Industrialization 101

I just had to share this unplanned self learning and creative time the kids had yesterday in the backyard. I love the flexibility of homeschooling. I had gone outside to call the kids in to finish up their "book work" and they were all working together on these pine straw huts.It was so fun to see them collecting large limbs from the woods and I admire their creativeness in building something so unique. There is such a message of unity in this activity. Together we can work and make something great!!! I am amazed at how God reminds us and teaches us some of the most wonderful truths through the creative and simple acts of our children. May we all follow their example. The little hole in the pine straw where you see the kid's faces are little windows they made in the hut.

DR. MAC (Memories of True Hospitality)

Dr Mac was truly a man who exemplified what true hospitality is all about. In our culture of material gain and outward appearances, I feel we are losing this simple art of the heart.Dr. Mac was "Granddaddy" to me and he was a medical doctor back in the day when doctors made house calls and delivered women's babies in their homes.

For Granddaddy, it was his heart and his joy to help others. He was a simple man who was filled with a kindness that is rare today. I remember going to my grandparent's home to visit for a weekend. If Dr. Mac was on call, he would get up in the middle of the night to meet patients at his clinic. If the patient was very ill, he would go to their home. If they were poor, he would give them medicine. In addition,I also remember numerous times when sick people would come to his house needing help. I do not remember him ever turning anyone away.he even took a step further and made time to call his patients the next day to see how they were doing.

This compassion impacted my life as a little girl. As I watched him, there was a work being done in my young heart that I did not realize. This was a simple man, who simply loved people, and he was known and respected not for all he did, but for who he was.

Dr. McLane,(Dr Mac) was a true vessel of hospitality. It is grievous to see how our world has twisted the true meaning of hospitality. It is not about having a perfectly decorated house, and preparing the fanciest meals. It is not about trying to advance appearances. Hospitality is an art of the heart. It is kindness shown toward guests or strangers. It is a resting place within that says "welcome" to those we meet. In fact the word hospitality is formed from the root word, "hospital".

Our homes should be a place of rest where our family members feel welcomed and accepted. Our churches should be a place of comfort and encouragement where others feel valued. We should see every individual as Christ sees them and esteem others as more important as ourselves.

When someone is before us, we need to welcome them with a smile that is genuine. Instead of frowning or turning our heads when someone walks by, we should say, "WELCOME" with our countenance and smile.

I am sure our Saviour smiles much more than HE frowns. He delights in His children.
Let us make an effort to reflect His genuine smile,make house calls,and go to the places where others are hurting. Then follow up with a phone call. Thank you Dr. Mac, Granddaddy, for showing so many the true meaning of hospitality. May your legacy live on!

Galatians 5:22-23 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.

Living Sacrifices

The other day I met an extraordinary young woman named Alicia. She is also the mother of five young children.
As we were having a great conversation about family and mothering, she shared more and more of her life and story with me. WOW, I was amazed by the things I heard. She and her husband are ministers here in Atlanta where they serve in an inner city organization in which they go out and meet the needs of hurting people. In this ministry there are many other churches and local ministries who gather together and go to the people. On Saturdays,these groups of people knock on doors and ask the people how they can serve them. They cut grass, clean, and help people with basic things such as getting their driver's license renewed. These are just a few of the services they provide. She said you would be so surprised at some of the basic life skills people do not know how to do right here in Atlanta. This gives them so many opportunities to pray and to share Christ with the poor and hurting.

She shared with me about a particular group that went to a home downtown and knocked on the door. There was a woman inside crying, "I need Jesus! I need Jesus!" A man came to the door and led them in to the woman who was strung out on drugs. One person said, "How can we help you?" The desperate woman continued to cry, "I just need Jesus!" So the group of people from this ministry prayed with this woman to receive Jesus as her Savior. Hallelujah!

This young woman also shared with me about her sister who lives in Metro Atlanta. She has five of her own children and has taken in five other children who were neglected and abused. She does not even receive pay as a foster parent, but just trusts the Lord to provide. One child's mother is a drug addict with several other children of different men. She was leaving the children alone all day at home to run the streets. My heart was stirred not only to hear the stories about the hurting, but was tremendously touched by these motherly ministers and others who have laid down their lives to reach the suffering. They truly are living sacrifices going out beyond the comforts of their own homes and families and making a difference in the live of others.

Alicia shared testimony after testimony of God's provision for their family as they have stepped out time and again to touch others lives. I was touched by her passion for the lost and her excitement for family and how her children serve along beside her and her husband.

I have contemplated much of this the past couple of days as I have been reading Philip Yancy's book, "Where is God When it Hurts?" I have had the book for two years but have not read it until now. I believe it is God's timing as my heart has been stirred in a different direction over the past several months. This is what Yancy said about Jesus.

"Clear your mind and reflect a moment on Jesus' life. He was the only person in history able to plan His own birth. Yet He humbled himself, trading in a perfect heavenly body for a frail body of blood and sinew and cartilage and nerve cells. The Bible says there is no temptation known to man that Jesus did not experience. He was lonely, tired, hungry, personally assaulted by Satan, besieged by leeching admirers, persecuted by powerful enemies.

"He had no beauty or majesty to attract us to Him, nothing in His appearance that we should desire Him. He was despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows, ad familiar with suffering. Like one from whom men hide their faces..." (Isaiah 53: 2-3)

When Jesus first began His ministry, the people hooted, "Can anything good come from Nazareth?" An ancient ethnic joke: Jesus the hick, the country bumpkin from Nazareth. In keeping with that reputation, he seemed to gravitate toward other rejects; those quarantined with leprosy, prostitutes,tax collectors, paralytics, notorious sinners."

Jesus was THE MAN familiar with every pain imaginable. So many times I have prayed and asked the Lord to share His heart with me. Sometimes we pray things and do not really know what we are asking. Are we really willing to share in His sufferings? He says if we want to know His heart then we must be willing to hurt in this life. How can we truly hurt for others if we never have to experience pain ourselves. I believe Jesus was drawn to the hurting and the diseased because He identified with their pains.

I want to find the rejects, for I was one. I want to find the hurting, for I have hurt many times. I want to find those who grieve, for I have been grieved by death and disappointment. I want to find the lost, for I was once lost on death's path.
Take me to them Jesus. Show me the way. may I be a living sacrifice today and everyday.

Testimony-The Gift of Pain

I have been like a running faucet the past couple of Sundays at church. We have nursery duty this Sunday so I will get a break. I am so sensitive to things and I am just learning to embrace that as a gift and to listen to the flow of my tears.
It just goes to show that God's anointing and holy presence is with us in our services. There have been some Sundays when I just have not wanted to go to church. Every time I have felt that way and went anyway, the Lord has given to me in such profound ways. However, I have expressed to the Lord that I am going to church for Him only. I am going Lord to love on You and to worship You. Every time I have prayed that prayer and have truly had that motive, He in turn has met me and has given to me in a way that I cannot measure in the natural or appropriately express in my limited vocabulary.

This past Sunday, Pastor Sterling spoke on the Bourne Identity which relates to wounds. The Bourne Identity is an action type of movie. He shared such great insight about how we are naturally born with wounds because we are born into a fallen world. The entire message I felt the Lord was touching something so deep in me. I really could not put my finger on it. EMANUEL WAS THERE!!!

As the message came to a close, Pastor Sterling had a ministry time in which he invited any who needed prayer for wounds in their hearts which needed to be healed to come forward. I knew I was hurting, but was not sure why. Wow! The gift of pain is precious. I cannot believe I am saying that. However it is the truth.

As the invitation was given, I waited a few moments and looked around to see if anyone else was going forward. No one was moving. However, I could not restrain myself. I got up and went forward. I do not even remember the steps I took to reach the front,but as I arrived to the couple who was up front to minister , the tears began to flow as if they would not ever stop.

It would take so much writing to explain all that God was touching in me. However, today I thought of the Title of the movie, "BOURNE IDENTTY" The very thing I was feeling pain and wounded in was the very core of who God has made me to be. Yes, I am first a child of God, but I am secondly a wife and mother. God revealed to me that I have been under a false guilt for the desires that I carry in my heart to carry children, to birth, to nurture and to mother. He gave me a new and complete freedom to grieve a miscarriage that happened about 2 months ago. He gave me freedom to grieve the loss of a much wanted baby even though I have 9 other children. God gave me liberty to embrace the core desires of my heart and the revelation that HE placed that there. The very things I had been fighting were the very things that God has anointed me by HIS grace to be and to do. IT is not just a season. I will always birth whether in the natural, or in the spirit. It is my calling as a woman and it is GOOD!

I so appreciate Susan and Jeff Hutchins who are elders at City Life. They were the ones who took me and prayed with me and cried with me. There is something profound when you see someone sincerely sharing your pain and truly grieving with you. There is such healing in that. I felt the love of the Father and the "motherly" love of God through them as they shared such a depth of compassion that I so needed.
How the Body of Christ needs each other.

If you ever feel like you do not want to go to be with your church family, that is a strong signal that you need to go. God is waiting for you there. The enemy wants to keep you away in order that you will miss God's hugs, His pleasure and joy for you as You go to give unto Him, even if it is your pain.

IF NOT FOR PAIN,
WE WOULD NEVER KNOW THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN
SORROW AND JOY
WE WOULD NEVER KNOW HOW TO COMFORT
IN TIMES OF GRIEF
WE WOULD NEVER KNOW
AND WE WOULD NEVER RECOGNIZE THE NEED
WE HAVE FOR A LOVING GOD
WHO IS ATTENTIVE TO US
IN EVERY DETAIL
IN EVERY STRUGGLE
IN EVERY HAPPY MOMENT
PAIN IS A GIFT
IT GIVES US A PLACE OF KNOWING
A PLACE TO REACH OUT
AND BE THE DIFFERENCE
FOR OTHERS WHO ARE SUFFERING!

THE JOY OF THE LORD IS OUR STRENGTH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

If you are a mother,whether in the natural or in the spirit, you are anointed to mother. His approval and strength is available to you. I received a stack of magazines today called "Above Rubies" The publisher wrote a personal note to me. It said , DEAR ANGE, (ANOINTED TO MOTHER),
MAY LOVE, JOY, AND PEACE BE MULTIPLIED TO YOU. MAY YOUR HOME OVERFLOW WITH THE PRAISES OF THE LORD. MAY YOUR WALLS REBOUND WITH LAUGHTER. MAY LOVE SPILL OVER FROM ONE TO THE OTHER. ABOVE ALL, MAY THE ANOINTING OF GOD'S PRESENCE FILL EVERY ROOM.

This is my prayer for every mother who reads this. I also have some copies of this encouraging magazine to give away. If you would like one, email me and I will reserve one for you and bring it to church on Sunday. I will be in the nursery. I have 9 copies so let me know. My love goes to you mothers!!!!!!!!!!

Ange