Promise Land Living

I was reminded recently how the Israelites wandered around the wilderness for forty years before reaching the promised land.  Metaphorically speaking, we too spend too much of our lives wandering in the wilderness, instead of living in the land God promised us.  My experience of wilderness wondering is much like the Israelites - full of complaints, doubts, lack of faith and trust in God, and forgetting all of His past miracles and blessings.  I refer to these times in my life as having a 'Faith wobble'.

Lisa Laizure from Womansbiblestudy.com in her series Life is a Battle, explains how we can live everyday in the Promised Land.  It's all about changing our focus back to God and making everything about Him.  No more whining or having a me, me, me pity party when things don't go our way. It means seeking God before making every decision, regardless of how trivial. It means staying in a 24/7 constant commune with the Holy Spirit and Jesus, in prayer and through our words, thoughts and actions.  When we allow God to use us as His hands, feet and voice, then we will find ourselves being able to stay calmer, remain more at peace and be filled with love for our fellow neighbours.  

The more we remain in this constant fellowship with God, the more inclined we will loose our selfish, judgemental, prideful ways. 

When we begin to accept that God is in full control of our lives, and that every trial or crisis we confront, is either a test or a lesson, then we can fully submit to it and stop struggling to control, fix or remove it from our lives. 

We need to start taking possession of our Promised Land, where we are living with the inheritance that is ours - an abundant life, flowing with milk and honey. All it takes is  a shift in our focus and making our lives all about God. 

Easter Reflections

This past Easter, I was blessed to learn a few things that helped make this special holiday even more symbolic to me, than it already is. 

Our church's Good Friday service was about Jesus's crown of thorns being the curse of sin that He bore upon Himself.  I had always thought they were just a mockery of a Royal crown in calling Jesus the 'King of the Jews' and to obviously cause pain.

In Genesis 3:18, we read how God introduced thorns to the land as the curse and punishment for Adam and Eve's sin. This meant that they and we, would have to work and toil the land in order to grow our food.  Learning that the thorns represent the curse of sin, reminds me that there are no co-incidences with God and that everything has a reason and a purpose.

Another interesting thing I learnt was the origins of the secular Easter characters. Some of you may have seen the social media video that went viral, of the Scottish girl questioning what the Easter bunny and eggs had to do with Jesus. Well, this got me wondering, and as I was on Sunday School duty on Easter Sunday, I wanted to be able to share this with the kids.

I learnt that the bunny rabbit became the mascot for Easter, as a symbol of their fertility, representing new life. You know that saying 'to breed like rabbits'? Well a rabbit can start breeding as young as 6 months old, can have as many as 12 babies, with their gestation period being only 30 days, and can breed again after only 6 weeks! So you do the maths...

As with many of our holiday symbols, these originated in the Northern Hemisphere, when the Easter period marks the beginning of Spring, a time to celebrate new life, when lambs and chickens are born and plant life sprouts new growth.  The egg also became the symbol representing new life. 

The early Christians in celebrating the death and resurrection of Jesus at Easter, introduced the hot 'cross' bun, with the spices representing those used in His burial. Somewhere along the line, these two holiday celebrations became meshed and the egg became hollowed to represent the empty tomb.  Obviously, it was the chocolate companies who commercialized the Easter symbols with all things chocolatey!

In keeping with the symbolism of this special holiday, myself and many other Christians and Catholics like to enjoy pickled fish on Good Friday, not only because it is meat-free but to remember Jesus's flesh, and also to remember the sour vinegar that He was made to drink on the cross. 

Eating Lamb on Easter Sunday is also a well known tradition, remembering how Jesus, the Lamb of God, became the perfect and ultimate sacrificial lamb for the atonement of our sins.

As you reflect on Easter, may these iconic symbols bring your future celebrations of this holiday new meaning...