When I was a child, we lived under the threat of Communism and the Cold War.  There was not one German nation, there were two—East and West Germany, as well as East and West Berlin, a city within East Germany.  The Eastern halves of both were Communist.  It had been like that since before I was born, since 1949, in fact.
            Then Communism fell apart, one nation at a time, and that collapse hit East Germany in 1989.  Reunification suddenly became the topic of the day.  Some nations were against it.  After all, a unified Germany had killed an estimated six million Jews, "and might do it again."  They were also primed to become the dominant power in Europe with a robust economy.  In short, some did not trust them and probably never would.
            But on October 3, 1990, East and West Germany signed the necessary papers to make them once again one nation.  The legal matters are too complicated to discuss here, but it happened and it has remained so since then.  There is now one Germany called the Federal Republic of Germany.
            God believes that unity is a good thing.  He expects it of his people, and when something happens to ruin the unity, he expects us to do everything short of sin to repair it.  For example…
              I entreat Euodia and I entreat Syntyche to agree in the Lord. Yes, I ask you also, true companion, help these women, who have labored side by side with me in the gospel together with Clement and the rest of my fellow workers, whose names are in the book of life.  (Phil 4:2-3).
            One of the saddest things about having been part of many different congregations in my lifetime is seeing people just like those two famous women above.  These were good women who had worked hard for the Lord, but for some reason they just could not get along.  We have seen it in every church and it is never takes long to figure out who the two parties are.  Once we were only at a place for a week-long gospel meeting and we still knew who they were well before the week was up.  That time it was two men, by the way.
            A lot of people may say that it doesn't really matter as long as they don't gather up parties on either side or cause a ruckus because, after all, the Bible doesn't say we have to like each other.  Yet the older I get and the more I study, the more I believe it does matter for one very simple reason.  Let me show you quickly this morning.
            Grab your Bible and look up Ephesians 2:11-22.  Christ came here with a mission.  The first one was making peace between God and man (Rom 5:1-3).  But he also came to make peace among men.  Look at verse 12 in this passage.  What was happening before Christ?  As Gentiles we were separate from Christ, alienated from the Jews, strangers from the covenant of promise, had no hope, and were without God.  Do you see all those words of separation and disunity?
            But now that we are in Christ we have been brought near, are one new man, are in one body of the reconciled, have access to the father, have become one nation and one family, and are built into one spiritual Temple (vv13-21).  Notice the difference in the words—nearness, access, oneness.  And why did that have to happen?  Because (v 22) God, who is a God of peace (Phil 4:9) cannot dwell in a Temple where there is no peace.
            When we think we can hang on to our little peeves and animosities and have it not affect the church, we are sadly mistaken.  It isn't just the Jew/Gentile or black/white problem, though they are bad enough.  It took Christ coming and dying to fix that and make us one nation.  But we can still ruin the whole thing if an outsider can come in and see the disunity after just a few days, when one family fights another, when two men behave like children who want their way "or else," when two women avoid one another like the plague. 
When you just can't get along, and don't really even seem to care, you may as well hang a sign on the door that says, "God not wanted here."
 
I do not ask for these only, but also for those who will believe in me through their word, ​that they may all be one, just as you, Father, are in me, and I in you, that they also may be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me.  (John 17:20-21).
 
Dene Ward
 

Some have called eggs the perfect food with their own perfect container.  I recently heard a TV cook say they are “hermetically sealed.”  Eggshells themselves are stronger than their reputation says.  After all, birds sit on them for days, and it takes a good deal of effort for a baby bird to peck its way out of one.
            However, it doesn’t take more than one instance of carelessness to discover just how easily they will break.  Mine usually make it home from the grocery store in one piece, in spite of being placed in a cooler with a couple of bags of groceries and an ice block, and then traveling thirty miles, the last half mile over a bumpy lime rock lane.  Only once in nearly 30 years have I opened my cooler to find eggs that have tumbled out and cracked all over the other groceries.
            You must also be careful where you put them on the counter.  Most recipes require ingredients at room temperature, so I take the butter and eggs out a half hour or more before I plan to use them.  I quickly learned to put them in a small bowl so they couldn’t possibly roll off the countertop onto the floor, even if I did think I had them safely corralled by other ingredients.  Somehow they only roll when you turn your back.  As I recall, that recipe required a lot of eggs, and suddenly I was short a couple.
            Because of their relative fragility, we have developed the idiom “walking on eggshells.”  When the situation is tricky, when someone is already on a short fuse, we tread carefully with our words, as if we were walking carefully, trying not to break the eggshells under our feet.  Sometimes that is a good thing.  No one wants to hurt a person who has just experienced a tragedy.  No one wants to carelessly bring up a topic that might hinder the growth of a babe in Christ.  Certainly no one wants to put out a spark of interest in the gospel.          
            But sometimes the need to walk on eggshells is a shame, especially when the wrong people have to walk on them.
            I suppose every congregation has one of those members who gives everyone pause; one who has hot buttons you do your best not to push;  one who seems to take offense at the most innocuous statements or actions.  The shame of it is this:  in nearly every case I can remember, that person is over 50, and most over 60.  “You know old brother so-and-so,” everyone will tell newcomers.  “You have to be careful what you say around him.”  Why is it that younger Christians must negotiate minefields around an older Christian who should have grown in wisdom and forbearance?
            Do you think God has nothing to say about people like this? 
            The vexation of a fool is known at once, but the prudent ignores an insult. Pro 12:16
            Hatred stirs up strife, but love covers all offenses. Pro 10:12
            Good sense makes one slow to anger, and it is his glory to overlook an offense. Pro 19:11
            Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. 1 Cor 13:7
            Above all, keep loving one another earnestly, since love covers a multitude of sins. 1 Pet 4:8.
            Now let’s put that all together.  A person who is quick to take offense, who is easily set off when a certain topic arises, who seems to make a career out of hurt feelings is a fool, imprudent, full of hate instead of love, divisive, and lacking good sense.  That’s what God says about the matter.  He didn’t walk on eggshells.
            On the other hand, the person who overlooks insults, who doesn’t take everything the worst possible way, who makes allowances for others’ foibles, especially verbal ones, and who doesn’t tell everyone how hurt or insulted he is, is wise, prudent, sensible, and full of love.  Shouldn’t that describe any older Christian, especially one who has been at if for thirty or forty years?
            So, let’s take a good look at ourselves.  Do people avoid me?  Am I defensive, and quick to assume bad motives?   Do I find myself insulted or hurt several times a week?  Do I keep thinking that everyone is out to get me in every arena of life?  Maybe I need to realize that I am not the one that everyone always has in mind when they speak or act.  I am not, after all, the center of the universe.  Maybe it’s time I acted the spiritual age I claim to be.
            Maybe I need to sweep up a few eggshells.
 
Put on then, as God's chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience, bearing with one another and, if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other; as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive. And above all these put on love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony. Col 3:12-14.
 
Dene Ward

Every so often after a shirt slips over my head and rests on my shoulders I know instantly that I have put it on backwards.  The neckline chokes me while my upper back feels a draft.  Even a crewneck tee shirt is a bit lower in the front than in the back!
            However, I have a blouse that has inspired even perfect strangers to inform me that I put my shirt on backwards.  The blouse is a deep pink, with an embroidered vine trailing down the right side on the front, studded with shiny silver beads, the flowers themselves a raised pattern of brown felt and the leaves an olive green.  But that same vine also crawls up over my shoulder and falls down the back.  And thus we have the problem.  Most people’s shirts have the design only on one side, while mine is on both.
            I was actually standing at a supermarket deli, waiting for my number to come up when a lady tapped me on the shoulder and whispered conspiratorially in my ear, to save me embarrassment, I suppose, “Honey, you put your shirt on backwards this morning.”  At that I turned around, smiling, and she was suddenly no longer so quiet.  “OH!” she blurted out, and then it was her turn to be embarrassed when she saw that my shirt was on frontwards after all. 
            I had no ill will toward her.  She was only trying to help.  And this morning she is helping us see something very important.  Too often we judge other people’s affairs from our perspective.  Somehow from where we sit, we can figure out all the “right” ways to handle things, the “right” things to say, the “right” things to do.  Too often we are looking at the back of the shirt while judging it to be the front.
            I suppose I had my nose rubbed in that lesson for the first time when I became a young preacher’s wife.  Everyone in the church could tell me exactly what I ought to be doing, what my husband ought to be doing, what my children ought to be doing, what I should and should not spend money on, how many hours my husband should spend in the church office, and whom we should visit.  They could also figure out how much time it took my husband to prepare his sermons and Bible classes. 
             At some point along the years, a brother suggested that Keith should be receiving $800 a week (it was a good while back).  Another man stuttered out, “Wh-wh-why that’s $200 an hour!”  In yet another place a man said that all the visiting requirements of the New Testament should be handled by the preacher “because he has so much time left over”—that’s after those four hours he works on Sundays and Wednesdays, I suppose.
            I really think as a whole the church is much more informed about the work a preacher actually does, the time he must spend studying in order to answer all those “Bible questions” off the top of his head and to preach intelligible lessons, the personal Bible studies he holds as well as the one-on-one counseling sessions with struggling brothers and sisters, and the 24/7 on-call nature of his work.  But until you have actually done the work yourself—or seen your husband or father do it—you don’t really get it.
            And when we see our brothers and sisters struggling, it’s easy to think we know the right things to say to comfort them and the right advice to give.  We are often mistaken.  Until we have experienced something similar we need to be cautious in our words.  Having said that, let me reassure you that truth is still truth whether I have experienced exactly what another has or not, but compassion and empathy can go a long way in helping a hurting soul do the right thing no matter how hard it is to do.  Acting like an unmerciful, self-righteous know-it-all can do far more harm than doing nothing at all.
            Sometimes the shirt is on frontwards after all.
 
Finally, all of you, have unity of mind, sympathy, brotherly love, a tender heart, and a humble mind. (1Pet 3:8)
 
Dene Ward
           

"I wouldn't want to be a member of it."
            The above comment came after a Bible class in which we studied and discussed the very first church, the one established on Pentecost (Acts 2).  Because it began with a membership of 3000 and quickly grew to 5000 men (Acts 4:4), which could easily have translated to 10,000 when counting wives and widows, this comment was muttered by one of the women sitting in the class.  She didn't like "big" churches, and evidently that included the congregation founded on the Day of Pentecost.  Can you imagine saying that you would not have wanted to be a member of the first church, the one where the apostles themselves did the teaching, where miracles were still performed, and the Holy Spirit made himself evident?  Unfortunately, I think I have a lot of brethren who feel the same way whether they say so or not.
            They want a small congregation so they can become "involved" and, though they probably won't say this, "important."  They want a church where they can know everyone personally and have close relationships with everyone.  They want a church where what they say and think matters and where they have as much say-so as the next guy because there are no elders.  Do you think I exaggerate and presume?  I have heard all of these things.
            We forget what the church is.  Jesus did not die for a social club where we get to make the dress codes and decide who can belong based upon the severity of their problems or their social stratum.  (When we fail to meet and greet certain ones in a friendly fashion, that is exactly what we are deciding.)  The church does not exist so we can all get a turn showing off our perceived talents and abilities and garner praise from everyone else, or so we can be sure to have a group who will give our children a wedding shower or a graduation present, or so we can have people to cater the family meal after a loved one dies.  Those are simply the side benefits of being in a body of Christians.  And if those things do not happen for us, we do not have an automatic right to leave the Lord.
            What Jesus died to establish is a dynamic group of believers whose minds are on the spiritual world (the "heavenlies") not the physical; who understand the severity of God's judgment; who believe it is not only their mission to make sure they are saved, but also to take as many as they can with them; who believe their worship must include a life of service to others; and who put the unity and good of the body ahead of their own likes and dislikes.  When we reach that point, statements like the one at the top of this post will simply disappear.
 
But you have come unto mount Zion, and unto the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to innumerable hosts of angels, to the general assembly and church of the firstborn who are enrolled in heaven, and to God the Judge of all, and to the spirits of just men made perfect, and to Jesus the mediator of a new covenant, and to the blood of sprinkling that speaks better than that of Abel. See that ye refuse not him that speaks. For if they escaped not when they refused him that warned them on earth, much more shall not we escape who turn away from him that warns from heaven…Wherefore, receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, let us have grace, whereby we may offer service well-pleasing to God with reverence and awe: for our God is a consuming fire (Heb 12:22-25,28-29).
 
Dene Ward
 

If there was ever a new church that struggled with its spirituality, it was the church at Corinth.  Paul scolded them:  And I, brethren, could not speak to you as to spiritual, but as to carnal, as to babes in Christ. [Read that:  “you are acting like a bunch of big babies,” and you will get the picture.]   I fed you with milk, not with meat, for you were not yet able to bear it, no, not even now are you able, for you are still carnal, 1 Cor 3:1-3.  We have a tendency to think of things sexual when we see that word “carnal,” but Paul tells us in the next phrase or two what it really means:  “walking after the manner of men,” in other words, being physically minded instead of spiritually minded.  He then spent most of that first letter telling them how to become more spiritually minded. 
            Their struggle over spiritual gifts surely has to be the most obvious example.  They actually rated them as to importance, using, of course, carnal measurements--the flashier and showier the better.  So Paul spends most of chapter 12 telling them that no one is more important than anyone else.  Everyone is useful in the body of Christ, and if any one of them was not there, something would be obviously missing.  In chapter 14, when their sense of importance is leading to a confused and disorderly assembly because none will yield his “gift” time to another, he actually gives them specific instructions about how to order things, all of which are pure common sense if you have the correct object in mind, the edification of the church rather than the glorification of the individual.  He even spells it out several times:  if there is no edification, let them keep silence. 
            And of course, there is the pitiful business with suing one another, letting things of this physical life effect how they dealt with spiritual brothers and sisters.
            Those poor Corinthians at whom we so often shake our heads are not the only ones with these problems.  We are beset by the same weaknesses, and the same feelings.  In fact, as I was reading and thinking about these things it suddenly struck me that almost any time I take an idle remark as a personal attack, it falls right into the same category. 
            I believe there is such a thing as being sinfully sensitive.  Think about it.  How many times could Jesus have “gotten his feelings hurt” or “felt insulted?”  You could make a list as long as an entire book in the Bible, but he did not allow his feelings to keep him from completing a mission that was more important than anything else in the world. 
            When I commit myself to being his disciple, don’t I promise to follow his example?  The problem with being too sensitive is that it causes me to stop what I am doing and spend time on nothing but myself, usually moping or pouting, or even beginning a campaign against the other person.  Nothing anyone says to me or about me, or that I might even possibly construe to be about me, is an excuse for setting myself up as more important than my mission as Jesus’ disciple.  As a mature Christian, those things should roll right off me, because my concern is God’s glorification, not my own.  That is what spirituality is all about.  And if we cannot even begin to get a handle on it here, why should we be allowed to live in that exalted state for an Eternity? 
            Something to think about as we interact with one another today.
 
Do nothing from rivalry or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves, Phil 2:3.
The vexation of a fool is known at once, but the prudent ignores an insult, Prov 12:16.
 
Dene Ward

"You're bringing the wrong class of people to church."
            He was a young, full-time preacher, and this particular congregation was quite sure they were the answer to any young preacher's prayer.  He was told that he was so lucky such a wonderful congregation hired him, a group so faithful that the Sunday morning attendance and the Wednesday night attendance were exactly the same, and who could certainly teach him a few things about being a gospel preacher.
            He was still new to the community and had no direct contacts nor any referrals from the members.  So he did it the old-fashioned way—he went out door-knocking, passing out literature and offering personal Bible studies.  He quickly discovered that the poorer, blue collar neighborhoods were the most accepting and willing to talk, even if only on the door step, while the upper middle-class were more likely to slam the door in his face.
            Gradually, several of the ones he had met and studied with came to church.  One Sunday, when four or five of them were standing to the side after services, not one member went to meet them and shake their hands.  Finally a younger couple, saw what was happening and headed straight to the visitors to meet them and greet them.  This should have shamed everyone else, all of whom were older and considered themselves pillars of the church, but it did not.  At the next business meeting, the statement at the top of this essay was made.  Never mind that the young preacher was the only one bringing anyone to church—they were not the preferred class.
            I hope you are completely horrified that such a thing would be said at all, much less by a former elder who had moved there from another location.  But take a minute now and examine your own hearts.  Who do you run to greet?  The well-dressed ones or the leather-clad tattooed ones?  The ones who obviously know how to act in a worship service, or the ones who haven't seen a razor in a week or a barber in a couple of months?  None of the people who were considered "the wrong class" were dirty, unshaven, loud, nor did they "act out" as some might say.  They simply did not wear jackets and ties, skirts and heels in a day when that is what everyone wore.
            Realize this—unless you were raised going to church, you might never have listened to someone knocking on your door.  People with solid marriages and strong nuclear families who do not have major problems, don't see a need for God.  The gospel has always spoken loudest to those who need it the most.  For behold your calling, brethren, that not many wise after the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble, are called (1Cor 1:26). 
         This congregation wanted to pick and choose the ones they thought worthy of them.  Jesus had a parable for them.  He also told this parable to some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and treated others with contempt: Two men went up into the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. The Pharisee, standing by himself, prayed thus: God, I thank you that I am not like other men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. ​I fast twice a week; I give tithes of all that I get.’ But the tax collector, standing far off, would not even lift up his eyes to heaven, but beat his breast, saying, ‘God, be merciful to me, a sinner! I tell you, this man went down to his house justified, rather than the other. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but the one who humbles himself will be exalted (Luke 18:9-14).
          People like me who have always been in a church building on Sunday morning, who never had difficulties being tempted by liquor, drugs, and promiscuity, need to be grateful for the legacy our parents left us and then be even more determined to help those who were not so fortunate.  When someone comes out of a pagan world, he has a lot more baggage to unpack and leave behind.  Let's welcome them gladly and help them do it.
 
Listen, my beloved brothers, has not God chosen those who are poor in the world to be rich in faith and heirs of the kingdom, which he has promised to those who love him?...Let the lowly brother boast in his exaltation, and the rich in his humiliation, because like a flower of the grass he will pass away. For the sun rises with its scorching heat and withers the grass; its flower falls, and its beauty perishes. So also will the rich man fade away in the midst of his pursuits (Jas 2:5; 1:9-11).
 
Dene Ward

Samuel Colt, the founder of the Colt Patent Fire-Arm Manufacturing Company was born in Hartford, Connecticut on July 19, 1814.  Perhaps his most famous gun is the Colt Single Action Army Peacemaker.
            Isn’t it ironic that “peacemaker” is the name of a gun?  The Peacemaker was designed in 1873 and the standard military service pistol until 1892.  I sometimes think we must have the same definition for “peacemaker”—a weapon of war. 
            More and more I see people starting fights over things not worth fighting about.  More and more I see people not only excusing their aggressive behavior, but justifying it as righteous.  Maybe it is because I am older now, but “zealous” no longer means “quick to fight” to me, and I think it never did to God.
            “Blessed are the peacemakers,” is not a concept foreign to the old law.  God’s people have always understood that righteousness is not about contention.  David is a prime example.
            He refused to harm Saul, whom he called “the Lord’s anointed,” even though Saul had sworn to kill him, 1 Sam 24:6.
            He bowed before Saul, even though he himself had been anointed king, 24:8.
            He promised not to harm Saul’s heirs, even though they might have tried to claim the throne God wanted him to have, 24:21,22.
            It’s easier when those around you have the same attitude, but David even managed to keep his peacemaking attitude when surrounded by warmongers, Psa 120:6,7.
            Yet this is a man who did fight for God, who lived in a time of a physical kingdom that fought physical wars against physical enemies.  He bravely went into battles and killed God’s adversaries, so much so that he was not allowed to build the Temple with his blood-stained hands, so we cannot call him a wimpy, namby-pamby by any means.  He simply knew when it was time to fight and when it wasn’t.  Like Paul in Acts 16:3 and Gal 2:3-5, he depended on the circumstances to help him decide what justified either action in exactly the same issue, and never let his passion for God push him further than he knew his Father would want.  It wasn’t about having his own way, about not allowing anyone to tell him what he could and couldn’t do.  In all things the ultimate mission, God’s mission, was his goal, not saving face.
            Jesus’ mission was the same—peace.  He brought peace between men (Eph. 2:12-14) and peace between man and God (Rom 5:1-2).  Then he told us that was our mission too—bringing peace to the world. 
            Blessed are the peacemakers for they shall be called the children of God.  Whose children are you?
 
It is an honor for a man to keep aloof from strife, but every fool will be quarreling. Turn away from evil and do good; seek peace and pursue it. Strive for peace with everyone, and for the holiness without which no one will see the Lord. If possible, so far as it depends on you, live peaceably with all. Finally, brothers, rejoice. Aim for restoration, comfort one another, agree with one another, live in peace; and the God of love and peace will be with you. Prov 20:3; Psa 34:14; Heb 12:14; Rom 12:18; 2 Cor 13:11.
 
Dene Ward

God has tried again and again to give us the perfect place.
            It started with Eden.  All of our physical needs were met in a place of perfection.  And the God who loved us came to walk with us every night "in the cool of the day."  But what happened?  We messed it up.  We listened to the one who did not love us and believed his lie.
            Then God took us to a land flowing with milk and honey, the place he had promised Abraham 400 years before.  And what happened?  We messed it up.  Even though God had shown us His power again and again—the plagues, the Passover, the Red Sea—we failed to trust that He would help us win the land.
            So forty years later, God tried again.  The Jordan parted.  The walls of Jericho fell.  And what happened?  We messed it up.  We failed to drive out the sin and the sinners, but took it all into our bosoms and nurtured it.  Once again we discarded His perfect Plan A and drove God to Plan B, judges to deliver us when the oppression got so bad that we actually repented.
            And you are saying, "What?  That was them, not us."  Really?
            One more time God has given us the perfect place.  A kingdom that cannot be shaken.  A King who is King of kings, who sacrificed himself for us, and ever lives to make intercession.   A place of righteousness, joy, and peace in the Holy Spirit.  And what happens?  We mess it up.  We fail to "be of the same mind," to do "nothing of faction or pride," to "each count the other as better than self" (Phil 2:2,3).  We forget to "be kind, tender-hearted, and to forgive" (Eph 4:32).  We certainly never "take wrong" for the good of the kingdom and its mission in this world (1 Cor 6:7).  We ignore God's authority because, "God wouldn't mind if…" and "God wants us to be happy! (Col 3:17)"
            Every time we misbehave in this ideal kingdom God has blessed us with, we are Eve taking a bite of the forbidden fruit, we are the 10 craven spies shaking in our boots, we are the unspiritual men who failed to drive out the pagans and their worship from the Promised Land.
            But this time, we can still be part of that perfect kingdom.  God is gracious and forgiving.  His lovingkindness endures forever.  And even in Sardis, there were …a few names…that did not defile their garments: and they shall walk with me in white; for they are worthy (Rev 3:4).  I can be one of those few, even amid a crowd of the others, and so can you.
            God is giving us one more chance with his perfect kingdom, the one his Son died for and now rules over.  Don't mess up again.
 
​The nations shall see your righteousness, and all the kings your glory, and you shall be called by a new name that the mouth of the LORD will give. You shall be a crown of beauty in the hand of the LORD, and a royal diadem in the hand of your God. ​You shall no more be termed Forsaken, and your land shall no more be termed Desolate, but you shall be called My Delight Is in Her, and your land Married; for the LORD delights in you, and your land shall be married. For as a young man marries a young woman, so shall your sons marry you, and as the bridegroom rejoices over the bride, so shall your God rejoice over you (Isa 62:2-5).
 
Dene Ward

After decades of scrimping, doing without, patching and re-using when most would have tossed the old one and bought a new one, things have gotten a little easier for us.  I guess it finally hit me the day I was sweeping our bedroom, picked up the old plastic trash can next to my dresser to sweep under it, then flipped it over to empty into a trash bag I was carrying room to room.  There on the bottom was a piece of duct tape over a long crack that somehow, despite weekly cleaning, I had forgotten about.  I suppose I had just gotten so used to it that it disappeared from view.  We couldn't afford anything unnecessary for so long, and that handy swath of duct tape made buying a new one "unnecessary."
            But things are different now and that fact suddenly broke through old attitudes and habits.  "What does one of these cost?" I asked myself.  "Five dollars?  Six?  I think we can afford that now." And the next week on our once a week trip to town (we still don't make extra trips at two gallons of gas per trip), I bought myself a new trash can for the bedroom.
            And now Keith has decided that we can afford to have our house cleaned every other week.  I can't deny that my old age ailments make doing it myself a lot more difficult and painful than ever before.  However, it does cost extra money.  [Actually, I did not want this godly woman wasting her energy and time cleaning and then being too tired to prepare these posts and her classes, kw inserted.]
            So he found a young Mennonite woman who is an excellent cleaner and hard worker, and who charges half the going rate to boot.  We give her a substantial Christmas bonus so she won't go out of business any time soon.
            Do you know the hardest part of having someone clean my house?  Actually letting her clean it.  I want to go around the day before she comes cleaning bathrooms, dusting shelves, and scrubbing floors.  It's too embarrassing to let someone else see my dirt.  Why am I like this?  I could blame my mother, a perfect housekeeper who kept our home spotless with everything in its place.  But it probably has a whole lot more to do with pride and plain old embarrassment. 
            That may be the problem people have when it comes to conversion.  Do you know how many times we have heard, "I have some things I need to work on first?"  As if things so monumental, in our minds, that they will keep the Lord from accepting us, are things we can easily handle on our own.  Even after years of NOT being able to handle it on our own.  Do you really think the Lord hasn't already seen your dirt?
            While the Lord certainly expects us to clean up our lives when we commit them to him, he never expected us to do it beforehand and without his help, and he was willing to spend an awful lot to make that help available.  Stifle your pride and embarrassment.  Come "just as you are" and let him help you change that.
 
​Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light (Matt 11:28-30).
 
Dene Ward

When my boys were still at home, family meal time was important.  We all made an effort to be together as many nights a week as possible, even as their schedules became busier in the high school years.  The majority of the time, we managed to do so. 
            I recently read a couple of articles discussing the importance of families eating together.  A family that eats together has better nutrition and the girls have fewer eating disorders.  The children do better at school.  They develop better language skills. They are less likely to take drugs, smoke, or drink.  Eating together, especially the evening meal, helps maintain accountability.  It is a “check-in time” which fosters a sense of togetherness.  (www.sixwise.com)
            “Dinnertime should be treated like a reunion, a respite from the outside world, a moment of strengthening relationships, and a pleasant experience that should always be cherished,” Ron Afable, “Eating Together as a Family," www.adam.org.
            When I read that last quote I was stunned.  Was he talking about family dinnertime or the Lord’s Supper?  God tells us we are to have this meal when we are “gathered together,” not each in his own home.  The reasons are precisely those reasons.  When I walk into the church’s gathering place I should have a feeling of relief, a “Whew! I made it!” moment.  This is my haven; these people are my support group; this is where I gather the strength to face another week of trials and temptations.  Is it any wonder God chose something that was part of a family meal to celebrate our one-ness with Him, with our Savior, and with each other? 
            The denominational world says that having this meal as often as the first Christians did—every Sunday—makes it less special, yet what does the world say about families having meals together on a regular basis?  Surely that applies here as well.  We are better nourished spiritually, we grow in the knowledge of the Word, we sin less because of the accountability regular meetings require, and we develop stronger relationships with one another.  Funny how God knew what He was doing, isn’t it?
            We often say that we should forget the outside world during this special time, but more than that, we should remember our “inside world”--our bond with one another.  Disagreements should melt away.  Aggravations with others should be covered by our love.  Personality problems should take the place they deserve—the bottom of the barrel.  To do otherwise is to make a mockery of the feast, and “drink damnation to ourselves.” 
            Our Father calls us to this special suppertime to reunite, to rest and recover, and to remember who we are and how we got here. This special dinnertime should always be cherished.  Don’t make a habit of missing it.
 
The cup of blessing which we bless, is it not a communion of the blood of Christ; the bread which we break, is it not a communion with the blood of Christ?  Seeing that we who are many are one bread, one body, for we all partake of the one bread, 1 Cor 10:16,17.
 
Dene Ward