rock, my refuge is God. 8Trust in him at all times, O people; pour out your heart before him; God is a refuge for us.

Psalm 119: 147-149 I rise before dawn and cry for help; I hope in your words. 148My eyes are awake before the watches of the night, that I may meditate on your promise. 149Hear my voice according to your steadfast love; O Lord, according to your justice give me life.

Psalm 121 I lift up my eyes to the hills. From where does my help come? 2My help comes from the Lord, who made heaven and earth. 3He will not let your foot be moved; he who keeps you will not slumber. 4Behold, he who keeps Israel will neither slumber nor sleep. 5The Lord is your keeper; the Lord is your shade on your right hand. 6The sun shall not strike you by day, nor the moon by night. 7The Lord will keep you from all evil; he will keep your life. 8The Lord will keep your going out and your coming in from this time forth and forevermore.

Psalm 136 is a reminder of all God did in Israel’s past and that “his steadfast love endures forever.”

This is just a small sampling. There are so many other Psalms I could have included but had to limit for space. Open your Bible today and seek him. Rest in all he has done and is doing and will do. Great is our Lord!!

Photo by Kien Do on Unsplash

Times of Drought

I’ve been thinking about water a lot.

Where we live in Utah, we are in the midst of a summer drought. Advertisements are all around that we need to conserve water, we have limited days and times that we can water the grass and the fire risk is high.

At times, it’s easy to forget I live in a high desert. We aren’t surrounded by cactus and sand, temperatures in the 100s are rare {although this year we have hit the 90s a record number of times already}, and we have snow in the winter. It doesn’t feel like a desert except in these years of drought when the news is constantly how the reservoirs — filled with melted snow runoff — are getting lower and yards are getting brown.

But one of the amazing things about drought is the weeds are thriving. Even though the grass is getting brown in some spots, viney weeds are creeping up nice and green. It doesn’t seem fair.

I find nature to be such a good metaphor for much of the Christian life. Even some of the language we use {going through a spiritual desert or dryspell} makes us think of nature. So it shouldn’t really be a surprise that my mind jumped to spiritual application while trying to keep my plants alive.

The other day, I missed an evening watering of my flowers. Because our sprinklers aren’t turning on as often, I’ve had to fill a watering can and go to each pot and plant. I try to go around sunset so the plants can soak up all the water without the sun evaporating any. After missing that one watering, when I went out the next evening, the ground around my seed spouts was so dry and cracked, the water I poured ran right off. The hard ground didn’t let any of the water soak in and nourish the struggling plant. I had to fill my can a second time and slowly pour the water at the base of each plant before the ground finally accepted it and turned to mud.

I thought how incredible it was that forgetting to water just one day made all the difference in the ground. With constant sun and heat and no water or shade, the ground almost became unreceptive to the water the plants around it needed. And watering seemed fruitless. Maybe I should just give up this year. Let the flowers dry and wither and spend my evenings on more profitable than hauling water across the yard.

Now I know all object lessons break down at some point but let’s compare this to a spiritual dryspell we might experience. In my own life, I’ve found that it’s harder to live a consistent Christian life when I’m not reading my Bible. I get angry and frustrated more easily and things seem more overwhelming. And when I stop and think about what brought this change, it’s usually because I’ve missed my Bible reading or I’ve been consuming so many other things that fill my mind instead of God’s truth.

My heart becomes like the hard ground, unable to soak in the good things God has put in my life or dwell on his Word.

Spiritual droughts happen for many reasons: life transitions, trials, sometimes laziness or mixed priorities. But droughts don’t have to last forever. Unlike a physical lack of water, we can do something to help our situation. We can faithfully read and apply God’s Word, even when we don’t feel like it and it’s hard.

One of the best books I read during the pandemic was, “Everyday Faithfulness” by Glenna Marshall. In it, Marshall devotes each chapter to explaining how even in suffering, even in waiting, even in doubt, even in….you name it, we can practice faithfulness. But the thing about being faithful is that it doesn’t happen overnight. It is a slow, steady, diligent process. One of her quotes that I love is, “Many of us long to follow Jesus more closely, but we are more focused on our present circumstances than on a long view of faithfulness.” {p 19}

Faithfulness is that diligent watering even when days of heat seem to be withering the flowers. Faithfulness is pulling weeds that multiple in dry grass overnight. Faithfulness is opening our Bibles and reading a chapter when we would rather do something else.

Times of drought — physically and spiritually — are almost inevitable. But by being faithful TODAY in what we know we should be doing, we will be building a foundation of faithfulness for the hard times to come.

Photo by Pawel Czerwinski on Unsplash

Why Personal Bible Study Matters

I recently purchased The Daily Grace Co’s Bible study called “Search the Word.” The purpose of this six week study is to show why personal Bible study is important and how to do it.

Even though the information in this study is not new to me, it has been an extremely helpful study and I’ve enjoyed it so much. One of the big takeaways from it is that reading and digging deep into the Bible is not for a select group of special experts. It’s for ALL people. No matter your education level, time, resources, skill…you can read and study God’s Word and learn.

If you go to church every week, maybe you’re wondering why you need more than that. Consider these points:

• We should never blindly believe anyone. Know what the Bible says so you can know when it’s falsely used/applied, even if it sounds good.

• A relationship with God is personal. He wants us to know him as he knows us. We can’t fully do that if we don’t personally spend time learning about him.

• The Bible wasn’t meant for one person. It was written for ALL to read and know and learn. Think about the Epistles written to entire churches. EVERYONE in that church was to read/listen to that letter and then know how to live as Christians.

• We have more Bible resources/helps that are more available than ever better in history. Don’t read Greek or Hebrew? We have the Bible translated in our language. Find parts of it confusing? We have commentaries {many online for free!!}. We have it on audio to listen while driving to work or walking the dog. We have dictionaries and atlases and online tips.

• You cannot grow spiritually and truly apply God’s Word to your life by only being exposed to it one hour a week. The Bible offers wisdom, comfort, encouragement, help for EVERY SITUATION AND CIRCUMSTANCE. But if you’re just waiting for your pastor to get to a certain passage to glean that wisdom, you are missing out on something you could benefit from now.

So if those are the reasons, how do we do it? This is one of the things I love about the study I’ve been going through from The Daily Grace Co. They break up the process into simple steps with lots of examples and helps. They explain how the Bible works together across every book, major themes and words to look for, how to highlight and underline to see each chapter/books main theme, and more. Using I Peter 2:1-12 as a guide, you read and walk through the text multiple times, adding a new step to each reading. They make it not overwhelming and very doable. Then they show how those same steps can be applied to every Bible passage. There are workbook pages, charts, examples, memory verses. I love it!

This is a great place to start if you’ve never studied the Bible on your own, if you’re starting a Bible study with friends, if working through a chapter study seems impossible or overwhelming. As I said, the information in it isn’t new or earth shattering but it’s so practical and well laid out. It takes the guess work and excuses out!

If you are interested in checking out this exact study, click here.

Photo by Aaron Burden on Unsplash

Dwelling on Identity

Our culture has become one of identity.

We have dozens of ways to categorize ourselves and — intentional or not — it usually leads to categorizing others also. We want to put people into neat boxes so we know what they believe, what they value, why they react a certain way, how to respond to them, etc.

The trouble is people are unique. People have personalities. People are sinful. Therefore, we don’t respond in the same way, we don’t agree with everyone in a given “group.” The trouble continues when we constantly seek to find our identity in the category we place ourselves in.

Maybe it’s easier to give an example. I’m a stay at home, homeschooling mom. Because of this, people have assumed {and I know this because I’ve been told} that I’m patient, that I have no interests outside homeschooling, that I’ve always wanted to be a mom, that I’m a picture of domesticity, that I have no clue what’s going on in the greater world, that I look down on other moms, that I don’t care about fashion….I’m sure you get the point. People make a lot of assumptions about me because they put me in what they believe a homeschool stay at home mom box should look like. And they believe all those things form my identity, my worth, my life.

Now, even if some of the above things were true about me, it would be unfair to categorize me based on those things alone and either praise or condemn me. There is much more to who I am and what I’ve experienced but if you look away from me because of the labels you’ve placed on me, you’ll never know the ‘real me.’

But it’s also very easy for me to identify myself as only a stay at home homeschooling mom and take pride or resent what that looks like. If I compare myself to other moms who make everything from scratch and mop the floor everyday, I will become convinced I’m failing as a mom. If I compare myself to the homeschool mom who plans each hour of everyday to maximize her children’s learning, I will be discouraged that I’m ruining my children’s education. If I compare myself to the stay at home mom with a six-figure side hustle, I can become envious and lose contentment with my life.

The honest truth is every stay at home homeschooling mom is different because THEY are different, in different homes with different kids and opportunities and challenges and….Yes, I homeschool and stay home with my kids, but that’s not the only thing that identifies me.

Another way the culture has highjacked identity is platform building. As someone who has researched the publishing field, attended writer ‘webinars,’ and asked questions of other writers, platform has become a huge buzzword. If you have a platform — a following of people on social media based on a certain topic you write on — you can get a publishing deal. It’s all about platform and if potential readers can identify with you and your writing topic. So you need to make what you write about your identity.

It’s extremely tempting to make my identity what I want it to be. To focus on the externals and the roles I want to be known as. But identity as a Christian is more than whatever we want it to be. God gave us a new life and new identity when we accepted Jesus as Savior.

In a ladies Bible study I’m attending, we’re studying Ephesians and Paul doesn’t waste anytime reminding this church where their identity lies: in Christ. Here is the passage:

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, 4even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him. In love 5he predestined us for adoption to himself as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will, 6to the praise of his glorious grace, with which he has blessed us in the Beloved. 7In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of his grace, 8which he lavished upon us, in all wisdom and insight 9making known to us the mystery of his will, according to his purpose, which he set forth in Christ 10as a plan for the fullness of time, to unite all things in him, things in heaven and things on earth.

11In him we have obtained an inheritance, having been predestined according to the purpose of him who works all things according to the counsel of his will, 12so that we who were the first to hope in Christ might be to the praise of his glory. 13In him you also, when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and believed in him, were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit, 14who is the guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire possession of it, to the praise of his glory. (1:3-14)

No matter what our outer identity looks like, as Christians we have Christ in common. Categories and stereotypes and things that might divide us according to the world should dissolve because in Christ, we have inherited the same blessings and redemption, we are chosen and sealed, we have hope and life and purpose because we are now in Christ!!

I realize it’s natural to look at what we like, how we spend our days, our stage of life and identify with others who are similar. It’s not wrong to seek out people we have things in common with, but when that becomes our only qualification, we need to take a step back. Look at verse 10 above; Christ came to unite all things in Him. As Christians, we are to be united in the gospel message. Ephesians 2:19-22 reminds us that Christ is the cornerstone and we are “being fitted together…in the Lord, in whom you also are being built together for a dwelling place of God in the Spirit.” (vv.21-22)

If we want to spread the gospel to a broken world, we need to stop focusing on how we want to identify ourselves and consider that God has given us a true, lasting identity in Christ that should take precedence over all else.

Photo by Joseph Young on Unsplash

Making Sense of the Puzzle

We’ve been a puzzling family lately. By that I mean we’ve been working a lot of puzzles!

When my oldest was younger, she worked puzzles constantly. We started with 9 piece puzzles, moved to 24 then 48. She would ask for a new puzzle every time we went to the Dollar Store and work it as soon as we got home. I was always amazed that as a four year old, she could look at the pieces, observe the colors and patterns, and patiently work through it.

I showed her to put the edge together first and work from the outside in. She would try a piece, turn it all four ways, then pick up the next piece. We did puzzles more than we played games.

My son was completely different at that age. He loved the idea of a puzzle — of taking all those pieces and making one picture — but he hated the process of doing it. He didn’t like turning all the pieces face up before beginning, finding all the edge pieces before jumping into the ‘fun’ part of the actual picture, trying a piece and not having it fit. Even wood puzzles with the shapes cut out were never his favorite.

But recently our family interest in puzzles has picked up again. We bought some educational ones for school and have made family nights of working them by the fireplace, taken breaks during our school morning to put a few pieces together, and turned on movies to serve as a nice distraction for the kids while Tommy and I work through the difficult parts.

The thing about puzzles is that it takes time. There is prepping an area, sorting the pieces, getting everything face up and spread out. Then you find the corners and edges and just start trying to fit pieces together. It is daunting at first; the perfectly clear picture on the front of the box looks nothing like that jumble of shapes staring at you now. Sometimes it’s hard to know where to focus or what you’re doing. You may sit at the puzzle an hour and see very little progress. But if you want it completed, you have to keep coming back and working through the impossible sections and trying again.

This is the way Bible study is at times. We love the thought of knowing God’s Word, of having an answer for difficult questions, of growing closer to God. But when we sit down to read, we get discouraged. Maybe we’re confused about what the Bible is teaching or why certain passages matter.

However, just like working a puzzle, if we give up when it gets difficult, we’ll never get any farther. Our understanding of the Bible will only grow if we put in the time and effort to actually study it. This means reading it daily, praying for guidance and understanding, consulting commentaries or reference books when we’re stumped, and looking up words we don’t understand.

Psalm 119 is all about why God’s Word is so important to not only know but to apply to our lives and meditate on. It shouldn’t surprise us that the longest chapter in the Bible is about the richness of the Bible!! Consider these words:

How can a young man cleanse his way? By taking heed according to Your word.

With my whole heart I have sought You; Oh, let me not wander from Your commandments!

Your word I have hidden in my heart, That I might not sin against You. {119:9-11}

My soul melts from heaviness; Strengthen me according to Your word.

Remove from me the way of lying, And grant me Your law graciously.

I have chosen the way of truth; Your judgments I have laid before me.

I cling to Your testimonies; O Lord, do not put me to shame! {119:28-31}

Make me walk in the path of Your commandments, For I delight in it.

Incline my heart to Your testimonies, And not to covetousness.

Turn away my eyes from looking at worthless things, And revive me in Your way. {119:35-37}

And those are just in the first 37 of 176 verses! Reading and studying the Bible is a necessary daily habit for all Christians. No matter how long you’ve been saved or how many times you attend church, you need to daily, personal practice of being in God’s Word for yourself.

Even when you don’t see the whole picture of the puzzle and the pieces of what God is doing don’t seem to fit, don’t get discouraged! Keep reading, keep studying, keep praying. It’s the most important way you can spend your time.

Photo by Hans Peter Gauster on Unsplash.

Mom + Kid Devotions - Psalm 119

I’m not sure if it’s the extra time at home that everyone seems to have or what but people have been asking me for ideas to study the Bible with their kids. As I searched through the free resources some blogs and websites are offering, I noticed they were either/or: they were for kids or they were for moms.

Of course, you can always do a children’s devotion with your kids and learn from it and you can modify and simplify what you read for your kids. But I wondered if it wouldn’t be helpful to have one passage for mom and kids to read/study, some questions to think about and answer, and of course an activity!!

I started putting this simple study together on Psalm 119. The goal is not to overwhelm but to help you read and think about God’s Word together. Here’s some things to keep in mind:

• Break it into different days. This devotional isn’t designed to do in one day. Try one of these approaches: 1) read the entire Psalm one day, review and ask questions the next, do the activity while you review the key verse the third day, etc. Or 2) since Psalm 119 is already divided into sections of eight verses each, read one section and answer the questions each day. For smaller children, that breaks it into easier chunks to read and think about.

• For older kids, have them write out the answers to the questions listed under “For Mom.” You could also encourage them to think about/write down how the verses apply to them, what it teaches about God and his character, questions they have.

• Have kids who can read take turns reading the verses aloud.

• When you do the activity, talk about why it’s important to put God’s Word in our hearts opposed to other things. Remind them that the Bible is profitable for ANY circumstance we find ourselves in.

Below you’ll find the link to a 2-page PDF you can print off for free. I started reading Psalm 119 with my kids today and asking these questions. By keeping it simple, my prayer is that it’s easy for you to use and adapt to your family without being overwhelming or “just one more thing.”

Please let me know in the comments or over on my Instagram account if you find this helpful and would like more Bible studies like this to print and use with your kids. Stay healthy and stay home!

Photo by Kelly Sikkema on Unsplash.

Trust the God of the Bible

The world is a crazy place right now.

I usually don’t follow the news. I’ll read major headlines and I read a newsjournal magazine each week with a rundown of what’s going on in the world. But I’m not keeping up everyday. However, what’s going on now with COVID-19 is impossible to close off from.

In the midst of stopped plans, schedules, and routines, I’ve been attempting to fill my mind with God’s truth instead of the anxiety that swells around. I KNOW God is in control. I KNOW this doesn’t surprise him. I KNOW my plans aren’t the end all be all of life. But sometimes, when we’ve come to rely and depend on our ability to plan and control and do what we want, KNOWING something needs to sink in deeper.

In my Bible reading plan for the year, I’ve been traveling the wilderness with the Israelites so far. In my last week of reading, I came across some incredible verses that reminded me of who God is. Let me share just one with you. In the opening chapters of Deuteronomy, Moses is reminding the Israelites what has happened over the past 40 years. From leaving Egypt to refusing to enter the Promised Land, from wandering in the desert to disobeying God, he lays their not so glamorous history before them. Then in chapter 4, Moses commands obedience, forbids idolatry, and tells them {again} about the amazing God who has guided them all those stumbling, complaining years.

…know therefore today, and lay it to your heart, that the Lord is God in heaven above and on the earth beneath; there is no other. {Deut. 4:39}

Consider those words in the context of where we are today. God is in control of heaven above and earth beneath today just as much as he was for the Israelites gearing up to claim the Promised Land. Consider also what the Israelites were facing. God had promised them victory over their enemies if they obeyed his commands and obeyed him. Because God is sovereign over everything, not just his people, he tells them that he will strike fear in their enemies and that he is preparing the way for the Israelites to defeat the enemy. Because he is God; there is no other.

A few days after I read that verse and started writing this post, there was a 5.7 earthquake near where I live that woke up my family to 15 of the longest seconds of my life. We are safe, there was no damage, but my heart was racing all day. As a mom with young kids, I fought back my tears and put on a smile and quoted verses all day about not being afraid. That night, I tried to return to this post and finish writing it but I just couldn’t. I stared at the words of Deuteronomy 4:39 and the paragraphs that I had typed a mere 24 hours before the earthquake and I couldn’t stop repeating to myself, “There is no other God. He is Lord of heaven and earth. Yesterday, today, always.” After just going through the strongest and longest earthquake I’ve ever experienced, those truths took a new meaning to me.

As a writer, it’s always interesting to go back and read my thoughts and relive in a way what God has taught me in the past. {As a side note, it is one of the reasons I’m a huge advocate of journaling, even if you aren’t publishing your writing. I’ve been reminded of so many lessons and blessings by keeping journals of my thoughts, prayers, and daily life.} But to read this reminder of Who God is in the midst of walking through the great unknown that we all find ourselves in…it brought me humbly seeking God and KNOWING he is in control in a whole new way.

This week, and I’m sure the weeks to come, are proving to me that I am weak but he gives strength. I need grace and he pours it over me. I can trust him with the weeks and months full of unknowns and he will not leave me.

When was the last time you really KNEW with your head and your heart Who God is? Have you thanked him for his faithfulness recently? Do you, today, know and lay on your heart that he is Lord of heaven above and earth beneath?

Photo by Davide Cantelli on Unsplash

Your Work is Not in Vain

No matter what we’ve been called to in this life, no matter how much we love it or enjoy the ministry we have to others, there will be times when we wonder why. Why is it like this? Why am I trying? Or maybe we question the whats: What difference do I make? What does it matter if I pour myself into this thing I’ve been given? Another word for this could be discouragement.

I’m ashamed to admit I get discouraged easily. It’s something I’ve struggled with for a long time and something I’m continually working on. I’ve seen my share of times when I made an extra effort, spent time I didn’t have, waded deep with someone into hard things and it didn’t turn out how I thought. My efforts went unnoticed and unappreciated. The person I had spent hours helping went off and did the opposite of my counsel, basically walking away from me. And I thought, “Why did I try? What did all that accomplish?”

It’s easy in our finite, limited view of life to see what’s right in front of us and completely miss what might come. The immediate attracts our attention and gets noticed. But sowing seeds for the long haul? Why? We often don’t see the benefit.

A few weeks ago it was unseasonably warm where we live and I sent my two oldest kids outside for the afternoon. I soon heard them rushing inside, the flow of water in the sink, then the slam of a door as they headed out again. This happened about three times before I wandered outside to see what was going on. With pure excitement, my son informed me they had found seeds from some kind of tree, planted them, and were now diligently pouring water by the cupful onto the ground. That night he asked if he could check on his seeds the next day.

“Do you think my seedling will be above the ground tomorrow?” he asked.

I gently reminded him it takes awhile before we see a plant blooming. And that it was still a little early for anything to start sprouting outside. A few days later, a layer of snow confirmed my warning to not get his hopes up.

We might smile — as the wise, older adults we are — but our short sightedness in life is perfectly parallel to his five year old expectations. We stop praying for something because we don’t see an answer. We get discouraged when our situation is less than ideal. We give up on people that disappoint us. We decide to not put in effort when we don’t see a payoff.

But a verse that keeps coming up in conversations, readings, and posts is Romans 12:12 —

Rejoice in hope, be patient in tribulation, be constant in prayer.

Here we have three things that Christians are told to practice: joy, patience, and consistency. And all of these take time! We rejoice because we have hope for the future in Christ. Patience is not something that develops overnight and especially when we want to give in, we need to wait for how the Lord will work. Finally, we are called to pray (I Thess. 5:17) and we need to approach everything with the attitude that God will answer — in His time and way. Our responsibility is to be consistent in asking Him to work.

It’s easy to believe that if we don’t see results for our work immediately we don’t need to keep trying. But just as it takes time for seeds in the garden to mature, we must continue on with what we have been called to do. It might get discouraging, the process might be hard, but we are not alone in our efforts. God gives the strength and ability for everything we do and everything we do is for Him.

Photo by Markus Spiske on Unsplash.

Shine Your Light

My family went to see a huge display of Christmas lights last week. I love the gentle twinkling that hangs from houses, trees, and bushes this time of year. As we passed under a tree with branches tightly wound with dozens of strands of lights, I looked up and the lights seemed as numerous as the stars.

In Matthew 5:14-16 we read, “You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden. Nor do people light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on a stand, and it gives light to all in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven.”

We are told from the beginning that Christians are like a light and like a city on a hill, we are not hidden. Let’s consider this picture for a minute. Have you ever seen a satellite image of the world at night? {If you haven’t, Google ‘world satellite at night’} It’s easy to point out where the cities are compared to the less inhabited places because the cities are glowing! Even from space, they can not be hidden or mistaken for farm land.

This shows that light can not be hidden when surrounded by darkness. Verse 15 points out that when you light a candle, you don’t place it under a basket but rather on a stand where the light can spread to the corners of the house and allow people to see. To be honest, why would you want to hide light and dwell in darkness? The point of having light in the darkness is so you see things - Legos that might hurt your tender feet, a wall you might run into, a person running through the neighborhood. Light allows us to function in dark places that would otherwise trip us up.

The purpose of this analogy is brought to our attention in verse 16. In the same way the light penetrates the darkness, we are to let our Christian witness shine. While the world tells us one thing, we are to follow God and do what he has instructed in the Bible. And when others see these good works we do and notice we are different than the world, ultimately the glory bypasses us and goes to God! Have you ever thought how God uses us - frail, sinful humans that we are - and we are able to give glory to him for all we are able to accomplish?! And others can give glory to God through what he allows us to do!

Have you ever noticed how the darkness is dispersed by just one little bulb? The lights we saw last week numbered in the millions and the night around us was bright enough to read in but even if there had been one light, the darkness would have been changed. Things would have been seen - maybe not from space but definitely from the street.

Sometimes I think we grow weary of being 'the only light’ around. The darkness of the world feels so thick and close around us. We wonder what difference our one little light will make and we hide our witness under a basket. But God can use one willing light to shine and make a difference. Maybe just in your family or workplace. Maybe never in a group of thousands but in a section of dozens. God is not limited by our limitations. Shine your light faithfully for him. Let others see how you follow him. And give him glory for what comes next.

Photo by Fred Heap on Unsplash

A Journey Through Trials

I was talking to one of my sisters in law recently and she made a comment that made me think. She referred to a trial a friend was walking through as a journey.

It made me consider how we deal with and talk about the trials we face. I think if we were honest we usually want trials to pass as soon as possible and we look for ways to change an outcome for the better.

But trials are not merely hard things that we need to muster strength and get through. Trials are opportunities for spiritual growth, learning, and stretching. They give us experience we can serve others with. No, trials are not fun or convenient or something we would desire. But they can be used in our life for the good.

When my sister in law called it a journey I couldn't help but think how true that is. A trial is something we walk through and experience. We don't know how long the journey will last or what will happen along the way but we stand in the midst, praying for strength and leaning hard on God.

James 1 reminds us that endurance and faith come from testing/trials. If we never experienced trials we would have limited ways to grow in Christ. Instead, we grow and mature through the sufferings we go through (v 4). Remember also what Paul says in Romans 5. He tells us to rejoice in suffering because, “suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not put us to shame…” (vv 3-5a).

For some reason trials seem to catch us off guard but we are told to expect difficult things to happen if we follow Christ (I Peter 4:12-14). We don’t know what trials will look like - sometimes it is a health diagnosis, family issues, personal struggles, or losing a loved one. Often it’s seasons of hard times with children, plans falling through, work, or relationships. The point is trials are different for everyone and come in all sizes. But we know the solution.

Instead of trying to escape trials we must turn to God in prayer and trust, asking Him to grant strength and grace for the road ahead. Sometimes a trial is over in a week. Other times we struggle for years before we see the end. But the constant to them all is God. He is merciful. He is gracious. He is able to comfort (II Cor. 1:3-4).

What trial are you going through? Have you turned it over to God and asked for His wisdom and help?

Photo by Katie Moum on Unsplash