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Psalm 23

Nov13

“1) The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want 2) He makes me lie down in green pastures; He leads me beside quiet waters. 3) He restores my soul; He guides me in the paths of righteousness for His name’s sake. 4) Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I fear no evil, for You are with me; Your rod and Your staff, they comfort me. 5) You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies; You have anointed my head with oil; my cup overflows. 6) Surely goodness and lovingkindness will follow me all the days of my life, and I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever.” (NASB)

Recently I was praying and this prayer just came from within me. I don’t recall the last time I prayed this passage of Scripture, but as I was praying these words, I could feel a stirring in me to write about them.

“The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want”, seems pretty straight forward, but if you stop and really think about the words,” the Lord is my shepherd”. What is a shepherd? I won’t do the dictionary “thing” I usually do, most of us know what a shepherd is, right? The shepherd is the one in charge of the herd. The shepherd guides the sheep, protects the sheep, takes care of the sheep. Sure, the shepherd is the one in charge – if you will – but the shepherd is also the one who has the most accountability over the herd.

“I shall not want”. Ouch! Seriously, I shall not want? Like anything? We live in a society where many things that we want we can get practically with a click on the phone, right? I shall not want – four simple words, yet, if you allow them to, they can grab a hold of you and convict you. So, the Lord is my shepherd. He’s the One in charge, not me, He will correct me, take care of me, provide for me and I shall not want.

“He makes me lie down in green pastures”. Have you ever seen or walked through a green pasture? (I’m not talking about a cow pasture, lol, that is NOT the same thing!) A green pasture is lush, vibrant in its green tones because it has been nourished and is thriving. I once heard someone say that everyone should take their shoes off and walk around in soft green grass once every day, because it’s relaxing. Obviously, that’s an opinion, although I do agree with it. There is something about being surrounded by a lush, green pasture that is relaxing, perhaps even enough to lie down in it.

“He leads beside quiet waters”. I grew up in Oscoda, Michigan, a beach town on Lake Huron. I LOVE everything about the beach. When there is a body of water before you and it is still, there is something quite peaceful about it. Perhaps there’s a small ripple, but audibly it is quiet. Not great for surfers, but peaceful and still, calming to the spirit. So, He (the Lord) has lush green pastures to lie down in for rest and relaxation, and He leads us to still, quiet waters.

“He restores my soul”. I’m not going to say this is 100% accurate, but I have always been taught that our soul is our mind, will, and emotions. Since this is my understanding, I’m going to work within that understanding for this verse. Most of us have felt mental exhaustion, had racing thoughts, and have bad memories. Most of us have made really good choices, and we’ve most likely made really bad choices as well. Most of us have felt overwhelmed, stressed, or betrayed. It says right there in the 23rd Psalm that He – the Lord, our Shepherd – “restores my soul”. He can restore our minds, He can restore our free will (our choices), He can restore our emotions. We do not have to keep feeling the way we feel; those feelings are just that, feelings – feelings are fluid, they change and God can restore them.

“He guides me in the paths of righteousness for His name’s sake”. Maybe you don’t think of your life as a path, but that symbolism is used quite regularly in Scripture. In Matthew 7:13-14, Jesus talks about a narrow gate and a wide gate. Many people refer to it (myself included) as a narrow path and a wide path. The narrow path leads to the Lord, while the wide path (the easy way) leads to destruction. Our Lord, the Shepherd, guides us on this narrow path, or “paths of righteousness, for His name’s sake”. The Lord can do nothing “less than”. He is holy, righteous, pure; His standard is extremely high and He cannot lower His standards – that would be less than holy, that would be less than righteous, that would be less than pure and He simply cannot do that. The Lord – our Shepherd – restores our souls and He guides us in paths of righteousness.

“Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I fear no evil, for You are with me”. One thing that was brought to my attention years ago was that it doesn’t read, “If I walk through the shadow of death” – no, it reads “Even though…”. Those words can almost guarantee that we will ALL have to walk through the valley of the shadow of death. Let’s look at the rest of the verse because we don’t need the mention of death to trip us up – “I fear no evil, for You are with me”. If God is for you, who can really be against you? (Romans 8:31) In my time on this earth, I’ve noticed that fear is a mighty tool in the toolbox of satan. I know it has definitely worked on me, especially in the past. Fear would grip me for various reasons; my heartbeat would pick up fast, my stomach would seem to fall to somewhere unknown, a grip would tighten around me, a cold sweat would start to develop. As I’m typing this, I’m actually shaking my head. I remember those feelings and I hated it every single time it happened. I was trapped by the enemy, and the name of his trap was called fear and it would get me, over and over again for many years. Fear becomes a mental stronghold that needs to be broken. In my own personal experience, the longer fear is allowed to stay, the more control of your life you have handed over to fear. Fear is running the show (controlling you) and now it is even harder to break the mental stronghold of fear. It is absolutely NOT impossible to break though, but one has to be willing to face the fears (however many there may be) and let God help you. There is only one fear that is righteous and that is the fear of the Lord. Not to be fearful of Him as in afraid and trying to hide from Him, no, that’s not what I mean at all. A fear of the Lord is honoring to Him, you believe who He is and you love Him so much that you don’t want to partake in anything that He is not in. You don’t want to look at pornography because that is not honoring God. You don’t want to get drunk or do drugs, because that is not honoring God. It also means, you don’t want to lie, because that doesn’t honor God. You don’t want to be abusive in your speech, with your hands, with your position at church, or work because that doesn’t honor God. Fear of the Lord does mean that you want to honor God with your speech (Ephesians 4:29), with your thoughts (Philippians 4:8), with your actions (1 Corinthians 10:31), with your time (Ephesians 5:15-16), with your choices (Joshua 24:15). No matter what we walk through, we need to not give fear a foothold in our lives, for we are not alone.

“Your rod and Your staff, they comfort me”. The rod is usually spoken of as a rod of discipline from God. Now how can discipline be comforting? When we know the boundaries with God, we know what lines to not cross (as I mentioned some in the previous paragraph). If we know the boundaries and if we choose to stay within those boundaries, guess what? There’s comfort within the boundaries of God. Staff is usually referencing the shepherd’s staff that is used to help guide the sheep, keep them in line, or to use to rescue them if needed. Again, I can’t say getting a thump from a shepherd’s staff is what I want to receive, but if I need it, then I guess I need it, right? Correction or discipline is not always fun, but it is always necessary. (Hebrews 12:11) Even in the shadow of death God has not left us and He corrects us when needed so we can make it to the narrow gate.

“You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies; You have anointed my head with oil; my cup overflows”. This verse is one that had caused some head scratching for me growing up. My thought was, “Why would I want to eat food in front of my enemies? I don’t want to be anywhere near them!”  Obviously, I was much too young to understand what God was doing. To be honest, I’m not going to claim that I have it all figured out now either. Imagine sitting down in a chair at a table and the table is being prepared for you – the tablecloth is laid down, the plates, cups, silverware are being put into place. You have a fine, crisp white napkin tucked under your chin and into your shirt collar. Now, trays of food are brought out from the kitchen, freshly prepared just for you, just the way you like your food – absolutely perfect. Now imagine that as you are about to eat, you see people before you who have lied about you, gossiped about you, criticized you, mocked you, and betrayed you. People who caused divisions within your family, within your workplace, within your business. People who stole from you, who set you up for a fall. People who mentally, emotionally, physically, and spiritually abused you. However, your focus is not on them – they are there, trust me, they’re there, but they can’t hurt you, for the Lord is with you. One could say, you can have your cake and eat it too. It’s as if God is showing you off to your enemies, standing right behind you, and saying to your enemies, “Look, I know what you did to My child and I want you to witness that I am providing for My child, I am causing all things to work together for good for My child, I am protecting My child, I will defend My child, I will recompense for My child, I have anointed My child to be set apart, I have anointed My child for My purpose, I cause My child’s cup to overflow, I LOVE My child – I just wanted you to know that.” To me, that is the ultimate mike drop.

“Surely goodness and lovingkindness will follow me all the days of my life”. Does anyone honestly, truthfully feel like goodness and lovingkindness follow them? Honestly, there are times I don’t feel that way at all. That being said, just because I feel that way doesn’t mean that it’s true – it’s just how I feel, it’s my perspective at the moment. Isaiah 52:12 and 58:8 both mention God being our rear guard. So, what is a rear guard? According to a dictionary look up on the internet, “rear guard – the soldiers positioned at the rear of a body of troops, especially those protecting an army when it is in retreat”. Since God is good and loving and kind, (all of those being fruits of His Spirit) to say that “surely goodness and lovingkindness will follow me” would be accurate if one thinks of God as covering us from behind, as well as in front, and all around.

“And I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever”. To me, this is more of a hope, a desire, a prayer, for the time here on earth but also with a view on eternity with God. No human knows the future perfectly, only One does and He is not human. Ending the Psalm with this is looking at the present time, but also looking forward to what is yet to come. It can also cause us to question ourselves with this: do we care more about the here and now on this earth or do we care more about the Lord? (Matthew 16:26, Mark 8:36, Luke 9:25)

A verse to leave you with, Matthew 6:19-21, (Jesus is speaking), “Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys, and where thieves do not break in or steal: for where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.” (NASB)

Let Your Light Shine

Aug29

If anyone really paid attention to the timeline of my blogs, they would see a large gap in time. First of all, I only have six blogs up and I started this website at the very end of 2015. If you look closer, you will see that I put out four blogs in 2016, one in 2017, and one in 2024. Somehow, I still have a small group of subscribers to this site– I’m thinking that they completely forgot they subscribed to my once-in-a-blue-moon blog! (laughing, but serious)

This morning, I was looking over past notes and I came across one that I just felt like now was the time to write about it.

A little backstory first…

I always loved writing, and one of the things I wanted to do when I grew up was to be a writer. Many years down the road, in August of 2011, I pulled out my laptop and started writing. I wasn’t sure what I was going to write, I just felt inspiration striking and went with it. That writing session developed over time into “Love Waits: Book One” in the Fruit of the Spirit Series. It took me three years to write “Love Waits”, not because I am that slow, but because I had so many things within me to overcome – insecurity, overwhelmingness, unworthiness – just to name a few. When I realized that God was calling me to write a book, I froze. Seriously – deer in the headlights and hit with a car froze. I had many breaks from writing over the course of those three years because of all the emotions going on in me. Then when I finally accepted that I was writing a book, God gave me a dream. When I woke up from that dream, I knew the dream was going to be another book and also realized it was a series. (Again, deer in the headlights freeze moment.) I just couldn’t understand why God would want me of all people on this earth – me – to write this book series. I grappled with this for quite a long time. I was sure I would “miss” my opportunity and God would definitely give this calling to someone else.

Yet, here I am, 14 years later writing this blog now.

In 2015 “Love Waits” was published. It was not a good experience for me overall. After everything that I had been through and had overcome to finally be at a point where I was a published author and accepted that I was a published author, I didn’t have much to show for it in the end. I was pretty much left high and dry by the publishing company. I did every single thing that they told me to do to “be successful”. In the end, I sold more books than they did and their biggest customer was me, which is probably why I still have about 30 copies of the original “Love Waits” in my office on a book shelf.

In January of 2017, I terminated my contract with them. I had a huge, gaping wound inside of me. My love for writing was barely on life support. I felt like I let everyone who loved me down – my husband, our children, friends – but most importantly I felt that I let God down. I was not successful, I was a failure and I was sure that was how God saw it, because that was the truth after all, right?

So, this morning this is what I came across in my notes from December 23, 2021:

“Today I realized that there was still a wound in me from _____ _____. I also realized that I needed to forgive them again. From a worldly perspective it looks like _____ and _____ _____ got away with everything that they did to so, so, so many people, with nothing more than a slap on their hands.

“As the day rolled into evening, I found myself truly reflecting and seeking the Lord about all of this. A thought came to me – perhaps it was the Lord. The thought was, “If they’re not in prison, then why should you be?” I’ve thought about that quite a bit. I have allowed the experience with _____ _____ to practically stop me from writing. Why?

“Tonight, as I thought more on this, it’s as if I heard God say, “Write like the wind.” I thought about what that means. I think most people would take that statement to mean to write feverishly, with reckless abandon – no limits. But the wind is not that – the wind cannot do whatever it wants, when it wants. It doesn’t have a brain or freewill. The wind can only do what the Creator tells it to do.

“If I apply that understanding to the statement I heard – then I need to write as the Lord says. Perhaps it will look fast, or furious, but perhaps it will look calm and still. Either way, I am to be obedient to God with writing.

“He makes the wind His messengers…” Psalm 104:4 NASB”

For the record, no, I don’t have a grudge against my previous publishing company. I don’t find them to be very honorable, but that’s going to ultimately be between each of them and God. I am just one of many people that they treated that way.

So, why am I writing this? Perhaps for a couple reasons. One, I want to encourage anyone who has felt like their passion to do something has waned or like me, felt like it’s been on life support. Please don’t follow my example and take 14 years to get to the point where you are fully ready to live out your calling. Please, don’t put yourself in prison and don’t let others put you in prison.

Two – I’m writing this for myself. Creative people can be quite sensitive to be honest. However, they can also be very resilient. I needed to be real and put this out there for anyone who’s been put to shame or drug over the coals with their giftings. I am one of those “anyone”.

Let me leave you with this verse that I have reflected on a lot over the past 14 years with my calling. Matthew 15:14-16, these are the words of Jesus: “You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden; nor does anyone light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on the lampstand, and it gives light to all who are in the house. Let your light shine before men in such a way that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father who is in heaven.”

On the left, the original “Love Waits” from 2015. On the right, “Love Waits: Book One” from Covenant Books. https://covenantbooks.com/books/?book=love-waits

Thanksgiving

Jan8

SIDE NOTE- I wrote this the day before Thanksgiving this past year and intended for it to be made public then. Since that didn’t happen, I thought I would still post it. I hope you enjoy it!

At this time of year, it’s “easy” to start listing all the people and things that we are thankful for.  Christians say that you need to have an attitude of gratitude. While that is true and it has a catchy ring to it, having an attitude of gratitude is sometimes a hard thing to have.

Three years ago this month our family packed up from Fairview, Montana and moved to Battle Creek, Michigan. Why? The simple answer is God. The complex answer is…God. Let me start at some sort of a beginning.

On June 20, 2012 my mom, Dorothy Marie Roberts, passed from this earthly life into the heavenly life. She lived in Lansing, Michigan and I was in Fairview. One month later on July 20, I was back in Lansing for my parents’ memorial service. Both of my parents were cremated when they passed so that once both had gone they would be buried together with my dad’s veteran honors for 20 years in the USAF. While in Lansing, I felt an overwhelming peace with everything that was going on. Don’t get me wrong, I missed my mom and losing her “reopened” the grief wound of losing my dad, William James Roberts, in 2009, but somehow, I felt a peace and a comfort that is beyond words. I felt as if I was caught up on a cloud but my feet were firmly planted on the earth. I felt like a sponge, in that I was absorbing everything around me that was happening, and being said. For me, peace was like an emotion- there was calmness within me, but it was much greater than just being calm. That peace and that comfort can only come from one place- God.

On the way back to Montana I noticed an uneasiness and irritability that wasn’t just with me, but it seemed to consume our whole entire vehicle and everyone in it. The long two day drive (while it was still only a two day drive) under those circumstances was even longer, or so it seemed. I did much praying during this time. I sang praise songs in my head while there was turmoil all around me. Figuring the environment was because of everything that went on during our visit and then the long drive back, I thought we would get back to “normal” in a day or two after being home. Wrong! Oh was I so wrong. Days later our family was still at odds and grumpy. This is not typical of our family- we all have our moments, but we are not an angry, grumpy kind of family. My husband, Eric, came up to me and said, “We need to talk.” I agreed, however in my mood, I really didn’t want to, but I followed him back into the house-at a much slower pace. Think of a child being sent to the principal’s office.

We went into our office and he sat at his desk and me at mine. He asked me what I thought God was telling us about where we were supposed to move. Up until this moment, Eric and I believed that we were being called to move about 30 miles away into Williston, North Dakota. I answered Eric by telling him about the unbelievable peace that I had in Michigan. I told him that I took it as a gift from God because of having to bury my parents and that I had closure. I ended the conversation by saying that I wanted to live wherever God wanted us to go. I even remember saying, “If God wants us to sell everything and move to a third world country with no plumbing or electricity (gulp), then I will do it. It’ll be hard, but I will do it because I know that He will go before us and it will be all right.” After my long-winded answer to Eric, he said, “Ok. Well I came in here to look at houses and I was praying about where God wanted us, this is where I was led.” He turned his laptop around that was on his desk and when he did, the screen showed a website of rental property in Battle Creek (and surrounding areas) in Michigan.

As Eric and I continued to talk and pray over the next couple of weeks, I dared to not even hope that God was calling us to Michigan.  See, I was born at Wurtsmith Air Force Base in northern Michigan. I grew up in Oscoda, Michigan, and graduated from Oscoda High School. I am a Michigander through and through. But, when Eric and I got married, I left Michigan in my rearview mirror and wasn’t sure that I would live there again. But, when God calls you somewhere, you go-period. We had confirmation that God was calling us to Michigan. The next few months were a whirlwind of activity. Moving back to Michigan changed many things about our upcoming move. What would have been many, multiple 30-ish minute trips to Williston, North Dakota, was now a two day drive. You know something, it’s funny. God closed every single door in Williston. There was no rhyme, nor reason, except God. But, the door that He opened in Battle Creek is the door that stayed open. You want to know something else? The house that God opened the door for us to buy is the house that was the first house Eric looked at when he was directed by God to look at houses in this area just over 3 years ago and it was also the same house that was on the screen of his laptop when he turned it to show me that day in our office. I wish I could say that this is a movie and that we all lived happily ever after as the screen fades to black and an upbeat, happy song plays on the screen as the credits roll. Wrong again. Fast forward 3 years-

We are still remodeling the house-it is/was a HUGE fixer-upper.  The house is not the only thing that has been under “renovation” since the move. Eric and I are not the same people we were 3 years ago when we moved here. God has taken us through many trials and grown us in ways we hadn’t experienced before.

My husband is a contractor by trade and I believe truly gifted by God to do what he does. You can see some of his work on our website www.inhishandsrc.com. So, buying a house that needed such an overhaul was not really such a crazy idea to us. We knew what we were getting ourselves into (or at least we thought we did). But, little by little, rooms are getting done and I would say our house is probably close to 70% done. Of course, if you asked “Eric the contractor”, he would probably give a much different number. While Eric and I embarked on this journey that God had for us with zeal (much like that of the apostle Peter) 3 years ago, we have lost hope a number of times over the years. God moved us from family and friends and we closed a successful construction business to go where God wanted us to go. When we opened up a business here, we both thought it would take a little while, but that eventually we would be booking future customers before no time. Again, we were wrong. We had customers here and there. But mostly our “job” was working on the house. We learned to budget in a completely new way, since our “old” way of budgeting no longer worked without income (enter your chuckles here). I won’t go into all the details, but one thing I can say, when you name your business ‘In His Hands Remodeling and Construction”  and you use the Scripture reference of Psalm 66:9 “Our lives are in His hands”, God will take you through some stuff. So while I could list all the stuff that has been trying in the past few years, I do know that things could always be worse. To say “money is tight” is an understatement. But, we have our family, we have our health, we have a roof over our head, and we have food in the fridge and cupboards. We may be poor in the eyes of the world, but in the eyes of God we are rich. And we are only rich because of Him, not because of anything that we’ve done.

Our family has learned a new definition to the word “sacrifice”. Lately I have been shown something from God about a well-known verse. This is how I have been reflecting on this Scripture lately. I’ll close with that. “For God loved the world so much, that He gave His only begotten son, that whosoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have ever-lasting life.” John 3:16

Happy Thanksgiving!