ONCE UPON A TIME and long ago I deeply loathed the month of March…  Good to know I was a sinner at the time.

I love, absolutely love, when I admit I was stupid, stupid or wrong! (A very good character trait!)

Selah.

Why did I loathe the month of March? Glad you asked! The weather. Minnesota Marches are for the most part dreary looking.

Yes, here in Minnesota, March gives much of our trees, plants, and ground looks of lifelessness; things look very brittle, dry, broken… giving the impression of death. You see, I had chosen for many years to look at the typical Minnesota March weather as gloomy, lonely, lacking life…  I had chosen as well to line up with this wrong thinking and feel dismal myself. Stupid!

Now, it may look that way, but it’s not. We all know, it’s not. Do you see why I am grateful I turn to truth, embrace victory simply by changing my mind with facts?

Selah.

Like the precious seed inside her mother’s womb, unseen is the reaching, stretching, growing, and producing life signs under the Earth. The trees, the plants, and the ground are alive above and below; they are in a state God has determined them to be! Beauty in a different way…

As you drive past a cemetery, think of this:

 

1 Corinthians 15:35-58
But someone will ask, “How are the dead raised? With what kind of body will they come?”  How foolish! What you sow does not come to life unless it dies.  When you sow, you do not plant the body that will be, but just a seed, perhaps of wheat or of something else. But God gives it a

body as he has determined, and to each kind of seed he gives its own body.  Not all flesh is the same: People have one kind of flesh, animals have another, birds another and fish another. There are also heavenly bodies and there are earthly bodies; but the splendor of the heavenly bodies is one kind, and the splendor of the earthly bodies is another.  The sun has one kind of splendor, the moon another and the stars another; and star differs from star in splendor.

So will it be with the resurrection of the dead. The body that is sown is perishable, it is raised imperishable;  it is sown in dishonor, it is raised in glory; it is sown in weakness, it is raised in power;  it is sown a natural body, it is raised a spiritual body.

If there is a natural body, there is also a spiritual body.  So it is written: “The first man Adam became a living being”; the last Adam, a life-giving spirit. The spiritual did not come first, but the natural, and after that the spiritual. The first man was of the dust of the earth; the second man is of heaven.  As was the earthly man, so are those who are of the earth; and as is the heavenly man, so also are those who are of heaven.  And just as we have borne the image of the earthly man, so shall we bear the image of the heavenly man.

I declare to you, brothers and sisters, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable.  Listen, I tell you a mystery: We will not all sleep, but we will all be changed—in a flash, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed.  For the perishable must clothe itself with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality.  When the perishable has been clothed with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality, then the saying that is written will come true: “Death has been swallowed up in victory.”

Where, O death, is your victory?
Where, O death, is your sting?”

The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. But thanks be to God! He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore, my dear brothers and sisters, stand firm. Let nothing move you. Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord, because you know that your labor in the Lord is not in vain.

 

Driving past a cemetery as a sinner is bleak. To them, it seems like the end and that there is nothing left when your body dies…

Selah.

But that’s their fault (as it had been mine) they don’t embrace the truth of the everlasting God of glory. That’s their fault.

Join me and celebrate the wonderfulness of March!

 

SCRIPTURAL TRUTHS FOR THIS JOY STORY:

 

Psalm 96:11-12
Let the heavens rejoice, let the earth be glad; let the sea resound, and all that is in it. Let the fields be jubilant, and everything in them; let all the trees of the forest sing for joy.

 

Proverbs 3:9-10
Honor the Lord with your wealth, with the firstfruits of all your crops; then your barns will be filled to overflowing, and your vats will brim over with new wine.

 

2 Corinthians 9:10-11
Now he who supplies seed to the sower and bread for food will also supply and increase your store of seed and will enlarge the harvest of your righteousness. ¹¹ You will be enriched in every way so that you can be generous on every occasion, and through us your generosity will result in thanksgiving to God.

 

Galatians 6:7-9
Do not be deceived: God cannot be mocked. A man reaps what he sows.  Whoever sows to please their flesh, from the flesh will reap destruction; whoever sows to please the Spirit, from the Spirit will reap eternal life. Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up.

 

1 Timothy 4:4-5
For everything God created is good, and nothing is to be rejected if it is received with thanksgiving, because it is consecrated by the word of God and prayer.

 

James 5:7-8
Be patient, then, brothers and sisters, until the Lord’s coming. See how the farmer waits for the land to yield its valuable crop, patiently waiting for the autumn and spring rains. You too, be patient and stand firm, because the Lord’s coming is near.