Discover Grace Blog

From Rachel's Heart: Being Served

It is sometimes hard to ask for help.  It’s hard to say, “I’m having it kind of rough.”  For me, it is easier to do for someone than to have someone do for me.  And the Lord used a dear friend to show me the sin in this. 

“Do not think of yourself more highly than you ought, but rather think of yourself with sober judgment, in accordance with the measure of faith God has given you.  Just as each of us has one body with many members, and these members do not all have the same function, so in Christ we who are many form one body, and each member belongs to all the others.”  Romans 12:3-5

I never thought of myself as better than others.  I always took this verse to mean that the body of Christ should all work together, and just because we don’t all have the same role doesn’t mean we aren’t all necessary.  I have had many a patient who has lost a big toe and you would be surprised at how much something like that can affect your balance or ability to run.  Everything else has to work “overtime” to compensate for the loss, albeit a “small”  loss. 

“If one part suffers, every part suffers with it; if one part is honored, every part rejoices with it.  Now you are the body of Christ, and each one of you is a part of it.”  I Corinthians 12:26

But when one member is hurting, the other members suffer with it.   And when one part is honored, everyone rejoices with it.  What a beautiful picture of the body of Christ!  When I step back from the picture (as I have had to do being home with my sweet, sick, Mary), I smile at the picture of the beautiful body of Christ caring for one another.  Using their own gifts and exercising their spiritual “muscles” to do the work Christ has given us to do.  Prayer ministry.  Mercy meals.  Administration.  A phone call.  An e-mail.  A note of encouragement. 

The Lord began showing me that this verse also means not to think so highly of yourself that you cannot be on the receiving end of a kind gesture.  A false humility says, “I’m okay, I don’t need anything.  I don’t need YOU to do anything for ME.”  Allowing the body of Christ to serve one another so that we are equipped to serve Christ as we serve a hurting, lost world is another way to look at these passages from Paul’s pen.

I marvel at the beauty of Christ’s bride at Grace @ Bell Road.  Each one serving the other, as we ultimately serve Christ, spurring one another on to be effectively equipped to do the good work He has called us to do.  Thanks be to God for continuing to humble each of us to accept God’s grace from one another.  I pray our LifeGroups will be a place where this kind of necessary ministry will take place. 

We have much to look forward to – the marriage supper of the Lamb when we, the body of Christ, will be together with our Lord and Savior, the Groom who has come for his lost bride, who gave His very life for her!  Christ is risen, He is risen indeed!  And He is coming back for us SOON!

Rachel's Heart: Children, the Best Teachers

 It was one of those afternoons where the sin nature of my 3 year old reared its ugly head. Anna had been whining for something, I don’t even remember what it was now. She whined and whined and whined. After telling her no more than I’d like to admit, I sent her to her room when the whining did not stop. She refused to go. Now the battle of wills had really begun. So I picked her up, began carrying her to her room as she screamed and kicked in defiance, and I calmly said, “Now you are going to get a spank because you did not listen when I sent you to your room.” She wailed and in a burst of anger, slapped me across my cheek. I felt my face flush with anger as the sting of her slap lingered for a second or two. I continued carrying her to her room, a bit quicker now, and said gruffly, “Now you are going to get two spanks.”

I set her down on the bed, dished out my two spanks as promised, and reminded her of why she was receiving the spanks. I kissed her hand as I tried to discipline in love, and told her not to get up until she had thought about what she had done.

I could hear the wailing from the kitchen while I tried to finish cooking dinner. I grumbled under my breath to see I had burned the chicken in the time I had been gone. My cheek still stung, but not as much as my heart did from the blow my daughter had delivered. As I salvaged what chicken I could, I noticed the wailing had died down. So I went back into her room and walked over to her and asked, “Do you know why you were being punished?” 

She answered with quivering lips and apologetic eyes, “Yes, mommy, I’m sorry for hitting your face.” 

I hugged her and said, “I forgive you, Anna,” as I had taught her to say so many times. She kissed my cheek and made it all better. 

She began playing with her toys in the kitchen as I finished dinner, back to her happy self, when I overheard her talking. I heard her say, “I’m sorry for hitting mommy in the face.” Remembering the sting in my heart and on my cheek, I chimed in, “Yeah, you should be sorry because that was VERY naughty!” I began to scold her some more when she interrupted me to say, “No, mommy, I’m not talking to you, I’m talking to my Lord.”

What a shocker that was for me. It was as if someone had slapped me on the other cheek, the sting was so real. In an instant, I realized so many things, first of which was the shallow example of forgiveness I had modeled to her. I had said, “I forgive you,” but I was so ready to bring it back up and rehash her naughtiness to make her pay for it again. Second, I realized how deeply our Lord forgives us. He doesn’t just say the words to patch up our ugliness and cover it like a band-aid. He tells us our sin is as far as the east is from the west when he is the one who does the forgiving. And lastly, I was really happy to hear she referred to our Lord as her Lord. She realized she had sinned against both me and God, and since she had already asked me to forgive her, she knew she still needed to ask the Lord to forgive her as well. Her childlike faith to ask and expect to receive freely the forgiveness that He offers was a breath of fresh air to me. This time I muttered under my breath, “Lord, help me to forgive the way you do. “