During the Wednesday night Bible study the question came up about my marriage proposal to Robin. “Will you marry me?” I had thought only one thing prior to that question; “I want to spend the rest of my life with that woman.” Oddly enough, Robin thought the same thing. Good for me! But what we didn’t concern ourselves with were the particulars, such as, where we will live, how much income we will make or how large our family will be. We never thought of prenuptials and we didn’t look for an “escape hatch.” We were in love and that was good enough. In fact, being in love was really all that it took. Believe me, Robin put up with a lot of garbage the first years of our marriage. And if it wasn’t for her love for me and she knowing that deep down, I truly loved her, I believe that the marriage would have ended. The blessing of all this was Jesus Christ coming into our lives and changing both of us. We have been married for over thirty years and we would never have dreamed that two people could have such a wonderful relationship together. I’m not saying that all of our days are peaches and cream, but on the days when I don’t have the peaches, she has the cream. What we have discovered though is this: Our love had to be seasoned with life. We went past the romantic love and went past the “duty” love and now are living in what I call the “committed” love. The committed love entails all that is romantic and all that fulfills obligations and joins with another in oneness. This kind of love doesn’t come right away –it can’t. It needs time to get to know the good, the bad and the ugly. It loves right through it all!
It is this sort of love that God offers us through Jesus Christ. First, you are ecstatic and filled with all kinds of joy because your sins are forgiven and you no longer stand condemned. Next, you begin to labor in service to God because of your love for Him. At times gratitude may be your motivation, but at other times, if you are honest, you fulfill your obligations because –well frankly- that’s what you do. Finally, after you have walked with the Lord through the vales of shadows and He has laid you down in green pastures, after times of being hidden under the Shadow and at times being exposed to dangers –you develop a committed relationship that goes beyond childish “crushes.” Picture the young lady in the flowery fields pulling the petals from the daisy; “He loves me, He loves me not.” That is a childish relationship and God doesn’t want that for anyone. Rather He would have us to be so committed to Him that we never question that He is so committed to us.
I can live with and without many things in this world. But I cannot live without His love. Have a blessed week, Beloved.

Some people forgive those who hurt them only when the offender asks for forgiveness. “Can you forgive me?” is usually met with a reluctant “yes” or “Please give me time.” The problem of holding back until someone asks for forgiveness is that it tends to make the one doing the forgiving feel as though they are only forgiving because they were asked but not actually forgiving the offense. They find out later that they are still hurting and wonder if their forgiveness came too quickly. Some people never forgive. These folks end up living very sad lives, always finding fault with others, usually complaining and constantly living in the past. The problem with living in the past is that life is meant to be lived with hope. There is no hope in the past. Some folks forgive with their mouths but their hearts are not in it. “I’ll forgive you but I never want to see you again!” These folks are only kidding themselves –they haven’t forgiven anyone. Some folks say, “I have to forgive you, I am a Christian.” I catalog those folks with those who say, “I have to love them, I’m a Christian.” Sheesh! Give me a break. That’s like saying, “I’m only loving you because somebody told me I have to.” Could you imagine your mom or dad saying that to you while you were growing up. “I’m only giving you this Christmas present because somebody told me I had to.” You are probably wondering what Christmas presents have to do with forgiveness. Well, I’ll tell you.
Peter tells us in the book of Acts 5:31; “God exalted Him(Jesus) to his own right hand as Prince and Savior that he might give repentance and forgiveness of sins.” The forgiveness of God is strictly a gift and that gift was given whether we asked for it or not. Remember, while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Paul exhorts us to forgive one another as Christ forgave us. I can forgive because Jesus forgave me. And besides that, Jesus has forgiven everyone that has offended me as well. Think about it, if you are saying to yourself, “I can’t forgive that person. They have hurt me too deeply. And besides that, they don’t want forgiven.” Well, Jesus forgave people who don’t want to be forgiven. Who loses?
The benefits of forgiveness are tremendous. And I think the number one blessing is that it puts us in right relationship with God. If I hold onto unforgiveness I am actually telling God that my way is better than His –and no Christian in their right mind would say that. But when I offer my forgiveness freely, because I am conscious of God and my love for God, then God’s Spirit bears witness and abides in my heart. If I will not forgive my brother I am hating him. No man can love God, whom they can’t see and hate their brother whom they do see –that’s Bible 101! One final thought. If God has forgiven that offense upon us and God has forgiven that one who has offended us, who are we to say they are not forgiven. I’m not going there. I know forgiveness is hard; in fact, no one can forgive sins except God. Get the hint?

The Bible states that God dwells in a light unapproachable. David asked, “Who may ascend the hill of the Lord? Who may stand in his holy place? With these questions alone and the declaration of God’s unapproachable light, we stand befuddled to even think that we will be helped in our time of need. Does this Sovereign Potentate, Governor of the universe, take time to know and care for my need? Does He who transcends all things natural that even the heavens cannot contain Him, take the time to single me out in the midst of the whole scheme of things? The answer is a resounding, “Yes!”
The Russian proverb, of not being able to see the forest for the trees, seems to fit so well here. So many people miss God when He has been right in front of them the whole time. They look for the supernatural and the miraculous. They want to see the water turned to wine. They want God to do the spectacular for them like He did for the Israelites in the Exodus. But even though they saw the mighty hand of God through miracle after miracle, they still would not listen to God’s message. They heard the same gospel but did not combine it with faith. Therefore, they turned away when trials came, they followed after the allurements of the nations and they trusted in themselves rather than God. Someone once said, “Seeing is believing.” Since I have become a Christian I can tell you that just the opposite is true. “Believing first is the only thing that will open our eyes so that we can really see.” Listen to the words of St. Anselm Archbishop of Canterbury. “I long to understand to some degree your truth, which my heart believes and loves. For I do not seek to understand in order that I may believe, but I believe in order that I may understand.” Sometimes I think that there are too many obstacles in the way of seeing Him who is invisible. Just this last Thursday I took the truck to Zanesville while Robin took the car to run errands in town here. While we were both out and about, we both nearly ran into parked cars! Believe it or not, or think what you want, I believe that God was watching over us that enabled us both to escape the irritating consequences of these kind of fender benders. Or, worse yet, a serious injury. Who knows what could have happened? What I do know is that God was there and He was watching over the both of us. Maybe someone would say, “That was just a close call and quick thinking on both your parts.” First I would smile, because I would know that that person doesn’t know Robin or me –we’re not real quick like that. Then, I would wonder if that person also has trouble seeing the forest. If we fail to see God in the simple things in life will we have the ability to see Him in His glory? If we fail to hear His instruction, will we fail to hear Him call us up to meet Him in the air? Remember that Moses persevered because he saw Him who is invisible.

In Aesop’s fable of the Grasshopper and the Ant we learn the lesson of preparedness. As you know the Grasshopper frolicked during the summer months of plenty while the industrious little Ant stored up kernels of corn. One day the Grasshopper said to the Ant, “Why not come and chat with me instead of toiling and moiling in that way.”
“I am helping to lay up food for the winter,” said the Ant, “and I recommend that you do the same.”
“Why bother about winter?” said the Grasshopper, “we have got plenty of food at the present.”
Well, the story goes on telling us that the Ant went on his way continuing his work while the Grasshopper frolicked in the summer plenty. But during the winter the Grasshopper found himself starving to death while seeing the ants distribute their food that they had worked for all summer long. Then the Grasshopper knew that it was best to prepare for the days of necessity.
The warning God gives to the Israelites through the Prophet Amos is also befitting for us today. “The days are coming,” declares the Sovereign Lord, “when I will send a famine through the land –not a famine of food or a thirst for water, but a famine for hearing the words of the Lord. Men will stagger from sea to sea and wander from north to east, searching for the word of the Lord, but they will not find it.” (Amos 8:11,12)
According to the U.S. Census bureau there are over 300,000 reported church congregations for a population of 300 million. In other words we have, in the United States alone, a church congregation for every 1,000 persons. Thomas Nelson Publishers sold 12 million Bibles last year and they account for just one third of all Bible sales in America. They estimate that most individuals possess from three to ten versions of the Bible. Ministries flood the airwaves in both television and radio. The word is going out into the prisons, rest homes and hospitals. It’s possible that there isn’t a city within the U.S. that doesn’t have at least one church in it. Even if these statistics are off just a little bit –that’s still an abundance of the Word of God for everyone here in America. Today is the summer of plenty. Now is the time to gather and prepare for the winter of want. The question left to us is are we grasshoppers or ants?