I AM

I have been studying the I AM statements in the book of John lately. This poem was spoken by Priscilla Shirer at this past weekend's Deeper Still Event. **updated** The authors of these lyrics are the group Aaron Jeoffrey . Hope it encourages you today.

I AM

In Genesis, He's the breath of life
In Exodus, He is the Passover Lamb
In Leviticus, He's our high priest
In Numbers, the fire by night
Deuteronomy, He's Israel's Guide
Joshua, He's salvation's choice
Judges, He's Israel's Guard
In Ruth, the kinsmen's redeemer
1st and 2nd Samuel, our trusted prophet
In Kings and Chronicles He is Sovereign
In Ezra, He's the true and faithful scribe
In Nehemiah, the re-builder of broken walls and lives
In Esther, He's Mordecai's courage
In Job, the timeless redeemer
In Psalms He is our morning song
In Proverbs, He is our wisdom
Ecclesiastes, He's the time and season
In Song of Solomon, He is the lover's dream
In Isaiah He is Prince of Peace
In Jeremiah, the weeping prophet
Lamentations, the cry for Israel
Ezekiel, the call from sin
Daniel, the stranger in the fire
Hosea, the forever faithful
Joel, the spirit's power
Amos, the strong-arms that carry
Obadiah, the Lord our Savior
Jonah, the great missionary
Micah, the promise of peace
Nahum, our strength and shield
In Habakkuk and Zephaniah, He's brings revival
In Haggai He restores that which was lost
IN Zachariah, He's our fountain
And in Malachi, He's the son of righteousness rising with healing in His wings
AND THAT'S JUST THE OLD TESTAMENT

In Matthew Mark Luke and John, He is God and Messiah
In the spirit filled book of Acts, He is the reigning fire from Heaven
In Romans, He is the grace of God
Corinthians, the power of love
Galatians, freedom from the curse of sin
Ephesians, our glorious treasure
Philippians, the servant's heart
Colossians, He's God and the trinity
Thessalonians, our calling King
In Timothy, Titus and Philemon, He's our mediator and our faithful pastor
In Hebrews, the everlasting courage
In James, the one who heals the sick
In 1st and 2nd Peter, our faithful shepherd
In John and Jude, He's the lover coming for His bride

AND in the Revelation, in the very end, when it's all over, said and done, when time is NO MORE. He is and will always be the King of Kings and Lord of Lords, Prince of Peace, son of Man, Lamb of God, The Great I am, Alpha and Omega, God and Savior He is Jesus Christ the Lord HE IS EVERYTHING THAT YOU NEED!

Psalm 20

May the LORD answer you in the day of trouble!
May the name of the God of Jacob set you securely on high!
May He send you help from the sanctuary
And support you from Zion!
May He remember all your meal offerings
And find your burnt offering acceptable! Selah.
May He grant you your heart's desire
And fulfill all your counsel!
We will sing for joy over your victory,
And in the name of our God we will set up our banners
May the LORD fulfill all your petitions.
Now I know that the LORD saves His anointed;
He will answer him from His holy heaven
With the saving strength of His right hand.
Some boast in chariots and some in horses,
But we will boast in the name of the LORD, our God.
They have bowed down and fallen,
But we have risen and stood upright.
Save, O LORD;
May the King answer us in the day we call.

Psalm 20 (nasb)

Psalm 97

The LORD reigns, let the earth be glad;
let the distant shores rejoice.
Clouds and thick darkness surround him;
righteousness and justice are the foundation of his throne.
Fire goes before him
and consumes his foes on every side.
His lightning lights up the world;
the earth sees and trembles.
The mountains melt like wax before the LORD,
before the Lord of all the earth.
The heavens proclaim his righteousness,
and all the peoples see his glory.

Psalm 97:1-6 niv

The Road Not Taken

Do you ever find yourself taking the road less traveled? The path is seemingly smooth ahead as many have walked it, yet you take the other path. Robert Frost knew about this...

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveller, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I--
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference

...Robert Frost

Jesus knew about it as well..."12As He entered a village, ten leprous men who stood at a distance met Him; 13and they raised their voices, saying, "Jesus, Master, have mercy on us!" 14When He saw them, He said to them, "Go and show yourselves to the priests." And as they were going, they were cleansed. 15Now one of them, when he saw that he had been healed, turned back, glorifying God with a loud voice, 16and he fell on his face at His feet, giving thanks to Him. And he was a Samaritan. 17Then Jesus answered and said, "Were there not ten cleansed? But the nine--where are they? 18"Was no one found who returned to give glory to God, except this foreigner?" 19And He said to him, "Stand up and go; your faith has made you well." Luke 17:12-19

I've always been one to take the road less traveled. For me, I think it is an exercise in faith. I want to be the person in the above scripture who turns around and thanks the Lord for His grace and His Mercy. Not the one who keeps walking with the crowd. It is interesting to note that the phrase "Go show yourselves to the priests" was the way to re-enter society. Given a clean record of health, these former lepers could enter back into the society they were cast out of. They were in a hurry to re-enter...forgetting the one who had cleaned them. Where are you today? In a hurry to join the crowd or in a hurry to praise and thank the Lord?

Are we insignificant....no.

"For I know the plans that I have for you, declares the Lord, plans for welfare and not for calamity, to give you a future and a hope. Then you will call upon Me and come and pray to Me, and I will listen to you. You will seek Me and find Me when you search for Me, with all your heart. I will be found by you." declares the Lord, and I will restore your fortunes and will gather you from all the nations and from all the places where I have driven you.' declares the Lord, and I will bring you back to the place from where I sent you into exile."
Jeremiah 29:11-14

F.R.O.G.

I received an email during my work hours today that had a sign off that said, F.R.O.G. and then this after it...Fully Rely On God. Now, I'm going to apologize right now if this is a copyright of anyone. It wasn't marked that way and I am not claiming it, but I did enjoy it. Fully Rely on God. It reminded me of lots of things, but the frog analogy was compelling. Do you know the story of the two frogs...it goes like this:

Two frogs fell into a can of cream
Or so I've heard it told
The sides of the can were shiny and steep
The cream was deep and cold.
"O, what the use?" said No. 1
"Tis fate-no help's around!
Good-bye, my friend!
Good-bye, said world!"
And weep still, he drowned.
But No. 2 of sterner stuff,
Dog paddled in surprise,
The while he wiped his creamy face
And dried his creamy eyes.
"I'll swim awhile, at least," he said
Or so it has been said...
It wouldn't really help the world
If one more frog was dead."
An hour or two he kicked and swam
Not once, he stopped to mutter,
But kicked and swam and swam and kicked, then hopped out,
via butter.

In my bible study group today we looked back on a year of study together. We realized that while our prayers went up our circumstances did not necessarily change - but our hearts did. God is always faithful. The frog analogy above is a good reminder that we can mutter and give up or we can Fully Rely on God, pursue His face within our circumstances and have unexpected blessing when God takes our creamy circumstances and turns them into butter.

"O taste and see that the Lord is good; How blessed is the man who takes refuge in Him!"
Psalm 34:8

My emma and I went to San Diego to attend a Living Proof Ministries Live event led by Beth Moore. I have had the honor of hearing Beth Moore in person a couple of times and our women's bible study at church has utilized several of her studies. There most definitely was a special anointing this weekend. 10,000 women together worshiping our Lord and Saviour and hearing Psalm 139 taught like I've never heard taught. It was extraordinary. My emma loved it as well. The theme of the weekend could be said in two ways - "Known" and "The Divine God and the chosen you." I think Emma came away with recognizing at her 11 year old level her specialness to the Lord. Beth gave 8 points which were:
1. I am known
2. I need to be known
3. I'm scared to be known
4. I've always been known
5. I can know because I am known
6. My enemies are known
7. My anxieties are known
8. Search me and know me

All 8 points correspond to the different verses in the Psalm. She taught in depth on each point, but some of the take aways for me were: The Psalm speaks of all the Omni's of God (His omniscience, His Omnipresence, His omnipotence) - those are attributes of God, not attributes of us. We are not to be omni's, there is knowledge that is to be His and His alone (see Gen. 2), God's way of knowing us is to search us, we continually get God mixed up with people, self loathing and humility are not the same thing, "anxiety is always rooted in the need to control or a loss of control", "see if I have made an idol of my pain!"

It was a good time. It was a deep time. It was God's time...well worth the effort, fatigue, lines (don't get me started on exiting the parking structure). The Lord chooses different times and places to show himself BIG. He was HUGE this weekend!

Creating

I was given the gift of a weekend to myself this weekend. Not easy to accomplish when you have a husband and 4 children. It is not only a weekend to myself, but a weekend to myself IN MY HOME. There is something very renewing to a woman to have time to herself (whether she be single or married with children). Due to circumstances out of our control my usual two weekends a year of down time has not happened for two years. I was overdue and worn out. The Lord cleared the weekend, strengthened my husband, and met me for a weekend of rest and renewal. Travis Cottrell has a song on his Alive Forever CD which the Lord gave me to contemplate for the weekend. It is entitled Search Me....here are the words:

Search me, know me, try me and see every worthless affection hidden in me.
All I'm asking for is that you would cleanse me Lord.
Create in me a heart that's clean,
conquer the power of secret shame.
Come wash away the guilty stain of all my sin.
Clothe me in robes of righteousness.
Cover my nakedness with praise.
All of my life before you now I humbly bring.

(If you have not heard this song then download it from itunes). I heard an interesting and thought provoking sermon this morning. The teaching was from Colossians 3:12-14 and was entitled "Life Together -- Forgiving One Another". Many good things were shared from this very familiar passage of scripture, but a couple of thoughts were worth more pondering. One is the use of the phrase "put-on". The phrase in the Greek refers to the immediate - not working towards putting it on, but as in it is raining, "put-on" on your raincoat or you will get wet. If you only put your coat on part way you will get wet. Another thought (always good teaching) is to look at what God's agenda is in the scripture. In this case the Lord gives it to us when He says, "put up with one another and forgiving one another..." The pastor used an illustration of sheep to get a very important point across. Sheep will do three things (always)...1. whine 2. wander (isn't there a scripture about one of those wandering sheep and the Lord seeking him...?!) and 3. wound.

Now we are talking about Christians when we reference the sheep - yep, we really do whine, wander and wound. The pastor ended the message with these thoughts: "Forgiveness is anchored in what Christ has done, it is acted out, and it is authentic in spirit." Someone asked me recently what I thought John Piper's response would be to Christians being stumbling blocks to other Christians? I think his answer from the book entitled Future Grace responds to that question. ..." All the wrongs that have been done against us by believers were avenged in the death of Christ." Beth Moore's take on the Godly result of wounding is this..."I know God did not author my abuse as He is light and that which was done to me was in darkness and God does not dwell there. So then the question always is why did God allow it? Maybe it was allowed because we need something from the healing process that would only be attained through His grace within that healing process." By the way...this applies to all wounding. Hers was sexual abuse, but the thought really speaks to every type of wounding.

Lots to think about...