I'm Patty, and my husband and I are living with our adult son who has autism and epilepsy. I love sharing lessons learned from life around me, especially life with Aaron.
Early last spring we bought a play set to put together for our grandchildren. One of the first and most important steps was to carefully divide all the many pieces of wood into groups based on their stamped labels. Then we separated all the hundreds of screws and nuts and bolts and hooks.
Gary and two young men we know then began to assemble the play set. They carefully followed the printed instructions page by page. My job was to lay out all the screws and other hardware as well as the boards to be used in each step.
As we worked together, we quickly learned that only the particular pieces listed in the instruction manual would work for each step of the building process. No substitutions would fit.
The finished product was a beautiful play set that our grandson has greatly enjoyed. But it’s beautiful only because every part and piece was placed exactly where it belonged.
There were times as we were building that we questioned the placement of a section, but we had to trust the instructions and keep on going.
Isn’t this just like our life sometimes? Even as we follow Christ, we wonder at the way He leads. We question what He has allowed in our lives.
But we also have an instruction manual to follow. God told us clearly in His Word a very important truth.
“And we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God…” (Romans 8:28)
We don’t need to understand all that is happening to us. The placement of the parts and pieces of our trials are usually impossible to understand.
Our responsibility is to love and follow our Savior, trusting that He is putting every part and piece of our lives into an order that will produce a beautiful work…one that will make us more like Him and bring Him glory as we trust His building process.
I love the verses of this very old hymn. I pray it means a lot to each of you as well.
If thou but trust in God to guide thee,
And hope in Him through all thy ways,
He’ll give thee strength,
Whate’er betide thee,
To bear thee through the evil days;
Who trusts in God’s unchanging love
Builds on the rock that naught can move.
Only be still, and wait His leisure
In cheerful hope, with heart content
To take whate’er thy Father’s pleasure
And all discerning love hath sent;
Nor doubt our inmost wants are known
To Him Who chose us for His own.
Sing, pray, and keep His ways unswerving;
So do thine own part faithfully;
And trust His Word, though underserving,
Thou yet shalt find it true for thee;
God never yet forsook at need,
The soul that trusted Him indeed.
(If Thou But Trust in God to Guide Thee, Georg Neumark, 1641)
A prominent trait of individuals with autism is a fixation on time. Not just the current time, as in this oft-repeated conversation:
Me: Aaron, would you like to go ahead and eat your sub for lunch?
Aaron: Wait!
He then pushes his shirt sleeve up…WAY up, because he wears his watch halfway to his elbow…and stares at the time.
Aaron: Not yet.
Me (knowing the answer): Why not?
Aaron: Because it isn’t 12:00 yet. It’s 11:54.
But Aaron is also very concerned about ordering the timing of events in his day. That particular interchange sounds like this.
Me: Aaron, would you like to go to Swanson Park for a walk today?
Aaron: Yes! What time?
Me: Just whenever I get done with this laundry and a couple other things.
Aaron: So what time will that be?
Me: I don’t know, but I’ll come get you when I’m ready.
Later, as we walk in the park:
Me: After we finish our walk, I need to run by the house to do a few things. Then would you like to go to Dairy Queen? (Silly question!)
Aaron: Yeah!! What time?
Me: I don’t know the exact time. We haven’t even finished our walk yet.
Aaron: OK. So will it be 3:00?
Me: I don’t know, Aaron.
Later again, as Aaron is happily chowing down on a Choco Brownie Extreme Blizzard:
Me: For our show tonight, do you want to watch The Big Valley?
Aaron: Yeah!!
Silence, but I’m waiting for it…and Aaron doesn’t disappoint.
Aaron: What time?
AAAAHHHHH!!
That last part was just in my head.
Oh Aaron! He can drive us to distraction with his emphasis on time. And drives himself into great frustration when his timing ideas don’t match up with ours. Or even worse, when he asks us what time something will happen, and we don’t give him a precise answer.
Did you know that between the Old and New Testaments, there was a gap of 400 years when the people of Israel did not hear directly from God? There were no prophets, no visions, no word from God at all.
Just silence.
BUT!!!!
“BUT when the fullness of the time came, God sent forth His Son, born of a woman, born under the law.” (Galatians 4:4)
When the time was right in God’s eyes, did He ever speak! He sent His only Son, born of woman, to live and die in this world so that you and I could be redeemed.
I’m a time worrier, too. I wonder why sometimes God seems silent, or why He answers me but not in the way or in the timing I want…and am sure I need.
But this verse in Psalm 16 has meant so much to me, especially recently as I have claimed it for a situation in our family:
“The Lord is the portion of my inheritance and my cup; You support my lot. (Psalm 16:4)
Just as God portioned out the Promised Land to Israel, so He also gives to me what I need but only WHEN I need it…not when I THINK I need it.
The words, ‘You support my lot’ mean that God takes care of my circumstances.
When I allow Him to be my portion and my inheritance…I partake of Him in daily communion as I travel this road of life…I learn to trust His timing in all the matters of life that matter so much to me.
Yes, I’m human and I get impatient and bothered but God is ever faithful and understanding of my fixation on time, much like Aaron’s.
Several years ago, I had an experience with a small weed in one of my front yard flower beds.
I had become so busy with my other gardening that I had put off the task of pulling that little weed. It didn’t seem like such a big deal. The outward growth, though, hid what was happening under the ground, out of sight.
Here is what I wrote:
One hot day as I worked among my flowers, I looked down and saw that this little weed had grown significantly. Still, it wasn’t huge but it sure was larger than I had noticed before. Silly me, I thought. Why have I been waiting to pull this once-little weed? I just need to get rid of it now, I reasoned. I reached down and gave the weed a pull, and nothing happened. I pulled a bit harder, and still the weed didn’t budge. I gripped harder on the small growth, gave a firmer yank, and still it sat firm in its place in the dirt. This small, harmless weed was certainly being stubborn! It wasn’t letting go of its foothold very easily at all! I was so deceived by the small growth that I could see that I was in turn shocked by its apparently deep growth in the soil. I once again got a firmer hold, jiggled the weed back and forth, pulled with all my might and finally out came the root. What a surprise! The root was very long – much longer in proportion to the rest of the plant. While I had procrastinated about getting rid of the little weed or argued with myself about how harmless the little weed was, this small weed was growing a deep root system that could have damaged or killed my pretty Coreopsis. There was no excuse for my neglect – a wise gardener knows better.
Sometimes I let attitudes fester in my heart…attitudes that are, quite frankly, sin. It’s easy to say, “Well, now, you have every right to feel that way. Don’t be so hard on yourself.”
And every time I give myself that little pep talk, I am letting that root grow deeper and deeper in my life until it’s not so little anymore.
I have been keenly aware of this fact as Gary and I care for Aaron. Usually after a stressful period, often involving Aaron’s anger, we find ourselves talking together as we try to understand him and handle his issues in the right way. So often, solutions are hard to come by. The effects of living long-term with him spill over into every area of our lives. We go back 17 years to the time we were making decisions about his future.
Did we make the right choices? We were headed in one direction and the doors closed. Or did they?
I am constantly reminding myself that all those years ago we were seeking God’s will and we were desiring to walk in that path of God’s choosing for us and for Aaron. I must consciously trust God today with our past decisions…decisions that touch us in ways today that we never dreamed.
The impact of having Aaron with us now affects our “golden years” in so many unforeseen ways. We know that future decisions will be upon us some day, but there is a bigger issue for me right now.
That issue is bitterness. How easy it is to find ourselves saying, “If it wasn’t for Aaron, we could do this or that, go here or there, etc., etc., etc.”
And soon my eyes are on the hindrances of life with Aaron rather than the joy of being in God’s will…of doing His work within the walls of our home…of loving Aaron and caring for him.
We are physical creatures. We get tired. We get discouraged.
And sadly, we compare ourselves to others in those vulnerable moments when we’re scrolling through social media or having conversations.
Before I know it, the bitter root is taking deeper root in my heart. And while I understand that my feelings are normal, I also know that I cannot let myself perch there.
I must not settle for a life of bitterness.
These verses spoke to me so deeply this morning:
“O Lord, lead me in Your righteousness because of my foes; make Your way straight before me.” (Psalm 5:8)
My foes…my enemies…are those attitudes within me that contradict what God says is right. A big one is this issue of bitterness over the result of God’s past leading.
We trusted Him then to put us on the right path, and so we can trust Him now to provide all we need to face the results of walking on that path.
I need God’s leading and His righteousness to overcome that bitter root that seeks to take hold. Here is the result of trusting Him:
“Let all who take refuge in You be glad; let them ever sing for joy; and may You shelter them, that those who love Your name may exult in You.” (Psalm 5:11)
Paul told the believers in Ephesus that through the power of the Holy Spirit, they could be rooted and grounded in love.
Not rooted in bitterness but rooted in love…the love of Christ seen in their lives.
I must stop and check where I am allowing my roots to grow. We all do, right? We have so many hurts in life…so many stresses that pile up around us.
O Lord, lead me in Your righteousness. Do not allow me to lead myself into bitterness.
I love this old hymn. The lyrics speak well to each of us, wherever we are in our life of following Christ.
He leadeth me, O blessed thought! O words with heav’nly comfort fraught! Whate’er I do, where’er I be Still ’tis God’s hand that leadeth me.
Refrain: He leadeth me, He leadeth me, By His own hand He leadeth me; His faithful foll’wer I would be, For by His hand He leadeth me.
Sometimes ’mid scenes of deepest gloom, Sometimes where Eden’s bowers bloom, By waters still, o’er troubled sea, Still ’tis His hand that leadeth me.
Lord, I would place my hand in Thine, Nor ever murmur nor repine; Content, whatever lot I see, Since ’tis my God that leadeth me.
And when my task on earth is done, When by Thy grace the vict’ry’s won, E’en death’s cold wave I will not flee, Since God through Jordan leadeth me.
Recently, Aaron has been listening to the Phantom of the Opera movie soundtrack. He has seen the movie and heard the music before, especially listening to the CD over and over. But time has gone by, and Aaron doesn’t remember what the story is about.
During lunch a couple days ago, as he asked questions and I told him the story, I realized once again the sadness wrapped up in the Phantom’s life. I couldn’t hide it from Aaron if I was going to tell the story correctly.
“You know, Aaron,” I finally said, “it’s really in many ways a sad story.”
Aaron thought for a minute.
“You have to see it as love,” he said. “Love with a little bit of sad.”
His comment blew me away. I was legitimately speechless.
I’ve thought a lot about what Aaron said. I realize that he, in those few words, so perfectly described our life with him.
This life of parenting a special needs child is not a cake walk. Yet we know that what God has allowed in our life is for a reason…and God’s reasons are always good. Maybe His reasoning doesn’t make sense all the time, but God is good in all that He does and allows.
Gary and I have choices to make every day as we parent Aaron. Yet no matter what moments we face each day, we love Aaron fiercely.
What is our focus? Is it love, or is it sad?
We can’t ignore the sad. That would be denial.
We’re sad when Aaron has seizures.
Sad when sometimes those seizures cause serious injuries.
Sad when his seizure meds make him so sleepy and tired.
Sad when he must be poked with needles so often.
We’re sad when his behaviors break his own heart.
Sad that he still refuses to travel to meet his new nephew.
But wait. I need to remember what Aaron said.
Love, with a little bit of sad.
We want our life to be lived with a major on love and a minor on sad.
Like the love we felt for him last night as we stood outside watching the beautiful lightning to the west, hearing the distant thunder along with Aaron’s deep happy chuckle.
Seeing the love he has for animals of all sorts.
The way he takes huge delight in the unusual.
We love the joy he shows in sharing.
And the big smile he gives when I pick him up from his day group.
I love how he looked on the exam table at his last doctor’s visit, reading his UFO book that he couldn’t wait to show his doctor.
I love how he leans way over to listen to the music that comes out of the self-checkout register at Dillon’s, oblivious to all the stares.
I love his random love notes.
And that he’s willing to take an occasional picture with Mom.
I love looking out the window and seeing this scene.
I love that behind every hard, frustrating, stressful, and sad moment…I can hold on to this fact – that God has given us our special Aaron to love and care for.
We have to see it as love…love with a little bit of sad.
No, he didn’t have a seizure. He was just having a very hard time waking up to start his day. It takes patience and wisdom on my part to deal with him when he wants to sleep late. Sleepy Aaron is almost always grouchy Aaron.
A scenario like this isn’t life changing. But lately, Aaron has been unsettled and extra-easily upset. Is it the new little member of our family that he is struggling to accept? Is he trying to establish his place of importance at home and at his day group? Side effects of the meds he takes? Or just the way his autistic brain functions in our world which is not always his world?
Probably some of all the above.
It’s been wearing on Gary and me lately. Tiring.
I walked back to my desk after several treks into Aaron’s room.
It hit me how crazy it is that at my age I am still actively parenting our son. This is not at all how I ever imagined my life would be.
Don’t get me wrong. I realize how very blessed I am in so many ways.
But some days I wonder…
It’s easy to get mired down in the stress and frustrations, to the point that I lose sight of the path.
I feel much like Job, which I just read that morning.
“Behold, I go forward but He is not there,
And backward, but I cannot perceive Him;
When He acts on the left, I cannot behold Him;
He turns on the right, I cannot see Him.” (Job 23:8-9)
It’s not just the path that I lose sight of. Sometimes it’s God Himself that I cannot see.
Our emotions have a way of doing that to us.
Our disappointments can blind us to God in our everyday lives.
BUT!!!
“BUT He knows the way that I take…” (Job 23:10)
I may lose sight of God in front of me or behind me…to my left or to my right.
BUT…God knows the way I take!
God hasn’t lost sight of me!
That word “knows” in Hebrew means “designates.”
The word “way” means the “course of life.”
God has designated the course of my life.
God IS love and I know deep in my heart that His every plan for me is designed and wrapped in His love for me.
God also knows that I am but human…weak…questioning…fearful…sometimes angry.
Questions come easily when I am vulnerable.
Why does Aaron have to suffer?
Could You not have found another way to grow me, Lord?
If I allow myself to keep going down those paths, though, I will soon be off the path that God has for me.
That’s never a good place to be.
I need to be like Job, who in all his terrible suffering still said:
“My foot has held fast to His path;
I have kept His way and have not turned aside.
I have not departed from the command of His lips;
I have treasured the words of His mouth more than my
necessary food.” (Job 23:11-12)
Some days and many moments I don’t FEEL like I am holding fast to God or treasuring the words of His mouth.
But deep, deep in my heart I know that I do desire God’s will and God’s way.
We all go through the tough times, don’t we? Some are brief. Too many are prolonged…lifelong.
Oh God, show us every day that even when we can’t see You…You see us!
You appoint our path, hard as it often is.
Because in the hard is where we do more clearly see Your hand.
We feel your breath upon our faces as we wait before You, drying our tears and strengthening our failing hearts.
Then may we be able to say with Job:
“When He has tried me, I shall come forth as gold.”
I heard Aaron’s first seizure at 12:38 this morning. The second was at 2:37. As I often say, Aaron would appreciate that I am using the precise time.
Not long after 4:00 I heard him rustling. It wasn’t a seizure. I listened and knew that he was out of bed. He went to the bathroom and then back to his room. I heard his door close.
I got up and went to his room, fairly sure of what I would find. He had changed his pajamas and was getting ready to climb back into bed.
His sheets were wet. Bed wetting seizures are common to Aaron.
I had him sit in his desk chair as I changed his sheets. He watched my every move, as he is not only bent on using precision with his time keeping but is also particular about his bedding being just right.
I was thankful for waterproof mattress pads, and that we keep an extra one on hand. Thankful for extra sheets and blankets, and for our washing machine and dryer.
There sat Aaron. He was flicking his fingers together as he so often does now, more and more. There was some dried blood on the corner of his mouth where he had bitten his tongue during his first seizure.
He kept telling me that his head hurt. He wondered if he would have to go to his day group.
It always breaks my heart to see him like this. Broke my heart, too, as I asked him if he would have slept on wet sheets if I hadn’t come in there. He said yes because he didn’t want to wake us up.
I told him he never ever had to sleep on wet sheets.
I was finally done with his bed. It’s a stretch for Aaron to lay down under different covers than his usual ones.
“I want my Mario blanket,” he said as he looked at his bed all covered in a blanket not his own.
“But it’s wet,” I told him. “Here, I’ll get you another blanket to use.”
I walked out into the hall and opened the linen cabinet. I saw the quilt that we have had for many years and knew that the weight of it would be a comfort to Aaron.
As I carried it to his room and arranged it on his bed, I was thinking about the sweet memories of this quilt. It was a wedding gift to me and Gary, made 44 years ago by the dear ladies at Needham’s Grove Baptist Church in Needham’s Grove, North Carolina. My brother pastored there. The women in the church had gotten to know me while I was in Bible college not far away and would often visit on weekends.
Finally, I was finished with Aaron’s bed. He surveyed it as he stood up from his chair. I smiled as he immediately pulled out some wrinkles in the quilt before he walked around to get back in bed. He snuggled under the covers, and I pulled them up around his face, a soft smile of contentment visible on his lips.
It wasn’t even 30 minutes later that I heard another seizure. As I stood beside his bed, I looked at that special quilt again. Each stitch was sewn by hand…hands of women who loved the Lord and loved to give.
All those years ago, I had no idea what our life would hold. We were dreamy-eyed newlyweds with our whole life before us.
And now, under the quilt that we used to lay under, lay our special Aaron. Never would I have imagined that we would still be caring for our 37-year-old son…that the quilt that covered us now covered Aaron.
I don’t know or understand the reason for any of it.
But I do know my heavenly Father.
And I do know that He has stitched every little piece of my life and of Gary’s life and of Aaron’s life.
God has stitched it in order to create a beautiful work.
Not an easy work. And not the one I would have chosen if He had let me.
But do I trust Him?
And if I do, at what point do I stop trusting?
I either fully trust God, or I don’t.
That means, that even through tears and disappointments and frustrations and exhaustion, I trust the God Who has promised to direct my steps.
Who has promised that “underneath are His everlasting arms.”
I am never lower than His arms that are always under me to hold me up.
And neither are you, my friend, if you know and trust this God Who loves you so much.
Who gave His own Son, Jesus, to die for you.
And Who is meticulously stitching the fabric of your life…of my life…of Aaron’s…into a work of art.
I visited a local nursery a few months ago to buy vegetable plants for our garden. I took Aaron with me, hoping that he would enjoy seeing the various goodies that we were going to plant in our garden. But Aaron had eyes for one thing only – sunflowers!
“MOM!!” he exclaimed as I stood at the counter to pay, “can I get some sunflowers?”
I turned to see him with the packet of sunflower seeds already in hand, so I agreed. He watched carefully as the cashier scanned the small package, all the while talking excitedly to her about how we were going to grow SUNFLOWERS!!
We decided to plant the little seeds between our house and our neighbor’s house, near her raised garden beds. This way, their children could also enjoy the sunflowers. Amanda loved the idea, so one afternoon Gary dug the holes…I handed three seeds to Aaron to plant in each hole…and Aaron bent over to place them in the ground. We covered them up and went about our day.
Aaron wanted those sunflowers to be growing the next day but growing takes time. Growing takes lots of patience. One day, though, we saw the tiny shoots emerging from the ground! Aaron was SO excited! Over the next weeks we watched each little bitty plant become more and more established. They grew!
But not into the huge sunflowers that we have had in the past. These seem to be smaller sunflowers, or maybe they are responding to the harsh heat and the dry weather we have had.
Then one day, Amanda texted me with some exciting news. We had a bloom! Later, Aaron and I walked out to the row of sunflowers and sure enough, there was one bloom.
I noticed something that day. The pretty sunflower that had been the first to bloom was the smallest of the others in that row. Its flower wasn’t large and impressive like ones you typically see in Kansas fields.
Yet the happiness that our little blooming sunflower gave all of us was huge!
Sometimes I feel like my life is that of the small sunflower. Others are living more impressive lives similar to the taller sunflowers that stood on each side of our shorter plant…lives, quite honestly, that I thought I might have.
But God has taken that measly sunflower that bloomed first and has used it to reinforce a lesson I know well in my head but don’t often practice in my heart.
Yesterday God gave me a verse that says it perfectly, as only God can:
“The Lord has made everything for its own purpose…” (Proverbs 16:4)
God has planted me where I am for a purpose.
And more importantly, God has planted Aaron in my life for a purpose as well.
If I believe in God’s sovereignty…and I do…then I must also believe that every area of my life is sovereignly planned with purpose by Him.
My idea of great purpose is usually not God’s idea.
Yet God’s idea is always best and right. Not always easy or even fulfilling on many days…but always best.
I can live a life that shines for God as I care for Aaron, or I can live a stunted life of anger and questions and comparisons to others.
I can see Aaron as a weight that keeps me down, or I can see Aaron as a means of experiencing God’s joy.
I can bloom or I can wither.
And here’s the catch. Often no one…NO one…sees my bloom. I feel like my life has no purpose.
But God clearly says that He has made everything for its own purpose.
I am to bloom brightly for Him, not so that my bloom will necessarily be seen and admired by others but so that I will grow in grace and be more like Christ.
So, little sunflower, I am thankful that you were planted where you were. I’m thankful for yet another lesson that God planted in my heart using the least of these.
May I live a faithful life no matter how small I think it might be.
One of Aaron’s favorite things to do in all the world is to eat out at a restaurant. The promise of eating out makes every doctor visit or dental procedure totally worth his time.
Aaron might vary a little in what he will eat at the different restaurants that we visit, but always…if possible…he will order a side salad with “no croutons and two ranches.”
And often he will order another of his favorites…French fries!
Not long ago, while he munched on his fries at lunch, he had an idea.
“Mom?” he asked, “can we make French fries?”
“I kind of made them last night in the air fryer,” I answered as I reminded him of the potato wedges that we had eaten.
“I didn’t see them that way,” he responded.
I smiled at Aaron’s response.
He has, yet again, given me something to ponder.
A couple blogging friends mentioned Psalm 37 last week. I decided to read slowly through that wonderful Psalm in the mornings after my regular Bible study.
Verse 3 jumped out at me.
“Trust in the Lord and do good; dwell in the land and cultivate faithfulness.”
Guess what the word ‘cultivate’ means? It means to ‘feed on.’
Dwell in the land and feed on faithfulness.
‘Dwell’ can also mean ‘rest.’
The land is wherever God has put me.
So, I am to rest where God has put me and feed on faithfulness.
That sounds pleasant at first glance. But what if the place God has put me is less than ideal?
What if it’s just downright hard?
Fact is, God didn’t say that I am to be faithful when my pasture is lush and green…when my place in life is fun and easy and fulfilling.
He just said to dwell there in the pasture where He has placed me…stay…rest.
And while there, feed on faithfulness.
Here I am, approaching the age that I used to think was REALLY old, and I am still in a large sense raising a child. This time of my life was what I used to hear being referred to as having the time of my life.
Empty nest and all that.
Hasn’t quite worked out that way for us.
But I can’t deny the fact that God didn’t qualify the type of land He would ordain for me. He just told me to rest there.
And to feed on faithfulness.
You see, we can all be faithful where we are. The form it takes is what sometimes trips us up.
Caring for Aaron, in all the shapes that caring takes, is me feeding on faithfulness.
But many times, I’m like Aaron as he compared the air fryer potato wedges to French fries.
I don’t see it that way.
I don’t see managing Aaron’s medicines, doctor visits, tons of paperwork, or driving him everywhere as having a lot to do with my faithfulness to God.
I most definitely get tangled up in tiredness and complaining as I work to keep him fed, active, happy, encouraged, and clean.
Sadness at seizures and frustration during behaviors jerk my emotions in all directions.
And as the days turn into weeks and the weeks into months and the months into years, it sure is easy to lose the sense of living in faithfulness to God.
Seems like I often compare my grass to others, and usually theirs is so much greener than mine.
Their feeding on faithfulness seems exciting and fun.
Mine? Pretty dull and daily.
And often dirty.
But something I’m learning…ever so slowly…is to look up to God when I feel like looking over to someone else’s land. Keep my focus on my Shepherd and on the land He has given to me.
To see every tiring moment as an opportunity to trust Him, to do good, to rest in this place, and to feed on faithfulness.
To remind myself, at the end of another tiring day, that God smiles on my faithfulness.
This past week, the Supreme Court voted not to block Texas’ heartbeat bill. This, in effect, has made abortion in Texas illegal after the first heartbeat of the baby in the womb is heard…usually around the 6th week of pregnancy.
Against the backdrop of yelling protestors –
I was looking at my own backdrop at home, which consisted of all Aaron’s bedding after his seizures earlier Friday morning.
And dear Aaron recovering from those seizures as he slept on the couch.
My mother’s heart was drawn to Aaron in his struggles.
But my mother’s heart was also drawn to all the many babies who have not had the chance to live, no matter how difficult their lives may have been.
There is a choice that is seldom addressed when most people talk about “choice” as it is defined today.
It’s the choice that Joshua talked about when Israel was going into the land that God had given them. He told Israel to choose that day whom they would serve – the one true God, or one of the false gods worshipped by the peoples in the land around them.
Either way, they would choose a deity to worship. They would worship God, or they would worship a non-god…a pagan god.
“Joshua calls Israel to ‘serve Yahweh’ (Joshua 24:14). But if Israel will not serve Yahweh, they must at least serve some god(s). He presses Israel to the wall; they must come down somewhere. If not Yahweh, the real historical God, then they must choose either the ancestral Mesopotamian gods or the contemporary Amorite ones. The conservatives who were fond of tradition, of what had stood the test of time, who yearned for the ‘faith of our fathers’, might vote for Mesopotamia. The liberals with their yen for relevance, for being in step with the times, might prefer to identify (as an act of goodwill) with the current social milieu and enter into dialogue and worship with the Amorites. But you must choose; if not Yahweh, then take your pick from ‘these dunghill deities’ (Matthew Henry).” (Dale Ralph Davis)
Do you see the issue here?
Do you see the issue for our culture today?
My choice!
My choice which god I will serve.
For in making the choice to reject Jehovah God, you ARE making a choice to serve whatever pagan god fits your lifestyle.
We all serve and worship someone or something.
My choice to worship God will then dictate my other choices in life.
My choices FOR life.
For no matter how many silly arguments are made condoning abortion, we all know that something inside that woman is alive and growing.
And if nothing else, modern technology has shown us that what is growing in her womb is a human baby with a functioning heart at only several weeks old.
Psalm 139 tells us that God has woven that baby together in his mother’s womb. She is fearfully – reverently – and wonderfully made by God Himself!
So how do I explain our Aaron, born with special needs?
I can’t.
But I can explain that as for me and Gary, we have chosen to serve the Lord.
With all my body and soul and heart, I have chosen to trust almighty God to make the right decisions for me and for my son.
My body is not mine.
My choice is not mine.
I belong to God and His choice is all that matters.
And because I know Him and trust Him, I know that our Aaron whom he created is made just the way that God allowed and designed.
I walk in peace. I don’t need all the answers to do that.
I love early mornings at my desk in the room facing west on our upper level. I have taken scores of sky pictures from the windows in this room.
It is dark on the mornings I sit there with my Bible open. But always the sun eventually rises, later this time of year.
Yesterday the view outside those windows matched my heart.
Heavy.
The sky laden with clouds.
Aaron had a seizure a couple hours earlier. His seizures have been more frequent lately and I wonder why. Will this mean an increase in one of his seizure drugs and then all that goes along with that?
Our son 10 hours away tested positive for COVID this week. When it went to his chest, I wanted to be near him in the way that only a mother understands. Then he got the call that he was furloughed from his job.
And he can’t join us for Thanksgiving.
We plan to travel to our daughter’s for Thanksgiving. Should we go? The virus, you know.
Heavy.
Even the partial early Christmas decorating I’ve done this week doesn’t create the needed cheer in my heart.
But I read Psalm 24:1-2:
“The earth is the Lord’s, and all it contains; the world and those who dwell in it. For He has founded it upon the seas and established it upon the rivers.”
The sun DID rise, obscured by clouds though it was.
God has an order to this world He created. He’s promised that to us.
“While the earth remains,
Seedtime and harvest,
And cold and heat,
And summer and winter,
And day and night,
Shall not cease.” (Genesis 8:22)
God also has an order to my life.
I am not a pawn to random chance or karma, but I am under the steadfast and certain predictability of the God Who created this world, and all that is in it.
I prefer this sunrise:
And this sunset:
But I trust the God Who holds this world together (Colossians 1:17).
Whatever the news, national or personal, I am certain that God is in charge.
I don’t know or even understand His plan.
But I’m not to trust the plan.
I’m to trust the Planner.
So I will…through heavy clouds or blue skies.
Sunrise and sunset will not cease. And neither will the loving control and care of the God behind it all.
He Said What?! 