On the Doorsteps of Heaven
/Janice is a dear friend and sister in the Lord. We studied the Scriptures together back in the day. I love and admire Janice and her love and faithfulness to the Lord and His people.
But right now, Janice is suffering. According to a shocking medical diagnosis, Janice may soon see her God, the Lover of her soul, face to face.
Prayers are ascending to the Throne of Grace — prayers for mercy, for healing, for grace to face each day. We, her friends and loved ones, want her to stay with us.
Please, O God!
But it is our dear sister who continues to encourage US to grab hold of our Sovereign God and HIS plan no matter what.
In fact, just the other day, Janice wrote on Facebook:
I am awake at 2:00 a.m. more alert than in DAYS! Feeling refreshed, clear thinking and praying!
I think we have this dying thing all wrong....we are not leaving ‘life’, we are in fact leaving DEATH behind and entering REAL LIFE!!
If living holds so much pain, stress, limitations and bondage....LIFE WITH HIM is the very opposite! Bring it on!!.
Truth!
Really, when we know our Jesus, we can experience LIFE indeed right here and now on the very doorsteps of heaven.
Why?
Because . . .
our God and Father, the Sovereign King of the universe
our Jesus, our Savior, our Brother, our Lord
our indwelling Holy Spirit, our Comforter, our Teacher —
the TRIUNE GOD lives within us and through us as us right here, right now.
And when we walk through the trials of this life, His glory bursts forth, just as He so obviously is doing in and through our dear sister.
So with Janice’s permission, I would like to share some of her thoughts as she walks through these hard but glory-filled days of suffering in union with her God on the doorsteps of heaven . . .
Reflections on Psalms 23 & 139 —
When you’re a sheep and the Lord is Your Shepherd....
What could you lack? He is the most tenderly attending overseer for His flock than any mortal shepherd ever could be!
He sees everything....
He can fight off any predator....
He can dress or heal any wounds
and He can lift us up on His shoulders to hear Him whisper...”you can do this with or without Me but I really have a plan that will be best realized if you come with ME!”
That’s where I am!
I could spend my remaining days chasing around for a cure that would ultimately fail because HE WILL take me in His timing no matter what I try to do otherwise.
Or, I can rest in the assurance that He created me with days ordained that if I COULD change...and I could know what He knows...I would NOT want to!
He’s got me in good hands the whole way!
Psalm 139: O Lord, You have searched me and known me.
2 You know when I sit down and when I rise up;
You understand my thought from afar.3 You scrutinize my path and my lying down,
And are intimately acquainted with all my ways.4 Even before there is a word on my tongue,
Behold, O Lord, You know it all.5 You have enclosed me behind and before,
And laid Your hand upon me.
6 Such knowledge is too wonderful for me;
It is too high, I cannot attain to it.7 Where can I go from Your Spirit?
Or where can I flee from Your presence?8 If I ascend to heaven, You are there;
If I make my bed in Sheol, behold, You are there.9 If I take the wings of the dawn,
If I dwell in the remotest part of the sea,10 Even there Your hand will lead me,
And Your right hand will lay hold of me.11 If I say, “Surely the darkness will overwhelm me,
And the light around me will be night,”12 Even the darkness is not dark to You,
And the night is as bright as the day.
Darkness and light are alike to You.13 For You formed my inward parts;
You wove me in my mother’s womb.14 I will give thanks to You, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made;
Wonderful are Your works,
And my soul knows it very well.15 My frame was not hidden from You,
When I was made in secret,
And skillfully wrought in the depths of the earth;16 Your eyes have seen my unformed substance;
And in Your book were all written
The days that were ordained for me,
When as yet there was not one of them.17 How precious also are Your thoughts to me, O God!
How vast is the sum of them!
18 If I should count them, they would outnumber the sand.
When I awake, I am still with You.
January 23, 2020
So, why am I here? I had NO symptoms ( the doctors agree that I am very healthy...otherwise) but my brain is overflowing with malignant tumors...( report says too numerous to count) some necrotic, many having bled at some point! The doctors seem very puzzled by me...I surprise myself sometimes, so why not them! Lol
If not for the ‘happen-chance’ discovery during my CT Cardiac Calcium scoring test (which I aced) nothing would likely be known even today!
Even so, the extent of jeopardy was believed to be to the left lung...a small spot that was first discovered 11 years ago as a granuloma! . . .
Eleven years down the road, here I am! It was clearly a living thing! . . .
I am a rare case of lung cancer metassizing to the brain on such a large scale with no side effects, thus far! I knew I was ‘rare’, even peculiar to some, no doubt!
That makes me think of what the Lord calls us to...when He offers us HIS LIFE to be inside of us! It is His holiness which means that we are to stand out as different from the world’s failing hopes and promises to give us a sense of significance, purpose and meaning! Empty promises in relationships abound....we look for happiness and find it very conditional and fleeting when it’s being expected from another!
But, He offers us EVERYTHING we are truly longing for! Hope, love, purpose passion, profound senses of peace when we know who we truly are because of His saving grace freely offered if we would but reach out our hearts to trust Him with it!
If you’ve never taken a step toward Him, please take a chance...get into a Bible reading program or just go to YouTube and listen to Romans and then John...Ephesians...some of my favorites.
Pray SINCERELY....”SHOW ME YOUR TRUTH!”
HE WILL DO THAT!!
January 24, 2020
Father God, I am so thankful you allow your children by faith in YOUR Son to call you ‘Father’...THE VERY relationship-name you taught the apostles to refer to You by! What a nurturing but mighty empowering representative visual for us! You securely hold Your own!
What a privilege when we cannot even scratch the surface of who YOU truly are unless you REVEAL yourself TO US us,THROUGH YOUR WORD...the very truths you have kept in tact since the beginning records.
YOU HAVE TOLD US THAT FAITH COMES BY HEARING AND THAT HEARING IS BY YOUR WORD!
Thank you for preserving Your words for us to come to know You through!
I am praying that today you will put me in the path of someone you have already tapped out of eternity to become Your own child!! Give me the words of Your heart...Your undeniable truth and that You will resonate that truth into their own faith to trust You with the remainder of their days...
January 25, 2020
Reflections on Romans 8
Such a comfort for anyone facing their *graduation* into God’s heaven...leaving the school of death to enter the reality of Eternal LIVING!
Romans 8:1 “Therefore there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.
2 For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and of death.
3 For what the Law could not do, weak as it was through the flesh, God did: sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and as an offering for sin, He condemned sin in the flesh, 4 so that the requirement of the Law might be fulfilled in us, who do not walk according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.
5 For those who are according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who are according to the Spirit, the things of the Spirit.
6 For the mind set on the flesh is death, but the mind set on the Spirit is life and peace, 7 because the mind set on the flesh is hostile toward God; for it does not subject itself to the law of God, for it is not even able to do so, 8 and those who are in the flesh cannot please God.
9 However, you are not in the flesh but in the Spirit,
if indeed the Spirit of God dwells in you.But if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he does not belong to Him.
10 If Christ is in you, though the body is dead because of sin, yet the spirit is alive because of righteousness.
11 But if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, He who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit who dwells in you.
12 So then, brethren, we are under obligation, not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh— 13 for if you are living according to the flesh, you must die; but if by the Spirit you are putting to death the deeds of the body, you will live.
14 For all who are being led by the Spirit of God, these are sons of God. 15 For you have not received a spirit of slavery leading to fear again, but you have received a spirit of adoption as sons by which we cry out, “Abba! Father!”
16 The Spirit Himself testifies with our spirit that we are children of God, 17 and if children, heirs also, heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, if indeed we suffer with Him so that we may also be glorified with Him.
18 For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that is to be revealed to us.
19 For the anxious longing of the creation waits eagerly for the revealing of the sons of God.
20 For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of Him who subjected it, in hope 21 that the creation itself also will be set free from its slavery to corruption into the freedom of the glory of the children of God.
22 For we know that the whole creation groans and suffers the pains of childbirth together until now. 23 And not only this, but also we ourselves, having the first fruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting eagerly for our adoption as sons, the redemption of our body.
24 For in hope we have been saved, but hope that is seen is not hope; for who hopes for what he already sees? 25 But if we hope for what we do not see, with perseverance we wait eagerly
26 In the same way the Spirit also helps our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we should, but the Spirit Himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words; 27 and He who searches the hearts knows what the mind of the Spirit is, because He intercedes for the saints according to the will of God.
28 And we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose.
29 For those whom He foreknew, He also predestined to become conformed to the image of His Son, so that He would be the firstborn among many brethren; 30 and these whom He predestined, He also called; and these whom He called, He also justified; and these whom He justified, He also glorified.
31 What then shall we say to these things?
If God is for us, who is against us?
32 He who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him over for us all, how will He not also with Him freely give us all things?
33 Who will bring a charge against God’s elect?
God is the one who justifies; 34 who is the one who condemns?
Christ Jesus is He who died, yes, rather who was raised, who is at the right hand of God, who also intercedes for us.
35 Who will separate us from the love of Christ? Will tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? 36 Just as it is written,
“For Your sake we are being put to death all day long;
We were considered as sheep to be slaughtered.”37 But in all these things we overwhelmingly conquer through Him who loved us.
38 For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, 39 nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing, will be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.”
January 29, 2020
[Note: emphases mine]
Thank you, dear Janice, for sharing the heart of Jesus who is your Life. Your outer man is decaying but truly your inner man is being renewed day by day. (2 Corinthians 4:16-18). We are benefiting from your “renewal” as you share and as we observe your faith lived out today, no matter what!
