Dr. God

7 September, 2011 by 1 Comment
 


     We have always heard God referred to as “father,” but how often do we really think of him as our father? Our daddy? It’s hard because he is not tangible. We cannot touch or hug him. But when he created us, he gave us the ability to have faith. We just have to tap into it. With faith, we can use our imagination to imagine him sitting on the sofa with us talking; sitting at the kitchen table while we do read our Bible; wrapping his arms around us when we are hurting. All we have to do is take the step to go there.
     Now let’s take it a step further. God is our father, and he wants us to talk to him and get to know him just as we would our earthly father. But he is also the great physician. Our great physician. So why do we rely so heavily on doctors and medicine to help us? I’ve quoted this before, but it definitely bears repeating:
     “If God’s aim is to grant perfect health to all his children, he has failed, because no one enjoys perfect health, and everyone dies. But if God’s aim is to expand the boundaries of his kingdom, then he has succeeded. For every time he heals, a thousand sermons are preached.”~Max Lucado
     When I had my first seizure, it was a total shock. It came completely out of nowhere. Here was my thought process: “What in the world happened to my brain and why? How am I possibly going to keep from driving for 6 months with three kids? Well, maybe somehow this is God’s way of protecting me from an accident or something.” Then, after a few months I thought, “You know, David and I have gotten to spend much more time together since I haven’t been able to drive. It’s really been good for us.” I was looking for what God was teaching me. But then, after I had the second seizure when I broke my nose and ended up with sinus surgery, my focus shifted. Rather than rely on God and look for what he was teaching me, I began to try to figure out how I could fix myself. The ‘sciency’ pharmacist in me began to search for a cure. That’s when the snowball turned into an avalanche, and for seven years I was lost…searching…in all the wrong places. 
     As a child, we need our daddy to “make me feel better.” As adults, whether our dads are still with us or not, we must rely on our heavenly father to make us feel better. Well, God is not only our father, but also the great physician. We can rely on him for comfort in times of need, but we can also rely on him for healing. He WILL heal us if we accept, love, and get to know him personally. But here’s the catch: God has so much good stuff in store for us, but it may not be here on this earth. He has perfect health for us, but it may not be here on this earth. We will have to endure tough stuff while we live in this world. He tells us in John 16:33: In this world you will have trouble, but take heart, I have overcome the world. He will heal us, but it may be through death and entrance into heaven. 
      We think of our lifetime as lasting forever, because our human brains cannot comprehend eternity. But in reality, the span of time we spend here on earth is like a drop in the ocean compared to eternity. The sooner we can focus on the bigger picture, accept what we have here do what God wants us to with it, the sooner we can find peace, contentment, and happiness in our life here because we know it’s in preparation for bigger things to come. I’m not saying to just accept bad things as your fate in life…we just can’t have a victim mentality. I’m just saying if we take what God has given us, and look for ways to use our life for him, we will find peace and will be rewarded abundantly. 
      So let’s rely on God, our heavenly father, our great physician, to lead and guide us through whatever we are going through. Use his words to find comfort and healing. Imagine his loving arms around you and his peace flowing over you. I have Marlee imagine Jesus wrapping his arms around her every night when she is in bed saying her prayers. Please don’t roll your eyes…I know, it might seem silly to some. But if you can just do what he says when he tells us to “Be still and know that I am God,” the intangible will actually become tangible…real. If you are still enough and quiet enough, you can feel him. 
     “Be still…”
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Filed Under: Beating Depression, Brain Functions, Chronic Illness, God's Pharmacy, Living in Faith, Overcoming Addiction, Your Relationship with God Tagged With: , ,

What is the purpose of life?

29 August, 2011 by 5 Comments

I received the following email today from my stepdad containing the answer to universal question we all ask: “What is our purpose?” On August 10th, I posted “In Sickness and in Health” with this same prescription, and this interview with Rick Warren is right along those same lines. Enjoy!
You will enjoy the new insights that Rick Warren has, with his wife now having cancer and him having ‘wealth’ from the book sales.
This is an absolutely incredible short interview with Rick Warren, author of “The Purpose Driven Life” and pastor of Saddleback Church in California.
In the interview by Paul Bradshaw with Rick Warren, Rick said:
“People ask me, ‘What is the purpose of life?’
And I respond: In a nutshell, life is a preparation for eternity. We were not made to last forever, and God wants us to be with Him and in Heaven. One day my heart is going to stop, and that will be the end of my body—but not the end of me. I may live 60 to 100 years on earth, but I am going to spend trillions of years in eternity. This is the warm-up act—the dress rehearsal. God wants us to practice on earth what we will do forever in eternity.
We were made by God and for God, and until you figure that out, life isn’t going to make sense.
Life is a series of problems: Either you are in one now, you’re just coming out of one, or you’re getting ready to go into another one.
The reason for this is that God is more interested in your character than your comfort; God is more interested in making your life holy than He is in making your life happy.
We can be reasonably happy here on earth, but that’s not the goal of life. The goal is to grow in character, in Christ likeness.
This past year has been the greatest year of my life but also the toughest, with my wife, Kay, getting cancer.
I used to think that life was hills and valleys—you go through a dark time, then you go to the mountaintop, back and forth. I don’t believe that anymore. Rather than life being hills and valleys, I believe that it’s kind of like two rails on a railroad track, and at all times you have something good and something bad in your life.
No matter how good things are in your life, there is always something bad that needs to be worked on. And no matter how bad things are in your life, there is always something good you can thank God for.
You can focus on your purposes, or you can focus on your problems:
If you focus on your problems, you’re going into self-centeredness, which is ‘my problem, my issues, my pain.’ But one of the easiest ways to get rid of pain is to get your focus off yourself and onto God and others.  
We discovered quickly that in spite of the prayers of hundreds of thousands of people, God was not going to heal Kay or make it easy for her—It has been very difficult for her, and yet God has strengthened her character, given her a ministry of helping other people, given her a testimony, drawn her closer to Him and to people.
You have to learn to deal with both the good and the bad of life. Actually, sometimes learning to deal with the good is harder. For instance, this past year, all of a sudden, when the book sold 15 million copies, it made me instantly very wealthy.
It also brought a lot of notoriety that I had never had to deal with before. I don’t think God give you money or notoriety for your own ego or for you to live a life of ease.
So I began to ask God what He wanted me to do with this money, notoriety and influence. He gave me two different passages that helped me decide what to do, II Corinthians 9 and Psalm 72.
First, in spite of all the money coming in, we would not change our lifestyle one bit. We made no major purchases.
Second, about midway through last year, I stopped taking a salary from the church.
Third, we set up foundations to fund an initiative we call The Peace Plan to plant churches, equip leaders, assist the poor, care for the sick, and educate the next generation.
Fourth, I added up all that the church had paid me in the 24 years since I started the church, and I gave it all back. It was liberating to be able to serve God for free.
We need to ask ourselves: Am I going to live for possessions? Popularity? Am I going to be driven by pressures? Guilt? Bitterness? Materialism? Or am I going to be driven by God’s purposes (for my life)?
When I get up in the morning, I sit on the side of my bed and say, “God, if I don’t get anything else done today, I want to know You more and love You better.”
God didn’t put me on earth just to fulfill a to-do list. He’s more interested in what I am than what I do.
That’s why we’re called human beings, not human doings.
Happy moments, PRAISE GOD.
Difficult moments, SEEK GOD.
Quite moments, WORSHIP GOD.
Painful moments, TRUST GOD.
Every moment, THANK GOD.”
Enough said.

From my heart,

Celeste
Filed Under: Living with Purpose Tagged With: , ,

So where is Jesus?

27 August, 2011 by 1 Comment


We battle bullying as kids and teens, but as adults, I hope that we are past that stage, but how often do we judge someone without really knowing them, or avoid talking to them because of the way they look? 

Jesus says, whatever you do for the least of these, you do also to me. Yes, we need to have compassion for the poor, feed the hungry, help in times of crisis, etc., but I don’t think that’s all Jesus meant when he said that. Look again at the part, “you have also done unto me.” How often could we actually be encountering Jesus in “the least of these”?

How would you react in the following situations?

Your assigned seat on your flight is next to a mentally retarded man. You know he will talk to you the whole time if you sit beside him, and you really wanted to relax and read your book.

You are rushing through the grocery store to get home, an see a woman on your isle leaning in really close to the spice jars struggling to find what she needs because she has very limited vision, obviously from a terrible accident.

The mom of a girl in class with your daughter always tries to duck away unnoticed because she is scarred from a burn on one whole side of her face, and you know she really wants to be involved with class activities.

You are sitting in your doctors office waiting for them to call you back and a hearing impaired man, who speaks very loudly, strikes up a conversation with you.

What if one of the people you want to avoid could be Jesus Christ himself? Should we assume that it’s not because he doesn’t look like the Jesus we know? Or because Jesus ascended back into Heaven after being risen from the dead so we won’t see him again til we get there? 

I went to a financial seminar yesterday and met a sweet new friend. The really weird part…well, let me tell you the story. 

I have to start with the fact that I have vitiligo. It’s an autoimmune disease that destroys the cells in your skin that hold pigment. You might recognize it better as the “Michael Jackson disease.” There’s not too much research on it because it’s a cosmetic problem more than anything else, and the other autoimmune diseases like lupus & rheumatoid arthritis are much more important. I developed it during my second pregnancy, and it gets a little worse each year, but because I have fair skin anyway, it’s not that noticeable. 

Last year, David and I ate with some friends at a downtown steakhouse, and I noticed a black waitress with vitiligo on her face, and it was very noticeable. I had the thoughts, “I hope mine is never that bad.” and “I’m glad I have fair skin and am not dark skinned.” And that was the extent of my thoughts. This was not a situation where I avoided her, I just noticed her.

At the seminar yesterday, I saw a black woman with pretty bad vitiligo. Only this time, I found myself wanting to talk to her. I am trying a new herbal treatment for my vitiligo, and if it works, I wanted to be able to tell her about it. But I wondered, “ Is she going to think I’m rude for bringing it up? Will she tell me to mind my own business? Will I just make her more self-conscious?” Nevertheless, I felt a gentle nudging to talk to her. And wouldn’t you know she had the sweetest, most endearing personality? And when we talked, she revealed to me that she saw someone years ago with vitiligo all around their eyes, and she hoped she’d never have it that bad, but now she does. That’s when I told her about the waitress I saw at the restaurant.

“That’s where I work!” she exclaimed.

She was the waitress that I’d seen that day! 

I was so glad that I was not to “whatever” to talk to her. Afraid? Intimidated? Uncomfortable? I gave her my contact info, and I hope to talk to her more. God has people cross our path for a reason. You never know who that person could be, or why they cross your path, but when you feel that little “nudge,” there’s a reason. I have no idea where this contact will go, but I knew God was nudging me to make it. And I’m so glad that I did!

So next time you decide to avoid that person who might make you uncomfortable, think about who it might be, or who you could be to them.  

Do you wonder where Jesus is?

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Filed Under: Real Relationships, Your Relationship with God Tagged With: , , , ,

In Sickness and In Health

11 August, 2011 by 4 Comments


Now I have read this verse before I’m sure, but never has it jumped out at me as it did today when I was reading. Not only is God telling us that his word is all we need for our soul and spirit, but our joints? marrow? thoughts? heart? I looked up a commentary on this verse, and basically it’s pointing out that if we know the word of God, we have no excuses. God is able to search out all of us…right down to the differences between what we believe in our heart vs. our mind. I couldn’t help but see it even more literally. God’s word is alive and well, and can pierce into every system in our body. So shouldn’t all christians then experience perfect health if they claim the word of God? NO. This brings me to a quote from Max Lucado…”

“If God’s aim is to grant perfect health to all his children, he has
failed, because no one enjoys perfect health, and everyone dies.
But if God’s aim is to expand the boundaries of his kingdom, then
he has succeeded. For every time he heals, a thousand sermons are
preached.”

In sickness, in health, in happy times, in depression, in faith, in anger, in life, in death…God  is using us. God loves us. God is preparing us for our next purpose. God has eternity waiting for us. 


When struggling with a health issue, it is so easy in our nation to get on the computer, try to diagnose ourselves, and then put our diagnosis together with a drug we saw advertised on television, and the chase begins: the chase to find the right physician to listen to you, the chase to try and try again to find the right drug to fix you. We want to be fixed. Now. We don’t want to dig into God’s word and see what he might be trying to teach us, or even someone close to us.  


If you are battling any type of health problem, here’s the thing: you may be healed, or you may not. You may have a life long struggle ahead of you. BUT…if you continue to pursue God and seek out what his purpose is for your life, you can find happiness and peace in him. I firmly believe that if your desire to have a close, intimate relationship with God is greater than your desire to have perfect health, you will find peace. Seek your answer in God’s words to you, his child, in the most complete instruction manual ever written, the Bible. God’s answer for you may not be to grant you perfect health, but if you allow his words to penetrate your heart and soul, and let him to use you in whatever condition you’re in, you will begin to see things from more of an “eternal” perspective. My daddy used to love to tell me to “plan like you will die tomorrow, but live like you will live forever.” I thought he was talking about money, but now I see he had a deeper, more eternal, perspective. 


I have a friend whose husband recently died after a battle with cancer. He had so many people praying for him during his battle…praying for a miracle. At his funeral, I will never forget what my friend said as she hugged me standing beside his casket. 


“We got our miracle.”  


What a testament! Even in her fresh state of grief, she knew through his illness, family members came to Christ who might not have otherwise, and that her husband is now in Heaven with Jesus…completely and eternally healed. 


If you know my story, you know that God completely healed me and my purpose on earth is not yet finished. Through my healing, I pray that “a thousand sermons will be preached” (or written), but for others, it’s through sickness and death that healing takes place, and a thousand sermons are still preached. 


God is in control of it all. God knows our hearts. Embrace him in sickness and in health, and whatever purpose God has for your life will be fulfilled. 


From my heart, 
Celeste




Filed Under: Beating Depression, Chronic Illness, Fighting Your Fears, Have an Eternal Perspective Tagged With: , ,

Just to make you smile

29 July, 2011 by 2 Comments

Taking a small prescription break today…maybe I’ll start Funny Fridays? Gotta lighten things up every once in awhile! 


Here’s your Funny Friday story for today…


All of my kids love for me and David to tell them funny things that happened while we were growing up. They LOVE to hear the funny–and stupid–things we did. Oh how I wish I remembered them all! 


So my kids will have stories to tell their kids, I keep a journal for each of them full of stories of the funny things they do or say.


Last week I was sitting on the front porch of my mother-in-law’s house with her and Marlee and was reminded…


When Miranda (my oldest) was three, she absolutely loved to play with dinosaurs. She could literally sit for an hour or two in her own little world engaging in riveting conversation with her dinosaurs! Well, fourteen years ago, Miranda and I were sitting on that same front porch watching a storm roll in; thunder and lightning roaring and crackling in the distance. 


“Mommy, what happens if you get struck by lightning?”


“Well, it would definitely hurt you if it doesn’t kill you.”


“Would it be a painful way to die?”


“I’m not sure. I think it would happen so fast you might not realize it.”


After letting these morbid thoughts sink into her oh-so-innocent three year old brain, she continued, “How do you think we’ll die?”


“I don’t know. If I had to choose, I would hope that we would not die, but all go together in the rapture.” 


No pause from Miranda, she just looked up at me with her big blue eyes open wide and said…


“The veloci-rapture?”


From my heart, 
Celeste

Filed Under: Just for Fun, Miranda, Parenting Tips Tagged With: , , , , ,

Freedom

26 July, 2011 by Leave a Comment


What does the word “freedom” mean to you? 

     You’ve just been released from prison? 
     You are finally out of that abusive relationship you’d been in? 
     You are free from the bonds of an addiction? 
     You’ve finally paid off those student loans from school? 
     You finally got out of your three year old daughter’s room that she locked you in with the
      lock you put  on the door to lock her in? (yes, that really happened…but thank
      goodness not to me!)

One of the worse traps people put themselves in from childhood to the grave, is worrying about what other people think. Someone once gave me some very good advice, and at the time I never realized how much I would cherish it. “What other people think of you is their problem, not yours.” 

There are hundreds of ways we feel trapped, and I want to share with you the way to freedom from everything. Now just 11 months ago, I was trapped. Once God freed me from a seven year struggle with my health, he has shown me how to have freedom in everything. Now stick with me here, I’m not saying it is EASY, but once you get a taste of how sweet freedom in Christ is, you’ll never want to turn back. 
    
Freedom in forgiveness–In Matthew 18:21-22, God tells us to forgive those who have wronged us. How many times? Seventy times seven. When you can let go of a grudge…truly forgive the person who has wronged you and let God be their judge, you would be amazed at the weight lifted from your shoulders.
Then Peter came up and said to him, “Lord, how often will my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? As many as seven times?” Jesus said to him, “I do not say to you seven times, but seventy times seven.”
He also tells us in Mark 11:25, in order for God to forgive us or our sins, we must forgive those who have sinned against us. Now if that isn’t enough reason to forgive, I don’t know what is! 

And whenever you stand praying, forgive, if you have anything against anyone, so that your Father also who is in heaven may forgive you your trespasses. 

Freedom from worry–God tells us not to worry. By worrying about something does it do you any good? Does the situation change by worrying about it? No. Action may change it, but worry does not. 


Therefore I tell you, do not be anxious about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, nor about your body, what you will put on. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing? Look at the birds of the air: they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they? And which of you by being anxious can add a single hour to his span of life? And why are you anxious about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin… (Matthew 6:25-34) ESV


Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made know to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. (Philippians 4:6-7) ESV


Freedom from fear–Everyone is afraid of something. But just like worry, does fear really do us any good? An action that helps us with that fear is good, but the fear itself is in vain. In a previous blog (Life is good, Eternity is better) I shared a story about Jeff Strueker faced with a life and death situation during the gulf war. He could fear death, but instead he chose to look at it like this: If he died in battle, he would get to receive his award in heaven and begin his eternity with Jesus. If he survived, he would gain his reward here, go back home to his wife and continue God’s work. Win-win.  
For God gave us a spirit not of fear but of power and love and self-control. (2 Timothy 1:7) ESV

So have no fear of them, for nothing is covered that will not be revealed, or hidden that will not be known. What I tell you in the dark, say in the light, and what you hear whispered, proclaim on the housetops. And do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Rather fear him who can destroy both soul and body in hell. Are not two sparrows sold for a penny? And not one of them will fall to the ground apart from your Father. But even the hairs of your head are all numbered. Fear not, therefore; you are of more value than many sparrows. So everyone who acknowledges me before men, I also will acknowledge before my Father who is in heaven, but whoever denies me before men, I also will deny before my Father who is in heaven. (Matthew 10:26-33) ESV

Fear of the Lord himself is the only fear that should drive our actions. He is our creator, our judge, and our savior, and is the only one who decides our eternity. 

The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge; fools despise wisdom and instruction. (Proverbs 1:7)ESV

In the prescribed verse of the day, God tells us that we will have troubles in this world. We know that. The part we need to remember so well is “I have overcome the world.” We get so easily caught up in our troubles of this world. And while we must deal with them accordingly,  if we can remember that someday this world will be no more and look at the bigger picture, maybe our grudges, worries, and fears will be a little easier to let go. Freedom in Christ is an amazing way to live.

I recently bought a little leather bracelet that helps me remember not to let my thoughts  imprison me. Embossed in the leather are the simple words, “Change your thoughts and you will change your world.” Freedom. 

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Filed Under: Fighting Your Fears, Freedom in Christ Tagged With: , ,

One God, One Hope, One Choice…It’s that simple.

22 July, 2011 by 2 Comments
One God, One Hope, One Choice…It’s that simple.

Now when you read this statement, you might think, “what does she mean it is that simple?” Believe me, when I was in my state of depression, I would not have thought so either. When I felt like I would rather chop my head off that have my migraine continue, nothing was simple. My well-meaning, glass-always-overflowing teenager would say, “think about it this way, it’s better than if you were in a wheelchair or lost your arm or something.”

As frustrating as it was, she (or any of the rest of my family) could not understand my pain because they had never experienced depression, and I pray they never do!

The word “choice” is a key word here. I am not speaking of the “choice” to be happy and not depressed, or the “choice” to be cancer free, or the “choice” to be financially successful. There are, of course, steps you can take to help yourself in any of these situations, but there are some conditions beyond our immediate control, not situations we got ourselves into by “choice”.

The choice I am referring to here is Christ. He is my choice. Choosing Christ over everything else is really the only choice that matters.

Think about the choices you make in any given day:
“What do I wear today?”
“What do I want to eat for breakfast?”
“Should I start housework first or get my errands done first?”
“What should I cook for supper tonight?”
“How should I spend my time today?”
“Should I go the back way to avoid traffic or stay on the highway?”
“Should I buy this dress or is it too expensive?”

The list is truly endless. Everyone’s choices are different from everyone else’s, and they are different from day to day. When we were building our house, someone told me that throughout that process, you will make 360,000 decisions. My guess is that it was even more than that!

Make a list of choices you made this week. Looking back over these choices, how many of them were choices that will still be important tomorrow? What about next week? Next month? Ten years from now?

There is only ONE choice that you will make that will be important forever. FOREVER!!!
That is the choice to accept Christ as your savior and let Him have control of all of your life. Doesn’t that make all of the other choices seem silly?

There is a forever out there for each and every one of us. The choice you make today, right now, may be the choice that determines your forever.

Jesus said, “I am the way, the truth and the life.”

What else is there?

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Filed Under: Making Changes, Your Relationship with God Tagged With: , , , , , , ,

Life is Good, Eternity is Better

21 July, 2011 by 1 Comment
 Life is Good
Eternity is Better

This passage in John 14 is a favorite of many. I consider it the comfort chapter in the Bible. Jesus knew that  his time on earth was coming to and end, and he wanted to reassure his disciples everything would be okay and he had it under control. Oh how I have clung to these verses for the last seven years. I claimed this verse over and over in my head, but I could not really feel it in my heart. 

While I worked so hard to find some cure for my seizures and depression, my focus remained on what I could do. How could I use my knowledge about science, pharmacy, and medicine to make me better? Me, me, me, I, I, I…God couldn’t get a word in edgewise! It wasn’t until I was completely and totally exhausted that I gave God a chance to say, “Hey, look what I can do for you!” Once I let go of control and let God be God, he began to show me amazing things. The many times I read these verses, I thought I “got it.” Heaven is out there somewhere for us to live an eternal life and we will be happy. 
Somewhere, someday…but not now. 

It is so easy to get wrapped up in the problems of this world…we certainly have plenty of them! But when we begin to compare our life here with the life Jesus has prepared for us in Heaven, do some of those problems seem trivial? We all must deal with problems on a daily basis, because we must live in this world for now. But in John 16:33, God tells us that yes, we will have trouble in this world, but he has overcome the world!
I recently heard Jeff Strueker speak at a writer’s conference. A former army ranger and subject of the national best-seller, “Black Hawk Down,” he challenged me to think about life and death, from a Christian, eternal perspective. He was faced with the harsh reality that he was walking into his death during a mission in Somalia, and had to put his “bullet-proof faith” into action. When he was commanded to walk into the most dangerous situation in his life, he realized that no matter what, he could not lose. If he survived the mission, he would get to return home to live happily with his new wife. If he did not survive, he would get to enter his eternal home, Heaven, and live forever in the presence of our living God! 

If we could begin to approach our struggles and fears in life with an eternal perspective such as this, how much better would we be able to handle our day to day problems? How much better would we be able to handle life and death situations? Jesus has our eternal home ready. He has taken special care to prepare a specific place for each and every one of his children. 


Life can be good and life can be bad. But if you know Jesus as your savior, eternity will be AWESOME.

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