Just Think of the Cross

“And she said …. Then I said … can you believe it? … I don’t know what’s wrong with her …!?!?!?!” And so my story went on an on describing in storybook detail every nuance of the offense this woman committed against me.

Then I remembered how God had helped me out during her offense and afterwards, so I added a small tag-line to my story to include what He did.

Then it occurred to me … God should be the center of this story … and I tried to make it so, but the offense was so fresh, so real, so …

How can God be the center of my story if my relationship to Him, my encounters with Him are not fresh and real and … ? Why wasn't God be the center of my story?

I just read The Hiding Place by Corrie Ten Boom for the first time in years and realized that the last time I’d read this I a was a young girl … like maybe high school. I’d forgotten so many things and so many things struck me completely differently now that I’m a grown woman. For instance, Corrie was in her early 50’s during most of the book … I’m in my early 50’s. Corrie was a busy woman … I’m a busy woman. Corrie loved the Lord … I love the Lord. Corrie loved her family and did not want to lose them … I love my family and I don’t want to lose them. But I was so challenged by the love that God gave her and her sister Betsie for their persecutors … their captors.

At one point they are in line for a monthly Dr’s inspection. They had to strip naked and walk in single file past a line of male guards who leered and joked about their physical appearance. And suddenly the four months she spent in solitary confinement reading and re-reading the four gospels someone smuggled in to her, brings a scene back to Corrie’s mind and she leans forward and whispers to Betsie, “He was stripped naked too.” And Betsie replies, “Oh, and I never thanked Him for it!”

Long, long ago in a far away place …

Just to think of the cross moves me now

The nails in His hands … His bleeding brow ...

It should've been me!

It should've been me

Instead I am free!

I AM FREE!"

(lyrics from a song we sang when I was a teenager)

Then I was so embarrassed and humbled by my childishness over this petty minor offense that this other woman committed against me. Really?? The only thing I had to endure was to listen to a woman who had obviously been hurt or wounded deeply at one time or another, because she needed to try to humiliate me in order to elevate herself. Was this minor offense worthy of the 10 minute detailed story that I made it into in order to prove how worthy I was? And by the way … am I worthy? The Bible tells me that I’m not but that God loves me anyways and reaches down even though I’m not and embraces me and holds me and gives me what I don’t deserve.

God help me to give to others what You have given to me … help me to reach out and love people even when they don’t love me … help me to give them what they don’t deserve but what you long to give them anyways … forgiveness. God help me to remember that the days are evil and time is short and that my conversations are a tool to draw people’s minds and hearts to You. Help me to chose my words wisely … for they may be my last.

"For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all. So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal."

2 Corinthians 4:17