Author: Bradley Alexander

(Amy and I in the Jordan River)

She makes me want to be a better man everyday and has taught me so much about being faithful to what God has started within me. My relationship with my wife, my best friend is a constant reminder to how awesomely faithful my Heavenly Father is to us. I wanted to share a quote with you from the book, “Sacred Marriage by Gary Thomas.” This quote is not by Gary Thomas but is a quote that references at the beginning of chapter 3: Learning to Love.

If you treat a man as he is, he will stay as he is. But if you treat him as if he were what he ought to be and could be, he will become the bigger and better man. (Johann Wolfgang con Goethe) 

This is exactly what I mean by the feeling that I get everyday. My wife and my best friend, Amy is always pushing me, encouraging me, empowering me to realize that I am more than I realize. I think it’s easy for us to get stagnant in what we expect of ourselves, or another word to represent this is we get content with who we are and where we are.

What Amy’s empowering of me has taught me is that God doesn’t have a feeling of content with us. He is continually teaches us that He is making us new and the way that he helps us realize this is by the Body of Christ. God has this Holy Discontent for us. He is always desiring for us to continue grow in His grace and to trust in His spirit. So, today commit to have Holy Discontent. It’s what He wants for us, to continually grow in His grace and love and to continually extend that grace and love to the world.

Awesome God,

Help us this day to continually embrace and grow in your grace and love. HOLD US in YOUR GRACE and WASH US  in YOUR SPIRIT.

Amen.

 

Today was just another day where we are blessed to be breathing and also a day where we (Amy and I) were enjoying our day off. As Amy was the Pastor at her that was “on call” she had to make some hospital visits she had to make we went to St. Davids Hospital in Georgetown. After her visits we were going to see a movie so I drove her and hung out in the waiting room. After she was done with her visits she took me to the Hospital chapel (pictured above).

It’s amazing what you find when you are not looking.

The butterfly is a beautiful part of creation for me, it represents what God does to something not so great and turns it into something amazing. We sat in the chapel and prayed together, and it was a great holy moment. Then I realized that I couldn’t recall the last time we did this. As ministers we live a life of service to the church and sometimes we can get so focused on that that we lose sight of where we are in our lives. Which brings something to mind.

How do we expect to love God and the world if we have not first recognized our need for time with Him?

I know for a fact that this is not just specific to our situation, but something we can all relate to. We all fall short. We get busy and the first thing that is put on the back burner when we are busy is our relationship with God. Then after time the relationship communication (prayer) starts to get a little stale and you almost forget how to do this. We wouldn’t do this with someone in our lives because if we did the relationship would suffer and usually there are hurt feelings on either side.

So why do we do this with God?

Honestly because we can.

He will let us.

But the good news is that He is always waiting and welcoming for us to return. God is just awesome like that. So, today I am thankful for the findings that God has helped us find.

Praise be to God.

Amen.

“He does not treat us as our sins deserve or repay us according to our iniquities. For as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is his love for those who fear him; as far as the east is from the west, so far has he removed our transgressions from us. As a father has compassion on his children, so the Lord has compassion on those who fear him; for he knows how we are formed, he remembers that we are dust.”  (Psalm 103) 

Our shadow is always with us and for some of us this is an example of the feeling that sometimes our sins seem to follow us everywhere we go. Every time I think about this I think of this passage from Psalm 103 and how powerfully redemptive it is. Sometimes I think we forget that our Heavenly Father is just that a Father in all things. As a Father he shows compassion as a parent would, but the compassion that He shows is far more than we could ever fathom of giving.

Shadow is a term that is interpreted sometimes as a bad thing, but let us think that what Jesus has taught and the “Shadow” that followed him and as we follow him may we soak up all that was in him, and by the same token think of the shadow that you are leaving. The legacy that we are leaving for those that watch the way we live in the Lord Jesus Christ. Shadows do not always have to be a bad. Just like the Father has shown us let our shadows be filled with compassion.

And take heart and know that “For as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is his love for those who fear him.”

Amen.

One of the newest blessings that has come to my wife and my life is the ability to minister to some college students at Southwestern University. It is a great opportunity for Amy and I to open up our home and give a home cooked meal to some of the college students at Southwestern University, but it is also a chance for us to do some ministry with these students.

For some this would be seem to be not a big deal at all.

And if we are not careful and don’t look closely at what this truly is we would miss it as well.

I am reminded of Matthew 25 when Jesus says that when we show caring for the least of these we show caring to Jesus himself. Now, in this passage you will see that Jesus refers to people that are in prison, sick, or hungry. I would urge us to think that its everyone that we come in contact with that Jesus is referring to.

Because of this simple act of making tacos and playing games we show that we care for their lives and for what is going on in their lives. Because of this we bringing light into the darkness or in this photo’s case we bring day into night.

So, what are some simple ways that we can show Christ’s caring?