I have been to Arizona and California many times. While on those trips I drove through some real deserts. While in Egypt I traveled through one of the largest deserts I have ever seen. I know there are some people who love the desert, but I am not one of them. It is desolate, dry, sandy terrain, and hot, hot, hot! This goes on for miles and miles and miles and miles! Did I say it goes on for miles? Amazingly at night, cold winds will often blow. One can enjoy snakes, scorpions, lizards and all kinds of lovely creatures, and a cold wind. Ah, the desert – such an appealing place! Not really, but on my journey to a destination I have found myself in desert places.
Some are walking through the desert right now. Oh, not literally walking on hot sand and encountering snakes and scorpions, but still in a desert place. Perhaps you are in a dry, hot place with occasional cold, miserable winds. It goes on for miles and miles and miles and seems to never end. It can be such a lonely place.
In the Bible there are many who experienced the desert or wilderness including Jesus Himself. I seriously doubt any of them volunteered to be there! Yet, over and over, these great men and women of faith allowed their deserts to become defining moments in their lives. God spoke to them in the desert! God sustained them in the desert! God provided for them in the desert! God used the desert to prepare them for even greater usefulness! The hard place became a God-adventure for them.
Do I want to be in the desert? NO! But God certainly allows it from time to time. When we find ourselves there, trust Him that it will become a God-adventure, a place where He will meet you, a place where He will speak. Trust Him to make it life-changing and spiritually empowering. Allow the Holy Spirit to make it a defining moment of growth.
You will walk out of the desert one day. How do I know? The Bible says “They were not thirsty when he led them through the desert. He divided the rock, and water gushed out for them to drink.” – Isaiah 48:21. He led them THROUGH. He did not leave them there. He will do the same for you.
“Your God will come to save you.” Then will the eyes of the blind be opened and the ears of the deaf unstopped. Then will the lame leap like a deer, and the mute tongue shout for joy. Water will gush forth in the wilderness and streams in the desert.” – Isaiah 35:4-6
Almost every morning, I start my day with a wonderful, magnificent cup of coffee. I have been through the season of drip coffee makers, pod coffee makers, and now I am back to a good old-fashioned percolator. The coffee is magnifico!
I must be careful throughout the day, because after that cup of coffee, I do not drink very much of anything. Since I rarely get thirsty, I must remind myself to drink all through the day. I have trained myself to drink flavored bubbly water, cold citrus tea, and at times, a couple of other beverages. I’m not usually thirsty, but when I am, the only thing that will satisfy that craving is water. When I am thirsty, I can gulp down an entire bottle of room-temperature water. Nothing else will quench my thirst.
It’s what I drink that determines whether my thirst will be quenched.
There is a story in John chapter four of Jesus encountering a Samaritan woman at a well. As the woman came to the well, she came for water to quench her thirst. That day would be different from all the other days she had been to the well. Read the story to give fresh vision to the exchange between the Samaritan and Jesus.
Jesus began to tell her about a water that would be living water, and she would never thirst again. Was Jesus saying she would never need the water from the well again? Not at all. The woman came to the well to get what she thought she needed, but Jesus came to the well to give her what she really needed.
I will not rehearse the entire story, but there is so much to see. We are told that this woman has been married five times and is presently living with a man who is not her husband. She did not tell Jesus this, Jesus told her this. I wonder if she gasped. I wonder if she hung her head. I wonder if she thought this was just another person who would make fun of her, ridicule her, or shame her.
Since the woman came in the middle of the day to get water, it is widely accepted that she did not want to be around others. One would normally come draw water early when it was not so hot, because that heavy jug filled with water would be a burden to take home. It would be even worse in the heat of the day.
How many times had she been shamed by others? She did not want to hear their snickers or see their looks of disgust as she approached the well. Maybe the townspeople made sure she knew her place!
We don’t even know if they knew her whole story. We do not know why she had been married so many times. Men could divorce a woman any time they wanted. They could divorce her because they did not like her cooking, her mother, or the way she looked. How many times had she been rejected and abandoned? Yet, she continued to try to find fulfillment in another relationship. If she could just find the right relationship, all would be well, but instead she repeatedly found sorrow, rejection, and shame.
It did not take the Samaritan woman long to find out that Jesus did not come to heap shame upon her, but He came to take shame from her. When Jesus started to speak with the woman and confront her issues, she changed the subject to religion. Jesus was not interested in discussing religion. Jesus came to give her freedom from the shame that had controlled her life.
Others had written her off, but not Jesus. The Bible tells us that He intentionally came through Samaria, and His intention was a divine appointment that would bring a life-changing, freedom-giving, shame-killing, joy-filling encounter to her life.
As I was thinking about this scripture story this morning, I thought about myself. When life is difficult, people are mean, things do not work out, the devil reminds me of my mistakes, or I feel left out, to what well do I run for relief? Where do I go when I am thirsty because life has parched my soul?
I have served the Lord for decades, and yet too often when life has parched me, I turn to the wrong well for a drink. Often our well of choice is shopping, or entertainment, or food, or social media, or relationships. Those are not terrible things, but they are not the answer for a soul that is parched. It is so easy to turn to the wrong well, and when we do, we find that we are as parched as ever.
I ask you the same question I asked myself today. From which well will you drink when life is hard? We need to fight to drink from His well and allow nothing and no one to replace this source of living water. Don’t drink from the natural source of water in the wilderness of your soul, sit by the well of the Spirit and drink deeply from the water of life. Jesus is waiting at the well to have a conversation with you! Drink the good stuff.
“Jesus said to her, ‘Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again, but those who drink of the water that I will give them will never be thirsty. The water that I will give will become in them a spring of water gushing up to eternal life.” – John 4:13-14
If you know me at all, you know that I am a happy camper when March rolls around! Daylight Savings Time has begun, which means the dark of night does not arrive until after 7:00 p.m.. In the winter it is a little before 5:00 p.m. when darkness arrives. Ugh for me!!
Spring is one of the most beautiful and fragrant times of the year. The picture above is my street of residence and the Bradford pear trees are beautiful. We have hundreds of them in our neighborhood, creating a canopy of beautiful white blooms throughout our large neighborhood. What a beautiful sight to see these trees against the bright blue skyline.
The Bradford pear tree is beautiful, but they emit a stench that lingers for as long as the flowers last, making it unpleasant to be around until the flowers finally fall to the ground. The aroma causes one to have no desire to be near the beautiful-looking Bradford tree. The aroma does not match the tree.
The Bible has a lot to say about the aroma of a Christian. One verse tells us, “For we are to God the pleasing aroma of Christ among those who are being saved and those who are perishing.” – 2 Corinthians 2:15.
As believers, we all give off an aroma that reaches the nostrils of God and the nostrils of those around us. As we live our lives, we can spread the sweet incense of Jesus. What an honor, but also a great responsibility. Is our aroma Christ-like? Would our smell of Christianity attract non-believers?
I have lived seven decades on the earth, and I do not recall a time when people had so much emptiness, unhappiness, and restlessness. Now is the time to stop looking like a beautiful Christian because you carry a Bible, attend church, give money, or many other things that are beautiful. Those things mean little if we do not give a beautiful aroma of the Christ who lives within us. We offer hope to the lost when we emit a life-giving perfume.
There is a Hawaiian saying, “Tiny is the flower, yet it scents the grasses around it.” What a great illustration of how the smallest things can have impactful results. The fact that the flower is small and seemingly insignificant does not keep it from spreading the fragrance it was created to share. In fact, often the smallest flower can have the most potent fragrance!
Never underestimate the power of your fragrant kindness, joy, encouragement, and peace. Smile at the clerk who does not seem nice to you. Speak a kind word to them. Be nice to that cranky neighbor. When others speak of how rotten the world is, agree with them but with a caveat. Yes, the world is kind of rotten these days, but Jesus gives me joy and peace in the midst of it all. Show up to help a neighbor in need. Stop with rude social posts. Be an encourager in word and deed. Give off the fragrance of Jesus that lives within you.
By giving off a sweet aroma of Christ, you might just entice someone to search for the source. Maybe they cannot quite figure out why you are different, but they do often notice an enticing aroma that makes you different. It is God’s love they are attracted to, which could be the beginning step to opening their heart to Jesus.
Don’t look beautiful as a Christian but emit rottenness. Who in your daily interaction needs to smell the aroma of Christ today? Use every opportunity to be a fragrant offering for Christ.
“Live a life filled with love, following the example of Christ. He loved us and offered himself as a sacrifice for us, a pleasing aroma to God. – Ephesians 5:2
Because my husband was a pastor for thirty-three years and a chaplain for eighteen years, we have stood with many people as they grieved the loss of a loved one. In most of these cases, the deceased person was a Christian believer, but that does not annihilate the pain of having a loved one no longer on the earth.
Death has been on my mind a whole lot during the month of February. On February eleventh, our family hit the twelve-year mark for the loss of our son Bryan. There were still a few tears that day as we talked about missing him. About three weeks ago, we lost my brother Wayne. Wayne lived in California for well over fifty years, so we rarely saw each other. In the months before his death, we reconnected talking by phone or texting. Neither of us had a clue that he would be gone so quickly. On February twenty-eighth, my brother-in-law Tony left this world after being married to my sister for nearly fifty-seven years. Tony was a man with a servant’s heart and loved his family deeply.
There is a possibility that before this year concludes, we will find ourselves back at the cemetery unless God chooses to change that. Additionally, we are praying with and ministering to families facing losses of children, spouses, dear friends, and family members. Some are in intense pain.
I am not sure if it has been taught or been caught, but there is a misleading twist on the scripture about death losing its sting. The Bible says, “where o death is your victory, where o death is your sting?” We know that there is joy because our loved one, as a believer, is in the presence of the Lord. That is glorious and wonderful, but there is still the sting that those of us left behind feel. That verse does not tell us that death does not sting because we are Christians. It does sting, and the pain can be felt for years.
1 Corinthians 15: 54-55 says, “Then, when our dying bodies have been transformed into bodies that will never die, this Scripture will be fulfilled: “Death is swallowed up in victory. O death, where is your victory? O death, where is your sting?”
That word “then” helps us to understand these verses. The word “then” connotes a time in the future. So, these verses are telling us that there will come a time in the future, after the last trumpet has sounded, when we will be able to finally say, “Death’s sting is gone!”
I want the sting of death to be gone for all of us right now, but we are not there yet. For me and for some of you, death still stings. The pain is the ripping apart of interwoven hearts and brings a grief that knows no bounds.
For those who are feeling the fresh sting of death or a sting that has lasted for a while, it does not make you a weak Christian. God is not mad at you because you, as His child, dare to grieve. That is not our God! God is with you in the midst of all that pain.
It is amazing, when grief tries to be my steadfast companion on any given day, what faith in God can do. I have learned to pour out my thoughts and feelings to God. It really is true that, “The righteous cry, and the LORD hears And delivers them out of all their troubles. The LORD is near to the brokenhearted And saves those who are crushed in spirit.” – Psalm 34:17-18.
We might feel the sting of death now, but the day will come when the sting will be gone! Just as the grave could not hold Jesus, it will be incapable of holding Christians. What a day of reunion that awaits us, and we will be able to shout the questions, ” Grave where is your victory? Death, where is your sting?” Both will be silent.
