A Heaping Helping of Forgiveness

Proverbs 25:21-22: “If your enemy is hungry, give him bread to eat; and if he is thirsty, give him water to drink; for so you will heap coals of fire on his head, and the Lord will reward you.

Mother Theresa said, “If we really want to love we must learn how to forgive.”  I hope that challenges you as it challenges me.  God’s top two clearly stated priorities are for us to love Him with all we are and have and to love others as our self (Luke 10:27), so it would seem paramount to focus on what can qualify (or disqualify) us for loving.

When I experience offense, and that’s pretty often as my work takes me into high-conflict arenas, I’m sometimes not feeling so much like Mother Theresa.  More like the Tasmanian devil, I think.  So I find that I have to abide and keep on abiding in Him and ask the Lord to let me see that offender as He does.  But the subject verse (Prov. 25:21-22) is dripping with grace for me and for you in those times of hanging onto the vine.

God has a lot to say about forgiveness in the Bible. That’s not surprising since as C.S. Lewis says, “To be a Christian means to forgive the inexcusable, because God has forgiven the inexcusable in you.”  But here, in particular, I believe God is speaking to His children in the time when they’re struggling most to be ambassadors of His grace.  Rather than reminding you of who your offender is to Him, which requires abiding, or how much He’s forgiven in you or me (which he does often elsewhere, e.g., Matt. 18), in this passage, He gives us a construct for thinking about forgiving that even a Tasmanian Devil can grasp onto.  It’s as if He’d say to us, do what you should, and I’ll take care of the rest.  He reminds us here that He takes care of what your offender and mine deserves and what we deserve, too.

The grace here reminds me of what He says about divorce:  it was given through Moses not because God likes divorce.  He hates it.  Divorce was permitted because of people’s hard hearts (Matt 19:7-8).  In other words, God made a provision even for something He hates knowing His children would sometimes not love others as He intended and desires. Similarly, although He desires that we love our enemies and those who offend us as He has loved us – unconditionally, He makes a way for us to think about loving our enemies that we can stomach while we’re in Tasmanian Devil mode.  He lets me say: I’m going to love that person so much that the term ‘hot head’ will have new meaning to my offender!

God’s desire is that I neither give nor take offense, that none shall perish, that all reconcile to Him.  That’s His plan from Genesis to Revelation, but He knows His dust and bone-made people fail to stay focused or committed to His priorities.  We fail to love well in our hot head moments. If you’re struggling to forgive an offense (large or small), I pray this passage will give you a stepping stone of grace to start down or stay on the path to His priorities.

-Andrea Kim

Empowered by The Spirit

“So he answered me, “This is the word of the Lord to Zerubbabel: ‘Not by strength or by might, but by My Spirit,’ says the Lord of Hosts.”  Zechariah 4:6.

The Lord can give us holy ambition.  A desire to achieve great things for His Glory and Kingdom.  And we should certainly believe Him for great Kingdom miracles.  But maybe lately you’ve looked around at your day-to-day routine, at the steps you’re taking in faith for Him (both forward and backward) and are struggling to see how something great, something BIG, something awe inspiring is going to come of it all. 

Perhaps we’re most susceptible to getting down or growing weary of doing good when we’re looking inside ourselves and seeing the chasm between our holiness and the holiness of Jesus.  The more I walk closely with Jesus, the more I appreciate just how far I fall short and consequently how much Jesus had to pay for with the richness of His gift of salvation.  So with the goggles of grace I see just how big my sin has been and just how huge his love and sacrifice measures.

So then what do I do with this holy ambition when I look around and think: all of this doesn’t add up to His glory?  How is my day of filling the car with gas, picking up a taquito (or maybe 2 or 3), running errands, running to work, or waiting in a long line of cars going to square with this God-sized desire in me? Whether He’s placed a specific desire in your heart to be His instrument for a nation or a people or a need that He wants to meet or your passion for Him is just starting to burn and you know you want to be used mightily but aren’t sure what that looks like, the Lord has a Word of encouragement for you. 

A small group of people just returned from Babylonian captivity (God’s discipline for a disobedient people), hounded by naysayers and would-be attackers, just having left a long season of correction, surrounded on all sides by reminders of their disobedience in the ruin and rubble around them were called to a God-sized task for His glory: rebuilding and protecting the Temple.  Talk about discouraged. Any of that sound like where you are?  Naysayers on every side? A lot of broken down, not a lot of built up? More failures than triumphs? 

Zechariah, known as the prophet of hope, delivered God’s Word to the leaders who were undoubtedly looking around thinking that their holy ambition didn’t square with that scene.  From their own wilted spirit, they were tempted to give up.  How could they build the temple from ruins, let alone protect it with their small contingent?  In Zechariah chapter 4, an incredibly rich, encouraging passage, the Lord gave the prophet a Word for one of their leaders, Zerubbabel. 

First, the Lord confirmed His vision of the holy ambition: He described the image of a beautiful lampstand representing the temple and the Jewish believers who would stand under and hold up the light of the Lord’s glory for the world to see.  Sometimes we need visual aids.  Then, the Lord helped Zerubbabel understand that the resources for the glory-shining, God-honoring work of holy ambition - the Temple - would be supplied “not by strength or by might, but by My Spirit.”  Your strength will not be the deciding factor.  Your supplier will be the Spirit of the King of the Universe, the Creator, all knowing, all powerful God.  And what’s more, the Lord assured him that no obstacle is bigger than He is.  Zech 4:7: “‘What are you, great mountain? Before Zerubbabel you will become a plain. And he will bring out the capstone accompanied by shouts of: Grace, grace to it!’”  In other words, when Zerubabbel’s empowered by God, mountains better watch out.  Yes, God can make mountains into plains.  And, by the way, God’s ambitious plan will be finished: Zerubbabel will put the final stone, the capstone on that Temple.

Finally, and don’t miss this, the Lord encouraged Zerubbabel in the day-to-day: “For who scorns the day of small things? These seven eyes of the Lord, which scan throughout the whole earth, will rejoice when they see the plumb line [that line of stones topped by the chosen capstone] in Zerubbabel’s hand.” (v.10).  It was as if God was saying to Zerubbabel:  you may think each day that what you’re doing is small and insignificant, but what you do is significant in the Kingdom because I see it all and I, Myself, the King of Glory, rejoice when I see my completed work in you and by your hand. 

Nothing in your life goes unnoticed.  When you’re running errands, running to work, doing the small things, the Master is watching and rejoicing in the work He’s done and continues to do (Phil 1:6) on His Temple, the Temple of the Holy Spirit:  You.

-Andrea Kim

Hey, Y'all!  Welcome to the Radiant Blog!  We are so excited you found us!  As an extension of the Radiant Life Bible study class at Houston's First Baptist Church, we hope that the words you read here are challenging and comforting, encouraging you in your pursuit of Christ and His pursuit of you.

Each week, we will be posting contributions from a variety of real women who have stress, histories, struggles, and victories.  We will even get a some sneak peeks of upcoming Sunday lessons from Andrea Kim.  

       

If you're like me and not great at checking back on your favorite blogs, no worries, a link for each new post will be available on the Radiant Facebook page or you can have it sent directly to your email address.

This blog is here for you and me and "all the single ladies, all the single ladies" so please comment, share, retweet, invite friends and interact!  We have so much that we can learn from each other and as iron sharpens iron, so on person sharpens another (Prov. 27:17).  

That song is still stuck in your head isn't it.

So let's talk...what do you think it means to be "radiant" as a single woman following Christ?
I can't wait to see your comments!!!

The Lord equips the called - He doesn't call the equipped

The first question that usually comes up when people hear that a new women's Summit Life Bible Study (LBS) is being started they ask "how" or "why". To which I reply "Do you believe in Divine Appointments? Because that's how and why."

I (Megan) had a divine appointment with Andrea on September 17 that would start a conversation that would begin a journey. I was introduced to Andrea as "the best teacher that isn't teaching" by Don (Summit Minister) after she mentioned she would be interested in teaching a women's class Don responded with, "meet your director, Megan". At this point Andrea and I went back and forth about ideas for what the class could be and that was that. I thought it wouldn't come up again... a great idea but me - director - I didn't know about that!

I was hesitant to even think about starting a class. I was comfortable in the place I was and the LBS I was in. Why do I need to move, change what I am doing, or my community I am in? And starting a new LBS?!? There are days I feel it is similar to planting a  church - and in many ways it is - you are going out into the unknown to reach a specific group of people for the furtherment of God's Kingdom! But every time I tried to push it to the side or pass it off to someone else I felt the Lord pushing it closer and closer to me. Finally it came to a point when I felt the Lord asking, "Megan, do you trust me? Because if you do I will do great things through you. But if you don't, you can stay where you are and I will do my work. I don't need you to do my work for me, but I want to use you. Don't worry about the baggage you have or the things you need to work out. If I can use Paul who imprisoned and murdered Christians I know I can use you. So are you in or out?"

After many words of encouragement, a few nudges (from both the Lord and people in my life that I trust and value their opinion) and a lot of prayer and digging into the word I surrendered to His plan - knowing that His plan is and will always be better than any plan I can make for  myself!

Over the last few months I have come together with other women I have come to know in my 3 years living in Houston to start laying down the foundation for what is to come. Andrea has challenged me in many ways and is constantly pouring into me - giving guidance of how to always look to Him and He will provide all.

Being the planner that I am - I like to have EVERYTHING planned out well in advance. Something that I have come to know is if you plan everything so far in advance you don't leave any room for the Lord's plan to come to fruition. I believe this is a lesson that Andrea knew I was going to need to learn and challenged me early on the importance of sitting and listening to the Lord. After a lot of sitting, more reading of the bible in a short amount of time than I had done in a while, and many surrendered prayers to the Lord, his plan came to be and His words lead in a way that the foundation of the class was laid by His hands and He chose to use specific women in the process.

Here we are, less than a month away from the first "soft start" of the class and I have no idea what it will look like. I don't know the women the Lord will send. I don't know what my calendar is going to look like. I don't know who He will call to help lead the women that do come. BUT what I do know is that the Lord is in it. The Lord is in the business of doing amazing things through people that fully surrender their lives to Him!

But He said to me, "My grace is sufficient for you, for power is perfected in weakness." Therefore, I will most gladly boast all the more about my weaknesses, so that Christ's power may reside in me. 2 Corinthians 12:9