ONCE UPON A TIME WHEN I WAS YOUNGer

(I love saying younger because there is no such thing as middle age…  When your soul and spirit depart your body, they will all meet up again: either in Heaven or Hell. Your choice.)

Selah.

At this time in my life I was unmarried, living with my parents and brothers and taking a bus to work. Folks, it’s been so long ago I don’t even remember what job I had at that time. I’m thinking I was about twenty. My adult life was just beginning and I was so excited to get a lovely job, an apartment and a husband in the future (for I had always wanted to live alone for a while before getting married and having children.) I did! God is great!

At this time in my life I was not even honoring my Lord, my God, my Savior! And yet He was always wanting me to. He was waiting patiently and wooing me. He knew I would come to my senses and stop fooling around in foolishness wanting to live for my own pleasure!

I will never forget a sunny, beautiful summer (I think!) day. I was wearing a dress for my office job. I looked nice. I wanted to be the best secretary I could be! At my bus stop one and a half blocks from my home a woman and her two boys stood by me. The boys were little, about two and four (I think!) and they liked me. I was very shy at that time, a sinner who didn’t know her real value, a young woman who didn’t feel particularly intelligent (average standing in my view) with teeth very badly needing to be straightened. I did not appreciate the workmanship of God; the fine master pieces He daily creates. Once upon a time – me! and every other single person God has magnificently brought forth in every mother’s womb: all created for His glory, He desire to be loved and worshipped and all, without a doubt, without a lie, a treasured possession He has loved and cherished, desiring each and every one of us to be His child, not just His creation.

Selah.

What is so wonderful about this bus stop meeting is, as shy as I was (WAS) I tried to listen to them and also talk to these precious, beautiful little boys: but, I just could not understand them… at all!

Beloved, I was the youngest child with three older brothers. I babysat once for my little cousin, I was never around young children much at all. I didn’t go to church, I didn’t socialize much. I missed my prom because I was a dud. I was full of inferior feelings and didn’t believe I deserved to have friends who were pretty! Oh! That damned devil sold a bill of bads to me! But: I love

Revelation 20:10
And the devil, who deceived them, was thrown into the lake of burning sulfur, where the beast and the false prophet had been thrown. They will be tormented day and night for ever and ever.

I traded, turned in, eradicated my beliefs for truth:

 

John 16:33
“I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.”

 

That’s my Jesus! That’s my King! That’s my Savior! That’s my Lord! Make Him yours!

 

Let me continue.

As these little beautiful boys kept talking to me I looked at their mama, my eyes clearly asking for help. Beloved: I will never – ever – forget her words. They were so fun, so great, so beautiful!

She said: “Don’t worry about it! (I think I had apologized to her that I couldn’t understand anything they said.) She went on: “If you can’t understand them in English, they start speaking in Spanish.)

I had no clue! I have always loved dark hair, dark eyes. I know for absolute truth God has instilled in me the truthful beauty of African skin, Asian skin, Caucasian skin, curly hair, straight hair, dark hair, red hair, light hair… God is The Creator and He is the best Artist! I loved those little boys! They were beautiful! They were friendly! And they were innocent of sin! Their names were in the Lamb’s Book of Life! I pray those names are still there: just as I pray yours is and will evermore be! I sure would love to share eternity with them with Jesus and their beautiful mother
AND… UNDERSTANDING EVERY WORD THEY SAY!

Glory to God! ALL GLORY TO GOD!

 

SCRIPTURAL TRUTHS FOR THIS MOST JOYOUS “JOY STORY”!

 

Psalm 103 Of David.

Praise the Lord, my soul; all my inmost being, praise his holy name.
Praise the Lord, my soul, and forget not all his benefits—
who forgives all your sins and heals all your diseases,
who redeems your life from the pit and crowns you with love and compassion,
who satisfies your desires with good things so that your youth is renewed like the eagle’s.

The Lord works righteousness and justice for all the oppressed.

He made known his ways to Moses, his deeds to the people of Israel:
The Lord is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in love.
He will not always accuse, nor will he harbor his anger forever;

he does not treat us as our sins deserve or repay us according to our iniquities.
For as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is his love for those who fear him;
as far as the east is from the west, so far has he removed our transgressions from us.

As a father has compassion on his children, so the Lord has compassion on those who fear him;
for he knows how we are formed, he remembers that we are dust.
The life of mortals is like grass, they flourish like a flower of the field;
the wind blows over it and it is gone, and its place remembers it no more.
But from everlasting to everlasting the Lord’s love is with those who fear him, and his righteousness with their children’s children—
with those who keep his covenant and remember to obey his precepts.

The Lord has established his throne in heaven, and his kingdom rules over all.

Praise the Lord, you his angels, you mighty ones who do his bidding, who obey his word.
Praise the Lord, all his heavenly hosts, you his servants who do his will.
Praise the Lord, all his works everywhere in his dominion.

Praise the Lord, my soul.

 

1 Corinthians 15:35-49

The Resurrection Body

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.

 

Luke 19:10
For the Son of Man came to seek and to save the lost.”

 

Psalm 139:13-17
For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother’s womb.
 I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well.
My frame was not hidden from you when I was made in the secret place, when I was woven together in the depths of the earth.
Your eyes saw my unformed body; all the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be.
How precious to me are your thoughts, God!

How vast is the sum of them!

 

Genesis 1:31
God saw all that he had made, and it was very good. And there was evening, and there was morning—the sixth day.

 

Revelation 3:4-6
Yet you have a few people in Sardis who have not soiled their clothes. They will walk with me, dressed in white, for they are worthy. The one who is victorious will, like them, be dressed in white. I will never blot out the name of that person from the book of life, but will acknowledge that name before my Father and his angels.  Whoever has ears, let them hear what the Spirit says to the churches.

 

P.S.(A.): post sinner, Ann – that’s me! No one, NO ONE, is a child of God who is prejudice, who thinks he is / she is superior to any of God’s children! AND: he / she cannot be a Christian either if he / she hates the sinner and wants them to burn in Hell!

No Selah because this is a no-brainer! Don’t even think you can be holy without loving what God loves and hating ONLY what He hates!

 

1 John 4:13-21
This is how we know that we live in him and he in us: He has given us of his Spirit. And we have seen and testify that the Father has sent his Son to be the Savior of the world.  If anyone acknowledges that Jesus is the Son of God, God lives in them and they in God.  And so we know and rely on the love God has for us.

God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in them.  This is how love is made complete among us so that we will have confidence on the day of judgment: In this world we are like Jesus. There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love.

We love because he first loved us. Whoever claims to love God yet hates a brother or sister is a liar. For whoever does not love their brother and sister, whom they have seen, cannot love God, whom they have not seen.  And he has given us this command: Anyone who loves God must also love their brother and sister.