You have been told, O man, what is good, and what the Lord requires of you: Only to do the right and to love goodness and to walk humbly with our God. Micah 6:8

Well then, there you have it!  The Prophet Micah summed it all up in one brief verse of Scripture!  Do the right thing, love things that are good and walk humbly with God. So  I’m wondering; if it’s that simple how do I manage to mess it up so often?  I think the place where I get all snarled up is trying to make things more complicated than they need to be.  I can be the “Queen of Overthinking” and it just leads me farther away from the honest, simple root of my purpose…anybody with me there? (I am seriously hoping there are readers out there nodding their head in agreement!)

Let’s see if I can back up the truck and do a better job with these three simple expectations. Step one: “do the right”.  I guess I should ask myself, the “right” for whom? More often than I probably even recognize, I’m interested in doing what’s “right” for me!  I have a tendency to do “Christian good” when it’s convenient for me.   I’m good at helping and praying and doing nice things when it fits in the schedule but what about when I really have to go out of my way to do good?  I also have to stop and ask myself about how many times I don’t “do right”.  What if I know there is a conversation going on that I should keep my nose out of but I just have to listen in anyway, what do I do if the talk turns into gossip, how do I “do right” and get out of that conversation?  I suppose this simple directive should keep me out of those conversations in the first place.

Step two:  “Love goodness” I don’t think Micah was simply referring to lovely flowers and other good things found in creation.  I think he was challenging us to something bigger.  Here’s the deal with loving goodness…it isn’t always fashionable, popular or common.  Loving goodness requires us to love without judgment.   It means we look for the good and Christ like even in people who look very different than us. We can be pretty narrow in our description of what is “normal” in this society and turn a squinty eye at things that diverge from that vision. I believe the greatest sound and sight EVER is a child!  They are the ultimate “Good” created by God.  Not long ago I was visiting with a family who was joyfully announcing the upcoming birth of their 7th child and I was so excited for them and honored to share in their joy.  That baby will be the most loved child on the planet!  As I walked away from the family I overheard two women speaking critically about them and one woman said, “How do they think they are ever going to give that many children what they need?  She doesn't even work so they are doomed to a life of hand-me-downs and Wal-Mart shoes.” I wanted to speak but the tears stung in my eyes and my heart hurt so bad I couldn’t even talk. if I had that moment to re-live I would ask when Nike’s and designer clothes became more important in forming Children of God than the overflowing love of a family. Loving goodness means having great compassion and respect for EVERYTHING God created and doing everything in our power to defend it without casting worldly judgments.

 Step three:  “Walk humbly with our God” The real trick with this one is to realize we can’t be in charge!  It really should read, “Walk humbly BEHIND God.”  We might do a better job if we remembered we can’t be first in our Christian walk, God Himself must occupy that spot.  Walking humbly means coming to terms with the fact that we are NOTHING without HIM and the more we give Him credit for, the more He blesses us.  God doesn’t need our approval or our praise in order to build Him up and support His ego or self-esteem…He needs praise and adoration from us so we can practice humility and submission to His will for our lives.

A Seed To Plant:  Pick one of the three ideas from this reading from Micah and put it to work this week.  Ask the Holy Spirit to help you choose the one your soul needs most!​

 Blessings on your day!

​

​What your hands provide you will enjoy; you will be blessed and prosper.  Psalm 128:2

Growing up we always had a gigantic garden.  The garden was the work of the summer.  There was always something to do, planting, weeding, picking or preserving.  My mom canned and froze enough produce for the whole year; green beans, carrots, potatoes, corn, tomatoes, peas and beets.  It was a complete drag during the middle of the summer when it was 100 degrees and my brothers and I were sitting in the back yard shucking corn for hours but fresh sweet corn in January made it all worth it.  I can’t begin to count the times my folks reminded me of that while they handed me another bucket of green beans to snap. It isn’t always easy to see the blessing that comes with the investment at the time.  All these years later, I still plant a garden and can tomatoes.  True, I can get a can on sale for less than a dollar but it just isn’t the same.  The problem is, by the time spring finally comes in Michigan and I get to a point with the end of the school year chaos and I finally get them planted its always September before they are ready to pick and can.

This is a particularly busy time of year with speaking and school but I came home Wednesday to a basket of tomatoes staring me down.  I knew they had to be canned or they would spoil and even though I had a dozen other things to do, I reminded myself how good they would taste in chili and soup when the snow was flying so I got to it, but not without plenty of eye rolling and muttering under my breath, “really…now…I have to do this now?  Why can’t they be ready before school starts, that would be much more convenient!  As I stood at the kitchen sink washing jars and peeling tomatoes, I asked myself why I even bother at all. But as I sit here typing, drinking a cup of coffee, I hear the canner bubbling and the soft clink of the seals setting on the jars fresh from the canner and I realize how satisfying it is and how connected I feel to my mom when I do what she did.  It’s worth it, but it always takes me a while to remember that.

If I’m being honest, canning tomatoes is a little like my faith life.  I love the end result, but more often than I should, I grumble about the effort and the time it takes.  I want the relationship and the grace but I don’t always want to invest the time necessary.  I want to head to the pantry in January and grab what I need but it takes effort to make sure it will be there when I need it.  Sometimes my prayer life is like that.  I cry out to God with my list of wants and needs and I just expect to grab what I need.  I take his mercy and his goodness for granted way too often.  It will be a sad day when I go to the pantry and there are no more tomatoes but it would be an unfathomably devastating day if I went to the Lord and he wasn’t there.  I very well may run out of tomatoes but I can breathe a sigh of relief to know as long as I run to the Father and truly seek him, his grace and compassion will never run dry.  Out of all the things I needed to do besides can tomatoes, I had to make the tomatoes a priority.  I wonder how much better my attitude and perspective would be if I remembered to put the Father and his plan as my top priority every day. Timing is important.  No matter how hard I wish, I can't make those tomatoes ripe any sooner.  Patience is such a key and these tomatoes are a reminder to trust in Gods timing is perfect. As I sit back and admire the jars of warm tomatoes all lined up on my counter, I’m pretty sure there are many times the Father lines the events of my days up in perfect order and I don’t even notice it or thank him for it.  Funny how much you can learn from putting tomatoes in a jar!

A Seed To Plant:  Make a list of three things you can do this week to invest in your relationship with the Father. Say a prayer of thanksgiving for someone who taught you something important.

Blessings on your day!