Salty Zebra

  Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”   Matthew 28:19-20  When you think of a mission field, what comes to mind? People who look very different from you and live very different lives from you in a very different place far, far away? For some people, that is very much the case. My dear friend, Kris, for example flies all over the world to the most remote and inaccessible regions to bring the hope and love of Christ to people. She’s one of my biggest heroes! But that’s not everyone’s calling. Not everybody is sent far away, some of us, most of us in fact, are tasked with a mission field at our very doorstep.   At the beginning of the book of Acts , just before Jesus ascends into heaven, He tasks the disciples – and us – with carrying the message of His lo...

  For just as through the disobedience of the one man the many were made sinners, so also through the obedience of the one man the many will be made righteous.   Romans 5:19  Adam. Poor guy got a bad rep. He made the biggest mistake any of us can, choosing to disbelieve and disobey God, and with it he brought us all down with him. You know he had no idea the breadth or consequences of his choice before he made it, but do we ever? Only God has the whole picture, knows all that will come from a given choice or action. But the point the scripture is making here is that it only took one guy, one sin from one guy really, to bring down the many – every person after him.   That’s a pretty dark, sad thought, but the verse goes on! Because this was all brought on by one man, it could also all be undone by one Man, but it had to be the right Man, a perfect Man. It had to be the One without sin. Since we were so far past that even being a possibility, God had to come down a...

  Whoever has my commands and keeps them is the one who loves me. The one who loves me will be loved by my Father, and I too will love them and show myself to them.”   John 14:21  The order, the progression of things, matters. We love God because He first loved us ( 1 John 4:19 ). We obey God because we love God ( John 14:21 ). God loves us > We love God > We obey God. This is a very clear and important flow. When those arrows get moved around, when people try to put things in a different order, it goes poorly.   At times in my life, I mistakenly had the impression that God loved me only when and because I obeyed Him. Like His love was dependent on my actions. If I was obeying Him, I was in His favor or love and when I was making poor choices, I was out of it. The first fallacy of this thinking is it puts me in charge of God – how ridiculous! The idea that God’s choice to love me would be dependent on something as fallible and inconsistent as myself is so f...

   Yep, you read that right. Well, maybe you did. This is my husband's best handwriting, but it's not super legible so I'll copy it out here just in case: If you lose a day or If you lose your mind Know you will never lose me  Ok, so our humor tends toward the morbid, but it keeps us entertained! What does this cryptic message come from? Well, here's the story.  A few weeks back, I went to the ER for some pretty intense neurological symptoms. I was having memory issues, extreme fatigue, pressure in my head, dizziness connected with tinnitus and nausea. All of these sounded an awful lot like the hydrocephalus I had experienced before and I was concerned that perhaps my shunt wasn't working as it should. I messaged my neuro oncology team and they called the next evening and said I should go straight into the ER. It was 5:30 in the evening and I knew the ER would be busy after hours so I asked if it would be ok if I waited to go in, but they said it was important to go...

  And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to death – even death on a cross!   Philippians 2:8  Let’s be real. Jesus didn’t have to do anything He did for us. He is God. He is above all. He is all. He has all. He needs nothing. He DIDN’T HAVE TO DO IT. But He did. That’s the hugest, coolest part of it all. He didn’t have to, but He did. Jesus demonstrated for us the height and perfection of obedience to the Father and today’s passage ( Philippians 2:1-11 ) breaks it down for us.   Jesus, being in very nature God, emptied Himself when He came down from heaven to be implanted in Mary’s womb. He set aside His Godhood, His power, His immortality, His omnipotence. All the things that made Him God, He set aside for a time. Yes, we still have the mystery of the Hypostatic Union where Jesus was fully man and yet fully God, but certain aspects of His Godhood were removed from Him for a season.   Jesus took on the form of a sla...

  For no word from God will ever fail.” “I am the Lord’s servant,” Mary answered. “May your word to me be fulfilled.” Then the angel left her.   Luke 1:37-38  At Christmastime we read this story and are filled with awe and wonder that an angel appeared to a young girl, Mary was likely in her early teens, telling her that she would be the mother of the Messiah. It is a beautiful story, but when you slow down and look at it from Mary’s perspective, there is so much more to it!   By accepting what the angel said to her, she recognized that a great deal of risk of life and limb came with it. You see, Mary was engaged to be married to Joseph. Unlike today’s engagements, this betrothal was far more serious and binding. Mary coming up pregnant would brand her as an adulteress since she had not yet come together with her husband. In that day in age, she could be stoned to death for this! At the very least, her good reputation would be deeply soiled. The road ahead would ...