Shepherds Approaching the Manger

“I myself will tend my sheep and have them lie down, 

declares the Sovereign Lord” (Ezekiel 34:15).

The Lord, as our shepherd, is prevalent in Scripture. Old Testament passages share of shepherds tending their flocks. David was but a shepherd boy when anointed to be a future king in the line of lineage for the Messiah.

I have been pondering “shepherds” as we approach 

the celebration of the Incarnation. 

Christ’s first earthly bed was a manger among animals and Mary and Joseph in awe. How could such a humble birthing place and its surroundings hold the Messiah?

Those first told of His birth - yes - shepherds tending their flocks, were heralded right into Bethlehem and to the One who, himself, would grow to be the Shepherd to all.

Humble beginnings are not indicative of what is to come. 

Often we  find ourselves with feelings and questions for our Shepherd concerning some of the harsh and hard to understand events and their impact in our lives. They once had a birthing time but are not indicators of a life of lesser worth any more than Christ’s beginnings were.

They are not of lesser worth than the privilege given those shepherds of long ago who were the first in line to see the Glory of his coming. We have Him daily to give us strength and care.

What can we see this year as we come to the manger?  Jesus’ humbleness eventually led to another wooden place where he was not lain peacefully but nailed in agony. In between these two events, we come to know what he came to teach us as members of his flock.

We are saved by his grace and mercy. Tending to each of us with care is not only a joy for Him, but we, too, can come alongside others to see that each is tended to with his love - no matter how we feel or what we find impossible to understand.

 The first shepherds saw his Glory and we can too if we bow at the manger and let Him give us eyes to see and hearts to follow.

Prayer

 Oh, Lord! 

May we ponder the spirit of Christmas in ways anew this year

 and find You there in splendor. Amen.

Mark Schultz - "When Love Was Born"

Saint James Cathedral - Seattle, Washington 

To see this devotional as formatted by Rest Ministries Director, Lisa Copen, posted on their website, and sent out via subscription -  Click Here. 

Just A Feather Will Do *

A short phrase in a song lyric that a friend sent to me years ago caught my imagination: just a feather will do. 

In a world where other more ostentatious items fill our wish lists - this simple phrase got me to thinking of how “less can be more”. I need but the eyes to see and a change of direction in my heart to seek. 

Feathers. Some are so light that they are but wisps. Some are heavier and help eagles take flight. 

For those of us who embraced the film, Forrest Gump, we watched a feather wend its way down to Forrest’s feet. His awe in accepting it became a metaphor for his taking flight into the adventures that became the fabric of his life.

 In my contemplations, I can get focused on the heavier wings that fill my life - wondering if I may ever take flight. Contemplation can be helpful but I don’t want to miss the moments when God has wisps of grace right before my eyes. He wants me to rest in such moments and find contentment in what he holds within them as they are his step-builders to my ordained future.

I want just a feather to do: 

a teardrop that brings the fruits of restoration, 

the rests that are part of a musical score and make 

it complete because they are needed there, 

a smile, 

a hug that comforts, 

a friend who understands.

As feathers  were filling my thoughts, I asked my cousin, Teri, if I could share about the feathers that God brought into her life and into our family’s lives through her sharing of them.

 I will weave my comments amidst her story

Jan. 5^th 2011, I received a call at work from John [her husband] who was very distraught and said there had been a bad accident and I must come to the hospital. I was at the Express Lane at work with customers and he said, “Come quick, it isn’t good.”

Aaron [ their 28 year old son ] had called me the night before and asked me if I could take Ashley [Aaron's wife] to work the next day. He needed the truck she usually drove to work. So, of course, I said, “Yes”,  and he responded with the most emotion I had ever heard in his voice, “THANKS MAMA, I LOVE YOU!” Those would be the last words I ever heard from him.

[The family runs a tree service business in a rural area. Aaron was high up on a crane, all safety measures in place, preparing a tree to be felled, high enough to see the eagles swooping by in the freedom they have, as if owning the skies.]

What must go through a mother’s heart at such a time? What must have gone through Aaron’s young wife’s mind as Teri swooped her up with the urgency in the call and they took to the road. Surely, she and Aaron’s one-year old daughter, Abigail, filled some of her thoughts. 

Feathers of grace fell into place without hesitation.

We cried and prayed the whole way to the hospital. We drove not knowing if Aaron was alive or dead. We held hands and prayed and prayed and prayed. We reached the road near where John was raised. 

At that moment, and on that particular spot in the highway, a large eagle actually swooped over our windshield and flew over the bay and towards the horizon upward. 

I knew within my mother’s heart that at that very moment, Aaron was being lifted to heaven on eagles wings. To me an eagle has always represented God! I knew that God was lifting Aaron Home. When we finally arrived at the hospital, we found that the moment the eagle had swooped our car was the exact minute that they had declared Aaron dead on arrival. I choose to declare him resurrected!

When I received the news later that day and sat in disbelief of the accident and all that it may have entailed, feathered thoughts were upon me -- a mantle of God’s presence. 

In my mind’s eye I saw Aaron falling from his spot high above the road. As he fell, God swooped in. Cradling Aaron in his arms to soften the fall and holding him close, He whispered, 

“It is okay, son. I’ve got you. I am taking you Home.” 

It was months later that I found out that the place where Aaron came to rest was softened as I had seen. He lie as if in sleep, no evidence of what one would think the scene could be. His father and brother rushed to administer CPR as they awaited the paramedics. 

Those moments of unbelief, pain, horror 

co-existed with God’s hands of grace to help them.

Life became a blur for the week or two before Aaron’s life celebration. The day before the service, I felt led to speak for our family to those who gathered. I went up to the 100 year old homestead where Aaron and Ashley had been married. I wanted to hear the words from God that  I was to share. It was 8p.m. and already dark. As I turned on the  porch light at the house where I would write God’s message, there on the doorstep of the old farmhouse was a young eagle feather -- God’s signature to me that He was with us in all of this. Aaron was secure with Him. He had lived his ordained earthly days. 

Teri came to know, as others of us have experienced, too, that God wants to gift us with assurances of what can bring us comfort in the deepest times of despair. 

It will not be literal feathers for everyone, although young Abigail now knows that her Daddy may wing some feathers down from above, signs that he walks alongside her as she steps into the days and adventures of her life. 

For some it could be the promise seen in the appearance of an unexpected rainbow or a timely word in a note or phone call. 

I am often blessed hearing  a song that brings tears of recognition that God understands the depths of what I am feeling, notes of grace for me. 

Such signs will always be of personal encouragement as that is how God loves us. His Word is filled with exhortations of how He wants us to rest in the shelter of his wings. 

There, He can give us the gift of himself and the assurance that He, who is mighty, can honor us with a feather of help pulled forth from his abundance. 

Such a feather will do just fine.

I Find Your Love

Composer: Patrick Doyle

Lyrics: Beth Nielsen Chapman

Performed by Beth Nielsen Chapman

This mourning dove feather was a timely, and unexpected gift from my friend, Margie Scott - a perfect image to accompany this text.

Thank you, Margie!

* revision from an earlier posting

Trusting the Hands of the Potter to Transform His Clay

One of my devotionals was posted on the Rest Ministries’ website today and sent out via subscription. Most often when writing words of encouragement to others in a devotional, my intent is to focus on the message that God has helped me to discover as my challenges overwhelm me. 

A reader, who deals with the same challenges, wrote to me after a devotional of mine posted some months ago. She was grateful to have found another who knows how she feels and what she experiences, as I had been a bit more specific about my chronic condition. She told me that she appreciated my bringing “vestibular dysfunction” to the awareness of readers. It had me rethinking my focus - not for every devotional - but to state with more vulnerability what it is that God has helped me deal with for decades. 

Thus, the following devotional is for now, and for whoever may find a blessing in it, and perhaps a kindred soul on this life journey who understand because she/he is walking the same path.

To view the devotional as posted on the Rest Ministries’ website,

 click here.

There have been some beautiful responses that help me to know that others are now more aware of the writer behind the words and the One who is guiding me along His way. To share that is a blessing.

Trusting the Hands of the Potter to Transform His Clay

 “But the pot he was shaping from the clay was marred in his hands; 

so the potter formed it into another pot, 

shaping it as seemed best to him” (Jeremiah 18:4).

A friend told me years ago that she had never known anyone to be, so literally, on the Potter’s wheel as I am!

I have lived with vestibular dysfunction - constant dizziness, eruptions of internal spinning vertigo, related bouts with nausea and a striving to keep my balance - since March of 1983. The cause is unknown though doctors believe a virus hit my right inner ear as evidence of damage is there.

It hit in one instant, has refused to leave, and has defied all treatments. 

In early March, 2013, a differing form of vertigo hit, blindsiding me with its vengeance. 

Similar in debilitation, it has a differing trigger and was diagnosed as BPV ( benign positional vertigo). 

There is a therapy that has been successful for others in correcting this. I sought its help, praying for relief. The process is a nightmare putting one into a vertigo state in hopes that small crystals, flaked off and  lodged in a semi-circular canal of the labyrinth, where they do not belong, will return and stick in the part of the inner ear where they do. 

As I write this devotional, early April, I have chosen to stop the treatments as there has been no signs of improvement, no guarantee that any will emerge. My therapist is in agreement as she has witnessed the agony I was enduring, unlike  other patients of hers in the past. I am choosing to let the Potter work with me on his own.

In the context of this Jeremiah verse, the clay the potter was working with was flawed as Israel needed to repent of its ways and be reshaped

However, my vestibular system, though newly flawed, falls, more directly into the translation given in the New Century Version of this verse:

“He was using his hands to make a pot from clay, 

but something went wrong with it. 

So he used that clay to make another pot 

the way he wanted it to be”( Jeremiah 18:4 NCV).

God’s care in transforming each of us is personally designed for the clay that is “us”.  He alone can accomplish the transformation because He loves and knows his original design. 

Prayer

 Lord, I know I am safe in your caring hands although the transformation process is hard. Remaining still in spirit, if not body, I put my trust in You as You complete your work in me. Amen.

Jamie Zach is a talented potter who invited me  

to come to his studio and take photos of him at work at his wheel.

 Audrey Assad sings of the restlessness we each experience until we surrender to rest in the caring hands of the Lord. This is not easily done when we are being transformed on the Potter’s wheel but paradoxically, it is only in surrender that we can release the restlessness. May her song soothe you as you let its message come inward and settle you.

Click here to listen to the song.