The Great Balaning Act

Life is a balancing act. So many things constantly demand our time. Work. Eat. Sleep. Exercise. Devotions. Family. Friends. Commitments. Hobbies. By the time we fit everything into our schedule, we’re in the red either in sleep or sanity. And God cares about everything we do – which should be done all to His glory – so if life gets out of balance, we aren’t living as we should, right?

Maybe. But we can’t always get everything done. Life happens. Things come up. Inevitably, we will fall short eventually. So how do we prioritize?

Matthew 22 comes to my mind, the story of the lawyer asking Jesus what the greatest commandment in the law is. Jesus’ response is: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself” (Matthew 22:37-39).

If loving God is the greatest commandment, then that should be my single most important priority, not just playing out in my daily life, but throughout each and every day. But what does it look like to love God “with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind?”

I think it means we are consumed by thoughts of Him, that He is our motivation for decision-making and our strength to accomplish what He calls us to, that He’s the first Person we go to for help or direction.

Even so, how do we get to the place where God is that central figure in our lives? Both priorities and relationships require time for development. So spending quality time with God through the reading of His Word, prayer, and reflection becomes of utmost importance.

When God is our first priority, I’ve noticed that everything else falls into place. Only each individual knows how God has laid on his or her heart how to spend his or her time. Then it’s certain we’re glorifying God because we’re operating within His agenda instead of our own by following the leading of the Holy Spirit.

If you find that the scales are tipping in your “great balancing act,” ask yourself if you’ve sought God like Luke 11:9 says, “And I say unto you, Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you.”

Jessie Chamberlain
Family Radio Staff

Brotherly Love

Two little boys were the best of friends. They played and laughed together for three years. It didn’t make any difference to them that one had darker skin than the other. All that mattered was that they enjoyed each other’s friendship. But – they lived in Atlanta in 1935. Soon their friendship was forced to terminate when they went off to separate public schools based on their skin color. They were no longer allowed to be friends.

 One of those little boys was Martin Luther King, Jr. Despite living under the Jim Crow laws, his parents taught him not to hate, but that his Christian duty was to love. His mother tried to instill in her son a sense of “somebodiness” – that we are all persons of importance – a lesson that was contradicted every time he exited the front door of their southern home.

 During his youth, King witnessed terrible by-products of the Jim Crow laws including police brutality, judicial injustice, and Ku Klux Klan beatings. These atrocities led to a growing resentment toward segregation. The very idea of separation attacked his dignity and self-respect. At the age of fourteen, King won an oratorical contest in which he stated, “We cannot be truly Christian people so long as we flout the central teachings of Jesus: brotherly love and the Golden Rule.”

King understood that all people were created in the image of God (Genesis 1:26-27). He urged Americans to view each other the same way. “There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor female: for ye are all one in Christ Jesus” (Galatians 3:28).

As a reverend, King’s motivation was the Gospel, which he interweaved throughout his sermons at Dexter Avenue Baptist Church and public speeches. Inspired by evangelist Billy Graham’s crusades, King, along with several other civil rights activists, founded the Southern Christian Leadership Conference for the purpose of conducting nonviolent protests to achieve civil rights reform. He loved the Sermon on the Mount, and took seriously Jesus’ commands to “love your enemies” (Matthew 5:44) and “turn the other cheek” (Matthew 5:39).

 King’s prolific oratory and leadership skills projected him to the front of the desegregation movement. He had a dream, and through immense effort and the blessing of God, he got to see that dream realized in some measure. In a public address the day before he was assassinated, King stated:

We’ve got some difficult days ahead. But it doesn’t matter to me now. Because I’ve been to the mountaintop. And I don’t mind. Like anybody, I would like to live a long life. Longevity has its place. But I’m not concerned about that now. I just want to do God’s will. And He’s allowed me to go up to the mountain. And I’ve looked over. And I’ve seen the promised land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight, that we, as a people, will get to the promised land. So I’m happy, tonight. I’m not worried about anything. I’m not fearing any man. Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord.

May we also live lives so devoted to the Gospel that we accept God’s challenge in Matthew 5:44 to “…Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you” in the same spirit of brotherly love as Martin Luther King, Jr.

Operation Auca

“He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose.”
Jim Elliot

January 8, 2017, marked the sixty-first anniversary of “Operation Auca,” an expedition by five American missionaries into the jungles of Ecuador. Nate Saint’s yellow Piper plane carried him and his four companions to “Palm Beach” on the Curaray River. Their goal: to reach the murderous, secluded Auca* tribe with the Gospel.

Jim Elliot, Nate Saint, Roger Youderian, Pete Fleming, and Ed McCully knew they were putting their lives at risk by venturing into Waorani territory. Few who did lived to tell the tale. But these men felt the Holy Spirit tugging at their hearts to bring the light of Christ into the darkness of the Amazon rainforest.

After the missionaries landed on Palm Beach, they shouted Wao-tededo phrases into the jungle, taught to them by a woman named Dayuma who had escaped the Waorani tribe as a child. Three days passed before the Waorani made contact. A man and two women emerged from the trees. Nate took the man, nicknamed “George,” for a plane ride in his “wood bee,” as the Waorani called it, over his tribe’s village. Although communication was limited, things seemed to be going well.

After visiting Palm Beach, George returned to the tribe with the younger of the two women unchaperoned, which was against the tribe’s morals. Caught, George told the tribe that the missionaries attacked them, and that while they were escaping, he and his girlfriend got separated from their chaperone. The tribesmen became angry.

The next day, the Waorani attacked the five men, killing them with handmade spears.

Their story doesn’t end there. Jim’s wife, Elisabeth, and Nate’s sister, Rachel, returned to the tribe as missionaries. Without the men’s sacrifice, that door would not have been open to the women. They began to see huge changes within the Waorani. The tribe’s cycle of violence dramatically decreased. The Gospel began to take root in their lives. The Holy Spirit moved in them, causing them to grow in their personal walks with Christ. Years later, Nate’s son, Steve, also returned to the tribe as a missionary.

During the past sixty-one years, word about “Operation Auca” spread throughout the world. Books, articles, Time magazine, movies – all have recounted the story of the five missionary martyrs. Through their story, many have been encouraged to listen to the call of the Holy Spirit, just like the five men did.

As Steve Saint would say, “Let God write your story.” What is the Holy Spirit calling you to do?

*From this point forward, the Auca will be referred to as “Waorani,” since “Auca” is a derogatory term meaning “savage” or “naked one.”

Jessie Chamberlain
Family Radio Staff

Compasion

Her heart sank. She felt as though she was going to be sick. First her husband, and now her only son. They were both gone. She had no one to take care of, or to care for her in return. She trembled, feeling as though she would collapse from the weight of her grief as they placed her son’s body on the bier. All preparations had been made for his burial outside the city. Most of the town had shown up for the funeral procession, but she couldn’t seem to put one foot in front of the other.

As they neared the cemetery, she broke down into sobs, her grief too heavy to bear on her own. A man approached, and had compassion on her.

“Don’t cry,” He comforted her. He walked over to the bier. While touching it, He said, “Young man, get up.” The woman’s son sat up and began talking. The man brought him over to his mother. Fear and disbelief filled her, but passed quickly as she processed the miracle she had just witnessed.

“God Himself has visited us!” she rejoiced.

While it’s easy to imagine how the reality of this Bible story from the Gospel of Luke must have felt to the mother, my favorite verse from the biblical account is, “And when the Lord saw her, He had compassion on her, and said unto her, Weep not” (Luke 7:13). When Jesus saw the woman broken and hurting from her circumstances, He had compassion. Jesus wasn’t distant from her pain and sorrow. He reached out and touched her specific situation, mending it as only He could.

After experiencing my own loss recently, a friend reached out and showed compassion to me. She had faced a far more significant loss within the previous month, one that made mine trivial by comparison. But she didn’t tell me to get over it; instead she used her own experiences to empathize with me. Her words and actions validated my pain and helped my heart to heal. She showed up to be Jesus’ hands and feet for me.

In John 13:15, Jesus says, “For I have given you an example, that ye should do as I have done to you.” We all face different challenges in life, but when we demonstrate compassion to others, we let God work through us. And just like Christ, we should allow others to come just as they are.

How can you show compassion to those in your own life?

I Peter 3:8-9 “Finally, be ye all of one mind, having compassion one of another, love as brethren, be pitiful, be courteous: not rendering evil for evil, or railing for railing: but contrariwise blessing; knowing that ye are thereunto called, that ye should inherit a blessing.”

Jessie Chamberlain
Family Radio Staff

Carpe Diem

New Year’s Resolutions. Exercise. Lose weight. Eat healthier. Spend more time with family. Spend less. Save more. Enjoy life to the fullest. Almost half of Americans make them, but according to history.com, only 8% actually achieve their goals throughout the year. Smart phones even have apps to help you keep track of your resolutions!

Personally, I don’t make New Year’s Resolutions. I think if God puts it on my heart to make a change, I should seize the day – carpe diem! Instead of waiting for a convenient time like the beginning of a new year to implement better habits, I want to obey God right away. Luke 11:28 says, “But He [Jesus] said, Yea rather, blessed are they that hear the Word of God, and keep it.”

We don’t know what tomorrow might hold. Proverbs 27:1 says, “Boast not thyself of to morrow; for thou knowest not what a day may bring forth.” Why put off obeying God when we don’t know if we’ll get the chance later? When we meet Him face to face, He will hold us accountable for our choices. “So then every one of us shall give account of himself to God” (Romans 14:12). When that day comes, I want to hear, “Well done, good and faithful servant” (Matthew 25:23).

God cannot be separated from any aspect of life. He cares about how we treat our physical bodies, our finances, our time, and the people around us. “And when all things shall be subdued unto Him, then shall the Son also Himself be subject unto Him that put all things under Him, that God may be all in all” (I Corinthians 15:28). Either He is glorified by our choices, or not.

But we’re human; there is no escaping the fact that we all fall short (Romans 3:23). Sometimes we even fall short intentionally. In II Chronicles 7:14, God tells us, “If My people, which are called by My name, shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek My face, and turn from their wicked ways; then will I hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin, and will heal their land.”

Praise the Lord that His mercies are new every morning (Lamentations 3:22-23), and that Christ’s “grace is sufficient for thee: for My strength is made perfect in weakness” (II Corinthians 12:9)!

So if God is calling you to make a change in your life, carpe diem – seize the day! “For I the Lord thy God will hold thy right hand, saying unto thee, Fear not; I will help thee” (Isaiah 41:13).

Jessie Chamberlain
Family Radio Staff

Christmas Wish List

Only five more shopping days before zero hour! My mom asked me for a Christmas wish list weeks ago. She’s always one step ahead. So I sat down and made a list for her. And since this is my first Christmas as a married lady, my husband made one for my mom as well.

Even though she asks for one every year, and for birthdays as well, it still feels strange to make a list of things I want. I’m finding as I grow older that I want fewer and fewer material things. Sure, a book here, or a sweater there. Maybe a thing or two for the house now that my husband and I are settling into married life. The annual request for a kitten. But overall, I’m set. I figure if I’ve lived this long without it, I don’t really need it.

I can list things I want from God way more easily.

“Lord, help me with this.”
“Work in their hearts.”
“Forgive me for such and such.”
“Heal so and so.”
“Give me understanding.”
“Draw them to you.”

Pretty soon, my prayer journal can start to look like a string of demands instead of requests. Don’t get me wrong – I don’t think anything is wrong with any of those requests in and of themselves. But if I’m doing all the talking, then I’m not doing much listening. And if I’m doing all the talking, I’m too focused on what I think I need and not on what God is trying to teach me.

Prayer is a beautiful thing. We have a direct line of communication with the God of the universe whenever we so desire. And when we don’t even know what or how to pray, we have the Holy Spirit. “Likewise the Spirit also helpeth our infirmities: for we know not what we should pray for as we ought: but the Spirit itself maketh intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered” (Romans 8:26).

Even more of a blessing than simply being able to talk to God whenever we want is that He promises to hear us when we pray. Jeremiah 29:12 says, “Then shall ye call upon Me, and ye shall go and pray unto Me, and I will hearken unto you.” Prayer strengthens our relationships with Him and we learn to rely on Him for all things.

This Christmas season, let’s focus on God’s wish lists for us as we spend time in prayer with Him, celebrating Emmanuel – God with us!

“Behold, a virgin shall be with Child, and shall bring forth a Son, and they shall call His name Emmanuel, which being interpreted is, God with us.” Matthew 1:23

Jessie Chamberlain
Family Radio Staff

Hope In Christ

The Christmas holidays bring holly jolly, joy to the world…except, not everyone in the world joins in the merriment. For some, Christmas can be a sad reminder of days gone by, lost loved ones, loneliness, and unwelcome memories. If you find yourself in that category, this blog was written for you.

Whoever you are, wherever you are, and whatever you’re doing, you are not alone. God is always with you, ready to put His arms of love around you. “Be strong and of a good courage, fear not, nor be afraid of them: for the Lord thy God, He it is that doth go with thee; He will not fail thee, nor forsake thee” (Deuteronomy 3:6).

Not only is God with you, but He sends His angels to protect you. “For He shall give His angels charge over thee, to keep thee in all thy ways.” (Psalm 91:11). You are surrounded by evidence that the God of the universe loves you and cares for you.

When his good friend Lazarus died, Jesus visited Mary and Martha, Lazarus’s sisters, and wept with them (John 11). Jesus not just knows our pain, but feels it. He enters into our sorrow with us. He doesn’t just wipe the tears from our eyes, but cries with us – the ultimate comfort.

We live in a fallen world. Things go wrong, people make bad decisions, and all around, life is just plain tough. And it takes a heavy toll on us. But in light of all these “sad tidings,” God sent His Son to be the hope of the world. Because Jesus lives, there is hope. The very name Emmanuel means “God with us.” Isaiah 41:10 says, “Fear thou not; for I am with thee: be not dismayed; for I am thy God: I will strengthen thee; yea, I will help thee; yea, I will uphold thee with the right hand of my righteousness.” Whatever situation has stolen your joy this season, Christ can mend it. He is the answer.

As Christmas draws nearer, consider “casting all your care upon Him; for He careth for you” (I Peter 5:7). Our burdens weigh us down, but if we cast them at Jesus’ feet, He will carry them for us, freeing us to live life abundantly as He intended (John 10:10).

“And the angel said unto them, Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord” (Luke 2:10-11).

You are not alone.

Jessie Chamberlain
Family Radio Staff