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Cafe Of Grace - living every moment steeped in His grace!
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Simply Serve

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Christian Living Eternally...on Earth Simple Life Simply Serve

When SERVING is not a SERVICE…

November 12, 2011 1 Comment
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38-40As they continued their travel, Jesus entered a village. A woman by the name of Martha welcomed him and made him feel quite at home. She had a sister, Mary, who sat before the Master, hanging on every word he said. But Martha was pulled away by all she had to do in the kitchen. Later, she stepped in, interrupting them. “Master, don’t you care that my sister has abandoned the kitchen to me? Tell her to lend me a hand.”

 41-42The Master said, “Martha, dear Martha, you’re fussing far too much and getting yourself worked up over nothing. One thing only is essential, and Mary has chosen it—it’s the main course, and won’t be taken from her.”  Luke 10:38-42 The Message

 

This passage is so commonly referred to; many books and sermons have been written using the comparison of these two sisters.  When it all comes down to it, both were loved by Jesus and both had much to learn from Him.  One just realized that it’s easier to learn when you are sitting at His feet rather than running around on yours.  

As I was pondering these verses in the context of service this week, I was asking God to show me how Mary was serving.  Martha was serving a lot that day, but Mary had found the better way…what was it?  Was she still serving her Master?  How does one serve by sitting and listening?  My oldest might have told me…

“Mom, can we play Monopoly after you lay Hannah down?”“Well, actually Christopher, we need to do some school first and then if we have time we can play.”“I knew you’d say that…”

************

 41 “Martha, Martha,” the Lord answered, “you are worried and upset about many things, 42 but few things are needed—or indeed only one. Mary has chosen what is better, and it will not be taken away from her.” NIV

Sometimes serving is not a service.  Sometimes we bow down, we get down, or we sit down…and we serve.  Serving is doing – yes – but more than the doing it is the just being.  Mary had that one moment to show her love to her Jesus; she knew not if there would be another time.  She could have given Him plates and cups and seconds; instead, she gave Him her attention…her presence.  She served Him by being with Him.  She wasn’t satisfied with glimpses from the kitchen or the laundry room.  She didn’t want to just say a quick hello, give a short answer, or make sporadic appearances to assure Him that she loved Him.  Mary gave Him all of her for the fleeting, precious moment before her.  

I remember having a special friend over one time.  We finished up dinner and I stacked the dishes in the sink.  A mess lay before me as I turned around and asked, “Would it offend you if I left this and sat to visit with you?”  Her answer…”I would prefer it actually.”

There are many moments in life when it will be required that I do something with my hands and feet, but God blesses those who are poor and realize their need for him, for the Kingdom of Heaven is theirs (Matthew 5:3 NLT).  There are precious and fleeting moments before me every day.  When he comes up behind me and wraps his arms around me while I’m washing off the counter…stop, turn around, and return the gift.  When they want me to spend 15 minutes playing a game before we start school…stop, refocus, and get out the game board.  When she is struggling to keep the pain and tears in and she catches your eye when you’re getting ready to pass her by…stop, look deep into her face, and listen.  When He has given you a moment of quiet and you’re about to do another chore…stop, bend the knees, and sit before your Master.  


To Simply Serve

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Written by: Nate
Christian Living Simple Life Simply Serve

Serve…A Real ReTreat!

November 8, 2011 1 Comment
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I stand folding clothes while tears stream…”I need a retreat!”  I cram in school and Bible Study and a ladies’ coffee and church night and a load of laundry and maybe a meal or two…”I need to get away!”  I flop down on the couch and try to sleep the cares away…”I want a vacation!”  I think about the last time I felt refreshed and fully alive and hopeful and at peace…

Was it Monday when I dressed up and hollered out orders in the Church cafe with several other fun and funny ladies?  Maybe it was Tuesday, when I had the privilege to take a meal to someone.  Maybe it was Wednesday when I taught a load of kids in a room of only carpet and chairs.  It could be Thursday when I helped clean up a children’s classroom.  Was it tonight when I got that sippy cup of milk for Miss Grace?

I sit down with that Man of mine for coffee this morning, a rare jewel in our days, and tell him I long to serve and to teach our children to serve…that service is the real reTreat I’m seeking.  I say that I have just got to get out of myself; I’m stifling what was meant to be shared.  I have accepted from His hand, and then closed the fist.  I have stayed in, closed the blinds, closed the heart, stuffed hands in pockets, walked with head and eyes bowed down, and the circumstances of the “in-side” have brought me to the door pounding!

I do not need another conference just for me, a shopping trip, a new outfit, more household items for me to hang and rearrange and eventually get tired of.  I don’t need to hold another payed for ticket to get into another crowded arena or hotel room to hear inspiration.  I have been inspired, only to have retired.  I desperately need them…who ever them might be!  I need to look into their eyes, shake their hands, hug their shoulders, smile into their face, give them their need, love their very being, and open my heart and hand.  It’s time for me to treat them to the abundance of Christ…to give them Him…their own retreat.  That would be a real reTreat to me.

So, the only place I might need to get out of is…me.  The only place I might need to go is where ever they are.  The only place I need to seek is into His face.  The place of refreshment I crave lies in His presence…

The LORD himself goes before you and will be with you; he will never leave you nor forsake you.  Deuteronomy 31:8 NIV

…have I not noticed Him?

13 You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart. Jeremiah 29:13 NIV

______________________________________

 

I will refresh the weary and satisfy the faint. Jeremiah 31:25 NIV

May the Lord show mercy to the household of Onesiphorus, because he often refreshed me and was not ashamed of my chains. 2 Timothy 1:16 NIV

Your love has given me great joy and encouragement, because you, brother, have refreshed the hearts of the Lord’s people Philemon 1:7 NIV

I do wish, brother, that I may have some benefit from you in the Lord; refresh my heart in Christ. Philemon 1:20 NIV

To Simply Serve

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Written by: Nate
Christian Living Simple Life Simply Serve

How to even begin…

November 2, 2011 No Comments
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In my goal to Simply Serve, how do I even begin?  I suppose I could just find a need and fill it, but God seems to have far more in mind.

1 If I speak with human eloquence and angelic ecstasy but don’t love, I’m nothing but the creaking of a rusty gate. 2If I speak God’s Word with power, revealing all his mysteries and making everything plain as day, and if I have faith that says to a mountain, “Jump,” and it jumps, but I don’t love, I’m nothing. 3-7If I give everything I own to the poor and even go to the stake to be burned as a martyr, but I don’t love, I’ve gotten nowhere. So, no matter what I say, what I believe, and what I do, I’m bankrupt without love. I Corinthians 13 The Message

I could teach little children, lead women, and serve a meal, but if I am doing all of this without His love…it is nothing in the Eye of my Beholder.  After doing a recent study on love, I have found myself lacking.  I have a great desire to be walking and talking His Love in this world.  I long to feel love-ly – to have lovely thoughts and emotions.  I have failed over and over.  When I cringe at next week’s lesson or put off another opportunity to meet with someone or skip this week’s meal need – those are moments that are hottest within the soul.  I face myself in those situations and wonder at what really could be made of me.

24I’ve tried everything and nothing helps. I’m at the end of my rope. Is there no one who can do anything for me? Isn’t that the real question?

 25The answer, thank God, is that Jesus Christ can and does. He acted to set things right in this life of contradictions where I want to serve God with all my heart and mind, but am pulled by the influence of sin to do something totally different.

1-2With the arrival of Jesus, the Messiah, that fateful dilemma is resolved. Those who enter into Christ’s being-here-for-us no longer have to live under a continuous, low-lying black cloud. A new power is in operation. The Spirit of life in Christ, like a strong wind, has magnificently cleared the air, freeing you from a fated lifetime of brutal tyranny at the hands of sin and death. Romans 7:24-8:2 The Message

Thankfully, God is not intimidated or appalled at my reflection.  He doesn’t shrink back at the mess I am; instead He comes running with a new garment to drape over my sin-torn clothing.  He covers my weakness in His grace and fills my need by His love.  (Forever the teacher of how it is done.) 

God knew what he was doing from the very beginning. He decided from the outset to shape the lives of those who love him along the same lines as the life of his Son. The Son stands first in the line of humanity he restored. We see the original and intended shape of our lives there in him. Romans 8:29 The Message

The beginning of serving others does not begin with their need or my ability; the beginning of serving others lies in His beginning in me.  Is His Spirit beginning to transform my thoughts, re-form my heart, conform my will, re-shape my life?  Is His love covering the sin in my life?  filling my life with joy?  seasoning my words?  motivating my actions?  restoring?  overflowing?

Is my service beginning with Him? or me?

But if God himself has taken up residence in your life, you can hardly be thinking more of yourself than of him. Anyone, of course, who has not welcomed this invisible but clearly present God, the Spirit of Christ, won’t know what we’re talking about. But for you who welcome him, in whom he dwells—even though you still experience all the limitations of sin—you yourself experience life on God’s terms. It stands to reason, doesn’t it, that if the alive-and-present God who raised Jesus from the dead moves into your life, he’ll do the same thing in you that he did in Jesus, bringing you alive to himself? When God lives and breathes in you (and he does, as surely as he did in Jesus), you are delivered from that dead life. With his Spirit living in you, your body will be as alive as Christ’s!  Romans 8:9-11 The Message

 

To Simply Serve

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Written by: Nate
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