Quite Time Notes – June 5, 2018 —
As I do my Bible Study I find that I need to go back and re-read what I had just read 30 seconds before… to ‘get it’. Right now, I’m doing a study on line with a few friends, and find it particularly hard, as I can’t highlight and make notes all over the margins as I do when I have a book. But even without my paper crutch, today’s message has a deep stabilizing strength for me to stand on.
In 1 Corinthians 1, Paul writes that we are part of this incredible fellowship in Christ, by Grace alone. We are not here because we are the smarter ones or the leaned few, quite the opposite. We are blessed, only because He picked us up out of this world – and plopped us into His throne room! We have access to the Divine – because He choose us. He knew before the beginning of time – who, what, where, when and how … for every person on this planet! He knew what their lives would look like, how they would behave, and who would accept His gift of salvation. He knows each of us and loves us.
But sometimes we don’t like the other people sitting across the room from us…they bug us.
Yet, Paul shares the biggest ‘secret’ in eternity – The Holy Spirit knows each person’s heart, and He loves them as much as He loves us. He likes them, even if we don’t. And He seals us all together with Himself! With all our individual preferences and differences, we’re like a crazy quilt of colors and attitudes. Live is beautiful when you appreciate how unique each person is! I think that is how He looks at us, each person beautiful by ourselves, but more wonderful when stitched together with other unique people….and the more different each person is, the more beautiful the outcome.
So, my ‘takeaway’ is this: Let the Holy Spirit lock me in life with all kinds of wonderful – yet sometimes prickly people. He chooses each of us, with all our different opinions and moods. He knows our hearts, and His wisdom of who needs to sit across the table from each other is greater than our best thoughts as to whom we should work and live. TRUST HIM, He can make something beautiful out of the broken and torn pieces of our lives. A crazy quilt is only beautiful because it is made up of so many unique and colorful pieces. Wrap yourself in unique friendships, your life will be warmed and enriched.
This message is perfect! I tend to want to hang around people who are “the same” as me and I sometimes get impatient or even a little disappointed when these people don’t meet the expectations I have. Hello!!! Who am I to even think this way?? It’s really odd and writing it down here makes it even more ridiculous to me that I would act this way. Thank you for your quilt analogy and how God takes all the broken and different pieces to make something beautiful. This visual is what I will use when my attitude needs an adjustment 🙂
Thank you so much for your thoughtful comment Mary. Perhaps a bit like velcro, we need both the soft and the prickly in life to make things connect.
Some days I’m soft, some days I’m prickly…. ouch.
Sandy