Today, I want to share one of my favorite stories from Paul Harvey.



Jesus and the Bird Cage
Paul Harvey
Boston preacher Dr. S.D. Gordon, placed a beat up, bent, rusted old bird cage beside his pulpit when he told this story.

An unkempt, unwashed, little lad about 10 years old was coming up the alley swinging this old caved in bird cage with several tiny birds shivering on the floor of it.

The compassionate Dr. Gordon asked the boy where he got the birds.

He said he trapped them.

Dr. Gordon asked what he was going to do with them.

The boy said he was going to play with them and have fun with them.

The preacher said, “Sooner or later you’ll get tired of them. Then what are you going to do with them?”

The lad said, “I have some cats at home. They like birds. I’ll feed them to my cats.”

Dr. Gordon said, “Son, how much do you want for the birds?”

The boy, surprised, hesitated and said, “Mister, you don’t want these birds. There just plain old field birds. They can’t even sing. They’re ugly.”

The preacher said, “Just tell me. How much do you want?”

The grubby little lad thought about it. He squinted up one eye. He calculated and hesitated and said, “Two dollars?”

To his surprise Dr. Gordon reached into his pocket and handed the boy two, one dollar bills.

The preacher took the cage.

The boy, in a wink, hurried up the alley.

In a sheltered crevice between buildings, Dr. Gordon opened the door of the cage and tapping on the rusty exterior he encouraged the little birds, one at a time, to find their way out through the narrow door and fly away.

Thus having accounted for the empty cage beside his pulpit, the preacher went on to tell what seemed, at first, like a separate story.

About how once upon a time, Jesus and the Devil had engaged in a negotiation.

Satan had boasted how he’d baited a trap in Eden’s garden and caught himself a world full of people.

“What are you going to do with all those people in your cage” Jesus wanted to know.

The Devil said, “I’m going to play with em’, tease em’. Make them marry and divorce and fight and kill one another. I’m going to teach them to throw bombs on one another. I’m going to have fun with them!”

Jesus said, “You can’t have fun with them forever. When you get tired of playing, what are you going to do with them?”

Satan said, “...They’re no good anyway! ...Kill them!”

Jesus said, “How much do you want for them?”

Satan said, “You can’t be serious! If I sell them to you, they’ll just spit on you. They’ll hate you. They’ll hit you and beat you. They’ll hammer nails into you! They’re no good.”

Jesus said, “How much?”

Satan said, “All of your tears and all of your blood. That’s the price.”

Jesus took the cage, and paid the price, and opened the door.

Happy Easter, from my heart...to yours. May your day be blessed and your heart be happy!

Fix, it mama!

How many times has a child asked you this? They bring broken things to us, not doubting that we will be able to put them back together. They don't know how it will be done, and they don't try to figure it out. They just bring them to someone that they have faith in...someone who will make it all better.

When a child brings something broken to you, what's the first thing that has to happen before you can fix it? They have to LET IT GO. They have to place it into your hands so you can do what needs to be done. If they are still holding onto it, you can't take control.

I'm afraid I'm like a child so many times, bringing things to God. I ask Him to "fix it", but I'm unwilling to let go. I bring my worries, my hopes, my fears to Him in prayer and ask for solutions, but I'm still holding onto the problems in my mind....still trying to figure out how to fix it myself. I realize this is something I need to work on. I don't have the answers. I don't have the ability. I can't "fix" everything. But I do know Someone who can. I may not know how He will do it, and I don't need to try to figure it out. Faith is enough.

My Sunday School teacher once said that he thinks of us as carrying our burdens and problems in "spiritual backpacks". They burden us and slow us down. They make the road harder to travel. They keep us from enjoying the journey. He said we bring these backpacks of burdens to Jesus and lay them at his feet in prayer. However, oftentimes, when we rise from our knees to go about our day, instead of leaving the burdens at the feet of Jesus, we pick them back up, put them back on her backs, and carry them around some more. If I truly have faith that Jesus is going to answer my prayer, I need to leave the burdens out of the backpack. I need to LET IT GO. Because Jesus is more than able. He is more than enough.

Just some thoughts from my heart...to yours. May your day be blessed and your heart be happy.

The Sun is Always Shining...

I work from home as a transcriptionist. I also homeschool my kids. I'm busy, but blessed!! I have a room in my house that we were blessed to add on as my "office". It has a lot of windows - which I love. My desk is underneath this little octagonal window where I can look out at the trees, sky, clouds, and birds while I work.

In southern Virginia, we have A LOT of cloudy days. I'm not really sure how Seattle gets more rain than we do sometimes. With that being said, it seems almost every day when I am working in the evenings, after school is done, that the sun will shine right into my eyes as it passes over this little window. I like to call it "baking at 350 degrees". It is not easy to find window coverings for these strange little windows, and so I sat. And baked. And fumed a little from time to time. I would tape up paper over it, hang fabric on a coat hanger and a thumbtack, many things. Finally, my husband cut a piece of cardboard to size that I could place into the window and solved my dilemma. I love that man. But what really struck me as odd, would be that we would have an almost totally cloudy day...gloomy...maybe even rainy. But in the evening when I was sitting there working, the sun would peek out from behind the clouds just for a while, just long enough to shine in my eyes while I was trying to type.

I got to thinking about this one day. I decided I wanted to take these little bursts of sun as God "waving" at me from heaven...letting me know that even though the clouds may be out right now, that gloomy days may be part of life, the sun is always shining, whether we can see it or not. Kind of like the way the "SON" is always shining in our lives, even on gloomy days when we can't see Him working.

So now, on those cloudy days when I'm working away, and the sun begins to shine right into my eyes to get my attention, I just think, "Hello, God. Thanks for letting me know you're still there."

Just some thoughts from my heart...to yours. May your day be blessed and your heart be happy!

Am I a Jesus fan?

We all know that one sports fanatic...um, I mean...fan. The diehard fan who cheers louder, dresses more brightly in the stands. You know, the one who sticks by his or her team no matter what, win or lose. Even when times are tough. You know to not say anything bad about their team, or you're in for a fight. Why? Because they truly, passionately LOVE their team.

That got me to thinking about sports fans. Some aren't diehard at all. They are more bandwagon fans. The ones who jump on board when it's smooth sailing and rainbows, but stop cheering when times get hard. They're not cheering because they love their team...they're just cheering because they love winning.

And then there's the 'fake fan' who wants to wear the t-shirts and hats, call themselves a fan, but they don't watch the games. They don't know the stats. They aren't really a fan at all, they just want to be included in the fun.

Hmmm. I wonder. Do we know any Jesus fans? Do we know the 'fake fans' who wear the crosses and call themselves Christians, but don't pray, go to church, read their Bibles? How about bandwagon Christians? Everything is fine until life gets hard...then they want to blame God and cry out against Him.

Then there's true Jesus fans. Paul and Silas in the Bible were true Jesus fans. They were thrown into prison for doing absolutely nothing wrong, and what did they do? They sang hymns and praises!!! THAT'S the kind of Jesus fan I want to be. The one who cheers louder, shines more brightly. The one who praises Him not for what He can give, but for who He is....

Just some thoughts from my heart...to yours. May your day be blessed and your heart be happy!

Pieces

Pieces

Pieces. I've been thinking a lot about this lately. Have you ever been putting together a really big jigsaw puzzle? You know, the ones with thousands of tiny pieces, each one so similar to the next that it is almost impossible to figure out what goes where. Maybe you've put a particular jigsaw puzzle together time after time, year after year....so many times that you no longer need to look at the picture on the box, because you know instinctively where each piece goes.

Now, imagine you are sitting down at a table to work this particular jigsaw puzzle for the umpteenth time. Your little girl comes to sit down next to you and says, "Mommy, can I help?" Now, you know this puzzle is too hard for her, especially because you've lost the box it came in and don't even have a picture of what it is supposed to look like. But you take her by the hand, sit her down with you, and say, "Sure, honey. Let's do this together." You give her about 10 or 12 pieces that you know will work to make a part of the picture, a small piece of the puzzle. She sits and works for a while, trying pieces first here, then there. She tries to put them in the wrong places at times, and you guide her hand. Then, after a time…voila! "I did it, Mommy!" She exclaims.

This goes on for a while, you giving her a few pieces to work on, guiding her, helping her, and her completing her portions bit by bit. Finally, in frustration and impatience, she says, "I don't want any help. I can do it just like you!" She takes all of the remaining pieces (not just ones you have given her) and tries to put something…anything together. She fits and tries and arranges and rearranges. Nothing. She gets more frustrated and annoyed, and tries some more. Not one piece goes together. Finally, she slings the pieces off the table, and exclaims, "I can't do it!", lies her head down on the table and cries. You say to her, "I know you can't do it by yourself. You're not ready for that. You need to let me guide you bit by bit, little by little, to put things together, because I know where everything needs to go to work out just right. You can't do it alone. But you can do it with me."

Now, I imagine me as that little girl, with God as the Ultimate Puzzle Master. Sometimes I try to do things on my own, thinking I know the best places for everything to fit. I try to fit things in here and there, turn it around, try again. But I don't get anywhere. Finally, I cry out to God, "I can't do it!" It's then He says to me, "I know you can't do it alone. You don't know what this is going to look like when it's finished. Only I know that. But you can do it with Me. I'll just give you a few things at a time that I know you can handle, and eventually, we'll get the whole picture finished. You and Me…together."

I want God to take all my pieces, jagged and torn, broken and ruined, and put them together into a picture, a mosaic, that will bring Him glory and honor.

May your day be blessed and your heart be happy,

-Andrea

"What you see is what you get." 

Or is it? In these technology bombarded times we live in, what we see is sometimes far from the truth. Movies, televison, magazines, internet images...they are all cropped and enhanced, changed and rearranged. It seems nothing is worth posting unless it fits the image of "perfect" that Hollywood has defined...but that is a blog for another time..

I got to thinking about the photoshopped images we see, and it occurred to me...am I a"photoshopped" Christian? Do I sometimes put the image out there that is untarnsihed, more vivid than actuality, more glowing than true? Do I put on a face for others to see  that is unlike that God sees? God isn't fooled by "photoshopped" images. He upholds our lives to the mirror of His word to see how we reflect. I want what God sees to be what the world sees too. I don't want to just APPEAR to be a Christian...I want to truly be one, from the depths of my very being. In today's world, it seems a lot of people are claiming to be Christians, but I'm afraid they are photoshopped. The image they send  out doesn't always "jive" with the way they are truly living their  lives. I don't  want to be that way. I want to be a true image. I have flaws...I'm not perfect. I get angry and sad, jealous and rude. I am not always happy with what I see, but I can only begin to work on changing the reflection in the mirror if I am honest about what I am seeing. I don't want it to be "touched up". I want it  to be changed....to be created in the image of God...to reflect Him.

May your day be joyous and your heart be happy!

-Andrea