Spiritual Shopping

Several Saturdays ago, my wife called to me from the kitchen saying she needed me to go to the grocery store for her.  I was tired of reading, so I jumped up, grabbed the shopping list, and headed for the car.  I parked at Walmart and walked toward the door.  But as I scanned over the items on the list, my heart sank.  My wife had not been specific.  Now this may not seem to be a problem to you, but it was for me.  I knew better.  There are so many ways that a man can mess up if the shopping list isn’t specific.  Creamy or crunchy peanut butter?  Great Value or Peter Pan?  Small, medium, or large?  But I was prepared, and I was not going to be trapped.  I pulled out my cell phone.  As I quizzed my wife on the first item, she reminded me that the groceries were for Brother So-and-so, a dear brother at church has been laid up for several weeks now, and our church was having an old-fashioned pounding for him tomorrow.  As I ended the call, a warm feeling spread over me.  Hey, I couldn’t mess up.  Whatever I picked would be right.  This was fun.  Then, as I reached for the Great Value strawberry jam, I had another wonderful thought.  This was no ordinary shopping trip; this was a spiritual shopping trip!  These items weren’t for me; they were for a dear brother, and they were for the Lord.  So, I put back the Great Value jam and picked out the more expensive Smucker’s Jam and put it into my basket.  It felt good.  As I selected the very best items from the shelves, I smiled.  I was doing God’s work.  When I got to the check-out, I even hoped that the total would be a little larger than it was.  Driving home, I remembered the words of Jesus that Paul quoted in Acts 20:35, “… It is more blessed to give than to receive.”  It was then that I realized that those words were true.  Tomorrow my brother in Christ will be blessed, but tonight, I am blessed.  Thank you, Lord.

Measure Up

 

In 1993 we moved to our present house in Ringgold, Georgia and we brought a piece of door casing with us.  When we moved from our trailer into our first home in 1978, we started measuring our children’s height on their birthday and marking it beside the laundry room door.  We moved to four different rental houses before landing in Ringgold.  But we always took that piece of door casing with us, wherever we moved.  I still have the casing on the inside of our basement door.  A great memento for children and grandchildren.  They still like to stand with their backs to the door and measure how tall they are.  And they are always excited when they are taller than Marmie (although she is only 5’ 2” tall).  But when it comes to what God expects from us, none of us measure up to God’s standard.  Paul said in Romans 3:23, “For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God.”  Some measure taller, some measure shorter, but we all fall short of God’s expectations of perfectness.  So, what can we do?  We are hopeless in our dilemma.  But Jesus stepped in and gave us the help that we needed.  Jesus, the perfect Son of God can give us the perfection that we lack.  He stands tall and measures up for us.  If we but trust in Jesus, His perfection is accounted to us, and our sin is accounted to Jesus and paid for on the cross of Calvary.  Praise the Lord!  In Jesus, we can “measure up”.

Refreshing Water

 

My son-in-law, Alex, owns a greenhouse with his two brothers.  But Alex is the business end of the operation.  Alex says, “Ron and Tim make the flowers grow, but I turn them into money.”  Alex may not know all of the ins and outs of growing flowers, but he does know how to please my wife (his mother-in-law).  When Alex comes for a visit, he brings the back of his SUV full of flowers.  And soon, our back deck looks gorgeous, thanks to a thoughtful son-in-law.  But occasionally, I forget to water the flowers.  And when I do, it’s easy to see.  I come outside to enjoy the back yard … but the flowers are all droopy and wilted.  I turn on the water, fill up a bucket, and begin taking a drink of fresh water with the watering can to each of the flowerpots.  Within fifteen minutes, each flower has perked up and is looking great again.  In John chapter 4, the woman from Sychar was thirsty when she came to the well just outside of the city.  She was surprised when Jesus, a Jew, asked her, a Samaritan, for a drink of water.  But after some conversation, Jesus offered the woman ‘living water’.  Jesus said in John 4:13&14, “… Whosoever drinketh of this water shall thirst again: But whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst; but the water that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water springing up into everlasting life.”  Hey, have you had a drink of this ‘living water’ that Jesus spoke of?  Has the living water that Jesus offers made a difference in your soul?  Let His living water refresh your life!  It will perk you right up!