Live In The Sufferings

The Lord started talking to me about suffering a few months ago. This was not a subject I was looking forward to and to be honest was a bit nervous about where He was going with it. I'm no hero and thoughts of suffering conjured up images of pain and distress in my mind.
As the weeks went by I realized what He was showing me. People are often suffering. Whether it be watching your children in an unhealthy relationship or caring for elderly parents there is suffering involved. It could be knowing loved ones are not in relationship with the Lord or a court case not turning out the way you hoped. Maybe it's a job you missed out on that causes you to suffer or a broken heart. Suffering comes in many forms.
The Lord was showing me we suffer not just from personal pain or loved ones dying but in life in general. If we are alive we will suffer at some point. The Lord told us in His word it's a part of life.
1 Peter 5:8-10 Be alert and of sober mind. Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour. Resist him, standing firm in the faith, because you know that the family of believers throughout the world is undergoing the same kind of sufferings. And the God of all grace, who called you to his eternal glory in Christ, after you have suffered a little while, will himself restore you and make you strong, firm and steadfast. Now you might be thinking to yourself, no kidding tell me something I don't already know!
We know people suffer so where are you going with this? Glad you asked.
What I realized is it's not if we will suffer but are we grounded in our relationship with God so when the suffering comes we can handle it. I have seen a lot of Christians who say they believe in God until tragedy hits and then they second guess God and feel distant from Him. Why? Because they don't have a strong understanding of who God is and how much He loves us. I am guilty of this very thing so please don't feel like I'm attacking you. As always these jewels are about my life and things I went through or are going through now.
For me it has been my situation with my mother. I have been suffering knowing she is in a place I can't get to on a daily basis to see and help her. I was having trouble waking up in the morning and allowing myself to be happy (and I love to be happy) because I felt guilty that I am going on with life and my mother is in a nursing home in the middle of no where without her kids. I would lay awake at night and toss and turn and it would be in my mind all day, a constant reminder that I wasn't “doing” something. I was even holding back from my prayer warriors that I needed them to pray for me because I felt guilty and ashamed of how things turned out with my family. I was suffering and didn't know what to do with it. Does this make sense?
God showed me that this was my current suffering. He then showed me that I wasn't trusting Him with it. I needed to go back to my relationship with Jesus and understand how much He loves me and my mother. I had to start with prayer and remember who I was praying to. I'm praying to GOD!
James 5:13 If anyone among you is suffering let him pray.
Then I had to remember that God would not turn His back on me regardless of the decisions me or anyone else in my family have made. I had to remember that not only could He handle this mess He would handle it and He would deliver me from my suffering as well.
Job 36:15 But those who suffer he delivers in their suffering; he speaks to them in their affliction.
God will speak to us when we need Him to we just have to give Him the situation and wait on Him. The Bible tells us that God will work out all things to the good for those who love Him but that doesn't mean suffering isn't a part of that working out.
Romans 8:28 And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.
A great example of this is my friend Carolyn's brother. He recently got hit in the head with a brick . We know that happened because we live in a sin filled world and the devil is out to hurt us. Remember what Peter told us “Be alert and of sober mind. Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour.” The devil meant harm to him but when he went to the hospital they realized his breathing was irregular and they were more extensive in their care for him. It turned out he had a much bigger problem then a few stitches to his head. They were able to begin treatment for a disease he didn't know he had which saved his life! God took a bad situation and worked it out for good.
In all suffering we have to trust God. We can't understand the mind of God but that doesn't mean His ways are not better than our ways. Ecclesiastes.11:5 As you do not know the path of the wind, or how the body is formed in a mother's womb, so you cannot understand the work of God, the Maker of all things.
Gems we need to learn how to live in our sufferings and not look at God like he's a mortal man because He's not. He is the Maker of all things, EVERYTHING! We need to have faith so when our world get's rocked it doesn't pull the rug out from under us. We need to be reminded, I needed to be reminded that God is Holy and Righteous and I have no right to question how HE decides to run my life or anyone else's. That my suffering is not a license to underestimate the God I serve. That I can't possibly help someone else whose suffering if I don't trust God with my own. We need to learn how to live with faith in our suffering to trust our creator and not question Him. I leave you with one of my favorite scriptures:
Isaiah 40 12Who has measured the waters in the hollow of his hand, or with the breadth of his hand marked off the heavens? Who has held the dust of the earth in a basket, or weighed the mountains on the scales and the hills in a balance? 1Who can fathom the Spirit of the Lord, or instruct the Lord as his counselor? 14Whom did the Lord consult to enlighten him, and who taught him the right way? Who was it that taught him knowledge, or showed him the path of understanding? 18With whom, then, will you compare God? To what image will you liken him? 21Do you not know? Have you not heard? Has it not been told you from the beginning? Have you not understood since the earth was founded? 22He sits enthroned above the circle of the earth, and its people are like grasshoppers. He stretches out the heavens like a canopy, and spreads them out like a tent to live in. 25“To whom will you compare me? Or who is my equal?” says the Holy One. 26Lift up your eyes and look to the heavens: Who created all these? He who brings out the starry host one by one and calls forth each of them by name. Because of his great power and mighty strength, not one of them is missing. 28Do you not know? Have you not heard? The Lord is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth. He will not grow tired or weary, and his understanding no one can fathom. 29He gives strength to the weary and increases the power of the weak. 30Even youths grow tired and weary, and young men stumble and fall; 31but those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint. Amen

Mother's Day

We are getting ready to celebrate Mother’s Day. I thought we could talk about a mom named Jochebed. Who is she you ask? Well let me tell you. Jochebed was the mother of Moses. A woman who put her baby in a basket and sent him down a crocodile filled Nile River.
Exodus 2:3 But when she could hide him no longer, she got a papyrus basket for him and coated it with tar and pitch. Then she placed the child in it and put it among the reeds along the bank of the Nile.
Now if you didn’t know the whole story you would assume Jochebed was a horrible mother and expect her to show up on the Jerry Springer show but you would have assumed wrong. Sometimes what looks like the worst thing you can do for your baby may in fact be the best. Jochebed was actually trying to save her sons life and it worked. Read Exodus 2 so you can get the whole story. Sometimes the hardest thing to do as a mom is walk away from your baby and trust God to save them. Jochebed’s sacrifice allowed Moses to become a messenger for God and one of the greatest leaders of all time. But we only hear about Moses not so much about his mom.
Sometimes you have to walk away from your baby when he’s a teen or a young adult or even a full grown adult. Sometimes we have to stop trying to rescue them so they can learn how to survive on their own. These are not easy tasks.
When Anthony my first born baby was a teenager and involved in drugs I warned him if he brought drugs or dealers around my house I would kick him out. I had three other children at home and could not risk them being in danger because of his bad choices. Unfortunately he didn’t believe me and the day came I had to put my baby in a basket and put him in the Nile. Throw him out on his own in this big bad ugly world. As I was throwing him out my oldest daughter, his partner in crime, was yelling at me from the top of the stairs that she hated me, my youngest son who was five at the time was crying “please don’t throw my brother out” and my baby girl Jessica was just crying because everyone else was. That was a hard day for this mommy. It didn’t help when days later I was driving and Nathanael was in the back seat and we passed Anthony on the road and just drove by and Nathanael was screaming “mommy pick up my brother!” and I had to keep driving.
We celebrate Anthony’s growth today, thank you Jesus, but the hard mommy moments are usually hidden in the background. It may have looked like I was a horrible mother when I was in fact loving him with all I had.
I read an article one time about a woman who had a bunch of kids and the interviewer asked if she loved one child more than another and she said yes. The surprised interviewer asked which one? The mother answered the one who needs it the most at the time. What a great answer.
In my life it took a long time to forgive my mother for not loving me the way I needed her to or thought she should. I can remember countless times being in a store to buy a card for my mother and had to buy a generic one because the official “mother’s” cards were too mooshy and I didn’t feel like they applied to our relationship.
I will never forget the day the Lord spoke to me about it. He said “Gena you are looking for something from your mother she can’t possibly give you and that’s not fair. You can either accept her the way she is and have some sort of relationship or you can love her from a distance.” As many of you know it had to be from a distance for a while.
Now I’m 51 and my mother is in a nursing home with Alzheimer’s far from me. It’s a time I feel she needs me the most but because of circumstances out of my control I can’t be there for her. I have been thinking back over her life and the things she endured that made her who she was and so wish I knew then what I know now and could tell her how much Jesus loves her. I now look at all the things my mother sacrificed for me and the qualities that I like about myself that I got from her. I spoke to her on the phone yesterday; even though she didn’t know who I was I told her I loved her.
Gems we are all just people doing the best we can with what we got. I don’t know if Moses ever told his mother how grateful he was for her risking her life to save his, I hope he did.
So Rose Marie Theresa Rignola Markstaller I want to publicly wish you a Happy Mother’s Day. Thank you for choosing life and giving me life. Gems I want to wish a Happy Mother’s day to the moms who did and are doing a great job and to the ones that are doing what their capable of. To the moms who adopted and the mom who realized it was best to give her baby away. To the mom who is a foster mom or a big sister being a mom. To the dads who are Mr. Mom and the grandparents who are raising their children’s children. To the moms who had to do the unthinkable and say goodbye to their children before they should have and the children who are sending a prayer to their moms. I pray that we will all decide to honor our moms no matter what they did and decide to be better people with what we do.
Proverbs 31:31 Honor her for all that her hands have done, and let her works bring her praise at the city gate.

Seafarers

OK so let me tell you one of the many reasons I’m crazy about Jesus. I never know where I’m going to end up day to day and yesterday was no different. I started off the morning just relaxing in bed and writing the last jewel you got when I was prompted to text my dear friend April. She quickly responded with an invitation to join her in meeting a new ministry she was checking out for our church. Here Gems is where the Lord began to unfold His plan and my fun began. As I said I just finished writing a jewel and no sooner had I hit the send button I got a response from a woman I met about 3 years ago. I will never forget her because her name is the same as my grandmothers who was very Italian and this woman is very Chinese. I knew it was an opportunity to help someone so while I was waiting for April to pick me up I called her. As I said she is Chinese and so communication was a bit difficult. My daughter and a friend were in my kitchen so I wrote a note asking them to be praying while I was on the phone for the Holy Spirit to break the language barrier so I didn’t have to keep saying things like, sorry, what, excuse me and break the flow of the conversation. Little did I know the Lord was preparing me for later that day. If you know anything about me you know I love meeting new people especially people who are being the hands and feet of Jesus. April picked me up and off we went to the Tampa Port Authority. We met the wonderful team at the Tampa Seafarers Center. Our host Steve, Jeff, Wesley and his beautiful wife Judy and learned about their ministry called Tampa Port Ministries, Inc. If any of you are reading this I’m sorry in advance if I don’t do the ministry justice because it is an amazing ministry that God has put on your hearts. As you can imagine in a Port Authority you would have ships coming in and out of the country. On those ships are men (sometimes women) from all over the world! Their time at port can be a few hours or a few days so what do these seafarers do while they wait? In comes God!!! This team of awesome people drives a van to the ship and picks them up. They take them to Walmart if they need to pick up some personal belongings since there are no Walmart’s at sea, yet… If there is no need for a shopping trip or other errand they bring the Seafarer’s directly to their facility where there are clothes they can have for free! A place to relax and watch TV or a game room complete with pool tables, ping pong, foosball and various other games. There are snacks and drinks and a feeling of home. They have a table set up for personal computers complete with Skype so they can see their families. There is a separate room for privacy with computers in case they don’t own one of their own. There are phones so they can call home and camera’s so they can see their loved ones. You can feel the love the moment you enter this place. Who would have thought of this? Only God! I love how God is concerned about everyone even people we don’t even think about not because we don’t care it’s just that our worlds never interact. Now get this you never have to leave Tampa to have a foreign mission experience, you have foreign missions right here in your back yard. They have tracts in all different languages on the wall and there is at least one person that speaks English on the ship so a translator is also available! They do more than meet their physical needs but Jesus said that’s where to start. James 2:16 If one of you says to him, “Go, I wish you well; keep warm and well fed,” but does nothing about his physical needs, what good is it? Don’t ask a man if he’s hungry then not give him something to eat. The team shares the love of God with these seafarers in Spirit and truth. They have a chapel for quite moments of prayer or if someone were killed at sea they can perform a ceremony for the men right there. If you can’t hear the excitement in this jewel I will tell you I am sooooo excited about this unique ministry. I have always wanted to do a foreign mission trip but I’ll be honest I don’t like to travel and here I was without knowing it moments away from my first one. After our meeting April and I got a tour of the place and before we knew it it was time for Steve to go to a ship and pick up some men! Oh my gosh! They asked if we wanted to come and I was like YESSSSSS! I really wanted to see a ship but we couldn’t go that far. We anxiously waited at the guard booth for our van to come back for us. Up pulled Steve and as I climbed in the back of the van there were 6 smiling Chinese faces looking at me. Chinese!!! God had covered me with communication prayer earlier in the day remember?? Is God good or what! We had great conversation on the way back with my spiritual ear for Chinese My new friends would be going to Brazil the next day and then in a few months back to China. Gems I was officially on a foreign mission trip! My new friends invited me to China and agreed to be my personal GPS as I told them I get lost easy. I pray that day happens, some day. I want to share one of the most solemn moments of the day for me. It was when Steve handed me a black and white composition book which the team lovingly referred to as “The book of Life.” In it were the names of men and women they led to Christ and prayed would go back to their countries and change their worlds. Oh how precious was this book and all it represented. It made me think of the Lambs book of life we will one day see in the hands of our sweet Jesus, I cry as I write these words. It was such a Holy moment I asked the team if we could pray before we spoke any further. Gems this, like all ministries, is funded by support. I have put the information of this ministry below if you feel led please go visit them, send money or at least pray for them. If you, like me, have ever wanted to go on a foreign mission trip but didn’t want to leave the country we no longer have an excuse. For one day you can be a Seafarer too! www.tampaseafarerscenter.org