Marie Armenia
mariearmenia@gmail.com
Friday, January 1, 2021
YOU ARE NOT THE BOSS OF ME
Wednesday, December 30, 2020
LIVING IN A TENT
For the record, I have avoided sleeping in a tent for over six decades - and I hope to keep that record intact for as long as I live. I don't do camping. You ask me, "How do you know you won't like camping if you've never gone?"
I just do. OK? Case closed.
Whether you love camping or not, the one thing about living in a tent that we intrinsically understand is that living in a tent is a temporary thing. A tent is unable to weather a storm, protect us from predators, keep us warm when it's cold or keep us cool when it is scorching outside. It takes a great deal more effort to survive if you are living in a tent.
No one EXPECTS a tent to be a substitute for a permanent HOME.
Except us.
This life we are living is being lived in a temporary tent. It's not the existence God created for humans. Living in this earthly tent makes it difficult to weather a storm, to be protected from the predators in this life. God has a permanent and peaceful existence for us that is not a camping trip, but an eternity in the place He has prepared for me.
Remember when life is difficult, you're just living in a tent.
Look at life truthfully. Everything about it is as flimsy as a tent.
Don't cling to the tent when it's time to go home.
"For we know that when this earthly tent we live in is taken down (that is, when we die and leave this earthly body), we will have a house in heaven, an eternal body made for us by God himself and not by human hands. We grow weary in our present bodies, and we long to put on our heavenly bodies like new clothing. For we will put on heavenly bodies; we will not be spirits without bodies.While we live in these earthly bodies, we groan and sigh, but it’s not that we want to die and get rid of these bodies that clothe us. Rather, we want to put on our new bodies so that these dying bodies will be swallowed up by life."
2 Corinthians 5:1-4
Sunday, July 28, 2019
WANTED: NAKED PEOPLE
He covers their nakedness:
“The Lord God made garments of skin for Adam and his wife and clothed them.” (Genesis 3:21).
Thursday, May 23, 2019
BUT IF YOU DO HAVE SOMETHING GOOD TO SAY, SAY IT
So I would like to suggest an alternative.
Saturday, February 23, 2019
I CHOOSE TO NOT IDENTIFY AS A WRETCH
I don't like thinking of myself as a wretch - a wretch who requires being saved. Who me? A wretch? How can that be helpful to my self-esteem?
Lately I've seen a pattern of people deciding what they "identify" as.
When we don't like what and who we are in our basic form, we have learned to reject it. We don't allow ourselves to assume that identity.
So what if I decide to choose to not identify as a "wretch" - I could.
I would prefer to identify myself as a basically nice person who has some less-than-stellar secret weaknesses. I could identify as a nice but slightly weak person.
Or how about I identify as a good person? I could identify as a good person - most of the time.
As long as I don't really understand - or refuse to accept and acknowledge - how wretchedly UNHOLY I am before a HOLY GOD... as long as I don't acknowledge that in my natural state I am inclined to UNHOLINESS and SIN - and - that although God is longsuffering I should not interpret His longsuffering as His compromise or overlooking me and my wretched unholiness.
When I identify as the wretch I am -I discover the amazing truth -
And God poured His accepting love in to a wretch like me.
And turned a wretch like me in to -
A priest in the Holy Kingdom of The Holy God.
Daughter of the Ancient of Days.
A soldier in the Army of The Lord
Perfect.
Loved.
Accepted.
A gift.
Amazing.
Grace.
Given to wretches.
Only to wretches.
Saturday, January 26, 2019
REQUIEM FOR THE CAMEL
And then, badda boom badda bing - his back breaks???
What's up with that?
"Why didn't you say something?" they ask the camel.
The camel is too exhausted to answer or explain.
"Why didn't you notice?" is what he is too tired to say.
"Who's going to carry the straw the camel has been carrying for me every day for as long as I can remember?"
They get kind of peeved at the camel for having limits.
But I think that every single mom, working mom, widow reading this understands completely.
I think every overworked and underappreciated pastor comprehends fully that devoted backs can only take so much burden and complaining before something inside them breaks - no matter how much they love the Lord and His people.
Sometimes, like the camel.. and without warning, we wake up one day, and -
And we lay down and wait to die under the weight of what we used to be able to carry without a problem.
Dear exhausted one..Jesus cares about your tired soul.
You don't have to lay down and die, but rise up and live with His help and power.
"Come to Me, all you who are burdened and heavy laden and I WILL GIVE YOU REST."
He carries your burden.
FOR YOU
and
WITH YOU
He promises.
He will.
He does.
He has.
Jesus will come to you and help you carry that burden.
Today.
Tomorrow.
Forever.
People are not faithful, but Jesus is.
Friday, January 25, 2019
I AM NOT GOD
Sometimes I act like I think I am.
When problems come because of people,
I assume I am right and they are wrong.
But only God is always right.
And
I am not God.
I am not God.
He doesn't keep a list of my mistakes.
Or the many awful sins I have asked Him to forgive.
And yet - if I were honest -
I still have lists with names of people who have hurt me.
Thinking I'm entitled to.
But Holy God, who has the right to hold my sin against me, has mercy on my broken, humble heart.
And when my mercy and compassion reach a limit,
and I will not forgive those who ask me to
The Holy Spirit rushes in and He reminds me
Only God can hold someone's sins against them,
And I remember, once again,
I am not God.
And neither are you.