This week I found God in a very strange place! In the wee hours of Friday morning... He was sitting behind a curtain in a small cubicle in the emergency room at our local hospital.
I know He was there... because I was there too!
Bobby had rushed me there about 11:00 on Thursday night with crushing chest pain. We were almost certain it was not a heart issue and pretty sure it might be another bad reaction from yet another antibiotics.
But, at four in the morning I was back from a chest CT scan waiting to hear if I had a blood clot in one of my lungs... and I was very frightened! Another reaction to antibiotics didn't seem so bad, I was almost used to them popping up. But a blood clot was very scary...
Bobby was sitting in a chair in the cubicle too... somewhere between worn out from a long day of work and being very much in his head trying to figure out what was wrong with me. He sat silent and had that "certain look" I know so well... a look that told me he was methodically going over and over all my symptoms and meds and recent medical history. I knew he running diagnoses in his mind.
It was at that moment I noticed HIM! Quiet and always the Gentleman. He was there... waiting for me!
So I began to talk to Him. Not out loud... but talk to Him nevertheless!
"I'm so glad you're here.. I just forgot for awhile that you would be!"
"I'm so glad you're here.. I just forgot for awhile that you would be!"
"Father, I am very very frightened! I don't want a blood clot. It really scares me! See, I am shaking. My palms are sweaty and it's even hard for me to concentrate right now!"
"But I know that You hear me and understand just what I mean... I may not be making much sense right now... but You know."
"You have the answer... you control everything. You know that I am here and it is no surprise to you. By Your will You let all of this happen to me. I sure wish I knew why. It would be so much easier if You would just speak to me out loud! Yes, I know that is not Your "style."
"I really need You right now. I need Your mercy and grace and favor. Please be with me and calm me and if it be Your will... and I really really want this to be Your will... please don't let this recent problem be serious."
"I just think I'm about at the end of my "complications" rope... for sure!"
I don't know if those were my exact words... but close enough. I kept asking for calm and mercy and grace and favor.
And I did remind God that I was His... just so He would know that I knew!
Bobby and I got home about 5:45 Friday morning. He showered and went to work. I went to bed. When I got up, sometime in the early afternoon, I began to think about how God has a habit of hanging out in the strangest places! If I were the King of every thing you probably would not find me in an emergency room at 4:00 am. Certainly not my first choice!
Actually,God has a history of hanging out in STRANGE places!
Just look at Jesus!
When He lived on planet earth Jesus was all about "His Father's business". So where ever His Father sent Him, Jesus went.
He was (and is) the King and yet we would have not found Him being born in a palace. The Magi made that mistake. They went to King Herod's palace in Jerusalem looking for Him... but Jesus was not there! It does seem that a palace would have been the most logical place to find a King!
Instead, He was found by lowly shepherds... lying in an animal food trough in a small town called Bethlehem. There He was in all His newborn kingly splendor hanging out with a poor young couple, livestock and shepherds!
As He grew up, Jesus lived in a pioneer-type town... very small. The Eternal King became a carpenter. And schmoozed with humble work-a-day people! Oppressed people under the thumb of the cruel Roman Empire.
During Jesus' ministry He could be found with common fishermen and hated tax collectors and with a half naked lady who had been brought to him because she had been caught in adultery.
He spent time in Samaria. A town the Jews hated with people the Jews hated! And Jesus stayed awhile with them and loved them. He loved them right into eternal life!
He found his constant companions were the sick and disfigured and chronically ill and downtrodden and demon possessed and disenfranchised and hated and even dead on an occasion or two. And He loved all of them.
They followed Jesus because He was the only answer... the only One who could make them well. He welcomed them and cured them and offered Himself to them.
Jesus went to the strangest places to find people who needed Him! Places that good Jews of His day would not go. But Jesus did!
He even took a dead-of night-walk ON the Sea Of Galilee to be with a group of fishermen he loved! Jesus went out of His way to be with the most lowly, discarded and hated of His day! He was all about His Father's business!
In the book of John, chapter 10 Jesus says...
"I am the good shepherd: the good shepherd lays down His life for His sheep." John 10:11
God is in the "sheep" business! He has a flock and He is all about finding and keeping every single sheep He owns and not letting a single one go!
"For He is our God, and we are the people of His pasture. And the sheep under His care. If only you would listen to His voice today". Ps 95:7
We are His sheep! And He will go to the strangest places to be with us, to rescue us and to save us. He even went to the strangest place of all for us... the cross!
Jesus said...
"My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow Me" . John 10:25
Jesus will go to the strangest places to be with His sheep and to call them and to lead them.
If you are wondering, it was not a blood clot. Just another bad reaction... just like Bobby suspected! But that is not the focus of why I am telling you this. It is that my Shepherd showed up. He was with me.
Even if the outcome would have been not so good... He was still there!
He leads me though good and bad. And because He leads... He goes ahead of me and goes through it first!
He IS the Good Shepherd! And one day He will lead me straight to my Father's arms and I will be home.
How about you? Is Jesus your Good Shepherd? If not, there is no place He won't go to find you and be with you and call you back to Himself.
All you need to do is perk up your little sheepie ears to hear Him!
"I really need You right now. I need Your mercy and grace and favor. Please be with me and calm me and if it be Your will... and I really really want this to be Your will... please don't let this recent problem be serious."
"I just think I'm about at the end of my "complications" rope... for sure!"
I don't know if those were my exact words... but close enough. I kept asking for calm and mercy and grace and favor.
And I did remind God that I was His... just so He would know that I knew!
Bobby and I got home about 5:45 Friday morning. He showered and went to work. I went to bed. When I got up, sometime in the early afternoon, I began to think about how God has a habit of hanging out in the strangest places! If I were the King of every thing you probably would not find me in an emergency room at 4:00 am. Certainly not my first choice!
Actually,God has a history of hanging out in STRANGE places!
Just look at Jesus!
When He lived on planet earth Jesus was all about "His Father's business". So where ever His Father sent Him, Jesus went.
He was (and is) the King and yet we would have not found Him being born in a palace. The Magi made that mistake. They went to King Herod's palace in Jerusalem looking for Him... but Jesus was not there! It does seem that a palace would have been the most logical place to find a King!
Instead, He was found by lowly shepherds... lying in an animal food trough in a small town called Bethlehem. There He was in all His newborn kingly splendor hanging out with a poor young couple, livestock and shepherds!
As He grew up, Jesus lived in a pioneer-type town... very small. The Eternal King became a carpenter. And schmoozed with humble work-a-day people! Oppressed people under the thumb of the cruel Roman Empire.
During Jesus' ministry He could be found with common fishermen and hated tax collectors and with a half naked lady who had been brought to him because she had been caught in adultery.
He spent time in Samaria. A town the Jews hated with people the Jews hated! And Jesus stayed awhile with them and loved them. He loved them right into eternal life!
He found his constant companions were the sick and disfigured and chronically ill and downtrodden and demon possessed and disenfranchised and hated and even dead on an occasion or two. And He loved all of them.
They followed Jesus because He was the only answer... the only One who could make them well. He welcomed them and cured them and offered Himself to them.
Jesus went to the strangest places to find people who needed Him! Places that good Jews of His day would not go. But Jesus did!
He even took a dead-of night-walk ON the Sea Of Galilee to be with a group of fishermen he loved! Jesus went out of His way to be with the most lowly, discarded and hated of His day! He was all about His Father's business!
In the book of John, chapter 10 Jesus says...
"I am the good shepherd: the good shepherd lays down His life for His sheep." John 10:11
God is in the "sheep" business! He has a flock and He is all about finding and keeping every single sheep He owns and not letting a single one go!
"For He is our God, and we are the people of His pasture. And the sheep under His care. If only you would listen to His voice today". Ps 95:7
We are His sheep! And He will go to the strangest places to be with us, to rescue us and to save us. He even went to the strangest place of all for us... the cross!
Jesus said...
"My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow Me" . John 10:25
Jesus will go to the strangest places to be with His sheep and to call them and to lead them.
If you are wondering, it was not a blood clot. Just another bad reaction... just like Bobby suspected! But that is not the focus of why I am telling you this. It is that my Shepherd showed up. He was with me.
Even if the outcome would have been not so good... He was still there!
He leads me though good and bad. And because He leads... He goes ahead of me and goes through it first!
He IS the Good Shepherd! And one day He will lead me straight to my Father's arms and I will be home.
How about you? Is Jesus your Good Shepherd? If not, there is no place He won't go to find you and be with you and call you back to Himself.
All you need to do is perk up your little sheepie ears to hear Him!
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