Will of My Life

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=S9oqi86yS3g


What I want to write about and the point I want to portray is one I have been trying to figure out for years. It’s an intimidating topic because I don’t know all the answers and I don’t for a second want come across as if I do. It seems to be something people of all ages and stages are always trying to work through…

What is the Lord’s will for my life? 

Making life’s next plan is always on the agenda. Planning for dinner tonight, planning how much studying needs to be done tomorrow, planning this next weekend, next summer, the next 5 years… it never ends. We want to know, we want the comfort of predictability, and we want the knowledge that we are secure in whatever is happening.

I have so many friends in such pivotal points in their life right now; friends looking at grad school, friends getting ready to graduate and look for a job, friends about to enter into marriage, and even friends who are searching for someone to marry. It seems like everyone is looking for what’s next and what they need to do to get to that next.

I am one of these searchers. I desire to be where it is the Lord has called me to be, but what does that look like? How do I find where that place is without mentally going insane from thinking about it all over, and over, and over again?

What I have found in times of searching is that there is a theme in the bible. This theme is that man sins and God saves. It is within the first three chapters of the bible and is consistently woven throughout all of scripture to the very end in Revelation.

Ya know that verse that people always quote during times of decision making and life changing steps, Jeremiah 29:11?

For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord,

plans for welfare and not for evil,

to give you a future and a hope.

Absolutely that is a beautiful verse and all of God’s word is true, but this verse so often is used out of context. I certainly do believe God has plans for us, but what this scripture is talking about here rather is the plans He has for a people that will be redeemed by Him. The people he is talking to are in despair, they are lost in their sin, but, despite their absolute disobedience to God He has a plan for them, a future, a hope. He is going to save them and raise them up to form from them a people of which are His people, a people who are called to worship Him. 

God has a greater plan than for us to each individually live the picturesque life that just verse 11 portrays when quoted.The following are the immediate verses after verse 11, verses 12-14:

Then you will call upon me and come and pray to me, and I will hear you.

You will seek me and find me,

when you seek me with all your heart.

I will be found by you, declares the Lord,

and I will restore your fortunes and gather you from all the nations

and all the places where I have driven you, declares the Lord,

and I will bring you back to the place from which I sent you into exile.

 We must seek Him with all of our heart.

God tells us in Hosea 5:15:

I will return again to my place,

until they acknowledge their guilt and seek my face,

and in their distress earnestly seek me.

We are a sinful people. We live for ourselves and do not even turn to acknowledge God. But in His great love for His creation, in His mercy, He has chosen to save us. He did not send Jesus to die just for a certain people, but for a people from every nation. Christ’s purpose of coming to this world was to build a kingdom full and abundant of worshipers who in their distress have earnestly sought Him out!

So where does that leave you and me in our search for what to do next in this life?

I think it leaves us at a point where we turn from sin earnestly seeking God. More than anything else, more than the love for ourselves in creating a career, or a family, or a lasting love we must desire to seek Christ. We must spend ourselves for His glory and making Him known.

For lasting labor to characterize our life we have to endure whatever stage, whatever hardship, whatever mundane activity may be taking our time for the glory of the Lord. We must be going at each day with our minds focused on eternity. The discipline would be to not have futuristic eyes that are only looking to what’s next, but rather having eyes that are focused on eternity that in turn causes us to focus on each and every day with purpose for the Kingdom. 

Jim Elliot, a missionary from the 50's, wrote this to a friend when persuading him to come overseas, encouraging him there is no greater thing he could live his life doing... Elliot wrote: 

“God will lead you and not let you miss his signs. It is his business to lead, to impel, send and call. It is your business to obey, follow, respond, move and what not.” 

-LauraLBrown

Acts 20:24:

But I do not account my life of any value

nor as precious to myself,

If only I may finish my course and the ministry that I received from the Lord Jesus,

to testify to the gospel of the grace of God. 

Life-saving CPR

Being a senior in nursing school it has become easy to dwell on the fact that I am graduating soon and will be expected to get out in the world and work, to put to practice what it is I have been studying for for the last four and a half years. Perhaps when people talk with me they might find that a career in nursing is not my number one goal and that I am not truly passionate about it compared to some. Though I’d say both of those statements are probably true, I don’t desire nursing as my ultimate career and I am not passionate about it as much as I am other things in life, I would also say that life-saving is important and it is something I look forward to being apart of. Life-saving is the calling and purpose of a nurse; to implement as much possible care for a patient that will promote health and life.

If there is one thing I've learned this semester in level 3 it’s CPR!!

Annie passes out in the floor… “Annie Annie, are you okay?” No response. Check her pulse. No pulse? Okay, start chest compressions. 30 compressions. Press the chest to the beat of the song “Staying Alive” just hard enough to crack a few ribs. 30 compressions complete, next check airway. Give 2 rescue breaths. Repeat until intervention works, CPR giver tires out, someone else takes over CPR, or person dies and is unable to be resuscitated.

A nurse’s goal is to always advocate and promote patient health, it is to go to great lengths to enable patients to live with as much physical, emotional, social, and spiritual well-being as possible. Life on this earth whether you’re resuscitated by CPR or not is short. There is an end. And after that end there is an eternity.  

As a believer in Christ it is my job to be an advocate of life for all people I meet. To go to great lengths to go, and serve, and love people, but most importantly to do so by telling of the saving grace that is offered by Jesus Christ.

It may be cheesy, but in the same way CPR is a pneumonic we all know stands for a method that brings someone back to life…  

CPR used to bring one life can stand for something like this:

Christ

Perished

[and was]

Resurrected

This is what brings life eternal. Believeing that Christ came and lived a perfect sinless life, that I cannot do. Believeing that He died for sin on the cross bearing all guilt and shame and was laid in a tomb. Believing that Jesus Christ, three days later, defeated death and rose again to life!! This is what is life-saving. This is the kind of CPR everyone should be given. Believing in Christ as the Son of the Most High God, His Perishing and His Resurrection as the ultimate intervention to withstand death deserved, hell.

Of course being a nurse is fruitful labor, it’s a rewarding career and I look forward to seeing how the Lord plans to use my degree. But a true lasting labor that I hope I am able to tire myself out for includes relationships I can invest in and tell this saving knowledge to.

I write this as reminder to myself that going to school, one day working in the nursing field, one day being a wife and mother- though all esteemed, important and needed jobs, they are not the kind of work that will last an eternity... Working without Christ as the center is like chasing the wind, it’s futile.

-LauraLBrown

 1 There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.
2 For the law of the Spirit of life has set you free in Christ Jesus from the law of sin and death.
3 For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do. By sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemned sin in the flesh,
4 in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.
5 For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit set their minds on the things of the Spirit.
6 For to set the mind on the flesh is death, but to set the mind on the Spirit is life and peace.
7 For the mind that is set on the flesh is hostile to God, for it does not submit to God's law; indeed, it cannot.
8 Those who are in the flesh cannot please God.
9 You, however, are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if in fact the Spirit of God dwells in you. Anyone who does not have the Spirit of Christ does not belong to him.
10 But if Christ is in you, although the body is dead because of sin, the Spirit is life because of righteousness.
11 If the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his Spirit who dwells in you!

Romans 8:1-11

Fervent Prayers

For the last two and a half years I have kept up with "A Thought-A-Day Journal". This is where each day I write a couple of liners down that happened throughout my day that I hope to look back on the next year and remember. This journal is made to be used for five years!

The other day I was joking with some friends that know I keep this journal about what could be written about my day... We decided it would say something along the mundane lines of, "I woke up. I worked. I ran. I went to bed." Nothing special or out of the ordinary. Little did I know that I would meet someone that evening that would touch my heart and teach me about devotion to the Lord. 

As some of y'all know, I am not always the promptest of people when it comes to being somewhere. If something is made to sidetrack someone it will sidetrack me. Arriving somewhere on the exact time I said I would currently isn't my forte. This particular evening I was thankful for that. 

As I showed up a whole forty minutes late to my running buddy Aspen's apartment, I simply just had to apologize. She didn't mind though because she was enraptured into the book she was currently reading and kept me waiting so she could finish her pages. 

By the time we were both set to run my watch showed that it was just shy of 10 p.m. We ran a loop that took about 45 minutes and when we got back, for whatever reason, we stood outside for an abnormally long time enjoying the weather together.

While standing next to her truck, we heard a funny sound and thought it must be coming from an apartment... Looking around we saw a white truck in the parking lot a few cars over with the shadow of someone belting out to Spanish tunes. We got so tickled and assumed it was a teenage boy singing.

As we stood, watched, and listened I said to Aspen, "Dare me to scare him? You can stand here and watch his reaction." For whatever reason, Aspen (surprising me) agreed and thought it would be hilarious! So of course I proceeded and snuck around the backside of the truck, jumped out, and yelled.

To my surprise an older Hispanic woman opened the door and, in her broken English, told us how she was practicing a song she was planning to sing in front of her church that Sunday. She told how she gets so embarrassed to get in front of people with all eyes are on her. 

As we laughed for a while at the fact that we just tried to scare this woman she began to tell us how her husband of 25 years divorced her because she was "ugly". She told us how he had moved on from her to another younger more beautiful woman. She told us how she now lives with her kids because she cannot afford to pay rent for her own home. For her, work is hard to come by and all her things had recently been stolen from someone breaking into her apartment. She explained that her three kids spend their nights drinking beer in their apartment and she doesn't want to enter in until they have fallen asleep. 

As we saw, and interrupted, this lady chooses to sit out in the apartment complex's parking lot in her truck singing praises to the Lord. She told us how she spends her time praying, asking the Lord to save her children. With it already being well past 11 p.m., she explained how every night she stays in her car for hours doing these things until she sees the light click off and she then makes her way into the apartment for the night. 

Both Aspen and I broken hearted and blessed by this lady's story and faith, we prayed for her, we encouraged her, and were encouraged by her. This woman's trust that the Lord will provide for her needs as well as her family's was so strong! She is a new believer, only a Christian for one year, and her devotion to the Lord is as if she has spent years in His presence. 

Recently I have been studying through James with women in my church. Tonight we read through James 5 and discussed how at the end of the chapter it gives an example of an Old Testament character, Elijah, who was fervent in his prayers. James 5: 17-18 reads:

Elijah was a man with a nature like ours, 

and he prayed fervently that it might not rain, 

and for three years and six months it did not rain on the earth. 

Then he prayed again, 

and heaven gave rain and the earth bore its fruit. 

As pointed out in our bible study, the above verse shows us how Elijah was a man with a nature just like ours! He was a man whose prayer life was powerful and effective. To paint a picture of praying fervently you wouldn't paint someone praying once or twice a week, praying for only five or so minutes during those sessions. No, you would paint it of someone with impassioned devotion praying daily, constantly, with a purpose, expecting and trusting that God is going to work in the said situation.

As Elijah prayed for a drought and then again rain, and as this sweet lady I met last week prays for her children to come to know the Lord, I am convicted and reminded of the importance of prayer and the faith that must be present in this commune. May I have this kind of devotion to the Lord... To pray fervently and expectantly, humbly and confidently. 

I am so thankful for this particular evening that went from trying to scare a teenage boy to meeting a beautiful woman of the Lord. This was a rare encounter that has led Aspen and I to reflect on our faithfulness to the Lord. My Thought-A-Day journal for 5-23-14 ended up not reading simple and mundane events but rather it can be read as a reminder of the sweet meeting of a new friend whose heart desires her family to know the Lord. I hope that one day that may be said of me as well. 

-LauraLBrown

Is anyone among you suffering?

Let him pray.

Is anyone cheerful?

Let him sing praise. 

Is anyone among you sick?

Let him call for the elders of the church, and let them pray over him, 

anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord. 

And the prayer of faith will save the one who is sick,

and the Lord will raise him up.

And if he has committed sins, he will be forgiven.

Therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another,

that you may be healed.

The prayer of a righteous person has great power as it is working. 

James 5:13-16

He is Able

I found myself a couple days ago saying how in the world am I going to fix the sin I’m in? How in the world am I ever going to learn how to rely on Christ alone and not myself? How will I ever be Spirit filled and live a daily life truly for Him?

After asking those questions to myself, and with help from this week’s Lord’s Day, He has shown me that in order to do those things there must be complete submission and obedience and He will do the rest.

Feeling dirty and defiant to the Lord I entered church service knowing that I was going to be spoken to. Knowing there would be conviction and knowing that stuff in my life had to change.

I found myself sitting on the front row surrounded by sweet college girls and one of my favorite families in the whole world. The man of this family was encircled by three brothers that were a friend of his sitting at a table across the way in our worship service.

The boys, crowded around this man they love, are beautiful and fun as well as rowdy and a challenge. Just like every other kid, getting them to mind the way they should is a task. As the service was beginning the middle brother peeked back and saw his mom at another table and turned to the man and said, “Can I go sit by my momma?” The man said back, “is there a chair beside her? Of course you can go. Thanks so much for asking!”

I don’t know what emotion it was that hit me, but seeing this picture of love and positive reinforcement completely broke me! All I could think about during worship is that man’s love for that boy is like our Father in heaven’s love for us! Only God’s is O so much more!

I am defiant and disobedient just like the defiant and disobedient child who wants his way when he wants it. And that man was happy and pleased just the way God is happy and pleased when I obey Him.

Now if that wasn't all this heart could take before the sermon, our pastor announced that a man in our church who is almost 80 would be getting baptized along with one of my sweet twenty year old friends. 

Hearing that those baptisms would be taking place after church hit me again with unexplainable emotion like a ton of bricks.

What obedience! All I could think of when hearing this was how much I would love to see the face of the Lord as He is pleased in these two for their obedience in being baptized!

As our service continued I was in tears as I opened the word to Psalm 145. Psalm 145 tells us of God’s wonderful greatness. It tells of how faithful and kind, gracious, merciful and loving He is! Vs 17-20:

The Lord is righteous in all his ways and kind in all his works.

The Lord is near to all who call on him, to all who call on him in truth.

He fulfills the desire of those who fear him; he also hears their cry and saves them.

The Lord preserves all who love him, but all the wicked he will destroy.

So the questions I was asking myself last week about what is it I need to do to fix this life of mine… I think there is nothing I can do. I think my work is pointless and in vain if I try to fix the sin I’m in alone. It is not me who fixes this life of mine, nor anyone else. It is God my Father who is abundant in goodness, slow to anger and abounding in love. It is He who has the power to save all who call on Him. He doesn't need us. We need Him! God wants all of us to obey Him. He doesn't desire to see His children stuck in sin or on an ocean of constant good and bad waves. He wants our submission so that he can take our dirty heart and turn it into obedience reflecting Him.

Like the little boy he wants us to seek Him in our wandering. Like the two who got baptized He wants us to read his word and do what it says. Like the scripture we studied in church, Psalm 145, it is God’s grace and mercy that allows me forgiveness and change. Jesus Christ is enough. I am not. He is able!

-LauraLBrown

Do you not know that if you present yourselves to anyone as obedient slaves,

you are slaves of the one whom you obey,

either of sin, which leads to death, or of obedience, which leads to righteousness?

But thanks be to God, that you who were once slaves of sin

have become obedient from the heart to the standard of teaching

to which you were committed,

and having been set free from sin, have become slaves of righteousness.

I am speaking in human terms, because of your natural limitations.

For just as you once presented your members as slaves to impurity

and to lawlessness leading to more lawlessness,

so now present your members as slaves to righteousness leading to sanctification.

For when you were slaves of sin, you were free in regard to righteousness.

But what fruit were you getting at that time from the things of which you are now ashamed?

For the end of those things is death.

But now that you have been set free from sin and have become slaves of God,

The fruit you get leads to sanctification and its end,

eternal life.

For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Romans 6:16-23

Love One Another

I have a confession:

I need to learn to love one another.

Let me explain… I got to spend my first two college summers learning how to share the gospel in some pretty neat places. I’ve learned how to be bold in my witness and not waste relationships made. I’ve learned to quickly turn a conversation into telling the most important thing about me and that is that Christ is my savior because I am a sinner. I’ve learned to take it further than my testimony and quickly share truth about the bible from beginning to end.

To me living out the gospel is sharing the gospel.

It’s being bold and risky.

It’s taking initiative and building relationships.

It’s living out loud so people can hear truth proclaimed and not worrying about the toes that might be stepped on.

Sharing the gospel to me has always been the above list of qualities. And though those are true and those things are needed, I’ve recently realized the list also includes the quality of a simple word I’ve failed to remember to live by, love.

Ya see, anyone can share truth of a bible story and force it into someone’s brain, but if you don’t do it in love… what is it for?

Over this summer I’ve attended more than half a dozen weddings. At each wedding the various handful of preachers spoke on the same scripture: The ever famous love chapter, 1 Corinthians 13. It of course tells us how to act in marriage and what love should look like lived out. However the words of that passage are not only to be applied in a marriage relationship or in a family relationship, instead and most of all the words should be applied towards all people and all situations by people who are in the faith of Jesus Christ.   

Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude.

It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrongdoing,

but rejoices with the truth.

Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.

Love is a fruit of the Spirit. Love is who Christ is and why Christ was sent.

Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God,

and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God.

Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love.

In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through him.

In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.

Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. No one has ever seen God; if we love one another, God abides in us and his love is perfected in us.

We love because he first loved us.

1 John 4:7-12, 19

All in all, I desire for love to be perfected in me. I desire to love because he first loved me and lives in me- so that I may share the gospel in its entirety.

Living out the gospel is to love.

Unending Housework

Something I try and do is be disciplined in staying clean and organized. Though organized doesn’t quite describe anything in my life, clean has begun to… Staying clean and constantly being conscious of picking up after myself or making my bed in the morning has become a discipline I’ve slowly learned. I know anyone who knows me can vouch and say that I have not always been a person who is self-motivated in that area- instead I used to be mom-motived. Living on my own, though, I have begun to learn that discipline. I can’t rely on my mom to do things for me that I’m too lazy to do and I can’t rely on my dad to nag me long enough to scour and straighten the bathroom to make me do it.

An observation I’ve made lately is that the work is never finished! Each morning I wake up and make my bed. I then straighten up my room and go to school. As I come home from classes and change into umpteen different outfits, for whatever the day brings, the clothes get strung and the dirt gets trudged. By the end of the day I find myself cleaning again and I find that it takes more time than the morning. Not to mention the kitchen constantly needs swept and the laundry constantly has to be washed and re-washed, as with the dishes.

Housework is never quite finished.

Y’all I’m a learner by application. Thinking about cleaning and how it is a discipline somehow, in my brain, relates to evangelism and how it is also a discipline.

I became a follower of Jesus Christ at a young age, and though I believe my salvation was real then- I was spoon fed a lot. My parents were the ones urging me to go to church. They were the ones who prayed with me in bed at night. Though the pressing feeling, from my parents, of seeking Christ might not have been as pressing as vacuuming the family living room floor, I was shown how to, and urged to, seek the Lord. Just as I mentioned in the first paragraph, at some point I had to slowly create my own walk into my own self-discipline. Choosing to wake up and preach the gospel to myself or anyone else is not as easy as making my bed. It’s not a natural habit to do.

One of my sweet friends Hannah Dancy said last night, at a girl’s bible study, something in the effect of… I know my own story of salvation and transformation so naturally I don’t think I need to tell myself every day the change that Jesus did in me. She pointed out to us Psalm 51 verses 12-17, it reads:

“Restore to me the joy of your salvation, and uphold me with a willing spirit.

Then I will teach transgressors your ways, and sinners will return to you.

Deliver me from bloodguiltiness, O God,

O God of my salvation,

And my tongue will sing aloud of your righteousness.

O Lord, open my lips, and my mouth will declare your praise.

For you will not delight in sacrifice, or I would give it;

You will not be pleased with a burnt offering.

The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart, O God,

You will not despise.”

Hannah said a few things that I don’t think I can forget. She told us how she wants to be broken for the gospel’s cause. She wants to hear Jesus’ name and it move her to do something. My heart has been going through the same thing and I haven’t quite known how to work through that conviction. But with this Psalm I can see that the word is telling me my joy comes from salvation (vs 12). With my own salvation I will be moved to share with sinners the story of God’s saving grace so they will turn to Him (vs 13). When I share I am able to rehear the gospel and, sometimes, my own story of God’s great work in my heart. With that comes brokenness and constant, consistent reminders of the gospel and what it means for all who believe in it. My brokenness leads to repentance (vs 17) which in return circles back around to the joy of salvation that moves me share.   

Being broken doesn’t always mean not being able to pick yourself back up again. I feel like in this cause, in the meaning Hannah was talking about, it’s being broken to the point of action. It’s making a conscious effort for the joy of salvation to transform our lives to the point of brokenness for those around us; so much so that we can’t help but pour out the truth of Christ on them.

I don’t think sharing and evangelism is something that can come naturally to someone. There are fears and there is laziness. In keeping with my “cleaning discipline” theme, evangelism is not something that is a one-time deal. It’s like the dirty dishes there is always more work to be done and more work that will appear. It takes time and the more you make it a habit the more you see the need for the work to be done. Working for the Lord’s cause is a discipline. It must be learned in the same way one learns to wake up and brush their teeth or wake up and read The Word. It takes practice, time and effort.  

Kingdom work is never quite finished.  

-LauraLBrown

Royal Robes

God's in the business of clothing the neglected and unexpected in royal robes.

I recently read the above quote in one of our Advent Celebration days and it completely sums up a lot of thoughts I've had lately in how great God is in extending His grace to us who have done nothing to deserve it.

A story that I think on constantly is found in Acts 3 where Peter heals the lame beggar who is daily carried and sat in front of Beautiful Gate. Peter’s response to the man’s plea for money was, “silver or gold I do not have, but what I do have I give you: In the name of Jesus of Nazareth, rise up and walk.” Same as in all the healings Jesus preformed, it was a miracle that he stood up and began walking and leaping, praising God while doing so. The thing that I find myself thinking about though is verse 9 and 10 where it says, “All the people saw him walking and praising God. Then they knew that it was he who sat begging alms at the Beautiful Gate of the temple; and they were filled with wonder and amazement at what had happened to him.”

Sitting at the gate is what he was known for. He was lame from birth and everyday he sat there to beg. He was a monument at the gate to the temple courts that everyone knew they would walk by to get inside. His presence was a daily fixture to the gate and all who knew the area at all knew him. That’s why verse 9 and 10 are so important! His healing was a big deal to the community and to all their unbelieving hearts. In the beginning of Acts it is all about the Spirit’s power through the people- and here is proof of the Spirit’s presence in their lives. No one could deny that the beggar was healed so they had to consider that it was Jesus’ work through humans themselves. 

When thinking about this story I think about all the influential people around my area of Kathmandu, that I daily see, who would make a huge difference in unbelievers lives if they were to come to Christ; People who are fixtures to the community and known for something specific. An individual that comes to mind is a Buddhist nun that sits on the side of the stupa each morning and evening. She is said to be over 100 years old. She daily gives blessings to all people who come to her and she is looked up to by the Buddhist community because of her high position, age and devotion to her religion. Think of the impact a nun, of her age, that people look up to would have if she was transformed into a Christ follower! Think about the confusion and wonder that other Buddhists would have as well as interest and curiosity in what she now believes. I desire for this woman to know the Lord not only because of the influence on other Buddhist people’s lives she would have, but for her own life! She would no longer have to work for her salvation. She could then find her many good deeds worthless in view of eternity and instead rest in her new belief of Jesus as Lord, the only possible way to heaven!

Another person that comes to mind from that story is my friend Rinku. He is an Indian man living in Nepal who was born lame. He sits each day shining shoes to provide for his blind wife and sweet six month old baby, who is without defect. Although people in the community don’t know Rinku like they do the nun, he can be seen every day sitting in the same exact spot working on shoes. My heart breaks for him because I see his hard work and sweet spirit and I desire for him to have understanding of God’s grace. The other day I was sitting and chatting with him and decided to have him clean my shoes, still dirty from monsoon season. As he was busy working away I was hit hard with emotions. I was holding back tears thinking about how much I desire for him to know the Lord. His happy-go-lucky spirit would be turned into unshakable joy that resides in the truth of Jesus Christ! He would have hope past his humble living, in day-to-day reliance of cleaning and repairing shoes, to instead eternal life in heaven. What brought me to tears, though, was thinking about the Acts 3 passage of the man in front of Beautiful Gate, who was once lame and then healed. This could be Rinku, he could one day be given a new body and be able to praise God by standing up and walking or jumping. As I began to picture this sight in heaven I pictured his wife there also- her first sight ever the face of Jesus! His salvation and transformation of heart on this earth would affect people for the gospel’s cause just as the lame beggar whose body was healed.

“Strengthen the weak hands,
 and make firm the feeble knees. Say to those who are fearful-hearted, ‘Be strong, do not fear! Behold, your God will come with vengeance, with the recompense of God; He will come and save you.’ Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf shall be unstopped. Then the lame shall leap like a deer, and the tongue of the dumb sing.” 

Isaiah 35:3-5

I am so humbled in thinking about how through Christ, after death, we are given unending life. It’s humbling also to think that nothing from our Earthly bodies will be with us, we will be made new! Rinku and his wife would be without defect and would have no worries or cares (Philippians 3:20-21). The old nun who has spent her life working for deliverance from this sinful life would truly be set free and made pure (1 John 3:2-3). Something I am learning though is… yes these people’s salvation would be a miracle, the nun and the Hindu man, I pray for that, but their salvation would be no more of a miracle than my own salvation. I was saved by my faith in God’s grace and it is the Spirit that miraculously brings me up out of the pit of destruction, out of the miry clay, and He sets my feet upon a rock making my footsteps firm (Psalms 40:2). The sin I’ve left behind, and battle with now, is conquered in Christ and by His Spirit. That same Spirit that has brought me out of the pit can also bring out any person of any situation!

I am finding out more and more everyday how thankful I am that salvation is not based on doing good or having right morals. I’m thankful that it is the Spirit that gives life and releases the hold of my deserved death because of sin (Romans 8:1-2). The beginning quote, "God's in the business of clothing the neglected and unexpected in royal robes" is not just talking about those who have a hard time on this earth because of their physical needs or financial needs… To me it refers to all of the creation that has been chosen to bow down to the Lord in obedience! We are all undeserving of any royal robe.

My last thought in continuing with the thinking of “royal robes” is about how heaven is something that can never be imagined or understood through our earthly eyes. When thinking on my hope of Rinku’s salvation I begin to think of what his eyes would think of heaven. Like I said he would no longer have earthly pain, but something else that is mind-blowing is that in comparison to all the things that he has seen on this Earth, heaven would be magnificent, something he could never dream up or imagine because he has never seen nice things or lived in a home with walls other than tarp. Thinking on this I began to ponder what it would be like if the richest man in the world, who lived in a mansion on this earth and ate fancy dinners with expensive china, was a believer, what would his eyes think of heaven? This thought is new to me- I’ve never considered how for him it would be unimaginable. But it would, I have no doubt in my mind that the glory of God in heaven he would see would be the same amount of astonishing and mind-blowing that Rinku would experience! I don’t know what to expect in heaven because I have earthly eyes, but I know that the new life and royal robe that those who enter heaven will experience is something undreamed-of!  

-LauraLBrown 

“I consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us. For the creation waits in eager expectation for the children of God to be revealed.

For the creation was subjected to frustration, not by its own choice, but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the freedom and glory of the children of God.

We know that the whole creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time. Not only so, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for our adoption to sonship, the redemption of our bodies.

For in this hope we are saved. But hope that is seen is no hope at all. Who hopes for what they already have? But if we hope for what we do not yet have, we wait for it patiently.” 

Romans 8:18-25