Jesus, You are here,
Your Spirit’s presence with me.
My Emmanuel.
Mandy Baker Johnson
Living without Shadows
Month: March 2017 (page 1 of 3)
This is the last will and testament of me, Jesus Christ of Nazareth, Son of Man and Son of God.
I give to all who will believe in my name the right to become children of God.
To all whom my Father has adopted, we give the Holy Spirit. We want them to know they are beloved children of God, and the Spirit will tell their spirits that this is who they are.
Every child of God becomes an heir of God and a co-heir with me, the firstborn.
I give to each child every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places. Everything I have enjoyed, I bequeath to them. They are citizens of heaven and my Father’s home is their home. I joyfully share with each one the unending blessing that is mine.
Each child of God is seated in heavenly places with me. The Father will lavish His grace on them for all eternity: showing them how abundantly rich His kindness is to them.
I, Jesus, have died to give them life because I love them with outrageous and extravagant love. Their worth is far above the price of rubies. I have cleansed them from sin with my own blood. I’ve taken all their dirty rags of striving and rebellion, and clothed them in my glorious robes of righteousness.
When I was a young teenager my then church joined up with a church in Derby for a joint youth camp on the Gower Peninsula in south Wales. The Derby youth group were old hands at camping on that particular site: an old army barracks (from what I remember).
The leaders had prayed much for the week of camp and thought that all the young people would become friends.
That first weekend proved them wrong. They prayed desperately on Sunday night for God to move.
He did.
The next day, Monday, the Lord opened the heavens. Literally.
There was a terrific storm with lightning, wind and flash flooding. Rain fell in sheets, drenching everything. Our one road in and out of camp was flooded such that we were cut off from the mainland for a day or two.
At lunchtime the leaders gave up on trying to keep us dry and organised a football match in the rain.
There are some experiences where we can’t help but end up friends with the people with whom we’ve shared them.
God sent rain and changed the atmosphere.
The following summer, we teens eagerly anticipated meeting up again with our good friends for camp.
I heard a lovely quote the other day: ‘Jesus is the Good News.’
The gospel (good news) is a person: Jesus.
Jesus is the One I love and adore. He is my magnificent obsession. He is the only person with whom I can be utterly besotted without feeling empty, as though I’ve been robbed. He gives and gives and gives. He is wonderful. He is love. I’m thrilled that He’s my friend. I’m thankful – so thankful – that He’s my rescuer and saviour. He is the best master. He’s always fair and absolutely trustworthy.
Jesus is full of grace and beauty. He is the most beautiful person I know. His goodness and love shine from the inside out with purity and radiance. When I eventually get to see Him face-to-face, He will be beauty personified.
God is rich in kindness to me: this is called grace.
I know the generous grace of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Though He was rich, yet for my sake He became poor,
so that by His poverty He could make me rich.
2 Corinthians 8:9
I attended a women’s conference Outrageously Loved on Saturday. I’d gone expectant to meet with God and for Him to meet with me. And wow, I was not disappointed!
At the front of the room was a banqueting table, laden with all kinds of goodies: chocolates, crisps, tortilla chips, strawberries, grapes, a pineapple, marshmallows, Maltesers, etc, etc. The banner across the table read: He brought me to His banqueting table and His banner over me was love.
While praying and preparing for the conference, the ladies organising it were seeking God for what He wanted for the day. He showed them a picture of a banqueting table with crystal glasses and delicate china as well as lots of goodies and treats.
The first thing the organising ladies did was to offer an invitation to us from the Father, to come up and partake of the banqueting table He had prepared: of the delicious nibbles right before us. It was a picture of how the Father was inviting each of us to meet with Him, to come to his spiritual banqueting table to know Him more intimately.
As part of our worship and as an act of faith, we went forward to help ourselves.
I was thrilled and went forward happily. But my breath was taken away when I saw what was there, and was a sign to me that the Father really was in this and He had planned it with me in mind.
Popcorn.
Popcorn is my latest favourite snack.
My Daddy in heaven had seen that, and gave me popcorn on Saturday as a sign of His outrageous love for me.
The Father’s love is so crazy, unlimited, and extravagant that He doesn’t just want me to believe with my mind that He loves me ‘because the Bible tells me so’. Oh no. He wants me to know with every fibre of my being that He is utterly besotted with me!
WHOOP WHOOP WHOOP!!!!
We were on our way to the ACW weekend at Scargill House. I had picked up my friend Helen in good time that morning and we talked non-stop as I drove north on the M1, enjoying catching up after only ‘seeing’ each other on Facebook for the last year.
We decided to stop for coffee at Woolley Edge services. Still plenty to talk about over coffee and cake in Costa.
I knew we needed to join the A1M for a time before coming off at junction 47 for Harrogate. With this in mind, we headed out of the service station.
For some reason we were convinced we were on the A1M and Helen started counting off the junctions. We came to junction 47 and I drove up the slip road. There were no signposts for Harrogate which was puzzling.
After a couple of turns on the roundabout trying in vain to find a sign saying ‘Harrogate’, we decided to get back on the motorway. I was certain we had come too far north by mistake so headed south.
Thank goodness Helen had the map and a clear head. She figured out we were on the wrong road, travelling in the wrong direction, and redirected me.
We laughed over our silly mistake, and carried on chatting about more important things such as writing and faith and family. We eventually arrived safely at Scargill, ready for a great weekend.
Partly as a result of my encouraging (literally putting courage in me) conversations with Helen, I took the plunge that weekend and not only did the writing task set by our speaker Tony Collins but also read out what I had written. Although this was my fourth visit to Scargill, I had never had a go at the writing task before, let alone had the courage to read out something I had written.
We set off for home, determined not to go wrong. After all, we had both been to Scargill several times. How hard could it be?
We made it all the way to the M1 safely.
But so busy were we, chatting and comparing notes of our weekend, we never even saw the junction for Helen’s home in Chesterfield. We overshot by two junctions before realising we’d done it again….
But when I look back on that weekend, I realise it was as much about the journey as it was about the conference. Helen and I shared life’s trials, disappointments and encouragements together in my car and over coffee. There were little triumphs to rejoice over, and niggles to pray in to.
In writing and in life, let’s not rush to get to a destination. The journey is an important part of the process.
This post was first published in the Winter 2016 edition of ACW’s Christian Writer.
Seven years ago, I had a chronic illness that was worsening despite the best efforts of the medical profession. I wondered if I was in the valley of the shadow of death. It felt like my body was beginning to shut down and there was little hope, physically speaking.
But then I had a significant breakthrough healing, followed a few months later by Jesus meeting with me and completing what He’d started. It was just me and Him in my living room, when He restored my health.
I’d made the decision to follow Jesus as a child but I didn’t really begin to comprehend His love for me until He healed me. I was stuck in a hopeless and, at times, very dark situation that I couldn’t get out of. My best efforts on my ‘good’ days got me nowhere and mostly made me worse. No one was able to help.
But Jesus came to my rescue.
I will always be so thankful to Him. He gave me back my life – and this time with a new sparkle in my eyes because I know He loves me. I no longer just believe it with my mind. It has become a reality in my heart, something I experience.
For me, the illness and healing are a physical picture of what Jesus had already done for me spiritually.
My soul wasn’t dying, it was dead. I was alienated from God. I was a good child, but just like a corpse can’t help itself, I couldn’t help myself. I was in a hopeless situation.
But the Father loves me. In fact, He loves me the same way He loves Jesus. I was dead, but He brought me to life. He dealt with the baggage that I’ve collected since conception: bad thoughts, wrong reactions, rebellion, white lies, etc, etc. 2,000 years ago Jesus took all my baggage on Himself when He died on the cross, paying the full price for my wrongdoing and in exchange giving me His goodness instead.
This is real love—not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son as a sacrifice to take away our sins.
1 John 4:10
What is love?
Love looks like a King dying for His rebellious subjects so that they don’t have to pay for their wrong thoughts and actions, and to make them royal sons and daughters.
I love this song, written and performed by a friend, Chris Barton: This is Love
Today’s word is rest. This spidergram shows what gives me rest.
Joyful is today’s word for the Lent word-a-day challenge.
Joyful?
I don’t feel joyful.
It’s awful seeing terror attacks anywhere but when it’s on your turf it’s somehow so much worse. London is my capital city. This is my country, these are my people. We have been violated.
The media reports leave me cold, empty and sick.
Only a month ago, Adi and I were right there. ‘I’ve never seen Scotland Yard,’ I said. We stood outside and took photos, before wandering past Big Ben and the Palace of Westminster. Only a month ago.
How can someone plough into school children? How can someone think deliberately driving into fellow human beings is right? Stabbing, killing, maiming, destroying. Oh God, oh God.
I’m hollow inside for those who’ve died, for their families and friends. Life can never be the same.
And the wounded. ‘Catastrophic’ was the word used by reporters. Great damage and suffering being caused. Life has forever been changed for a handful of people today.
Eye witnesses, MPs, tourists and visitors, emergency services: no one involved remains unscathed.
Wednesday 22nd March 2017 began like any other day and ended in tragedy.
Where do I go from here?
I flicked the pages of my Bible and turned up this passage which seems strangely relevant today. This is where my joy and hope lie:
When the oppressor is no more, and destruction has ceased,
and he who tramples underfoot has vanished from the land,
then a throne will be established in steadfast love,
and on it will sit in faithfulness… one who judges and seeks justice
and is swift to do righteousness.
‘Go’ is a small word with potentially explosive results. It’s like the ripple effect of tossing a pebble in a lake.
Naaman was told by the prophet to go and wash in the Jordan River to be healed of leprosy. It seemed a silly, almost insulting, instruction but when Naaman came down off his high horse (literally and figuratively), and did what he was told, God miraculously healed him.
Moses repeatedly went in to Pharaoh with the request: ‘Let my people go.’ Pharaoh ummed and aahed and faffed about, and flatly refused. God sent increasingly nasty plagues until eventually the stubborn, arrogant king agreed to let God’s people go.
Ruth, whose story I’ve been reflecting on recently, showed intense loyalty and love to her mother-in-law when she declared: ‘Where you go, I will go….’ And thank God she did, because she is one of Jesus’ ancestors.
Jesus told the famous story of the Good Samaritan and encouraged His original listeners to ‘go and do likewise’ in terms of being a good neighbour.
Another famous statement of Jesus’ is the one He made shortly before going back to His Father, to ‘go and make disciples of all nations…’ It’s His heart’s desire that every Jesus-follower should so overflow with passionate love for Him that wherever we go, we will share the good news of God wanting a relationship with us and being willing and able to deal with all of our baggage.
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